Category: Personal (Page 14 of 14)

ILB’s personal posts

Hold it back: mental health confusion

August 6, 2020 / Innocent Loverboy / 2 Comments

For the past month or so, I feel like I have been holding back the tears. Sometimes it seems as if the floodgates may be able to break and I’ll let it all out – collapsing as I do into a screaming, crying heap. Maybe on the bed, or on the sofa. For dramatic effect, maybe on the floor, since it’s recently been hoovered. Who knows?

Silly, really, because I don’t really have anything to cry about. My mental health has never been the greatest, but I’m not particularly sad about anything, or going through anything tough or have any major worries. I’ve even been okay throughout the pandemic, keeping myself safe while I do the shopping, et ceteri; I have, today, a pressure headache, but that’s about it. Paracetamol is helping there.

I do, however, feel as if there is something desperately wrong – something I’m not aware of. My girlfriend is in a constant state of agitation (she has been made redundant and has no idea how to make herself more employable), and tells me all the time about how sad she is, and part of me is wondering why I’m not equally as worried or sad. I can’t really bring anything up, because it doesn’t really compare, but then I don’t have anything to bring up, so wouldn’t be able to anyway.

Most of my problems are memories from my past. Yes, memories can be helpful; there are some wonderful, special ones and they’re a fantastic source of content. Then again, I have some very bad ones too, and they’re the ones that stick. They come to me when I lie in bed unable to sleep, and niggle at every inch of my brain. They’re very difficult to explain, and more so to visualise, so there’s not much I can say about them. But they are there.

Everything seems better in the morning (apart from today, where – as I said – I had a tension headache). I rarely get up in time for breakfast these days, but I can throw some clothes on and have some coffee, and that seems okay. Sometimes – most of the time – it seems like I am doing, if not fantastically well, reasonably so, given the circumstances.

But, in my quiet moments, I sometimes get the twinge. My eyes well up, and I feel my breath hitch in my throat. I sniff a little. Maybe, I think, maybe I am about to cry. I don’t know what about, really. Maybe it’s all too much, but then again, what is it?

Perhaps it’s true that, despite having the patience of a saint, I can’t really cope. But I’d very much like to know what it is I’m not coping with.

It doesn’t make it any better. But it makes it easier.

One more confession…

July 18, 2020 / Innocent Loverboy / 0 Comments

Dear ex,

I need to clarify something. I know you’re probably never going to read this; you dumped me just under a decade ago and I’m not even sure if you know I still write my blog (although I know what you’re doing). But there’s one thing I never told you, and it still comes to me in my darkest of moments, so here goes.

The night my grandfather died I got a text to tell me it had happened. I still don’t know why I had turned on my BlackBerry, really – it had been off for a few days and I didn’t really want any distractions – but nevertheless, I turned it on, and there was the message from my mother. We all knew he was dying – he was in hospital, watching the Olympics and waiting for it to happen. He squeezed my hand the last time I saw him.

I don’t think you ever met him, but you would have liked him. He was the 83-year-old who saw the sign on Space Mountain advising elderly people not to ride it and saying out loud, “right, I’m doing that.” He was in the third wave on D-Day and assumed that he could survive anything after that.

I could have cried that night, but I didn’t. You were angry with me – very angry. We had had a slight mishap (involving orgasms, in fact) that necessitated the changing of sheets. I explained, calmly I hope, that this was easy – we could take the sheet off, rinse the stain out, and hang it up to dry in the balmy Provence heat – but you told me that I was being passive-aggressive (a concept I still don’t understand). I got the spare bedding down and added the new sheet. After we hung the damp sheet up outside, we went back to bed and you threatened to slap me.

You didn’t actually slap me, but I felt you could have.

As I lay there shaken, I wondered over and over if I should have told you that he died. If I did, you might have assumed I was trying to deflect, or ignore the (admittedly very trivial) problem that had prevented itself (and that we had managed to correct, I hasten to add). You clearly didn’t want to hear me say anything, and if I had cried, you’d have assumed I was trying to get sympathy. Maybe you would have slapped me. I don’t know any more.

So I didn’t say anything. I held back the tears, and lay awake, wanting more than ever to get to sleep so it could be morning and you would have calmed down.

I hadn’t done anything wrong.

The next day, as we sat at an open-air café in the village, you decided to have a look at your ‘phone and told me that you had a text from my mother, since I hadn’t replied to hers, telling me that he had died. I acted shocked, went still for a while, and let a few tears out while you squeezed my hand sympathetically.

“I’m sorry,” you said.
“Well, thank you. I knew it was going to happen; it was just a matter of when…” I started.

The thing is that, well, I knew it had happened. I found out the night before, but I was far too scared to act sad or shocked or morose or… anything other than calm and rational, really… because I feared your reaction. I didn’t want to trivialise the old man’s death, either; this was a massive thing. But we were on holiday (for the first time as a couple). We were meant to be having lots of sex, and we probably would have done, had the sheets not been stained.

So I didn’t tell you I already knew. I kept that to myself; it was all I could have done in the circumstances. We went to the cathedral in Avignon the following day and I lit a candle for him under a picture of St Joseph, saying a prayer and watching the light dance.

I’m sorry for not telling you sooner. I could have told you that morning, maybe, over breakfast – the sad news might have been better over croissants still warm from the boulangerie. Or maybe when we were washing up afterwards, or taking showers, or sitting on the swing in the garden. Any of those times. But I couldn’t come up with a viable explanation for why I hadn’t told you when I actually found out.

So I didn’t say anything.

And I didn’t say anything, either, for the next one-and-a-half years of our relationship. I didn’t tell you when it ended, either, and I still haven’t told you until now, when I’m telling you in the knowledge that you probably won’t read this. You may remember me going to the funeral a week or so later, after surprising you by staying in Oxford for a day longer than I was going to. You may remember spending Christmas together and how I cried because I missed my little church so much. You may – I know I do – remember all the good times we had in Provence, even if we had better holidays later on.

But I didn’t tell you that I knew. I’m sorry that I didn’t tell you sooner. And I’m sorry to my grandfather, posthumously, for keeping his death a secret. But, in all honesty, I really don’t know what else I could have done.

Forever and always, my love,
– ILB x

Cockblocked by… myself?

July 4, 2020 / Innocent Loverboy / 0 Comments

For the past year or so, my gut has left me alone. I was formally diagnosed with IBS a few months ago, after repeated and increasingly uncomfortable tests to make sure it wasn’t Crohn’s or UC or something new that’s going to end up named after me. A less stressful job that I quite like, some tablets with friendly bacteria (which makes me seem like a wanker, but just go with it), and – dare I say it? – drinking more water (it is free at work) have all helped, and whereas I do still have issues with my stomach, attacks are less common, and when they do happen, rarely debilitating.

Mind you, when they happen, they really happen.

As you may have realised from my last few posts, I haven’t had sex for a very long time, and non-penetrative sexual contact (while something that has happened, rarely) is the most I’m doing. I’m not going to push the issue, or talk about it much here, but very little has been happening of late. The other day, however, my girlfriend started talking about getting some new sex toys, and my interest was piqued.

I was in the bathroom when she asked it.

“Hey, you okay?”
“Yeah, I’m… I’m on the toilet.”
“Okay, I was thinking… after you’re finished, maybe do you… do you want to play?”

The fact that I’d noticed our Doxy had been moved from the corner of the room to her side of the bed floated into my head.

“Play? Play! Yes! Yes, I want to… I’ll be with you in an… aaaaaaargh…”
“What is it?”
“Nothing, nothing…”

Of course, that was a lie. It was something. The instant she had mentioned play, my entire abdominal system compressed into a ball with roughly the density of a neutron star. I leaned forwards, stuffed my fist in my mouth and screamed silently.

I kept promising, of course, that I would be with her soon. Zounds, but I wanted to be. The problem was that, with my gut deciding to have a go at shibari without having consulted me first, I could barely talk, never mind move. I couldn’t wield a Doxy, wouldn’t have been able to concentrate on using my fingers, and if it came to oral sex (DEAR GOD I MISS GIVING ORAL SEX AND IT HAS BEEN SO LONG), I doubt I’d have had the focus to give as much time and attention as I usually do, what with my body experiencing an internal French Revolution, complete with guillotine.

“Hey, I’m sorry, I… aaaaaaaaargh…“
“It’s okay – you stay in there as long as you need – we don’t have to…”
“No, I want to… it’s just… aaaaaaaargh, fuck!“
“Seriously! Take care of yourself first!”

Discord wants a glass of water — “A little glass of water, please?”

It’s not really like I had much of a choice in that situation. So that’s where I stayed, sitting, for the next hour or so, continually swearing at the entirety of my gastro-intestinal system and wishing, not for the first time, that I could just rip it out, if only temporarily.

She did bring me a glass of water, though, so it’s nice to see that she doesn’t consider me a complete disappointment.

I’ve not been feeling myself lately…

June 29, 2020 / Innocent Loverboy / 3 Comments

I’m a sucker for good stationery, and that extends to diaries. I used to keep a journal – a paper one, not this newfangled invention of modern technology I’m using now – and did so for three years before largely migrating over to LiveJournal. I don’t have the patience to do so now, but I do have a diary – one for appointments and reminders to pay rent and so forth. I never really thought I’d need one, but here I am, organising my life in a little book. This must be what being an adult is like.

This isn’t the first time I’ve referred back to my diary. My last few ~~spam content posts~~ orgasm counts have all been obtained by looking through it and deciphering the increasingly complicated shorthand I’ve managed to develop, in case my mum starts reading it and somehow works out what the little stars mean.

This is assuming that she overlooks the event I’ve been referring to as ‘con being written out in full as “EROTICON!” in red pen. But there we go.

For the last few days, though, there is a new mark.

I have, effectively, taken a stay of execution from masturbation. This isn’t a strange, quasi-religious judgy NoFap thing, nor is it a sudden volte-face into someone who hates masturbating (I love it – and we all know I do); it isn’t even a “just to see if I can do it” self-denial challenge like Lightsinthesky did in year 12 (although I’m using the same diary mark as he did – NJO – although not in a homework planner, obviously). None of that.

No.

The reason is that, after my last orgasm (which was now over a week ago and counting), I felt a little wrecked. It was beginning to take longer and longer to climax than I remember; I’d also noticed that there had been a decrease in things to which I’ve been used – like morning wood (or wet dreams, but then I never have those in any case) – whereas the ILB of a few years ago was very sexually healthy. Go back a decade and I was channeling Priapus.

Coming to the gradual realisation that I may have been suffering from “iron fist” (if that exists… but I’m fairly certain it may, given my sporadic inability to come during partnered sex), and even seeing masturbation as something of a chore (as which it should never be seen!), I decided to… well… to stop. Not that I have an end goal in mind, really – I haven’t set a date or anything, and I’m not really sexually active with anyone right now so this isn’t really to improve sex – but working on more of a vague idea:

“If I’m really horny and want an orgasm, then I’ll masturbate, but I won’t do it just because I think I ought to. Even if I’m just moderately horny.”

Sounds weird when I write it down. But then I only just came up with that, so.

I mean, I haven’t actually been horny for the past week, but I’m kind of hoping that a wank break might help bring my horny back too. (Of course, if it does, this will become more of a challenge. It isn’t a challenge right now – it just tends to give me blank periods during the day where I wonder what else I’d be doing!)

So yeah. That’s literally the most exciting thing I’m doing right now. And if you’re really lucky, I’ll let you know how amazing my next orgasm is, having not done so for however long beforehand.

If you’re really, really lucky, I won’t.

Archaeology

June 20, 2020 / Innocent Loverboy / 0 Comments

I know I’m in my thirties. I’ve been in my thirties for a while now (so says the blogger with the word “boy” in his sobriquet), and will be for a while yet. I just don’t feel like it.

Admittedly, I don’t really know what I’m expecting being in one’s thirties to feel like. Part of me feels old, very old… old enough that most people at work, and what feels like half of my family too, is younger than me (my friendly colleague who did my annual review last year was 22!). I wasn’t really expecting to be anywhere by this age… but then again, I never thought I’d live this long to begin with.

But then sometimes I completely forget that I’m in my thirties. I accidentally told someone the other day that I was twenty-five, not that I look it. At some points, it feels as if I haven’t even left my late teens, which (considering that was now two decades ago) is a thought both terrifying and a little sad.

I sometimes feel like I didn’t age too well because I never really had a “wild period”. I was a good kid, and while I wasn’t the world’s greatest teenager – because who is? – I could have been a lot worse. I wasn’t overly confrontational, nor did I overindulge in any of the adolescent vices, avoiding as I did smoking, drinking, drugs, and even masturbation (until I was 17). I didn’t go out a lot (or at all, really, unless you count Woodcraft); I did all my schoolwork (often at school, so I didn’t need to do it at home); I was relatively civil to everyone.

For most of my teenage years, though, I was battling quite severe depression, of the type that most people misconstrue as “attention-seeking”. I didn’t have much energy after all the crying and self-harming and nights spent lying awake wondering if my life was a failed one and I should just give up.

I’m not sure what my twenties was supposed to feel like, either. I didn’t really do anything at university (all my escapades were outside thereof – again, mostly Woodcraft). Despite all the stories one hears about students – wistful nostalgia about having “come alive” while there and so forth – nothing happened to me. I didn’t particularly enjoy university as it is, and the fact that after my finals the celebrations consisted entirely of a hot chocolate in a coffee shop with a bunch of mature students, themselves in their thirties, should probably tell you all you need to know.

The bits after my university life were just as sedate. Going out now consisted of being in a friend’s house watching DVDs with a pizza from Domino’s. Social media wasn’t a thing (MySpace was around, but I wasn’t really using it), so I didn’t really have any way of contacting people I didn’t have the numbers of to text.

I also didn’t date, nor did I sleep around. Or sleep with anyone. Or come close. I’m not hot enough, nor am I bold enough. 20-year-old me would have been all over hookup apps, had they been a thing. Still.

For most of my twenties, and all of my thirties so far, I’ve been attached. I had about half a year of being single around the age of 25/26, and about a month again in 2012. As much as being attached is pleasant (I work best in relationships), I do feel sometimes like there’s been the occasional missed opportunity. I wasn’t ready for my third relationship – I was still suffering from being broken up with – and I spent subsequent years meeting hot people at Erotic Meet, Eroticon, etc. being completely unavailable.

I know, it’s all the kind of “what-if?” situations that are completely unknowable, but it’s the not knowing that’s killing me.

Why am I saying all this?

Because last night I remembered someone. A real person, too, not an unreal girl. I spent most of the morning trying to find her, and when I finally did (I had to follow links through a huge number of Facebook profiles to do so), I barely recognised her. She was there, but she was different – married, a mother, having a stable job and wearing sensible clothes, taking holidays in sunny destinations. She looked like, well, like a parent.

This is the girl who used to chat to me for hours. She’s the girl who openly talked about how much sex she was having and how much she was enjoying porn. She’s the one who advised me to watch the Paris Hilton video (I did watch it, but only once… and I’ll never do that again!), the one who counselled me after my first relationship ended, and teased me mercilessly about touching herself while we talked.

I don’t recognise her.

So what’s the lesson here? Maybe my good memory is starting to play games with me. Or maybe I just remember things so vividly that they seem much more recent than they actually are.

But we age. We all do. And perhaps, just perhaps, we change as we do so.

As I was saying…

June 13, 2020 / Innocent Loverboy / 0 Comments

Welcome (back) to Innocent Loverboy!

I’m not quite sure why I’m doing this, so bear with me. After twelve years of sex blogging, I’ve migrated from Blogger to this here space.

My old blog isn’t going anywhere – because of its huge amount of cyclical backlinks, embedded images and the like, I’m leaving it up and will continue to link to it. If you’re new here and have hours to kill, then have a look through it. I dare you.

The content here will be largely the same – flailing, disjointed nonsense, with a healthy amount of sex blended into the mix. As with everything else I’ve written, this isn’t really suitable for minors, so if you are under the age of 18, you probably shouldn’t be reading this.

Follow me on Twitter for more randomness that doesn’t make any sense.

– ILB