So I've been trying to deal with this myself, but I feel I'm running out of options/don't truly know where to go. I'm new to this forum and I felt that I could get some advice.

I've been dating my current gf for almost 2 years. She is Japanese and came to the US to study abroad. We met in America and starting dating (unfortunately) 3 months before she had to go back to Japan.

During our time in America, we tried to have sex several times, but always found it impossible. At that time, I was led to believe (by the evidence I could clearly see and by what she told me) that she was 1) too small for my penis and 2) unwilling to actually go through with it since she was returning home in a matter of months. I relented and we had originally decided to break up after she left.

To make a long story short: we decided to stay together and spent the last year doing a long distance relationship. During that time, she never cheated or sought someone else (she is a really, really trustworthy and nice girl - and very shy/independent).

I just came to Japan for a year study abroad (I'm actually studying Japanese (among other things)) and thought that this relationship would pick up right where we left off. During our time apart, we spent almost everyday talking on Skype, and so I felt that, once we finally got together, we would be okay.

But, at first she was flakey and a bit distant. It took me so much coaxing just to get her to come out and hang out with me. And then we finally found time to spend with each other intimately. It turned into a disaster. Our attempt to have sex was marred with frustration and tears on her part - and again I thought it was solely physical. We gave up and haven't tried again since.

However, I finally figured out that much of the problem (perhaps ALL) is actually emotional. See: she has only had one boyfriend in her life before me (actually she is also my first gf). They only dated for 6 months, but that was more than enough time for the two to have sex - once. When they finally did it, my gf was able to bear through the small amount of pain and (according to her) overall discomfort. She said she didn't hurt very bad nor did she bleed

The next day, apparently the boyfriend became super cold and led her on a month-long game of phone tag before showing up one day and breaking up with her. This devastated her.

The problem is, although she is otherwise mentally healthy, she now forever associates sex with this breakup. She learned to loath not only sex, but her own vagina and her sexiness. She made excuses to validate her new found hatred ("I'll get pregnant even if we use protection" is the big one). Furthermore, she has never had a proper female role model in her life to tell her that sex is fine - she has (since the scarring Japanese sex ed videos of her childhood) come to fear the organ between her legs.

Now, with me, it is such a crippling fear that she actually has a panic attack every time we even TALK about it (I can see all the signs now when we actually tried in the past). It is an honest to goodness sick feeling she gets whenever the concept of us having intercourse is introduced. She has been getting better, but she seems to be putting off the topic more and more (for example, we have a vacation planned together for Winter Break, but she has a big school related event that she states she wants to focus on, and then afterwards she'll be open to try. However, I feel that she will find yet another way to put it off).

I'm trying to help her: I complement her on her body a lot and am trying to use positive reinforcement. I'm trying to get her comfortable with her body. I've also run through all these mental reasons why she should give sex another shot: I'm not going to leave her like her ex did, I am comfortable with her body, I tried to make her understand how limited/short life is to be putting off an integral part of a health relationship due to the past, I let her know my intentions are based mainly on my love for her (what kind of guy stays with a girl for almost two years just to get sex?), etc. But still no true signs of progress.

I'm really at the end of my rope mentally: I love this girl so much, but the fact that I cannot have a sexual relationship with her is destroying me. The very selfish reason of course is that I'm still a virgin, and I feel sick every time I think there's a man out there in this city who took advantage of the girl I love now and got to a place of intimacy I just cannot. Actually, this concept alone is slowly driving me insane:

I am now beginning to truly dislike my time studying abroad because every little thing - whether it be seeing other Japanese men or when simply a word relating to, say, virginity comes up. I have also had frequent nightmares over the subject - the worst of which woke me up crying. I can't help but feel insecure being a virgin. It's just so hard to get the mental images of someone else getting to experience everything that we have done (i.e. oral sex, massages, baths, kissing) and more (actual sexual intercourse that I have yet to experience) with the girl I love out of my head. It's just eating me up inside.

The overall reason is that I love this girl so much, and I really just want to fix her and let her know that I'm here to love her, that I won't leave her like her ex did, and that I just want to share my body and spirit with her through sex.

I don't mind taking it slow (I've been patient for well over a year), but she has thus far refused to help me with her mentality surrounding the problem. What should I do? What should I do the next time we have intimate time together?

tl;dr: My girlfriend has a paralyzing fear of her body and sex due to the shadow looming over her from her previous relationship and it makes us unable to have sex.