Sexpectations Part 1

The Burlington Coat event is back. Buy a coat now through November 29th and get $5 off your merchandise purchase of 25 or more from December 6th through December 24th. Plus, Burlington is donating 50,000 new coats to help those in need nationwide. Through our partnership with Delivering Good, we've been keeping you warm for over 50 years. We'll see you at our coat event, Burlington Deals, brands.

Wow.

Visit burlington.com coats for details.

Hey, guys. Welcome to the Naked Marriage podcast. We are Dave and Ashley Willis, and on this podcast, we Undress the truth about sex, intimacy, and lifelong love. And we've got a great episode for you today. It's actually going to be a part one of part two.

That's right. We're so excited to talk about this because we're going to talk about the emotional side of sex. And this is for those who are engaged and maybe getting ready to have sex for the first time. But we're also going to talk about those who've been married a long time, and. And sex really isn't what they thought it would be, and it's not going as smoothly as they thought it would be, or they feel like they kind of reached a stagnant season. We're going to talk about all those things, so let's dive in.

Hey, guys. We are so excited to have this conversation today. And this is a really unique topic. We're talking about sex, which isn't all that unique in itself, because if you listen to this podcast for any length of time, you know that here on the Naked Marriage podcast, we want to create a safe space for you to talk about sex. And so we weave it into a lot of conversations. And. But today we're going to kind of tackle this topic of sex from maybe a little bit of a new perspective. We're going to rewind the clock down to our own story, you know, our own honeymoon experience. This could be an interesting talk maybe for those who are preparing to get married and talking about sex for the first time, but it could also be, I believe, a really interesting and important conversation for those of you who maybe just feel like your sex life has gotten a little bit stagnant or stale and to kind of give you some new ways to talk about that that could reignite maybe a second honeymoon in your marriage, because we want you to have great sex. We believe God wants you to have great sex, by the way, which is, you know, he's the one who invented it. He's the one who created it, and we should. We should celebrate that. Thank you God, by the way, for creating sex.

That's right.

And so, sweetie, let's rewind the clock. 2001. May 19, 2001. A beautiful blushing bride. You're even more beautiful today. But you were such a lovely bride, and you were, you know, getting ready to walk down the aisle. I think that's the day your mom tried to have the sex talk with you for the very first time.

Yes, mom, if you're listening, I'm not. It's no offense, but I'm just being honest. So, yeah, so I'm getting ready to walk down the aisle, and right before I walk down the aisle, my mom grabs me and says, you know what? We probably should talk about sex. And then she starts going into this whole, like, you're gonna have all these feelings. And I was just like. I literally stopped her, like, mid sentence and was like, mom, I'm getting ready to walk down the aisle. I have already, you know, talked about this with other trusted people in my life, and I love my mother so much, but it just. Sex was something that was awkward for her to talk about. Like, it is for a lot of parents. And so, you know, I think that that. That is not necessarily a unique story. You know, we talked to a lot of different people where they grew up in homes where, for whatever reason, their parents just didn't feel comfortable talking about sex.

Well, the reason why the parents didn't feel comfortable is because the Naked Marriage podcast did not exist in the 70s and 80s, and so they can't be held totally responsible. They didn't have this tool to help them have these conversations.

Right. Because, you know, honestly, it can be awkward. It can be awkward to talk about, especially with your children. And I think a lot of parents avoid it because they don't want to have to answer some hard questions that kids naturally are going to ask. You know, like, teenagers who are, you know, have inquiring minds are going to ask maybe about their own experience, like, well, mom, did you wait for marriage? Or, mom, how is this for you? And it's like, you don't necessarily want to talk about that with your child. And so a lot of parents just end up not talking about it altogether because they just feel awkward. And I was one of those people, and I also was part of an awesome youth group, and we talked about sex, but it was always in the sense of just don't do it because you just don't want to have that baggage. And so I'm coming from this background of, first of all, you don't really talk about sex. So, I mean, I only knew, like, what. What I learned in health class and what I read in, like, a Cosmo magazine. Okay.

Yeah. And I think a lot of people can. Can relate to that.

Oh, yeah, definitely. And then in my youth group, on the other hand, it was like, I knew I wanted to save myself, but it was like, that's kind of where my. Where it kind of stopped for me. And so it was constantly going into our marriage. It was like, for years just trying to save myself and shutting it down when it came to.

Well, because sex wasn't. You're not saving yourself in terms of, like, this is this beautiful, glorious gift, but saving yourself in terms of you've been scared of sex.

We don't speak of it or sex.

Was talked about in this kind of dirty way. And it was just something that was totally off limits. And, you know, I'd like to honestly do an episode in the future 100% about how to teach your kids about sex, because I believe that we as parents have an important and sacred duty to be the ones who really have these conversations. And I know that, but it's hard. Most parents are not equipped. You know, I've recently written a blog article about this called, like, how and when to teach your kids about sex that you can find at Marriage today, and put together a separate resource that goes with that blog article at howtoteachyourkids about sex.com which is a long domain, but very specific because we. We believe in this and we think that part of our sacred duty is to help equip kids with the right mindset as it relates to sex. And so that's not what this episode is necessarily about. But we. We just want you to know that we want to equip you in those ways because we're wanting to equip ourselves in these ways. We're. We're raising four boys. We want them to have the right mindset as it relates to sex, but this episode is really about you and your spouse, or if you're listening and engaged you and your future spouse. And we just want to acknowledge that maybe you're. You entered into the marriage with a lot of baggage. And the baggage wasn't even necessarily from sexual sin per se, but from all of these different kind of, like, wrong lessons or. Or the absence of lessons as it related to sex. And that can create its own form of baggage just because you enter into it not knowing what to expect, thinking it's going to look like the movies, thinking that it's not going to it's just going to be totally easy and natural and fun, and hopefully eventually it will be. But at first, it's usually not right.

Especially when you are coming into the marriage, you know, kind of with my like. Like a background like mine, where you're just kind of like, well, I know that before marriage, it was just something that I would shut down immediately and abstain from. But suddenly you get married, and all of a sudden it's like, okay, that's not the rule anymore. You get to just have free reign when it comes to sex. And that can really be hard to come to terms with because it's a huge flip in the mind. And I hear this from a lot of wives especially, but I think that husbands can deal with this too. You have to kind of flip this switch in your mind where for years you've been telling yourself sex is something that you shouldn't do. And so you don't want to walk into situations where you're gonna be tempted, and you need to shut that down. You need to flee from sexual temptation. And all of a sudden you're married, and it's like, okay, now you need to be really geared up for sex. And for me, personally, I really had a hard time with this. I mean, I was excited absolutely to experience this with Dave. I was so excited. But I was, like, scared to death because of just all this mixture of lessons and of just kind of a confusing time in my mind.

And.

And then there's Dave, on the other hand, which. Tell me what you were experiencing.

I was ready to go. I had, like, 15 positions mapped out from the Kama Sutra that I was ready to try. No, not exactly, but, you know, I had my own kind of form of baggage. You know, I was raised in a home where mom and dad were really, really healthy in their affection to one another. You know, sex was talked about some, not really a lot. I think the extent of dad's sex talks with me was just keep your weenie in your pants, you know, he would say. And I. That's burned into my mind, which isn't bad advice, but I needed a little bit more information. But, you know, I was raised at home and youth group environment where sex was typically talked about in a healthy way, in an affirming way. And mom and dad, you know, I love you guys. You guys have a great marriage still and are still a great example. My baggage came from. And we've talked about this in our Naked Marriage book and in past episodes, so I won't dwell on this too much. I had a lot of baggage that came from pornography. And I think a lot of young men can relate to this. And we, we talk so openly about porn because I'm convinced it is one of the main culprits that are just ripping marriages apart, especially in the bedroom. But not only in the bedroom. And I can relate to that from personal experience. And so I was exposed to porn at an early age. I kind of got it, got kind of hooked on it. And I would try to stay away by sheer willpower, but I would fall back into it. And all the while, without even realizing it, porn was kind of programming my mind to look at sex as a very self indulgent exercise. Not as something that would eventually create oneness with my future wife, but as a way of just my own sexual release. And so like I would, you know, watch porn and masturbate. And it became just this ritual of very, you know, selfish. A selfish expression of, of sexuality instead of the selfless, beautiful oneness that God created sex to be. So that created baggage in my mind and I think that kind of carried into the marriage and it also created some sin, you know, outside the marriage. I never actually had intercourse. So that our wedding night was the first time either of us had actually had intercourse. And that was a beautiful gift to share with each other. But through porn and through compromise, you know, I had crossed a lot of boundaries in my dating life, you know, before, before I met Ashley and was, you know, carrying baggage from that honestly too, because, you know, I knew that I'd crossed boundaries and I'd made mistakes and I had guilt over that. And so, you know, I'm bringing kind of all that mixture of, of kind of baggage and expectation into the marriage. And so we both have baggage. It looked completely different, but then when those two worlds converged, it actually created some, you know, some, some tension. It wasn't bad. I mean, the honeymoon was fun. You know, we had a good time. But those early days in the marriage, I remember there was, there was just some, some tension. Like I felt like, oh, we've waited, now we can just be naked and have sex all day every day and not do anything else. We don't even need jobs. And that. And for you it was a. I think you had to slowly overcome what, you know, a lot of that, that baggage of realizing that like, no, this is a gift. This is something we can enjoy together. And that was a hard transition.

It was, you know, cause like Dave said, I mean, we had a good honeymoon, but I just had a whole lot of feelings kind of going on. And I really was hard on myself because I wanted to enjoy sex first and foremost with Dave, and I wanted it to be an enjoyable experience for him too. And I wanted it to be this wonderful gift for both of us. But I just kept on fighting those feelings that I was doing something that was bad. And when you feel like what you're doing is bad for some people, I guess that might be kind of an aphrodisiac. But for me, it just. The way that I'm wired up, it was like. It just made me feel like it kind of killed my sex drive. And so here's Dave, who's like, every day, multiple times a day, let's do this. And I'm just like, I'm wrestling with my feelings over here.

And we are covering a lot of territory in this, and this is all good stuff. And these are things that I wish we would have had more kind of honest, frank conversations, you know, before. And so we're doing this now kind of in retrospect number one, again, just to help couples who are maybe preparing for their wedding night and dealing with kind of whatever sexual past or baggage they have that's kind of leading into that. But then at the same time, helping couples who are married already, which is the core of our audience and most of you listening right now, like us, are already married. But to. To just, again, help you kind of go back and understand maybe what was happening at the beginning of your marriage and how it set a trajectory for where your sex life is today and how you can. Yeah, you know, how you can kind of deal, you know, deal with that and talk about it. Because here's the deal. Like, I think your sex life should keep getting better. You know, there's this. This modern myth that we live in that, like, you know, the first time you have sex with somebody, it's gonna just be this mind blowing, otherworldly, amazing, out of body experience. And everything's gonna just be completely, you know, natural.

Just work perfectly, perfectly the first time.

And that's just not real life. I mean, that's just not real life. There's gonna be kind of awkwardness. You guys are kind of learning. Learning each other, so to speak. And you're, you know, there's just an awkward process in it. It's like learning to dance with somebody. You step on each other's toes at first and. And it's the same way in the bedroom. But that doesn't get talked about a lot, really, the longer you're with someone. I Believe the better your sex life should be because you grow in your comfort with one another. You learn what. What you like, you learn what your spouse likes, and you really become experts in bringing that oneness to one another, bringing that pleasure to one another. Hopefully, you're talking openly about it like, you know what? I really like it when you do this. Or, you know, I actually don't like it when you do that. You think I like it, but I actually don't. And so, you know, and be. Be sensitive about how you communicate these things, but you've got to be able to talk about it again. One of the big reasons why we keep coming back to this issue of sex is that we find in the work that we do that couples who might be healthy in every other way, they. They have a difficult time talking openly about their sex life. And because of that, there's usually this underlying frustration about their sex life that can spill over and create tension, you know, in all parts of the marriage. And we just want to help you with that. We wanna safeguard that. And. And we want to help your sex life be all that it could be. And it starts by just being willing to have these conversations. And so we're kind of leading the way by, in a public forum, you know, talking awkwardly about makeup.

Way too much baggage about us.

And you got to be. You got to be able to laugh, laugh, laugh at yourself and just be like, oh, well, we tried that. That was. That was awkward.

Well, that was not our thing.

Yeah. So you've got to give yourself permission to just be able to say, you know what? It's gonna be fun, and we're gonna figure it out, and we're gonna keep working at this, and it's gonna be the most fun work we've ever done.

And I think when you can be lighthearted about it, it doesn't feel like, oh, I'm failing my spouse or I'm messing this up, or maybe there's something wrong with me. I think that's something where the enemy really tries to get a foothold on people in their marriage is here, they've saved themselves, or maybe they've recommitted themselves to being pure. And. And so you're walking into this marriage with the right posture of the heart. And then it comes to sex, and it's not working like you thought it would, and you start believing the lie. Oh, there's something wrong with me. Or maybe I married the wrong person, or we're not sexually compatible. That's a big thing. We have that whenever we Put something about sex on the marriage page on Facebook. There's always someone who says, well, how are you supposed to know if you're sexually compatible?

Does one of you have sex? Have a penis? Does one of you have a vagina?

Oh, my goodness.

You are sexually compatible. Guess what? Ding, ding, ding.

No, I think what they're meaning is, like, is there going to be passion? You know, is there passion? Well, again, and I would say absolutely, because sex doesn't start in the bedroom. It starts with conversation. It starts with being intimate emotionally. And so if you're able to be, you know, intimate emotionally and you're connecting on a heart level with your spouse, and, you know, intellectually you are stimulated by your spouse, that's going to carry over into the bedroom. But what we need to realize is, like Dave was saying, it's not gonna be this just, you know, right out of the gate. Everything's working fine. You're not even gonna have to talk about it, you know?

Yeah, it. It.

You're gonna have to talk about.

It takes work. I mean, you know, you don't see some, like, you know, Olympic diver doing all these twists and spins and landing in the water and think that's probably the way it looked the first time he jumped off a diving board. No, it took a lot of work. I think your sex life is somewhat like that. You know, I mean, if you're doing Olympic dive moves in the bedroom, you're much more advanced than I am, but you're pretty awesome. I'm saying, just with this mindset that we've got to give each other permission and grace to say, we're gonna get better at this over time. Yes, but let's enjoy it now. But we're going to get better over time and to be able to laugh at just kind of the funny, quirky things, because there are, especially early on, you know, there are going to be weird, you know, maybe sensations you weren't expecting or smells you weren't expecting, or just a variety of things. And it could be messy. And you're thinking, well, I wasn't expecting this. And it's all part of it.

Well, just the very nature of an orgasm. It has all these kind of feelings firing in your brain and your body.

And so we're just saying, you guys talk about this, have fun with this, be willing to laugh about this, but also with the seriousness of. Of addressing baggage that you have. And we've had separate episodes about this that I encourage you to listen to, and we encourage you to read the Naked Marriage book. As well, to kind of spark this. But while you can laugh about your sex life, we also want you to be able to very seriously address the baggage that might have caused deep wounds that are creating barriers that are holding you back. And those barriers could come from abuse, past abuse, regret over your own sexual decisions, and from a whole myriad of factors. You've got to be willing to talk about that and get naked not only physically, but emotionally in every other way. So talk about this stuff. So kind of switching gears as we prepare to land the plane on this. For those who are getting, like, remarried, maybe you've had sex in the past, you are preparing to marry someone, and you're. You're trying to reconcile sort of your own sexual past and your own baggage, and you're trying to enter into this new marriage, new covenant with, with kind of a new beginning.

Yes.

You know, what is. What does that look like? What advice would you have for folks who are in that situation? Or maybe you've been married for a while, but there's been just kind of like a. There's been a funk in this part of your. Your marriage, the sex life. And you want a new beginning with your spouse. You know, you want to. To create this new beginning together and overcome sort of the baggage that maybe you've created together. Feel stagnant, you feel stuck. How do you move forward?

Well, first, I wanna address those who are maybe remarrying. Maybe you're engaged, you're gonna be married, you know, for the second time, and you're so excited. And I first wanna encourage you. I wanna encourage you to clearly you've already, you know, had sex, but I wanna encourage you to kind of recommit yourself to waiting to have sex until you get married with your person that you're marrying. And there's something so beautiful that happens again. It just kind of gives us the right posture of heart. It helps us to really have, I don't know, clearer eyes for maybe anything we need to address within the marriage that we need to talk about before we get married. And it just helps us to be kind of in the right place when we walk down that aisle. And also, just practically speaking, it makes you more excited for that, for that wedding night. And so definitely the recommit yourselves to that and waiting.

But also, don't set yourself up for disappointment by saying, because we're waiting, it means it's going to be magical and glorious.

Absolutely, absolutely.

You know, there's still going to be that process.

Yes, you'll still have to talk about it. But there'll be anticipation, which is exciting.

And waiting is the. God's plan is always the best. We don't, like, make up these rules arbitrarily. I mean, God's plan is always the best.

Absolutely. And I would tell you, too, once you're married, you know, you've been married before, and so you're going to have some different feelings, some different things for me from that previous marriage that maybe kind of come to mind when it comes to this area of sex. And you've got to be very careful to shut down those thoughts when they enter. And, you know, it talks a lot in the Bible. I know we've mentioned this several times on the podcast. You know, we're gonna have things that come into our mind, but we decide what stays there. So if you start having these thoughts, these negative thoughts, maybe that they're. They're shaming you or maybe even comparing your spouse to your previous spouse, I just encourage you to shut those down. And what it says is you basically pray and say, lord, please replace these lies with your truth. And it takes being very intentional and being very just aware of your thoughts and really just ask the Lord to replace those thoughts with his truth. And he will. But this takes time. And so if you find yourself falling into that, that is normal. But you need to go ahead and shut that down and not let that take a foothold in your mind, because it can, and it'll become kind of this rabbit hole that you don't want to go down. And it's going to hold your marriage back. And so I just encourage you in that way. And if you have anything that you just really want to talk about with your spouse, that maybe something that you didn't like that your previous spouse did, I wouldn't, like dwell on that with your spouse, you know, that, that you're married to and start talking all about your ex. But you do need to address those issues. So even without talking specifically about what your ex did and kind of getting caught in this negativity of talking about the past, you can take. Talk about what you like, talk about it in terms of, of what you would like out of your marriage, out of your, you know, out of sex, like what you like, what you dislike, what makes you feel good, what thing makes you feel loved, you know, whatever you need to talk about, just get that off your chest. But I do encourage you not to dwell on the ex or what was bad with your previous marriage, because that's just gonna hold both of you down. Now in terms of people who are kind of in a stagnant part of their marriage. They feel like things are just boring. They're like, it's the same old same old all the time. Or maybe you just stop having sex altogether because you're like, this is just. It's just not exciting anymore and I don't really need it. Maybe you've told yourself, like, I don't really need it. I just. I hope you see this as a wake up call to say, you know, sex isn't everything, but it definitely is something that's important in your marriage. Now, I know there are certain circumstances that are medical where maybe you can't have sex right now, but there's still ways to sexually satisfy each other and to connect on a sexual level. And so I encourage you to have these conversations and, you know, they're probably gonna start out awkward and your spouse, you know, may be on the defensive a little bit. Especially if you haven't had sex in a while. Because when you haven't had sex in a while, it's gonna make you edgy anyway, because, you know, God designed us to have this sexual need. And so I would just encourage you to talk very openly about it. And instead of making accusations and saying, you know what, you haven't had sex with me in a month, or you do this, you do that, just say, listen, sweetie, what can I do to connect with you more? What can I do to make you feel sexually satisfied? Like, what do you like? What's your favorite thing that I do? What position do you like? You know, when you think about our sex life, what was the best night ever when it comes to our sex life? And start talking about it and just talk openly about it, laugh together, lighten up the mood, and then, you know, commit to trying to reconnect sexually. And, you know, some people think that you have to just wait for the moment or whatever, but when you have kids and busy jobs, that rarely comes, right? Cause you're just busy. So I would say put it on the calendar and get excited about it. You know, if you have kids and they're looking at your calendar, you know, make a little emoji that you know what that means. The two of you know what that means. And it's something you can look forward to.

Ooh, it's Tuesday. Yeah, it's gonna be a good night. Wow, that's a great conversation. We'll continue these conversations, you know, as we go, in future episodes. And we've. We've also got more on this in past episodes, past blogs and and we talk about these at the live events, the EXO events, which you can find if you go to xomarriage.com and come to one of the live events. And we, we love, we love connecting with you there as well. Before we wrap up this episode, we always love to do a Q and A. Thank you. For those who have submitted questions@nakedmarriagepodcast.com and feel free to write us anytime or to submit questions directly on that website. Here's the question today. Hey, Dave and Ashley. My husband and I have been married for six months now, and it's been rough, to say the least. So my question is, what do you do when the introduction of sex in a new marriage seemingly destroys your bond with one another? To put it short, I have almost completely lost interest in him, and I believe it was sparked by our intimacy issues. Severe premature ejaculation in parentheses. We have never truly been intimate. We haven't even tried since a month into our marriage. This is all a total shock to my system as we were so in love and attracted to one another before the marriage. But ever since sex became a part of the equation, it has seemed to ruin everything. We fight constantly. We're annoyed with each other. I'm thinking about other men. I'm trying to follow all this advice from all these places, but it's just so dang hard. I love you guys. Please keep putting out this great content. Wow. Well, thank you for that question. Thank you for your honesty. You know, premature. This, this seems like premature ejaculation is kind of at the core of the frustration. And so I, you know, I'm not getting the husband's perspective on this, but just kind of trying to read between the lines. He's probably frustrated because, you know, if he's already premature ejaculating, he's. He's already got a lot of drive and wanting her a lot. And now that's been cut off completely because in her mind, it's like, well, if you're not going to, you know, finish the job, you know, so to speak, for, for me, if it's only going to be about you, then, you know, I don't want to do it. And so now he's resentful because he's like, well, I'm just being starved to death. And he's probably, you know, just, you know, masturbating, doing things on his own. She's fantasizing, doing things on her own. And this marriage is headed for a crash if things continue the way that they are. So I would say you. You've got to this. You've got to get back together, the bedroom, and you got to work through this together. You can't punish each other. You can't pull away from each other. You can't try to deal with things on your own through fantasy, through masturbation, through whatever that's keeping you apart. And specifically for the premature ejaculation, there are things to help that. I mean, there are like a desensitizing gel that a guy can use that will kind of slow down the process and give him a little bit more control. You know, sometimes condoms might. Having sex with a condom can take away some sensation and can prolong it for everybody. So, you know, I would spend a lot of time on foreplay with each other to kind of help get her closer to that point of climax before the intercourse even begins. But you've got to work through this together. And right now, the resentment and the kind of just dealing with it separately, it's destroying the whole marriage, not just the sex life. And so you've got to make it a priority. And. And by writing in, I think you do want to make it a priority.

Oh, absolutely. And I just want to say, you know, I'm so sorry that you're going through this. You know, this is something that can be so frustrating because, like she said, they're so in love, but this one issue has just messed with them. And I just want to encourage you, too. If one of the spouses does reach climax before the other, I would tell the spouse, you know, who already climaxed, to do whatever they can to make sure their spouse climaxes. You know, I do think, you know, some people have trouble with that. They don't really maybe know their bodies quite yet, like, what gets them there. But I would say do whatever you can to show that you want them to have that experience. Cause I think this wife, in this particular question, feels like he doesn't care that he, you know, has his sensation. And then he's like, I'm done. But, you know, there's. Like Dave said, there's things we can do. And I think the bottom line is wanting to get help. You know, do what you can so that sex is not only good for you because it's not just, you know, meeting your own needs. You want to meet your spouse's needs. You know, this is the person in your life that can fulfill your sexual needs and that you can fulfill their needs. So don't cut them off. You know, do what you can to get the help that you need. If it's condoms, if it's the desensitizing gel or just extra foreplay, do whatever you can to show your wife that you want her to have a climax as well. And I think if that husband can do that, then it's gonna help things. Now, as far as this wife, she's the one who wrote in. She's gonna be the one who's probably listening to this answer. I think if you come to your husband and say, listen, I can tell that we're growing apart and I've been angry, I've been really angry and I'm so sorry I've been angry, but I just want this to work so bad for us. And you know, I've been listening to this podcast and there's things we can do and I just want you to know I want to work together in this with you so that we can have an awesome sex life together. I think if you approach it that way, he's not going to feel defensive. And I think that you guys will be on the road to healing and having, having the kind of sex life that you want to have.

Boom. That's good stuff.

Hey, guys, thank you so much for joining us today. And please, please put it on your calendar to tune in for part two so that you can get the rest of the story. We're going to talk about the physical side of sex, so you don't want to miss it. And always, if you love this podcast, please leave us a five star review and tell us what you think about it. Share it with your friends and don't forget to check out our naked marriage book. And you can find that everywhere books are sold as well as@nakedmarriagebook.com.