Dive into the complete episode list for Better Sex. Each episode is cataloged with detailed descriptions, making it easy to find and explore specific topics. Keep track of all episodes from your favorite podcast and never miss a moment of insightful content.
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Title
Pub. Date
Duration
240: Making and Keeping Agreements with Martha Kauppi
09 Sep 2024
00:51:18
In this episode of the Better Sex Podcast, host Jessa Zimmerman welcomes back guest Martha Kauppi for a vibrant discussion on the art of making and keeping agreements in relationships. They explore the importance of having explicit conversations to establish trust and understanding between partners. Topics include identifying when and what types of agreements should be made, the significance of revisiting and renegotiating agreements, and developing the skills needed to navigate these discussions constructively. The episode also delves into distinctive challenges faced by both monogamous and polyamorous couples, providing insights into maintaining integrity and trust. Listeners are guided on how to uphold agreements effectively and the potential pitfalls of inadequate or overly detailed agreements.
00:00 Introduction to Better Sex Podcast
00:51 The Importance of Agreements in Relationships
03:29 Common Areas Requiring Agreements
07:20 Revisiting and Keeping Agreements
11:15 The Skills for Making Good Agreements
22:31 Trust Building Through Transparent Agreements
24:10 Mid-Episode Break: Resources for Desire Discrepancy
25:04 Revisiting Agreements: The Importance of Flexibility
25:13 Experimentation in Agreement Making
26:27 The Collaborative Nature of Agreements
26:54 Understanding Your Partner's Needs
28:32 Building Trust Through Hard Conversations
30:14 Monogamous vs. Polyamorous Agreements
33:17 Avoiding Pitfalls in Agreement Making
39:17 The Consequences of Breaking Agreements
40:50 When Agreements Become Deal Breakers
48:35 Resources for Better Relationships
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Martha Kauppi is a marriage and family therapist, educator, author, speaker, and AASECT-certified sex therapist and supervisor. She has a lifelong career in health and sexuality, and is a senior trainer of the Developmental Model of Couples Therapy. Martha trains therapists all over the world to work more effectively with relational intimacy challenges and sex issues. She is the author of Polyamory: A Clinical Toolkit for Therapists (and Their Clients).
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
In this episode of the Better Sex Podcast, host Jessa Zimmerman discusses Peyronie's disease with Dr. Irwin Goldstein, a pioneer in sexual medicine. They explore the causes, diagnosis, and treatment options of the disease, and offer insights into both men's and women's perspectives on the condition.
Dr. Goldstein has been involved with sexual dysfunction research since the late 1970's. He has authored more than 350 publications as well as multiple book chapters and edited 6 textbooks in the field. His interests include penile microvascular bypass surgery, surgery for dyspareunia, sexual health management post cancer treatment, genital dysesthesia/persistent genital arousal disorder, physiologic investigation of sexual function in men and women, and diagnosis and treatment of sexual dysfunction in men and women. Dr. Goldstein is Director of Sexual Medicine at Alvarado Hospital, Clinical Professor of Surgery at University of California, San Diego and practices medicine at San Diego Sexual Medicine. He is also Editor-in-Chief of Sexual Medicine Reviews and past Editor of The Journal of Sexual Medicine. He is a Past President of the International Society for the Study of Women’s Sexual Health and of the Sexual Medicine Society of North America. He holds a degree in engineering from Brown University and received his medical degree from McGill University. The World Association for Sexual Health awarded the Gold Medal to Dr. Goldstein in 2009 in recognition of his lifelong contributions to the field, in 2012 he received the International Society for the Study of Women’s Sexual Health Award for Distinguished Service in Women’s Sexual Health, in 2013 he received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Sexual Medicine Society of North America, and in 2014 he received the ISSM Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Society for Sexual Medicine. He is happily married to his college sweetheart Sue, and together they have three children and five grandchildren.
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
230: Sexual Behavior Analysis with Nicholas Maio-Aether
01 Jul 2024
00:38:04
In this episode of the Better Sex Podcast, host Jessa Zimmerman interviews Nicholas Maio-Aether, a pioneer in sexual behavior analysis. They dive into the behavioral approach to changing sexual behaviors, emphasizing consensual goal-setting and positive reinforcement. Nicholas explains the methodologies used in behavior analysis, the importance of reducing punishment, and how this field can be beneficial both for individuals with disabilities and neurotypical clients. They also discuss the differences between traditional sex therapy and sexual behavior analysis, as well as the populations best suited for each. Nicholas shares insights into his practice, his training program for professionals, and his personal motivations for working in this field.
00:00 Introduction to Better Sex Podcast
00:50 Exploring Sexual Behavior Analysis
01:41 Defining Behavior Analysis
02:56 Challenges and Misconceptions in Behavior Analysis
03:49 Behavior Analysis in Sexual Relationships
08:26 Behavior Analysis in Disability Support
16:08 Behavior Analysis for Neurotypical Clients
31:11 Training and Finding a Sexual Behavior Analyst
Nicholas owns Empowered: A Center for Sexuality in St Louis, where he and his occasional teams of partnered Universities' students work to assist humans with and without disabilities to achieve sexual access, sexual freedom, gender affirmation, and self-control of compulsive behaviors. Nicholas works throughout the US training BCBAs/Behavior Analysts so persons in Individualized Supportive Living (ISL) programs gain access to applicable and generalizable comprehensive sex ed and sexual opportunities. Nicholas provides Sexual Behavior Analysis, and has assisted polycules, kinksters, gay couples, trans and nonbinary humans, among others, on their journeys. Trained by GLSEN in 2003, Nicholas started Gay-Straight Alliances across Alaska while in high school, and provided them sex ed materials and trainings. Nicholas spent five years managing Hustler Hollywood in St Louis before moving into Behavior Analysis, and joined AASECT, where he currently sits on two committees. He then completed a Sex Therapy practicum under Linda Weiner, LMSW, CSTS, in 2019 before getting a second Masters in Marriage & Family Therapy, and meeting those hour requirements under Angela Skurtu, LMFT, CST, along with his LGBTQIA+ Family Systems Specialist certificate in 2021. He also ABD for a PhD in Clinical Sexology.
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
On this episode, we visit the topic of erotic fantasy in a box! Thien-Kim came up with the idea after selling sex toys at parties and one day finding herself aroused while reading a novel.
She compares books today versus those written decades ago, explaining how writing has evolved for today’s audience. While older books come across as forceful, today’s books around heterosexual characters, usually lean toward romantic beginnings that consider the pleasure of the female partner first.
Gender Diversity
With many obstacles around sexually diverse characters, Thien-Kim notes that many authors self publish in order to get their work out there. Her monthly box is called the bawdy quickie and only features diverse romances and more gender-diverse toys.
Thien-Kim handpicks toys specifically to the books she selects and gives her clients the opportunity to give her feedback on her virtual platforms open to anyone.
Her Experience and Findings
With thousands of books to choose from, Thien-Kim mentions a few great resources for you to find good reads and authors for yourself. She looks for good quality toys that are female-friendly. Her journey has led her to discover that many people want to try sex toys in the bedroom so she provides advice and direction regarding toys wherever she can.
Background
As the Chief Erotica Officer of Bawdy Bookworms, Thien-Kim Lam curates kits to help women explore their sexuality through romance books and sex toys. Her subscription box-meets-virtual book club pairs steamy romance novels with sex toys, lubes, and lickables.
She selects from hundreds of best in class sex-positive products and smart, sexy fiction to create a curated experience every time. Their virtual book club chats create a safe, open-minded community for women to connect with others who wish desire to embrace their pleasure. Through Bawdy Bookworms, she celebrates diversity in romance because everyone deserves a happy ending.
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
On this episode, Kayla Potts educates us about STIs. She highlights that people often do not display symptoms when they have an STI and recommends testing as the only way to be certain of your status. From Kayla’s experience, she has found that it’s better to specify each individual test you require to your healthcare provider.
When Should You Test for STIs
If you are wondering how often to get tested, Kayla encourages us to test once a year if you have one partner. Multiple partners moves you up to 3 to 6 months. In a perfect scenario, she advocates testing before every partner as well. Bringing up testing can be uncomfortable but Kayla shares easy ways to broach the subject.
The Best Timing for STI Testing
In terms of timelines, some STIs may only reflect positive result weeks or months after infection. Kayla urges us to speak to our health providers to get help around the correct timing for best results. While all STIs are worth knowing about, Kayla mentions that there are very comprehensive tests for the serious types and explains the kinds of infections we can encounter.
Common STIs
HPV, Chlamydia and Ghonoreaha come up as common STIs. Kayla urges us to be aware of these if you are sexually active and ensure that you are responsible. She discusses the two ways we can contract an STI, namely body fluids or skin to skin contact. She digs deeper into Herpes and how one can contract, identify and prevent it.
Using Condoms
Kayla shares in-depth guidance on the use of condoms, dental dams and gloves clearing up a few grey areas including how these should fit. Because of sugars in condoms, she proposes not using flavoured condoms for genital to genital contact and advocates other types instead.
Prevention and Myths
In the conversation around STIs prevention, we learn about vaccines and that the best prevention is abstinence.
With many myths around HIV, Kayla informs that it is not specific to a gender, sexual orientation or a specific sexual act. In addition to this, she flattens any belief that STIs can be passed on via toilet surfaces or air among other common misconceptions.
Background
Kayla Potts is a community outreach educator with Planned Parenthood in Washington state. As an educator, her role includes offering comprehensive, inclusive, and medically-accurate sexual health information to her local community and beyond. Most of her days are spent in the middle. and high school classrooms educating young folks about consent, relationships, birth control methods, STIs, gender, and more.
Kayla has been involved in sexual health education work since volunteering for Planned Parenthood as a high school student. She is particularly passionate about sexual health information that is free of shame and centres pleasure.
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
138: [Personal Story] Pelvic Organ Prolapse – Erin
17 Aug 2020
00:30:06
Once a casualty of prolapse, Erin is completely asymptomatic today. Having encountered this long before support groups and information was easily available, Erin was forced to learn how to help herself. After the birth of her fourth child, her body had surrendered.
Symptoms
In addition to incontinence, Erin explains the symptoms of prolapse as the feeling of a tampon falling out or sitting on a tennis ball. After being advised to live with her condition, Erin did some searching of her own.
Working Solutions
Her search led her to a biomechanist, marking the beginning of her recovery. One of the methods she discovered was the belly release. She notes the role of the ribcage and how important it is to select non-underwire bras to allow movement in the ribcage. Erin credits a book by Katy Bowman (available on Amazon).
Erin advocates walking and tackles the superficial elements of kegels, explaining how critical control is for this exercise. With unnecessary shame around pelvic floor prolapse, Erin encourages women to take look at recovery as very achievable.
Background
Erin Underwood is a functional movement therapist from Oregon that specializes in prenatal and postnatal health. She is passionate about education around pelvic floor and core strength and function.
She has studied biomechanics extensively and in addition to her in-depth yoga training has continued her education by certifying and training with the top minds in the country connected to pelvic floor and core wellness.
She currently is focusing on her local community by serving through workshops to the prenatal and postnatal community as well as local health care providers, providing them with the most up to date science broken down into practical and helpful tools.
Erin has four beautiful boys and, post deliveries has personally healed from a grade 2 uterine and grade 2 rectocele prolapses and a four-finger Diastasis Recti using all the tools she teaches in her movement therapy, which further fuels her passion for seeing women fully functional and getting all the information necessary to heal.
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
3 years ago Ode discovered Flow – The Psychology of Optimal Performance and picked up dancing again after so many years of not dancing regularly. This reversed her stressed-induced high blood pressure diagnosis within eleven months. Now, she uses dance as a mechanism to help her clients alleviate stress-related anxiety that hinders performance, and to spark creative insight to problem-solving in various work, learning and life environments.
Flow State
Ode joins me on this episode and discusses using dance to access a flow-state. Her first experience with flow state was through dance. According to Ode, research shows that flow improves anything you apply it to.
While flow may seem a spiritual experience, Ode explains that flow is exhibited by highly successful people. For many of us, we would have heard it referred to as “peak performance.”
DOSE
As a testament to the success of flow state, Ode shares that it transformed her sex life with her partner. She explains that this is caused when neurochemicals are triggered when we move our bodies. The common chemicals released in the flow state are commonly called DOSE: Dopamine, Oxytocin, Serotonin and Endorphins.
Ode explains that the process involves the body going into a calmer state and then releasing “happy chemicals” so the activity you are doing is enjoyable. She reveals that the flow state can happen during specific activities. These are usually activities that require actively using your brain and using your senses to focus on the present. Dance is one such example.
“ Flow is intrinsically motivating” We learn that when we perform a certain action, it should be enjoyable and come naturally without being calculated.
Background
Specialist in deep embodiment, Afrojuju Dancer, peak performance researcher, and former bedside nurse, Ode has been using the tight link between beliefs and mind/body connection since she toured as a praise dancer with a prolific evangelical group partaking in missions across rural regions of West Africa for 10+ years.
She has been dancing since the age of 5, showcasing performances along the streets of her village with her dance groups. She’s vastly knowledgeable in various African dance styles, rhythms, movements and beats. She understands the neuroscience that underpins body movements and enhanced performance.
Ode holds 2 bachelor’s degrees – Management and Registered Nursing, an Associate degree in Social Works and a long-term mentorship under some of the world’s top Flow Scientists and researchers.
She lives in Naples Florida with her husband and 3 boys, avid anglers and boaters who love discovering the 1,000 islands that surround the SouthWest Florida Keys one island at a time.
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
Dating Again
Marni shares a great tip for figuring out what entering the dating world would be like. After gathering the stories we have about it in our minds, she suggests that we challenge the stories that could turn into fears or excuses. Her method is light-hearted and creative but really eye-opening!
Entering the dating arena after a while can require a bit of preparation. Marni recommends practising dating by targeting the areas you are less comfortable with like dressing or confidence. For those surviving divorces or reaching their golden years, Marni encourages you not to run away from dating but lean in and take a step in a direction that could lead you to happiness.
Marni shares advice on communicating openly as a vital element when dating to ensure both parties are clear on where each stand and if there are any concerns or issues upfront.
Dating While Parenting
She shares advice for parents in the dating world – advocating that time is separately allocated for dates and that your expectations regarding your partner’s role in your kids’ life are clearly voiced early on.
Where to Find a Date
If you are wondering where you can meet your perfect partner, Marni recommends Match.com. From her findings, dedicating at least 30 min a day to one chosen app should return decent results.
Beware of free apps like Plenty of Fish. Marni warns that these sites can be cumbersome. She mentions a few niche sites that you can find in the links below.
“Be the person you want to attract” Marni has experienced people unexpectedly finding partners within their current circles eg: work, clubs they belong to etc. She suggests dressing well and being aware of the habits and interests of people around you when you are looking for that someone special. A connection can happen in the most unexpected place.
You will also hear her view on matchmakers. She reveals the right age for trying matchmaking services and what people generally look for.
How Does Dating Work Today?
With men having to adjust to the times, Marni explains that their biggest fears include rejection and being perceived as predators. For this reason, women need to be much more direct about what they want.
Paying can be a grey area for many. Marni’s advice is fair and allows men to express their chivalry and for women to reciprocate in return when the time is right.
Safety
An absolute must is safety during dating. Marni shares some great tips in terms of defining available time upfront and not using your personal environment as a venue for your first meeting. Red flags include your potential date refusing a video meeting!
Dealing with Quarantine
Funny, thoughtful ideas given by Marni reveal how easy and special dating can still be if you are in quarantine. For those that just need to abide by social distancing, Marni suggests hiking or picnics within the rules.
Background
Marni Battista is a certified professional Dating and Relationship Coach and expert writer. Her work can also be found in Cosmopolitan Magazine, Yahoo! Shine, Huffington Post, YourTango.com, CupidsPulse.com, Men’s Fitness, Glamour and more.
She has also had appearances on major television networks, including CBS and ABC where she has been a guest on Loveline (filling in for Dr Drew!) and Dr Phil, on nationally broadcast radio shows, such as On Air with Ryan Seacrest, and on Youtube Channels, like Off Air with Sisanie.
Marni’s weekly dating and relationship podcast, “The Dating Den,” has more than 25k downloads per month and she was named one of the 10 Best Women’s Dating Experts by @DatingAdviceCom.
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
135: Optimal Sexual Experiences – Dr. Peggy Kleinplatz
27 Jul 2020
00:51:35
In this episode, Dr. Kleinplatz introduces her findings around “optimal sexual experiences” based on actual interviews she performed. After much research, she shares these eight components couples need to have to eventually reach an optimal sexual experience:
1. Being totally absorbed in the moment
2. Sharing a connection with your partner
3. Deep sexual and erotic intimacy
4. High levels of empathic communication
5. Fun, laughter, exploration and good risk-taking
6. Authenticity
7. Vulnerability
8. Transcendence
Her findings show that people begin to seek these experiences around their mid 50’s. Part of the process of discovery is unlearning much of what we know about sex growing up. Spontaneity arises as one of the behaviors to “unlearn “ as Peggy candidly shares her views on this.
Anyone can get there!
Peggy has found that people with chronic illnesses are enjoying magnificent sex! In an unexpected twist of events, Peggy’s co-workers proved that presumed stereotypes are false. She shares that consent is a major piece of the puzzle and contributes to empathic communication.
Peggy educates us about moving from good to magnificent sex explaining that getting to know each other on an ongoing basis builds trust to explore deeper levels of your relationship.
We learn about differentiation and how it impacts reaching optimal sexual experiences while identifying that therapy has to be customized to each individual.
To reach for the optimal sexual experience goal, Peggy highlights that respect for each other is crucial.
Background
Peggy J. Kleinplatz, Ph.D., is a Professor in the Faculty of Medicine and Director of Sex and Couples Therapy Training at the University of Ottawa, Canada. She was awarded the Prix d?Excellence in 2000 for her teaching of Human Sexuality. She is a Certified Sex Therapist and Educator.
She is the Director of the Optimal Sexual Experiences Research Team of the University of Ottawa and has a particular interest in sexual health in the elderly, disabled, and marginalized populations.
Kleinplatz has edited four books, notably New Directions in Sex Therapy:
Innovations and Alternatives (2012), winner of the AASECT 2013 Book Award,
Sadomasochism: Powerful Pleasures with Charles Moser, Ph.D., M.D. (2006)
Sexuality and Ageing with Walter Bouman, M.D. (2015).
She is the author with A. Dana Menard, Ph.D. of Magnificent Sex: Lessons from Extraordinary Lovers
In 2015, Kleinplatz received the American Association of Sexuality Educators, Counselors, and Therapists Professional Standard of Excellence Award.
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
Joan tells us that being a senior sex advocate is her third career. She lived as a high school English teacher until a car accident made her acutely aware of the privilege of being able to be and stay mobile. She tells us that insight inspired her to become a fitness trainer, group exercise instructor, and health and fitness writer. After falling into what she calls a “planet-shattering” romance at the age of 57, she understood that great sex was a crucial element of romance at any age. Her research into overcoming the challenges of senior sex and increasing the passion and intensity of senior sex revealed an empty market niche, encouraging her to jump into the market by sharing her own experiences and adding her own research to the topic of senior sex.
She explores the misconception that sex is no longer experienced in old. She says that many believe that when people are older, they give up their sex lives and take up crocheting instead. “I have nothing against crocheting,” she says, “but it’s not sex.”
Challenges of Senior Sex
Joan admits that senior sex is not the same as the sex people have in their twenties. Bodies age and change, and she suggests that our sexual history can impact our sex lives.
She tells us that many people presume their sex lives are irrevocably declining when their knee arthritis prevents their favorite position, they take too long to orgasm, their erections are unreliable, penetration can become uncomfortable or intercourse may not feel as good as it used to. Joan believes that hurdles like these can be overcome when they’re acknowledged out loud and discussed with our partners. She admits that sometimes these are medical issues, while others are best solved with creativity, research, and an enthusiastic partner’s work.
Responsive Desire
Joan mentions that many elderly men and women insist that their desire to have sex is gone. To combat this belief, Joan describes writing a blog post on hotoctopuss.com about the difference between spontaneous desire and responsive desire. Many people believe that if spontaneous desire goes away, they no longer want to have sex, but that’s inaccurate. Responsive desire, she explains, exists when your body begins to engage in sexual activities, and you slowly develop a real desire and passion for sex while you’re engaging in the act.
Spontaneous desire, where a person knows they’re aroused and wants to have sex actively, often fades with age due to the hormones encouraging sexual reproduction declining. People who only experience responsive desire claim that they never really care about sex until they’re actually doing it—at which point they care very much! Joan argues that this responsive desire is just as intense and valuable as spontaneous desire, it just appears during instead of prior to sex.
Joan’s webinars talk about communicating needs, knowing your needs, as well as scheduling sex, and creating responsive desire. She says that her books, blogs, and webinars help people respond to and understand their current needs and abilities, and guides people through the conversation.
Benefits of Senior Sex
Joan assures us that senior sex can be better than the sex young people have because the elderly know what they like sexually and in other areas, they’ve learned to communicate very well, and they’ve gained the perspective to understand many problems as easy to overcome or as entirely unproblematic. She implies that elderly men and women have outgrown the shame and reticence most young people feel about sex. In her work, she notices older people are better at truly focusing on the pleasure their bodies are capable of creating, while young people are often fretting about minor bodily imperfections or other insecurities instead of being fully in the present moment.
That isn’t to say no seniors have hang-ups about sex. Jane describes the prejudices her generation internalized about the topic. She informs us that her generation was told not to talk about or have sex until you’re married and that women who don’t have orgasms during intercourse—as most women can’t—were called frigid. She says she is currently working on a webinar to work through this process and help seniors find the words to talk about attaining great sex.
Scheduling Sex
Joan believes that especially for couples without spontaneous sexual desire, it can be sexually rejuvenating to set a date for sex. She explains that seniors can see that date on the calendar and that will cause them to think about sex more often. Scheduling sex also allows for planning the event with special underwear or a romantic setting or any number of other, enjoyable ways to improve sex and foreplay.
Joan suggests scheduling time to talk about sex and the physical and emotional changes that occur as people age. She insists that this can’t be accusatory. It’s meant to inform your partner about your changing body and needs and to invite your partner to do the same.
Sex Surveys and Seniors
Joan has been disappointed by surveys surrounding sex, because they often don’t poll the elderly about their sex practices at all. When they do include the elderly, she mentions that they don’t ask the right questions. Usually, she says, they ask whether you’re sexually active, which is a nebulous term.
She believes it would be illuminating if people writing surveys would ask what kinds of sexual activities people are utilizing at different ages. On air, she considers that she could do some of this research herself.
Another worthwhile survey question Joan suggests is, “What is interfering with your sexual pleasure?” Joan suggests that trouble reaching orgasm, not having a partner, and not having a vibrator could all be included in such an open-ended question.
Losing a Partner
She says her book, Sex After Grief was written after she lost her great love. Joan found herself trying many, many things to try to come back to her sexuality after losing her husband. She recounts her journey and shares the methods others used to overcome grief. She explains that there are many ways to regain your sexuality after the death of a partner, and though no single path exists, this book will help you navigate the loss of your partner and the return to your sexual self with insight and compassion.
Sex in Nursing Homes
Joan has written some about sex inside nursing homes, where you’re kept apart from others, cannot lock the door, and are given no privacy. She says there are a few nursing homes where sexual rights are a priority, based upon the belief that assisted living home residents should not be treated as prisoners. She says that it’s important to research nursing and assisted living facilities to determine whether they have policies in place to enable sexual activity in their facilities.
Sexual Rights
She explains that it’s important for the elderly to discuss what sexual rights their partners have before their mental state deteriorates or their body becomes too infirm to allow sexual activity. She says that if their partner can’t provide sexual or romantic love, or they themselves are too senile to remember their spouse, it’s important to make decisions about whether their partners finding love elsewhere is blessed or discouraged.
Background
Joan Price is an advocate of ageless sexuality encouraging seniors to reclaim and rejuvenate their sex lives. A public advocate of senior sex since 2005, Joan has written five books to help and sexually engage seniors: Sex After Grief: Navigating Your Sexuality After Losing Your Beloved, The Ultimate Guide to Sex After Fifty: How to Maintain—or Regain!—a Spicy, Satisfying Sex Life, Naked at Our Age: Talking Out Loud about Senior Sex, Better than I Ever Expected: Straight Talk about Sex After Sixty, and Ageless Erotica.
Joan narrated and collaborated with Jessica Drake on her award-winning, explicit educational film “Jessica Drake’s Guide to Wicked Sex: Senior Sex.” Joan maintains a newsletter and a blog on senior sex, and she created an entertaining, free webinar to encourage safer sex among the elderly.
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
Vanessa shares that she’s always working to make people’s sex lives better, but the idea of forming a personality test for sex began from hearing her clients talk about sex in very different ways, inspiring her to take notes and investigate what people truly desire and require in their sex lives. These notes developed into a system that identifies 11 different personality types based upon what people need, want, and hope to get out of sex.
The Decompressor
Vanessa’s survey describes decompressors as people for whom sex is about stress relief, blowing off steam, and getting to that sense of relaxation that ensues once sex is over. She clarifies that people who use sex for this reason often talk about the joyful, restful afterglow than about sex or anything that precedes sex because reaching that state is their real goal.
The Explorer
Explorers are all about novelty in sex. They like trying new things and experimenting. She explains that this type doesn’t always enjoy everything they try sexually, but they still appreciate the novelty and variety of their experiments.
Fair Trader
For the fair trader, sex is all about reciprocity. They want a balance between giving and receiving in bed.
The Giver
She explains that the giver views sex as a gift that they give to their partner, and they enjoy giving much more than they enjoy receiving. They like focusing on their partner and their pleasure instead of their own.
The Guardian
Vanessa identifies guardians by their need to have safety and security around sex. She says they care very much about boundaries and enthusiastic consent in sex. She reveals that for some people, this emphasis on safety and consent is the result of previously enduring sexual abuse, but she admits that others simply like for sex to be safe and enthusiastically enjoyed.
The Passion Pursuer
This type loves pursuing all-encompassing, intense, passionate, and even animalistic sex. She says this type of lover is very in tune with the energy between them and their partners during sex, and she tells us they want to feel like time stands still, leaving only themselves and their partner in the world.
The Pleasure Seeker
For pleasure seekers, Vanessa describes sex as being all about feeling good. They care about the simple pleasure of enjoying their bodies interacting with someone else’s.
The Prioritizer
For this type, Vanessa explains sex must feel like a priority in the relationship. She explains that they need to feel desired by their partners, and to believe that their partners are not making excuses about being tired or too busy for sex. She notes that they value consistent, frequent sex and require partners who will work to keep sex a regular activity.
The Romantic
For romantics, it’s all about the connection they feel to their partner during sex. She continues to say it isn’t really about the physical act or the hedonistic pleasure for them, but the emotional bonding and intimacy that sex engenders.
The Spiritualist
Sex is about spirituality and connecting to a higher energy or purpose for spiritualists, Vanessa explains that for them sex is a transcendent experience.
The Thrill-Seeker
Thrill-seekers most enjoy sex that’s forbidden or taboo. They enjoy kink, power plays, dominance and submission. She says that if there’s a twinge of this is naughty or we shouldn’t be doing this, that thought only intensifies the sexual thrill-seeker’s enjoyment
Sexual Personalities in Action
Vanessa has heard all of these motivations for sexual activity in her practice, but she emphasizes that people will typically combine two to three personality types in their love lives. She describes the purpose of the quiz as a conversation starter that helps people understand their sexuality and learn how to discuss sexuality with their partners more clearly.
The decompressor, explorer, giver, and passion pursuer are what Vanessa sees most often, but she emphasizes that all of the personality types are very common.
An Online Quiz Can Help You Discern Your Type
Vanessa informs us that there is no need to read and reread descriptions to find out the sexual personality types of you and your partner. Her team is finishing up a quiz that can be found at vmtherapy.com to take out the guesswork.
She insists that her personality type quiz is meant to be lighthearted, but it can lead to genuine discussions and discoveries that can hopefully improve people’s sex lives.
Tricky Pairings
Vanessa affirms that it’s common for people in a loving relationship to have different sexual personality types, but she believes that all of them can work together, even if some pairings require more communication before sex to ensure mutual satisfaction.
She discusses that guardian types and the thrill-seeker can be a tricky combination to navigate because one wants regimented and well-guarded environments while the thrill-seeker aims to bring in more, new, different, and potentially dangerous activities. However, Vanessa mentions that people who are into BDSM are usually proponents of safety and enthusiastic consent. Under those or similar circumstances, she assures us that the guardian and the thrill-seeker can be a fantastic combination.
She also mentions that the pleasure seeker can be at odds with the spiritualist. She explains that the spiritualist wants to create a transcendent experience and basically leave their body behind, while pleasure-seekers are focused on enjoying their bodily pleasures of orgasm and sensual, very physical, touch. However, she insists that this pairing can work out by having conversations focused on finding ways for both of them to have their needs met.
Talking About Sex Types
One way that Vanessa suggests people can compromise about their sexual desire is to take turns while emphasizing their partner’s type during sex one day, and their own type another day. She also suggests that it could be fun to run through all the personality types and play with every manner of sex.
She mentions that taking the sex quiz and talking about it to your partner can be a fun and playful method of entering into a discussion that reveals each partner’s true desires and allows those desires to manifest in bed.
Background
Vanessa Marin earned bachelor’s degrees in Human Sexuality and Sociology from Brown University before attaining a master’s degree in counseling psychology. Her writing has been featured over 1,000 times in periodicals as prestigious as The New York Times; Allure; Lifehacker; O, The Oprah Magazine; Harper’s Bazaar; Refinery29; and Real Simple.
With her sister Jennifer and her husband Xander, she specializes in online courses like The Passion Project: A Couples’ Blueprint to Rediscovering Desire and Reigniting the Spark and Finishing School: Learn How to Orgasm.
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Katherine explains her initial interest in sexual pleasure gaps began with her journalistic coverage of the search for a female version of Viagra. She describes being intrigued by the prevalence of the notion that there is something fundamentally wrong with women’s level of sexual desire.
She argues that feminine sexual desire is an ephemeral state that stems from myriad sources and appears as a final state that is or isn’t reached. She says it’s not a single trait that can be manipulated directly. Upon seeing this attempt to manipulate female sexual desire, Katherine began to interview women about their own sexual desires and what brings them sexual satisfaction.
Men and Woman Experience Sex Differently
In broad strokes, Katherine explains the Pleasure Gap is a measure of social inequality. She explains three intersecting ideas, the first being the differences men and women give in the accounts of sexual experiences. She says men report higher levels of sexual satisfaction than women, they achieve orgasm more readily, and are happier with their sex lives overall. She also informs us that men feel less stress, pain, and anxiety related to sex.
By contrast, she tells us women commonly report low desire, absent pleasure, muted or unfulfilling orgasms, sexual aversion, and disinterest. She points out that women beat themselves up for feeling that way about sex. Katherine reiterates that these are common female experiences of sex, but women are prone to blaming themselves for their problems.
She suggests that even women who report some satisfaction during sex may not be experiencing the event completely. Katherine mentions one study in which 50% of female participants reported having an orgasm when the scientific monitors for orgasms indicated no orgasm had occurred. She says this suggests that women’s education about their bodies and their possibilities is distressingly subpar.
Female Sexual Dysfunction
Curious about this disparity in human feeling, Katherine shares that many women express sexual dysfunction, asserting that their genitals feel numb or dead, all while lab tests report ordinary, healthy function of those organs. In other words, she noticed that women were responding physically to sex without any pleasure or intimacy being experienced in their brains. She suggests that because the mental and emotional aspects of sex are so important to women’s pleasure, that medications that aim to help women enjoy sex by affecting their genital performance miss the mark.
Sex in Media vs. Sex in Life
The third gap Katherine mentions is the gap between the sex we’re sold in the media and the sex we actually want and find fulfilling in life. She suggests that our modern notions of a liberated identity suggest that women should want and exude sex constantly, but real women often experience the opposite reality. She suspects that the problem is rooted in the lack of education women receive about sex and pleasure.
Ms. Rowland also cites the stereotypes that men, the socially dominant sex, are supposed to desire lots of sex, while women are limited to being a gatekeeper restricting sexual access. Katherine believes that women need to be taught that pleasure is worthwhile and healthy so that they can feel comfortable exploring what gives them pleasure and allows them to enjoy sex.
What genuinely leads to satisfying good sex is intimacy, freedom of expression, creativity, safety, and being empowered to explore what genuinely turns you on.
The Effects of Sexual Trauma
Sexual trauma and abuse can also hinder women’s experience of their bodies according to research. She explains that women with this history may feel numb and distance themselves from the experience of sex or be hyperactive and hypervigilant during sexual encounters, leading to them feeling too stressed to enjoy sex. Women Katherine talked to also noted that women are inevitably objectified in pornography, which can lead to women objectifying themselves, instead of seeing sex as an avenue to express their own desire.
What Woman Want
She tells us that the scant research available on what makes good sex suggests that sexual satisfaction has nothing to do with the physical aspect of genitals coming together.
Feeling fully present and in the moment—often achieved through mindfulness and the like—and feeling overwhelmed and encompassed by their experience to the extent of forgetting about daily obligations are markers Katherine found in women’s reports about good sex.
Katherine also found women asserting a need for safety, and the need to feel confident exposing the full extent of their sexuality with their partner. She mentions that many women who discuss transcendent sex often describe it in spiritual terms – as if sex is a way to break into people’s spiritual interiors as a homecoming in the other person.
What Women Can Do to Improve Their Sex Lives
Katherine asserts that her book is not proscriptive, though she does provide resources for self-inquiry and erotic amplification. Katherine does suggest that women can try to shut off the external noise distracting them from sex as much as possible to increase sexual immersion. She also suggests that they can explore their bodies and fantasies to enhance their knowledge of their bodies and their sexual experiences.
Background:
Katherine Rowland holds a masters in Sociomedical Sciences from Columbia University. At the same university, she was a National Science Foundation Graduate Research fellow in medical anthropology. In the past, she published and served as the executive director of Guernica. She’s contributed to Nature, the Financial Times, Green Futures, the Guardian, the Independent, Aeon, Psychology Today, and more. She is the author of the Pleasure Gap.
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Living with MS
Six months after her daughter was born, Kimberly stopped nursing, and soon went completely numb on the left side of her body. An MRI uncovered that she had 8 lesions on her brain, which she says led to a quick diagnosis of MS. While her MS has been in remission for 12 years, her prognosis could change at any time.
Despite her remission, Kimberly tells us that situations exist that can still trigger MS symptoms. She informs us that many people with MS have trouble with heat which affects her sight. Difficulty swallowing and walking and feeling a tingling along her body are also common, she explains, especially in the heat. At a psychological level, Kimberly reports that people with MS have to live with a great deal of the unknown, as they can’t guarantee their level of functioning from day to day.
Support for the Newly Diagnosed
Kimberly tells us that many support groups exist for people newly diagnosed with MS, some of which can be found in the Resources section of these show notes. She recalls when she was first diagnosed, she thought MS was a death sentence, which she now knows is incorrect. However, she counters that while MS doesn’t kill, it does hinder functionality, which she found devastating enough to trigger all the classic stages of grief. She attributes her acceptance of MS and her emotional recovery to the love and support of her partner.
Difficulties with Sex in MS
Ms. Castelo points out that many people with MS are depressed, which leads to wide usage of libido-lowering SSRIs. Even without SSRIs to reduce sex drive, Kimberly informs us that 85% of women and 90% of men with MS suffer from sexual dysfunction.
For both genders, Kimberly tells us about spasticity issues, generalized pain, and difficulty moving legs that can impede sexual function. Kimberly says that another common problem is that MS affects the bowels, causing some people to lose bowel control during sex.
She warns that people with MS can fall into having obligatory sex to please their partners, which she describes as incredibly damaging. She believes that sex should prioritize both you and your partner’s satisfaction, never just one person’s.
Kimberly explains that the partners of MS patients can suffer too. Many partners become caregivers, and amongst partners who become caregivers, switching hats to make sex possible can be difficult, especially when their partner needs a lot of care. Kimberly encourages caregiving partners to compartmentalize moments and force themselves to have fun and playful events as well as their required caretaking.
Another problem amongst caregivers that Kimberly sees in her practice is that people operating as caregivers often don’t share their own struggles. In those cases, she reminds caregiver partners that humans enjoy helping each other, and by not sharing their struggles, they are depriving their partners of that joy and intimacy. Helping partners with problems, she asserts, is also empowering to the partner with MS, because they are given the opportunity to be a caregiver as well.
Improving Sex with MS
Kimberly says that for people partnered with someone who has MS, it’s important to allow space for grief before they can begin problem-solving. After the grieving gives way to acceptance, she states that couples may be surprised to discover that sex with MS can create phenomenal sexual connections due to the incentive MS creates to explore new avenues of sexuality. It can even raise the quantity of playful erotic moments in people’s lives.
She describes her concept of daily erotic moments as simmering with her clients. Just like making a soup, she suggests that first, you get things started, then it starts to smell good, then better, and in the end, it’s so amazing that you have to eat the stew. She mentions that having multiple sexually intimate moments throughout the day can produce an identical effect.
Expanding the Meaning of Sex
Kimberly suggests expanding the definition of sex is important. She says it’s not just about genitals touching genitals. She says it’s about flirting, touch, cuddling, holding hands, passionate kisses, and learning to bring those acts to a level that facilitates deep pleasure and connection in both people. She teaches that slowing down sex to accentuate and be more mindful about each action increases the eroticism of life. She insists that sex can’t just be about genital-to-genital contact and orgasms.
Sex Therapists and MS
When you’re figuring out how to plan sex and keep it romantic, when is a good time to have sex to avoid fatigue, and how to get involved in sex in the first place, Kimberly says a sex therapist can help. She also suggests that sex therapists can help MS patients and their partners figure out how to really connect emotionally and share their sexual challenges with each other. She says sex therapists can help couples plan sex around the best times of day to avoid the crushing fatigue of MS. Despite popular conceptions that sex should be spontaneous, Kimberly says people with MS in particular need to schedule sex sessions.
She also warns that it can be difficult to cope with partners about the changing, day-to-day pains that people can feel with MS, but therapists can encourage communication, creativity, and being mindful and appreciative of sexual actions that don’t involve intercourse.
Background:
Kimberly Castelo is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, a Certificated AASECT Sex Therapist, and a Certified ETF Couples Therapist. As a Certified Integrated Intimacy Professional, she believes in treating mental health in a holistic way, exploring individuals, couples, family systems, sexual health, medical issues, and spirituality to create a full picture of her clients’ lives and resources. As a woman who’s lived with MS for 13 years, Kimberly intimately understands how medical maladies can influence the mental health of families and individuals. This experience combines with her training to provide invaluable insight into relationships and sex.
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In this episode of Better Sex, host Jessa Zimmerman talks with Esther Hooley to address the impacts of purity culture on individuals and their sexuality. They explore how purity culture influences sexual scripts, the resulting shame, and how one can begin to heal and embrace their true sexuality. Esther discusses her book, 'Embracing Erotic Wholeness,' and how curiosity and reframing spirituality can assist in overcoming the detrimental effects of purity culture.
00:00 Introduction
00:45 Guest Introduction and Topic Overview
01:15 Esther's Background
03:09 Defining Purity Culture
02:28 Impacts of Purity Culture
10:15 Shame and Sexuality
08:25 Disconnect and Reconnection
19:47 Reframing Sexual and Spiritual Beliefs
24:36 Closing Remarks
Want to share your personal story on our podcast? This can be done anonymously! Just email us at info@intimacywithease.com
Bio:
Dr. Hooley has been a clinician for over a decade and is currently a licensed psychologist in Waco, Texas. She specializes in sex therapy, trauma recovery, eating concerns, and spirituality concerns. She is currently in private practice working with people across the U.S. seeking healing. She recently published her first book entitled "Embracing Erotic Wholeness: From Shame to Curiosity" which focuses on embodied healing after living through purity culture.
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Diversity in Jewish Beliefs and Practices
Dr. Shy describes Jewish law as a corpus of Jewish religious requirements. He explains that every aspect of life has regulations to help Jews proceed through life. He discloses that there are disputes within the Jewish community about who can interpret Jewish law, leading to different sects of Judaism being formed, each with their own practices. Dr. Krug reminds us that he can only share his own interpretation and some alternate views he’s encountered personally and professionally.
The Spirituality of Sex in Judaism
The doctor describes Judaism as a sex-positive religion that appreciates the human body and human experiences. He emphasizes that Judaism encourages its adherents to elevate the mundane and the physical to the holy through thoughtfulness, intentionality, and restriction. He says Judaism contains many laws and restrictions on sex that are meant to transform a potentially carnal act into a holy union that increases both people’s connection to each other and to God. He tells us that in the Jewish view, conceiving a child is an act involving three people: the man, the woman, and God.
He counters this interpretation of Jewish law by describing smaller, rarer sects that see sex as a necessary evil that should be experienced infrequently. He states that many people with this belief see sex as a necessary transaction that occurs within marriage.
The Sexual Power of Jewish Women
Dr. Krug mentions there is a Jewish law that requires men to satisfy their wives sexually. He explains that a man cannot demand sex from his wife, but a wife can demand sex from her husband. He clarifies that a man can tell his wife that he’d like to have sex, but compelling her to have sex isn’t licit. This imbalance of power can create tension when the man wants to have more sex than his wife, but he tells us Orthodox couples often mitigate this disparity by refocusing on sex as a holy and intentional act, rather than a purely physical drive. He implies that the absence of desired sex allows men to reinforce the intimacy and holiness of sex through the delayed gratification abstinence ensures.
Family Purity Laws
Dr. Krug describes family purity laws that require men and women to separate when the woman is menstruating. During menstruation and for seven days following her period, he says that Jewish men and women cannot interact sexually. Dr. Shy describes several protective barriers many employ to fulfill this law, like sleeping in separate beds, not sharing food from the same plate, not passing things to each other, and not feeling each other’s weight. When two people sit on the same couch cushion, he explains that they feel each other’s weight when they move; he informs us that Orthodox Jews avoid doing this during this part of a woman’s cycle to avoid the desire to touch each other that such closeness might incite. While the Bible does not give the reason behind these restrictions, he informs us that Talmudic sources extrapolate that physical distance encourages couples to focus on the verbal and emotional elements of their marriage and maintain the excitement of sex.
Premarital Sex
Dr. Shy asserts that premarital sex is prohibited in Judaism. He informs us that some Jews will avoid all physical contact with potential mates and many Jews avoid being alone with each other altogether. He informs us that in the most right-wing forms of Judaism, girls and boys are kept apart and schooled separately, allowing them to reserve all sexual education until their children are old enough to marry. Some Jews, he tells us, do have premarital sex and cohabitate with partners before marriage, but those practices are not widely accepted in Orthodox communities.
About Masturbation
While he admits that some Jews do masturbate or utilize pornography, he points out the clear Biblical prohibition of masturbation, which he defines as the spilling of seed to avoid pregnancy. By contrast, he explains that because women do not spill their seed, they are permitted to masturbate, but they are advised to restrict the frequency of their masturbation and focus on maintaining their marriage’s intimacy first and foremost.
Sex Ed in Jewish Orthodoxy
Sects vary in their approaches, but he describes the modern Orthodox sect teaches about sexual health, puberty, relationships, and communication in middle school. By high school, he informs us that students are educated about masturbation, pornography, and healthy sex practices. He says that modern Judaism acknowledges that people are sexual beings and that it’s important to acknowledge and understand human sexuality. He explains that marriage classes also inform the youths of the laws surrounding marital relations, family purity, and the ritual baths women must take monthly. He says that developing intimacy, foreplay, and discussing the origins of sex outside of the bedroom are also covered in these classes, though he tells us more right-wing sects will clothe the education in more modest language.
Condoned and Prohibited Sex Acts
While Dr. Shy clarifies that some rabbis condone sex acts like oral sex and manual stimulation as long as ejaculation always occurs inside the spouse’s vagina. He reveals that teachings vary with regard to women receiving oral sex, with some saying men can perform oral sex on their wives if it’s dark or he doesn’t look at her vagina. Dr. Krug admits that Orthodox Jews are often allowed to utilize sex toys and engage in manual stimulation. He emphasizes that the law that women need to be fulfilled during sex is so important that many rabbis will bend rules if it helps women achieve orgasms.
Laws about Homosexuality
Dr. Krug conveys general agreement that homosexual sex between men is prohibited, but even with that blanket prohibition, some homosexual sex acts are seen as more illicit than others. He explains that some rabbis will guide homosexual men towards performing sex acts that are less harmful because continuing practicing Judaism is considered more important than practicing every law successfully. Dr. Krug remarks that Judaism understands that people do not choose their sexuality, and rabbis do not turn people away for being gay.
What About Sexual Dysfunction?
Dr. Shy tells us that some Jews might go to their rabbi first when they struggle with some form of sexual dysfunction, while members of more liberal sects may consult their medical team first. When rabbis are faced with a man experiencing problems like premature ejaculation, he says they will understand it as a physical problem that can prevent procreation and as an issue that can forestall marital intimacy and spiritual health. As such, Dr. Krug remarks that many rabbis will relax the normal laws against things like masturbation for as long as the prohibited act is part of the man’s medical treatment.
Gentle Advice for Gentiles
Dr. Krug suggests that the intentionality and mindfulness surrounding sex can help gentiles improve their relationships. He gives the example of sensual massage, saying that being fully present while touching and being touched improves the act. In general, he believes that being motivated by the higher goals of emotional intimacy and the sensual act of truly being present for your partner can enhance sexual and emotional intimacy.
Background
Dr. Shy Krug holds a PhD in clinical psychology from Fairleigh Dickinson University and a B.A. in psychology with a minor in biology from Yeshiva University. At the James J. Peters VA Medical Center in the Bronx, NY, Dr. Krug parlayed his pre-doctoral internship into a two-year post-doctoral fellowship assessing and treating post-traumatic stress disorder and Gulf War Multisymptom Illness. Subsequently gaining a certificate in Sex Therapy from The Buehler Institute, certified training in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, and training in Gottman Method Couples Therapy, he is now a staff psychologist in the general outpatient department and sexual health clinic at the James J. Peters VA Medical Center, where he supervises and teaches the internship program. Dr. Krug also has a private practice in the Upper West Side of Manhattan where he treats sexual dysfunction, relationship difficulties, anxiety, and trauma.
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To reach an ADHD diagnosis, Dr. Tuckman reports that a 45-minute interview is required. With the media coverage of young boys with ADHD, Dr. Tuckman says that most clinicians can diagnose childhood ADHD accurately, though he notes that girls aren’t diagnosed as often as boys. He suggests that clinicians might expect ADHD more often in boys than girls, leading to them not noticing the symptoms.
Ari says that adults with ADHD also have a harder time being diagnosed, partially because their symptoms vary a little. Grown men and women almost never display the hyperactivity of ADHD youths, he admits, but forgetfulness, poor time management, losing things, and high distractibility continue to impact people’s personal and professional lives throughout adulthood.
He shares that adults with ADHD frequently realize they have ADHD themselves in what he calls a two-for-one: Parents bring in their child for an assessment and realize they also display ADHD symptoms, leading to simultaneous diagnoses.
Adult women with ADHD can be particularly difficult to diagnose, according to Ari. He tells us that they often present with anxiety and depression, but he reports that most clinicians stop their analysis there, when the root cause of their mental anguish stems from poor executive function, poor time management, and other, similar symptoms of ADHD.
ADHD Symptoms
Dr. Tuckman explains that it’s easier for people with ADHD to maintain focus on more interesting activities and on tasks that have a strict, close deadline. Being consistent and reliable are difficult tasks for people with ADHD, admits Dr. Tuckman. In these scenarios, partners with ADHD often lament their lack of reliability, while partners without the condition hate seeing themselves turn into a nagging spouse.
Dr. Tuckman describes another scenario where one person who likes everything organized in a rational manner, marries someone who isn’t as attentive or consistent about item placement at home. He says this often becomes a power struggle when what is needed is a method of reconciling their differences by coming to a compromise. He informs us that partners with ADHD will genuinely commit to the compromise and will often fulfill it for a few days, but before long they get derailed by things like getting home late, work difficulties, or not sleeping well the night before. He adds that this also leads to nagging and relationship struggles.
ADHD or Simple Laziness?
Ari asserts that ADHD is characterized by a failure to actualize good intentions. He describes people with ADHD as genuinely intending to fulfill their responsibilities, and he tells us that they are aware of the positive and negative repercussions that will occur if they do or don’t—for example—take out the trash. They’re often angry at themselves for neglecting their duties and breaking their promises. Dr. Tuckman assures us that adult ADHD isn’t purely about forgetting to perform menial tasks. He says they often forget things that outright hurt themselves, like leaving their lunch at home. He contends that their good intentions and their tendency to harm themselves with their disease distinguish them from people who simply want to avoid housework.
Sex and ADHD
Ari relates that when he was researching his most recent book, he had 3,000 people fill out a form that covered their marital relationships and their sex lives. He found that most people with ADHD enjoy their sex life when they are having regular sex. Unfortunately, Dr. Tuckman discovered several barriers to intercourse including partners not having enough good feelings about each other and the couple not having enough time to have sex. The former problem comes from the power struggles described earlier, but Dr. Hickman describes the lack of time as resulting from getting distracted and consequently taking more time to do things.
The ADHD Sex Drive
Within the aforementioned survey, he placed several questions designed to measure the sexual eagerness of people with ADHD. By asking how often they masturbate, how long it takes them to get revved up, how frequently they would like to have sex, and similar questions he found that people with ADHD are significantly more sexually eager than people without ADHD. He theorizes that just as people with ADHD tend to be more influenced by what’s going on around them, they may also be more easily influenced by the regular thoughts about sex that float through their minds. He further theorized that having one member of a relationship respond to sexual impulses more strongly can help to maintain the couple’s sex life by incentivizing the intentional pursuit of sex in the relationship. Alternately, he admits that differences in sex drive can create a wedge between the couple.
Sexual Satisfaction with ADHD
Dr. Tuckman sees a lot of couples in his office who are struggling because the ADHD partner is male, and the increased sexual eagerness of his condition magnifies the already high male sex drive. He says this difference in desire combined with the way women frequently assume chores and tasks often leaves women in relationships with male ADHD patients exhausted and unhappy.
By contrast, he found that when women have ADHD, the couple has sex 25% more often than couples where the male has ADHD. He points out that men with ADHD tend to have the highest sex drive, while women without ADHD have the lowest sex drive—a situation that naturally causes conflict. However, Ari explains that women with ADHD and men without ADHD both sit in the middle of the spectrum, with sex drives that are more similar. He speculates that having a similar sex drive between partners may lead to happier relationships in general because the good feelings from sex spill into and enhance other parts of the relationship.
Treating ADHD with Medication
Ari says that prescribing stimulants to ADHD patients is an excellent idea. He informs us that the stimulants prescribed for ADHD are some of the most effective medications in psychiatry and they’re non-addictive if taken as prescribed. This is particularly important to Dr. Tuckman because untreated ADHD doesn’t just result in poor school performance, but also lowers lifetime earnings, leads to increased car accidents, and even lowers lifespan because of ADHD’s tendency to reduce a person’s self-maintenance abilities and its ability to reduce a person’s ability to seek and comply with medical advice.
Non-Medical ADHD Treatments
Ari tells us that a lot of great resources are published to help people and their partners cope with ADHD. Seeking out better methods to get things done, get organized, and get on top of things. He suggests that cognitive-behavioral therapy can also help some symptoms.
Navigating Sex and Romance
When it comes to romantic relationships, he maintains that both partners must come to an agreement that they both can accept. He emphasizes that this does not mean either partner should completely change and do things their partner’s way, as that is unsustainable and avoids the fact that healthy relationships involve a give-and-take that satisfies both partners. He points out that if your sex life is important to you, working on your relationship will help that out. Similarly, he asserts that working to have a better sex life will improve the nonsexual elements of your relationship too. He explains that it’s hard to have a truly intimate sexual experience with someone you’re mad at, but reaching a level of a deep, vulnerable union during sex absolutely colors the hours and days that follow.
Background
Dr. Ari Tuckman has a private practice in West Chester, PA where he specializes in diagnosing and treating adult ADHD. As a certified sex therapist, he also focuses on couples counseling and sex therapy. He frequently presents and co-chairs at CHADD, the national ADHD advocacy organization, and has been featured on CNN, National Public Radio, and several other media outlets. The author of four books, his most recent is “ADHD After Dark: Better Sex Life, Better Relationship,” a title that explores the impact of ADHD on romance and sex.
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Amy noticed that even she was having trouble talking to her own child about sex, and she imagined it would be even more difficult for people without her work background. She discusses the difficulty of discerning the right amount of information to share with kids, especially with the poor cultural examples in the US but reiterates that it’s crucial for parents to push through their discomfort.
Amy advises us to look at our own lives, our own sexual decisions and early relationships, and our current relationships to get a good idea of what can happen without quality education about sexuality and relationships. She emphasizes that sex and relationships constitute a lifelong social-psychological health issue and that parents can’t rely on schools to teach these things to their kids.
Sexual Health Requires Healthy Relationships
A lot of sexual health is about relationships, Amy asserts. She explains that many things can go wrong in relationships that will negatively affect the lives and health of people if they don’t know enough about what healthy relationships look like and what isn’t okay. Amy suggests that parents should want their children to grow up with a lot of information so that they can feel good about their decision-making skills and so that they can build safe, healthy relationships and quickly, correctly notice when relationships become unhealthy.
What Kids are Learning Now
Amy points out that most people are only getting educated about sex in the 5th and 9th grades, and neither of those sessions is comprehensive in any way. She explains that most young people learn the most about sex through pornography, sexualized entertainment media, and their friends. She points out that this gives kids a lot of very adult information about sexuality without providing them any context for that information.
Amy advises that parents contextualize pornography for children. She believes it’s important for kids to know that the models are acting, and they aren’t having real, normal sex.
The Limits of Sex Ed in Schools
Ms. Lang supports kids getting sex ed, even abstinence-only sex ed because that gives parents an opening to discuss the fact that abstinence-only education doesn’t work. She adds that it even lets parents talk about waiting to have sex until they’re prepared and able to make a mature decision with their partner. But she explains that schools can’t provide a values-based sexual education that aligns with the values of all their students’ families, schools can’t provide enough details about sex, and schools really can’t talk about how sex is pleasurable and not just about making babies.
How to Answer Questions
Amy tells us that a lot of questions kids ask can be answered simply and directly, but sometimes they’ll ask questions that are more sensitive. In those cases, she suggests admitting to your child that you’re not sure how to answer, and you need time to think about what to say. She explains that hot topics and questions about your own history can be dicey; she advises parents not to air their traumas to their children because she believes it’s important to talk about sex in a way that encourages them to have consensual, safe sex in a safe place.
Talking About Rape
She says that it’s easier to answer questions about difficult issues like rape and abortion if you already have created an early, strong base with your child about the fact that sex is healthy and fun when it’s consensual. When you have that background and talk about rape with your child, you can emphasize that sex is usually a happy thing adults do, but that sometimes people are bad and force others to have sex. She demonstrates that you can reassure children by saying that even though it’s a sad and scary part of life, it’s something they need to know about, and you’re glad they asked you.
Age Appropriate Conversations
She says that sex talk starts from birth in the form of discussing anatomy and sex differences directly and with correct terminology. Amy believes children should know how babies are made, how consent works, how families are structured, and what safe touch is by kindergarten, because when they’re that small, they are very curious and absorb the information naturally, and they haven’t yet learned enough of the negative aspects of sex to darken or pervert the facts of life. She highlights that early education about sex does a lot to protect kids from sexual abuse, which should motivate most parents to discuss the topic with their kids.
She mentions using the opportunities available to talk about sex in everyday life, from family members becoming pregnant or being gay to people displaying the signs of puberty. Amy discusses that it’s important to address puberty before they’ve completed the process, with 8 and 9 being her specific age suggestion. Parents can look for breast buds in girls to spot puberty, and she says in boys, parents with notice them becoming stinky.
By middle school, she believes kids should know the basics of everything about sex, the good and the bad. She suggests teaching them about oral and anal sex, about birth control, STIs, slang, and all about consent and healthy relationships. At this age, she explains that you want your child to be the smartest kid on the school bus so that they don’t internalize false information from their peers.
How to Start Sex Talks
Amy advises parents to talk about sex on car rides, where the kids can’t run away, but she also says that telling your kids you need to talk with them about a sex thing, and asking them if they want to do it now or later is a good tactic to ensure you have the conversation. She says that it’s often easy to observe the mood of adolescents to see when they’re most receptive and chatty, and those times are good opportunities to talk about sex. As eye contact is concerned, she admits that kids often don’t like it (especially boys), and it’s usually better to discuss sex with kids when you’re side to side. She tells us talking about song lyrics or news items with your kids can create good segues into sex conversations. However you do it, she reinforces the idea that you want them to be well-educated before their peers start talking to them about sex, love, and relationships.
Gender and Sexual Orientation Talks
Being careful with the language you use about LGBTQ+ issues is important to make certain your child feels welcomed no matter what their sexual orientation or gender identity turns out to be. She recalls that with her own child, she and her husband always said things like, “when you have a girlfriend or boyfriend…” until the boy revealed his orientation and settled the matter. It’s important not to transmit prejudice for gay or trans people to your child, because doing so will make them feel alienated, and can even cause suicide attempts if they are LGBTQ+.
Young Girls Coming Out
In her professional life, Amy encounters a lot of stories about middle school-aged girls coming out as asexual or bisexual, and many parents ask her what that means. Amy suggests that it may be a result of our culture being more open. Sexual experimentation can be a normal, healthy developmental stage in kids that age, she explains, and some children will feel that doing those things makes them gay or bisexual, while others may be experimenting and exploring their sexuality. She suggests just waiting, always demonstrate your acceptance of whatever they may wind up being, and making sure your kid feels safe being themselves around you.
How Can Parents Learn to Support Their Kids?
Amy refers to her first book, Birds and Bees and Your Kids was written to help parents figure out their values surrounding sex and gender identity and how they want to talk about the issues. She also has a Solution Center on her website that provides lots of resources. It’s important to think about and prepare your responses in advance, she suggests, to communicate your values more clearly and concisely. She also says that the more parents practice by talking about sex with their kids, the easier it will become.
Background:
Amy Lang, MA has been a sexual health educator for more than 20 years. With a master’s degree in Adult Education and years of experience as a sexual educator, Amy decided to combine those two fields to help herself and other parents have those conversations.
As the host of Just Say This Amy helps parents learn to talk to their children about sex and values. She also authored two books to help parents and their kids navigate romantic and sexual relationships titled Birds + Bees + YOUR Kids – A Guide to Sharing Your Beliefs About Sexuality, Love, Relationships and Dating Smarts: What Every Teen Needs to Date, Relate or Wait. Amy lives with her husband and teenage son in Seattle, WA, and can be found online at BirdsAndBeesAndKids.com
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Dr. McKenzie explains both sexes produce testosterone however it’s much more prevalent and important in men. Serena informs us that puberty is driven primarily by testosterone. She notes that testosterone production increases exponentially in men during puberty, peaks around age 30, and subsequently declines. From driving growth and facilitating sexual function to retaining bone density and cognitive function, Dr. McKenzie describes testosterone as a hormone with lifelong importance in men’s health.
Causes of Low Testosterone
Serena tells us the most direct cause of low testosterone, clinically diagnosed as testicular hypogonadism, occurs when the pituitary gland produces insufficient hormones to trigger adequate testosterone production. But she explains that many cases of low testosterone are caused by obesity, diabetes, insomnia, sleep apnoea, a sedentary lifestyle, smoking, excessive alcohol consumption, and other varieties of poor self-care. She also mentions that many clinicians understand lower testosterone levels as a natural result of aging, and not as a condition requiring treatment.
Symptoms of Low Testosterone
Dr. McKenzie admits that most of her patients present with sexual dysfunction. She often finds problems such as low libido, trouble gaining or sustaining an erection, fatigue, or depression. One symptom she describes that points directly to hypogonadism are a measurable decrease in testicular size. She mentions the loss of non-sexual erections as indicative of low testosterone. She points out that these symptoms can also be caused by vascular disease or pituitary dysfunction, but she reassures us that true cases of testosterone dysfunction can be diagnosed fairly easily by physicians.
How Low is Low?
To diagnose hypogonadism, Serena explains that labs look for reproducible testosterone levels below 300 or 350. The doctor explains that testosterone levels vary from day to day and hour to hour, which is why testing a man’s testosterone more than once is necessary for a correct diagnosis. She admits that some practitioners will skip this second test, which can lead to inappropriate diagnoses. She explains that most men should have testosterone levels between 200 and 900 for full sexual health, but the exact levels vary for different individuals.
Treating Low Testosterone
Dr. McKenzie believes that it’s important to assess lifestyle variables and consider alternative treatments like testosterone stimulation before rushing into testosterone replacement. For many men, correcting poor self-care, addressing relationship problems, and learning to foster romance in their relationships can solve their sexual and energy complaints. She remarks that these treatments are especially useful for younger men because hormone replacement shuts off the body’s natural ability to produce testosterone, which can prevent men from fathering children or require lifelong testosterone supplementation after treatment.
But for men with primary testicular failure or pituitary dysfunction, Dr. McKenzie acknowledges that testosterone treatments will be a necessity for the rest of their lives. Men whose testicular tissue has been damaged by chemotherapy or alcohol abuse may also need continual testosterone treatments to maintain sexual function.
Treatment Types
Serena describes a market that has produces 15 to 20 different methods of administering testosterone for patients, including injected doses of testosterone, injectable pellets, transdermal gels, sprays, and pills, but she says insurance usually decides the form of treatment.
Risks of Different Treatment Types
Dr. McKenzie prescribes transdermal gels and lotions most often. For those, she warns that it’s important for men to wash their hands after application and for them to allow the gel or cream to dry after application, otherwise accidental transmission of testosterone to partners or pets may occur.
She implies that most other methods are even safer, though high-dose injectable varieties of testosterone have been shown in some studies to increase the risk of blood clots, making heart disease important for prescribers to consider.
Testosterone Abuse and Misuse
Serena believes that testosterone is a wonderful substance, but she recommends it only be used with a clinician’s oversight. Because of testosterone’s ready availability online, she meets many men who buy themselves testosterone and are puzzled by the substance’s tendency to reduce, rather than increase, libido in healthy men.
Producing Testosterone Again
For men who don’t need lifetime testosterone treatment, Dr. McKenzie explains that results vary when treatment is discontinued. She says that some men—usually those who did not require treatment—produce adequate levels of testosterone immediately after treatment stops. Other men must wait for three to six months for their testicles to resume testosterone production, a time period that she warns can cause men to feel the depression, fatigue, and other symptoms associated with low levels of testosterone. She says that people who recover more slowly may require testosterone stimulating therapies to regain sexual function or fertility treatments if they intend to conceive a child. She also warns that a few men never regain their fertility or sexual function after undergoing testosterone treatments.
Finding Treatment for Sexual Dysfunction
Dr. McKenzie admits that medical treatment for sexual problems can be difficult to find. She describes some doctors as being disinterested in hearing about their patients’ low libido and sexual problems.
To meet the needs of this under-treated population, Serena tells us that pop-up sexual health clinics began to appear. Because pop-up clinics often provide inadequate or inappropriate treatment, she explains that more clinicians began to understand the need to provide sexual health services to their patients. Thanks to these changes, Serena shares the encouraging news that getting medical help for sexual problems is becoming easier every day.
Background:
A healthcare worker since 1992, Dr. Serena McKenzie is an evidence-based, holistic primary care physician with expertise in sexual medicine, healthy aging, and the pelvic floor. She is certified as a sexual medicine fellow (IF) through the International Society for Women’s Sexual Health (ISSWSH), as a nationally certified Menopause Practitioner (NCMP) through the North American Menopause Society (NAMS), and as a sex counselor through the American Association of Sex Educators and Therapists (AASECT). Using a multi-disciplinary approach that assesses her patients holistically, Dr. McKenzie helps her patients treat sexual dysfunction at every stage in life.
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Amanda Walker is a health lifestyle coach whose focus is on helping women feel better naked. She created the Feel Amazing Naked Program and the Feel Amazing Naked Podcast. She is the creator and blogger at awalkmyway.com. Amanda overcame a life of yo-yo dieting and emotional eating, allowing her to live a life where she controls her food, rather than her food controlling her. Now she uses her experience to help thousands of clients unearth the root causes of their food struggles to transform their bodies and their lives. She encourages her clients to lead fuller, healthier lives in which they can embrace their bodies and lose the self-consciousness and guilt that holds them back.
Why ‘Feel Amazing Naked’?
Amanda explains that many of her clients will lose a lot of weight, see the transformation, but continue to feel inadequate and lack confidence in daily life and their romantic relationships. She says that’s why it’s so important to feel amazing, in addition to looking amazing. When you feel amazing, she reminds us, confidence, and attractiveness can radiate outward and improve your sex life in ways that just looking amazing never will.
She believes that looking and being healthy are important, though she doesn’t deny that some individuals can be very attractive even while carrying extra weight. But Amanda tells us that she’s about holistic self-growth that includes mindset elements along with health and body transformation.
In order to set a course for individual clients, Ms. Walker informs us that she likes to ask clients what their goals are before they begin. She says that some clients want to lose weight, some want to work on weight-loss goals, and many want to work on mindset and body transformation goals.
The Feminine Ideal and Modern Women
Amanda suspects that women struggle with body image issues more than men do because social media and traditional media alike put increasingly perfect, and increasingly impossible feminine body ideals into the world. She explains that women are susceptible to these images of perfection from early adolescence onwards and that she feels her personal background with these influences makes her especially passionate about helping women get past the detrimental thoughts and poor mindset these cultural ideas impart.
Ms. Walker also mentions that women are encouraged to serve many roles. She lists female roles like being parents, spouses, employees, and entrepreneurs as a small selection of the roles women are expected to fulfill, and she goes on to mention that the more women serve others or fulfill externalized ideals, the less in touch they are with their own needs and desires. She suggests that when people disconnect from their own, personal ideals, they also disconnect from the confidence that’s derived from having a clear view of one’s own desires, needs, and independent identity. She suggests that it’s necessary to serve yourself first sometimes, and it’s imperative that women stop feeling guilty about prioritizing themselves if they want to effectively interact with their friends and families.
Confidence’s Link to Health and Happiness
Amanda says that if we’re not clear on who we are and are not confident in who we are, then we can’t fully show up in our other relationships and roles in life. Lacking confidence, she explains, dims our light, and tries to hide who we are, while confidence allows for full investment in and involvement with the world. Especially in our sex lives, she says, lacking confidence can lead to us trying to literally hide the body that makes us insecure, and that inhibits connection.
Ms. Walker explains that prioritizing health and making healthier choices also allows women’s confidence to improve because it encourages women to make more intentional actions. She suggests that this link between intentional living and growing confidence can encourage women to adopt more healthy changes, like becoming more active, which leads to more confidence and creates a healthy cycle of confidence-boosting.
How to Change Your Habits
Amanda points out that overeating is usually a coping mechanism being used to cover up something else. She says that people can undereat or overeat, but in either case, she encourages women to discover the root cause that’s preventing them from making the changes they desire. After observing the thoughts that accompany eating or other actions that need to change, she suggests that people can start to chip away at what’s really behind their unhealthy behaviors.
By embracing the journey towards wellness and enjoying the systems that lead to our ultimate goals, Ms. Walker suggests that we can enjoy and appreciate where we are on our path to health. She uses the example of a person who wants to be a runner, saying that it’s essential to stop saying you can’t accomplish your goal. She explains that you must say you’re becoming a runner before you’ll let yourself become a person who runs. She reminds us that our thoughts change our beliefs, and changing our thoughts about who we are and what we can do can change our feelings and actions.
She also explains that habits are easiest to change by taking small, consistent steps in the right direction. Initially, the tasks should be so easy that you make it hard for yourself to avoid the activity you want to add to your life. She tells us that aligning the actions of her clients with their goals is another important part of her work. To do that, she encourages her clients to look at what they’re actually doing, and accept that those are their priorities right now. Only by changing their actions, she explains, can her clients truly change their lives.
Morning Celebrations
Amanda encourages her clients to look in the mirror with a dry erase marker and write down one thing they love about themselves each day in the mirror. She says that the constantly lengthening reminder of awesome things about you helps to remind you of how awesome you are.
Root Causes of Unhealthy Choices
Amanda tells us that time management, not understanding how habits are formed, negative self-talk, and limiting beliefs are a few of the root causes that prevent her clients from making the changes they desire.
Being Intentional About Sex
Amanda knows that poor body image often limits people’s sex lives, but she also finds that simply talking about sex and bedroom confidence with her clients makes them feel more comfortable approaching and talking about sex in their own lives.
Ms. Walker admits that even in her own life, she often fails to manage her time intentionally enough to have time with her husband before the end of the day. To combat this tendency and retain intimacy in romantic relationships, she says we must stop, pause, and make a commitment to approach sex earlier in the day and give our best selves to our partners.
She tells us that pausing to think about and realign our actions helps us remember to connect with our spouses and often rejuvenates our lives romantically and sexually. She also insists that taking care of yourself and building your self-love makes it much easier to give yourself freely in intimate contexts.
Amanda’s Favorite Weight-Loss Tip
Amanda advocates time management and meal planning as great first steps. She suggests planning your food intake a day in advance because having a plan and being fully intentional about food intake solves a lot of problems. She says that just being mindful of what you’re eating, which this type of planning requires, starts to create a spiral of success.
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228: The Orgasm Gap Revisited with Dr. Laurie Mintz
16 Jun 2024
00:29:25
In this episode of Better Sex, hosted by sex therapist Jessa Zimmerman, the topic of discussion is the orgasm gap between heterosexual men and women. Joined by Dr. Laurie Mintz, an expert who wrote 'Becoming Cliterate', they explore the reasons behind this gap, which includes the lack of clitoral stimulation for women and societal misconceptions about female pleasure. Dr. Mintz shares insights from her research and teaching experiences, highlights the improvements since her book's publication in 2017, and discusses ways to enhance sexual pleasure through communication, use of vibrators, and changing cultural narratives around sex. The episode provides valuable information for both women and men to improve their intimate relationships and achieve a more fulfilling sex life.
00:00 Introduction to Better Sex
00:48 Understanding the Orgasm Gap
01:02 Guest Introduction: Laurie Mintz
01:39 Defining the Orgasm Gap
04:59 Cultural Influences on Female Pleasure
05:43 Statistics and Research on Female Orgasm
08:45 Barriers to Female Pleasure
19:09 Strategies to Close the Orgasm Gap
19:40 The Role of Vibrators in Sexual Pleasure
23:10 Empowering Women and Men in Sexual Relationships
Dr. Laurie Mintz is a professor, author, speaker, and therapist. As an Emeritus Professor at the University of Florida, she teaches the Psychology of Human Sexuality to hundreds of undergraduate students each year. She has published over 50 scholarly articles and six chapters in academic books. She is the author of two popular press books, both written with the aim of empowering women sexually and both with published studies demonstrating their effectiveness: Becoming Cliterate: Why Orgasm Equality Matters and How to Get It (HarperOne, 2017) and A Tired Woman's Guide to Passionate Sex: Reclaim Your Desire and Reignite Your Relationship (Adams Media, 2009). With this same goal of providing scientifically-accurate, sex-positive information to enhance female pleasure, Dr. Mintz gives presentations and workshops to professionals and lay audiences, including a TEDx talk with over two million views. For over 30 years, Dr. Mintz has also maintained a private practice, working with individuals and couples on general and sexual issues. Dr. Mintz is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association, indicating that her work has had a positive national influence on the field of psychology. In 2023, she was named one of Forbes “50 over 50” woman innovators.
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
The Pressures on Men in the Bedroom
Dr. Corey Allan is a Marriage and Family Therapist and Licensed Professional Counselor with a Ph.D. in Family Therapy. He has a private practice in McKinney, TX. With his wife, Pam, he hosts a weekly podcast, Sexy Marriage Radio, to help married couples engage with each other and have the best possible sex. He also established sexymarriage.net, a website that strengthens and deepens married relationships. In all his work, he helps people embrace their choice to live life and be married deliberately while growing spiritually, enhancing passion, and embracing the people and events we encounter with joy and simplicity.
The Sex Men Desire
Corey points out that men are expected to want sex at all times. He stresses that society generally expects men to initiate sex and pursue sex to the exclusion of other romantic and familial goals. Dr. Allan says that many men balk at the expectation because they also experience relationship goals that are more stereotypically feminine, like the desire for emotional intimacy, romance, affection, and lasting interpersonal bonds. When men deny their desire for the quintessentially feminine aspects of sex, they aren’t bolstering their masculinity but missing out on something ineluctably human.
Dr. Allan discusses that men and women do have different biological strengths and weaknesses, and they have desires and abilities that statistically differ. He laments the generation of men raised almost exclusively by women and the specter of ‘toxic masculinity’ that produced. He agrees that acknowledging feminine needs in men is important, but it’s equally important for men to live up to their own forthright and healthy forms of masculinity with integrity and honesty.
Ten Women, One Man
Corey describes a hypothetical scenario posed by Dr. Glover. In it, he posits that a man can have an orgasm with ten of the hottest women of his choice. In that scenario, Dr. Glover asks how long each man would take to accomplish that goal. Dr. Allan says that a young man might be able to do it in a weekend, but given male refractory periods, age-related fluctuations in desire, and the increased time and effort required to please women, he thinks it might take men in their 30s or 40s two or three weeks. He mentions that a woman in a comparable scenario could have sex many more times in a smaller period of time due to the capacity for multiple orgasms and not needing to maintain erections.
Corey believes that because of women’s biological capacity to “go and go” and men’s need to fulfill and satisfy that potentially endless desire, many men are, on some level, afraid of female sexuality—it’s intimidating. Dr. Allan discusses that while male attraction is believed to be fairly straightforward, women’s desire and arousal are more mysterious. He says that reaching beyond the mechanical, physical acts is necessary to facilitate female fulfillment. Instead of following the formula of what worked last time, Corey encourages men to open up a real dialogue with their partners to find out what’s arousing that day without feeling like failures for not intuiting everything.
The Role and Meaning of Erections
Corey brings up the fact that men often have erectile issues and says that the heavy expectations placed upon men can lead to a cycle of harmful thoughts that perpetuate the situation. He mentions that even women see erections as signs of their own attractiveness; they worry that if a man doesn’t gain an erection, it means he doesn’t desire her.
Corey reminds us that sexual encounters are intimate sessions between two people—they may or may not involve disrobing, and don’t need to involve intercourse or erections. He says that focusing on erections or the superficial characteristics that women assume decrease male desire misses the point. In Dr. Allan’s opinion, attraction to the whole, nuanced being within the skin we wear is what produces sexual desire, not any external feature men or women may have. He believes that getting the chance to ‘taste the essence of the person’ is what makes sex incredible, not mere genital stimulation.
Sexual Expectations of Men
Corey claims that a great many expectations rest upon the behavior of a body part that’s only three, six, or nine inches long, and that creates performance anxiety and harms men’s sexual desire. Men are expected to always be ready and willing to have sex, to sexually satisfy their partners, and to initiate sexual activity. He claims that always being expected to initiate sex can create leadership fatigue, and many men would be grateful if women took up some of that responsibility. With full responsibility to initiate, men can fall into an uncertain headspace that worries about the implications of them pursuing more or less sex than usual, such as making their partner feel less desired or being accused of only caring about sex. He believes that acknowledging sex in a slow burn element of daily life can ease some of that tension by decreasing the tendency to pathologize differing sex drives.
The Role of Masturbation
Dr. Allan believes that sex and masturbation too often go hand in hand. He acknowledges that arousal will occur from myriad sources, but he believes it’s healthier to turn to utilize one’s own memories and fantasies for masturbatory content rather than pursuing porn, because those mental scenes make it easier to transform that randomly produced arousal towards one’s spouse, which he believes is the healthiest use of sexual arousal. Corey admits that other masturbatory habits are valid, but reiterates that it’s essential to prevent the formation of secrets and deceit within relationships, which excessive porn usage can create. He suggests that if porn usage is driven by consistent sexual rejections from your spouse, it’s healthier to approach her and try to solve the problem than it is to masturbate the problem away.
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Dr. Belous is an Associate Professor, the Director of the Couple and Family Therapy Center at Purdue University Northwest, and a practicing therapist. He is a certified sex therapist and educator, a certified family life educator, and a certified gay-affirmative psychotherapist. He is on the editorial board of the Journal of Marital and Family Therapy and the American Journal of Family Therapy. He is the founding chairperson of the Couples and Intimate Relationships Topical Interest Network and is the treasurer of the Queer and Trans Affirmative Network for the AAMFT. He is a sex and sexuality researcher focusing on social justice and couple and family therapy education and supervision. He has over 20 published works, has given more than 40 presentations at national and international conferences, and has completed 7 different research grants.
The Cass Identity Formation Model
Dr. Belous has done research on the process of coming out and helped people integrate their sexual identity into their holistic concept of themselves. He explains that science has worked to understand the coming out process for years. He gives The Cass Identity Formation Model as an example from the 1970s. Dr. Belous tells us her model begins with ‘confusion,’ the stage where people discover they aren’t heterosexual. ‘Comparison,’ the stage where people decide to act straight or gay, is second. ‘Tolerance’ is the third step; which Chris describes as the stage when people acknowledge their sexuality without fully accepting it. He says that leads to ‘acceptance,’ when a person’s sexual identity is fully accepted, and people start coming out. He tells us the fifth step is called ‘identity pride,’ which is when people become activists, march in parades, and broadcast their sexuality. Her final stage, he explains, is ‘identity synthesis,’ when a person’s sexual identity is integrated with their everyday personality. Chris mentions that this model has many drawbacks, including its presumptions that straight people don’t have to go through sexual identity integration, and its presumption that gay people must believe they’re heterosexual before they realize they’re gay.
A Multidimensional Model of Sexual Identity Formation
Dr. Belous more often works with a multidimensional model of sexual identity formation rooted in social constructionism and developed by Horowitz and Newcomb. He explains that in their model sexual identity is more fluid, and their system is less linear. With the Cass model, people look at their behavior to see where they are on a very linear scale. However, Chris describes Horowitz and Newcomb’s model as referencing behaviors, desires, and experiences to form a coherent but temporary understanding of one’s sexual identity.
The Minority Stress Theory
Chris explains that the minority stress theory was initially developed by Ilan Meyer to describe LGBTQ+ identities, but has expanded to include other minorities like race, ethnicity, and culture. When used in the context of sexual identity it codifies the fact that being LGBTQ+ is more stressful than being cisgender and heterosexual. Dr. Belous relates that the crux of the matter is that gay people have to come out repeatedly and coming out always involves theoretical or actual threats to their emotional, physical, and social safety. Stress is also compounded, Chris tells us, by the need to constantly fight against assumptions due to their sexuality. Mental health concerns like anxiety and depression are much higher in the LGBTQ+ community, and Dr. Belous believes that this theory accounts for that disparity.
Coming Out is More Stressful than Staying Closeted
Chris tells us that research has proven coming out is more stressful than staying closeted. In many parts of the world, he reminds us, coming out means you’re risking your life, while it’s a minor issue elsewhere. He tells us deciding to come out is influenced by their family of origin, personal values, and beliefs, and the environment one lives in. In Dr. Belous’ research men often claimed they had to come out because of the depression, anxiety, irritability, and aggression that resulted from being closeted. Nearly half of the men he interviewed exhibited stereotypically gay traits that made people assume they were gay before they came out.
How to Come Out
Dr. Belous acknowledges that there is a lot of information online about coming out but reminds us that their information is usually based upon one person’s very good or very bad experience with coming out. He encourages people to watch the videos and consider the advice out there, but he reminds us that your own experience of coming out may be very different. His advice is to think about the people in your life to find the person it’s safest to come out to. He says you should look for someone who’s very supportive and an ally of the community. Chris warns that coming out is hardest the first time, and he encourages practicing first, but he emphasizes that you deserve to feel authentic and to be relieved of the weight of this secret.
Coming Out Safely
When helping people come out, Dr. Belous emphasizes safety. Coming out to the wrong parents can lead to being kicked out and starting a downward spiral that leads to drug use and sex work. Those risks mean Chris advises some minors to remain closeted while living with their parents. Waiting until you are taking care of yourself or you have another place to live and sleep if things go wrong is essential.
Impact of Stereotypes on Sexual Identity
Dr. Belous explains that people like to put others into simple, stereotyped categories. He says that when gay men come out, people expect them to fit feminine stereotypes. Similarly, lesbians are expected to be masculine, and women with masculine traits are assumed to be lesbians. He says stereotypes can hinder people’s desire to come out because they can make people feel like they don’t fit in as a gay person when they don’t fulfill those stereotypes.
Chris points out that people who are bisexual, pansexual, demisexual, or any other sexual identity that doesn’t fit in the heterosexual or homosexual box often run into similar problems. They can be rejected by both communities for not choosing one or the other. Bisexuals also suffer from bi-erasure, which Dr. Belous illustrated by describing a bi man in a relationship with a woman. He also explains bi privilege, when happens when bi people are out with their different-sex significant other and have most people recognize their relationship and treat them appropriately, while homosexual men and women are often presumed to be friends or brothers.
Advice for Parents
He advises all parents to think about what values they want to communicate to their child, and what kind of person they want their child to become. Parents also need to identify things that are 100% unacceptable to them. When this happens, Chris says visiting a therapist to make a plan for when those things happen is a good idea, because if you don’t have a plan, you’re not going to react well. He suggests not under or overreacting if your child comes out as a homosexual.
If you suspect your child is gay, be as supportive of the LGBTQ+ community as possible and talk about homosexuality and how it’s okay when it comes up. Those small changes can be enough to make children feel safe coming out. Chris also reminds us that there are completely heterosexual people who interact with the world in ways that mimic gay stereotypes. Those children will frequently be mistaken for homosexuals, and it’s important not to presume your child is homosexual because of stereotypes they personify.
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117: Medical Approaches to Women’s Sexual Concerns with Dr. Ashley Fuller
23 Mar 2020
00:37:19
After accumulating nine years of experience working as an obstetrician and gynecologist at Swedish OB/GYN Specialists First Hill, Ashley Fuller transformed her practice into gynecology and sexual health. She claims that she was better able to pursue her passion for women’s sexual health by removing the obstetrics branch of her practice. In her practice she offers checkups, gynecological surgery, and regular exams including pap smears and STD screenings. She aims to help women with sexual and gynecological problems evaluate treatment options and make the best choices for their needs and lifestyles.
Gynecologists are often Ill-prepared for Sexual Health Problems
In her previous practice as an OB/GYN, Dr. Fuller would have women present with sexual health problems such as low libido. While managing women’s sexual health is an important part of gynecological practice, the treatment of sexual health issues related to the vulva are not covered with any depth in residencies or medical training programs. Because of this oversight, Ashley says that when women asked her about sexual health problems, she frequently didn’t know how to help them. In an effort to fulfill this need of her patients, Ashley shifted her focus from obstetrics and gynecology to gynecology and sexual health.
Evaluating Low Libido in Premenopausal Women
While menopause does affect libido, when a premenopausal woman presents with low libido, Dr Fuller begins by having her patient fill out the Decreased Sexual Desire Screener (DSDS), a worksheet that asks about SSRI use, possible relationship problems, painful sex, stress and fatigue, and several other common causes of sexual dysfunction in women. Ashley points out that not all of the possible causes are physical, and in those cases, she often refers patients to a therapist or sex therapist. Some causes of sexual dysfunction are physical, and in those cases, medication, hormone treatments, or other tangible interventions may be needed. The great news is Ashley tells us about libido treatment for pre- and post-menopausal women! Tune in for the details!
How Giving Birth Impacts Libido
Dr. Fuller lists several bodily and environmental changes involved with giving birth that negatively influence libido. As physical causes go, Ashley explains that breastfeeding women often have a very dry vagina, which can cause unpleasant or painful sex, and being postpartum entails hormonal changes that can lower libido. Psychosocial factors change the relationship between partners, as newborns often require nighttime care and fail to sleep through the night, leading to parental fatigue and increased stress.
Mental Health Influences Libido
Ashley mentions that depression and the SSRIs that treat it can both reduce libido. She looks for chronic opioid use and addiction issues, obesity, poor body image, and even poor heart health, all of which can contribute to low libido and need to be treated before hormone therapy should be attempted.
Painful Sex
We learn that tight muscles in the pelvic floor can cause pain upon deeper penetration. When the muscular source of pain is found, physical therapy is often helpful. Ashley also suggests the Ohnut to allow for shallower penetration, and she says that women with this problem can improve with physical therapy.
Psychological Treatment
Dr. Fuller finds that many of her patients have psychological issues that influence their pain levels. Ashley emphasizes that she isn’t saying their pain is imaginary, but she believes pain influences our psychology. “When you know something is going to hurt, she says it’s natural to tense up, but tensing up also activates the pelvic muscles, causing pain during intercourse.” The secret is to relax!
Vulvar Pain Causes and Treatment
Ashley treats a lot of patients with vulvodynia. She says it often stems from hormone changes, especially hormone changes that appear around menopause. Birth control pills can also lead to very low testosterone levels and cause vulvar pain while some vulvar pain stems from an immune cascade where an overactive immune system attacks the vulva, causing inflammation. She warns that it can be a long path to significant relief, but she enjoys the process of treatment and is grateful for the opportunity to change her patients’ lives for the better.
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
Domina Franco is a New York City based sex educator, coach, and writer. Franco completed her Masters in Human Sexuality at Widener University and helps clients of all genders and orientations clarify, explore and enhance their sex lives. She guest lectures at universities around the country and provides one-on-one coaching as well as trainings and workshops that cover pleasure exploration, empowerment, kink and alternative relationship models.
Defining Sexual Authenticity
Domina defines sexual authenticity as approaching your sexuality in a way that’s true to your desires while honoring what you need, what you want, and your boundaries. She warns that it requires a lot of honesty with yourself and others, both of which can be difficult.
Unpacking Hang-ups
“People don’t give themselves enough credit for acting against social norms.” Domina says accepting ourselves and our sexual selves despite cultural resistance requires courage and involves the hard work of cultural unpacking. She admits that overcoming stigma and shame takes a lot of courage.
Many people, Domina reminds us, were raised in conservative social or religious groups, and beliefs about sex, gender, and sexuality inherited from those groups can create lifelong hang-ups. Even people who don’t come from conservative backgrounds can have hang-ups, she admits, but regardless of your hang-ups or their origin, she insists that it’s imperative to get in touch with your genuine needs and align yourself with your authentic sexuality.
Not Accepting Your Sexuality Divorces You from Your Partners
Even if it’s condemned by social norms, Domina believes it’s important to accept or, better, rejoice in our sexuality. If we can’t do that, she warns that sex will be unfulfilling. She further warns us that if our genuine sexuality is too different from what we act out in reality, we may be traumatized by the sex we force ourselves to endure.
She believes sex is about connection, but we pull away and compartmentalize our true emotions when we engage in sex acts that we don’t find fulfilling. When we aren’t present and attentive during sex, we aren’t just pulling away, we’re also growing more distant from our partners, which she says defeats the relationship-building purpose of sex.
Sex is Something We Learn to Do Safely
Domina warns that your first few times authentically expressing your sexuality may not grant you the full connectivity found in sex either, because it can be difficult to relax into activities that society condemns or stigmatizes, but embracing and acting upon your true sexual desires allows for the vulnerability and joy that create emotional connections between people. In short, she assures us that the connection and enjoyment will improve with time and practice.
Human Sexuality is Relative
We hear what Domina things about this when she asserts that everything is relative, “Somebody’s flogging and needle play is somebody else’s doggy style.” But despite these differences, she makes it clear that ‘vanilla shaming’ people is not okay while reinforcing the fact that there’s no hierarchy of sexual desires, and it doesn’t make sense to compare human sexuality in that way. Knowing that everyone—including you—deserves to be sexually fulfilled is what’s most important.
Embracing Truth Can Change Your Relationship
You need to roll the dice and share your sexual truth if you want to be fulfilled. The alternative is being perpetually unsatisfied, according to Domina. She acknowledges that this can be scary but reminds that courage is acting while feeling fear. Domina always hopes that people find the mustard seed of courage they need to pursue their true desires.
Talking about Sexual Goals with Your Partner
Once you know your authentic self, she says, you can speak your truth. She tells us we can start speaking our truth in a place as safe and impersonal as an online community, but she believes that sharing your truth with someone who’s important to you in person is more helpful.
Many of her clients don’t feel comfortable talking about their fantasies face-to-face, even with their partners. Sometimes her clients write letters or emails to their partners to get around this limitation but face-to-face discussions, Domina explains, should take place in a neutral, nonjudgmental, accepting environment. She says both parties should be sober, fully clothed, and in a receptive mood. The conversation should provide a safe space for both of you to air your desires, and both parties must aim to accept what the other says, even if they can’t meet all the needs voiced.
Sometimes Partners Can’t Meet Our Needs
Heartwarming stories of acceptance are great, but Domina admits that not everyone is accepted when they decide to be authentic. She reminds us that some partners do not want to participate in our kinks. Just like not everyone shares the same taste in food, not all partners are going to be okay with everything we want to try sexually.
Being Single While Exploring Your Sexuality
Domina wants to point out that doing this can be harder when you’re single because you’ll be having a lot of conversations with a lot of different people who will have a lot of different reactions. However, the only way to meet people who can fulfill your sexual needs is to keep sharing and being open about your sexuality. On a good note, she points out the experience gained by being open with new people will quickly raise your confidence, making it much easier to discuss sexual matters with potential partners.
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
115: Creating Relationship Satisfaction – Dr. Sara Nasserzadeh
09 Mar 2020
00:46:17
Dr. Sara Nasserzadeh is a global thought leader in psychosexual therapy, couple counseling, and social psychology. A former member of the International Federation of Journalists, Dr. Sara combined her journalism experience with her expertise in sexuality and relationships, to host a program called Whispers for the BBC World Service. The show received the BBC’s Innovation of the Year Award in 2007 and continues to gather Farsi-speaking viewers around the world. In 2007, she earned the World Association for Sexual Health runner-up award for Excellence and Innovation for her human development work. Harper’s Bazaar named her as one of the Best Love Doctors, and DatingAdvice.com named her one of the 10 Best Sex and Dating Experts in 2015.
She is the author of three books in English: Orgasm Answer Guide, Sexual Health Needs and Preferences of Young People, and Wheel of Context for Sexuality Education. Recently, she developed the Emergent Love model as an antidote to Love Confusion and the design of a validated inventory called the Relationship Panoramic Inventory to help couples assess and develop their relationships. Her personal and professional life is defined by her goal of creating world peace one relationship at a time.
Types of Love
Dr. Sara explains that there are several types of love. Eros is the passionate, romantic love we usually think about. Philia is the affectionate love we feel for family members. Storge is friendship love, Ludus is game-playing love, Mania is possessive love, Pragma is practical love, Philautia is self-love, and Agape is selfless love. She suggests listeners take the Love Attitudes Scale test to find out what types of love show up in their relationships. In her practice, she found that a lot of couples who scored highly in the Philia aspect of their relationship came to her with the statement, “I love my partner, but I’m not in love with my partner.” Dr. Sara believes that it’s useful to be aware of these different types of love, as it can clarify the fact that people truly do love their partners, even if their current love feels different than it did initially.
Dr. Sara’s contribution to the realm of love and sex is making the distinction between submergent and emergent love in relationships. Submergent love happens when two people need to spend a lot of time together and are over the moon when they’re with each other, she tells us, and emergent love is the developed, calmer love that comes after partners know each other better.
What if You Don’t Feel Butterflies when They Walk in the Room?
Dr. Sara explains that Helen Fisher researched this infatuated, honeymoon period of love and found out that it lasts, on average, two years. According to Dr. Sara, this early, submergent stage is something to build up the relationship from, not an experience meant to be sustained indefinitely. She also mentions that submergent love isn’t necessary to create a fulfilling romantic relationship, and people shouldn’t feel bad for not feeling that way about their partner. Many people she consults worry because they don’t feel butterflies or intense passion, and it makes them wonder if they’re supposed to feel their love in their heart and ‘just know’ if a person is right for them. Dr. Sara shares her distinction between submergent and emergent love helps people better understand these foundations of love “it is something you do, not something that happens to you that you have no control over.”
Five Ingredients of Emergent Love
Dr. Sara spent time studying 312 relationships to discern what qualities were important to couples who were not only happy but thriving in their current relationships. The five ingredients that they shared are a shared vision, compassion/empathy, physical attraction, respect, and shared values. This research is where she says she learned that romantic, passionate, submergent love was not necessary, and that even couples who began with that kind of love moved beyond it and developed a different kind of love that John Gottman calls compassionate love.
Individual Traits Conducive to Emergent Love
In an attempt to generalize and solidify her findings, she created a study that surveyed 306 US individuals and 159 US couples who rated their relationships from satisfied to thriving. She reports that they had people of many orientations and relationship types, and they controlled for educational level, economic background, and some other variables. She found four levels of identifiers of satisfying relationships, the first of which was individual fundamentals. She teaches us about this first identifier by comparing love to dancing; we dance with partners, but before we can dance, we have to do things like stretching to avoid getting hurt and make it easier to dance. Individual fundamentals are the ‘stretching’ portion of finding love, which she describes as the ability to connect moral values, have positive thoughts and emotions, be present and mindful, have a healthy financial attitude, and be capable of abstract thinking. While some of her clients insisted that if these were the requirements, they could never develop those healthy traits well enough to sustain a healthy relationship, Dr. Sara considers these findings to be a source of hope, because each trait can be improved and developed with the help of a therapist.
Non-negotiable Traits of Sustainable Relationships
The next level of requirements she found are dyadic fundamentals, Dr. Sara calls them non-negotiable objects that must exist between the two partners. It’s important to note that these fundamentals can be improved. She lists mutual physical attraction, shared vision, shared moral values, and shared financial attitudes as the necessary elements asserting that financial attitude factor was something she investigated more deeply to discover if it was not having money or merely people’s attitudes towards money that had to be compatible, and the research showed that it was the attitudes that actually mattered.
Interpersonal Dynamics
Respect, compassion, love, commitment, and trust are the five aspects of the third dyadic fundamental which she calls interpersonal dynamics. According to Dr. Sara, these are all choices we make on a daily basis. She says we choose to be loving towards others, to be worthy of respect, to be trustworthy, etc., and these choices and actions produce the love, respect, and trust we desire from our partners. She notes that while these are all verbs, and they’re all things we can do, they’re also things that we don’t only do in our relationships, but in the world at large. In other words, they’re also states of being. She clarifies that this is also a hopeful reality because therapists can help people attain those traits as well.
Relationship Outcomes
Dr. Sara describes this aspect of emergent love as indicating good results on the individual level. The results she includes are overall satisfaction, sexual satisfaction, better self-care, better sleep, less anxiety, and less preoccupation with their partners and the relationship in general. When people find these traits growing during a relationship, she says people can be certain they’re on the right path.
Physical Attraction
Dr. Sara believes that physical attraction is largely socially constructed and thinks it’s important to deconstruct where our attraction comes from, who told us to be attracted to certain things, and how you’re approaching attraction. After you do this, she believes that we can be freed from these preconceptions and be attracted to more traits and types of people. She also emphasizes that it’s important to find yourself attractive so that you don’t project the feeling of being unattractive onto your partner. Once you deconstruct and move past your barriers to physical attraction, she says that once you have physical attraction, you also need sexual chemistry and the ability to move that towards sexual harmony, where you actually work well together physically.
How Can People Integrate Dr. Sara’s Knowledge into Their Lives?
Dr. Sara suggests starting with the survey she created called the Relationship Panoramic Questionnaire or the love attitudes scale and taking the results of the surveys to a therapist who will know how to interpret it and help them implement the necessary changes. She also recommends watching The Anatomy of Trust by Brené Brown with your partner, so that you can better understand and build trust in your relationship.
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
114: Permission; Finding Your Libido – Lauren White
02 Mar 2020
00:39:26
Lauren is a qualified sexologist and permission-granter who helps her clients reduce stress and reinvigorate their sex lives. Through her writing, online classes, and one-on-one sessions, she helps high-achieving, introverted women release their physical and psychological blocks to liberate their libidos for sex and life. She is the author of Permission: Personal Liberation for Switched-on Women.
Defining Libido
Lauren takes her definition of libido from Alisa Vitti, the author of Woman Code, who defined libido as “the ability to give and receive pleasure, enjoyment, and acknowledgement.” Using this definition, she’s free to acknowledge nonsexual actions as integral stimulators of her libido. She shares examples of planting her feet in nature, brushing her children’s hair, and working towards and achieving goals as libidinous activities that help her drop into softness and feel powerful in a giving way. Her definition of libido is “a sort of energy that we gain familiarity with and exercise whenever we take part in sensual giving or receiving that becomes easier to channel the more we access it.”
She mentions that her broader definition of libido takes the focus away from exclusively desiring the really passionate, intense, sexual forms of libido, and encourages us to focus on smaller, softer, more day-to-day manifestations of libido. She tells us that focusing exclusively on our desire for intense desire, especially in circumstances that aren’t favorable to it, leads to a loop of dissatisfaction that can make us frustrated while focusing on tinier pleasures can help us escape that frustration loop and clears the way for us to experience the bigger, more passionate emotions.
Women are Held Back by Doing Too Much
Lauren argues that the need women feel to spread themselves thin doesn’t leave a lot of room for the erotic and sexual. While she admits women are good at juggling obligations and multitasking, she thinks a disservice is done when women mistakenly internalize “I can do anything” as “I can do everything” or, worse, “I should do everything.”
Lauren advises women to sit down and make conscious choices about where their energy—their libido—is going. She encourages people to keep doing what they’re doing if it’s fruitful and fulfilling. However, she claims that if there’s a cost to the activity, it’s better to focus on things like personal relationships that you genuinely need to invest in. She says it’s also important not to fall so deeply into work or hobbies that you forget to keep dating.
How to Identify a Withered Libido
In Lauren’s experience, withered libidos usually come to light when women’s partners turn to them and ask why their sex life diminished. For a lot of the women she sees, their loss of libido began with a valid cause, like grief or the loss of a pregnancy, but then refraining from sex became a habit until their partner brought it to their attention. Other times, she sees women who notice their own loss of libido when something in a movie or their friends’ lives brings their loss of vitality to their attention. Gentle wake up calls that remind them of the confident women they used to be do happen, but usually when people have a partner, their partner is the one who brings up the topic.
“I don’t care if I never have sex again.”
Many women who come to see Lauren do not care about sex anymore. She recalls that for many women who have lost their drive for sex, their drive for other activities and their basic sensuality has evaporated simultaneously. She says it’s rare for the sex drive to diminish all by itself, usually lots of other joyous, playful, and pleasantly purposeless activity is also absent. Fun is usually missing too, which she claims is important, because all of those nonsexual indicators of a lack of libido also need to be worked on to reignite women’s sexual libidos. She asserts that it’s never just about sex.
Balancing Masculine and Feminine Energy
In the workplace, Lauren explains, a lot of women learn to act more masculine as a result of working hard and disconnecting from their emotions. Many women wind up with what she calls a very ‘masculine’ energy that is opposed to the physical and metaphorical opening of oneself that’s necessary during sex. She says that even our personal goals like gym routines and strict regimens in our hobbies can encourage the same masculine energy, and women need to balance that with the soft, supple, flowing and accepting nature of femininity. She emphasizes that women don’t have to just be feminine. Masculine energy is great, she explains, but a balance is necessary.
How to Nurture Your Libido
Every human, Lauren asserts, even people who are petrified of change, wants to know that they’re growing and changing in some way. People want to look back and see progress, not a stagnant, repetitive blur or a confirmation that they were too scared to try for something new. She’s certain people want more than that.
Lauren learned from Emily Nagoski that when we move our bodies, we’re letting our bodies know that they’re safe. She explains that we often try to tell ourselves we’re safe or sexual or erotic mentally first, and that’s part of the puzzle, but our bodies won’t respond that way until we act. She doesn’t suggest people jump right into sex, but dance lets you engage in a lot of different movements, including sensual, almost sexual hip movements. She says that can connect you to your sensual, erotic side without throwing yourself into a situation as vulnerable as actually having sex. She reminds us that we usually wait for a feeling and then act on that, but she says that what we need to do is move our bodies first, and then the feelings will come.
Another method she suggests to help your libido flourish is paying attention to the small things in life, and focusing on everyday experiences. She admits that most of the time, most of us are running on autopilot, but says that being mindful of our surroundings, our everyday experiences, and even little details like how we breathe can show us the many, little enjoyable things we were missing. She emphasizes that it doesn’t take big things like luxury purchases and foreign vacations to have a great experience; she reminds us that we can and should accomplish that on a daily basis. The ultimate goal is to get better at caring for ourselves, which she claims we can accomplish by trying new things and continuing to do the ones we enjoy. This lets us enter a flow state, which she describes as the state where you’re losing track of time, completely absorbed in what you’re doing, with your nervous system balanced and happy; this is a state normally attained in good sex, but Lauren suggests that it’s just as important to pursue and enjoy that feeling during daylight hours.
Objections to Overcome
While women often insist they do not have time, Lauren discovered that women were afraid of failing at seeking pleasure, or that they were going to fail when doing things without a predictable outcome. Some of her clients even worried what will happen if it did work! She reminds us that when we were children, we had a natural curiosity about the ‘what if’s in life, while as an adult they hold us back. Also, as children, she knows that we played for the act of playing, instead of to reach an outcome. We learn that as adults we expect to feel satisfied when we finish projects, but she points out that we never really reach that state of happiness.
When time really is the obstacle, Lauren wants people to know that in most situations, time can be made. Making time might involve learning to say no and refusing to take care of everyone except yourself. “We are entitled to take care of ourselves, our needs are important, and we are allowed to relax and make ourselves happy.”
The Role of Permission
Ms. White tells us that permission is wound through everything she’s saying here and in her book, because it’s important for everyone to give themselves permission to show up in life and sex in a way that works for them, without worrying about what other people are doing or expect. She emphasizes that it’s about figuring out what to subtract from and add to our lives. She explains that it’s about acknowledging who you are and what you like to enjoy in your life inside and outside of the bedroom.
How to Find Out More
Her book, Permission, is available worldwide at every online book merchant. Lauren is based in Brisbane, Australia, but she works with people online. She can be contacted on social media using the handle LaurenWhiteAU.
If you’re enjoying the podcast and want to be a part of making sure it continues in the future, consider being a patron. With a small monthly pledge, you can support the costs of putting this show together. For as little as $2 per month, you can get advance access to each episode. For just a bit more, you will receive an advance copy of a chapter of my new book. And for $10 per month, you get all that plus an invitation to an online Q&A chat with me once a quarter. Learn more at https://www.patreon.com/bettersexpodcast
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
113: Premature Ejaculation and Treatment – Jeff Abraham
24 Feb 2020
00:41:38
Jeff Abraham is a man dedicated to doing the right thing. After winning a court case against Hyundai who asked him to actively discriminate against female and African American candidates in 1999, he moved to Promescent as CEO, a company founded by his late friend, Dr. Ronald Gilbert. Jeff has continued his legacy by fulfilling his companies dreams in his honor. In addition to this Jeff has spent the last decade advocating sexual health and wellness by educating the public on the importance of intimacy and how to resolve common sexual dysfunctions.
Premature Ejaculation Can Cause Erectile Dysfunction
Jeff learned that 10% to 15% of erectile dysfunction cases are misdiagnosed cases of premature ejaculation. He clarifies that premature ejaculation is diagnosed when a man suffers from a complete inability to have sex, masturbate, or engage in oral or anal sex for more than 90 seconds without ejaculating. He explains that having clinical PE often causes erectile dysfunction, as when men are aware that PE is going to be the result of sexual play, anxiety can prevent an erection from forming. He says clinicians often diagnose this as ED, but as treating the PE would also cure the ED, a PE diagnosis and treatment is more correct.
Healthy Male and Female Climaxes, “The Orgasm Gap.”
According to Jeff, a healthy male climaxes after an average of five minutes of sexual stimulation. Meanwhile, he reports that women who are capable of orgasms from penetration take an average of 18 minutes of thrusting to reach orgasm. This gap in climaxes is called the “arousal gap” or “orgasm gap” among sex therapists and neurologists. He points out that even healthy males have good reason to want to last longer, even if they don’t meet the diagnostic criteria for PE. He hopes that treatment for longer-lasting sex becomes more respected and acknowledged by the medical community.
Causes of Premature Ejaculation
Jeff reminds us that premature ejaculation has been needlessly stigmatized. People claim that men ejaculate early due to not caring enough about their partners or not having the mental fortitude to wait longer to orgasm. Jeff admits that some cases of premature ejaculation are psychological in nature, but he lists hypersensitive penile nerves, prostatitis, and low testosterone as some of the physical causes of the condition. Due to the number of physical causes of PE, he hopes that we can reject the notion that men with PE don’t care about their partners or that they’re mentally weak. PE is a problem with physical roots and as real and treatable as diabetes or cancer. He advocates a combination of behavioral therapy and products like Promescent or SSRIs to help men build confidence and overcome their physical and psychological difficulties.
Consequences of Premature Ejaculation
Jeff points out that PE destroys men’s confidence and limits their ability to satisfy their partners. This lack of confidence, he suggests, isn’t confined to the bedroom, but extends to all aspects of life. He calls it the layering effect, which he describes as a sort of chain reaction. In the layering effect he describes, PE can lead to lowered sexual confidence, which leads to being less amorous, which leads to the PE sufferer’s partner feeling unattractive due to the lack of sexual attention, and finally leads to a disconnect between the members of the couple. He says he’s seen this happen over and over again, all without people realizing that the root of their problems is a single, treatable issue. Jeff advises men not to avoid sex due to PE, pointing out that this leads to men having less control over his own ejaculation, and creates a less pleasant sexual experience than the couple had before.
How to Approach Your Partner About PE
When approached by women on how to tackle PE with their partners, Jeff suggests setting up a special date night with any sexual accessories you and your partner find enjoyable. He goes on to suggest offering Promescent to your partner as one way to enhance the evening, noting this works better than discussing the problem directly. Jeff shares that this method allows the use of Promescent to be physically and figuratively within your partner’s control, a circumstance that he asserts is important for men. When couples use his method, he claims it’s often the case that men will try the product, see that it works and improves the experience, and will usually decide to use it more often to enjoy their sex lives consistently.
How Promescent Works
Unlike its competitor products, which numb the area, this new treatment uses a specific formulation of lidocaine, to create a eutectic formula that can penetrate the outer layer of the skin and be deposited in the fatty tissue underneath the skin, where it can help to better control ejaculation. While the product may have a medicinal aftertaste, he says they’re working on neutral, coconut, and citrus flavors to remedy that problem right now.
Who Should Use Promescent
Jeff emphasizes that the product is for couples, not just men. Sex, he implies, affords a level of intimacy that’s important in relationships, and Promescent is just one product that can help that emotional and physical intimacy last longer. He observes that sex is a huge part of life and reiterates that if you’re not confident and don’t feel good about it, you need to do something or see someone. “Just like we have personal trainers for fitness and coaches for businessmen”, he remarks, “sex therapists are an important part of human health and wellness.”
Jeff talks about how men feel the need to hold off climaxing, and he discusses the fact that their desire to last longer provokes a lot of anxiety. He doesn’t believe that intimacy should be about anxiety, it should be an enjoyable experience, and making it easier for men to last longer facilitates that for both parties.
How Credible Are Promescent’s Claims?
Jeff is proud to share that Promescent is the most recommended treatment by Urologists today. He’s equally proud of the fact that Promescent was found to have statistically significant results in an Institutional Review Board certified study. These elements differentiate their product from the competition by building credibility that can be relayed through physicians or by patients self-diagnosing PE online.
Where Can I Get The Product?
www.promescent.com
eBay.com
amazon.com
Target (in-store)
walmart.com
Some independent pharmacies, urologists, and therapists also carry it.
Claim your free code for a 15% discount: bettersex15
If you’re enjoying the podcast and want to be a part of making sure it continues in the future, consider being a patron. With a small monthly pledge, you can support the costs of putting this show together. For as little as $2 per month, you can get advance access to each episode. For just a bit more, you will receive an advance copy of a chapter of my new book. And for $10 per month, you get all that plus an invitation to an online Q&A chat with me once a quarter. Learn more at https://www.patreon.com/bettersexpodcast
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
112: Hip Injuries Can Cause Sexual Pain – Dr. Ben Domb
17 Feb 2020
00:29:28
Benjamin Domb, M.D. is the Founder, Medical Director, and Orthopedic Surgeon at American Hip Institute & Orthopedic Specialists. His group pioneers advanced, comprehensive, and non-invasive treatments in a mission to cure hip pain. AHI uses Hip Arthroscopy, Robotics, Resurfacing, and Regenerative Medicine to treat hip pain in their Chicago office. Now Benjamin is reaching out to discuss the ways that hip pain can create and contribute to pain during sex.
Painful Intercourse Can Be Caused By Hip Problems
Benjamin notes that when women feel pain during intercourse, their first impulse is to head to the gynecologist. He admits this is sensible, because there are a lot of ways that gynecological problems can lead to pain during intercourse. While a gynecologist is the first step, Dr. Domb hopes women will learn that hip injuries are another, nongynecological cause of pain during sex. He explains that the pain during sex happens when the hip is brought to its endpoint of motion, where the hip bone meets the hip joint, stating that pain occurs when bones grind against bones, or when impingement occurs. Dr. Domb emphasizes that hip pain felt during sex is nothing to be embarrassed about as many women feel pain during intercourse. He reminds us that it’s both common and treatable.
How Localized is Hip Pain?
Dr. Domb shares that, unfortunately, the body isn’t very good at keeping hip pain localized, which contributes to the wrong diagnoses people tend to get before their hip pain is identified correctly. According to Benjamin, hip pain can be referred to several locations, including the groin, vulva, penis, or even the abdomen.
Doctors Often Don’t Realize Hip Injuries are Causing Groin Pain
Gynecologists often don’t consider the possibility of hip injuries causing groin pain, according to Dr. Domb. He tells us that isn’t a bad thing; each specialty in medicine is very focused, and rarely understands things outside of their particular discipline’s scope, but he encourages physicians to learn about causes of discomfort that interact with their discipline more often. Currently, 60% of people he treats for hip injuries were initially misdiagnosed and took an average of seven months to receive a correct diagnosis.
Men Can Also Feel Hip Pain in the Groin
Benjamin clarifies that this isn’t exclusively a female problem. Men also present with pain in the penis or testicles when they really have hip problems. Often, he observes, men in those conditions see a urologist as their first step.
How are Incorrectly Diagnosed Patients Treated?
Some patients he’s seen have gone through treatments or even have surgery for conditions like endometriosis or hernias they don’t have thanks to their referred pain. He conveys that one in five of his patients were recommended surgery for conditions they did not have due to their undiagnosed hip trouble. The patients themselves are often the ones who figure out their problem is rooted in the hips, he reports, as they’re best able to notice what movements and situations exacerbate the pain.
How Labrums are Torn
One of the more common hip injuries that cause painful intercourse are torn labrums (the cartilage rings around the hip socket). Dr. Domb has found that slight abnormalities in the shape of the hip bone or socket wear away or injure the cartilage and cause pain. Most of us have hips that fit imperfectly in the socket, making these injuries a common sight for Dr. Domb. Sometimes these injuries are caused by discrete events like sports, but usually he sees people whose joints are damaged slowly over time.
How to Prevent Hip Injuries
Benjamin reminds us that not everyone is built the same way, and different people will be able to tolerate different degrees of hip extension. According to him, everyone should accommodate how they are built and not push hip extension past a reasonably comfortable point. Stretching for flexibility can be bad advice, even when range is only limited on one side. Dr Domb advises us to stay within our limits to prevent hip injuries.
Treatments for Hip Injuries
Dr. Domb tries to avoid surgery with his patients. Physical therapy and injections (including biologic injections) are where Dr. Domb begins treatment, though he will perform arthroscopic surgery when milder interventions don’t provide sufficient relief. He describes arthroscopic surgery as inserting a camera into a keyhole sized incision to relieve impingement, repair a torn labrum, and even improve his patients’ range of motion. He assures us this is a quick procedure that allows his patients to return home and live an active life that same day. He explains that even in the case of a torn labrum, physical therapy won’t heal the tear, but he hopes that strengthening hip muscles, learning to avoid painful positions, and stabilizing the area may allow people to live their lives with a torn labrum without pain.
How Common is Recurrence of the Problem After Surgery?
Benjamin informs us that 95% of people who receive arthroscopic surgery don’t have a recurrence within the first two years. But, he adds, people who need surgery in one hip are more likely to need surgery in the other hip eventually. He always counsels his clients on this possibility in the hope of catching it early if the other hip develops problems.
Resources and Links for Dr. Benjamin Domb
http://www.americanhipinstitute.com: lists resources and screening centers all over the country to help prevent and treat hip injuries. They also do remote consultations.
If you’re enjoying the podcast and want to be a part of making sure it continues in the future, consider being a patron. With a small monthly pledge, you can support the costs of putting this show together. For as little as $2 per month, you can get advance access to each episode. For just a bit more, you will receive an advance copy of a chapter of my new book. And for $10 per month, you get all that plus an invitation to an online Q&A chat with me once a quarter. Learn more at https://www.patreon.com/bettersexpodcast
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
Understanding and Treating Erectile Dysfunction with Dr. Jeff Nuziard
In this episode of Better Sex, host Jessa Zimmerman welcomes Dr. Jeff Nuziard to discuss erectile dysfunction (ED). They delve into the misconceptions around ED, particularly the false notion that blood flow is the primary issue. Dr. Nuziard shares his personal journey with ED, beginning at age 40, and his research which led to developing a patented treatment protocol that focuses on hormone balance and collagen regeneration. The episode explores traditional and new treatment methods, including hormone replacement therapy, PRP shots, and acoustic shockwave therapy, emphasizing the importance of treating the root cause rather than just the symptoms. They also touch on the broader implications of hormone imbalance and collagen loss in both men and women, showcasing innovative treatment options available through Sexual Wellness Centers of America and RegenMax.
00:00 Welcome to Better Sex: Unveiling the Show
00:51 Diving Deep into Erectile Dysfunction: A Tough Topic
01:40 Dr. Jeff Nuziard's Personal Journey and Breakthrough in ED
06:29 Unraveling the Myths of Erectile Dysfunction
08:50 The Hormonal Connection: Testosterone's Role in Aging and ED
13:58 A New Perspective on Hormone Levels and Health
16:02 The Future of Hormone Testing and Management
18:36 Navigating Sexual Wellness: Understanding Hormonal Balance
19:19 Breaking the Silence: Addressing Desire Discrepancy
20:01 Exploring Traditional Treatments for Sexual Dysfunction
After a twenty-year career as a CFP, Dr. Jeff Nuziard completely reinvented his life after finding himself wholly a-sexual and unable to perform at the age of 40. After selling his financial book of business, he was determined to fix this performance issue without the use of pills or surgery. After 15 years of study, research, development, and testing, he discovered the actual cause of Erectile Dysfunction and how to reverse and cure the problem. After completing a 250-patient clinical study, this discovery led to a Doctorate in Bio-Medical Science and the issuance of the only Globally patented cure for Erectile Dysfunction with a 97.2% success rate. This patented multi-modality cure is known as REGENmax®.
Jeff Founded and oversees Sexual Wellness Centers of America, LLC in 2020, located in Colleyville, Texas, where his staff treats both ED and Vaginal dysfunction. While maintaining a 97.2% success rate and the Patent issued, Jeff now spends his time teaching and working with practitioners to obtain licensure for his protocols and help people worldwide.
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
110: Your Conscious Sexual Self – Melissa Fritchle
03 Feb 2020
00:37:05
My guest is Melissa Fritchle. She has developed The Conscious Sexual Self Workbook, she is a mindfulness meditation teacher, a Holistic Sex Therapist, is an educator and workshop leader, and that’s just a few of her qualifications.
Within this episode, she shares a lot of wisdom about communication between partners, mindfulness, and exploring sexuality. Really important work that Melissa is doing, and she has a lot of great things to say on the subject. Listen in!
The “Conscious Sexual Self Workbook”
Melissa said she wrote the workbook during a time that she realized the people she interacted with in her practice were self-identifying their sexual being solely through a lens of sexual behavior. For example, she would introduce questions and journaling exercises to participants who never really considered looking at their sexuality apart from a normative model of sexual behavior.
So, Melissa likes to remind those who want to become more conscious of their sexuality should factor the complete picture of sexuality: this ranges from the events and discussions that you had as a child and teenager, to the less malleable reinforcements of adult sexuality.
Within the workbook, there are plenty of exercises and prompts that help participants explore their sexuality and perhaps learn for the first time some of the true facets of sexuality that many assumed they learned in high school. As we explore within the episode, many adults feel like a window closed for learning about sexuality. Most are embarrassed to be in their 40s and ask questions about sexuality, so Melissa’s work offers a great platform for reopening those doors and discovering the sexual self.
Does it Specifically Resonate with You?
Melissa wants to remind you that there are a lot of great resources out there on sexuality but to remind yourself that there is also a lot of junk information as well. One of the most important considerations is that you take and apply the information that resonates with you personally.
Often what happens is a particular person hears that something is working for someone and then they feel it necessary to incorporate it, even if it has hardly anything to do with their unique sexual self.
How to Talk About Your Wants and Desires
One of the added benefits of exploring your conscious sexual self is that you can work through the shame and uncertainties of your sexuality and get much more comfortable communicating with your partner or other people in general.
This can still be a difficult thing though that requires consistent practice. Melissa suggests just talking about things at first. There should be no pressure to act on something immediately. Broaching the subject on a particular area can be powerful in itself. But there should be no immediate pressure to act right away.
Another thing Melissa talks about is having the “what turns you on?” conversation can be a really productive and powerful conversation to have with partners. This sort of conversation can act as a bridge for other conversations as well, just because of how easy it is to have.
Mindfulness and Sex
Melissa says that instead of “performing” sex, being mindful and practicing mindfulness techniques can lead to better sex hands down. With it, you are much more present with your partner and conscious about the sexual act itself.
She says that a lot of her clients end up losing focus and diverting their attention elsewhere during sex, which makes for less engaging sex.
If you’re enjoying the podcast and want to be a part of making sure it continues in the future, consider being a patron. With a small monthly pledge, you can support the costs of putting this show together. For as little as $2 per month, you can get advance access to each episode. For just a bit more, you will receive an advance copy of a chapter of my new book. And for $10 per month, you get all that plus an invitation to an online Q&A chat with me once a quarter. Learn more at https://www.patreon.com/bettersexpodcast
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
My guest today is Lindsay Tucker. She is the founder of artfulsleep.com and is on a mission for better sleep for all. When managing a snoring partner, she has a fresh perspective on the challenges that can arise. To her, instead of getting rid of the disruptions, she teaches the powerful concept of accepting the disruptions and becoming a better, stronger sleeper regardless. Within this episode, she shares anecdotes and expands upon the idea of becoming a more resilient sleeper.
The Link Between Sleep and Sex
Lindsay says that most people can see the link between sleep and sex because it can create a really special bond. It’s also an intimate setting – hello, it’s the bedroom after all – and any disruptions in sleep can have considerable carryover into a couple’s sex life.
Lindsay actually shares a story about the first night she stayed the night with her husband. And right when he fell asleep, the whole house shook with his snores. She said it was so loud that she had to leave the bedroom and head to the couch. Upset and unsure if she would ever be able to cope with his seismic snores in the future, she didn’t know what to do.
She says she doesn’t share the story to make her husband feel bad, of course, but only to accentuate the close connection between sound sleep and a harmonious relationship.
Snoring is not Insurmountable
Lindsay says that you’re never going to change the person who snores, but you yourself can change and learn how to sleep better.
She says that you can work on getting rid of the disruptive blue light that messes with your circadian rhythms. This can lead to more peaceful sleep, even if your partner is a loud snorer. Additionally, instead of this subtractive approach, there’s also an additive method.
Adding blackout curtains or a cool room to the equation can really help you embrace the snoring and become a better sleeper. Lindsay said she tried all of the “gimmicky” things like a noise-canceling app on her phone, earplugs, and more, but they didn’t work for her.
Health Costs for the Snorer, and the Importance of Sleep
Lindsay says that in her experience and expertise with snoring, really the only time that there are health risks for the snorer is if they have sleep apnea. Sleep apnea prevents the sleeper from getting adequate oxygen throughout the night, which often means the person is waking up multiple times a night, gasping for air, even if they are not aware. They can then awake and feel groggy, even if the clock shows that they did in fact “sleep” deeply for 8 hours.
A big reason why Lindsay is so keen on talking about this topic is not only her own experiences with a snoring partner but also her interest in the importance of sleep. She calls sleep the one “constant” for all of us. Sacrificing your quality of sleep is a recipe for disaster. And being sleep deprived not only saps your energy but also reduces your sexual drive.
If you are sleep deprived, you are most likely not wanting to have sex. This is just the simple reality of only having a finite amount of energy. As experience dictates for my clients and in Lindsay’s estimation, if you are tired, the last thing you want to do is have sex. Add sleep deprivation to an already rampant snoring problem and things can get complicated.
For much more on this subject and details on Lindsay’s program, check out the rest of the episode!
If you’re enjoying the podcast and want to be a part of making sure it continues in the future, consider being a patron. With a small monthly pledge, you can support the costs of putting this show together. For as little as $2 per month, you can get advance access to each episode. For just a bit more, you will receive an advance copy of a chapter of my new book. And for $10 per month, you get all that plus an invitation to an online Q&A chat with me once a quarter. Learn more at https://www.patreon.com/bettersexpodcast
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
108: Out of Control Sexual Behavior – Doug Braun-Harvey
20 Jan 2020
00:51:02
My guest, the sexuality educator, author, trainer, and psychotherapist Doug Braun Harvey is here to share his knowledge on an important distinction in the sexual health realm: Out of Control Sexual Behavior (OCSB). Within this interview, there are discussions about classifications of sexual health, advice for psychotherapists on how to let patients present their own vision of sexual health, and an overall fruitful discussion on the nuances of the field.
Spoken eloquently and drawing from his wide experience in the field, Doug Braun-Harvey makes this a must-listen.
A Specific Definition of Sexual Health
Doug says that sexual health is the “balance between sexual health and sexual pleasure.” What he means by this is that you are not only being careful about your sexual activity but also equally focusing on pleasure. He also states that sexual health must factor in the sexual rights of all involved.
When talking about the generally agreed-upon definition of sexual health currently taught in schools, the definition has not changed for many years – where the didactic preoccupation has centered on wrapping “sexual health” in a limited, encompassing curriculum of just pregnancies, STDs, or STIs.
Classifying Sexual Disorders
With classifications and conceptualizations of sexual dysfunction always being defined, assigned, and redefined, it’s difficult to find the point where an out-of-control sexual behavior becomes a disorder. Classifications are made that relate sexual compulsion to impulse control; this presents challenges from a psychiatric standpoint, and even more so because most of those definitions are not made definitively – so to speak – but are only established to get a dialogue going and the research flowing. In other words, there is a lot of gray area and malleability for sexual disorders that take professionals in the field to work out and categorize.
It’s a fascinating and complex subject that Doug does a good job at explaining within this episode.
Out of Control Sexual Behavior
The core concept of this talk is Out of Control Sexual Behavior. Doug defines OCSB as “when a person’s urges, thoughts, or behaviors feel out of control to them.” He says this only applies to consensual sexual behavior. And the most important distinction he makes is that OCSB is recognized as a sexual health problem and not a disease or disorder.
He says that someone who has OCSB is not aligned with six key principles of sexual health:
- Sexual health is consensual
- Non-exploitive
- Protected from STDs, STIs, and unwanted pregnancies
- Honesty
- Shared values
- Pleasure and mutual pleasure
He says that for those patients who fall out of the realm of consensual sexual behavior, into the non-consensual categorization, there is a whole different specialist they should be referred to. That training is much different and the methodology changes for patients who are not participating in consensual sex. Doug says that getting in touch with a specialist who is equipped to help the patient with non-consensual behaviors is important.
Allowing the Patient to Determine Their Own Sexual Health Vision
Doug says that during his assessment process with patients, he doesn’t present a certain narrative to the patients. In other words, he doesn’t tell them they have a disorder or disease but lets them present their own vision of sexual health. A lot of his patients come to him because they align with particular writings or teachings that Doug has presented, so he lets them come to him and present their sexual health identity in that sense.
He has his patients fill out forms that delineate boundaries that they shouldn’t cross, some they are ambivalent about, and then a sexual health column that presents where they want to be from a sexual health standpoint.
If you’re enjoying the podcast and want to be a part of making sure it continues in the future, consider being a patron. With a small monthly pledge, you can support the costs of putting this show together. For as little as $2 per month, you can get advance access to each episode. For just a bit more, you will receive an advance copy of a chapter of my new book. And for $10 per month, you get all that plus an invitation to an online Q&A chat with me once a quarter. Learn more at https://www.patreon.com/bettersexpodcast
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
106: Pelvic Floor Function after Childbirth – Kathe Wallace
06 Jan 2020
00:38:19
My guest is the author of Reviving Your Sex Life After Childbirth, a pioneer for diagnosing and treating pelvic floor dysfunction, and also a practicing physical therapist who specializes in the pelvic floor, specifically. Overall, she is one of the leading authorities on the PF and has a wealth of knowledge to share in this episode.
She talks about treatment, what to expect during the “4th trimester”, and common ways of regaining sex drive after birth through pelvic floor physical intervention. Listen along!
Postpartum Considerations
Kathe says that what sparked her interest and important work with post-childbirth mothers was that no one was really helping mothers regain their sex drive. Additionally, she drew from her own experience as a mother to drive the work she would do with other mothers. More specifically, Kathe specializes in the all-important pelvic floor muscles.
She says that obstetricians often don’t address the pelvic floor muscles and the importance of strengthening them after childbirth.
The Most Common Impacts of Childbirth on the Pelvic Floor
Kathe says that pain is the biggest reason why mothers come to her for physical therapy. She says that providing information and treatment for the pain not only alleviates the symptoms but provides a huge relief to mothers who might have uncertainties and stresses about regaining their sex drive.
Other common reasons are simply a lack of sexual desire and incontinence due to weakened pelvic floors. Laxity and looseness is another common byproduct of childbirth on the pelvic floor, which can certainly contribute to mothers feeling uncomfortable about sex, making them more likely to avoid it.
Kathe spends some time talking about the connecting fascia and tissue that comprise the pelvic floor and how childbirth can stretch out the tissue. It can take a lot of attention to strengthen the muscles back to form, so Kathe says it’s an important step to seek physical therapy.
The Benefits of Kegels for Arousal and Lubrication
Kathe says that a lot of mother struggle with getting adequately lubricated for sex after childbirth. This is a completely normal phenomenon, so she dispels the myth that only menopausal women struggle with it. Kegels and other physical interventions can really help with lubrication.
Arousal is another closely related facet of sexuality that kegels can improve. During the “4th trimester” it’s hard for mothers to get aroused. Strengthening the pelvic floor can help immensely.
For strengthening the first layer of muscles, she suggests the technique called the “wink and nod”. She says that if you squeeze and think about moving the clitoris, closing the vaginal lips, and winking the anus you can strengthen the first layer of muscles. For the deeper layer of muscles, you would seek to bring your anus to your pubic bone, so to speak.
For much more on that, listen along!
How to Release a Tight Pelvic Floor
Kathe says that there are cases where the pelvic floor actually is too tight and could benefit from a regular release of tension. For those who perhaps are too tight, she has a wide variety of diaphragmatic breathing exercises that can help. She goes into much more detail on how to know if you can benefit from tightening or loosening exercises. Definitely, don’t miss that!
If you’re enjoying the podcast and want to be a part of making sure it continues in the future, consider being a patron. With a small monthly pledge, you can support the costs of putting this show together. For as little as $2 per month, you can get advance access to each episode. For just a bit more, you will receive an advance copy of a chapter of my new book. And for $10 per month, you get all that plus an invitation to an online Q&A chat with me once a quarter. Learn more at https://www.patreon.com/bettersexpodcast
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
My guest Lucie Fielding identifies as a nonbinary femme. She is a Resident in Counseling, where she practices under supervision as a counselor in Charlottesville, Virginia. In addition to her professional education and experience in Counseling, Lucie has a Ph.D. in Literature, which has been invaluable for analyzing the narratives and power dynamics at play within our society. Those same cultural scripts have very real socio-political circumstances for LGBTQ and nonbinary communities, especially.
Within this episode, she talks about the importance of finding the Embodied Sexual Self, of Intimate Justice, and a wide range of concepts that can only improve the quality of understanding for all who want to improve their sexual knowledge. This interview was a treat, and I know you’ll enjoy it.
Changing the Patient-Caregiver Conversation
Lucie says that things are not going to get better for nonbinary individuals if the dialogue between patient and primary caregiver does not come from a place of knowledge and nonbinary thinking. She says that there is a false dichotomy at play that doesn’t take into account the complex spectrum of trans–sexuality. Informing yourself and preparing for those conversations opens the door for progress and much broader conversations about sexuality and pleasure when it comes to hormone therapy sessions and the possible outcomes for each trans experience. She says it’s important to not foreclose conversations with “loss” or “function” based language. Instead, a much more open and optimistic outlook that factors in the wide range of potential experiences of trans–sexuality can truly become a great methodology for patient-caregiver conversations.
Intimate Justice and Oppression
Lucie states that a really key concept is one that was developed by Sara McClelland called “intimate justice.” This term defines sexual satisfaction through factors that vary from person to person and depends largely on the different strata of socio-political experience. In other words, a lot of the time, sexual satisfaction is output-heavy and hardly takes into account the existential burdens or oppressions that some people can experience in their day-to-day life. Because someone who is oppressed often has a narrower window for sexual satisfaction, intimate justice is key because it sets out to provide the full picture on sexual satisfaction, and not provide a binary framework that often pits “normal versus not normal” instead of more accurate designations.
Lucie says much more within the episode. It’s really worth a listen!
The Embodied Sexual Self
Lucie defines the Embodied Sexual Self as coming into your own body: to experience the corporeal senses of your body and to come to your own understanding of your sexual being. This goes hand and hand with cultivating a passionate relationship with a partner or multiple partners where you experience the full embodiment of your sexual self. And there can be a wide range of relational energies that connect intimacy with passion from an interpersonal perspective.
Providing a Safe Space for Sometimes Scary Conversations
Lucie says that her practice provides a safe space for initiating difficult conversations and explorations of the uncertainties of trans–sexuality. In this sense, she encourages her patients to take the plunge and explore areas of their psyche and sexual identity they might have not had the courage to explore on their own. Creating these opportunities for transsexual and nonbinary individuals is absolutely essential for the overall psychological health of the community. She says it’s often a leap of faith, but one that’s so worth it because the benefits outweigh the costs.
Mystifying Sex
Within the interview, Lucie introduces the concept of mystifying sex – which, to frequent listeners of this podcast or advocates of continued sexual education, might seem like a verbal typo. Lucie does demystify sex within every one of her sessions with clients, but she likes to remind people that mystifying sex is just as important. With mystification comes the denormalization of sex. All common narratives, all knowledge, gets challenged and called into question on a continual basis in order to prevent a rigid definition of sex. Instead, mystification replaces it with an always evolving definition, not quite set in stone or normalized. It also helps equalize power dynamics.
Lucie offers an amazing parting message, so listen in for that! For more on this and much more that was covered here in the notes, listen to the rest of this enlightening conversation with Lucie Fielding.
If you’re enjoying the podcast and want to be a part of making sure it continues in the future, consider being a patron. With a small monthly pledge, you can support the costs of putting this show together. For as little as $2 per month, you can get advance access to each episode. For just a bit more, you will receive an advance copy of a chapter of my new book. And for $10 per month, you get all that plus an invitation to an online Q&A chat with me once a quarter. Learn more at https://www.patreon.com/bettersexpodcast
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
104: Recovering Your Sexuality After Cancer – Tara Galeano
23 Dec 2019
00:39:35
My guest is a certified sex therapist and sexologist with a lot of important information to share on sex therapy for women with cancer. She is the creator of the class Rediscovering My Body After Cancer and has a book and online class in the works based around the class.
When I asked her how she got started in the field, she says that she had always enjoyed teaching in a group setting, and providing cancer support really became a great opportunity to do impactful work in the field.
Soon she would develop a class that women could come to for answers, and things have taken off from there, resulting in a large number of women who are better equipped to navigate the often disorienting world of cancer. This is such an important topic, so please listen along.
Body Image Through Body Maps & Trauma Treatment
The class, Rediscovering My Body After Cancer, started as a 6-week class, but soon Tara realized that 6 weeks was too long to commit to – especially for women with cancer who might not have the motivation or energy to attend every class or commit to such an intensive process. They cut it down to 4 weeks, and within those weeks they cover a few key areas.
The first area they cover is body image. Many cancer survivors have scars or various bodily alterations that make it hard to maintain a positive body image. And for those who have, or are dealing with, negative body image: it can be next to impossible to care about having sex if you don’t feel good about yourself. They manage body image through a body map. This is such a great exercise for sharing with others and for each woman to get connected to their own sexuality and share aspects of it in a group setting. Tara says it’s a simple exercise, but one that is a crucial starting point for moving forward and building a positive foundation for each woman.
The group then moves onto more treating trauma. A big part of the course is to treat trauma through shaking procedures, which are a common practice in a lot of trauma treatment efforts. Tara doesn’t specifically share the shaking exercises involved, but there are a lot of resources you can check out online, including Traumaprevention.com.
The Power of Being in a Group
There is so much uncertainty and complexity in everyone’s experience with cancer and the resultant effects it has on feeling sexy. Living in the group, as Tara describes it, is an incredibly enriching experience because everyone shares their experiences and perspectives for finding their own sexuality. And often all it takes is to express and vocalize one’s struggles or hope for rediscovering sexuality for the act to become fruitful. The group can bring out so many positive things that can lead to transformation and growth.
She calls it a very normalizing process. It can get the ball rolling on discussions between partners about desire and sexuality, which can be a tough conversation to initiate for a woman who has a negative body image because of cancer.
A Place of Healing for Women with all Types of Cancer
Tara says that she works with a lot of breast cancer survivors, as well as other survivors, who all benefit from the group setting and the educational opportunity. There are many occupations – massage therapists deserve a lot of kudos – who function as educators on various facets of bodily pain. But there are still limitations in the amount of information that women cancer survivors are getting regarding sexuality. Many assume that someone else will delve deeper into the subject, often resulting in women who experience a lot of unnecessary pain during sex.
If you’re enjoying the podcast and want to be a part of making sure it continues in the future, consider being a patron. With a small monthly pledge, you can support the costs of putting this show together. For as little as $2 per month, you can get advance access to each episode. For just a bit more, you will receive an advance copy of a chapter of my new book. And for $10 per month, you get all that plus an invitation to an online Q&A chat with me once a quarter. Learn more at https://www.patreon.com/bettersexpodcast
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
Pamela Madsen joins me on this episode about the importance of finding your YES. Pamela explains the conditioning women undergo, which rewards them for saying no and ignoring their desires. By 50, Pamela had tried over 300 diets and is therefore very familiar with this topic, having had first-hand experience.
Pamela is the founder and CEO of Back to the Body: Sensuous Retreats for Women, providing women with permission to find pleasure. Retreats are held in exotic locations all over the world, allowing participants to immerse with a powerful sisterhood and a safe and supportive staff. Pamela has been an activist for women for over 30 years and was the Founder and first Executive Director of The American Fertility Association where she worked for reproductive freedom for all women. She has appeared in over 3000 media outlets including Oprah, CNN, NY Times, The Huffington Post and countless others. Tune in for an eye-opening episode!
What about No?
Pamela evaluates this with a few key questions. While consent can be a bit of a gray area, it’s important to address. Understanding the root of your No’s are crucial to know what you want and therefore shape what we ultimately say yes or no to. Pamela asks us to dig a little deeper and understand if our No’s are established in fear. That will ultimately guide us.
She points out that women are regularly expected to put themselves last and this spills into the bedroom.
Say Yes
Feeling safe in your own body plays a big part in saying yes. Pamela shares that this can be a direct impact of your physical environment, which then manifests in your decision making and your inner feelings. Once we are in a safe and supportive environment, she believes we are able to take what we truly want and “claim all of ourselves.”
Know Yourself
We hear more about how vital it is to actually know ourselves in order to unlock our true yes’s and no’s. Pamela tells us about her retreats and the amazing results it has produced for women and men. Becoming unshackled from the expectations and conformity of society brings a sense of enlightenment that allows women to finally lose their fear of shame and put themselves and their desires first!
This bleeds into our sex lives, our relationships with other women and our relationships with ourselves. Pamela’s retreats attract cross-generational women. She has found that women leave knowing their boundaries and taking strides in their relationships, as well as in their careers.
Healing through touch
Pamela explores a different aspect of touch that she uses at her retreats. We learn how healing touch can actually be and that it can be transferred into our lives. With a special focus on somatic touch, Pamela highlights how significant external touch can be in our relationships and in our healing process.
If you’re enjoying the podcast and want to be a part of making sure it continues in the future, consider being a patron. With a small monthly pledge, you can support the costs of putting this show together. For as little as $2 per month, you can get advance access to each episode. For just a bit more, you will receive an advance copy of a chapter of my new book. And for $10 per month, you get all that plus an invitation to an online Q&A chat with me once a quarter. Learn more at https://www.patreon.com/bettersexpodcast
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
102: Medical Treatment for Menopause – Dr. Rebecca Dunsmoor-Su
09 Dec 2019
00:36:34
Medical Treatments for Menopause
Dr. Rebecca Dunsmoor works in Seattle, Washington as an OBGYN specializing in diagnosing and treating unwelcome symptoms of menopause. The North American Menopause Society acknowledges her as a certified menopause practitioner and educator. On her website, renuvagyn.com, Dr. Dunsmoor maintains a growing collection of menopause-related information and runs an online women’s clinic to assist patients remotely. Dr. Dunsmoor also contributes to genneve.com, improving their impressive collection of knowledge and resources on menopause and midlife.
What is Menopause, and What Happens During Menopause?
If you’ve ever wondered about the true definition of menopause, Dr. Dunsmoor explains its clinical definition and its biological cause on air. Rebecca then explains the three phases of menopause she sees in her practice, allowing us to understand the changes that occur during menopause, and when troublesome symptoms are likely to occur. Rebecca also shares the surprising reason why a healthy sex life isn’t just good for your romantic relationship.
How Menopause Impacts Health
Menopause is a natural part of life, but that doesn’t mean we have to let it disrupt our lives. Dr. Dunsmoor explains when you should see an OBGYN for your menopausal symptoms, and the two symptom clusters that often plague women in midlife. You might recognize the systemic problems women encounter when their ovaries stop producing estrogen, but you could be surprised by some of the vaginal symptoms. Dr. Dunsmoor explains those symptoms and the reasons women start to experience them during menopause.
Frequency of Menopause Symptoms
Does every woman experience the hot flashes, night sweats, or vaginal symptoms associated with menopause? Dr. Dunsmoor says yes, and no. Learn from her how likely you or women you know are to experience the systemic or vaginal effects of menopause.
Dr. Dunsmoor says, “Lube is for Everyone.”
Rebecca Dunsmoor recommends different lubes for different situations. Women whose partners use condoms and those who have sex without a need for condoms can benefit from different products. Dr. Dunsmoor points out the best products on the market and tells you where to find them.
Treatment Options for Systemic Menopause Symptoms
Systemic symptoms of menopause can be alleviated with medicines, medical treatments, herbal supplements, alternative medicine, retail products, and lifestyle changes. Want to know what can be done about your symptoms? Dr. Dunsmoor is here to explain what you can do to improve your life, and what over-the-counter treatments might be making your symptoms worse.
Worried about the cancer risk of hormone therapy? Dr. Dunsmoor discusses the study that popularized the fear of hormone therapy, brings us up to date on current research, and tells us what treatments really cause cancer.
Treatment Options for Vaginal Menopause Symptoms
Dr. Dunsmoor describes topical treatments for vaginal and vulvar symptoms of menopause and hormonal treatments that can be applied locally or taken orally to relieve symptoms.
Dr. Dunsmoor also offers a revolutionary carbon dioxide laser treatment that rejuvenates vaginal tissues to relieve symptoms. Rebecca explains why and how this treatment works, and what you can expect during the process. According to studies she cites, this new treatment relieves symptoms in a whopping 92% of patients.
The Role of Testosterone in Menopause
Dr. Dunsmoor explains the changes in testosterone production and management that occur in menopausal women and looks to the future of testosterone management in menopause.
If you’re enjoying the podcast and want to be a part of making sure it continues in the future, consider being a patron. With a small monthly pledge, you can support the costs of putting this show together. For as little as $2 per month, you can get advance access to each episode. For just a bit more, you will receive an advance copy of a chapter of my new book. And for $10 per month, you get all that plus an invitation to an online Q&A chat with me once a quarter. Learn more at https://www.patreon.com/bettersexpodcast
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
Healing After Infidelity: Insights and Strategies with Rich Heller
In this episode of the Better Sex Podcast, host sex therapist Jessa Zimmerman welcomes back relationship expert Rich Heller to discuss the complex issue of infidelity recovery. They explore the various reasons behind infidelity, the different forms it can take, and the steps toward healing after a breach of trust. Rich emphasizes the importance of understanding and recognizing both partners' roles in the relationship dynamics that may lead to infidelity. The conversation covers topics such as emotional versus physical infidelity, the necessity of honest communication, personal responsibility, and the steps required to rebuild trust. Rich also shares his professional experiences and introduces his mental and emotional release techniques aimed at relationship healing.
00:00 Welcome to Better Sex: Navigating Infidelity
00:52 Understanding Infidelity: Definitions and Dynamics
02:24 Exploring the Gray Areas of Infidelity
03:59 The Impact of Children and Intimacy Challenges
04:25 Navigating Emotional Connections and Trust Breaches
08:38 Recovering from Infidelity: Accountability and Healing
16:23 The Role of Communication and Responsibility in Relationships
20:59 Inviting Reflection on Contribution and Culpability
22:36 Confronting Denial in Relationships
24:24 The Signs of Infidelity: A Deep Dive
25:43 Healing from Infidelity: Steps and Strategies
25:54 Understanding the Dynamics of Infidelity
28:14 The Role of Personal Responsibility in Healing
35:09 Exploring Solutions: Therapy and Beyond
39:07 Accessing Support: Workshops and Consultations
Rich is a "Conflict Coach" who works with people engaged in high levels of conflict so that they can create cooperation out of conflict. He works with individuals and couples, focusing on how they can have a relationship that works with minimum friction and maximum support for their children. Additionally Rich helps organizations and businesses transform destructive conflict into a vehicle for change and innovation.
He went to Vassar College for his BA, Hunter School of Social Work for his MA, a trained in mediation with the Center for Understanding in Conflict, and trained in Parent Coordination through the AFCC. He is a Certified Professional Coach, and an ELI Master Practitioner.
No stranger to conflict, Rich Heller grew up in NYC, is a child of divorce, has been divorced, and successfully remarried. He and his partner Katherine have been married for over 20 years and launched six children into the world.
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
My guest Rebecca Scritchfield is an exercise physiologist, nutritionist, author of Body Kindness and host of the Body Kindness podcast. She is a strong advocate for body positivity and healthy standards for eating, living, and self-evaluation.
Rebecca poses the question in this interview: Isn’t your life all that much better when you aren’t worried about the standards of society? Through love, connection, and care, she shares how to be fully committed to yourself and how to have better sex through body kindness. Really valuable advice within. Enjoy!
Being Thin is Not the Best and Healthiest
Rebecca says that through her professional experience, she has formed the opinion that there’s way more to health than being thin. The lynchpin for health hinges on mental wellbeing and positive body images and the standards of society often glamorize unhealthy expectations. Once caught in the cycle of negative body image, it’s hard to become the best version of yourself.
She shares an alarming statistic that most children will try their first diet by the age of 10. Even Weightwatchers has an app for young children! Rebecca herself knows what it’s like to struggle with dieting and a compulsive need to “earn” her food through exercise because she was being constantly evaluated by an unhealthy standard.
This has considerable carryover into sexuality as well because unhealthy standards can translate into a negative body image. And as is common, sex can be the furthest thing from your mind if you don’t feel attractive or good about yourself.
How to Make Peace With Your Body Now
Rebecca says that to unhook from unhealthy body image is to practice the acceptance of self. It’s not easy to do at all, but accepting your body for what it is, even on the days when you feel the worst, is one of the most valuable tools for body positivity.
And remember, acceptance is not apathy or giving up. It is an active decision to accept what is and to invite self-compassion into your mind. It also means that you unplug yourself from conforming to society’s standards. You will feel calmer, less overwhelmed by “what you should look like”, and happier in your own skin. That’s the goal overall!
Trusting Your Inner Caregiver
You don’t need rigid food rules or to follow the strict standards that others may impose on you. Yes, you get constant feedback from the other people in your life (indirectly or directly), but Rebecca says that instead of listening to the voice that preaches rigidity, you should listen to your inner caregiver.
She says that we all have inner caregivers. The voice will tell you to eat food that tastes good and to do things that give you pleasure. You can listen to the voice, you can get the takeout food that you love so much, but you can also balance out the components of the meal with something nutritious as well. This means you don’t have to diet to be healthy; you can treat yourself and not have to be so rigid and restrictive in your choices.
You can listen to the inner caregiver inside of you who tells you that you’re doing good. You can hydrate more or go on a 10-minute walk after lunch. Instead of listening to the voice that says “that’s not good enough,” listen to the voice that says: “good job!”
Tips for Better Sex with a Partner
Rebecca suggests you first establish what feels good for you personally and can readily communicate what works for you before applying the techniques she teaches to a partner. The meaningful work first starts with you!
She says it will take time, but once you sit with your desires and pleasures and know more about yourself, you will be more comfortable with your partner in the bedroom.
For more on her book, why she thinks fun is so important, and more on this subject, be sure to listen to this great interview! Check out her website as well.
If you’re enjoying the podcast and want to be a part of making sure it continues in the future, consider being a patron. With a small monthly pledge, you can support the costs of putting this show together. For as little as $2 per month, you can get advance access to each episode. For just a bit more, you will receive an advance copy of a chapter of my new book. And for $10 per month, you get all that plus an invitation to an online Q&A chat with me once a quarter. Learn more at https://www.patreon.com/bettersexpodcast
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
99: From Sexual Madness to Mindfulness – Jennifer Gunsaullis
18 Nov 2019
00:43:31
My guest is fresh off a book tour for her new book From Madness to Mindfulness: Reinventing Sex for Women. Her name is Dr. Jennifer Gunsaullus and she is a sociologist and sex coach with a wealth of knowledge on sexuality and mindfulness. Within this talk she deftly connects her term ‘sexual madness’ with mindfulness, which is an extension of her book and professional work with her clients.
If you wondering how mindfulness can help you with sexual desire, body image, and to achieve better, well-rounded sex, then listen along and learn. You won’t regret stopping by!
What is “Sexual Madness”?
Dr. Jenn says that women are not given a right to own their sexuality. Additionally, many are not taught at all growing up in school about sexual expression or even basic anatomy. And when women get married and have sexual partners they are expected to just flip a switch and have this working knowledge of sexual expression. That, in a nutshell, is madness. More specifically, it’s sexual madness.
She then introduces sexual mindfulness as a solution for breaking through this sexual madness. Jenn encourages heading towards the pain and discomfort in sex first. She says that it’s important to explore the pain points through mindfulness because you can get to the root of sexual avoidance and unpack whatever is there.
Jenn also states that it’s such an empowering practice. The ability to not compartmentalize feelings and instead connect thoughts to bodily feelings and be in tune with yourself like that is such a valuable skill. She sees it countless times in her clients.
Expanded Definitions of Mindfulness
Jenn says that because mindfulness has become such a buzzword nowadays, there should be distinctions made between some of the more important factors of the concept. Paying attention and really focusing is a part of mindfulness. But more important to the definition is self-compassion and non-judgment. This means being truly present with whatever arises, and if there is shame that bubbles to the surface, not beating yourself up about that shame. That’s true mindfulness.
Another important concept that arises during the interview is just being with the raw sensations you feel, no matter what. Just staying with them, without any meaning, interpretation, or story attached to it, often means you can get through the feelings. Jenn says most of the time, all it takes is 90 seconds of being present, of being mindful.
How Mindfulness is Helpful for Desire
For women, Jenn says that mindfulness can be a real help for cultivating and understanding desire. She says there is a dearth of understanding on the topic, so any help is beneficial. She says body image issues and shame can definitely arise and mindfulness can always help. Even for those in perfectly healthy relationships where partners are attracted to each other can lead to a lack of desire. Mindfulness helps unearth traumas, shame, or overall feelings that may be inhibiting desire from really flourishing.
She says that journaling and sitting with the awkward, uncomfortable feelings is absolutely essential.
Applied Mindfulness
Jennifer not only teaches mindfulness practices and their merits to couples, but she also encourages their active participation with the principles. Without what she calls “applied mindfulness” there’s hardly any room for growth or the complete cultivation of sexual expression.
She also says that we’re responsible for teaching the younger generation about the importance of not passing on limiting ideas of sexuality to young women. Instead of just compliments about physical appearance, parents should stress the importance of celebrating the whole person: intelligence, personality, and so forth. This cultivates a deeper sense of self-worth in women.
If you’re enjoying the podcast and want to be a part of making sure it continues in the future, consider being a patron. With a small monthly pledge, you can support the costs of putting this show together. For as little as $2 per month, you can get advance access to each episode. For just a bit more, you will receive an advance copy of a chapter of my new book. And for $10 per month, you get all that plus an invitation to an online Q&A chat with me once a quarter. Learn more at https://www.patreon.com/bettersexpodcast
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
My guest today is Tamara Pincus, who is an AASECT certified sex therapist, an advocate for BDSM and polyamory, and an overall celebrator of the diverse BDSM community. In this episode, she breaks down the fundamentals of BDSM, gives advice on how to start and practice safely, as well as talks about trauma and dissociation and other important topics. As she reminds us, BDSM is really common, so if you’re just getting started, curious, indifferent, or have been practicing for many years, this episode is for you. Enjoy!
What is BDSM?
Tamara says that the four letters stand for bondage, dominance, sadism, and masochism. This essentially means tying your partner up, having power over another, sometimes utilizing pain, and things of that nature.
She says that a lot of typical intercourse can be seen as versions of BDSM, given that there is usually a power dynamic at play. This can be considered an offshoot of BDSM – meaning that intercourse can be seen as a continuum of sorts on the BDSM spectrum.
She says that role-play can also fall within the same category. For more on her BDSM ideas, listen in!
BDSM for Healing from Trauma
Tamara says that BDSM can actually lead to breakthroughs in sexual trauma. Someone who has experienced a specific kind of sexual trauma can claim and have mastery over their trauma through a BDSM act. Tamara says that healing can occur if the trauma victim feels better emotionally or experiences positive feelings afterward.
When asked how sexual partners can engage in BDSM in a safe, non-intimidating way, she says that it’s important to have a safe word or safe signal, as well as make sure there is agreed-upon consent between all participants. She also makes the good point that couples should get kink training and be cognizant about health conditions before doing rope play or breath play, and various other activities of the same category.
To find a local dungeon or similar setting where you can learn these techniques, Tamara says to make sure you check out https://fetlife.com/.
The “Top” and “Bottom” Dynamic
Tamara says there’s generally two distinct dynamics at play during any BDSM proceeding: the bottom and the top. The top is the dominant player, while the bottom is the receiver. There can be a flexible interplay of differing power dynamics as the top can also function as the bottom at the same time.
Tamara makes it a point to remind listeners that the top needs to be completely aware of the wellbeing of the bottom given that dissociation can happen. After all, a lot of the draw of BDSM comes from the fantastical aspects of the act, so altered mental states are common.
Legitimate BDSM Versus The “Fifty Shades” Version
Tamara says that one of the biggest mistakes of Fifty Shades of Gray is that it doesn’t understand the concept of non-concordance. This basically means that just because something turns you on physically doesn’t mean you’re emotionally turned on as well. Basically, your body is not lining up with your mind in this instance.
How to Start & What to do if a Partner Isn’t Into BDSM
She suggests a few books that you can find below in the “key links” section, as well as the aforementioned FetLife community. She suggests being careful, using the right equipment, make sure you have ways of getting out of any equipment, and having open conversations about boundaries and consent with your partner.
For those who have partners who are not into BDSM, she says that you need to have frank conversations about likes and desires. She says that you can try and fight your sexuality, but it might be a losing battle. It’s best to explore options with your partner and see if there are compromises that can be made. Communicating about expectations is important!
If you’re enjoying the podcast and want to be a part of making sure it continues in the future, consider being a patron. With a small monthly pledge, you can support the costs of putting this show together. For as little as $2 per month, you can get advance access to each episode. For just a bit more, you will receive an advance copy of a chapter of my new book. And for $10 per month, you get all that plus an invitation to an online Q&A chat with me once a quarter. Learn more at https://www.patreon.com/bettersexpodcast
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
Chronic Illness and Sex
My guest is here to talk about chronic illness and how it relates to sex. Originally, there wasn’t a lot of information or resources on the subject, so to fulfill this pressing need, Dr. Lee Phillips made it a point to devote his time towards researching and alleviating some of the sexuality stressors of chronic illness.
Lee has worked for more than 12 years as a psychotherapist; he is a licensed social worker, an educator, a sex therapist, and a prolific researcher in the sexuality realm. He brings a lot of experience and wisdom to this episode. Check it out!
The Inspiration for his Book on Chronic Pain
Lee says that he started a chronic pain management group through his work as a geriatric psychotherapist in Williamsburg, Virginia. This would lead to the inspiration for his subsequent work in understanding and mitigating the detrimental sexual effects of chronic illness.
Shortly after, he was approached by a colleague and persuaded to get into sex therapy because of the impacts of chronic pain on sex and relationships. He knew he could do some good work in that facet of therapy. He also says that he was inspired to take his own research further because there wasn’t a lot of information out there on the topic of chronic illness and pain, and how it relates to sexuality.
The Various Emotions That Can Accompany Chronic Illness in a Relationship
Lee says that some couples go through ‘crisis mode’ whenever a partner is diagnosed, but overall the emotions and dynamics vary from person to person.
He says that it’s typically a dynamic consisting of one ‘ill’ partner and the other healthy. Occasionally relationships can “open up” as the ill partner doesn’t feel adequate enough to pleasure their partner. But even more frequently, the healthy partner teams up and doesn’t act adversarial towards the illness, but instead looks for a way to manage it together.
And sometimes there’s actually relief after diagnosis because it brings context to an otherwise mysterious ailment that hadn’t been understood.
The Mental Aspects of Chronic Illness
Lee says that the physical symptoms can be extreme for chronic illness, but they can also lead to severe mental health difficulties that should not be overlooked.
A big part of his job is to try and alleviate the mental turmoil that can arise in dealing with an illness. When considering getting back into as healthy of a sex life as possible, he likes to take into account their sexual history and see what can be done about getting back to the same level of frequency and intimacy. This can be a good boost for overall mental health in a patient.
Imago Dialogue for More Reconnection Between Partners
He says he uses Imago dialogue therapy for his couples. One of the core principles of Imago is that we unconsciously pick partners based on the qualities of our caretakers through life. So, if there’s a lot of isolation, anger, fighting, or depression within a chronic illness relationship dynamic, he will use the Imago model as exercises to break through some of those issues.
He says there is a sender and there is a receiver within this model. The basis of the practice is to have couples actively listen and repeat what is sent from the sender back to them. This builds the necessary rapport and reassures both partners that what they’re saying is being internalized and understood.
The Importance of Seeing a Sex Therapist
Lee encourages couples to see a sex therapist and make active strides for sexual reconnection. In addition, a sex therapist can help a couple figure out alternatives to the traditional way they’ve had sex. Because, after all, sex is so much more than just penetrative sex. There’s a whole spectrum, and a sex therapist can help illuminate this crucial aspect of sexuality to those suffering from chronic pain.
If you’re enjoying the podcast and want to be a part of making sure it continues in the future, consider being a patron. With a small monthly pledge, you can support the costs of putting this show together. For as little as $2 per month, you can get advance access to each episode. For just a bit more, you will receive an advance copy of a chapter of my new book. And for $10 per month, you get all that plus an invitation to an online Q&A chat with me once a quarter. Learn more at https://www.patreon.com/bettersexpodcast
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
My guest is Sherrie Palm, who is the founder and CEO of the Association for Pelvic Organ Prolapse Support. In addition, Sherrie wrote a great book called Pelvic Organ Prolapse: The Silent Epidemic that delves deeper into the subject of this episode: Pelvic Organ Prolapse or POP for short.
Driven by Sherrie’s expertise and research on the subject, this talk demystifies the condition and shines a light on treatment options, causes, challenges, and ultimately the ways to manage the condition and live freely with it. Such an important episode that I am glad I have the opportunity to share with you. Enjoy!
Pelvic Organ Prolapse and its Causes
For those who are not aware of the condition, Pelvic Organ Prolapse (POP) is a condition where the pelvic floor muscles are weakened over time and cannot provide adequate support for the sexual organs atop the pelvic floor. There are 5 different types of P.O.P. as Sherrie states: it can affect your bladder, rectum, uterus, intestine, and colon.
Sherrie also says that the most common cause of POP is childbirth. But it can also be caused by menopause because as estrogen is depleted within the body, muscles grow weaker and lose their supportive function throughout the body. In relation to this, heavy lifting can also cause POP.
She says that women typically have more than one cause for developing POP. She goes into a lot of shocking facts and stats on the causes for POP within. Be sure to listen to that.
The Most Common Symptoms of POP
Sherrie says that feeling a bulge or tumor-like presence coming out of the vagina is a common symptom of POP. Additionally, urinary incontinence is a big indicator of developing the condition. Frequent constipation, pain during intercourse and lack of sexual sensation are also common indicators as well.
“A Push for Patient Empowerment”
Sherrie shares how many gynecologists are not looking for POP symptoms, and it can actually be hard for them to diagnose if they don’t know what they’re looking for the physical manifestations of the condition.
Sherrie states that there are a lot of pushes for correct screening protocols, including a standing screening procedure because it’s easier to notice any prolapsed tissue from that position. She suggests taking a handheld mirror, standing, and then to examine yourself to see if there are any protruding tissue from your vagina. There are varying degrees of tissue bulge, and she says that any at all is a red flag.
She goes into detail on surgical and non-surgical treatments for POP as well, which you should really take into consideration.
What Will POP Mean for Sexual Function?
Sherrie says that this condition significantly affects women, as they are usually sexually stigmatized by any vaginal tissue bulge. This can translate to a lack of desire and intimacy as body image issues arise. A whole cycle of sexual avoidance can occur if POP happens, even if it’s not a severe case.
Again, responses are unique and can vary from partner to partner, but POP definitely increases the likelihood of sexual self-consciousness, as it can be an emotionally devastating medical condition.
She also states that the incontinence and physical symptoms of the condition can lead to intimacy difficulties as they can be embarrassing for some. But Sherrie states that the biggest way of overcoming some of these struggles of the condition is to educate yourself about the condition itself.
Once the fear of the unknown diminishes, you can become more comfortable with the condition and experiment with whatever positions and dynamics work best. You can also opt for surgical treatment as well, which can drastically improve symptoms.
If you’re enjoying the podcast and want to be a part of making sure it continues in the future, consider being a patron. With a small monthly pledge, you can support the costs of putting this show together. For as little as $2 per month, you can get advance access to each episode. For just a bit more, you will receive an advance copy of a chapter of my new book. And for $10 per month, you get all that plus an invitation to an online Q&A chat with me once a quarter. Learn more at https://www.patreon.com/bettersexpodcast
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
My guest today is Jennifer Valli. She has been on the show before to share her expertise and we’re very fortunate to have her back!
Jenifer has a PhD, has 26 years of clinical experience in psychiatry, and she is an experienced therapist an AASECT-certified sex therapist and educator. She is professional involved with many different publications including Men’s Fitness Magazine, and she did Post-Grad work in Sexual Health at the University of Michigan. This is just a few of her notable accomplishments and qualifications.
Most applicable to this particular episode is her training in fetishes/paraphilias through Johns Hopkins University. Within this talk, she explores the complex world of fetishes, and how we should approach them, some theories on their starting points, as well as ways to normalize atypical arousal.
What is Paraphilia?
Jennifer says that “a paraphilia is when someone has an intense sexual arousal pattern to an atypical object or situation.” These are known as fetishes. While we used to consider these “abnormal,” we now see these arousal patterns as part of the spectrum of human experience. A couple common fetishes that Jennifer talks about are the cuckold fetish and the infantilism fetish.
The cuckold fetish means that one partner derives pleasure from another person pleasuring their partner. It usually involves a male, and there is often a humiliation component to the act. This is different than a threesome, though. With cuckoldry, there is a voyeuristic component that is different than three individuals collaborating together in a threesome.
The infantilism fetish consists of being treated as an infant during sexual encounters. This often involves wearing a diaper or drinking from bottles. Jennifer walks through a lot of different non-consenting paraphilias which are listed as a disorder in the DSM-5.
The Importance of Sex Positivity for Those With Paraphilia
As is discussed within the talk, the DSM has been shifting in a positive direction when it comes to paraphilia. This is important because it normalizes these desires and removes shame from the consensual fetishes – that are actually pretty common across the board.
Where do Fetishes Start?
As far as the origins of some fetishes, there are the rare cases that can be traced back to a particular moment. But she states that there is not a lot of consensus on why people develop fetishes.
One of the theories is that because men have a higher incidence of paraphilia, that there are distinct moments, say around the age of 10, when they witness a taboo moment that is linked to an erotic arousal. And then as they masturbate, this serves as a biological reinforcement that is sort of mapped into the mind.
Females are more likely to have sexual fluidity around arousal, and males are more linked to a kind of sexual imprinting.
Listen along for a detailed 5-step breakdown of how assessments are made for fetishes.
Legal Vs Non-Legal Assessment
When talking about the assessment of fetishes, legality is a key thing that professionals like Jennifer are required to assess. If the fetish is legal, there will be efforts to normalize the behavior by minimizing any residual shame surrounding the paraphilia. If it is not legal, like pedophilia, she then looks to see if there is any distress around the urges. If there is no distress, that’s when the red flags are raised, and there’s a problem.
Mistakes in Accommodating Paraphilia in a Relationship
Jennifer says that a common mistake is in too much time and attention being spent on the partner with the fetish and not enough on the balance of the entire relationship.
Another mistake is in trying to meet both partner’s needs in one night. Jennifer states that it’s probably a better idea to separate out days and accommodate the fetish separately.
One strategy to accommodate fetishes, if a particular partner is having a hard time participating, is in strengthening other activities that speak to that paraphilia but which aren’t quite as involved. This is for the benefit of the partner without the particular fetish.
You can also make a hierarchy of interests and compromise according to a determined range you decide with your partner. This relates to strengthening related interests that speak to the original fetish. She goes through a lot of other different strategies and practices for accommodation within the talk. Make sure to check it out!
If you’re enjoying the podcast and want to be a part of making sure it continues in the future, consider being a patron. With a small monthly pledge, you can support the costs of putting this show together. For as little as $2 per month, you can get advance access to each episode. For just a bit more, you will receive an advance copy of a chapter of my new book. And for $10 per month, you get all that plus an invitation to an online Q&A chat with me once a quarter. Learn more at https://www.patreon.com/bettersexpodcast
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
My guest, Taylor Pierce, is a therapist at the Center for Couples & Sex Therapy in Portland, Oregon. She works closely with couples to explore issues in relationships and sexuality and really loves connecting and working with the LGBQT community and ethically non-monogamous dynamics.
In this episode, in particular, she explains the ins and outs of jealousy and how we can avoid it by diving deeper into the root causes of our insecurities and fears. Really important, powerful stuff that Taylor does a great job demystifying!
Her Interest in Jealousy
Taylor says that she first gained an interest in jealousy because she likes working with people who are in ethically non-monogamous relationships, and jealousy can come up a lot within that relationship dynamic.
But Taylor soon began peeling back the layers of the jealousy onion and realized that jealousy is a basic, universal trait of many types of relationships. This led her even farther into a specialized interest in the trait and she has a lot to share about the subject!
Control Issues Because of Jealousy
Often, if a partner becomes jealous, they can forbid the other from seeing another person out of insecurity or fear. For example, let’s say that a couple in a monogamous relationship develop some trust issues. It can be common for one of the people in that relationship to assert too much control over the other because of underlying insecurities.
Taylor says it’s never a good thing to let the jealousy morph into controlling situations because it’s often a sign of avoiding communication about the deeper issues at play: insecurity and a lack of trust.
Primary and Secondary Emotions
To understand jealousy on a deeper level, Taylor says that you can frame it through primary and secondary emotions.
Primary emotions are your gut reactions. They are the most vulnerable and tend to act as defense mechanisms. They are also full of fear and display any insecurities that may have been circulating inside of you.
Secondary emotions are reactions to those primary emotions, which in turn add to the complexity of the overall emotional reaction. Jealousy is a secondary emotion; it may arise after feeling angry, sad or hurt when your partner is flirting with someone else.
Steps for De-escalating Jealousy
Taylor reminds you to first be self-understanding because jealousy is a pretty common emotion to have. Almost everyone has felt jealous in a relationship before–if not now, then probably in the future.
She says self-awareness of emotions or deeper core issues at play– like a fear of abandonment–can help mitigate the overall intensity and longevity of your jealousy.
Taylor also encourages you to ask yourself questions to investigate the surrounding thoughts around your feelings of jealousy. And if you start having that regular dialogue with yourself, you’ll find that you come to the root cause of your jealousy and can often move past it.
Identify What You Need to Feel Safe
After you have identified what emotions or deeper insecurities are at play in your jealousy, Taylor encourages you to make a list for achieving a safe solution to your jealousy. She states that the list should be a balance between the work you do yourself and your partner could provide for you–for example, reassurance that you are not going to be abandoned.
Create Self-Care Rituals
Taylor says that creating a self-care ritual can really help if you’re struggling with jealousy. So often the main cause of jealousy is a feeling of inadequacy and insecurity, so reminding yourself just how strong you are, as well as empowering yourself with positivity, is never a waste of time!
Negative Reactions to Jealousy
Taylor says that shaming yourself for feeling jealous will only make you stuck in jealousy even more.
She also states that trying to react to jealousy by controlling your partner is a bad idea as well because it will only keep you in that cycle of jealousy.
More Sexual Connection Rather Than Avoidance
Taylor says that avoiding jealousy is also a gateway for better, more connected sex with your partner. There are a lot of jealousy issues around porn use or your partner’s sexual history, but if you can dive deeper into the layers of your jealousy and not react automatically, you can come out the other side much more connected.
Compersion
The term compersion is often associated with the non-monogamous community. It is a direct antonym to sexual or romantic jealousy. Taylor describes it as the positive feeling you may have when someone you love is experiencing something positive and fulfilling in a romantic or sexual way.
And although by definition this is the complete opposite of what you’d feel while you are jealous, just trying to imagine yourself full of compersion instead of jealousy is a powerful technique for overcoming your overwhelming feelings. You can approach it from less vulnerable places in order to build up to dealing with jealousy as well.
If you’re enjoying the podcast and want to be a part of making sure it continues in the future, consider being a patron. With a small monthly pledge, you can support the costs of putting this show together. For as little as $2 per month, you can get advance access to each episode. For just a bit more, you will receive an advance copy of a chapter of my new book. And for $10 per month, you get all that plus an invitation to an online Q&A chat with me once a quarter. Learn more at https://www.patreon.com/bettersexpodcast
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
My guest is a repeat guest, which is a first for the Better Sex Podcast! His name is Matthias Rose and he is a Tantric teacher and healer. Matthias operates his practice out of Seattle and loves to connect couples through the power of Tantra.
In this episode though, he explores the power of “ejaculatory choice”. This is the concept that men can be in control of their ejaculation and learn to orgasm without ejaculation. By riding what he calls orgasmic waves, men can slow down their experiences, ramp up their connection and intimacy with their partner, and overall just let go and experience sex in a healthy, care-free, powerful way.
Listen in for much more on this powerful practice.
The Benefits of ‘Ejaculatory Choice’
Matthias says that rewording the phrase “ejaculatory control” to “ejaculatory choice” is a much more accurate and healthy representation for men. The benefits are many, and can extend to covering premature and retarded ejaculation. Ejaculatory choice is also beneficial for those with erectile dysfunction.
The Difference Between Ejaculation and Orgasm
Matthias says that when he is paying attention to internal experiences, arousal, and physical stimuli, the act of ejaculation doesn’t necessarily coincide with orgasm. Usually, orgasm and ejaculation happen close together, but they are not the same thing.
And so, as he states, you can have the orgasmic experiences without ejaculation. Because they are separate, you can practice ejaculatory choice and forego ejaculation to experience the waves and sensations of orgasm.
Multiple Orgasms and Greater Intimacy
Apart from being able to separate ejaculation and orgasm and thus achieve multiple orgasms with practice, ejaculatory choice also means greater intimacy with your partner.
It can lead to an exploration and a ‘playing’ in orgasmic waves that naturally stokes the embers of passion. And overall, being present and thoughtful and fully engaged with your ejaculation choice leads to more thoughtful, intimate sex.
He says that once sex is approached from a more open-ended way, there is greater potential for felt connection and overall better sex.
Ejaculation Obstacles and Techniques for Resolution
Matthias says that rapid ejaculation is more common than delayed ejaculation. He says that his approach is to let go of the ‘why’ when talking about ejacluation. His approach is less analytical and more practical in the sense that he introduces techniques for resolving the ejaculatory issue.
He says that getting rid of the usual anxious thoughts and distractions is key. He also tries to bring conscious attention to the physical sensations. And within that consciousness comes a shifting of the body’s automatic path to climaxing.
The Power of Breathing
Mathias says that deep, calming breaths are important for curbing the urge to ejaculate. You can self-regulate in this way if you are feeling the intensity ramp up.
He also says that you look at breathing as a way of moving energy away from the penis and upwards into the body, this can give you a lot more control over your ejaculation. This practice de-escalates the need to ejaculate and makes for more pleasurable sex. It is also directly applicable to females as well.
This breathing technique opens the door for more relaxation, which by extension leads to better sex. This is diametrically opposed to the tensing and clenching techniques often used to delay ejaculation, which leads to loss of energy and doesn’t give the benefits of ejaculation control.
As he says, most men who practice slowing down and doing the deep breathing find that after the initial climax builds and the male successfully slows down and avoids ejaculation, the brain understands that you are not wanting to ejaculate. Most men report having a few more minutes of free play until it builds back up again.
In short, you build up the potential to ride orgasmic waves as you continually build up the delayed climaxes.
If you’re enjoying the podcast and want to be a part of making sure it continues in the future, consider being a patron. With a small monthly pledge, you can support the costs of putting this show together. For as little as $2 per month, you can get advance access to each episode. For just a bit more, you will receive an advance copy of a chapter of my new book. And for $10 per month, you get all that plus an invitation to an online Q&A chat with me once a quarter. Learn more at https://www.patreon.com/bettersexpodcast
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
Ep225: Boozy Bestie Advice for Sex and Relationships – Desiree Simone
19 Apr 2022
00:46:41
For the final episode of the Better Sex Podcast, blogger Desiree Simone shares her journey on divorce and how it led to her blogging her feelings as she was going through the process. More than a decade later, through her blog that evolved into a podcast, Desiree lets us in on the most common mistakes that she gets from people regarding relationships, dating and sex and the kind of advice she gives on every challenge and mistake.
With the onslaught of social media, one common mistake is still having a social media communication with your ex-partner. It is one thing when you just want to see what the other person is up to, but even just looking is a form of engagement. There is a slippery slope in this scenario, although still on a case-by-case basis, of becoming a little bit obsessed as to what they’re doing and looking at it every day. There’s a great danger of going down that rabbit hole of really trying to get additional information. You then would wonder why it is important to you suddenly? Are you just platonic Facebook friends? The emotional response is the one that you need to be careful of because it can get you asking whether you still have feelings for your ex? Am I really over this person? Am I ready to move on?
You also must think about the effect it would have on your current partner once they find out that you still have that emotional connection that you are holding on to. Ask yourself: How would you feel if your partner was doing the same thing? If you realized you wanted to get back to your partner, you must be honest even if it will make you look bad.
Another problem still related to social media is the need to make all aspects of the relationship public. It tends to create chaos because you are inviting other people to put their two cents in. Ask yourself: Why do you need to do it and to what gain? Creating an image of a perfect relationship or marriage on social media is dangerous as it feels the need to compete.
Top bad decisions people make about sexual relationships
The biggest mistake people make is not openly communicating to their partner the things that they like and do not like. It is important to let your partner in. We all must be better at being able to talk effectively to our partner about things that work or do not work for us. Sex is about you too and not just your partner. It is important to find ways to make the experience amazing for both parties. Fake orgasms do not serve anybody, and you will be miserable doing it.
Another thing in line with this is talking about things that you might want to try. Do not repress it because you might end up being resentful in the end. You should feel comfortable enough with your partner to open up. If you are on the receiving end of this, you should welcome any conversation without judgement, even if it is something you don’t have any interest in doing. Be accepting, even if you are not interested and try to find a happy medium. There should be no kink shaming.
Another thing is the issue of watching porn and masturbating. Some people think that this is a form of cheating. If this is an issue, it is important to step back and really understand where your partner is coming from and why they have this thought about porn and masturbation. From there, start to peel the layers to understand but whatever you do, do not feel like it’s your responsibility to change your partner’s mind.
Biography:
Desiree Simone is a blogger and host of the “Break Bottles, Not Hearts” podcast. She’s known as “The Boozy Bestie”, your go-to friend who helps with relationship issues with love and good cocktails. Originally from Georgia, Simone has a dual degree in Public Relations and Rhetoric and worked for Carnival Cruise Lines for over 10 years as a Production Singer. Her take on love, sex and dating is equal parts honest, funny, inappropriate and vulnerable. Never shy to make fun of herself and learn from her mistakes, she enjoys being a safe space for all those who venture in the world of love, hoping they are not alone.
Resources and links:
Podcast: Break Bottles, Not Hearts
Instagram: @iamdsimone
Blog: Desiree-Simone.com
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
My guest Susan Bratton has been called a ‘trusted hot sex advisor for millions’. She is a sex technique publisher, a celebrated speaker, educator, CEO and Co-Founder of Personal Life Media, and the list goes on and on about her qualifications and amazing qualities.
In this episode, in particular, she shares her experience with sexual vitality and the summit she is spearheading in September (September 23-29, 2019). Within this talk, she also shares some insights into intimacy issues and basic remedies for those disconnects between couples of all dynamics.
Really useful, informative stuff. And I’d recommend that you check out the many resources that Susan has put out there!
How She Got So Passionate About Her Career
Susan got her start as a publisher for sex techniques. She was inspired to continue pursuing this avenue because she started to see much more pornography than actual positive tips for more satisfying, engaging sex.
In addition, she and her husband were taking workshops and tantric classes trying to ensure that their sex life was healthy and fully engaging. In that process, she reinforced her passion for sex and helping others find great sex. She and her husband actually started their company once they had learned enough to reinvigorate their sex life.
Roadblocks for Intimacy and Their Solutions
Susan says that after asking and having people fill out surveys, there were hundreds of different answers towards intimacy problems. About 15% of them were related to trauma; others were the products of physical hurdles: from diabetes and heart disease to painful sex for women and erectile dysfunction for men.
When approaching how she would address this wide array of intimacy issues, she came to the logical conclusion that a Sexual Vitality Summit with a diverse panel of experts was the way to cover all bases.
And then she also came up with the Magic Pill Method to spark a dialogue between people and get them to open up about their intimacy troubles.
The Life Stages of Sexuality
During the talk, the subject of age-specific intimacy issues came up. And usually the younger couples struggle with a lack of information and experience, and they aren’t communicating as openly as they should be on the subject.
Middle age is usually more varied when it comes to intimacy problems: with children, careers, neglect, complacency, and physical issues being responsible.
And as Susan reminds us, sex can just keep getting better and better. In fact, most 60-year olds are probably having the best sex they’ve ever had because of the experience levels and the acceptance of old age. There comes a point where sexual self-consciousness and intimacy issues are replaced with more grounded sex.
Couples Heal Each Other
Susan states that most healing work is done together with your partner. It’s a very involved process that incorporates not just yourself but your partner(s) as well.
She also says that it can be challenging to connect with a partner who has been programmed (so to speak) through cultural means that sex has a linear function. Susan states that younger couples are less prone to these fixed behaviors and mindsets derived from environmental and familial factors.
This is very common and applicable to LGTBTQ dynamics as well.
How Your Gut Microbiome Affects Your Intimacy
Susan states that the foods we ingest, the water we drink, the cleaning products we use, lotions we rub on our skin, and much more, all affect our gut microbiome.
And after all, our gut is closely correlated with our libido. Physical vitality is inextricably linked with gut health, which really is an overall precursor to a healthy body. So probiotics and an emphasis on better nutrition really is essential for better sex.
If you feel bad, you definitely won’t want to have sex. Sometimes it’s as simple as that. She goes into much more depth within the episode itself; be sure to check it out!
If you’re enjoying the podcast and want to be a part of making sure it continues in the future, consider being a patron. With a small monthly pledge, you can support the costs of putting this show together. For as little as $2 per month, you can get advance access to each episode. For just a bit more, you will receive an advance copy of a chapter of my new book. And for $10 per month, you get all that plus an invitation to an online Q&A chat with me once a quarter. Learn more at https://www.patreon.com/bettersexpodcast
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
Sexual Fantasies and Eroticism
I know I say it often, but this topic is one of my favorites. In this episode, I talk with Dr. Justin Lehmiller about the all-important topic of sexual fantasies.
Justin is a celebrated speaker, researcher, author, and a very effective educator on the psychology of sexuality. His blog Sex and Psychology (https://www.lehmiller.com/) gets millions of visitors every year, and he regularly contributes his writing to major publications. This talk about his research is guided by his expertise and experience in the field.
The Most Common Sexual Fantasies
Justin says that when he surveyed almost 4,200 Americans from 2014 to 2016, the most common fantasies encompassed 7 different themes.
Multi-partner sex
BDSM
Novelty, Adventure & Variety
Taboo activities
Emotional connection and fulfillment
Homoeroticism and gender-bending
Non-monogamy
Justin describes these as the building blocks of fantasies, meaning that they are not mutually exclusive and many overlap. For example, you can very well dip your toes into multiple categories in your own personal fantasy life.
Are people ashamed of their fantasies?
As Justin states, he found that men reported more shame about their fantasies than women. Overall, the majority of study participants reported that they held a positive relationship with their fantasies, but there were still some who felt negative emotions towards their fantasy.
Another important thing he found during his research is that just sharing sexual fantasies can open up eroticism and alleviate feelings of embarrassment or shame for having certain fantasies.
The Differences between Men and Women regarding fantasy
Although the data showed that both sexes share a lot of commonalities, there were still some marked differences.
Men had more multi-partner fantasies than women did. And women had more fantasies about an emotional connection with a partner. Women also had way more BDSM fantasies than men by a large margin. In addition, men usually had a specific person in mind during their fantasies, and the women focused more on the setting and environment overall. Justin also found that the LGBTQ community had more sexually adventurous fantasies, as well as taboo fantasies.
Justin provides some insight into why women might like BDSM more than men, as well as the LGBTQ community and their sexual fantasy preferences. Listen in for that.
Sexual Fantasy by Personality Type
Justin shares some interesting insight into the correlation between personality type and sexual fantasy. For example, those who are more extroverted by nature will be more outgoing the bedroom. And for those who are ‘agreeable’ personality types, there will be a higher incidence of focusing on their partner’s sexual satisfaction in the bedroom.
He also talks about what conscientiousness has to do with fantasies, as well as self-esteem.
“Sometimes a Cigar is Just a Cigar”
Justin says that sexual fantasies don’t really have to mean all that much. They can offer a glimpse into something deeper, but for the most part, they are just a product of your environment and genetic makeup and can be left out of the examination room. Fantasies can be a good evaluative road map to follow for your own unique sexual satisfaction, though.
But when talking about sexual traumas, there were small connections between sexual victimization and types of fantasies. But there was a lot of inconsistency in the data.
Hear Justin explain the data on this subject.
How to Share Your Fantasies with Your Partner
Justin says that before you share with your partner, you first have to feel good about yourself. You aren’t alone in your fantasies, so there’s a normalization that needs to first occur.
He says to lay low and start slow. A gradual buildup for disclosing your fantasies to your partner is much more powerful than an overwhelming information dump!
He also goes into detail on how important sharing is for increasing overall sexual desire and satisfaction within the relationship.
If you’re enjoying the podcast and want to be a part of making sure it continues in the future, consider being a patron. With a small monthly pledge, you can support the costs of putting this show together. For as little as $2 per month, you can get advance access to each episode. For just a bit more, you will receive an advance copy of a chapter of my new book. And for $10 per month, you get all that plus an invitation to an online Q&A chat with me once a quarter. Learn more at https://www.patreon.com/bettersexpodcast
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.
88: Dr. Corey Allan – Desire Discrepancy Conversation
02 Sep 2019
00:45:30
My guest is Dr. Corey Allan. He is a professional counselor and host of the podcast Sexy Marriage Radio, which centers on helping couples experience amazing sex within their relationships. He hosts the podcast with his wife, Pam, and they share some pretty stellar information on the topic every week.
Corey also has a private practice in McKinney, Texas and holds a Ph.D. in Family Therapy. And in this episode, Corey talks about desire discrepancy in particular. More specifically, he talks about productive ways for partners to navigate the high seas of fluctuating desires and the frustrations that can occur. One of the most important concepts that he shares (among so many others) is the importance of accepting desire discrepancy as natural, and not as right or wrong.
But this is a complicated subject. And through this episode, we dissect the many nuances of a common phenomenon. Be sure to listen and learn because this affects so many of us. Enjoy!
Framing Desire Discrepancy in a Positive Way
As Corey states, close to two-thirds of all relationships experience some sort of desire discrepancy within the dynamic of the relationship. So this is a common phenomenon that doesn’t mean there’s something inherently wrong within the relationship at all.
Corey likes to frame it in a higher-lower spectrum rather than a right or wrong metric. This relieves some of the pressure and reframes this frequent aspect of relationships in a much more positive light.
He points out that sometimes it’s actually the lower desire partner who brings the necessary perspective to the relationship by shedding light on areas that perhaps need more improvement: this could be manifested in more mindful, present sex and other areas to explore for more meaningful sex for both parties. Often the lower desire partner has a good reason for not wanting sex all that much, and attending to those reasons can shift the whole relationship dynamic in a positive way.
The Harms of Pathologizing Desire
As we discussed during the episode, a common thing that happens within couple dynamics is the ‘pathologizing’ of each other’s differing desires.
The lower desire person will often ask what’s wrong with the higher desire individual, and vice versa, leading to a harmful interplay between each. It’s natural to get defensive, and it’s easy to assume that someone is to blame in the relationship; but mostly, desire discrepancy is a natural byproduct of being in a sexual relationship with anyone.
More on this within the episode.
Don’t Take Rejection Personally
Corey highlights the productive and constructive ways to initiate sex with a lower-desire partner. This means if you are high desire, you should not pout or whine at rejection. In addition, don’t complain that you do all the initiation–that just comes with the high-desire territory. Corey reminds you to play the long game and frame your initiation in a positive way. How you respond to your lower desire partner’s reaction is important!
Corey’s Definition for Great Sex
Corey says that the best sex is when a partner is seeking what they want, and at the same time, trying to give their partner what they want. He calls it a “fluid dance”, which could also be described as a healthy interplay between the wide spectrum of sexual interests that two people can naturally develop in their relationship.
He says that both partners have to show up to achieve this. Frequency has less to do with it. It has to do more with the quality of the sex itself. He says that if you can have good, quality sex, the number doesn’t really matter. In other words, there’s no quota to fulfill, but instead, there’s a standard of quality to achieve between both partners.
The Importance of Communication for Lower-Desire Partners
It can take courage for a lower-desire partner to speak up about their needs, or to break off an initiation, but it is extremely crucial for a healthy relationship and sexual dynamic. If the lower-desire partner can communicate their needs and be in a comfortable enough place to assert their comfort level with sex, then a lot of good can come from that. It is the responsibility of the higher-desire partner to create a space that is conducive for this type of communication to occur.
And for much more within this episode that wasn’t touched on here, be sure to check the rest of this episode out. There’s definitely a lot to chew on and digest!
If you’re enjoying the podcast and want to be a part of making sure it continues in the future, consider being a patron. With a small monthly pledge, you can support the costs of putting this show together. For as little as $2 per month, you can get advance access to each episode. For just a bit more, you will receive an advance copy of a chapter of my new book. And for $10 per month, you get all that plus an invitation to an online Q&A chat with me once a quarter. Learn more at https://www.patreon.com/bettersexpodcast
Want to learn more about my sponsored charity? Charity: Water is committed to providing clean water to every human on the planet, 100% of your contribution will be used directly for water projects around the globe. You can learn more at https://www.bettersexpodcast.com/water.