We have been together for three years, but I feel self-conscious with him and worry about the future of our sex life

My boyfriend of three years has never actively looked at my vagina or shown the slightest interest in it other than the usual foreplay. He performs oral sex occasionally but always under the darkness of the duvet and has admitted he doesn't find vaginas particularly attractive, joking that mine is especially repulsive. I feel hugely hurt and ashamed and his behaviour makes me consider him childish. He jokes that bodily fluids are disgusting and always washes after sex. I feel self-conscious and unattractive and worry that we'll never enjoy the explorative sex life I've had with previous partners.

Besides biological factors, each person's sexuality is created and influenced by early experiences: family attitudes to sex, friends, religion, along with the messages about sex received from school, the media and society. Your boyfriend's background may have made it difficult for him to be comfortable with his sexuality, or with your genitals. And like many men, he may have picked up a misleading notion of an ideal kind of vagina ("neat", evenly proportioned and hairless) from media images. Help him receive some sex education to adjust his sexual attitudes by inviting him to join you either watching educational DVDs or reading a well-written book that accentuates sexual and physical diversity (for example Our Sexuality by Crooks and Baur). Discuss the material as equal adults, not teacher/pupil, and reward him when he demonstrates maturity.

• Pamela Stephenson Connolly is a psychotherapist who specialises in treating sexual disorders.

• If you would like advice from Pamela Stephenson Connolly on sexual matters, send us a brief description of your concerns to private.lives@theguardian.com (please don't send attachments).