“Why can’t I have sex? I’m a young, healthy woman, right? At first I thought I should just persevere, then maybe I wasn’t in love enough. Deep down I knew better.

Inserting a tampon never worked. I was always the only one of my friends who came out with sanitary pads. Even the thinnest tampons looked like thick cactus, and my finger seemed to be the enemy in those parts.”

“I was single for a long time, and when I dated someone it didn’t last more than about three months. I was avoiding intimacy, sleeping together and everything you would expect in a normal relationship. Until I met Bert Jan over dinner. From mutual friends we were sitting next to each other at the table, ‘the sad singles curve’, he joked, but in the end it turned out that we were not sad at all.

We cried, even though I had just met him. Bert Jean is a very funny and very nice guy. Not a lover chaser, but just someone who wants to have a good time. I felt that way too, so a week later I invited him for a walk in Busbank.”

‘What do you want?’

“We have now completed over a hundred outings, because we go out practically every week. We have had a great time together, partly due to Bert-Jan’s eternal patience. Although that may not be the right word. It is peace. I feel that nothing is necessary and everything is fine.”

“We cuddle a lot and he gets really excited regularly, but I don’t want anything to do with him. At first I didn’t want to deprive him, because past experiences had made me think that men always want sex. So I made sure he enjoyed it and then we could sleep. ‘What are you doing?’ he asked and that weird formula was so liberating for me and I told him that touching my legs didn’t feel good and his response was, ‘What do you like?’ Comfort.”

Relaxation practice

“He still leaves the control to me. We’ve tried the missionary position, several times, on my initiative. I really want it to work. To feel what it’s like, but also because I have the option of having children, I want to keep it open. .

Vaginal spasm Sometimes it’s permanent, sometimes it’s not. It’s a kind of spasm in the pelvic area, which in many cases is caused by a traumatic experience. I don’t have that memory, but I have the spasm. I’m now trying to relax my pelvic area with pelvic floor physical exercises. On her advice, I’m also now practicing with some kind of soft rod to see if insertion is successful.”

“Bert Jean supports me, even though I do this part alone. If I just look at myself, I will completely reject sex and just cuddle. That seems loving and intimate to me.

“Bert Jan says it’s okay, that we can do other things too and that forcing him isn’t really necessary. But the fear that he’ll run off with someone else at some point is a huge fear.”

No steamy sex

“I can’t give him what he wants, no exciting sex and maybe no child. And of course, we also share a love of hiking in nature, we can laugh like crazy together and I have unconditional love and loyalty for him. That’s there too.”

But the idea that he has to make concessions to me sometimes bothers me. He sees it right away when I start to feel anxious again. “Can we agree that I discuss what I feel and think for myself?” he says. It helps that we can talk about everything lightly. Still.”

Preferably a child too.

“I want to give Bert-Jan everything I have. My heart, my time, and preferably a child. I know why I do it and that’s why I continue to practice. Fortunately, I already received a guarantee of a planned caesarean section from my gynecologist, if not, we will stay together, we work well together.

The name Sien was fictitious. Her real name was known to the editors.

Wanted: Love Lessons

For the RTL News Lifestyle Love Lessons section, we are looking for beautiful, vulnerable, funny, inspiring and honest love lessons. An insight, a moment of reflection. Preferably with your hand in your lap. In the end, did you turn out to be the one who was afraid of commitment? Should you never have emigrated for love or was the blended family just an illusion after all? Journalist Hanneke Megnester would like to ask you about this. You can say anonymously. Email to: [email protected].