We are both members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints*

I am 25 years old. I have been married for 3 years. Before I was married I had no idea of my condition. My husband and I both wanted to wait until marriage to have any type of sexual relations including intercourse (We are both members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints). As a result, vaginismus first came to our attention on our wedding night.

During my engagement, however, I was concerned that I was not able to use a tampon- as was my gynecologist. She recommended that I see a therapist before getting married. I went and explained the situation to the therapist and it was her opinion that I would have no problems because “intercourse was totally different than inserting a tampon”. When I heard this I trusted her completely, naively thinking that things would take care of themselves. My fiancé, however, felt that I should get a second opinion. But– I told him everything would be fine and not to talk about the issue anymore.

After a rude awaking during our honeymoon, I went to see a therapist in Salt Lake City. I saw her from August to the end of December. She tried several different things including EMDR. I did make some progress with her- I was able to start using tampons and even got up to using my 4th dilator. But still, intercourse did not work and her suggestion was that my husband and I get a divorce.

We obviously did not take her suggestion and I stopped going to therapy for a few weeks. My husband and I then found a new therapist…which we saw for a period of two months. During this period of time, we saw no results, and our relationship seemed to be getting worse. In March of 2003, we decided to take a break from counseling.
Then in June of 2003, we went to another counselor that helped us a lot with our relationship, but I didn’t make any improvements with my vaginismus.

In May of 2004, my husband and I moved to Arizona and I ordered a vaginismus treatment kit off of the Internet. After working with the kit for five months I saw very little improvement. This became extremely frustrating- I had recently joined an online support group for women with vaginismus. As I read the messages posted on the group’s website, I became increasingly discouraged. Many women had been cured of vaginismus by using their dilators for only a few weeks. I couldn’t understand how after five months I could see little change. At this point, I decided to check out the Women’s Therapy Center (WTC) in New York, which I had discovered about a year earlier after searching the web. I was very skeptical that they would be a good resource for me. This was partly because of the rumors I had heard about this clinic on my online support group.

In desperation, however, I contacted the WTC. They were very helpful and even gave me names of women with backgrounds similar to mine, whom I could call and ask questions. After calling some former patients of WTC, my husband and I decided that this was our best option. In June of 2005, we flew to New York for treatment. Although I desperately wanted the treatment to work I was still skeptical that anything would work for me.

Fortunately, the two week treatment program did work. Dr. Ditza and Dr. Ross were great to work with. After only one week of treatment, my husband and I were able to have intercourse. Our lives have drastically changed. Our marriage has improved greatly. In fact, what we did in New York saved our marriage. I will forever be grateful to them for making vaginismus their life’s work*.

– A.R.

* Results may vary from person to person