There are a lot of reasons our sexual desires and interests don’t always match up with those of our partners. Changing tastes, medical or mental health challenges, busy work schedules, stress and juggling different demands, and simply having different libidos can make it hard to find a common ground. In both my personal life and
I got a text from a guy I know about a challenge he’s facing: How do you deal with turning down a woman you’re not interested in sex with? At first, this might seem like the answer is obvious. Just say no, right? But there’s a lot more to it than that and it’s worth
One of the things that often surprises people is the fact that being queer, kinky, and poly doesn’t have to mean that someone is promiscuous. “Promiscuous” is such an interesting word. My dictionary has two definitions for it: having or characterized by many transient sexual relationships demonstrating or implying an undiscriminating or unselective approach; indiscriminate
Sex has been a challenge for my partner and me lately. Molly* has been experiencing pelvic pain, which makes sex uncomfortable at best, and really unpleasant at worst. Molly’s pain has a few different causes. She has endometriosis, which can be really excruciating. In the two decades we’ve been together, she’s had four surgeries for
Talking about sexually transmitted infections can be tricky. Most of the time, sex educators focus on how to have the conversation before you have sex. Reid Mihalko’s safer sex elevator pitch is a really good format for that: Reid’s Safer Sex Elevator Speech Write down your answers for each and then try it out on
Ever since my post about resentment, I’ve been thinking a lot about why so many people allow resentments to build and what we can do to avoid them. And it seems to me that one of the easiest things we can do is to tell the people in our lives what we appreciate about them.
The other day, I was interviewed by a reporter who asked me what I think the biggest challenge to sex in a long-term relationship is. I suspect that she was expecting me to say something like keeping the passion alive, or finding new things to try, or even that old standby, communication. But I think
When I first became a sex educator, I figured I’d be learning a lot about relationships. Over time, I discovered that helping people explore sexuality also meant that I learned a lot about shame. So much so, in fact, that I went back to school and started learning about the interplay between sex & shame.
The fabulous Clarisse Thorn wrote a great article in which she asks why men who are honest about their sexual desires get written off as creepy (among other things). It was originally posted on Alternet and it’s interesting to read through the comments and compare them to the comments on the Jezebel repost. This is
I have a confession to make. Once upon a time, I was a Sensitive New Age Guy. I suppose I should explain what I mean. As I’ve written in other posts, I’ve always been rather dainty. And in my struggles with the Act Like a Man Box, there were several years where, rather than rejecting
I’m generally in favor of anything that gets more discussion of sexual and relationship diversity into the news, but the recent allegations by Newt Gingrich’s second wife about his demand for an “open marriage” after having an affair for six years has highlighted the general confusion about what these words mean. For example, W. Bradford
I’ve been following a lot of the conversations in various circles about creeps, both online and in various communities I move through, and I’m really glad that this topic is getting more traction. I know that it’s a tough thing to bring up, for a variety of reasons, but until something gets brought into the
