The Turned-On Couple Podcast

Sexuality is so much more than what most of us have been taught, or grown up to expect. It’s not done in one way that’s considered normal. Sex is not gender specific or older-age restricted. It’s not a performance. It doesn’t even have to include other people. Sexuality comes in a rainbow of energies and a banquet of flavors. Sex can invite us to be light and playful, and it can be intense and psy...

If you opened the drawer of 53 % of women’s bedside tables, you’d find a vibrator or two. We’ve finally reached a tipping point that makes owning a sex toy pretty normal. Thank goodness! According to data released last year, sex toys are a $15 billion industry, making them more mainstream than ever. Today, women’s pleasure is now a primary focus of the sex toy industry, and vibrators for solo and...

What Does Consent Mean in Long-Term Relationships? A couple I worked with came in after what one partner called a “nonconsensual” experience. She felt angry. He felt confused. He had wanted to try something new in the bedroom. Instead of talking about it beforehand, he showed up with handcuffs and locked her arms behind her back. There had been no prior conversation, no shared curiosity, no agreem...

When I first saw Eve Ensler’s *The Vagina Monologues in 1996, one of the monologues stood out to me. It was a woman’s account of being with a man named Bob. This is some of what she wrote: “…Turned out that Bob loved vaginas. He was a connoisseur. Bob loved the way they felt, the way they tasted, the way they smelled, but most importantly he loved the way they looked. He had to look at them. The f...

Here’s a COVID throwback for you. In the summer of 2021 I was helping a friend celebrate his birthday with three other people at a little outdoor soirée where mask-wearing and social distancing were in their glory days. When someone held up a camera to take a picture of the birthday boy, I jumped up and, without thinking, wrapped my arm around him and snuggled up close for the camera. In that spli...

Three conversations with clients inspired me to write about pleasurable touch, and why many people can dish it out, but they can’t take it! Let me explain. The first client lamented the permanent closure of her rural massage center. I asked her partner if he might be able to massage her. His answer was, “Oh no, I don’t know how to do that kind of thing. I’m not a big toucher.” The second is a long...

Many of the clients I see in my coaching practice are dealing with the same thing, even if they describe it differently. They don’t feel sexually confident anymore. Not necessarily because something huge happened. More often it’s been worn down over time. Life gets full. Relationships get complicated. A few bad experiences stack up. And somewhere along the way, they stop feeling like a good lover....

For a time, I got hooked on the Netflix reality show Married at First Sight. The season I watched followed four couples who agreed to arranged marriages, meeting for the first time, sight unseen, on the day of their wedding. Three relationship experts paired them from a large pool of applicants. The show followed these four couples for a period of two months — from the honeymoon to sharing an apar...

Warning: This song can get stuck in your head. It’s the Pointer Sisters’ song, I Want a Man with a Slow Hand “I want a man with a slow hand I want a lover with an easy touch I want somebody who will spend some time Not come and go in a heated rush I want somebody who will understand When it comes to love, I want a slow hand.” I Want a Man With a Slow Hand was written about a woman who knows what s...

In the early 70s my female cousin was a primary contributor to my early sex education when I needed it most. For instance, she clarified that I couldn’t get pregnant by dancing with a boy, no matter how close we got. My cousin confirmed that I wasn’t the only person who touched themselves (down there). We compared our touching techniques, me on my back, her on her stomach, pressure preferences, st...

There are places on my daily walk where I pick a small lavender bud to crush in my hands and inhale its calming fragrance. I pass a running creek that sparkles in the sun. I see dogs of all kinds engaged in their own present-moment practice. I see white clouds appearing and disappearing and vibrant colors in changing leaves. If I’m aware enough to notice these opportunities to slow down and see wh...

I’m elaborating on a Substack Note I wrote this week in response to Carol Buckfire Benson’s recent post. I’ve noticed, both in other women and in myself, the common discomfort of taking up too much time or space to share thoughts, feelings, or insights. Even when invited, I notice how many women pivot too quickly back to the person they’re speaking with. In so many words, spoken or not, we’re sayi...

A client told me she was doing a “Marie Kondo” on her closet, ridding herself of anything that no longer gave her ‘joy’. We went on to talk about her sex life with her partner that included a nagging resistance to being touched. Somewhere along the line she formed a belief system about touch. She couldn’t identify a particular incident that informed that belief system. There was no trauma or abuse...

Our culture is in a multi-decade ‘sexual revolution’ that began in the 1960s, but we’re far from being free from the deeply ingrained programming that sex is still a fundamentally shameful topic of conversation; beliefs persist that we unwittingly inherited from our parents (and their parents and their parents). You might not identify with having sexual shame. Perhaps you’re quite liberal when it...

“We haven’t had sex in months. This is not what I signed up for when we got together five years ago!” These words from a past client ring in my head now and then, when I think about couples who are dissatisfied with their sex lives. You can feel the utter frustration he felt when it came to his unmet expectations. Over those five years, his experience of his sex life changed or, more than likely,...

This chapter is for a subsection of women, and the people who want to understand those women better. A therapist friend of mine once asked me if many of the women I work with ever confess that they’re just done with sex. My answer was, “yes.” They’ve had the babies and many years of sex with their partners. They’ve never felt very sexual. It was never that important to them. They’re done! When I h...

We’re all on a wild ride together. There’s no question about that. Every part of our lives — including health, politics, cultural norms, and the environment — is in crisis. Depression and anxiety are skyrocketing. I don’t know about you, but it sometimes it feels like life is spinning out of control. When I sit down to write about sex, or speak to a group, a coach, or a client, the question, “ Why...

With this post, we are beginning Part 3 of the Turned-On Couple. (Chapters 45-69) In the journey of long-term love and passion, few aspects of a relationship hold as much potential for connection and fulfillment as the realm of sexual intimacy. Yet, for many couples, navigating the intricacies of fulfilling sex can be a journey fraught with uncertainty, inhibition, and frustration. In Part 3 of Th...

Ever wonder what happens in someone else’s bedroom? We all do, right? Consider this your “digital keyhole” into the bedroom of one of my coaching couples, Thomas and Kelly, and how they applied some of the coaching tips they received from me over the last few weeks. Then I’ll break down all nine coaching tips they used on their date night so you can learn from them as well. Thomas and Kelly came t...

I won’t say exactly how long cannabis has been in my life, but the release of Dark Side of the Moon and my first joint fell in the same calendar year! I feel like a relic of the past when I remember terminology like doobie, roach clip, and head shop. That was also the year my sexuality came fully into being. Ergo, the idea of combining consciousness-altering substances with sensual pleasure is not...

Watching other people have sex is tucked deep into our DNA. We’re drawn to it out of curiosity, the thrill of voyeurism, the excitement of arousal, and the big-time driver in our human bodies, the desire to procreate. Watching others have sex has signaled the desire to have sex ourselves since time immemorial. As a sex and relationship coach, I see how porn tends to pit partners against each other...

Sexual desire discrepancy in long-term relationships isn’t an anomaly; it’s built into the lifestyle of cohabitation and is pretty much guaranteed to develop at some point within the first couple of years in a new relationship. Desire discrepancy is normal and to be expected, yet it remains one of the most painful and destabilizing challenges a couple must face. This dynamic pits partners against...

You can’t argue someone into loving you, yet in effect that’s the conflict in which many no-sex or low-sex couples find themselves. Chronic anger around a couple’s sexuality poisons a relationship and stresses their emotional bond. When the higher-desire partner badgers, guilt trips, nags, pouts, barters or begs for sex, they unwittingly turn sex into a commodity to be acquired, an argument to be...

Sex is probably one of the hardest things to discuss with a partner. It’s easy to take things personally because sex is deeply personal. Many couples tell me the only time they talk about sex is usually when there’s tension or a complaint. If a conversation about sex always leads to bad feelings then of course we’ll avoid the subject. There’s another way to talk about sex that is more relaxed, cur...

Many years ago, a convergence of experiences and losses left me in a state of grief. I cried, I felt sadness, and I rationally accepted life as it was. Yet over the months that followed I felt like I was in a low-grade depression. I spent time with friends and enjoyed day-to-day pleasures, but something inside of me was not moving on. After a few months I went to see a bodyworker who offered massa...