[Dogg]

I had feelings of attraction for her from the second time I saw her and she brought out feelings stronger than I knew I could have for a girl. We were each other's closest friends for over a year while I battled my feelings for her (I just could not come out to myself as gay!). From the day we became friends, I felt like I could trust her more than friends I had had for years. We just clicked, with incredible chemistry. Finally, after many months of drunken flirting and late night talks, I admitted to her my feelings and she felt the same way. I was ecstatic, over the moon.

We completely immersed ourselves in each other but it wasn't enough to hold off the bad things that were happening outside of our relationship. I lost quite a few friends when coming out, who I had thought were my closest support system, my parents reacted badly to our relationship and I lost my close relationship with them. A family member died unexpectedly and it was my first real experience with loss.

I didn't come to her very prepared to be in a relationship. I had never done anything sexually or romantically but kissing before (embarrassing, even to admit online). Even in the middle of sex, I would freeze, feeling overwhelmed, guilty and ashamed. I grew up very religious and would have been ashamed to have sex with a boy, let alone sex with a girl. My girlfriend was completely understanding, would immediately stop without pressuring me and over time, helped me overcome some of those feelings so that they weren't so paralyzing.

Once I overcame a lot of these feelings, our sex life improved incredibly. We were creative and could not stop touching each other. Sex was fun and exciting. Her sex drive was limitless. My libido was lower but I was almost always a willing partner. I had a lot of frustrations sexually, however. While my girlfriend had no trouble coming, I was never able to, even alone. I still enjoyed sex but the frustration built a type of resentment I wasn't expecting. I was also upset, if not consciously, that she had had such an easy time coming out while it felt like I had lost a lot of my identity for a new one that didn't feel comfortable.

A few months after the death of my family member, I started experiencing symptoms of anxiety--- panic attack, unable to eat or sleep, throwing up, etc. I visited a therapist who told me I had a fear of losing people and that I was afraid that I or other people would be destroyed by loss.
During the weeks of my severe anxiety, my mother asked me if I was feeling anxious because my relationship was coming to an end. Her words struck me and from then onward, I started to worry that I was falling out of love with my girl. Was it anxiety or had she struck a chord of truth?

I told her I didn't feel in love with her anymore but upon the point of breaking up, I decided that I didn't want to break up without trying everything I could to fix this. We have been through so much, and I want her by my side now and in the future. We have not taken a break so much as see each other less frequently, maybe four times a week as opposed to every day, and with limited physical affection. Even kissing makes me nervous. Through this all, my girl has been great. Her feelings haven't changed at all.

With all the anxiety, which I am still suffering, to a lesser degree, I have come out the other side with my loving feelings fluctuating day to day, hour by hour. Some minutes I know this relationship is right and others, it is doomed. I can't believe that my feelings have changed so fast!

But now, on this other side of these weeks of trauma, I feel not attracted to my girl anymore. She still talks about how she can't wait until we have sex again but I am, in different moments, excited and then dreading it. Every time I see her, I am surprised by how beautiful she is but as soon as I go home and try to imagine sex again, I get a pit in my stomach. I have read on other threads that if you're not attracted anymore, you should let the other person go. But at the start of our relationship, my attraction to her was so strong, I threw my life and cares to the wind just to have a chance to kiss her on the lips! It is not that it wasn't ever there.

I see other girls walking down the street and I feel attraction to them. I don't think my attraction is dead inside! But then I remember, that even though these other girls as attractive, there is no way they could meet the level of amazing personality my girlfriend has that matches mine more than anyone I have ever met (And I went to an all-girls high school, so I have met a lot of girls! lol.). I don't want to be the type of person that chases relationship to relationship to get that beginning-in-love feeling.

More than anything, I want to fix our relationship. She is the greatest girl I have ever met. We have more fun together than with anyone else I've spent time with. I like her body close to mine, sleeping next to her, watching her put her make up on. We make crazy plans for dates, love celebrating our time together. I want to be by her side when she graduates college, gets her first job, etc. I want to be there for it all.

My therapist says I need to get rid of the fear of losing this relationship and throw myself into it without worrying about tomorrow and I think that helps, to a degree. When I throw that feeling away, I can kiss her, hold her, make out with her, do a little more with her, without any worry.

But am I too optimistic that I will get these loving feelings back, these sexual feelings back after all these negative thoughts about our relationship? I feel like our story isn't over and I want to get back on track to the great relationship I know we can have. But what if my attraction and butterfly in the stomach feeling is gone forever? Please help!