Explorez tous les épisodes du podcast Pleasure Uprising: Desire, Attachment, and the Sex You Actually Want

What do you do when you’re always the one initiating sex, and you’ve started to dread reaching out?

This episode is for anyone who is tired of waiting for their partner to want sex, and it starts with the belief that keeps most people stuck: that the fix belongs entirely to the other person.

You are not imagining that something is wrong. A partner who avoids the subject doesn’t make the problem disappear, and this episode is not about letting anyone off the hook. It’s about the part that is yours to change, because waiting or pushing are the least powerful positions you can be in, and you have more room to improve the situation than it might feel like right now.

In this episode:

• Why pushing, pleading, cajoling, and pressuring backfire, even when they get you sex in the short run, and what they do to desire over time
• The difference between responsibility and blame, and why blame is never helpful
• Six signs you may be adding pressure without meaning to, including keeping a clock on how long it’s been, explaining why your partner should want it, and going cold after a no
• Why you can’t make someone want sex, but you can change the conditions so desire has room to show up
• What to do instead of asking: playful invitations with a clear out, and finding out what would feel good to their body

You don’t have to keep waiting. Taking responsibility for your side is not the same as taking the blame, and it’s the part of this you can start on this week.

Topics: partner doesn’t want sex, initiating sex, desire discrepancy, sexual rejection, pressure and desire, responsibility vs blame

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Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/

The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

A listener wrote in asking how to bring her male partner into her emotional experience of the sexual violence in the news. Especially without having to teach him everything first. I think many of you may have a similar question. So I made you an episode.

When sexual violence dominates the headlines, a lot of us end up either carrying it alone or doing the emotional labor of explaining our own pain to the people closest to us, with sometimes disappointing results. I wanted to offer a real way through that doesn’t ask you to choose between caring for yourself and being heard.

In this episode:

• Why naming your desire to be understood, even before you know how to say what you’re feeling, is itself a gift to your partner
• How to actually identify and name the emotions you’re carrying, rage, exhaustion, grief, fear, so you can ask for what you need
• A script for telling someone how you want to be received before you share something hard, instead of hoping they guess right
• The difference between a good response and a bad one, and what to do when your partner gets defensive
• Why this collective rage and exhaustion erodes desire, and what actually helps you come back into connection
• What men in your life need to hear, and why silence, even well-intentioned silence, doesn’t land the way they think it does

You don’t have to carry this by yourself, and you don’t have to be anyone’s teacher to be loved well. Let people show up for you.

Topics: sexual violence, rage, loss of desire, sexual trauma, relationship communication, intimacy coach

Resources mentioned: 

• My original article: "What We Actually Need From You Right Now" at Pleasure Uprising Substack
• Rage Becomes Her by Soraya Chemaly (book) — Simon & Schuster
• Believed (NPR podcast) — npr.org/podcasts/510326/believed
• Roll Red Roll (documentary) — PBS POV
• Know My Name by Chanel Miller (book) — Penguin Random House
• Missoula: Rape and the Justice System in a College Town by Jon Krakauer (book) — jonkrakauer.com

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/

The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

When nothing has worked to fix your sex life, it’s easy to decide nothing will. You’ve tried a few things, they didn’t help, and so you stop trying. I understand why. But that conclusion is a belief, not a fact, and it’s the belief that keeps people stuck in their relationships and sex lives for years.

I recorded this episode on a walk around my neighborhood, up the steep hill I’d been begrudging and semi-avoiding for months. Somewhere on the climb I realized the hill wasn’t the problem. My negativity bias was. The same is often true of the things you’ve decided can’t change in your relationship.

In this episode:

• Why avoiding a problem that feels hopeless makes it feel even more hopeless, and how that shows up as low energy, numbing, and overworking
• The belief that the past predicts the future, and why you already know it isn’t true 
• How I turned the hill I was dreading into my favorite loop, and what that reminded me about negativity bias
• Why hope isn’t something that falls from the sky and hits you in the head like an acorn, and the simple writing practice I use to build it
• What teaching kids and adults to swim showed me about believing change is possible
• Why every hard change I’ve made, from quitting smoking and drinking to earning a PhD and building a business, started with hope before I was ready to invest the time, effort, or money to actually do it

Hope is the part you build for free. And it has to come first.

Topics: feeling stuck in relationship, improving your sex life, negativity bias, avoidance, building hope, making change

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/

The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

This episode is about autism and sex, autism and intimacy, and the myths that keep autistic people from seeing what they bring to relationships. It's the first in a series on autism and relationships. 

A pattern I see in my work with autistic clients and their partners is that they come to me sure that the autism is the problem. It's usually not. There are usually just some specific needs to be addressed and some specific strengths to capitalize on. Plus, most autistic people I work with benefit from even stronger doses of what neurotypical people benefit from: clear communication, practice, and a plan. 

In this episode: 

• Why "aromantic," "asexual," "no empathy" and "not interested in partnership" don't describe autistic people as a group at all 
• The double empathy problem: autistic and non-autistic people misread each other in both directions, and only one side gets called deficient  
• Why asexuality, demisexuality, queerness and gender fluidity show up more often in autistic people, and why none of that is a problem to solve 
• The autistic strengths that also make great lovers
• Sensory needs in sex (lighting, sound, smell, texture, pressure, pacing) and how to negotiate them like any other preference 
• Why needing sensory downtime is not rejecting your partner 
• What my client actually needed: not better "reading," but explicit questions, practice, and a plan 

Nothing about being autistic is a problem for relationships and intimacy. You have specific needs, like everyone else, and what's unique about you is likely what makes you a fantastic partner. 

Topics: autism and sex, autism and intimacy, neurodivergent relationships, double empathy problem, sensory needs, consent 

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/

The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

"I want to create a relationship with my body, my mind, pleasure and intimacy that is rooted in my values & freedom, without guilt or shame. I want to have sex with someone I'm not married to and not feel dirty or immoral the next day." 

That's what my client Amber wrote on her intake form in June. She rated herself a 1 out of 10. Ten weeks later, she rated herself a 10. In this episode, Amber and I talk about how she made that giant leap. 

This is a conversation about building sexual confidence after divorce and letting go of sexual shame. Amber grew up in purity culture and came to me when she was just starting to date again, worried that her desire was too much and feeling that her job in bed was to make the other person comfortable. She tells you what she practiced to shift into owning her pleasure, receiving pleasure without shame, and letting go enough to get back into her body and enjoy the way it responds instead of judge it. She also talks about learning to accept her own desires and preferences for relationship, rather than worrying about being "too much" or assuming having needs means you have an attachment problem (which is not necessarily true). 

In this episode: 

• How Amber learned to receive: lying back, being seen in pleasure, and accepting her face, her sounds and her shaking legs instead of being embarrassed by them 
• What changed when she said her fantasies out loud to someone who didn't flinch, after years of feeling "insatiable" and dirty for wanting so much 
• The anatomy lesson, mirror work and daily breath practice that changed how she feels about her vulva 
• Asking for what she wants without apologizing, including an orgasm before penetration 
• Why sex stopped hurting once foreplay took as long as her body needed 
• How she went from freezing or fawning to saying no out loud, starting with low-stakes role play 
• Why wanting more contact from a partner wasn't anxious attachment. It was having needs and not getting them met 
• The sentence she prepared for the morning after, so shame didn't get the first word. 

Amber got here by listening to what her body asked for, one small decision at a time, and practicing until she trusted herself. If you're starting over after divorce, struggling with people-pleasing, feeling like you're "too much," or still hearing the voice of religious shaming in your head, this one is for you. 

Topics: sexual confidence, sex after divorce, sexual shame, receiving pleasure, purity culture, boundaries 

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/

The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

If you want to last longer in bed, the stopwatch is probably not your biggest problem. Most men who orgasm faster than they want to are carrying performance anxiety, and it shows up as tension in the pelvic floor, tension in the whole body, and a habit of pulling away from the person they're with.

Here's the thing. When researchers asked women whose partners came quickly what distressed them most, the top answer was not how fast it happened. It was his lack of attention and his focus on his own performance. This episode is for men who come faster than they want to, and for the partners who love them.

In this episode:

• Why partners are usually upset about the shame and the withdrawal, not the clock, and what research says about average time to orgasm
• How anxiety, pelvic floor tension, and old masturbation habits train your body to orgasm fast
• A five-minute breath and pelvic floor practice, plus how to slow down and ride the waves in self-pleasure
• What to say to your partner, whether you're the one struggling with PE or the one who's partner is struggling
• How to take the pressure off tonight, before any practice has time to work
• Where cock rings, positions, and medication fit, and when to see a doctor

Lasting longer is worth working on. But staying present and engaged with your partner, whether you've orgasmed or not, is what your partner will remember, and that part you can start right now.

Topics: how to last longer in bed, lasting longer, performance anxiety men, premature ejaculation, early ejaculation, pelvic floor exercises for men 

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/

The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

If you ask your partner "do you want to have sex?" and they say no almost every time, the problem might not be desire. Seriously. 

It's the question. Responsive desire doesn't show up to that question. It shows up in response to something tangible happening that enables desire. So if nothing has happened yet, there's nothing there to say yes to. That's not rejection. That's an honest answer to a question that can't be answered yet.

Responsive desire is also the most common form of desire in long-term relationships, and in most adults over 40, regardless of gender, in my practical experience. Almost nobody depicts it that way, so a lot of people think something's wrong with them for having it.

Today I'm going to help you understand responsive desire and how to navigate it, including how to make more effective invitations. 

In this episode:

• What responsive desire actually is, and why it works like breadcrumbs rather than a switch
• Why asking for sex point blank almost always gets a no from a responsive desire person, and why that's not the problem it looks like
• Why no has to be genuinely safe before yes becomes possible, and why nobody is ever entitled to their partner's body
• What to actually ask for instead of asking for sex, and how to build a "menu" of what generally feels good
• The exact conversation to have before you're in bed, not during
• How to avoid the pitfall of turning a good night into next time's obligation
• Why this matters even more if you're neurodivergent, and what pathological demand avoidance (PDA) has to do with it

If you give yourself real time and space, with no predetermined destination, desire tends to show up. You just can't demand it in advance.

Topics: responsive desire, initiating sex, sexual rejection, desire discrepancy, consent, neurodivergence and intimacy

Links to other episodes mentioned:

Saying No Vs. Rejection: https://laurajurgens.com/138-sexual-rejection-vs-saying-no/

The Freedom Wound: https://laurajurgens.com/137-the-freedom-wound-why-you-say-yes-when-you-want-to-say-no/

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/

The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

You know what you struggle with in bed, and you're probably pretty hard on yourself about it. But if I ask what you're good at, do you go blank? Focusing on our deficits is just what brains do, but it costs us more than we think.

You're not broken, and you are not starting from zero.

I spend a lot of time on this show talking about what gets in the way. Shame, performance, the stories you absorbed about your body. That work matters. But there's a flip side that gets overlooked: you almost certainly have sensual and sexual strengths right now that you have never once given yourself credit for. The things that come easily to us just feel like the water we swim in, so we assume everyone has them and we don't count them as anything.

And that costs you, because when all you can see is the gap between where you are and where you want to be, you start using that gap as proof you'll never get there.

In this episode:

• Why fixating on what's missing quietly undermines your ability to get there
• The tale of two Lauras: the softball season I quit before it ended, and the Olympic weightlifting I'm still doing and loving
• How measuring backwards from where you started keeps motivation alive
• Sixteen categories of sensual and sexual superpowers, from knowing your erogenous zones to flirting, receiving, consent, imagination, and taking your time
• Why nobody has all of them, and why you don't have to work on everything
• An exercise to find your own, and what to do once you have the list

Getting out of performance isn't only about putting down the act. It's also about finding out what's underneath it and owning that. You can't stop performing if you don't believe you have anything real to offer without the performance. You do.

Topics: sexual confidence, sexual self-esteem, body confidence, embodiment, pleasure, sexual shame

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/

The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

I used to break up with the good ones. The kind, available, clearly-into-me ones. Not because I got bored. Because it made my skin crawl. I knew it was bad for me, but I didn't fully understand why I felt that way until I learned to feel worthy, twenty years later.

This is the final episode in my series on attachment wounds and how they shape desire and relationship dynamics. Today's is the worth wound: the belief that love has to be earned. We talk about how this impacts relationships and, among other things, turns intimacy into performance instead of presence.

In this episode:

• Where the worth wound gets built in childhood, even in loving families, and why high-achieving or scarcity-driven households produce it so reliably
• How it shows up differently in the body: sexual numbness or pain in people with vulvas, erectile difficulty or hypersexuality in people with penises, both tied to performance anxiety 
• Why being fully wanted by someone who's clearly into you can feel like an ick instead of a relief, and what that reaction is actually protecting you from
• The two erotic pathways this wound creates, why playing with them can be healing if you know how to ask a partner for the right stuff, and how to tell which one your fantasies are running
• How this wound plays out in long-term relationships: testing partners, over-functioning, and the black hole dynamic where nothing your partner offers ever feels like enough
• The two-part practice for healing it: soothing the inner child parts that hold the not-enoughness, then practicing being instead of doing
• The sentence most worth-wound carrying people crave from themselves and their loved ones

You are not required to perform your way into being loved. That was never the deal, even when it felt like it was. You get to just be wanted.

Topics: feeling unworthy, attachment wounds, dissociating during sex, feeling numb during sex, performance anxiety men, people pleasing

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/

The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

She wanted more sex with her husband. She flirted. She invited him to bed. She was not subtle. And he had an entire set of moves for avoiding it. Staying up working late. Taking a very long shower and hoping she'd be asleep by the time he came to bed. Acting harried, a quick peck, roll over.

He almost never said no out loud. He told me directly that he was avoiding saying it because he didn't want to hurt her feelings. He thought that was the kind version.

It was so much worse than a no would have been. Because what she was receiving, night after night, was not "not tonight." It was "I don't want you."

Here's the punchline, straight out: a no and a rejection are not the same thing. A no is information about this moment. A rejection is the withdrawal of connection. Most of us have collapsed them into one thing, and it's costing us.

In this episode:

• Why a no is just one piece of data about right now, and a rejection is something you do with your body and your attention
• The two reasons people overstate their no: not feeling entitled to say it, and never having seen it done well
• What the nonverbal rejection dance does to a relationship over time, and why invitations eventually stop happening altogether
• A four-step way to say no out loud and stay connected while you do it
• What to do if you're the one receiving it, because this is not a one-person job
• Why the desire for an orgasm and the desire for connection are different wants, and what happens when you conflate them
• Other ways of connecting, and why most of my clients turn out to want to feel wanted more than they want sex at any given moment (regardless of gender)

You can say no as often as it's true. A no is a gift of trust. It's the rejection that does the damage, and those are two completely different dances. This episode will show you how to separate them. 

Topics: sexual rejection, saying no to sex, desire discrepancy, mismatched libido, responsive desire, feeling rejected by partner

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/

The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

Picture someone who says yes to almost everything. They're helpful, they're loyal, they always show up. And yet there's always some reluctance. A headache. A tiredness. They take forever to get out the door. Underneath all that yes is a wagon load of resentment about being asked in the first place.

This shows up in bed exactly the way it shows up everywhere else. They think they want intimacy. They say they want it, and they probably mean it. But when the moment comes, their body does something else. If you ask what changed, they may genuinely not know.

This is episode four of the specific attachment wounds and erotic emotions series, and it's about what happens when a small child's no was not allowed. Around age two to five, we're supposed to discover that we get to decide things for ourselves, at least sometimes. When that gets squashed, or love is conditional on compliance, life turns into a series of obligations. The autonomy that never got a legitimate outlet goes underground into slowness, procrastination, and quiet resistance.

A lot of people with this wound have to be allowed to say no before they can find a yes. Not as a preference. As a requirement.

In this episode:

• Where the freedom wound comes from, and the two very different directions it goes depending on whether compliance actually earned love
• What it feels like from the inside, including the pride in enduring and the fury about having had to endure
• Why procrastination and slowness are the body's protest response, not a character flaw
• Why welcoming a partner's no is one of the most erotic things you can do, and why it's non-negotiable for this wound
• The paradox of chosen restraint, and why submitting to control you selected can feel like freedom
• Why dragging your partner into anything is the worst available strategy, and what to do instead
• How to start telling the difference between an obligated yes and a real one

There is nothing wrong with you. This was a wise strategy for a small person who wasn't allowed to have preferences. You're allowed to have them now.

Topics: sex feels like obligation, people pleasing in relationships, resentment in relationships, saying no, attachment wounds

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/

The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

A man came to me because his marriage was close enough to over that they'd both used the word divorce. Underneath the resentment and the withdrawal and the fights about everything else was this: his erections came and went. Sometimes they softened partway through. Sometimes they didn't show up.

That is normal. It happens to men at every age. But he was so ashamed of it that he avoided sex with his wife for ten years. She had guessed, and she had told him more than once that it did not matter to her. He did not believe her.

We solved it in about four sessions. None of the actual problems were about his penis. They were about the shame, the silence, the misdirected anger, and the avoidance.

This is the third episode in my body shame series, and it's the one for people with penises. I'm giving you the real numbers on size, hardness, and duration, because they are nothing like what porn taught you. Then I'm going through each specific worry with a fix that gets you both more pleasure and less anxiety.

In this episode:

• Where penis shame comes from, and what porn does to your subconscious when you don't get better information
• The actual average erect length, from clinician-measured data on over 55,000 men, plus what's normal variation (hint: 3" is as normal as 7")
• Why 85% of women are satisfied with their partner's size while only 55% of men are satisfied with their own, and what to do about size, regardless of yours
• The single change that solves lasting-longer anxiety better than any technique, and why stopping sex when you orgasm is the real problem
• Why 75 to 80% of women don't orgasm from penetration alone, and what that means for where your anxiety is aimed
• How performance anxiety physically restricts blood flow, and why you cannot will an erection into existence by worrying at it
• Specific fixes for size concerns, a genuinely small penis, erections that fluctuate, delayed ejaculation, aging, and lower desire
• What women consistently report actually caring about

Your penis was never the problem. Don't spend any more years of your life creating unnecessary misery because of shame about it.

Topics: erectile dysfunction anxiety, penis size, delayed ejaculation, premature ejaculation, how to last longer, what women want in bed

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/

The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

I used to chase accomplishment hard, and I dismissed soft skills and people skills entirely — mostly because I had no idea how to do them. I'd put on this dissociated charm self when I met new people, which wasn't connection at all. It was a disarming move. If I could charm you first, you couldn't get to me. Underneath all of it was a deep fear of being publicly rejected.

A close colleague of mine has the same wound and it looked nothing like that from the outside. Hers came out as passive aggression, eye rolls, indirect judgment, the quiet withdrawal of approval. Underneath: a deep fear of humiliation. Two different flavors of the same armor, both doing the same job of not letting anyone get close enough to make us feel small.

This is episode three of the attachment wounds and erotic emotions series, and it's about the trust wound — what happens when your openness got used against you, and you concluded you'd never be in that position again.

The paradox at the center of it: the erotic emotion people with this wound most often crave is the exact thing they've spent their lives defending against.

In this episode:

• Where the trust wound comes from, and why humiliation specifically drives manipulation as a coping response
• The two developmental paths, depending on how old you were when it happened
• What it feels like from the inside, including the constant low-level tracking of who has power in a room
• Why the powerful poles — revered, dominant, worshiped, unattainable — show up as the obvious turn-ons, and what's often underneath them
• How this shows up in relationships: guilt tripping, triangulation, passive aggression, and pseudo-connection
• Why the vulnerability play that can heal this needs serious aftercare, and what happens if you get dropped
• What actually changed for both me and my colleague, including what she discovered was a real turn-on

Vulnerability is not the thing that makes you vulnerable. Look around at how many people are working to avoid it. It isn't making them any safer. It's just keeping them from being known.

Topics: fear of humiliation, why is it so hard to be vulnerable, passive aggressive relationship, invulverable

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/

The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

Around 40, I realized I felt disgust about my own genitals. I'd been carrying middle school bullies' words about female bodies in my head for more than thirty years without ever once questioning them, and it wasn't until I started trying to reclaim my own sexuality that it smacked me in the face. It's very hard to feel pleasure in a part of your body you feel bad about.

If any of that lands, you are in extremely good company, and I want you to know it is not personal, not yours alone, and not permanent.

This episode covers where female genital shame comes from, why it's more layered than penis shame, and the exact four-step process I used to repair my own relationship with my vulva. Plus the myths worth dismantling on the way: that vulvas are dirty, that porn vulvas resemble real ones, and that "vagina" is the right word for the parts that actually give you pleasure.

A scope note: this episode addresses cis women's experience specifically. Trans people with vulvas face distinct and important challenges with genital shame that deserve dedicated coverage, and I'm working with a trans colleague on a collaborative episode on that.

In this episode:

• Where vulva shame comes from, and the strange contradiction at the center of it — women are the only sex with an organ that exists purely for our own pleasure
• Why middle school is so often where genital shame gets installed, and what's actually going on for the boys doing the installing
• The dirty myth, and why calling a vulva dirty makes about as much sense as calling a flower dirty
• Why porn vulvas aren't real-world vulvas, and how to normalize the actual range
• Vulva versus vagina, why the distinction matters for your pleasure, and how to pick language that works for you
• My four-step repair process: acknowledging the harm, normalizing through exposure, mirror work, and a daily gratitude practice
• The eviction exercise — identifying whose voice is actually in your head, and taking away their vote

There is no downside to loving your genitals. None. And on the other side of that shame is considerably more pleasure than you currently have access to.

Topics: vulva shame, genital shame, body shame, labia, women's pleasure

Resource Links: https://www.labialibrary.org.au/labia_gallery/ 
https://www.all-vulvas-are-beautiful.com/
https://www.thevulvagallery.com

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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

One partner wants sex constantly and can't understand why they're being refused. The other has quietly stopped wanting it at all and feels like they're constantly being pestered. Most people assume these two have opposite problems. Often times, they don't. They have the same challenge underneath, but they are coping in different ways.

We're going beyond the standard "anxious or avoidant" here. Most of us learned early on whether care was something we could count on, and when the answer was unreliable, we did what smart, adaptive human children do: we picked a coping strategy and got very good at it. There are two main choices children make — pursue harder, or stop needing.

Those two roads lead to very different adults, very different ways of existing in relationships, and very specific erotic desires. This episode will help you understand the challenges, drawbacks, opportunities, and desires that come from each path, and how to work with those to have better connections, easier relationships, and a more satisfying sex life.

This is episode three of the attachment wounds and erotic emotions series, and the second one on specific wounds.

In this episode:

• Where the dependency wound comes from, including causes that have nothing to do with bad parenting and everything to do with circumstances that made consistent attunement hard
• The two survival strategies it creates, and what each one actually feels like from the inside
• Why the under-dependent's deepest erotic craving is often identical to the over-dependent's, just buried under years of pretending it isn't there
• How both patterns land on a partner, in and out of bed
• Why over-dependents and under-dependents are drawn to each other, and why that match can go sideways fast
• What movement actually looks like for each, including the single most important thing an under-dependent can do before they quietly shut someone out for good

Your needs are real. Both sides of this wound are just different ways of coping with the same early experience, and you can learn to count on care being there.

Topics:  anxious avoidant attachment, my partner never wants sex, sex feels like obligation, mismatched libido couples, desire discrepancy

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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

Body shame is pervasive, especially for women but increasingly for everyone, and it gets in the way of much more than how we feel in a swimsuit. It gets in the way of presence, pleasure, and our capacity for real connection. This is the first episode in a series I'm doing on body shame. If you've ever been so in your head about how you look that you couldn't stay present with a partner, or with yourself, this one is for you.

I walk through where body shame actually comes from (spoiler: it's not truth, or you, that's the problem), the business model built on manufactured insecurity, the medical misinformation and racial history behind our cultural obsession with weight, and why shaming yourself has never once helped anyone change. I also share the exact steps I used to move from shame to neutral to genuinely loving my body.

In this episode:

• Why body shame kills presence, pleasure, and desire, and why underconfidence itself isn't sexy
• Where body shame really comes from: family, culture, diet culture, and a patriarchy that built this by design, not by accident
• The advertising strategy behind manufactured insecurity, including research on exactly when women feel worst about themselves
• Debunking the medical myths: why BMI was never built to measure individual health, and why weight stigma itself, not weight, is the real risk factor
• The racial history behind fat phobia and Eurocentric beauty standards, and how that bias still shows up in medicine today
• Why shaming yourself has never once helped you change, and what your inner rebel is actually trying to tell you
• My own story of hiding my arms for years, and finally wearing tank tops without a second thought
• "Point positive," the whitewater kayaking principle I now use to retrain my brain out of shame spirals
• The exact steps for shifting from shame to neutral to genuinely believing you're lovable and attractive exactly as you are

Topics: body image and sex, overthinking sex, get out of your head in bed, fatphobia, health at every size, mindset work for body image

Resources mentioned: Health at Every Size: The Surprising Truth About Your Weight, by Lindo Bacon, PhD  https://lindobacon.com/health-at-every-size-book/

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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

Part 2 of the Attachment Wounds & Erotic Emotions Series

Maybe you have a tendency to intellectualize or spiritualize your experience, but not always fully feel it. Or maybe you can only really arrive in your body when something intense is happening. This episode is about how that happens, how it shapes your erotic needs and the way you show up in intimacy, and what to do about it, if you choose. 

The safety wound is the earliest developmental wound we're covering in this series. It shows up in desires, in relationship, and in sex, plus in every day life where people with this wound have a tendency to dissociate. This episode is Part 2 in the Attachment Wounds and Erotic Emotions series — if you haven't listened to Episode 130 yet, start there first.

What Is the Safety Wound? Origins and Early Development

The safety wound forms in the very first stage of life — from the womb through infancy, before language, and before verbal memory as we know it. The unmet need is fundamental: a sense that the world is safe to exist in, and that the body is a safe place to be.

The causes can include traumatic birth, early separation from a birth mother through adoption or loss, time in a NICU, parental anxiety or depression, domestic chaos, overwhelming or unpredictable environments, or generational trauma. Often nothing was done consciously or intentionally. The body simply learned, very early, that being present was dangerous — and dissociation became the primary survival strategy. This is just a coping style, and it carries some challenges that can be worked with.

In this episode:

• What the safety wound is, where it comes from, and why it forms so early — before language, before memory
• Why dissociation here is a brilliant survival adaptation, not a pathology — and how I recognized it in my own experience
• How this wound is named across Hakomi, NARM, and the Somatica Institute® framework — and why the older Freudian label is worth leaving behind
• What the safety wound feels like from the inside: the floating quality, the empathy overload, the pull toward intellectualizing and spiritual bypassing — and the deep current of pain, fear, or rage that often lives underneath
• How the safety wound shapes erotic desire through two pathways: resolution (craving calm, merged, held, contained, seen) and repetition with agency (craving intensity, edge, risk, primal)
• Why craving dangerous or intense experiences in a chosen context makes complete sense for this wound — and why felt safety is still the prerequisite, even for the edgy stuff
• What the safety wound looks like in relationships: the connection that arrives and quietly disappears, and what partners tend to experience in bed
• What healing looks like for this wound — embodiment first — and why somatic work is more relevant here than therapy or spirituality alone

Companion resource for this series: The Wheel of Erotic Emotions → laurajurgens.com/wheel

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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

That thing that turns you on but you've never quite been able to explain? Or the relationship dynamic you keep recreating? Those aren't random. And they aren't fully explained by your attachment style.

This is the introduction episode for a series on attachment wounds and erotic desires. Before we get into the specific wound patterns, I'm laying the foundation — what attachment styles actually are, where they fall short, and how to understand attachment patterns beyond the standard (avoidant, anxious, disorganized or secure) boxes. We'll talk about how our childhood experiences and specific attachment wounds tend to lead to specific turn-ons. Plus, why that's good news and will help you de-shame your desires. 

In this episode:

• Why attachment styles are learned habits, not personality traits or life sentences
• How your attachment response shifts depending on who you're with, how they communicate, and the specific felt safety of that relationship
• Why the anxious/avoidant label doesn't capture the full picture — and what the deeper wounds underneath those patterns actually are
• A preview of the five developmental wounds this series explores: safety, dependency, trust, autonomy, and worth
• The core skills that underlie secure attachment — and why they're learnable, not fixed traits reserved for people who had easier childhoods
• How early unmet needs shape not just your relational patterns but your specific erotic desires — and why that connection makes complete sense once you see it

Companion resource for this series: 

Dr. R. Chris Fraley's attachment quiz at yourpersonality.net/relstructures/ — the most useful tool I've found for understanding your patterns in the context of specific relationships, not just in the abstract

The Wheel of Erotic Emotions — a visual map of common erotic emotions organized by category → laurajurgens.com/wheel

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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

If you're searching for how to be a better lover, chances are you're encountering a lot of opinions that aren't rooted in fact. Most of us absorbed a version of what makes a great lover without ever being taught it — from movies, porn, romance novels, and a culture that never corrects those images with reality. The result is a subconscious checklist that includes perfect technique, the right body, spontaneous chemistry, and orgasms that look like movie scenes. And most of us are quietly measuring ourselves and our partners against it.

Here's what the research actually says: none of that is what separates great lovers from everyone else.

Dr. Peggy Kleinplatz at the University of Ottawa spent years interviewing people having what she calls magnificent sex — the largest in-depth study of its kind — and what they described looks almost nothing like what we've been taught to aspire to. The traits that actually made the difference are learnable. And almost nobody is talking about them.

In this episode:

• The cultural myths most of us are still measuring ourselves against — and why they're not just unhelpful, they're actively in the way
• All eight traits Dr. Kleinplatz found in people having truly magnificent sex, and what each one actually means in practice
• Why the cure for low desire isn't more desire for the sex you're already having — it's more desirable sex

The book referenced in this episode is Magnificent Sex by Peggy Kleinplatz: https://www.routledge.com/Magnificent-Sex-Lessons-from-Extraordinary-Lovers/Kleinplatz-Menard/p/book/9780367181376

Topics: what makes a great lover, magnificent sex research, low desire, low libido, somatic sex coach, intimacy coach, feminist sex coach, embodiment, erotic intimacy, sexual communication, be a better lover

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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

You love your partner. You're pretty sure you're still attracted to them. So why does your body say no — and why does it feel so connected to the fact that you've reminded them three times this week to do one thing?

It is connected. The slow creep of feeling like your partner's parent is one of the most consistent desire-killers I see in my practice. In this episode I'm breaking down the three forms it takes, where each one comes from, and what actually moves the needle — whether you're the one carrying the household or the one wondering why your partner never wants sex anymore.

In this episode:

• The three patterns I see most: chore-based parenting, "good-boy syndrome," and anxiety-based reassurance-seeking — and how to recognize which one you're in
• Why your nervous system cannot be in caretaking mode and erotic mode at the same time, and why wanting to want your partner isn't enough to override that
• The flip side: why the person in the "child role" often has high desire and gets stuck in a loop they can't see from the inside
• Where this comes from — work-life balance issues, patriarchy and male learned helplessness on one end; the developmental roots of not being able to self-soothe on the other
• Why the frustrated-complaints approach keeps not working — and what I've seen actually work instead
• What moving out of this dynamic looks like, depending on which side of it you're on

Topics: parenting your partner, desire killer, low libido, not attracted to partner, emotional labor, mental load, resentment and desire, nervous system and sex drive, somatic intimacy coach, intimacy coach, relationship coach, male learned helplessness, self-soothing, attachment anxiety

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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

Most people who are experimenting with power play and BDSM aren't doing anything extreme. They're just two people who trust each other, trying to "spice it up." But skipping the negotiation conversation because it feels like it has to be a mood killer is a rookie move that can lead to real problems. 

I'm not talking bruises here, I'm talking about emotional distance, shut down, and loss of libido. 

This episode is built around a real couple — smart, communicative, good at relationships — who did years of power play without ever having a proper negotiation conversation, because they both assumed that trusting each other was enough. It wasn't. The fallout was a sexless relationship, nervous system shutdown, and a lot of hurt that took real work to untangle. 

I want to help you avoid that entirely.

Whether you're using restraints, doing impact, or just soft-topping: the negotiation is the first scene. Done right, it's not a clipboard and a liability waiver — it's where the anticipation starts, where you find out what your partner actually wants, where you start co-creating something that's going to be really, really good. This episode is about how to do that.

In this episode:

• Why smart, aware people keep skipping BDSM negotiation — and what it actually costs them
• What subspace is, why your prefrontal cortex goes offline in it, and why that means the bottom has to be an architect of the negotiation, not a passenger
• The real difference between topping/bottoming and dom/sub dynamics (and why accidentally agreeing to the wrong one causes relationship problems)
• How to make the negotiation desire-forward, not just limit-focused — starting with how you want to feel, who you want to be, and what energy from a partner opens you up
• Why aftercare isn't an afterthought, and how to talk about it before you play
• Where to find real community and credible resources if you want to go deeper

Whether you're kink-curious or have been playing for years, this one's worth your time.

Resources mentioned: 
Yes, No, Maybe Lists from various sources (pick your favorite): 
Babeland: https://www.babeland.com/babe-blog/how-tos/yes-no-maybe/
Bex Caputo: https://www.bextalkssex.com/yes-no-maybe/
Sunny Megatron: https://sunnymegatron.com/consent-sexual-boundaries-yesnomaybe/

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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

Sexual self-abandonment is what happens when we stop having sex for ourselves. We may or may not actually stop having sex -- we might be doing it for someone else. For their desire, on their timeline, their idea of what sex should look like, while our own wants, our own pace, our own boundaries quietly went missing somewhere along the way.

That's what this episode is about. How we get there — there are three really common pathways, and I've lived through all three myself — and more importantly, how to find your way back to your own body, your own desires, and your own pleasure. This episode is about hope, and about a door that's still open to you no matter how long you've been on the other side of it.

In this episode:

• The three pathways into sexual self-abandonment — through approval-seeking, through abusive relationships, and through trauma and dissociation — and why they so often overlap
• Why "sacred sexuality" group spaces can actually be dangerous if you haven't done this work yet
• The six steps back to yourself, including the grief that's part of the process (and why that grief is a good sign, not a setback)
• What it actually means to come home to your own body, your own erotic self, and your own yes and no — and why that's the foundation everything else gets built on

Topics: sexual self-abandonment, somatic sex coaching, sexual trauma recovery, de-shaming, erotic self, intimacy coach, body-based healing, dissociation, reconnecting with your body, feminist sex coach

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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

It's Pride Month, and I am celebrating with my dear friend and fellow feminist relationship coach Maggie Reyes by doing something I've been wanting to do anyway: sit down and talk about Heated Rivalry — the show, the books, why we love them, and what they actually teach us about real relationships.

Beware: There be spoilers ahead, matey. 

This is a fun one, and it goes deeper than fangirling. Maggie and I both coach on many of the dynamics this show depicts — vulnerability, shame, the cost of hiding your real desires, and what happens when someone finally has the courage to go first. We talk about how we can all learn from this show through that lens.

In this episode:

• Why the closet dynamic in Heated Rivalry is a perfect illustration of how shame works, and how to heal it
• Turning toward vs. turning away: what Shane and Ilya get right (eventually) and what costs them years
• What Scott and Kip's relationship models that most couples never figure out
• Why vulnerability requires someone going first — and how to do it without it backfiring
• The cottage episode as a masterclass in why time and play matter as much as hard conversations
• What women's response to this show tells us about desire, representation, and who mainstream sexual culture has never been built for
• The communication pitfall that we both want to warn you off

Maggie Reyes is a master certified life coach, feminist marriage coach, and host of the Marriage Life Coach podcast. Find her at maggiereyes.com.

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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

If you've been wondering whether your sex life can actually be different, this is the evidence.

This episode is like the before and after photos you've been needing that real people get real change. 

We're going into details about specific goals and what actually changes when people do real, structured work on desire, intimacy, and connection. Not inspiration. Not theory. Real people, real goals, real numbers — tracked from start to finish. 

In this episode:

• What people who come to somatic intimacy coaching actually say they want — and how many have already tried therapy, books, and everything else
• Why going from a 1 to an 8 in fulfillment on "fun, enjoyable sex" in six months is possible even when you've never been there before
• How desire discrepancy works when both partners get support — and why it's never just one person's problem
• What shifts for higher-desire partners who struggle with self-worth
• Why coaching moves the needle when other approaches haven't — and what the Pleasure Path Method actually looks like step by step

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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

You've solved harder problems than this. So why is this one still stuck?

This episode is for the high achievers who have done real work on themselves — the therapy, the books, the hard conversations — and still can't get traction when it comes to desire, intimacy, and their closest relationships. It's not because you haven't tried hard enough. It's because you've been using the wrong tools for the wrong system.

In this episode:

• Why capable, self-sufficient people are often the last to get help with intimacy — and why that costs them the most
• The cultural lie that you're supposed to just know how to do sex and relationships (and why it makes zero sense)
• Top-down vs. body-up: why cognitive tools and talk therapy can't reach what's actually stuck
• Why "trying harder" and "knowing more" can fool you into thinking they'll eventually work for everything
• What somatic, body-based work actually reaches — and what changes when you find the right tool for the real problem

Topics: high achievers, intimacy, somatic sex coaching, low libido, desire, nervous system, body shame, sex therapy, intimacy coach, relationship help

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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

Most people who feel disconnected from their desire, their body, or their partner aren't broken. They're just exiled — from themselves. And nobody ever taught them the way back.

This episode is about what it actually feels like when you find it. The felt sense of coming home to your own body's sexuality — as a resource, a grounding force, and the place from which real confidence, real connection, and real intimacy become possible.

I was skeptical this even existed. Then my teacher demonstrated it on me with nothing but eye contact — and my body responded before my brain could catch up.

In this episode:

• What sexual energy actually is — grounded, demystified, no woo required
• Why most of us have it locked away (and what that actually feels like from the inside)
• The breathwork and mind-body practice that opened it up for me — and how I now use it with clients
• What becomes possible from this place: confidence, connection, intensity, and desire that doesn't require performance
• Why this isn't something you have to earn or learn from scratch — you already have it
• A note on group settings, charismatic facilitators, and who this actually belongs to (you)

If you've ever felt like you were performing intimacy instead of inhabiting it — this one's for you.

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 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

You don't have to join a compound to end up in a high-control group. Sometimes it starts with a neo-tantra festival. A weekend workshop. A community that feels like finally, finally, you found your people.

Anke Richter is an international cult journalist, author of the bestseller Cult Trip (HarperCollins), and founder of Decult — the first cult awareness conference in Australasia. She spent six years inside ISTA (International School of Temple Arts) before becoming one of its most informed critics. She's also researched Centrepoint, Osho/Rajneeshpuram, and OneTaste firsthand.

This is Part 2 of a series. Start with the previous episode "The Men Behind Sexual Polarity Have A Lot to Answer For" — or read the full article on Substack (link below).

In this episode:

• Why smart, educated, well-resourced people end up in cults — and the myth that it couldn't happen to you
• What actually makes something a high-control group (and why "you can leave any time" doesn't disqualify it)
• How ISTA and similar neo-tantra spaces specifically target ex-evangelicals and ex-Mormons leaving purity culture
• The slippery slope from a weekend workshop to deeper entanglement — and what the escalation actually looks like
• Osho/Rajneeshpuram as the ideological origin of modern neo-tantra — and the documented child sexual abuse that history includes
• The playbook: how spiritual framing gets used to override consent and silence complaints
• "Acting from your wounding" and "stuck in victim consciousness" — the specific language used to shut down resistance
• The veneer of consent: why trauma-informed language and consent frameworks can be used as cover
• Why the word "victim" gets weaponized in these spaces — and why that needs to stop
• How David Deida's sexual polarity ideology functioned as a gateway into neo-tantra spaces for a generation of people, and why it is harmful

Resources mentioned:

• Cult Trip by Anke Richter — available wherever books are sold
  Anke Richter: https://ankerichter.net
  Decult — cult awareness conference and resources: https://decult.net
  Red Flags in Workshops — free consent-forward resource for participants and facilitators: https://redflagsinworkshops.com
  Part 1 — Have You Been Sold the Patriarchy's Version of "The Divine Feminine"?  https://open.substack.com/pub/laurajurgens/p/have-you-been-sold-the-patriarchys

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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

If you've ever left a sacred sexuality workshop feeling worse about yourself than when you walked in — or heard a friend blame herself for not being "receptive enough" — this episode is for you.

Sexual polarity teachings are everywhere right now. They promise to unlock your feminine energy, reignite desire, and deepen connection. Sounds great. The reality is different. They're built on a foundation of made-up science, cultural theft, and a paper trail that leads somewhere deeply problematic. They are also actively causing harm. 

In this episode I'm mapping exactly where this ideology came from, who's profiting from it, and what it's actually doing to women's desire, relationships, and sense of self — because I see the damage in my practice every single day.

In this episode:

• Why "sexual polarity" isn't ancient wisdom or real science — and how it borrows language from physics to sound legitimate
• David Deida, Tony Robbins, and Deepak Chopra — the men profiting and what their paper trail actually shows
• The Osho/neo-tantra origins: why the history of this ideology goes back to documented child sexual abuse in cult communes
• Why the OneTaste sentencing matters — and what Nicole Daedone's case tells us about who enforces patriarchal ideology
• What women are actually hungry for that polarity coaching hijacks and exploits
• The difference between genuine erotic power play and a grooming script dressed as spirituality
• How to recognize a genuinely qualified practitioner — and what red flags look like in these spaces

This is part one of a two-part series. Next episode I'm joined by journalist and cult researcher Anke Richter, author of Cult Trip, for a conversation on sex cults, ISTA, and the darker end of this spectrum.

Resources mentioned:

• Full article with sources and resources: https://open.substack.com/pub/laurajurgens/p/have-you-been-sold-the-patriarchys?utm_campaign=post-expanded-share&utm_medium=web
• Barbara Carrellas' Urban Tantra: barbaracarrellas.com
• Midori on consent-forward BDSM: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLaxv6fBRPDep5NIrLfjEUNzmPtY4Ax5CN

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Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

You've done the work. Real work. Therapy, couples counseling, the conversations, the books. You understand yourself better than you ever have — and you still feel the same way in your body.

That's not a sign you're beyond help. It's a sign you've been using the wrong tools.

This episode explains why the things most people reach for — talk therapy, mindset work, even good communication — don't reach desire and embodied intimacy, and what kind of support actually does. Whether you're partnered or not, high-desire or low — if you want a more satisfying sex life, this episode is for you.

In this episode:

• When therapy is genuinely valuable — and what it wasn't designed to do
• Why mindset work and self-talk can't override a nervous system pattern
• What somatic therapy does well and where even that hits a limit
• Why your doctor's answer probably wasn't the right one
• What body-based, future-facing work actually looks like
• Why I wish you wouldn't give up on your sex life before trying the right tool

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Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

If you've been trying to figure out how to want sex more and nothing is working — this episode is going to explain why. And it's probably not the answer you've heard before.

A lot of people struggling with low desire or low libido have already done the reading. They understand the concepts. Their body still hasn't gotten the memo. That's not a character flaw. It's the wrong sequence.

In this episode, I cover:

• Why desire and arousal are not the same thing — and why the order they happen in matters more than most people realize
• What responsive desire actually is, what the research says (including Rosemary Basson's work on how desire really works for most women), and why the model in most medical textbooks is wrong
• What your nervous system has to do with low desire — and why this is the piece that's almost always missing from mainstream advice
• How cultural conditioning and shame get wired into the body at a level that thinking simply can't reach
• Where your mind actually does help with desire — and what most people are doing with it instead that's actively working against them

If you've read the books, done the therapy, and you still feel stuck in your head, this one is for you.

Resources mentioned: Episode 5 (core desires and erotic emotions) | Free guide: Get Out of Your Head at laurajurgens.com/guide | Substack: laurajurgens.substack.com

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Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

Most people carry sexual shame so quietly and for so long that it starts to feel like a character trait rather than something that was handed to them. It isn't. Every flavor of shame — about wanting too much, too little, taking too long, not taking long enough, about your body, your history, your desires, your "low libido" — came from somewhere specific. And that somewhere is not you.

In this episode, I go through the full inventory of sexual shame I see in my somatic intimacy coaching practice, explain exactly where it came from (the culture, not your character), and go deeper into why shame lives in the body and nervous system — not just the mind — and what that means for how you actually release it. This is about a somatic, body-based approach to understanding and releasing sexual shame — and it goes where most intimacy advice, and even therapy, doesn't.

In this episode, you'll learn:

• The most common sexual shames — about desire, low libido, body image, sexual anxiety, sexual confidence, and what it takes to orgasm — and why every single one makes complete sense given the culture we inherited
• Why shame is stored in the nervous system and body as implicit memory — and why thinking or talking your way out of it rarely works
• What shame actually does behaviorally — why it makes you hide, avoid, and stay quiet, which is the opposite of what heals it
• Why speaking your shame to someone who stays in full somatic connection with you is the most powerful antidote — and why that's so hard to find on your own
• What somatic healing of sexual shame actually looks like in practice — and how it differs from traditional therapy or mindset work
• My own shame story — the things I carried for years without knowing I was carrying them, and what shifted when I stopped trying to think my way through it

The culture handed you this shame. You don't have to keep carrying it — but getting free of it requires more than understanding it. This episode is where that starts.

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Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

Have you ever followed the "right" advice and ended up further from yourself?

That's what this episode is about — and it's also why we're now Pleasure Uprising: Desire, Attachment, and the Sex You Actually Want. The evolution of this show mirrors what happens in my practice all the time: when you stop trying to fit yourself into the frame someone else handed you, something truer emerges.

In this episode:

• What the desire gap framing got right, what it missed, and what the shift reveals
• Why the disconnection most people feel from pleasure and desire is fundamentally a cultural problem, not just a personal one
• The full scope of what we're doing here: somatic and nervous-system-based work, secure attachment, and creating the most pleasurable relationships possible
• Why trusting your own experiment — over conventional wisdom — is the foundation of real desire and genuine connection

If you're curious about what's possible when you stop performing and start pursuing your own pleasure, desire, and genuine connection, you're in the right place.

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

When a woman asks a male partner to "be more assertive in bed," those words are typically landing differently than she intends — and differently than he's hearing them. This is a gendered language problem, and it's causing real confusion, frustration, and disappointment in real relationships.

There is a real vocabulary mismatch about "dominance" and "assertiveness" rooted in how men and women are socialized differently as children around anger, aggression, and sexuality — and once you see it, you can't unsee it.

In this episode, you'll learn:

• Why "assertive" and "dominant" mean different things depending on how you were socialized — and why that gap is doing damage
• The five things women typically mean when they ask for more assertiveness in bed — for women who want to understand how to ask more effectively, and for the partners trying to meet it
• Why aggression shuts desire down at the nervous system level — and what works instead
• What "attuned confidence" actually means and how to build it
• What the masculine/feminine polarity content getting popular right now is actually teaching — and why it's harming real libidos
• Simple scripts for both of you: how to say what you actually mean, and how to ask what your partner actually means

Most couples are having the wrong conversation about this. This episode gives you the right one.

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Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

You've heard it a thousand times: "keep the spark alive, get back to how it used to be, recreate that honeymoon phase magic." But what if that's the wrong goal entirely?

Here's what nobody tells you: the honeymoon phase was a drug state — literally. A neurochemical cocktail of dopamine, norepinephrine, and nerve growth factor that made you want constantly, but didn't actually deliver the goods. Research shows that only 49% of women climax in new or casual encounters, compared to 70% in long-term committed relationships. You were having more sex, more urgently — and less actual satisfaction.

In this episode, I unpack the neuroscience of New Relationship Energy (NRE), why it was never meant to last, and — most importantly — what becomes available on the other side of it when you build intentionally. Spoiler: it's not a consolation prize. It's deep satisfaction that a honeymoon phase literally cannot give you.

You'll learn:

• What's actually happening in your brain and body during the "honeymoon phase" of NRE (and how serotonin actually drops)
• Why the NRE fade is completion, not failure
• What long-term desire offers that new relationships never can — being truly known, a partner who has learned your actual erotic makeup, and trust built through rupture and repair (if you  do the work to build it)
• Why "trying harder" doesn't work — and what actually changes the pattern
• The new research showing that desire for novelty and desire for deep commitment aren't opposites

This episode ends with a guided future visualization to help you focus forward. 

If you've been trying to go backward, this episode will turn you around.

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Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

BONUS: Teaching embodied consent at home—for your kids AND your relationship.

This special Podcasthon 2026 episode benefits Freedom Network USA, the largest coalition working on human trafficking in the United States. Prevention of sexual violence starts in families— and most of us were never taught how to practice true embodied consent ourselves.

In this episode, you'll learn:

• Why teaching consent early matters— and how it connects to preventing exploitation
• 5 practical tools you can use TODAY to teach body autonomy and boundary respect to your kids
• How to model consent in your adult relationship (even if you're navigating a desire gap)
• Why "embodied" consent is different from just asking—and why it matters
• What to do if you don't know how to say no without guilt or respect your partner's boundaries without resentment

Plus: An interview with Karen Romero, Co-Executive Director of Freedom Network USA, on immigration policy, vulnerability to trafficking, and how listeners can help.

Kids learn from what we DO, not just what we say. If you're struggling with embodied consent in your own relationship—saying yes when you don't want to, sulking when your partner says no, avoiding touch because it feels like pressure—your kids are learning those patterns too.

This episode gives you actionable practices to change that, plus a curated list of age-appropriate consent books for kids (link below).

Support Freedom Network USA: [Donate Here]

Learn more: https://freedomnetworkusa.org | https://podcasthon.org

Resources: Consent books for kids by age group: https://laurajurgens.com/consent-books-for-kids/

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Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

Does your partner's touch make your skin crawl? You're not broken—and this is fixable.

Touch aversion is when affectionate or sexual touch from your partner feels wrong in your body— irritating, threatening, or like you need to escape. This can happen even with light, loving touch. 

This isn't about attraction. It's a nervous system response— and it's more common than you think.

In this episode, you'll learn:

• What touch aversion actually is (and why it's not rejection, it's protection)
• 8 causes beyond sexual trauma—including disembodied consent, emotional coercion, being "touched out" from kids, unresolved resentments, and attachment patterns
• Why therapy may help you understand it but doesn't solve it (and what does)
• Why your partner acting hurt about it makes it worse, even though it's understandable
• The Three-Touch Discovery Process— a practice you can try today to start reconnecting with what your body actually wants

Touch aversion happens when your nervous system has learned that touch isn't safe— even with a safe partner. You can't think your way out of a body-based response. You need new somatic experiences to re-pattern.

This is solvable. But you need guided work with someone who specializes in nervous system re-patterning, not just talk therapy. So we'll talk about what that looks like. 

If you want help, book a consultation at https://laurajurgens.com/book-a-consult/

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/

The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

Treat others the way you want to be treated? Great rule. Terrible sex advice.

In this episode I'm breaking down the principle that actually works — go at the pace of the slowest body in the room, with open curiosity — and why applying the wrong golden rule is one of the most common ways couples accidentally shut down desire without even realizing it.

I talk about what going slow actually asks of the faster-arousing partner (hint: it's not a sacrifice — it's new, but delicious), why the slower-arousing partner needs to develop real self-knowledge first, and what that actually looks like in practice. I also get into why so many people with vulvas have never actually explored their own peak arousal — and why that matters more than most sex "experts" will ever tell you.

If you've ever felt like your body isn't responding the way it "should," or like you and your partner are somehow always missing each other — this one's for you.

Topics covered:

• Why the wrong golden rule kills desire without anyone meaning it to
• The nervous system reason that going too fast trips the brakes
• What the "five-course meal approach" actually looks like
• Self-exploration as a non-negotiable — and how to start
• Healing your relationship with your own genitals

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Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

Ever notice how sometimes the answer isn't more information — it's actually doing something with what you already know?

Like when your car is broken, you don't actually need more information from the mechanic after a certain point. You need someone to get under the hood and DO the work. 

I recorded this episode because I kept seeing the same pattern: people who've been reading books, listening to podcasts, and taking courses about their desire gap for years — but nothing in their relationship has actually changed.

If that's you (or someone you love), this episode might be the permission slip you need.

I walk through how to tell the difference between productive learning and learning as avoidance — when gathering more information becomes a way to delay the discomfort of actually trying something new. And I help you figure out which one you're in right now.

You'll learn:

• The one question that reveals whether you need more information or you need to take action
• How to know when "I just need to understand it better first" is actually fear talking
• Practical guidance to make the switch from default-thinking (aka fear and avoidance brain) to "I can take action" 

Here's the truth I wish someone had told me earlier in my own journey: You don't need to wait until "the right time." There is never a perfect time. You don't need to "feel ready." (We never feel ready). But there's a point at which we all need to decide we are worth it and take action, not just keep learning. 

If this resonates, send it to someone who's been stuck in the same loop. Sometimes we all need someone to lovingly say: you're ready, even if it doesn't feel like it.

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

You've read the books. Maybe you've done therapy. You've tried scheduled sex, date nights, "just doing it." And you're still stuck.

Here's why: you've been trying to fix a layout problem with decorative solutions.

In this episode, I break down the kitchen remodel analogy— why desire gaps need something very different than what most people try. You need a comprehensive, body-based approach, not another book, toy, date night, or conversation about the problem. I'll walk you through what most of you have tried, why it hasn't worked (not your fault), why it feels so deflating, and what actually does work for real human beings.

This is for people who are exhausted, at their wit's end, and starting to wonder if it's even fixable. Spoiler: it is.

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Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

If you're ready to work on your desire gap but your partner won't go to therapy or coaching, this episode is for you.

The answer to "can I actually fix this alone?" is yes — and today I break down exactly how individual work changes the entire relationship dynamic, even when only one person is ready to start.

Drawing on systems theory and real client stories, we'll cover why waiting for your partner to be ready is costing you — and why going first is often the most powerful move you can make. You'll hear two real stories: a higher-libido partner who discovered what she actually needed (hint: it wasn't more sex), and a lower-libido partner who finally found their authentic "yes" by first owning her "no."

In this episode:

• Why changing yourself changes the entire relationship system
• The two most common reasons people keep individual coaching private — and why both are completely valid
• What actually happens when one partner goes first (it's not what you'd expect)
• Why lower-libido partners especially need solo time before couples work
• The reality check: what your partner's response tells you about what's possible

Whether you're the higher-desire or lower-desire partner, you don't have to stay stuck waiting for someone else's timeline. Your growth ripples out. Always.

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

Avoiding sex? Feeling the "ick" when your partner initiates? Going to bed at 8pm to dodge intimacy? You probably think you have low libido. But what if that's not what's actually happening?

In this vulnerable episode, I share my own story of years spent in what I call "the messy middle"—that phase where you've stopped having sex you don't want, but you haven't figured out what you DO want yet. From the outside, it looked like my libido vanished. But what was really happening? My body was setting boundaries after years of performing intimacy.

I walk you through the three phases: passive withdrawal (where most people get stuck), learning to own your voice and have the hard conversation, and discovering your authentic pleasure. I also share the specific fears that keep people stuck—"What if talking about this makes it worse?"—and what actually helps you move forward.

Note: This pattern happens most for women due to socialization, but it affects anyone who's learned to perform sexually rather than connect authentically.

If you're in the messy middle, this episode will help you understand why—and what comes next.

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

When you're running on empty, sex feels like just another demand on your already depleted system. But burnout isn't just affecting your work life—it's killing your desire and disconnecting you from your partner.

Dr. Amy Grimm, veterinarian and certified burnout coach, joins me to explore how chronic stress impacts intimacy. We discuss what both high and low desire partners need to know, including: 

• Why burnout is a nervous system problem, not just a work problem
• How to tell if you're burned out vs. depressed
• Why sex becomes performative when you're disconnected from yourself
• The micro-moment practices that actually restore your nervous system (no hour-long meditations required)
• How to reconnect with your body so you can reconnect with your partner

If you suspect burnout is affecting your relationship or libido, this conversation will help you understand what's really happening—and give you simple tools to start healing.

Resources: Free video series: The Burnout Fix - https://burnoutfreeme.kit.com/burnoutfix Amy's podcast: Burnout-Free Me - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/daring-dvm/id1685789557 Website: https://daringdvm.com

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/

The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

Before you can solve your desire gap, you need to know what you actually want. This super simple, somatic practice helps you stop overthinking sex, connect to your body's truth, and find the safety you need to access authentic desire. Whether you want more or less sex than your partner, self-attunement is the foundation for everything. Learn the simple 1-minute body check-in that reveals your real yeses and nos—and helps your partner feel your presence too. 

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/

The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

Part 1 in this series covered how ADHD affects desire. Now let's get practical.

Mid-sex, suddenly thinking about work emails and grocery lists? Your partner can tell you're not fully there . . . and it doesn't feel great to you either. You're not a bad lover, your ADHD brain is just incredibly loud.

This episode covers the most common in-the-moment challenges and what to do about them:

• Sensory needs: why some touches work and others don't, and how to communicate what your body needs
• Task-list brain: staying present instead of mentally composing tomorrow's to-do list
• Novelty, time blindness, and working memory: we'll discuss practical tools

These aren't flaws to fix—they're features to work with. Your ADHD brain can experience incredible pleasure and connection when you understand what it needs.

Start with one small tool. Small shifts make huge differences.

Part 3 coming soon: medication effects, sleep issues, and how ADHD behaviors outside the bedroom kill desire inside it.

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
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The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

You've been sold a lie: that if your relationship needs work, something is fundamentally wrong. That love should just happen naturally if you're compatible. That needing help means you're failing.

This myth keeps people stuck in mediocre relationships, avoiding problems, and thinking they're failures when they struggle. And it's complete bullshit.

Here's the truth: We live in a culture that gives us terrible relationship advice, no real education about intimacy, and a bunch of harmful myths. Then we're expected to navigate one of the most complex, vulnerable aspects of human experience—intimate relationships—with zero guidance. Does that make sense?

Your relationship quality is the biggest predictor of your overall happiness and health—not your job, your bank account, or your body size. We invest thousands in gym memberships, career development, and lawn care. But when it comes to our most important relationship, we hesitate. Why?

This episode is about what "doing the work" actually means: time, money, effort, and attention. It's about why your intimate relationship deserves the same intentionality you give to other important areas of your life. And it's about giving yourself permission to get help before things become a crisis.

Your relationship deserves your best effort, not your leftovers. Let's talk about what real investment looks like—and why it matters.

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/

The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

If you're dealing with a desire discrepancy, you probably think you know what you want: more sex, or less sex. But what I've learned is this: there's always more under the surface. And that information is gold for figuring out the way forward together.

If you're the higher-desire partner, what are you actually seeking when you want sex? Is it validation? Connection? Reassurance that the relationship is okay? If you're the lower-desire partner, what are you really trying to avoid when you don't want sex? Certain sensations? Emotions? Pressure? Memories?

When you dig deeper and get honest answers to these questions, everything shifts. You can communicate what you actually need, you stop putting invisible pressure on your partner, and you find other ways to meet your real needs.

This episode walks both partners through the questions you need to ask yourselves—with curiosity, not judgment. Plus: how to stop asking yourself crappy questions that make you feel worse, and start asking empowering ones instead.

Your brain will answer whatever you ask it. Let's ask better questions.

Check out Emily Nagoski's latest book here: Come Together: The Science (and Art!) of Creating Lasting Sexual Connections

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/

The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

Thinking about asking ChatGPT about your desire gap at 2am? You're not alone—lots of people are turning to AI for relationship help. And I get it. It's free, private, and you don't have to admit to another human that you're struggling.

But here's what you need to know: AI can be genuinely helpful for some things—like understanding new concepts, normalizing your experience, or organizing your thoughts before talking to your partner. But it also has serious limitations that can actually make your problems worse.

In this episode, I break down what AI does well (psychoeducation, reducing shame) and what it fundamentally can't do (anything embodied or somatic). We'll talk about the "sycophancy problem"—why AI tells you what you want to hear instead of what you need to hear—and when it's time to get actual human support.

For anyone considering on turning to AI for relationship advice, but wanting to be informed about that choice, this one's for you.

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/

The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

This is THE episode to share. After 100 episodes and years of working with couples on mismatched desire, I'm breaking down the 10 mistakes that keep you stuck—from obligation sex and taking rejection personally, to making every touch sexual and believing someone is broken. These patterns make total sense, but they backfire hard. If you or someone you know is dealing with a desire gap, start here. You'll learn what's keeping things stuck and exactly what to do instead.

The 10 mistakes:

1. Trying to 'fix' your partner instead of the dynamic
2. Having obligation sex to keep the peace
3. Taking rejection personally
4. Believing scheduling sexy time is not "natural"
5. Being defensive about sexual feedback
6. Making all physical affection have to lead to sex
7. Chasing your partner (pursuit-distance trap)
8. Not knowing your own body
9. Expecting only spontaneous desire to be "real"
10. Believing someone is broken or wrong

For each one, you'll learn why it backfires and exactly what to do instead.

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/

The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

Depression tanks your libido. Then you finally get help with antidepressants—and your sex drive tanks even more. If this is you, you're not broken. You're dealing with a real, common side effect that nobody wants to talk about.

In this episode, I break down the double whammy of depression and SSRIs on your sex life: how depression shuts down motivation (including for sex), why antidepressants compound the problem by affecting serotonin and dopamine, and how orgasm difficulties create a feedback loop that kills desire even further.

I also share my personal story—how I dealt with depression, the mental scripts generating self-hatred that my brain was trying to protect me from, and how I got off meds through coaching and massive self-compassion work. Literally re-writing the thoughts in my head changed everything.

We cover: what you can actually do about it (medication options, body-based approaches, relationship support), why this isn't your fault, and how to stop choosing between mental health and a satisfying sex life.

Quick note: I'm not a medical doctor—this is educational, not medical advice. Always talk to your doctor about medication decisions.

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/

The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training. 

If you're not tearing each other's matching pajamas off for holiday romance, you're not broken - you're normal. The holidays come with dreamy visions of mistletoe magic, but the reality is stress, family drama, overbooked schedules, and exhaustion.

In this episode, we tackle:

• Why holiday pressure kills intimacy
• The common patterns that widen desire gaps (and how to avoid them)
• Low-pressure ways to stay connected when libido is low or mismatched
• How to communicate without pressure if you're the higher-desire partner
• How to free yourself from holiday expectations if you're the lower-desire partner
• How to redefine holiday intimacy for your actual relationship

Real love doesn't care about picture-perfect presents. It cares about being seen, heard, and connected, even when life is messy.

Perfect for those navigating desire and relationship challenges during the most stressful season of the year. Zero shame. Real help.

Send Laura Fan Mail

Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/

The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel

 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training.