Hi @will19, thanks for replying.

I wouldn't judge yourself too harshly based on the material things that surrounded your childhood. Whether your bars were made of lead or gold, you were probably still in a cage... as was I.

On the outside my family home looked pretty normal and pretty good. But if your parents didn't do a good jobs with their interactions with you, especially when you were young (let's say Under 7) then damage is still damage.

When I referred to "partner therapy" this is sex surrogate therapy. Very good, but not cheap.

I was actually thinking of ways that some of the positive aspects of this could be replicated, other than simply having sex with a prostitute - which I guess will not be the same and potentially very disappointing.

My view on this subject is that you may need to use more than one tool in the toolbox ...

Catharsis - see Osho Dynamic Meditation, great for letting it out!
Therapy that includes reading your body's energy system - like Spiritual healing, Cranio-sacral, Kinesiology, Reiki.

Your mention of your parents telling you that a woman wasn't good for you.. I'm thinking about the possibility that maybe you were "emotionally invalidated". Teal Swan talks about this on YouTube, v good.

I started with counseling but the person I saw wasn't able to penetrate very deeply into the problem, I guess this was just the place where I started my journey