Is it normal to fantasize about family

Menu Sections. I find my relationship with my sister both pleasant and awkward. My sister lived abroad for many years and has come home in recent times. She is a successful businesswoman who divides her time between living in Ireland and going abroad to see after her business interests. She is with my wife and me quite a lot and we get along very well. T he trouble is that I find I am increasingly thinking of my sister in a sexual way.

When we were young there was some sexual tension between us, though we never did anything wrong. On one occasion, when my sister was 15, there was a family event, and my mother bought her some new clothes. This included a new set of underwear which I remember well was silky and gleaming. I was a year younger and a bit innocent. We used to horse-play a bit, and as her skirts and dresses in those days were short, her underwear was often exposed.

I hardly noticed this until puberty set in and from then on I was sexually aroused much of the time when I was with her. My sister was more mature than me, and, looking back now, I think she enjoyed teasing me. Sitting down, she would often draw up her knees and let me see up her dress. But as I say nothing ever happened.

You must understand that we had been brought up at home and in school to be scared of anything to do with sex and sin, which were practically synonymous. Time passed and those earlier experiences faded in my memory. But when in my middle years I started having problems with not being able to ejaculate when making love with my wife, a piece of advice I was given was to think of something that excited me sexually.

Somehow my mind drifted back to those days with my sister as I fantasised about what might have been, and that plan actually worked. I think it'll be a while before we get to the point where we're really open-minded about all different relationships between consenting adults. How does incest porn differ from other porn except it maybe has a caption saying "um, this dude is doin his sister, dude! As a new parent 7 years ago, I completely freaked myself out, coupling my provider anxiety and deep desire not to completely ruin my kid's life with way too much thinking about pedophiles and how they probably just kinda ended up that way, and what if I wake up one morning attracted to my kid?

Nightmares and neurosis ensued. The curse of having huge brains, that. If you're obsessed and it's fucking up your life then get help. If you're just overthinking it and overworrying about something you have no desire to actually act upon, then chalk it up to being a zany human like the rest of us. PS - I totally made out with my sister when I was a wee lad. I answered a bit before, but I was off to watch the daily show and didn't get to answer in full. Someone mentioned the Westermarck effect by name, and that's what I had been talking about.

Children who grow up together are not normally attracted to each other. I think the "taboo" of it being gross for siblings to have sex with each other grew from that, people develop sexual taboos for the same reason they develop disgust when it comes to eating certain foods, there's a strong evolutionary advantage for people to do the 'normal' thing sexual and eat the 'normal' foods, and do the normal things to stay alive and have children.

We determine what's normal by observing the people around us, and due to the Westermarck effect societies are not going to have many brother-sister parings and as generations progress the disgust will amplify itself. That's my theory anyway. And in any event, why are you beating yourself over feeling a certain way, just because other people might find it disgusting?

Why bother to correct something inside your head, that no one else can see or hear? I don't think there is any reason to be bothered by your own thoughts, it's only when you act on them that there is a problem I mean if you wanted to kill someone, it would be OK with me if you wanted to fuck your sister. On the other hand, if you're in love with one of your siblings, that could be a pretty big problem. Also, you asked: And if they are not healthy, would simply trying to suppress them and not think about them make them worst or more intense?

Yes, not thinking about them will make them dissipate, however, if you fret and get stressed out then and think about not thinking about it, that won't work. What you need to do if you really want to get rid of these thoughts is try to think about something else.

You definitely would want to avoid reading any stories or whatever about it. If it ever comes up in your head just concentrate on something else, not the same thing every time because that will just associate it with that thing but just some random thing from the day. I think it would just be easier to accept the fact that this turns you on, and not worry about it, though.

There are clearly several unresolved issues here. While I heartily recommend Nabokov, Ada is in fact one of his tougher slogs of a read. Both men and women have them, and chances are in one of those books you'll find one that will make your fantasy look casual.

If you want something more clinical, the question is addressed in books such as The Hite Report and The Kinsey Report. Incest is an enduring source of comedy, especially in say French farce, as well as of tragedy and drama in literature. Without giving away too much, it was a key plot element in the recent Korean Sundance favorite, Oldboy. So certainly you're not the first to have these thoughts, and not the first to want to find a way to deal with them. Really, it's probably pointless to feel shame for something that takes place only in your mind.

If you have a partner, role-play can be one way of exploring your attraction to various fantasies and may even lead to you discard them , and will over time "free your mind" as it were to the consideration of alternate sexualities as just one more thing we stupid monkeys do. A simple trick is to use a rubber band on your wrist or a wrist counter as a form of biofeedback.

Every time you have the thought that disturbs you, snap the rubber band, or hit the counter button. Soon this will become automatic, and the association with a negative outcome -- the pain of the snap, or the number at the end of the day -- will help your mind banish what it does not want to consider.

I've done this in the past for bouts of depressive and suicidal thoughts, and it does help. At a more aggressive level yet, you can use cognitive therapy to pile on negative associations to your fantasies -- something you don't want, like imagining the people in your fantasy hurting each other; or you can perform a bait-and-switch by looking at porn like the Friday books, or adult films or websites or just creating for yourself a non-disturbing fantasy, and every time the one that bugs you flows into your mind, switch as soon as possible to the new one.

With time and the positive feedback from orgasm this could retune your inner television channel. But really, just talking it out and accepting your inner freak is probably healthier. I know someone who engages in "real play" fantasies online, which have to do with acting out family scenarious with people you're not actually related to. A lot of it is really mundane, but some of it is sexual. She's actually going to marry someone she met through these communities.

I just tried to google some "real play" and didn't come up wiht anything resembling what my friend is into, however, so I may have the name of the subculture wrong.

Oh yeah, in response to dhartung's analysis of pop culture incest: Check out any V. Andrews book. Even creepier than the fact that every one of her books seems to feature some form of incest is the knowledge that after she died her children started writing the books using her pen name. Her children. Just think about that.

Questions about a sexual fantasy that may be disturbing to some people are interesting to most people judging by all these responces! All of a sudden, I was paralyzed by fear that I wanted these things to happen, in reality, and it literally stopped me from functioning. They included fearing that I was attracted to family members; fearing that I was a pedophile; and worrying that I had violent urges.

Unlike a fantasy, which is kind of something that you can take out when you want to play with it, so to speak, and put it away, I felt like I had lost total control over myself and my sexuality. Unbearable shame? Constantly beating myself up? A little bit of talk therapy and a little bit of anti-anxiety meds later, I'm healthy and happy and I don't feel desperate and ashamed anymore.

Bottom line: when I tried suppressing these fantasies, what I found that I ended up suppressing was all of my sexuality, in case I ended up feeling sexual and acting on one of these thoughts. It took me a good long time to feel like I could function normally as a sexual person. Consider meeting with a therapist at least once - bare minimum, it will help to hear from a trained professional that you're perfectly normal. If it's more than that and you can't shake it in a healthy fashion, a little more therapy might help.

Good luck. A simple trick is to use a rubber band on your wrist And then soon enough you start associating sexuality with pain. Quick, someone say something about a frying pan and a fire. Best advice yet.

You asked about the roots of such fantasies. Basically, when you're hitting puberty, who are the people around you the most? Your family. If you've got a straight teenage boy thinking constantly about sex, for instance, and he's got sexually mature or maturing women living in close proximity, well There is nothing intrinsically unhealthy about any sexual fantasy.

There's also nothing intrinsically unhealthy about any sexual act, so long as it doesn't harm physically, mentally, emotionally any of the participants. Speaking anecdotally, incest fantasies are garden-variety. I'd be willing to bet that just about everyone has at least one, in some degree, at some point, and the majority of people probably more than one. Go to a nice supportive therapist who specializes in sexual issues. As for social acceptance, I highly doubt it. Incest taboos run deep, much deeper than most others.

They inspire a visceral horror which is obviously a big part of the attraction , and visions of deformed babies and Hanover chins. Obviously not a concern with same-sex incest. Add in that most but certainly not all incest is coercive and abusive, and there's a recipe for no social acceptance. If you have a clear sense of the division between fantasy and reality, then by all means: enjoy whatever fantasies you want.

I hope the top of your head blows off due to sheer erotic intensity. Nearly 85 percent of women fantasize about getting down in a sultry locale, like on a deserted beach, the survey in the Journal of Sexual Medicine found. Your Best Life. Type keyword s to search. Getty Images. Related Stories. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site. Put simply, letting your imagination run wild could help you get in the mood.

While you may be fantasizing about someone else, pay attention to what else is going on. Are you getting it on in public? Are you doing something new in the bedroom? These details could give you an insight into your deeper desires.

Rather than judging these fantasies as wrong or inappropriate, consider what they are telling you about your needs. Should your mind keep wandering to that attractive coworker, for example, think about what they represent for you.

See: open relationships. Why not use your fantasy as inspiration when role-playing with your partner? Research published in the Journal of Sexual Medicine identified some of the most common sexual fantasies. The findings suggested that many women fantasize about submission—i. Aside from that, there are a couple of main types of sexual fantasies. These types of sexual fantasies often include a taboo element.

For example, you might fantasize about someone else giving you a 'golden shower,' having sex with a prostitute, or cross-dressing as part of your sexual play.

However, you can learn from these fantasies and safely act them out. The most common types of fantasies are different for men and women. The research found that women often fantasize about having sex with someone in a romantic location, while many men are drawn to the idea of two women having sex.