Everything that happened to us in our infancy, every touch received, every reaction we felt to our sexuality, is remembered in our subconscious minds. We have stored these memories of our first touch, bonding with our mothers and fathers, feeding, toilet training, holding, and nurturing, to be triggered off as results when we create intimate experiences with our partners.
The Birthing Experience
How people react at our birth affects how we feel about our sexuality. If the baby feels disappointment, or anything other than complete joy around its sexuality, as it grows up the child could become sexually confused. At birth, a baby is vulnerable and naked, and has never before been touched by human hands. If the touching is rough, or if the baby is treated as an object when she/he is cleaned or touched, she/he may decide touching doesn't feel good, or it hurts. How a baby is touched is an important factor in how it will like to be touched sexually as an adult.
If the baby's cord is cut too quickly or roughly, the baby may decide breathing is painful. These babies may unconsciously hold their breath whenever they are in a new or fearful situation. Often people hold their breath when having sex. Sex is really enhanced when people let go of fear and breathe. The more we breathe, the more pleasure there is in sex. This pattern of holding one's breath start right at birth with the cutting of the cord.
Sex brings up birth issues and vulnerability. The bonding period between mother, father and baby is also an important time. This is when the choice is made between feeling separate or feeling connected to other human beings.
Infant Feeding And Sex
In the past, babies were only brought to their mothers at feeding time. Then they would be separates from their mother and taken back to the nursery. Because of this, these babies learned that they had to wait for food, pleasure and affection; and after they received it, they had to separate As these babies grew older and established relationships, they could only feel connected during sex, and then abruptly became separate. (The old one-night-stand syndrome.)
Interestingly enough, men who were not nursed may have an obsession with big-breasted women. The men I have interviewed who were not breastfed often admit they are attracted to, and obsessed with, thoughts of being with big-breasted women. If they have sex with women with small breasts they are disappointed, and feel they can't have what they want. The obsession with big breasts occurs because, to an infant, the mother's breast looks really big! The breastfed man is usually turned on to breasts, but he is also turned on to women's faces, legs, and other parts of the feminine body. The obsession with big breasts just doesn't seem to be there for men who were satisfied as babies by being breastfed.
Whether an infant was fed on demand or on a schedule is important in future decisions it may make about affection. For example, a person who was fed on demand may appear too demanding about wanting sex, love, or affection. Whereas, their partner, who was schedule-fed, feels one must wait to receive what you want. This dynamic can create struggle and upset, because these two people are out of sync in their timing and decisions about life.
Birthing, Sex and You
It's amazing that we have so much going on in the first two years of our lives that we don't consciously remember. These first two years are very important conditioning years for our sexuality and sensuality. These decisions are about being a sexual being; experiencing pleasure; feeling that pleasure is innocent; receiving what you want, how and when you want it; being touched and how that feels; feeling safe and connected to another human being.
When interviewing people about whether their parents were affectionate in front of the children, I found a direct correlation between this, and whether or not the same people felt comfortable showing affection in public. The adults who had never seen their parents acting affectionately toward each other when they were growing up, said they had a hard time being affectionate in public.
Just like birth, sex is a very vulnerable time, with lots of holding, touching, kissing and connecting. How much you were touched, tickled, and played with as an infant would also influence how you feel about being touched and being affectionate. Some people have so much fear and embarrassment about sexuality, that they are afraid to show affection or receive affection from their partners in public.
Begin to activate and stimulate your mind to remembering your infancy, and what decisions you made. If you don't like the decisions you made in infancy, and thus the results you have in your life, you can choose out of them, and make other choices.
This article was excerpted from:
Sexual Evolution
by Rhonda Levand.
The above was excerpted with permission from, "Sexual Evolution" by Rhonda Levand, ?1991, published by Celestial Arts. Rhonda can be reached at: 3770 Greenview Drive, Marietta, GA.
About The Author
Rhonda Levand holds a masters degree in child psychology from California State University, is a licensed rebirther and manager of the Loving Relations Training in the Atlanta area.
Another article by this author.
