Owning Your Sexual Self – Détails, épisodes et analyse

Hey hey! Thank you so much for coming back to another episode of the Owning Your Sexual Self podcast! This week we have Danie Bergstrom on the show! Danie is a queer somatic sexologist and a trauma specialist working with the sapphic community. Her work focuses on transforming trauma and intimacy blocks into deeper connection and pleasure through experimental learning. We're talking about how purity culture can disconnect us from our bodies and the gentle practices that help you rebuild safety, trust, and a sense of ownership over your pleasure again.

In this episode:

• What purity culture and religious trauma are
• How high control religious environments shape sexuality
• Why shame can make it hard to enjoy pleasure
• How somatic practices help the body relearn safety and agency
• Why curiosity and voice matter when reclaiming desire
• A reminder that pleasure is deserved and healing has no timeline

Thank you so much for listening!  Don't forget to share on your social media and tag me if you loved this episode!

Resources
Want By Gillian Anderson
The Intimacy Block Quiz

Connect with Danie
YouTube - @SapphicSexologist
Website - SapphicSexologist.com

Support the show

Connect with Rachel!
Instagram: @The_Rachel_Maine
Website: https://linktr.ee/WellnessSexpertise
YouTube: YouTube.com/@OwningYourSexualSelf
Facebook: Rachel Maine
Email: therachelmaine@gmail.com

Hello! Welcome back for another episode of the Owning Your Sexual Self podcast! I am so excited for you to hear from Devin Scott today! Devin is a therapist and coach who helps people reconnect with their own inner wisdom and move through life in a way that feels real and authentic. He blends body based coaching, mindfulness, and psychological insight in a way that feels supportive without being overwhelming, and he works with so many people who are tired of playing "the game" and ready for something deeper. His perspective is thoughtful, fresh, and so needed. You're going to love him! 

In this episode:

• What Leela is and how it uses emotional states to reflect the ups and downs of life
• How cultural messages and expectations can create conflicting pressures
• Why so many people end up performing instead of living as themselves
• How shame and identity struggles show up in the nervous system
• Why everyday pleasure matters and how it helps people move through heavy emotions
• Why pleasure can feel uncomfortable or selfish during painful or uncertain times
• How to get back to your own meaning, agency, and self trust

Connect with Devin
Website: FindYourMeaning.coach

Support the show

Connect with Rachel!
Instagram: @The_Rachel_Maine
Website: https://linktr.ee/WellnessSexpertise
YouTube: YouTube.com/@OwningYourSexualSelf
Facebook: Rachel Maine
Email: therachelmaine@gmail.com

Hey, hey! We're back with another episode of the Owning Your Sexual Self podcast! This week I'm joined by Tash Doherty! Tash is a writer, creator, and voice for shameless sexuality. She has a gift for turning personal experiences into stories that inspire others to embrace their desires without apology. From her bold perspective on pleasure to her passion for helping people release shame, Tash brings energy, honesty, and creativity to every project she takes on. In this episode she shares her journey and the exciting new journal she is bringing into the world.

In this episode:

• Tash shares her background and what inspired her work
• The role of shame in early sexual experiences and how she learned to release it
• The power of asking for what you need in intimacy
• Writing as a tool for reflection and self discovery
• The journey of creating the world’s first sex journal for women
• What makes the journal unique and how it blends poetry with prompts
• How sexuality impacts every area of life
• A really fun Q&A to close out the episode

Thank you so much for listening!  Don't forget to share on your social media and tag me if you loved this episode! 

Resources
Substack - MissEducated.Substack.com
Website - TashDoherty.com

Connect with Tash
Instagram - @tashdoherty_
Instagram - @misseducated_

Support the show

Connect with Rachel!
Instagram: @The_Rachel_Maine
Website: https://linktr.ee/WellnessSexpertise
YouTube: YouTube.com/@OwningYourSexualSelf
Facebook: Rachel Maine
Email: therachelmaine@gmail.com

This week I've got Elan on all the way from San Diego! She's here to talk about having a pleasure led life, and how she came into sexual empowerment after religious trauma.

Who is Elan?
Elan is a self expression and sexual empowerment coach who specializes in helping individuals embody their most confident selves in life, relationships, and business. 

How did she get to where she is now?
Her parents, while not religious themselves, would force her to go to church because they thought that would give her a good life and allow her to be raised with good morals and ethics and all of that.
As a result from all of these the ways that she was raised, she learned how to really silence her own voice and her own opinions to keep the peace and to be the harmonizer. She would notice that in every romantic relationship she was feeling like she couldn't be herself, and there's so many layers to that;  fear of intimacy, ultimately not knowing how to communicate and coming to these like big, big statements of like, 'Okay, well let's just break up because we clearly are not in alignment.'
She also experienced things like faking orgasms, not being herself, not even knowing that she could orgasm with a partner, not knowing that she could actually experience pleasure with anybody, thinking that she was broken.
Then she entered into a relationship with her now partner Shane which completely flipped her world upside down.  His presence in her life just showed her so much of her own shit and showed her so much opportunity for growth. So here she is today,  a completely different person. She's teaching and coaching and mentoring other women, how to do the same for their life for what feels good for them.

"I think really having the foundation of freedom to be your full self and not feeling that pressure to try to be validated in romantic partnership was huge. Also just having that camaraderie with your partner in being like, let's just like explore together and see where this takes us."

What does living a pleasure led life mean?
It's really important to understand the ways that you, me, we have all been conditioned to believe that pleasure is bad in whatever form or sinful or that having too much pleasure is not a good thing. Just having the awareness around the subconscious stories of sex and pleasure is huge, that's the foundation. Once you have the awareness, once you have that base understanding of where you're at why you've been doing what you've been doing, then you can really start to embrace a new way.
Where are your energy leaks?  When you have energy leaks, you're not in a good space, you're not letting the energy flow through your body and you're not letting that energy flow through. You're not feeling pleasure, you're not feeling good, you're feeling stressed, overwhelmed, anxious, all the things.
Living a pleasure led life doesn't mean that you are avoiding the opposite.
It doesn't mean you're avoiding pain or discomfort. Living a pleasure led life means you really embrace it all. You really embrace your emotions the whole rainbow and the whole spectrum you really lean into your pain because the amount of pleasure that you can allow into your life is respective to the amount of pain that you're able to hold as well.
It's not about pushing all of the shit down we have to work through that, that shit and and shame right to be able to get to the other side of having more pleasure show up in our life.
"Where pleasure is present, shame is not" 

Connect with Elan
Instagram & TikTok: @Elan.Zel

Support the show

Connect with Rachel!
Instagram: @The_Rachel_Maine
Website: https://linktr.ee/WellnessSexpertise
YouTube: YouTube.com/@OwningYourSexualSelf
Facebook: Rachel Maine
Email: therachelmaine@gmail.com

I have another wonderful guest on with me today, Catherine Magee. She’s here to start the conversation around women's sexual health and pleasure and why we should all be talking about it!

How did she get into the sexual health industry?
I've spent the majority of my career in the beauty industry. One of the reasons I've always loved it is because it really focused on having women build their confidence, feeling beautiful, and doing all these great things for people while not taking it too seriously. I just couldn't believe what a difference there is. In beauty, we are trying to create beautiful brands and beautiful products that improve women's beauty and wellness and make them feel confident. And sexual wellness, particularly personal lubricants, doesn't do that at all.
Every time we talk to somebody about that experience of going down the aisle in the supermarket they feel ashamed as if something is wrong with them. And we just said this should not be the case, we need to change that.

Why is including certain things in your lubricant so important to you?
We create a product that's lubricating and moisturizing and silky but also good for the vagina. What we've learned through this process is the overlap between sexual pleasure and sexual health and how women are using a lubricant because we feel like we need it. But the fact of the matter is we can all improve our sexual pleasure with using this product and by improving our sexual pleasure, we're actually improving our reproductive health.

Why is using Lubricant important?
I think number one, like, let's focus on the pleasure challenge. We know through various studies and statistics that lubricant improves orgasm because you're just reducing any kind of friction. Using lubricant also decreases your chances of having urinary tract infections. Over 80% of urinary tract infections are correlated with sexual intercourse. So for either one of those reasons, it's an easily available product to try and bring into the bedroom.  

Are there any things that you feel the beauty industry has taught us when it comes to sexual health?
I often compare it to mascara, mascara companies don't say, oh, your eyelashes are brittle and dry and they look terrible. They say wear mascara, it'll make your eyelashes thicker and it'll make you feel beautiful and confident. That message Is what the beauty industry, you know, the good brands are communicating and that is not happening in sexual health.

What products do you offer at Playground?
We consider ourselves a science based sexual wellness company. And so our first line of products are libido enhancing, clean personal lubricants. Our one big difference for our water based brand is that a little goes a long way. We use an ingredient that's a silicone like plant based ingredient because we know that women don't like it sticky, and we don't like to reapply, we want it to last a long time. And we thought that's what was not happening, so we made it happen. 

Can men use these products too?
Playground products are for everybody. They're just specially formulated for vaginas because vaginas have so much more complexity to them and we just wanted to be really thoughtful about that. So what I say is if it's safe for a vagina, then it's safe for everything.

I always say we take our products very seriously, but we don't take ourselves very seriously. We say we're up for fun, down for anything. Nice girls finish first. 

Connect with Playground!
Instagram - @Hello.Playground

Support the show

Connect with Rachel!
Instagram: @The_Rachel_Maine
Website: https://linktr.ee/WellnessSexpertise
YouTube: YouTube.com/@OwningYourSexualSelf
Facebook: Rachel Maine
Email: therachelmaine@gmail.com

This week Danny and I are back and talking about our experience with couples coaching and how it led to The Connected Couple!

Why did we do couple's coaching?
I was so excited to be able to do this because for for me being in this work, being on the other side of it I knew was going to be a different experience. Even though I had introduced some of these things to Danny before, it's different when you're being facilitated through something like this.

Why was it different?
I really liked that because it was just so much different than just us kind of sitting down watching TV and then all of a sudden one of us is like hey what do you acknowledge about me? What do you love about me? It’s keeping awkwardness out of bringing it up in just any conversation. So it's so much easier to just let things fly.

What happened in this coaching?
Eye gazing was something that we did almost every single call and is such a great technique for us to be able to come together. 
There's other people in the group and they were doing it too, these were all couples from all over the world. Some people were nomads, like literally zooming from their Rvs, like talk about no excuses to do something like this. On our very first call, we got to learn a little bit about each other and all of us were going through the same things. We or we had been through the same things that each other were going through.

Was there any resistance to participate?
I wouldn't say that I was holding too much back. I definitely felt that being in that container, it was so much easier to allow myself to kind of just let things out and be a part of it. Just bring everything in and let everything out because at that point, if you're trying to hold something back, but then you're seeing everyone else just express themselves in a way that really is just truly vulnerable, then why not just why not keep going with it?
These are things that you think about on the daily but then to express them and share them while looking your partner in the eye and not being able to look away and like just being seen and heard in myself and just trusting that your partner is going to receive what you’re saying. 

 What have been the biggest benefits?
Just trusting in each other.  If you have something to say, you trust that the other person is going to recognize what you're going through and express back  the gratitude that you're expressing that feeling.
That has carried over in our relationship even now after this program is over. It's really set the tone and set the stage for us to continue having these conversations and more in depth conversations. We also discovered so much about ourselves sexually. We got to talk through fantasies and we learned the blueprints of each other's sexual languages, all these things.

How would you describe The Connected Couple?
If you are looking to just upgrade your relationship and life without really feeling like it's on the brink of disaster. I feel like it's just finding out more about you and more about your partner and just taking that and running with it. 
Even after the program is complete, you're gonna be able to take these tools and things that we're teaching you and carry them on into your life. It’s also for couples that are wanting to learn more about their sexual selves or wanting to learn more about their partner, they're wanting to maybe explore more of their kinks and things like that. All of that is covered in a connected couple.

Resources

Support the show

Connect with Rachel!
Instagram: @The_Rachel_Maine
Website: https://linktr.ee/WellnessSexpertise
YouTube: YouTube.com/@OwningYourSexualSelf
Facebook: Rachel Maine
Email: therachelmaine@gmail.com

Hey guys! This week you'll be hearing a live recording of a Masterclass Danny and I did called How to Sex up your Space!

Why is setting and sexing up your space so important?
Women generally fall into the category of responsive desire, meaning we need something to happen for our bodies to respond to that thing for us to then feel turned on. Whereas men generally fall into spontaneous desire to where they are just walking through life and it's like a lightning bolt hits them and they're like, boom, I'm turned on. 
I had entered into our space and literally like everything that I saw, I could immediately feel the warmth from the space here. I was able to walk into that experience and just already feel so seen and so held and like frankly turned on like, ready to play, ready to do the damn thing. 

How do you start to sex up your space?
The first one we really put together is a Bluetooth speaker, and just play a sexy to you playlist.
Next, get yourself some bedding that feels sexy to you. Get whatever color you want, fuzzy blankets, velvety textures. Think sexy, sensual textures that feel really good to you.
The most important thing, and something that is on our current list to get ourselves, is a waterproof blanket. Easy to wash. They're still soft. It's not like that plasticity sort of material, it's still plush, it's cozy.
Another thing is color changing light bulbs. They come with this remote and there are all these different colors. So you got reds, oranges, blues, greens and you can dim them down, you can brighten them up and that itself changes the entire scenery of the room.
Add in some yummy smells to the room. If it's essential oils, I would recommend lavender, rose, and then ylang ylang. If you're gonna go with candles, you know find some nontoxic scented candles that would work for you. And then incense, which is probably my favorite. I feel like they just fill the room the most. If you want to go more on the safety side of candles, flameless candles. So they're kind of scattered all throughout the room, but again, it just adds a little bit more to your ambience.
Having the room warm is basically essential. So if you don't wanna turn up your thermostat or anything like that, you can add in a space heater. If I'm frigidly cold it's really hard for me to get in the mood or to feel sexy or to want to take my clothes off or want to get out of my lingerie, so adding in a space heater is necessary.
Artwork, things that inspire eroticism for you. Things that like you see and you feel are are sexy to you.

We're in this space, what the hell do we do now?
That's what The Connected Couple is for.
This program that we're running is going to look very similar to this, except we're not going to be just teaching you the whole time, we're gonna be teaching you a thing and then your you and your partner are gonna be doing the thing. It is also so inspiring to hear other couples sharing, to hear that another couple is going through a struggle that maybe you went through, or are going through now, but you can relate.
When you feel connected sexually in your relationship, everything else just starts to fall into place. The mental health starts to get better, the physical health starts to get better. Sex really is the center of everything and when that is good, everything else is gonna be good.

Resources
Sex Up Your Space

Support the show

Connect with Rachel!
Instagram: @The_Rachel_Maine
Website: https://linktr.ee/WellnessSexpertise
YouTube: YouTube.com/@OwningYourSexualSelf
Facebook: Rachel Maine
Email: therachelmaine@gmail.com

Today you’ll be hearing from a different voice, my husband Danny. He’s here to talk about his journey in men’s developmental work, and what it’s been like for him so far.

Why did Danny start men's work?
In my background with my friends, it’s been so much of a frat boy kind of lifestyle. And that’s just how I always thought men were. You hold back tears, and you talk shit to each other.  You don’t understand or express feelings.

What is men’s work?
The biggest thing for me was getting introduced too it because Rachel had been doing this work with Sex and Love Co, she was light years ahead of me. It really made me curious on what it tended to be like, what these retreats were like, and what these zoom calls were. It was a curiosity, that’s how it all started.
I got on a zoom call with the conscious bro himself, Jordan Bowditch with Sex and Love Co. The call was just this guy bullshittin' on a zoom, asking what I was looking to do, and what I wanted to do with my life.
The first time I jumped into a men’s group was September of 2021. It was zoom calls once a week with about 10 guys. Some of them had already been in their journey, but I hadn’t experienced any of this before. Right off the bat it was “let’s share, who’s willing to share and open up to all these strangers on zoom”. I was the last one to share in the first few zoom calls, or wasn’t expressing or saying what I was feeling, I was just watering everything down. 
I took the next men’s group off. I started settling into my new career, I was learning all the things, and getting good at it. I then jumped into the men’s group in August of 2022, Jordan was really pushing me to go to a retreat. Finally I had a call with Jordan and I was really in a “fuck yeah” mood for the whole call, so I said yes, I’m going to this retreat. Rachel had already gone to a couple, and she always come home so inspired, and her body and her mind were so clear to her, so I said it’s my fucking turn.

What was the retreat like?
It was nerve wracking as fuck. I don’t know any of these guys, I’ve never been on a retreat, I don’t know what to expect.  But getting to know these guys was awesome, we were all there for the same reason, we’re ready to jump in and take this new growth back home to our loved ones and families. Everyone is there and everyone is ready.
I won’t sugar coat the fact that that time there was the most exhilarating shit I’ve ever gone through in my life. There were tears and laughs and laughs. I feel like I grew a foot taller on just how much I brought back with me.

What did you learn?
All the shit that you can really accumulate as a human being without saying a single word, all the shit that can build up and completely hide away, you just can’t do that, you break yourself down after so long.  Being able to express your feelings in front of whoever you need to is really fucking powerful. Let the shit go that you know is holding you back. That’s really the biggest thing I learned, to better myself, and better my abilities as a lover, and as a friend, I need to let my shit go.

What about the post retreat life?
The “hangover” post retreat definitely hit a little bit. The first couple of days you feel like you’re on top of the world, you’re doing everything right and making all the right moves, but it’s so easy to drop back into old habits and tendencies you’ve embedded in your brain. I needed to be more present, more present in life, and with Rachel, because who the fuck wants to sit next to a zombie? It’s such a game changer to be more present a

Support the show

Connect with Rachel!
Instagram: @The_Rachel_Maine
Website: https://linktr.ee/WellnessSexpertise
YouTube: YouTube.com/@OwningYourSexualSelf
Facebook: Rachel Maine
Email: therachelmaine@gmail.com

I’m super excited about this episode! I have a doctor on today, and he’s here to talk about the medical benefits of vibrators and targeted vibrations. And ways to treat various ailments such as pelvic floor discomfort, vulva pain, discomfort during sex, vaginal dryness, and erectile dysfunction.

Dr. Soum Rakshit is the Co-Founder & CEO of award-winning sexual health company, MysteryVibe. Their mission is to make sexual health accessible to all – across all ages, genders & orientations.
In his role as CEO of MysteryVibe, he focuses on pushing the boundaries on R&D, customer experience and supporting their long-term goal of making sexual health an integral part of our overall health. Soumyadip passionately believes that by empowering people with actionable knowledge & purposeful innovation is the way to make this happen.

Why does he think it is that it is still so taboo to talk about these things?
A big challenge is often people aren’t aware of what they might be struggling with, or they don’t know that there can be solutions. And when they do seek solutions, the specialists they go to, might not know about all the solutions out there. It really comes down to lack of education and awareness. 

Often people think that their problems or pain are normal things that everyone experiences. It may be common, but it isn’t normal. You shouldn’t be experiencing pain during penetrative sex or any stimulation really. Men with ED will often think that if they don’t do anything about it, the problem will go away, but what ends up happening is it just continues to get worse, especially with anxiety now attached to it.

How often does he suggest people work with sex therapist, coach, or counselor?
As often as he can. 
‘We are engineers, we can build a really good product.  We are not chemists, we can’t make lubes. We’re not therapists, we can’t do therapy. But, there are amazing companies that do make lube. There are great places to find therapists, for whatever is the right match for you.  It’s finding the right collection of solutions, and making those available to people so people can easily get those.’

Like lubricants for women with menopause, often a first step can just be Lubricant for dryness. lube is a $10 investment that can sometimes significantly change the quality of life. It’s normal, it’s healthy, it’s not something kinky and special for very niche audiences.  Things like lubes, vibrators, or gels are very common things that anyone can try to see if that’s the solution for them.

What makes MysteryVibe products different than what you'd find in a sex shop?
They build everything with doctors to medical standards. The products have specific purposes. One mimics what a pelvic floor therapist would do, or one mimics what a urologist would do to stimulate the prostate. Every device is designed by the doctors and clinicians in that field who have a standard of care that they then recreate using adaptable devices that bend and reach the points that need vibration for blood flow. 

Where does he see the world of sex toys heading?
He hopes there will be more compliance, safety, and regulation focus. Not necessarily the same regulations they have to follow as a medical device company, but that more brands will use safety and following ISO standards as part of their marketing. We need it to be safe as a standard and not as an exception.  Brands should be opting in and educating their customers. There can still be many features, but they should all be safe to use.

Resources
Myster

Support the show

Connect with Rachel!
Instagram: @The_Rachel_Maine
Website: https://linktr.ee/WellnessSexpertise
YouTube: YouTube.com/@OwningYourSexualSelf
Facebook: Rachel Maine
Email: therachelmaine@gmail.com

Today I have on a very special guest today, Dr. Mathews! Dr. Mathews is a board certified OBGYN, minimally invasive gynecology surgeon, and NAMS certified menopause specialist.
As a mother and a wife herself, her goal is to help women of all ages to maintain their own quality of life while keeping up with the day to day needs of their families and careers. Her practice emphasizes the importance of patient education and empowerment to make the best possible decisions for themselves and their bodies.

It’s about creating a relationship where women feel open to talk about it without being judged about it. There’s just an idea that that's just what happens when you get older and there’s nothing we can do about it. But there’s a lot we can do about it, menopause doesn’t have to be a death sentence, we can still have a very robust life in all different ways, in health, sexual health and everything.

Would she say that libido is more of a physical or mental problem typically for women?
It’s everything. It’s way more complicated than people realize. Especially for women the amount of things that need to come together to even get to the point of arousal, there are just so many aspects at play.

What are changes that women might see before menopause?
Menopause by definition is one whole year of not having a period during a natural unhindered cycle.
Perimenopause is the time leading up to it and that can start 5-7 years before actual menopause. Those years that can be filled with the symptoms that are typically known as menopausal symptoms without much or any disruption to your cycle.
Some of those symptoms are night sweats, hot flashes, difficulty sleeping, mood swings, irritability, depression and anxiety, weight gain. You might also experience vaginal dryness, less elasticity, more frequent vaginal infections or UTIs. 

What would she recommend for someone who is experiencing dryness?
You want a good quality lubricant. The considerations you’d take for something you’re going to put on your face, you need to do the same for your vagina. You want something that isn’t going to disrupt the microbiome's natural balance of things.

What tips would she give for someone looking to maintain a healthy sex life?
 Sometimes it’s a hormonal change and she starts local vaginal estrogen therapy. That’s one of the more common issues and you can correct that on a very basic level.
Self exploration! No one knows your body better than yourself. If anyone is going to figure out what’s going to help you get aroused or stimulate your anatomy, what you need to have on your mind, or what you need to watch, hear, or read to inspire those thoughts, that’s you! You can’t expect a partner to read your mind to that level. And that stuff can change, what worked for you in your 20’s might not work for you always.

If you’re looking for a doctor that is open to talking about this kind of thing?
The North American Menopause Society has a database of all the certified practitioners. They have to have conferences every year or take a crazy exam, so they’re definitely going to be on top of these things. They’re going to not only know about menopause but also sexual health, hormonal and physiological changes.

Menopause doesn't need to be the end of anything. It might not be an easy journey, but with the right resources, you can maintain a happy and healthy life and sex life.

Connect with Dr. Mathews
Website
North

Support the show

Connect with Rachel!
Instagram: @The_Rachel_Maine
Website: https://linktr.ee/WellnessSexpertise
YouTube: YouTube.com/@OwningYourSexualSelf
Facebook: Rachel Maine
Email: therachelmaine@gmail.com