I'm rather embarrassed to be writing about this even though I'm anonymous in the forum.

I've always had a high sex drive from when I was 16 or 17 years old. I had masturbated frequently since I've always had social anxiety and haven't been sexually active very much with a partner. My frequency became less over the winter for various non-health reasons, including the idea that at my age (36) I should be sharing orgasms with another person instead of wasting time on myself.

Since my anxiety attacks began earlier this year, I reached a point that my masturbatory sessions are rare, perhaps once or twice a month. It seems that when I get to the point of feeling pent up with the urge of satisfy myself, the excited feeling that I get is enough to set off my anxiety. The act of masturbating has also gotten to be an endurance test since I get a fast, amplified heartbeat (not an irregular one, but fast and distinct) and the anxiety that grows as I'm doing it often causes me to lose my erection. I do ejaculate in large amounts from the stimulation but I don't find this enjoyable at all.

Today, I masturbated but had to fight off an anxiety attack right before it. The thought of masturbating set in last night but I tried to put it out of my mind because I knew the trouble I was in for. This morning, though, I came back home from an errand feeling very aroused from the thoughts of the prior night. My heart sped up and I began having palpitations before I even got underway so I spent about 15 minutes trying to calm myself down and telling myself that I don't have to do it.

A conflict was going on in my mind. I was afraid that if I didn't masturbate, I would have repeated surges of the urge to but if I did, I was afraid it would be too much for my system, particularly my heart, to deal with. That it might be what finally kills me.

I'm sorry for the lurid details, but I decided to fight through it as much as I could and masturbated. My heart sped up even further and I ended up ejaculating heavily with a soft penis, probably because I was too excited and hadn't done it in so long. Afterwards, my nerves and heart rate settled down and I was back to normal.

I'm posting here because I'm not aware if other men with anxiety issues have experienced the same thing. I do know that I find it a frightening experience when it's supposed to be pleasurable. I'm afraid of doing great damage to myself while my body can only go so long without this outlet. I've always found it a needed release. But nowadays instead of feeling pleased, I feel like I've overcome something than can kill me.

I should mention that I was given a physical and EKG two months ago and was told that everything's fine. But doctors do miss things, as much as I respect their judgement. I am not on meds at present. My mother had anxiety issues that were apparently passed down to me. Thanks for reading.