ITCH

August 24th, 2025

Intimacy is a skill - something I'm realizing today. 

A skill I am very poorly versed at, and I deeply resent that fact.

I came to the realization today that I don’t have the knowledge or understanding of men to connect with them in any real way. Perhaps that’s why I haven’t traditionally expected much from them. I don’t feel safe around most men, I question their motives a lot, and even when they’re seemingly unthreatening, I am always waiting for the other shoe to drop, and for them to show me even a glimpse of their hand so I can flee. It always just feels like a given; never a matter of if, but always a when. 

Is this worldview conducive to my desires at having a real and stable romantic and erotic life? Not at all.

I keep thinking about that video I saw on my favorite artist. How much I relate to him, because our desires seem poorly aligned with our behavior, and attempts at correcting it hardly ever yields any results. In fact, the attempts at self-correcting often leaves us traumatized and in a worse spot than we started at. I thought about how their persona was nearly antithetical to their baseline needs. We desire closeness, yearn to be heard, to be seen, understood - the only way we know how to be is by remaining distant (sometimes by seeking closeness with the wrong people just to remain unavailable but occupied), by suppressing our true feelings, hiding from others (even in plain sight), and selling ourselves out because it's easier than to demand to  be understood.

I’m thinking about relationships more than usual lately, and I don’t know why. It seems rather unfulfilling to yearn for connection, and the output just be more rejection.

I’m really bummed about how things went down between [redacted] and I. Seems unbelievably unfair, and I think I take it so hard because it’s rare for me to connect with anyone like that. Ketu's in my 5H (from my moon) and so that purification seems to be hitting me. 

I find myself craving sex, but I know deep down that's just the itch, and not the need. I keep thinking back to the guy I met back in Chicago. How pure, and kind, and soft he was (seemed). The cynic in me wonders if it was a farce, if he was underneath it a rotten misogynist trying to lure me in to take advantage of me. I think my naivete with men manifests as catastrophizing over anything else. I assume the worst and run away for security. 

Anyway, back to that itch. It feels like I can't connect to men otherwise, I know that I am sexually attracted to a masculine appearance/presence, and I know it at least feels a little good (albeit terrifying) to be received well by them on the basis of my appearance. Knowing this, it doesn't even feel like I'm connecting with the man in such instances - it feels like I'm scratching my itch. Like they're crediting into a very overdraft account of low self-worth and insecurity, and at best I'm back at zero by the end of the interaction, but a zero is still a zero. It's not enough to buy anything, but it does feel good for a bit. 

Like yesterday, I think I just wanted to be held without saying anything. Since that wasn't available, I felt insatiable and blamed it on some hormonal shifts and the fact that I walked 6 miles. 

I guess intimacy has a compounding effect - meaning it takes some time to see its effects. Doing vulnerable things (expressing interest, sharing my feelings, etc.) all feel terrible in the moment. I want to throw up every time I reveal something close to my chest, and yet I've experienced deep intimacy before, and when it goes right, when you're not deserted or humiliated on account of your weaknesses - it feels quite wholesome. 

You have a deep-seated well of acceptance that collects at the bottom of you that says:

I might be strange, sometimes off-putting, and I may not be remarkable in any arena, but the fact that XYZ thinks I'm alright enough to stick around must indeed mean that I am alright. 

I just miss that feeling. I remember the very first and very imperfect connection I shared with a man, who was by all accounts a very troubled person - and yet, he made me feel as though I was just right. I longed to feel right when up to that point, I had always felt wrong. I loved the feeling he gave me, and at the same time feared it. He was fairly honest, but I was very cognizant of the fact that we were on shaky grounds to begin with, and any forming cracks underneath could be the end of it all. I wanted to brace myself, so I never disrobed fully.

I gave a glimpse here, glimpse there halfway hoping he would leave, but he lapped it up and wanted more. 

That confused and intrigued me and honestly still does. I don't know that I miss him at all, and I reflect back on that and cringe at how inappropriate that connection was, but it showed me that I need to disrobe with the right people, because it adds to the quality of life I want to live.  

- vetiveroil