Sex is very healing; it connects a person to their body in a way that gives them reason to appreciate having one. Isn't that the core of having the schizoaffective label? You are in one place and your body is over there somewhere else? Although I never had the actual label I have been told many times that I seem like I only visit my body from time to time and spend most of my time away from it in my own world. I told them that they were wrong and that the real world could still intrude way too much on my awareness. At one point I decided that the only reasons to live were food, sex, and alcohol. I wasn't entirely sure about food. Fortunately this was a long time ago - three or four years, maybe. The point is that if you have something that helps and does not come with harmful side effects, and you get rid of it without finding a replacement, then yes it can cause problems. It causes the kind of problems that what you were doing was helping to fix. The thing about guilt is that it is a conflict in your mind. It isn't about right or wrong. It is about the beliefs you hold in the back of your mind and in your gut feelings. Most of these beliefs have never been properly examined. Most of them came from other people, especially when you were too young to decide if you agreed with them or not. That's part of why they were never properly examined before they were installed. Then in the following years, they weren't properly examined because they were already in place and of course they were consistent with "your" beliefs. They were consistent with themselves and they were already in place. Let's say you have a belief that is causing you trouble, like that pre-marital sex is bad. Suppose you want to install a different belief, such as that monogamous sex is a great way for two people who love each other to bond and to get to know each other better. If they stay friends and do not get married that is fine. If they get married eventually that is okay, too. Sex, marriage, and love are all completely separate issues and it is not helpful to chain them together. Okay, that isn't just one belief. The point is that it doesn't matter what you decide you want to believe as long as that other belief is in the back of your mind, judging you and controlling how you feel about yourself and the actions you consciously choose. The way out isn't to fight it directly because that only serves to validate the belief. Here is how an approach like mindfulness helps. It lets you see when the old belief is surfacing, thank it for its input, and tell the old belief that you have moved on and no longer need it. As an adult you wouldn't let a small child judge you no matter how loudly it yelled. It would be too silly. The only difference is that the child is a voice inside of your head that has been stuck and unable to grow up. You can afford to see that such a child has no right to judge you; how could a child even begin to understand adult relationships? You can even choose to feel compassion instead for the child and provide the proper adult guidance to help this voice within to become unstuck and to start growing up. Unlike with actual children, these voices don't need years to get caught up when they become unstuck. And mindfulness is only one approach; it just happens to be the one I know best.