Episode 12: How To Let Your Partner Love Your Body - Even If You Don't

There are things that we dislike. There may be things that even offend us or really, like, feel yucky inside. But we do recognize other people can like those things, and that is okay. And for some reason, when it comes to our bodies, we are not able to do that.

Hello, and welcome to the Pillow Talks podcast. We're your hosts, Vanessa and Xander Marin. I'm a sex therapist with 20 years.

Of experience, and I'm just a regular dude. We share the ups and downs in our relationship while giving you step by step techniques for improving yours.

So make sure to subscribe for your weekly double date full of totally doable sex tips, practical relationship advice, hilarious and honest stories of what really goes on behind closed bedroom doors, and so much more. It's the sex education you wish you'd had. All right, we are starting this episode doing something that makes me very uncomfortable.

Yeah, what is it?

Xander is rubbing my stomach right now.

Your belly?

My belly. It's a part of my body that I don't love. I've never really, like, loved probably most of my life.

I always have.

Xander always has. Okay, you can stop.

Oh.

It'S uncomfortable. You know, I've done so much work on my relationship with my body, my self esteem, my confidence. I think that I actually have a pretty healthy confidence. And yet getting touch and receiving love in that area, it's really challenging for me. And I'm willing to bet that pretty much everybody listening has some part of their body that would feel really challenging to have their partner touch like that too.

For me, it is challenging as well, because I love her belly. I love being able to touch her everywhere. And I actually, I have a memory of very early on in our relationship. I think you accused me of squeezing your belly.

Oh, yeah. I like to, like, take handfuls of it and, like, squeeze it. And to me, what that was a reminder of is, like, my belly is not flat. It's not muscular. Like, there is stuff that you can grab onto. And I was feeling little twinges of that when you were touching. Like you were just caressing me right then. You weren't squeezing, squeezing, but it was still this. Like, I could feel there's flesh there and there's fat there and there's, you know, it's not this rock hard washboard abs.

And neither is mine. Yeah. So that time where I did squeeze her belly, Vanessa got upset and hurt. Initially, I felt confused, and then I felt really bad when I heard what it felt like for Vanessa. And since then, until maybe a couple weeks ago, that part of Vanessa's Body was off limits.

This is so long ago that it happened that I don't remember my exact thought process. But I think that what came up for me at the time was it almost felt like you were making fun of me. Like, I know you were grabbing my stomach because you love me and it's attractive to you and sexy, and it.

Sounds like you don't entirely believe it.

I don't. I don't. And I think that what happened, you know, back then, it's like, yeah, it felt like you were teasing me or making fun of me or, like, pointing out, hey, look at the ways that your body is not perfect. And it sounds really nutty to be saying that out loud right now, because I do feel like I'm in a really different place than I was back then. Obviously still have more work to go, more ways to go, but it felt like a teasing pointing out, like, yeah, look at this. This isn't the way that it's supposed to be.

And I totally understand that. That's also not how it felt for me.

What Xander is referring to is that a couple of weeks ago, we were doing a story on Instagram where we started talking about body image and how partners see each other's bodies, how we can see each other's bodies so differently from the way that we see our own. And he kind of spontaneously did this story where he was like, yeah, I really miss being able to touch your belly. Like, I loved that. And I'm sad that I haven't done that in so long. And so that made me think, like, okay, this is another piece of the puzzle, another layer of healing that I have to do. Can I let him start touching that part of my body again?

Yeah. And I think almost when I said that, you, you were kind of like, oh, my belly's been off limits to you. It was sort of like, oh, really? And I was like, yeah, you know, we had that one thing very early on in our relationship, and I have very consciously stayed away from that.

So we all struggle with feeling self conscious of our bodies and having these critical and judg judgmental thoughts. This can have a really huge impact on our sex lives. Obviously, it can impact every part of our lives, but our sex life in.

Particular, our entire relationship, really.

Yeah. So when it comes to our sex life, it can prevent us from desiring sex in the first place, initiating sex or asking for what we want, staying present during sex. Doing certain sexual acts, like oral sex, is one that comes up a lot for women as the receivers. In particular, having the Confidence to try new things, accepting the pleasure that your partner wants to give to you, and even orgasm. Body image and body confidence. These are obviously huge, huge topics. So today we wanted to take one particular focus and let's just look at one little slice of the pie here, which is allowing your partner to love your body.

We wish that we could just give you the simple answer to body confidence. Yeah, unfortunately it is too broad of a topic. Something like we, we could literally develop a multi month course on body confidence, I would imagine.

And let us know if you want to see that. Come over to Vanessa Marin therapy on Instagram, shoot us a dm. So, yeah, we're focusing today on allowing your partner to love your body. Even if your partner gives you tons of positive praise like Xander has been giving me about my stomach, we often don't allow ourselves to really take that praise, those compliments, that attention, that love to so many of us struggle to let that in. So we asked our Instagram audience about this. We said, do you struggle to let your partner love and appreciate your body? And 78% of people said, yes, this is a big struggle for them.

Strong. Very, very strong majority. Basically 8 in 10 people.

Thank you for the math there, babe.

You're welcome. All right, so before we go any further, let's give you the review of the week. Following Vanessa and Xander on Instagram and listening to their podcasts has helped me with building self confidence despite body insecurities. Slowly but surely, I'm feeling more confident in the fact that my partner is excited to be intimate or sexy with me and isn't focused on what I perceive as flaws. So why should I be? Two Hands raised emojis.

I was just looking at those emojis, wondering if you were trying to. Gonna try to translate the emojis like you usually do.

You know what? I think when someone leaves emojis, there's an emotion they're trying to.

So, you know, you would call that one the two hands raised emoji.

I mean, it's kind of like the touchdown signal in football, like double touchdown.

I think of that as like a praise Hallelujah.

I think, I think it really. I think technically it is hallelujah, right?

I don't know, actually.

All right, someone to write in and.

Tell us, please, Xander's emoji of the week, please. When you leave your reviews, try to leave the most complicated emojis so that when Xander reads some, he has to really work to describe what the emoji is.

Yeah, you know, that is an excellent idea because we have a fun little thing, a promotion going on. If you leave a review for us, please leave a review. On Apple Podcasts, we will pick our favorite review every single week, and we will be reading it aloud like I just did with the review of the week. And the winner of that will get a question answered from us directly to them on Instagram. What you're going to do is post a review, take a screenshot of of it, send us a DM on Instagram, because unfortunately, Apple sometimes takes a while to post the reviews. Sometimes they don't ever appear. So we want you to get credit. We'll pick a winner, and then you send us a question. We'll record you a voice memo or a video with a bunch of advice. Way more than we typically give on Instagram stories.

Yeah. So if you've ever wanted personalized advice from us, this is just our little way of saying thank you. The reviews really mean so much to us. We read every single one, and they make us feel really good. But also, it really helps the podcast reach more couples, have a larger audience, and that's really what we're trying to do here. We just feel so passionate about helping people. Your reviews help us help people.

Also, it'll be really fun if you get creative with your emojis, and then I have to interpret those emojis in our review of the week. So everybody wins with that.

All right, so let's get back to it. First, we wanted to spend a little bit of time talking about why is this such a challenge? You know, why do we really struggle to let our partners love our body? Again, we asked people on Instagram. By far and away, the number one response was, I don't love my own body, so it's hard to believe that my partner loves it. So this idea of believing your partner was so common. I would say probably 80% of the responses had at least some element of that. And I think this is just a show that, you know, we've been so brainwashed about our own bodies that it's just hard to believe that another person isn't as hard on our own body as we are. We're going to talk about this dynamic later in the podcast, too. This idea of, like, not believing your partner and what does that really mean? What impact does that have on your relationship?

Yeah, it's sad when you think about it. And it. If you follow that logic back, there's some implications there, so we're going to go deep on that one.

Okay.

Here are some of the other reasons that came Up. We have a few specific quotes that we're going to read to you. I don't love the way he compliments my body.

I'm not good at receiving attention.

When he touches part of my body that I don't like, it reminds me.

That they are there on past sexual trauma. That one's not a quote. But just.

Yeah. A lot of people mentioned having sexual trauma or physical trauma. Just makes them hard to accept other people's attention toward their bodies because it's been done in a really dangerous, unsafe, scary, non consenting way in the past. So those were the most common responses that came up. Again, that idea of not believing your partner accounted for the vast majority of them. So let's talk now about how to let your partner love your body. The first thing that we want to talk about is just a fact here. Your partner does not see the so called imperfections that you see. You are by far and away the hardest person on your body.

And a lot of that is you live in your body. Every day you observe more of your body, you have more time for things to start bothering you that probably no one else would ever see. You know, it's like when you walk into your friend's house, you're not going to see that random little corner that where the paint is a little chipped. But if you live there every day and you walk by that corner, like you. Yeah. Maybe you're going to start to notice it and then maybe you're like, oh, my God, I can't deal with this lack of paint in the corner. But the reality is literally everybody else who comes over to your house never going to see it, never going to know, never going to care.

Yeah. And we know that this is really difficult to believe, but it absolutely is the truth. You're the hardest person on your body. You see things in your body that nobody else in the world sees. We want you to go check out on Instagram. We're at Vanessa Marin Therapy. We have one of our highlights, those little circles kind of in the middle of the profile. There's one called Body Love. And we want you to watch this one because we filmed Xander having these real time reactions to my imperfections. So I pointed out to him parts of my body that I don't love. Like my arm that's got a little chicken wing flappy thing going on, my stretch marks, my cellulite. I pointed these things out to him. I didn't tell him beforehand what I was showing him. And so you're getting his honest, genuine reactions in Those moments of what he's seeing. And it's hilarious. It's really funny to watch just the. The confusion on his face because he genuinely doesn't understand so many of the things that I'm pointing out. Like, he sees it, right? Like you saw it, but you didn't even really get how it was a thing.

Yeah, yeah, I guess. Like chicken wing. Chicken wings on your arm. That sounds kind of funny. Tasty chicken wings on your arm. If you're gonna point to something. Yes, I see it. I have eyes. I can see, but I see it. But I don't really see the negative thing wrapped up in it. I see a body, a body that has similar things on that body, similar skin as my own body, where I have things. And that's kind of just what bodies do.

What about when I pointed out my armpit vagina to you the other day? I had, like, a shirt on where it was exposing my should and my arm, and I was like, oh, God, I got to adjust the shirt. I've got a little armpit vagina going.

Well, what. What I said was, that's just skin doing skin things. I probably have an armpit vagina, too. I know. It kind of reminds me. It reminds me of the genus penis.

Genie weenie.

The genie weenie. I think you're going to have to describe for all the good people here what that is. Okay, first of all, do you know what a genie weenie, a genus penis, is?

Which I want to put up a poll on Instagram. Which name do you prefer? Because I love both. A genie Weenie, Janus, Venus. They're both so great in their own ways. But what a genie weenie is, is when you're wearing jeans and you sit down and, like, the. The part of the jeans that has the zipper or the button fly, it kind of bunches up on itself. It makes, like, a little lump down there.

So you have a teeny, teeny, tiny boner.

Yes, that's what it looks like. So it's your genie weenie. Your genus penis.

You know, like in middle school, high school, I was always a little paranoid about that. But, you know, eventually I was just like, okay, you know what? Like, everybody's genes does that. It's not like I have shit jeans and they just bulge out like everyone's. It was not until I met you that you coined the term for me.

Really?

Yeah. I've never heard that before did I.

Come up with that.

I. I don't know if you came up with it. Amongst my friends in college, high School, middle school. There was no talk of the genus penis.

Well, I did have crappy jeans growing up, so maybe that.

Oh, it has nothing to do with crappiness or not. I think it's just. I don't know, like, what that material does when you have a zipper or buttons or whatever. You know, Vanessa points these things out to me. There are things I recognize in my own body. There are things that I just recognize as things that skin does, things that bodies do. You know, when she talked about cellulite. I joke about this every time. This joke maybe will stop being funny at some point when someone finally does explain what cellulite is to me. I still don't know what cellulite is. Vanessa has never actually told me. I ask her every single time, and then she kind of redirects the conversation.

No, I try to. It's. It's like the dimpley look that your skin gets. It's deposits of fat. It doesn't mean you are fat. Like, everybody has it. Even very thin people, very large people. Like, everyone has it, but it creates this kind of dimpley effect on skin.

So it's skin.

It's skin. This is where you had the quote, it's skin doing skin things, which a lot of people loved on Instagram. But the story behind the cellulite. Originally, we had been having sex in a position where my butt was, like, really in your face. Wonderful. And you said in the moment, oh, I love these dimples on your butt. And I was like, I don't have dimples on my butt. Like, what is he talking about? And I realized that you were talking about cellulite. And so you were saying in that moment of, like, oh, I love these. They're so cute. But I was horrified that here's my butt, like, so close to you, in your face, and you're pointing out my.

Cellulite in a loving way. It turned me on.

I know. Well, this is another perfect example of, like, it was so hard to believe that I really felt so much shame of, oh, my God, he's seeing this part of my body, this imperfection in my body. There's no way he could be attracted to it.

If I saw it as an imperfection, why would I have said something?

I know.

I would have. I would have kept my mouth shut.

I know, right?

Unless I was super, super, super passive aggressive. That would be so messed up. Like, in the middle of sex, make a positive comment about something that you really dislike. I mean, that's kind of like, what it is. Like, unraveling this whole thing of, like, I don't believe my partner. Let's follow that argument through and, like, what does that really say about them? Are they just like this evil, evil.

Person just pointing out all the terrible things? Yeah. Well, this is the perfect example that I don't believe my partner, because in that moment, I definitely remember feeling like there is no way in hell he thinks that this is. Is actually cute or sexy. This is cellulite. I've been taught my entire life that cellulite is this horrible, fearful thing. I don't want to have it. Like, I could not believe you in that moment. We want to talk a little bit about how to unravel that because it's such a strong dynamic that comes up for so many people. What we were thinking about when we were seeing all these responses come in is that to us, this feels like a classic and situation. So if you follow us on Instagram, we do a lot of stories about how and is our favorite word. Because what and helps you do is recognize that two things can be true in the same time.

Two things that might feel conflicting or polar opposites even.

Yeah. So one of the best things you can do in your communication and especially in your relationships is swap out the word but for and. Because when we say but, you know, like, I'm sorry, but, you know, but such an invalidating word. Right. But when we use and you can have both of those things, hold both of those things at the same time. So how we use it in this situation is you don't have to love your body. And it can also be true that your partner does. So with the cellulite example, I can say, yeah, cellulite makes me feel self conscious. It makes me feel embarrassed. And I can believe that Xander actually does think it's sexy or cute or not that big of a deal.

So the interesting thing about this is that in so many other aspects of our lives, we have no problems making this kind of distinction of, I don't like this, I hate this, I'm disgusted by this. And other people like it, other people love it. It doesn't offend me that other people like it or love it or that other people would feel differently about it. So here's an example. Oysters. Okay. This would actually be better if I could think of something that I hate and Vanessa loves. I'm not really sure we have that many. Oh, you know what? Capers. Capers.

Oh, okay.

I hate capers. I think they are disgusting. I actually do kind of like capers in certain Things, but, oh, my God, I would never eat a rock caper. There's not enough money in the world. They're just disgusting to me. I just Thinking about it right now, like, my stomach is hurtling.

But you also said you would eat them in a different.

Oh, like in a sauce or something. That's different. They're briny, but on their own. Oh, briny. This is a reason I don't like oysters. I don't like capers.

You know, like, briny.

No, I do like a lot of. I'm a. I'm a confusing guy. This is actually a great example. I have a lot of inconsistencies. I like almost every single food. There are just a couple things I don't like, and it is really inconsistent because it's like, the stuff I don't like. Like an oyster. I love mussels. I love clams. I'll eat those things raw.

But you're an enigma.

I hate oysters. I hate capers. I like capers and sauces. That's fine. Raw capers, though. They disgust me. They freak me out. I jokingly say that I judge people for liking capers, but the reality is.

You'Re gonna get really heated over these capers.

Well, I think this is a good example then.

I love capers.

I know Vanessa loves capers. The reality is, like, it's great for Vanessa that she likes capers. I recognize capers are things that many people like. Probably most people. Vanessa, I can acknowledge she really likes them. I have no problem keeping capers in the house. Suggesting that she have a caper in a. You know, in a dish that she. That would be caper appropriate, perhaps.

Have you ever suggest. Hey, babe, I just want to suggest to you that you have a caper today.

Oh, just you wait. In the next couple weeks, you're going to be eating a lot of capers.

Great. Love them.

But the reality is that I just kind of innately understand. And I think almost every person in the world has this experience of, like, some food or some type of clothing or some people don't like one color but, like, other colors. And don't get pissed when other people are like, well, I like purple. And, like, no, I hate purple. What's wrong with you? There are things that we dislike. There may be things that even offend us or really, like, feel yucky inside, but we do recognize other people can like those things, and that is okay. And for some reason, when it comes to our bodies, we are not able to do that.

Well, I think the capers is a good example because it's hard for you to comprehend how I could like them. But you don't think I'm lying.

No, I do not think that she's lying. And I just kind of accept, well, she must taste something different than I do, because when I put it in my mouth, it sets off a reaction of gross things inside of me. I assume that when she takes a bite of it, it must taste like something delicious.

Yeah. So I think, you know, it works for examples that are less intense. Yeah. I don't love oysters. I don't have a strong reaction to them, but I don't believe that the people, you know, we went out to dinner the other night with a friend of ours and she ordered oysters. It's not like I'm sitting there believing, wow, that's so weird. She's lying that she likes these, right? I'm like, okay, yeah, she likes them. But even with more intense examples, like, I hate this. I cannot fathom how other people like it, but I don't think that they're lying. So it was a very long example there. But I think the point of it is so powerful and so true. We can feel something so differently from what another person feels and. And still acknowledge that's their truth. We have our truth. That's their truth. And the reason we wanted to bring this example into the body image conversation, the end result, like, the ideal result would be that you love your body. You love your body, you embrace it. You see it the way that your partner sees it. Yeah, that's where we want you to get. And we also acknowledge that's a long road. It's a long path. We're not talking about all the different pieces of that today. So we want to give you a small step that feels more manageable to get you there, which is allowing yourself to just believe your partner. So it's okay if you don't believe it yourself. If you still think, wow, no, my cellulite is gross, or, gosh, I really am not a fan of my stomach. That's okay for you to be there right now. And can you just acknowledge that your partner is not lying? They just are having a different experience than you are.

What if that's really hard? I have an idea for how to maybe start breaking this down a little bit less. Follow the thread back of if they are lying. If you are not believing your partner and if they are truly then lying to you, what does that mean? Like, is your partner a liar? Do they lie to you? In other aspects of your life, do you disbelieve other comments that they make regularly? Do you not believe that they really like the foods that they like or that they like the city that you live in? Or do you disbelieve that they like you, like, at all?

Yeah. Like, is trust. Is that an issue in your relationship, or is it just coming across in this one specific area? I think when we play situations out like that, like, we really imagine, okay, what's the impact if I follow this thread? Is that really where, you know, where we get to, that your partner's just a terrible liar, lies about everything?

Yeah. And, I mean, if they're lying about that, if they're lying about how they feel about you, how much they want you, like, why are they with you? You start to get into some hard questions there. You know, if you keep following that back, I imagine you'll probably reach a point where you go, okay, I'm maybe not on board with this anymore. I do think that my partner loves me. I do not think that they are lying to me all the time. And so that might just help you start to think about, okay, maybe they are not just chronically lying to my face about how they feel about my body. So therefore, maybe I could start to just accept that they are seeing what they see, they are saying what they say. I don't have to agree with it, but they are saying it, and I believe them.

I think another way that you can look at this, too, is think about a friend that you have who's really hard on their body. You know, they're always picking themselves apart, putting themselves down. And so now think about how you see their body. So let's. Let's say, for example, your friend says she has thunder thighs, you know, and you look at her thighs and you think, like, those are normal, healthy thighs. Or like, I think those are sexy. Or, she's super strong. Look at those quads. So if you see her body differently from how she sees it, are you lying? Are you just, you know, deceiving her?

Are you a horrible person?

Yeah.

What's wrong with you?

So sometimes when we put ourselves on the other side of it, like, that really drills home this message that these. Both of these experiences can be true at the same time, even if they are seeming like they're in opposition with each other. So this is such a great reminder that you can give to yourself. I may not love that part of my body, and I can allow my partner. I can believe in my partner. I can, you know, trust them, that they're telling the truth, that they like this part of my body.

We totally understand almost all the time when friends of ours or people that we don't even know that well say something negative about their own body, we almost never agree with them. And I feel like we very often come away from interactions with other people being like, oh, man, they're so hard on themselves. Like, I don't know why they're being so hard on themselves, because they look great. And then we turn around and we do the exact same thing to ourselves. So I think it's just important to look at how often do you see other people doing the exact same thing you are doing, and how do you feel when they do it, and try to take some of that feeling and turn it around on yourself.

Now, another way that we can look at this, I like to use this metaphor a lot, that when our partner is trying to show us love or appreciation, you know, about our body, it's like they're trying to give you a gift. And so the challenge for you here is, can you allow yourself to receive that gift?

Good news is, gifts is one of your love languages. Vanessa loves receiving gifts.

I think we all do in some way or another. But I like this idea of it being a gift because I think sometimes there are ways that we see our partners love or appreciation. Like, it feels like a negative thing. Like, this goes back to the examples I was sharing at the beginning of this episode. Like, I honestly thought that you were kind of putting me down or making fun of me, right? And so it's just so easy for us to put this negative spin on it. But if we think of it as a gift, my partner is packaging up their love for me, their appreciation for me, their care for me. They're putting it in this beautiful box, they're wrapping it, putting a lovely bow on the top, and they're handing it over to me. And so we're going to get to compliments a little bit later in the episode. But it's sort of like imagine, you know, when your partner is giving you a compliment, imagine that they are extending their arms to you with this beautifully wrapped gif in their arms. What are you gonna do? Can you allow yourself to pick up that gift and take it, or are you gonna pick it up and throw it back in their face? Because that's what a lot of us end up doing. We get that compliment, that praise that, you know, those words of affirmation, and we throw it back in our partner's face.

And if that happened to you, if you gave someone a gift maybe a couple times, and they were not appreciative, in fact, they maybe didn't even open it and just said, I don't want anything, anything from you, would you keep giving them gifts?

Oh, we'll get back to that, too. Another interesting question to ask yourself. What do you think your body needs to look like to be worthy of love? Or make this even more simple. What do you think your body needs to look like to be worthy of a compliment? So this is another example of those kinds of, like, playing out the situations even more. Like, thinking, really thinking this through can be a super powerful experience for you. What does your body need to look like to be worthy of a single compliment? Yeah, if we think that through, sometimes it can be a little horrifying recognizing like, wow, I have all these guidelines, all these rules, all these expectations of my body, and until I get to that exact moment of pure perfection, I can't allow myself to let anything in.

Once you got to that point, do you think you just magically be happy? I mean, there's so many parallels here. Like, we talked about this in our Purity Culture episode, for example, where it's like, if you're told sex is not okay for your entire life, and then the moment you get married, all of a sudden it is okay, but no one has ever told you about how great it is. It's really hard to just flip a switch. And similarly, with your body, if all these benchmarks you need to hit in order to for it to be good enough, when you hit those, is it really gonna feel like, okay, cool, I can just take my foot off the gas. I can just coast. I'm gonna be happy. It's gonna be easy. Or do you think maybe you might start identifying new imperfections? You might move the goal posts a little bit further? I think we all have experiences like this in life where, like, we think, oh, well, if I just get this job, I'll be happy. Once I get a raise to X salary, then life is going to be easy. I'm going to have everything I need. And the reality is that oftentimes we have these goals for ourselves. We have these kind of like, benchmarks that we want to exceed. And then we get there. It's really like we've kind of like gone over that first hill. And we get over the hill, you can't see anything beyond the hill. You get up, you get over it, and then you see the next hill behind it. I think that, you know, it's not a matter of like, oh, my, things are bad, and I need things to be good. It's like. It's just a spectrum of, like, there's always things that we could do differently, worse, better, etc. It's never like. There's no such thing as perfection when it comes to our bodies.

And I have one final way of reframing this for you too. Can you look at it through this lens? What does your son or your daughter or your niece or your nephew or your sibling, just think of somebody else in your life that you care about, that you love? What does their body have to look like to deserve love? Sometimes when we take ourselves out of the picture and we think about it with somebody else that we care about, that we love, especially a younger person, this often can feel extra powerful. Then it just.

It's like.

It hits us like a. Oh, man. You know. You know what I was just about to say? It hits us like a wave of bricks.

Oh, why did you say it?

I did. That's a classic Vanessa mixing up her phrases.

A wave of bricks is really painful, especially as a surfer. Wow.

What is a wave hits you like a wave? A ton of bricks. A ton of bricks. But a wave, there's something with a wave, isn't there? Hits you like a wave. A wave crashes over you. Okay, we'll go with the bricks, man. I was having this, like, emotional, powerful moment here. This is like my mic drop moment for the episode. And then I. Then I went out there with the wave of bricks.

Let's. Let's try it again. Take it from the top.

So sometimes when we take ourselves out of the picture, these things hit us like a ton of bricks. We realize, like, wow, I don't want to live in a world where I think my daughter's body needs to look this very specific way for her to be worthy of love.

It washes over you like a wave.

So, yeah, I think that can be just a really interesting way to think about it. You know, what does. What do we need to look like to be worthy of love? And again, you know, we want to acknowledge there's so many other pieces of the body image and body confidence things. You know, there's so many ways where it becomes. It's about socialization, it's about politics. It's. You know, there's so much that feeds into this. But I think that's such a powerful and emotional question to ask yourself if you're really struggling to let your partner's love in for you. Like, yeah, what. What do I feel like my body has to look like just to be worthy of love.

Yeah. The reality is you have inherent worth and value. No matter who you are, no matter what you are, no matter what you look like, you are worthy, and you are worthy of love.

So now we want to move on to something really fun. We're pretty excited about this. So we went over to Instagram and we asked if you have a partner who struggles with body confidence, what is something that you wish they could believe? We asked people to record voicemails of themselves, you know, audio recordings, and send them over to us of what they wish their partner would believe. And so we're going to play a bunch of them for you here. And what we want you to do is just see if you can take a moment here to, like, close your eyes, take a few deep breaths, and imagine these people, all these voices that you're about to hear. Like, imagine that they're giving you these compliments and see if you can allow yourself to take them in. Even if it feels like you're just taking in 5% of it, even if it feels like you're just putting a finger on the gift and you're not fully accepting it yet. Because I think it can be interesting. Like, when it's coming from somebody else, it's not your partner. So you don't have whatever dynamics are, you know, built up between the two of you. This is a stranger. You're going to hear a lot of strangers voices, but could you imagine yourself just, like, letting in a little bit of that energy, that love, that attention, that care?

You said you're going to hear a lot of strangers voices, as if, like, maybe you're going to recognize some of them.

They will all be strangers to you.

That would be creepy.

Well, that'd be kind of cool if we could just, like, sneak in everybody's partner.

Yeah.

You're like, oh, my God, it's Jeff.

Yeah. But we have a few too many listeners to be able to accomplish that.

I think so. All right, here we go.

What I wish I could say is that you're still attractive whether you've gained weight or not. Like, your attractiveness has nothing to do with your weight gain. Yes. I really like your muscle tone. I also like your curves. Men are attractive with curves, too. It kind of goes hand in hand. Like, they're not one without the other. For me, I love you, so you're attractive to me, and I'm attracted to you because I love you and I want to be with you regardless of the way you perceive your body. And I wish you could see your body still as beautiful.

You see individual flaws, but I see you as a whole person.

I'm not looking for things to pick apart. I am just in awe that you are my partner.

Quit comparing yourself to what society says is attractive. You are my standard of beauty.

I know that you do not like your beautiful body, but that is the beautiful body that God gave you. That is the beautiful body that teaches the students during the day. That is the beautiful body that created our beautiful children. That is the beautiful body that I long to snuggle up to and cuddle with every night. That is the beautiful body that has changed over time, just like mine. Please learn to accept and love your body just as I have done. Let me love you.

If I say you look beautiful every day, it's because you do. I love watching the way your body changes over the years. It's an honor to walk beside you as we both change.

Mom bod is the most beautiful bod. That body gave me my kids. Nothing is more attractive than that.

Through all the body changes over the years, the constant is still the person I fell totally in love with.

I wish she would truly understand that.

I find every inch of her perfect. I don't see a single flaw.

Now we are going to get to the listener questions, and usually it's you asking me the listener questions, but I want to start this first one. I want to ask you.

All right?

I just can't wrap my head around how someone could actually be attracted to saggy breasts and a belly pooch. So I'm pretty sure that this one came from a woman and she was referring to her male partner. So how can a dude be attracted to saggy breasts and a belly pooch?

First of all, I think a lot of these judgments, saggy breasts and a belly pooch, are really in the eye of the beholder. As we saw from so many of the comments that we got from our listeners. You know, what they see is very different from what their partner sees. First of all, I would say probably what you consider to be saggy breasts are probably just boobs, hot boobs. Guys like boobs. And what you see as a belly po, probably he sees as that's a belly.

Just a normal belly.

Just a normal belly.

This is like the cellulite example, what you were thinking. It was cute. It was like this cute little dimple. And I'm horrified over here thinking it's this terrible thing.

I still think your butt has dimples. And I love it. I absolutely love it. But I Think the real thing is that especially in long term relationships, we are attracted, like, first and foremost to the person. I've been with Vanessa for so long, I love so much. There's so many emotional things and personality things that are so attractive to me. I would love Vanessa no matter what happens to her.

Oh, thanks, babe.

I think that it's very easy to depersonalize attraction and be like, it has nothing to do with who I am. It has everything to do with what I look like. That's unfortunately just sort of a way of deflecting.

The other thing that this makes me think of is that there's a story behind our bodies, too. Our bodies tell the story of our lives. I think we got a quote, you know, earlier from somebody else that was talking about, you know, mom bod. I think that's so hot because that body brought me my kids. Like, what could be more beautiful, sexier than that? And so this idea of, you know, saggy breasts or a belly pooch. I don't know if this particular person had a child or was pregnant at any point. There's probably some story behind those breasts. There's a story behind that belly. Your partner very well may have walked alongside you as that story was created. So that might be something that factors into their attraction as well as they know that story.

All right, so the next question is, how do I get better at accepting compliments with grace instead of instantly negating or shutting them down?

Such a good question. Okay, so we have a couple of tips for you. First one is, whenever your partner gives you a compliment, don't argue back with them. So if your partner says, oh, man, you're looking so good today, I think one of the classic things we do is like, no, I'm not. Are you crazy? Sometimes we can even turn it into an insult to our partner. Like, are you nuts? You know, how could you possibly think I look good today? I look terrible. That's definitely not accepting a compliment with grace. So let's try to stop doing that. And then the second part of this is to acknowledge the compliment. So you don't want to fight back about it, argue about it. You just want to acknowledge it. The best way to do this is honestly just to say thank you. You don't have to say anything else. Yes, I agree with you. I do have the best. But in the universe, you know, like, you don't have to agree with it in the moment, but just like that, confirmation that you've heard it, like, thank you.

Yeah. And if you. If you still want to argue or downplay the compliment, do that to yourself in your own head. If it feels better to be like, oh, I don't know if I feel comfortable giving this up yet, just know you can do that internally. It's also. It's also just not very nice to not acknowledge something that somebody says to you. Yeah.

I mean, think about the gift example, too. Another thing that you can do is say to your partner, like, I'm really working on accepting your compliments. That's something. It's a very neutral phrase. Like, you're not saying, I agree with you. You're not even saying thank you for it, but you're kind of letting your partner in on what this process is like for you. Like, I really want to accept that compliment. I really want to get more comfortable with it. I'm a work in progress right now.

Yeah, so, like, a dynamic that comes up very frequently in couples that we talk to and work with. You know, one partner gives their other partner a compliment or a number of compliments early on, and those compliments start getting negated, downplayed. Pretty soon the original person stops giving those compliments or stops giving them so frequently because it doesn't really seem like they're being heard. All right, so the next question is, how do I get my partner to show more love to my body? This one is interesting because it kind of plays out of the last thing we were talking about, because this is a dynamic that comes up so frequently with couples that we work with where someone downplays or negates compliments for so long, and so then their partner slows down on giving them and maybe kind of stops giving them. Because it can feel to them like, if I give a compliment, I'm actually doing more harm than good. Because then they start to kind of have this negative self talk. And so you feel like, well, if I don't give the compliment, then they won't say this really hurtful thing about themselves.

Yeah. So if you feel like your partner just, you know, never gives you compliments, doesn't show your body any love or appreciation, it's. It very well may be because you've had such a negative reaction to it in the past. So you can use the same line that we just said for the other question of, you know, tell your partner, hey, I really want to work on accepting your compliments and taking that in in the moment. You know, I'm working on it. I'm trying to challenge myself with it, and I would love it if you could start giving me compliments. Again, so I have an opportunity to practice now.

What about a scenario, though, where there's a partner that is just not very vocal with their compliments? Because we hear about this a lot as well. Some people are just not very comfortable, for whatever reason, giving compliments, or they are not comfortable verbally showing affection or love, and perhaps they feel more natural showing it in another way.

Yeah, this gets into a classic love languages type of dilemma, where, you know, we all have different ways that we like to give and receive love. Words of Affirmation is one of the love languages, and so your partner may not be that type, and so they don't really understand that that's what you're looking for, that that's what is meaningful to you. So we'll definitely do an episode on the love languages sometime in the future, but you very well may need to ask your. I mean, you're gonna have to ask your partner to give you more verbal praise and compliments and let them know how much that means to you and what sort of impact that has on you. And our final question was, somebody said, I would love to know what people in your community do to boost their body confidence. So, like we've been saying, you know, today's episode is just one very small piece of the puzzle. We're going to be talking more about body confidence and, you know, self esteem in the future. And so we would love to just start gathering your tools for body confidence. Come over to Instagram, vanessamarin Therapy. Shoot us a DM and let us know so we can all kind of support each other, give each other ideas. But what do you do to boost your body confidence?

Let's crowdsource this.

Yeah.

All right, so we have one final action item that we want you to take here. So many of us struggle with body image. Probably every person alive has struggled with it, you know, in one way or another, at one point in their lives or another. So what we would love you to do is send this podcast episode to a friend who you think needs to hear this, who could really benefit from this episode or maybe even just post it in your social, like, put it in your stories, tag us so we can see it. I just think it's really cool to imagine, like, how many people could we help if everybody who's listening to this episode sent to a friend and then they sent it to a friend, you know, and we could all just share this message of positivity, of learning to really accept and let in that love and appreciation and support that all of our bodies deserve.

That's all for today's episode of Pillow Talks. Thank you so much for listening. Join us again next week weekend.