Today guest blogger Pamela Madsen, author of Shameless: How I Ditched the Diet, Got Naked, Found True Pleasure…and Somehow Got Home in Time To Cook Dinner, discusses the unexpected hunger pangs that can happen after sexually starving ourselves. And, she also shares how we can all use this new found sexual energy to our advantage in life, love and everything in between. This article first appeared on Psychologytoday.com.

“If you don’t use it…you lose it”.

Have you ever heard that phrase? How about “The more you get – the more you want?” Have you noticed that the word “insatiable” goes so well with the word “desire”? Almost like peanut butter and jelly!

There have been times in my own sexual awakening that I started to feel exploring my sexuality is like that old saying about eating Chinese food. You can have a delicious meal and twenty minutes later you are hungry again!

Maybe I am exaggerating just a little, but I do think that if you do not stir the pot of your sexual being – you can become dormant just like a hibernating bear. Have you ever seen a hibernating bear on one of those nature shows after he wakes up? Just like the bear – once you wake up and begin to feed yourself – you can find that your hunger is extraordinary. And that hunger can be quite unsettling. How do we manage our hunger?

I love to talk about us “waking up your sleeping beauty!” And what I mean by that – is reawakening our sexual selves. But what happens when Beauty wakes up and the Prince is snoring? Or there is no Prince? How does Beauty feed herself? Or Visa Versa!

I have been steeped in desire lately – I have a Shameless Life Coaching practice – and one of my clients is a lovely woman who I am going to call “Gena”. Gena is in her forties and has two kids, runs her own business and after reading my book Shameless: How I Ditched The Diet, Got Naked, Found True Pleasure and Somehow Got Home in Time To Cook Dinner began to explore her own sexuality by working with me and a Certified Sexological Bodyworker.

Guess what happened? Her inner “Sleeping Beauty” woke up! WoooHoooo! Fantastic! Well, actually feeling our newly found sexual awakening can sometimes be uncomfortable.

Once we start exploring what we desires, figure out how desire looks for us and how to reach for them – things can really heat up for us in our lives! Gena recently said to me…

“Speaking of desire I have a subject that I hope to get feedback about. I have a terrible time focusing on the requirements of my daily life. Since I started do deeply explore this part of myself – I have become so focused on sex! I have a business to run, friends, kids, parents, etc.

I crave all that goes with this quest. Following discussion groups, reading, watching videos, having more experiences, experimenting with Zestra and other ways of exploring my own sexuality for myself. And all of this learning, all seem to tug at me when I really should be working or doing the more routine, and often less fulfilling parts of my life. I don’t feel comfortable sharing much of this with anyone in my immediate circle, which is obviously a problem I have to work on. I desire comfort in this new found joy. I’m unsettled. Like I’m waiting for something. It’s hard to sit with the pleasure and happiness I experience in increasing amounts as I learn and incorporate more of the eroticism and deep excitement I often feel. Maybe that’s it. Too much excitement for everyday pursuits.

How do other people deal with this? What do you do with an inability to satisfy yourself, in a complete, overall way? It seems like no matter what I experience I still have insatiable desire for more”.

I don’t think that Gena is alone. After we starve ourselves – and then taste food for the first time in a long time – it can be pretty overwhelming. The good news is that is we continue to feed ourselves things to become more balanced in our lives – and we end up in a much place in our lives.

What I have found is that it comes in waves. This this insatiable need for more in the beginning of ending our sensual deep snooze.

Again, I liken it to survivors of famine who for a while after they are rescued hoard food or cannot stop eating. So many of us are starving in our bodies for sensual pleasure and the road that it can take us down – a full, healthy integrated life.

It’s just that sometimes we don’t know our hunger until we jump start our bodies and come out of hibernation. And then the food tastes so sweet and our bodies just cannot get enough because we went too long without feeding it.

My suggestion is to everyone who is just beginning to wake up again sexually in their lives is to to notice your hunger. I am noticing mine, and as you are able to  – feed yourself. Perhaps you need a little more right now – then let your body have it. Reassure your body that you will not take this away from yourself ever again – that it IS available.

If you can afford it, explore taking a workshop and indulge yourself a bit. Look for new ways to feed and explore your own sexuality. Pleasure and sexuality can be found in so many things! Use your new found sexual energy to channel your creativity! Painting, taking up photography, cooking, dancing and yoga are all great ways to continue to explore and use your nearly emerging sexual energy.

Feeding yourself can be buying long black stockings and wearing them just for yourself! I have begun to buy beautiful bath products. I am addicted at the moment to LUSH. I give myself special long sexy baths .I acknowledge and feed my desire in different ways.

Please don’t be frightened of your desires. Feed yourself in ways that reassures your body and your mind will be much more free to do what you need to do. Notice your desire. Do not judge it or decide that it is too much.

Consider seeing and feeling your desire as an indicator of your vitality! I often feel my desire in that way. I choose to feel that I am a beautiful sexual being in full bloom! When I feel my deep desire….I imagine myself as that flower after the rain and I all myself to enjoy the feeling.

I believe that as our bodies learn that we will never go to sleep on ourselves again that we will become less agitated with all of these new feelings and we will become more fulfilled in how we live our daily lives. Sex is not an end point – it is an integral part of who we are.

For now, I have advised my client to eat freely and eat often.  I am so glad that Gena woke up! And she is not alone. So many of us are finally acknowledging our desires, and wanting more for ourselves in this life.  Feeling all of those feelings it isn’t always comfortable especially in the beginning  – but isn’t it so much better than being asleep?

Pamela Madsen is a fertility/sex educator, blogger, author of Shameless (Rodale, Jan 2011), motivational speaker and founder of The American Fertility Association. She is also a certified somatic sex educator with a coaching practice that focuses on helping people create the next big thing in their lives, as well as supporting her clients in issues related to sexuality and fertility.  To learn more about Pamela, please visit her website http://www.BeingShameless.com and her daily blog, thefertilityadvocate.com.