 Hi everybody and welcome back to our blog from the Kamasutra to 2020, where we talk about your questions, your concerns, even your worries around all things to do with sex and sexuality. So as always, we have with us today, Dr. Anvita Madan-Bihel. Anvita is a psychosexual therapist and she brings the clinical and psychological perspective to the advice that the Kamasutra has to give. Welcome Anvita. Thank you Seema and welcome everyone to our blog this week. So for our viewers at home, who may not really know what we're talking about when we mentioned the word sexual nostalgia. Sexual nostalgia is literally the term used for memories of intimacy, memories of a sexual relationship which you take forward into your life. So either if the relationship, that previous one is finished and you've moved on to another one or if you're single now or whatever. It's just that memories of the intimacy that you carry forward. And the thing is that these memories of your intimacy actually impact you hugely. I mean, they're very powerful memories because if your relationship was very good, then that's what you take forward. If it was traumatic, then that's what you take forward. And that will impact all your future relationships. And interestingly, as one of the people who'd written into us had said, this is the one thing that nobody ever deals with after a relationship is broken. So you go to a therapist, you go to a counselor, they will talk about everything that impacts your finances, to impacts your security, to everything else. But we never ever discuss the idea of sexual nostalgia because Anvita, as we know, this is always the taboo subject, isn't it? And I think what happens is that what we underestimate is that there are other relationships that can compensate for losing a relationship. You can find a solution to loneliness or talking to someone or going out for a movie with someone or a party. But what you can't replace is a romantic sexual relationship. And we really underestimate the value of it because once again, sex, we are not supposed to need sex, have fun with sex, have pleasure with sex. So why would we miss sex, right? So that is something that is very easily overlooked. And like you said, it really does trouble people. It really does. And interestingly, we've also had a lot of people saying, we don't understand, why have you called the blog from the Kamasutra to 2020? And I keep explaining to people, well, it's all about how the same things carry forward. Relationships, desires, arousal, wants, et cetera. None of that has changed. It never will because we're all human beings. And interestingly, the Kamasutra says that memory is the most powerful aspect of any intimate relationship, of any kind of intimacy. As a matter of fact, Kamdev, the God of Love and Desire, another name for him is Smara, memory. Because memory of things that have gone on before this moment can either bring you huge joy or complete trauma. And most of the time it's associated with pain and trauma, strangely enough. So let's actually start with, I have a few questions over here from people. They're fairly similar, but with a little bit of a difference. Let's actually begin with this idea of the sexual nostalgia leading to a great deal of obsession and trauma. The first person who wrote in to me said that it's the one thing that's never been addressed after her last breakup. And she's actually finds that she's become obsessed with the idea of her past relationship with this sexual nostalgia. And she's now not being able to get past it. So obviously it's scary when we hear the word obsessed and what that looks like. But what I would, and so I don't know how she's defining it. But I think we need to remember that good memories, like you said, about the good memories with calm and data and everything. Those are our pool of fantasies. We, when we want to feel aroused, we go to those memories, those days when we have an amazing sexual experience and we go back to them and we say, oh, this is definitely going to give me arousal because I have such an amazing night, day, sexual experience that day. So in some ways, if you are somebody who is connected to your sexuality and are secure about your sexuality, they don't feel bad that you're accessing those memories. It just means that those were pleasurable moments. They were beautiful moments that you went to. So in this case, sorry, carry on. No, ask what you were saying. I just wanted to say that it's not a bad thing if you're connecting to the fantasy. I was actually going to say that in this case, for instance, she's single and she feels that she's actually obsessing over this idea of sexual nostalgia. Is there something that you can advise her with to be able to use these memories in a more positive way? Because I know that we've often said that even sort of pleasuring yourself to a past memory or to something is good. So is there something that you would recommend? So I think that she needs to separate the relationship from a sexual memory because in some ways, a sexual memory is kind of like a trigger. It is something that is a trigger that gives us arousal. It doesn't want be complicated sometimes with everything right or wrong that happened in the relationship. And then we feel guilty that that person was horrible but we're still feeling aroused by their memory and how can we be like this and is there something wrong with me or I'm no self-esteem? And all of those things complicate the matter. When you look at it as your sexual desire, whatever that partner sexually did to you or you had in that relationship, gave you arousals. If you stick to that, don't attach it to all the relationship issues that happened there. I think then you will feel better about it rather than feeling like guilty about it in many ways. And I guess it's okay to, I mean, I know that you said obsession is a scary word and maybe she doesn't know how to deal with it and maybe that's why she's using the word obsession. But basically you're saying that it's also okay to have that part of memories to dip into till you find another form of stabilizing that particular aspect of your life. So I think that all of us have memories or we rely on moments of feeling good or proud within our lifetime, right? And when we are going through a difficult time, we dip into those moments and say, oh, if I'm thinking the worst of myself, I have that spot. I remember like if I'm thinking, oh, I'm obsessing about this sexually or I'm bad sexually or something, I can dip into saying no, actually I had a great sexual relationship. There was everything fine with me. So sometimes we just dip into those points. It becomes our toolkit to access. We need a pot, a well of resources that we can dip into to help us cope with new crises or new difficulties. And that's where we need to go. So don't feel guilty that you have those. Those are yours. They're not connected to other people or other relationship. Those are your positive moments. You know, I actually refer to this as a life hack. I always say that you've got to have this part of memories that you can daydream from or even if it's not memories, even if it's things that haven't happened. But to me, that whole idea of using a part of memories to daydream with is just the best thing that you can do to yourself. Yeah, and you know, and it doesn't, nobody has control over them because they're yours. You know, they're your dreams or your memories and polluting them with what if, how and all, and actually that complicates the matter. Keep it simple. It's your memory, they're beautiful memories. You know, you remember people and relationships through beautiful memories. And sometimes it doesn't help to remember the negative ones. So just stick to that. Which brings me very cleverly to the next point. There's a bunch of people who've also written in saying that their sexual nostalgia, even though the word nostalgia generally is associated with beautiful positive memories, but their sexual experiences in the past relationship was so bad that it's now impacting the next relationship because they find that they cannot actually go back into the sexual act because their memories of their previous one was so bad. What would you give in the way of advice for that? Yeah, so one of the things that I'm gonna start with, because I know we're gonna do a video around abuse and sexuality coming very soon, I am going to address this question based on that they were bad sexual experiences and something went a miss sexually and that they were not abusive. They're gonna do a separate video on that. So if you have a negative sexual experience, be very careful about that because what we have seen happens is that it has an impact on us. And then the second time that we're getting involved in the relationship, the fear of things going wrong, the fear that you're going to repeat that experience is so high that we start like obsessing about, oh, will I be able to do it? Will I won't I be able to do it? Will I have arousal? Will I get an erection? Would I be able to penetrate? Like all those things really trouble our mind. But what happens in that moment is what we call spectatory. We are looking upon the sexual experience rather than being present in it. We're not present. We're not connected. If you're not connected, sexual arousal chemistry will not happen. And in some ways you're giving birth to another bad sexual experience. And as you can see, we've started the vicious circle and what was just one of those crazy odd days that things didn't work out now becomes your firm belief that I'm bad at sex or I don't have arousal or I can't get an erection. So it becomes your firm belief. So be very careful, seek help, talk about it even if it's with friends. Don't let one experience define your sexuality in some ways. I think that's absolutely the best advice that I have heard in a very long time. We talk about this in everything else. We say mindfulness. That's the buzzword these days, isn't it? In the world of psychology, in the world of everyday life mindful breathing, mindful cooking, mindful everything but darned if anybody would ever use it for mindful sex. And yet it's so simple that we have had really, people have generally had bad experiences in sex at some point in their life or other. But for some people their entire relationship might have been a really bad sexual experience for a number of different reasons. It could be that the partner was not good that there was not enough arousal, there wasn't enough attraction, whatever the reason might be. When we go into the next relationship we bring all that baggage with us. And like you said, we're actually standing back and watching ourselves. And I think that for everybody out there listening I really want you to take this point on board because you know what, changing the way that you think we might say, people might come to you and say, you must learn to deal with it, must learn to put that out of your mind, you must learn to forget about this is a new day, this is a new life. It's not easy to change the mind, it's not easy to change the way that you think. And things that have, you know, ideas and conceptions that have sunk into your brain you can't shift them, it's not easy to shift them. So the only way to work around this is to actually deal with it, to understand how to actually, how to actually bypass this preconception rather than trying to shift it or move it out of your head altogether. And as Anvita says, just for that time being almost treated like a form of meditation, become present, say, okay, nevermind what things were in the past, they were all bad anyway but how about I actually just be part of what I'm doing almost like you're meditating. And if it helps, Anvita, do you think maybe they should try and do some meditation just before? So we highly recommend mindfulness actually. So you mentioned, so mindfulness has become a really important element within a psychosexual work because it is really like you said about being in the present, you know, this is a new relationship, it's a new connection, what didn't work in the past, this is a new partner, it's not true that it'll happen again here but the more you're in the present, the more you're connecting with your partner, things will flow automatically. You will feel aroused, there will be a flow, you will create a connection. That connection so many times gets broken because then we start worrying, the fears and anxiety take over and the connection gets broken. And the best way to keep fears and anxiety obey is like you said, to be in the sum food, mindful, present, meditative space with your partner. And actually a positive experience can go a long way in breaking the cycle. So if you can really practice being in the moment and you can start by saying, for the first for a minute I will be present, then for two minutes and the five minutes, the same way we do with meditation, we meditate for one, 10 and then we are able to meditate for an hour, right? So the same strategy goes here as well. I think that's just absolutely brilliant advice. I think that what we are saying between us is that one is we never ever talk about sexual nostalgia. It's a very real thing and you would be amazed at how much it impacts your mind and how much it drives forward your future relationships and almost every other aspect of your life is impacted by that. So first of all, become aware of your sexual memories. Just actually start to become aware of how you think of it, what they mean to you and how they actually define your behavior in certain aspects of your life. So first thing, become aware. Secondly, if you feel that your relationship has broken up and you are obsessing over this one aspect of your life we totally understand you're missing it, you're thinking about it, you're thinking about all the good times that you had. But more importantly, there was just that closeness, that intimacy is not just about sex, it's also about the desire, the arousal, the good feeling it gives you and the fact that you had physical closeness with somebody. Don't look at it as an obsession, work through it, actually allow that to come into your mind, let it be part of your positive memories and gradually that will then come to a slightly more calming level. Don't try and push it out of your head, don't feel that there's something wrong with you when you feel like that. Take it on board, accept it, give it permission to happen and gradually it will find its own balance. And finally, if the smut at the memory, the nostalgia was a negative one, as Anvita says, be present, the only way of removing that fear because you can't remove the memory, removing the fear is to be present in the moment so that you're actually doing something rather than watching yourself do something which is being impacted with something that happened in the past. Have I left anything out on with that? No, I think you covered everything. Brilliant, so as always, like, comment, subscribe on the video. If you have any questions, we're here on info.seema.anand at gmail.com and if you need any direct clinical advice, please do get in touch with Anvita at anvita madanbehel.com and we will see you here next week with another question. See you next week.