The Yes Starts Way Before the Bedroom

Hi, I'm Allie Roper, the host of the Wiser World Podcast. If you've ever read a headline and thought, wait, how did we get here? This podcast is for you. I break down world history in a simple, approachable way for busy people who want real context, not just soundbites. If you want to start understanding how world history affects current events, listen to Wiser World wherever you get your podcasts.

Welcome to Dear Dr. Tracy, the podcast that dives deep into the messy, beautiful world of relationships. I'm Dr. Tracy Dalgleish, clinical psychologist, relationship expert, and your go-to guide for navigating relationships, boundaries, in-laws, and everything in between. Whether you're striving to rekindle the spark, set healthy limits, or build deeper connections, this is the space where real talk meets expert advice. Together, we'll tackle the tough questions, untangle the sticky situations, and uncover the small shifts that lead to big transformations in your relationship. So grab a coffee, settle in, and let's rewrite the stories you tell yourself. This is Dear Dr. Tracy, your guide to creating relationships that feel good.

I want to start with something today that I constantly hear in my therapy room, and I also hear from so many people in this community. There was a time where you used to want sex. You used to have it come easy, and now Maybe you struggle to want it, or you don't want it, or at least it doesn't show up in the ways that it once did. And here's what happens next is then you start to wonder, is it me? Or your partner wonders, is it them? And then both of you are wondering, is there something wrong with our relationship?

I would imagine this is going to feel pretty familiar for a lot of listeners, particularly thinking about our listeners, kind of where they're at in their life journey. Maybe just having kids or just gone through some changes.

Stress, kids, all the stuff, all the things. And that's exactly why we are having this conversation, because I think the way most people talk about desire, including the advice that gets thrown around on the internet, is missing something so important. And we're going to get into that today.

Awesome.

I can't wait. This is one of my favorite conversations to have because there are so many aha moments and it's almost like— had this thought the other day— it's like the sex ed that you never got, and I have the privilege of giving it to clients so frequently.

Like the Sunday night sex show on the government-funded television didn't teach me this.

It did not, as you were listening to it on your Walkman in your room as a teenage boy. All right, here's what I see: a couple before kids, or before moving in together, or before some significant life event. They had a pretty solid connection. And most people will say sex isn't perfect. It's not supposed to be, but it was there and they both wanted it. And then something shifts. It's not just one thing, but it's all the things. So for some people, there's sleep deprivation after having kids. For others, it's the mental load that lands unevenly, or it's the how do we get the kids to bed after 1,000 things that they ask. And then there is nothing left. And for a lot of people, for women specifically, they end up feeling touched out by the end of the day. And that being touched all day long by the kids, it's not in a way that fills her up, but instead in a way that drains her.

Yeah, but I think the challenge is then the dude feels like he's done something wrong. He takes it personally. What the hell? Like, what's—

Absolutely. Because then he reaches for her she shuts down, and then it's the, okay, so something's wrong with us. And now you have two people who are struggling where she feels like there's something wrong with her or broken, or she feels like he only comes to me for sex. Mm-hmm. And then he feels rejected and confused. And there are some of these really common stories that show up for people. So here's one of the most common stories that I hear. One is, I must not be attracted to my partner anymore. And that's this fear that a lot of people don't say out loud is like, oh, well, if I'm not wanting to have this with them, does it mean that I'm not attracted to them? The other one that so frequently comes up, there must be something medically wrong with me.

Oh, that comes up a lot.

And it is interesting because if— and we should start this conversation here— if you are struggling with desire, whether you are a man or a woman, you should check your hormones, get some blood work done. And that, that's the same thing if you're noticing increased anxiety, increased depression, low mood. We want to discover if there's something physiologically that's happening. So looking at thyroid, that's important in the whole picture. Looking at your hormone panel, that's important.

So, so you're kind of talking, assuming the physiological stuff is in the norms, for lack of a better term.

Absolutely. But then if that's the norm, then people still go to the there's something medically wrong with me. Yeah. And it is really interesting because in the last week I've seen two posts that are very different. I'm not going to give them attention, but that are like a Band-Aid solution to desire for women specifically. And I was thinking, wow, this conversation is so timely because we just keep telling women, here's a solution that will quote unquote fix this rather than actually talking what the issue is underneath it. We'll get there. The other common thing that couples tell themselves we— this is just what happens when you have kids. So I guess we have to accept it.

Yeah, I think that would resonate with a lot of people. Just, it is what it is.

Yeah. And I think that can sometimes feel really bleak for people because sex is a healthy, exciting part to a relationship.

Right.

And that people do report greater relationship satisfaction when they are sexually connected. Yeah.

I think the other one that kind of building on what you said earlier, if I, as the dude, I'm getting shut down or dismissed for maybe many valid reasons, they just think they're doing something wrong and, you know, why, why even bother at this point?

Yeah. And it can become this cycle then. And of course, and of course then we go into nobody learned how to talk about this stuff. We don't have the language for it. So many people, Greg, tell me they cannot bring up the conversation of sex with their partner. One, because defensiveness shows up.

Sure. There's an ego around it, I think.

Oh, but we know what's underneath ego. It's vulnerability and shame because it's— it feels personal when it's not. People feel uncomfortable because, you know, nobody talked about sex growing up. I, I discovered the book in the bathroom. And I never told anyone that I discovered the book.

What's the book?

The book was like how your body changes and how a couple comes together. I don't even remember. But there were, there were naked drawings inside of it. I remember finding it, being like, oh, I'm not supposed to find this, right? Because nobody talks about this stuff. So sex is one of the hardest things to talk about for couples because it's built with so many Implicit scripts. So I'm excited for this conversation, for us to talk about why everything you have been told about desire is wrong.

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Okay, I'm going to share something with you that I have been formulating a lot, and it's actually opposite of what the advice you have traditionally heard me say. Are you ready?

Whoa, you're changing your mind?

I'm kind of changing my mind, and I'm saying kind of because there's nuance in this. Of course, when we're talking about a desire issue, this is where I'm changing my mind. If we're just talking about something that you're struggling with because of busyness and life getting in the way, right, then I think I know where you're going.

There's like a tactical component to it, but then there's like an emotional and theoretical.

100%.

Does that make sense?

Yes. Okay. So there's really great advice in the context that it works in. Which is schedule sex, which you have given, which I have given. And I believe that for some people, it is the tool that works for them. Yeah, we have busy lives. We want to, but we just forget. You know, it's like going to the gym. Yeah, I'm not going to work out if it's not in my calendar.

Yeah.

And then weeks go by and I'm, oh wow, I haven't worked out. And also too, then after I work out, I'm like, well, So great. We should do this more often. Right? Like that. That's, that's the thing. But I think this advice can be really tricky when we're talking about a desire issue. So a lot of the advice is, you know, just go ahead and start and let your desire catch up, which can be helpful for some people. It can be initiate even when you're not in the mood.

Right.

But I think that this advice is actually missing something really crucial. So for a woman who is running on empty, she has been the default parent all day. She has been the manager of the home, of the kids all day long. She has decision fatigue. You come home and you're like, what's for dinner? Well, adding intimacy on my to-do list, on a woman's to-do list, does not create desire. Here's what it does. It creates pressure. And pressure is the number one thing that shuts down your desire.

I would imagine there's a lot of women who are happy to hear that because I think that's kind of the pushback you and others have gotten around scheduled sex. It's like, again, it's on me to do as— not me, the man, me as the woman in the right.

I love learning about the Basson model. So Dr. Rosemary Basson, she is a psychiatrist in BC. I don't know if I've ever shared this with you.

No, I have no idea.

So she started to research female Viagra, and it's not on the market as far as I know, because here's what she found in the research study is that women would take this pill and then they would do a self-report and a report of blood flow to the genitals. And so then this woman would watch— I believe she was watching something, and then they would self-report and say, or maybe she was reading. I can't remember what this— there was a stimulus to elicit desire and arousal. Right. Okay. So there's a stimulus for the woman participant to elicit desire, arousal, and self-report. She would say, nope, I don't feel any arousal. But physiologically, blood flow had increased in her genitals. So that was the disconnect. Between what was happening in her mind and what was happening in her body. And now one of the things that we talk about— I can remember talking about this in my training around sex therapy, and one of the kind of feedback loops that men have is because your penis is visible and it gets hard, it sends the message to your brain, oh, look, I'm aroused and excited. Yeah, women don't have that, right? So anyways, this, this drug for women did not move forward because it was not found effective in helping to create desire. And so then what Dr. Basson went on to do is that she then found that desire actually emerges after engagement begins, and engagement is actually not sex. So, so a woman is actually starting sexually neutral. And so then it's after physical connection. It's after emotional connection where she feels safe and close. And this is the shift that we want to talk about, is that desire doesn't just start in the bedroom. It starts so much more before that.

So just to understand, so there's not like waiting for it to happen. It's all the preconditions that kind of lead to it.

Yes.

Which I think intuitively makes sense.

So if you put bodies side by side at the end of the day, but all day long she has been demanded on as a default parent, the laundry basket is in the corner, and then you just told her, no, I have nothing to share with you from my day, and then you're like, hey, do you want to— what kind of context is that?

Yeah.

So then what I think is evolving here, and this is what I really want you to hear, this is the through line for today's conversation. You don't have a desire problem. You have a conditions problem. And the positive part of that is that conditions are actually something you can work with. So the research from Dr. Basson also found two types of desire. So one is spontaneous desire. And then we've talked about this before. Before, I know I've posted online, I teach all my clients this. So Dr. Basson found there's two tracks for desire, or two ways desire is experienced within a person. One is spontaneous desire. Spontaneous desire is what you see on Bridgerton, what you see in the movies, right? It's the instant— everybody is ready, as you know, you look across and she's ready and orgasming instantly. Yeah, it's, it's not— spontaneous desire is often what happens at the start of a relationship, right? And what spontaneous desire is, is it starts in our brains. And it's really interesting because when I work with mothers, I ask them, you know, when you're kind of doing nothing, maybe you're moving about your day, do you ever have thoughts that are arousing? And so many mothers say yes, but that's, that's like spontaneous. My brain has space to do it throughout the day.

Right.

But what tends to happen for women more, especially then when you think of those who are touched out all day, their desire is responsive desire. And that is where desire actually happens in the body. So people who have responsive desire— I love this example from Emily Nagoski. She talked about it and she had said, you know, the person who gets the party invite and the party's in 3 weeks and they're like, yeah, yeah, can't wait for the party. Yes. RSVP. Yes. Okay. And then that night it's like, oh, well, I'm in my sweatpants. Why did I say yes to the party? I don't want to go to the party. Okay, I just go. And then after the party, you say, I'm so glad I went. If you, after sex with your partner, any kind of physical sexual intimacy, you say, I'm so glad we did that, you likely have more responsive desire.

So is it fair to say that most dudes think they have spontaneous desire? Like, as I'm hearing you describe it, I think most of the time I would have spontaneous desire, but I think it's actually responsive because I can relate to that feeling about after, like, oh, we should do this more often. That was great, et cetera. Right? Like it, it's kinda like, it's, I think as a man it's harder to determine where I have, because like I, I hear what you're saying about all those conditions. I think for a lot of dudes that's not their impediment. Mm-hmm. It's something else. Mm-hmm. And it might be contextually a little bit different for each person.

So I think in general it's different for each person. So I don't want to put people in boxes, of course, and that's really important. But then I also think about the context of our lives. If you are constantly holding your phone and carrying your phone with you from room to room to room, and you pick it up 100 times a day, your brain doesn't have a chance to even tap into those free-floating thoughts and like, who would it be nice to? And ooh, you know, look at my partner over there wearing those, those new pants or whatever. And I totally just heard my Canadian accent when I said pants there. Yeah, my friend's gonna over me on that one. Um, but if you are constantly distracting yourself in this world that we live in of constant distractions— ping, ping, ping, email this, email that— yeah, you won't have spontaneous desire anymore because you're not even absorbing the visuals around you. You're no longer receiving feedback and information, right?

Right.

Yeah, you are numbed out and distracted. So in some ways, I think the context— again, we're talking about context here— yeah, it matters. Context, conditions, And I think this actually segues really nice into what actually kills desire after kids. And we'll just— we'll name this quickly because I think a lot of people can relate to this. But the first one is the mental load.

And as soon as I say the mental load, I'm like, oh no.

But here's the thing. So we know this about research is that high cortisol, which is the stress hormone, directly suppresses sexual desire. And the mental load is a cortisol machine. If you enter every room in your house and you see all the things that are not done— and it's not just about task execution, because when then I enter the kids' room because I'm putting away the laundry, I then think, oh, do I have their next season of clothing available to them already? That's already again the mental load. So it's the tracking of appointments, it's the grocery list, it's the permission slips, it's all of the things. There's no room for desire to even surface in there.

So So it's interesting to hear you talk about this one cuz in the past I've kind of railed on the pervasiveness of the mental load. But I think in this case, if you just take a step back for a second, this is one where I can honestly see how it hurts desire.

Yeah.

Like, like it does make sense cuz I, I, I'm trying to hold two thoughts at the same time. Like I think the mental load concept gets a bit overused, but when it does come to this, I kind of have to step back and intellectually say, okay, yeah, that like, of course that's gonna be a big barrier.

You in our relationship have completely taken over the meal domain.

And if there's any sponsors out there that wanna help me, I—

this is not an ad, but we love our Factor. And Factor has been a support of the podcast before.

Like, it's so helpful.

In those nights when we're like, okay, kids are eating chicken fingers and fries tonight, we don't want to. We have a factor and it's just, it's so good. Anyway, but, but what I wanna say though is when you finally took on, sorry, that came out wrong. When you took on the whole meal thing, because I can think back to 6 years ago where yes, you were making dinner, but I was the one saying to you while you were running out the door to work, don't forget the ketchup. And then you would forget the ketchup, and then our kids were melting down because there was no ketchup to dip the nuggets in. Yeah, like, that was catastrophic. And I would get so mad because I was thinking about ketchup all day long.

Yeah, that was the conceptualization.

Totally. So you having taken that on, I think, is— and that, that really is where it's not— we're not trying to weaponize the mental load, but I think what partners really need to understand is sex does not exist in a silo.

That's right. Yeah.

It's all of it.

Yeah.

So you're on the couch. You as a man, you're on the couch and you're on your phone and your partner walks in the room. You're looking at your phone and you don't see the look on her face that she just had this like really cool moment in life and she wants to share it with you. Yeah, but you're looking at your phone. You miss the dopamine that could go between the oxytocin moment of eye contact and looking at her and saying, hey, tell me about that. Smile on your face.

God, as you're saying this, I can just like— I'm sure I've done it, but I can just extrapolate it to every single person listening to this right now has done this too, and the missed opportunity. And I include myself in that.

Yeah, this is— I'm being tangential, but I have loved recently losing my phone. I don't know if you've noticed me kind of like chuckling with the kids, like, I lost— sorry guys, hang on, I lost my phone. And I'm like I'm enjoying losing my phone. It's a signal, or it's perimenopause. Okay, number 2, being touched out. I can remember this one so early on. You would come home and I was with the kids, and then you would like stroke my arm just gently, and I would recoil because I have nursed all day long, I have wiped bums, I have had kids tickling me, touching me, and like that kind of touch. When I understood that that kind of touch wasn't soothing to me, that can change what happened between the two of us, right? So think of it this way. Your kids touching you all day long. Your nervous system is like activated.

Yeah.

And in order for desire to spark, you need a touch that is soothing and connective. And you can ask your partner so you can talk about this together. I would say for both men and women, talk about this today. What touch calms you? Because if you come in and you like tickle my arm, that does not— that's like, I recall, I remember that.

Yeah, yeah. Because I thought I was being like gentle and soft because I knew you were with the kids all day. But I think you said you need like a stronger squeeze or something.

Come in and give me a hard squeeze. And I think I've even said to you, or we've joked, like I'll resist it at first and you're like, you know, yeah, let me give you a big hug. So I just think that that being touched out is a very real experience. And I didn't even know it had a name before having kids.

Yeah. I mean, it sounds like it— like, if you can name this to your— for the women to their husband, like, it's just a capacity thing. It's not you. Like, yeah, if you can kind of get out in front of that, I'd imagine that'd be very helpful.

But, but the thing is, now you want to find the tools and strategies that are regulation for both of you. So It's not about no touch. It's about finding the touch that feels good.

Yeah.

And also to remember what I said at the beginning of this episode is that pressure is a desire killer. So it can't be touch where you feel like if I let him hug me and I linger here for a little bit longer than I have to.

Right.

No, it needs to be condition-free, right? Physical touch. And I think it's also too important to remember that everything you do after the last time you both had sex, Everything you do leads to the yes. That hug, the squeeze, the no pressure, all that. Okay, another one. The resentment.

Oh, gosh.

This one is just the silent desire killer because resentment is the signal that your needs are not being met. And then that's like asking you to have sex with an empty bucket.

Yeah.

And you have nothing to give. And so that is this real emotional distance between two people. And desire lives in emotional closeness. And so when I come to you and I say, this has been such an overwhelming day with the kids, I need 20 minutes. And if you say, is it really that hard? Yeah, that right there is like dismissing my needs, making me feel small.

But it's feeding your resentment too, right?

100%.

So if there's that perpetuating, there's going to be no space for desire.

100%.

I think people can relate to that. Like, do you really want to be intimate with your partner when you're like, fuck them?

Like, no, no, no. I think people can absolutely relate to that. So good, so good, so good.

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Before I ask you my next question, I just want listeners to know that I have 5 exercises. This is a free guide. It's all focused on nurturing your intimacy, and they're not sex-specific focused. It's more about how do we actually build the intimacy to want to feel close together. So we'll put that free download in the show notes. You can go check it out. And then I would encourage you, go through it today with your partner and talk about what exercise you want to try tonight?

Because it is the conditions that we create, which we've just learned, that lead to desire, right?

Yes, it's the conditions. Okay, Greg, what does it feel like from the other side? I want to hear from you because I think there's a version of this conversation that the partner listening right now needs to hear.

Well, I think a couple things. It's easy to kind of like get in this spiral of shame. I don't know if that's the right word. Like, I can't do anything right. It's me. It's me. I have to, everything has to be perfect. I have to really land this perfectly. So I think, I think that's, that's tough because that leads to like this confusion of like, but I thought I was doing everything right. And then like, it's still, it's still not happening. And then really to me, the biggest takeaway too is like understanding that conditions piece because It's all the things that lead to the desire and intimacy. And I think if they can just like intellectualize that just a little bit, maybe not all of it, it's just like, okay, that like, to me, as I hear you kind of flush it out, I'm like, okay, that makes sense.

I think I see a lot of men waiting. So there's kind of like a swinging. There's this one part where men are kind of putting the pressure on and saying, is it now? Is it now? Is it now? And that's tricky because the focus is just on sex.

Yeah.

And that's the pressure. And, and both partners' needs are important. And I think I always want people to hear this. And I also recognize one podcast episode does not address this whole thing. This is a, like, sliver of this conversation. But the pressure does not work. And I think that pressure comes from fear that we'll never get it again or losing you or so that doesn't work. But then I think what I also see is this other group of men who then they see their partner struggling with desire. They pull back completely. But what they don't realize is when they pull back because they say something like, I'm here for you, I'll wait, I'll wait for you. Yeah, you can work on your desire.

Like they're almost too passive about it.

Yes. And they're missing that. It's the conditions.

Yeah.

So, so here's a common example. She says, I feel pressure. And he goes, oh, I don't want to do that. Okay, I pull back.

Right.

So he pulls back, but then he's not participating they're not co-creating the conditions together. Because then the next question he could be asking is, what are the moments where you feel you want to be close with me? Tell me about those times. Because then he can help participate in those. Not to pressure, right? Not to put pressure.

It's like a giant overcorrection, right? Like, it's—

yes.

And the pendulum swings too far when it needs to be more nuanced in the middle, right?

Right. And so then the question is, okay, So if the mental load feels really heavy, let's talk about how we're going to divide that. Okay, so when I touch you, you think we have to have sex. That doesn't feel good. Let's talk about touch that feels good and exciting. We talk about this in our More Than Roommates Challenge. It is actually one of the day challenges. So I'm going to plug it here because we have another cohort running soon. For people listening who aren't aware of this, we have two challenges for people. One is the 30-day challenge. And that you do it on your own. It can exist at any time. I love that challenge, and it's based on my pillars of building a healthy relationship. But then we have a more intensive one, and that's the More Than Roommates Challenge. It's 10 days, and I say to people, I'm not telling you to go and kiss your partner. You can do that, but by the end of the 10 days, you'll want to kiss your partner. And so one of those exercises I give to you on one day— I'm doing this with my fingers like a pillar, right? This pillar is the How do you build anticipation? Yeah, because that is also part of the condition of wanting to be close. So I think what I want to say here is, and I'm sorry, I hijacked you jumping into this conversation, did I?

No, it's okay. I think, I think that was it. I mean, I guess the only other thing maybe is like when it does come time for intimacy, like then is there an extra pressure on the men to show up perfectly because it's been a while? Yeah, right. Like you finally crossed the line and then like, oh, but then, right. I'm sure that breeds all kinds of different issues, but maybe that's a separate conversation.

Performance is a huge one.

That's what I was kind of alluding to for sure.

So there's lots of different reasons why we have sex. We have sex because we want to play. We have sex for eroticism. We have sex just as a release.

Mm-hmm.

And we have sex for connection. And I think you can sometimes talk to each other at the beginning and say, what do we need from this? But if it's been a while and you're worried about performance, I think this is more the you being focused more in connection. This is a bigger conversation. And, and as we're kind of like laying down this conversation, I wanna invite you as a listener to click the link where it says submit your questions, because I think that's a good spot as well. So if there is something that shows up, let me know what your questions are, because that then directs what we talk about next on the podcast episode. But. I want to really emphasize this for people, is that we don't want the pressure. We don't want you to completely withdraw, but instead you become that safe presence for your partner to help create that condition. So the first thing you can do then is more of a mindset shift. It's not an action item. This is about you not manufacturing the feeling. So stop waiting for it to be spontaneous. And then instead start asking yourself, what would need to be true for desire to come up, for desire to emerge?

So it's like kind of changing how you operate, for lack of a better term, kind of like operate your life or how you interact with your partner that's going to kind of create these conditions.

Yes.

Is that fair to say?

Yeah. And so for a lot of women, it's less depletion, it's more connection, it's feeling like a person instead of just kind of existing. And it's also about inviting your partner in to be close to you and having that as a condition to start. So I think the next thing then is, and I want to say this to the partner with higher desire, is that, that physical connection, that physical presence where you put a hand on your partner's shoulder, or it's the hug that doesn't turn into anything more. I know it's not what you're looking for exactly in the moment, in the moment, but it is where desire can actually start to grow. And so it's for the people who are kind of doing the swinging. I touch you when I want sex versus I don't touch you at all. Like, we need to reshift how touch in general looks. I think something that for us that has kind of been this like aha moment is this idea that we touch our phones. More than we touch each other.

Yeah, that's— yeah, I remember you saying that for the first time. It's like, holy shit.

Yeah. So for people, then touch each other in the way that builds connection without the expectation for it to go anywhere.

It's kind of this foundational stuff, right?

Yes. Okay. This last piece, and I think this is a really— this is a really tricky one. And I want to just really emphasize this for people listening today, because what I would want for you to get out of today's conversation is that there is a lot of information we have about desire that is not being taught to people. The sex ed you don't get. And that it's not just about scheduling sex for some people, but instead it's about the conditions and the context in which helps you to then get to that yes. But I think what's really important that couples miss— and again, this is such a huge topic and we're like just scratching the surface.

It's hard not to generalize too.

Absolutely. But I think the important piece here is to have a conversation earlier, or to just start a conversation about this and to have sex and desire and arousal and what excites you and what doesn't, to be a conversation just as if you're talking about what you're planning for dinner. And I think part of that is the ability to say to someone, this is not you personally. This is not about you. It's not about our relationship. It's about now, how do we then get to have more of this? Play, fun, pleasure, right?

Like, so how do you have that conversation? Like, I can imagine someone listening to you like, yeah, that's, that sounds good in theory, but do you just like, hey honey, we need to talk about how we're gonna set up our sex life? Like, do you just be really like tactical about it? Like, I don't know, like, I'm sure for some people it's kind of tricky, it's kind of awkward, and maybe that's where the stigmatisms of it all come from.

Because what often shows up in the conversation is a pointing outward, and it's a pointing about the issue, right? You're not doing versus I need, I like, or what we miss and long for. And that actually is more vulnerable, to go to your partner and say, I miss that excitement in my belly that we used to have when we were apart and we would come back together.

Yeah.

And when you say, I miss that, then you say, how can we build that in together? And that relationship— so again, I think the piece here is we have to make sure we're addressing resentments that has to be part of this conversation. But then the other piece here is when we're in this together wanting the same outcome, then what I'm sharing with you is important to you and what you're sharing with me is important to me. So if you're saying, you know, you used to greet me at the door and now I come home and nobody's there, I want to hear that and take it seriously. And then I'm going to try and meet you at the door. Or if I say to you, I really miss physical connection, can we make 5 minutes of intentionally— kids are in bed, we flop on the couch, phones away, just give us 10 minutes, 5, 10 minutes where we can sit together and just connect. And I'll share with the listeners actually something that you and I have started to do, and it's been a connecting point for us, which was, or is, I sit in your lap. And it sounds itchy, kind of, but it's been really nice to have that physical connection. So it is this idea of like, how can you then find that one thing that feels really good for both of you, that's a physical connector, that's not a distraction of phones or TVs, and just do more of that together?

But more doesn't have to be long necessarily.

No, I, I remind people, small things frequently, it's huge. Okay, so here's what I want to leave you with this week. So ask yourself, what conditions would need to be different for desire to exist in my life right now, to have room to exist? And I think that's a very different question than asking what's wrong with me, but instead saying, what are we missing in the context of our life?

I think what I'm taking away too, it's not just something you either have or you don't. It kind of like ebbs and flows and And that conditions piece is, is it.

And if there is something that you bring to your partner today, you can talk about the desire types. What desire type do you think you have? Do you think it starts spontaneously in your brain? Are there moments where you have it and it's spontaneous and it's just this random thought and then you feel excited? Or is it something that happens more in the body as a reaction to—

can it be both, you think? Like, I'm thinking as like a dude, like I think men get that spontaneous thing, but then they could also have that response of it's actually happening. Like, is it, is it not a bit of both sometimes?

Think of desire as what ignites something first, not the actual.

Okay.

I think it's, it's, it's the spark that then says, okay, I want to. And that's what ignites the thing, desire. Because then I think what you're talking about is often then what the next piece is, which is arousal, right?

I'm jumping ahead.

And that's where I—

which I'm sure many dudes do.

Yes. Well, that's the, the linear model. Masters and Johnson's initial research is desire leads to arousal, leads to orgasm, leads to the refractory period, which is the recovery. For women, though, this is where Dr. Basson's research really came in, is it's not linear like that.

Right.

So that's why so much of this research on arousal and desire was based on what men were experiencing and not what women were experiencing, which was in this linear linear fashion, right? Right. Versus then desire for women. Think of it more circular instead of linear. Circular desire and arousal. Like desire, arousal. Actually, in her model, desire comes after, which is why it's this idea that women are sexually neutral to start.

Fascinating.

It is really interesting.

All right.

A lot to unpack. It's just a very small piece of it.

It is. It's such a small piece here. And I think, too, if you're nodding along today and you're thinking, okay, how do we actually get some small things that are going to support us. I would love for you to join our next More Than Roommates Challenge. That is 10 days, and it's going to support you one small thing. There's 3 exercises each day, and I love the exercises because it meets you where you're at. We've had people join the challenge where they haven't had sex for 2 years, or they have young kids, they're just struggling to re-meet each other. And you get to choose what exercise you do. You might do all 3 that day, you might just choose one. You can do it on your own because some people's partners are not on board yet.

True.

Or you do it with your partner, and it's about reigniting that spark, and that's something that I love about it. All right, thank you for clicking play today, and if anything resonated from today, share it with your partner or with someone you love, and we will see you next time. I have to remind you at the end of every podcast episode that this is for educational purposes only and does not substitute for the care from a licensed mental healthcare provider. See you next time.