on the topic of sex and self-loathing

The entanglement of my income, sexuality, and personhood is weighing heavily on me tonight. I feel like I’m constantly betraying myself, abusing myself, mistreating myself. Every time I go to bed with a man I know shouldn’t, it’s a betrayal. I give far too much of myself to men who can’t or won’t truly care for me. I want sex to be simple, mechanical, just two people enjoying the pleasures granted to us by our bodies but it isn’t. The reason it isn’t is because I don’t have sex for the pleasure of it alone, I have sex to try to soothe the ever-present hunger in my soul. I give my body to men in the hopes that they’ll be able to make me feel valuable, desirable but too often I just feel like a piece of meat, either while I’m still in their arms or when I’m leaving their apartment alone. I use sex, in the same way, I used drugs, in a desperate attempt to alleviate the hurt, sometimes it works for a bit, sometimes it doesn’t but every time I eventually come out worse for wear. Maybe I give my body to men that I know will hurt me because I think I deserve it, maybe I do it because I think things will be different this time around. All of my attachments are unhealthy by design because at least that way the pain doesn’t come as a surprise.