SWM 060 – Aug 2020 Questions – Negative Self-Talk, Affairs, Manual Sex Troubles and more

Sex Within Marriage Podcast : Exploring Married Sexuality from a Christian Perspective

Today we’re answering questions we received in August from our anonymous Have A Question page. For those who are new to our podcast or blog, these are questions that people have submitted anonymously, so I can’t ask any follow up questions, for more context, or anything. We discuss them in our supporters forum as they come in, and once a month, I gather the previous month’s questions up and answer them all in a blog post and podcast episode.So, without further ado, here’s the first question.Question 1 – Negative Self-TalkMy wife and I love your podcast. Thanks for informing/educating us that I have a spontaneous drive and she has a responsive drive.
My situation is, my wife has been engaging in negative self-talk when we try to have weeknight sex because 1) she can’t warm up as fast as me, 2) she gets anxious/frustrated and can’t be in the moment because of time constraints, 3) is thinking about work in the morning, and 4) feels she’s broken because we sometimes need to use lube (which sometimes makes her itch) and she isn’t as wet as she expects herself to be.
I’ve read books and listened to your podcast for several months, so I’ve encouraged her that nothing is wrong with her, that it’ll take some time for her body to catch up (not hours, either, but even as little as 5 to 15 minutes), and thirdly, there is absolutely nothing wrong with using lube… Do you have any suggestions on what I as her husband can do? How common is our/her concerns and thoughts? I encourage, I love, I don’t rush, I even made the call for us *not* to engage in sex, since she was clearly frustrated and anxious.Alright, so, I’d say what you can do is have her listen to this podcast episode, or read the show notes on it. Let me be explicitly clear – there is nothing wrong with using lube. Sometimes people just need to hear it from someone other than your spouse.Now, that said, the part about the lube making her itch is mildly concerning – that shouldn’t happen. So, maybe try a different lube. I was listening to something a few weeks ago (sorry, can’t remember what it was for the life of me), and they were mentioning that they had the same issue with lube. They had to try a dozen or so different ones before they could find one that didn’t cause a reaction.And it’s different for different people. For some, the more synthetic lubricants are more likely to cause irritation. For others, the natural ones are. It all depends on how your body reacts to it. Synthetic lubricants, you can find in the store or on amazon. Natural ones that people tend to use are things like coconut oil, sweet almond oil, and such. We tend to use Sweet Almond Oil ourselves, because it’s what my friend Denis over at Melt suggests for massages, and frankly, it’s a lot easier to transition from a massage to sex if you can use the same oil. Plus, it smells good, doesn’t have a strong taste, and just glides very nicely.Now, if you’re using condoms, I can’t guarantee what affect coconut oil or almond oil will have on them. I get conflicting reports on whether or not they break them down. So, beware of that.Secondly, yes, it’s perfectly normal to take time for your body to catch up if you’re not being pre-warmed up. 5-15 minutes is actually considered fairly quick. However, because of what we see in media, women tend to think they should just be ready to go at the drop of a hat. That’s generally not the case. As you said, you two have learned about responsive desire, and if you have responsive desire, well,