My subconscious buried my date rape for over 25 years. It came back when I was in a BDSM class and my body started shaking, and then my body actually did something about it. I tell you this because a partner with sexual trauma may not have the story to give you yet. The body often goes first, and the memory follows.
Most of the women and couples I work with come to feel safe enough, and once that happens they remember what happened to them. Then they work through it together. So the most useful offering comes before any technique: a body that is safe enough to remember.
What does my partner’s flinch actually mean?
A partner’s body is protecting them, and the protection started long before anyone arrived. My definition of trauma is anything that happened too soon or too fast for the psyche or body to absorb, and that leaves an imprint.
So a flinch can come from a story a partner has told, a story they have told nobody, or one their mind cannot reach yet. The reflex looks the same from the outside.
| What you see | What the body may be doing | What helps |
|---|---|---|
| Tightens or steps back when you reach | Protecting, in a reflex faster than a decision | Ask first, and take a “not yet” as a full answer |
| Seems present but far away | Slightly gone, even while fully there | Pause, and ask whether they are present enough for touch right now |
| Gets tighter when things go slow and still | Stillness can stir up more tightness | Keep the practice under two minutes |
| Shakes, cries or goes quiet | Something is moving through | Stay beside them and let it move |
I talk about the slightly braced, slightly gone feeling from the inside in episode 33 of The Scrumptious Woman. If the freeze is the part that worries you, why do I freeze when my partner touches me goes further into it.
How do I support a partner with trauma, whether we are dating or years into a marriage?
Build safety first, in pieces a partner can say yes to. Dating someone with trauma or a long way into a marriage, the order is the same, and safety is the first thing I build with every client, before desire and before any technique.
- Start with your own body. Touch Base: thumb to forefinger, feel the ridges, say “I am safe right now”, and hold for two minutes.
- Offer it, never insist. Touch Base can be learned in a partner’s own time, on their own, with no touch attached.
- Ask before any touch. The intimacy and communication cards, over 150 cards in the app, give the question a home, so asking becomes a habit rather than a negotiation.
- Keep it short. For someone with trauma, being still and slow can bring up more tightness, so a short practice done often beats a long one done once.
Nothing happens to a partner’s body without a yes from that partner. I teach women their no, and what their no lives in: their body.
Should we wait until my partner has healed?
No, because waiting until the healing is done is one of the quieter stories couples tell themselves. “We will do it when I have dealt with my trauma, when you have dealt with yours.” The story keeps the power to change things sitting somewhere else, where nobody has to pick it up.
Small contained touch, offered with a clear yes, builds the safety that healing needs. I describe the quiet story in episode 38.
What if a memory comes back while we are being close?
Stay, and let the body do what it is doing. The only way to move through an experience is to feel it, and a body that starts to shake or cry or go quiet is moving through it.
You do not need to explain it, fix it or fill the silence. This is also the point where I would rather you had a guide than went it alone. Couples do this work with me together, and The Beginning, my three month couples intensive, is where that happens.
Where do we go for more help?
Start with the step that matches who is reading. If you are the partner, my free guide When She Goes Quiet is written for men who love someone and cannot find the door back in. If your partner wants to look at it from the other side, the Touch Reset Quiz is a gentle first step.
Working through it with a guide is what I do at Feel Fully You, as an intimacy and touch coach in the UK. For the longer view, can intimacy feel good again after sexual assault has the path in full.
Your partner’s body is not asking for a fix. It is asking to be safe enough to remember.