I know this is a bad plan for some, but please don’t dismiss it out of hand. The reasons for doing this go well beyond the obvious surface reasons.
Ask your wife if she will join you in writing a sexy fantasy story about the two of you. Set some ground rules about content, and go with what she wants on this. Then take turns. She writes a page or so, then you pick it up and do a page or so. Then back to her.
Some of the benefits of doing this:
It’s going to be a turn on for both of you. Both writing your part and reading your spouse’s part are going to cause arousal, and that’s likely to translate into more and/or better sex.
It makes her think about sex during the day, which can help her want and enjoy sex.
You will learn about her sexuality. Watch what matters to her. The setting and your relationship are likely going to show up in what she writes because for her these are important parts of sex.
You will learn what she enjoys and maybe get some hints about what she wants but hasn’t been willing to suggest. One great way to facilitate the second thing is to end your page with you asking her what she wants.
You can tell her things you’ve never been able to say. Let your writing include what you’re thinking during sex with her so she can better understand you.
This is a safe way to test drive things. Be careful here – don’t just write about the two of you doing something brand new and take it from start to completion. Instead, in the story ask her how she would feel about _____ or if she’s ever wondered what it would be like to _____. Then let her story-self answer, and take it from there.
BONUS: When you have a good amount of material, ask her if she’d be willing to edit it to reflect on how it would have gone if she’s written the whole thing. If she’s willing to do this you could learn a great deal.
Finally, at some point, one of you might read the story, or part of it, out loud as foreplay.
Secrets show a lack of intimacy and trust. If you have a deep intimate relationship you want to share every aspect of your life. A lack of trust would limit sharing, but trust issues will also limit intimacy, so I think secrets are always an indication a couple doesn’t have the kind of intimacy God intended them to have.
What would happen if you and your wife both saw secrets as an indication your marriage had an intimacy problem?
Sex is not a system of reward/punishment. It is a way to build love and intimacy. @ForBetterOrWhat
Links to blog posts that stood out to me this last week:
New blog this week – Married And Naked – Bare lessons in Love and Marriage. I mean with a blog name like that…
Featured Post – A must read article I saw this week: Hot, Holy & Humorous posted How Libido Works: For Women, That Is ◄ A must read guest post that will help you have the sex you both want.
Awaken Love
Sweeter and Sweeter ◄ “Don’t believe the lie sex in marriage is supposed to get boring.”
Critical mass can work very well for sex – as long as you don’t rush it! Imagine your wife sitting on the bed waiting for you to come seduce her and you back a dump truck through the bedroom wall and bury her with all the “sexual fuel” you need to achieve sexual critical mass. That’s not going to work for her, is it?
And yet, it’s what most men do.
Reaching sexual critical mass will require patience on your part. Go too fast or too far and you’ll scare her off. You have to build things at a rate she can handle, regardless of how slow that may seem to you. Part of what makes this difficult is most women will, at least for a while, “put up with” more than they find comfortable. This makes the man happy, but it causes problems for her. If she can’t digest what he does it will become a block to her going further. She will reach a critical mass of sexual offence, and that’s not a good thing!
I suspect most men have knowingly pushed their wife past her sexual comfort zone on at least a few occasions. I’ve certainly been guilty of this more than twice. As it happened I had some clue it was too much, but I told myself she’d enjoy it and that would make it okay. Even if she did enjoy whatever, she was still being pushed sexually, and that feels bad. It’s a violation of trust, and women don’t find that safe or sexy. Besides, physically enjoying something she didn’t really want to do may cause her to feel betrayed by her own body, and that’s not good for your sex life either.
The path to a runaway sex reaction is a long, slow path. Especially at first. A bit too much nudging early on can come back to haunt you later on. Going too slowly is far better than going too fast. Being overly cautious will pay off.
What if she asks to speed things up?
This could be a great sign, but it could also be an unintended trap. She might be suggesting it because she knows you’re holding back. She might be suggesting it because she’s getting to where she should speed up, but she might also be close to but not there yet. Or, she could be getting a boost from her hormones (around ovulation,) temporarily pushing her past her own internal line. This can easily lead to a night of great sex followed by regret and backing off on her part. (For what it’s worth, this kind of thing is as confusing for her as it is for you.)
When she wants to do more don’t just jump in with both feet. Take it up a notch, but only a notch. Give it a month, then if all is still good go further. Continue to increase the rate of build up slowly until you feel a hint of resistance or concern on her part. A move, hold, move, hold approach is wise here.
What if you’ve already pushed too much?
Given how horny and clueless we are when we get married, this is the norm. Without being fully aware of what was happening you pushed her beyond or well beyond where she was ready to go. Many of us accomplished this before we said “I do” and started to reap the consequences days or weeks into our marriage. Others avoided premarital sex then exploded on the honeymoon, causing damage that shows up months or years later.
If you’ve gone too far too fast you’ve violated her trust. She may be a bit (or a lot) afraid of you sexually. She may think you’re deeply selfish. She has probably concluded you’re oversexed, which allows her to feel okay about saying no. She got hurt and has done things to protect herself. The things she’s done to protect herself aren’t the real problem. Yes, they’re blocking the sex life you want, but they exist because she got hurt. She’s not going to drop her defences unless and until she feels safe.
Making her feel safe is going to take a lot of self-control on your part. It’s going to require sticking to the most vanilla sex and it’s probably going to mean less sex than you want. Imagine you can have sex three times a week if you push a lot or twice a week if you don’t push. While three times a week sounds better, it comes at the cost of her continuing to see you as unsafe, selfish, and oversexed. If you keep pushing she won’t be enjoying sex, which will lead her to want it and do it less often. Eventually, you’ll have to push just to get sex twice a week, then once a week. On the other hand, if you go for the easy twice a week she’ll start to relax. You will seem less out of control and a bit safer. Do that long enough and she will open up.
It’s a matter of taking the long view. Do you want a bit more begrudging sex now, or more freely given and mutually enjoyed sex later? Can you control your lust for your wife now so you can indulged it later?
The answer to your requests can be yes or no depending on what she perceives as to why you’re asking.
Having talked to a lot of men and women about these things, I’ve come to the realisation there’s a huge disconnect on this. What women hear in what men say is often not at all what the man really feels. Some of this is due to misinterpretation on the woman’s part, and some of it is a failure to communicate on the man’s part.
I’ve yet to met a woman who would feel good about being her husband’s “warm place to put it”. And while there are surely some men who see their wife as nothing more than that, I’ve not met any of them. And yet, I’ve talked with plenty of women who think or fear that being a warm place is the only reason their husband wants them.
Sure, he’s horny and looking for release, but most men are after far, far more than that. They enjoy sex for the intimacy and connection. They want longer foreplay and they want sex to be as good or better for her as it is for him. But somehow all that comes across to his wife is “I’m horny, get naked”.
I’m convinced one of the main keys to a better sex life is communicating “why” to your wife. Perhaps some of your “why” could use a bit of work, but I think most men’s true reasons are so much better than what their wife thinks that she’d be pleasantly shocked if she could read his mind. The problem is men have been trained to think in terms of action rather than feelings, and this is doubly true with sex. We feel silly or vulnerable talking about our sexual feelings; we’d much rather talk about how it felt to our bodies when we ______.
If you want better sex you need to be willing to get naked. Not just physically, you have to get naked emotionally. It may feel uncomfortable at first, but it will get easier and will slowly become more natural.
I talk a great deal about being too busy. As we’ve been travelling the country we ask folks what they see as the biggest marriage issues in their location, and busyness is the most mentioned problem. So this isn’t just my pet peeve!
Busyness limits and hurts marriage in many ways. One of those is a couple’s sex life. If you want a great sex life, you need to find a way for both you and your wife to be less busy. This is especially true if you want more than mercy sex.
For most women, busyness:
Limits or destroys their sexual desire.
Pushed sex from their mind.
Makes it difficult to get into sex even if they make time.
Makes it harder to get aroused.
Makes orgasm more work and less pleasurable.
In short, when a woman is too busy, sex just isn’t worth the time and effort.
Tiredness is more of the same, and since busyness usually results in tiredness the problems compound each other.
By the way, while women are more prone to loss of sex drive due to busyness and tiredness, it happens to men too. You may get away with it for a while, but as you age you’ll find you can’t do it all and still have regular sex.
If you want more and/or better sex, finding a sane pace for your lives is mission number one. If you don’t work on this you’re saying something is more important to you than a better sex life.
If you work outside the home you have a quitting time. You leave work, and you’re done. Even if you take work home, you’re not “on the job” the way you are at work.
Many wives don’t have a quitting time – especially if they have children. She’s on the job 24/7/365.25.
Much of this could be about her expectations. It’s what moms do; it’s how it’s done. Odds are she walked into it willingly, or at least without giving it much thought. However, this doesn’t make it right, and it certainly doesn’t make it sane.
Help your wife set a quitting time, and then be her enforcer with the kids. Explain mom needs time to rest, and only true emergencies will be allowed to violate her end of the day. You’ll probably have to say some hard no’s and let the kids suffer some consequences to get them to respect the new limit. Getting an “F” on a project they expected mom to help them with at the last minute won’t destroy their life. Not getting to do some activity or going to school in already worn clothes won’t end their social life.
And of course, you must also respect her end of the day.
If you do this and do it well, you’ll be your wife’s hero. You’ll also be taking a giant step towards More & Better Sex in 2017.
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Are you trying to have wild sex on a broken down army cot?
Put another way, what kind of sex life can your relationship support? Good sex requires a solid foundation. While your bed is the physical foundation for sex, your marriage relationship is the emotional foundation. You can manage sex without a good bed – or without a bed at all, but without a good relationship your sex life will be limited and far less enjoyable than it should be. This is a place where our God-given strong sex drive can lead us astray. Most men can manage a pretty good sex life on a rather poor relational foundation; most women can’t. She may try for a while, but if the relationship doesn’t grow she’s going to pull back sexually.
Thinking your wife can enjoy sex without a solid relationship is like thinking she would be all about having sex on the cot shown here. Aside from saying no, most wives would be offended at a request to have sex on that “bed”. Complaining about the lack of sex in your marriage while your marriage relationship is in serious need of improvement is very much like expecting sex on a dirty, rickety cot. This is why my More & Better Sex in 2017 series is not about ways to make sex better in bed.
My goal in my marriage is to expect more of myself than I expect of my wife.
I want to do more for her than she does for me. I want to love her better than she loves me. I want to give and sacrifice more for her than she does for me. I want to give more grace, bless her more, and in every way possible be a better spouse.
Are you up for the same challenge? (BTW, this post is part of the More & Better Sex in 2017 series.)
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