Routines, UTIs, and Spooning

I can't read poetry when my crotch hurts.

I'm up late because I'm in the paired routine -- Catfish isn't home yet, and I can't go to bed without him. Ugh, I'm part of a pair. My independent self sooooo retches at the thought! And yet, we're up.

Catfish and I managed a sex routine for a while despite my pain. At first I was just so happy to be having sex that I didn't care how much it hurt. I had shied away from it since the vulvodynia began, only trying it three times between my diagnosis in June 2007 and starting to date Catfish last February. The first two times I got UTIs. Which got me thinking...

The one time I got a UTI from having sex with Catfish intersected with the one time I did my laundry at his house using his detergent. His stinky, smells-like-him detergent that is in no way gentle or hypoallergenic (but oh, it smells like him). Now, I am not a vigilant after-sex peer (that's pee-er), especially after reading this post at the Women's Therapy Center. So it's not like that one UTI resulted from some aberrant behavior. No: I probably didn't pee after sex, probably didn't drink enough water, just like the rest of my life.

When I got UTIs as a toddler, they stopped only after my parents stopped giving me bubble baths. So I think this stinky-detergent connection is legitimate. It's hippie detergent for me on my undies, always and forever.

Which doesn't really bring me to the present. Lately, as Catfish has gotten busier putting himself to work rebuilding people's porches and hanging people's doors, our sex routine has slowed down. Pre-vulvodynia Esther would be jumping on him at every chance. Vulvodyniaed Esther is secretly relieved. I want to be the asserter like I've been in the past, but I just don't have it in me. I don't even care. Every romp is one part pleasure, three parts waiting for it to end. I enjoyed it before for the idea of having sex, imagining having sex while I was having it. Now it just hurts and I don't want to abuse my body.

Catfish is thankfully the most understanding guy, the sweetest guy. His number-one thing is spooning. That we can do.