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illustration From Ice Cold to Steamy Hot: Touch for Tired Women

We are born with the need for skin-to-skin contact. Studies conducted in orphanages and hospitals reveal that infants who aren't touched lose weight, become ill, and even die. On the other hand, premature babies who are provided with touch gain weight faster, cry less, and have improved pulse and respiration rates.

Your sex drive mirrors these findings. Without touch, your sex drive shrivels and dies. Conversely, loving, sexual, and affectionate touch can all help to rejuvenate your libido. Rarely will a tired woman initiate sex or respond with ready passion to a spouse's advances if there has not been connected touching throughout the day and week. As stated by Nadine, my seventy-five-year-old friend who has had a satisfying sex life over the course of her fifty-five-year marriage, “You need to be defrosted. If you haven't been touched all day and go to bed at night, you're an ice cube. It's hard to go from an ice cube to boiling water. Being touched during the day warms you up.” But, just any touch won't do. Some touch warms you up and some touch frosts you further!

Not While I'm Doing the Dishes!

Have you ever been in the kitchen, perhaps doing the dishes, and your husband comes up and gropes your rear end? If you are like most busy, tired women, your reaction won't be instant pleasure. You will be annoyed. Why? Isn't this the same person whose touch, or even gaze, used to send shivers up your spine and tingles down to your vagina? Isn't this the same person whose kitchen-groping used to result in playfulness? Dianna described her change in reaction as a “sad little journey.” She explained that when her husband used to come up from behind and grab her breasts, she would turn around and engage with him and play back. Later, she said, this turned into a smiling rebuff. “Come on honey, I'm trying to do the dishes,” she would say. Sometime later, her reaction was a scowl and total rejection. Now, she realizes with some sadness, “He doesn't even try anymore,” and “I've become one of those women I never wanted to be.”

You need to be defrosted. If you haven't been touched all day and go to bed at night, you're an ice cube. It's hard to go from an ice cube to boiling water. Being touched during the day warms you up.

— Nadine, 75

Why does this story sound familiar to so many women? Why does your husband copping a feel while you are cooking or doing the dishes result in irritation? According to Susan, a client who came to therapy with her husband Jack, it is because “He only pays attention to me when he wants sex.” According to Amy, another client, “It feels too abrupt and devoid of affection. It turns me off and not on.”

But, what do husbands say? A session with Fred and Paula is particularly enlightening. Paula was lamenting that she wished Fred wouldn't grope her while she did the dinner dishes. She explained that this was a turn-off and that a much more effective turn-on would be a gentle kiss on her neck and an offer to help with the chores. To illustrate her point, Paula asked Fred, “How would you feel if you were fixing the car and I came up and grabbed your penis?” “I would love it!” he replied.

Fred's quick and honest answer led to a useful discussion about why Fred groped Paula and the type of touch they both craved from one another. Fred wanted more sex, but just as importantly, he also missed the sexual playfulness of their earlier years. He was using this indirect, joking method of touch to keep him from feeling vulnerable. This way, if Paula rebuffed him, he could tell himself it didn't matter since he was just messing around. Fred's touch had evolved from loving and sexually provocative to teasing fumbling. Fred learned that this was not an effective way to get closer with Paula or to get her interested in sex. Paula, in turn, realized that Fred's groping was actually an indirect invitation to be close and to touch, maybe even to have sex sometime later. Paula learned that Fred did indeed understand that, unlike in their pre-child years, she couldn't just stop doing the dishes to make out and maybe have sex. He wasn't expecting sex on the spot; he just wanted to be a close and sexual couple. In her exhausted annoyance, Paula had lost sight of this. In the end, Fred agreed not to grope Paula but instead to be more sexually provocative and also to initiate sex through more affectionate and sensual touch. Paula, in turn, agreed that when Fred approached her in the kitchen the next time, instead of reacting with quick, rejecting anger she would take a deep breath and respond with playfulness or affectionate touch. You might want to try the same and see what happens. You also might want to have a talk with your husband like Fred and Paula had about the kitchen sink groping. But, first, you need to take a much simpler step toward getting the touch you need.

Watch and Discover

Your first step to getting the kind of touch you need is to take one day (or better yet, one weekday and one weekend day) to monitor what type of touch you are giving and getting. Don't do anything to change what you or your spouse is doing. Instead, simply observe it. How often do you touch your spouse in an affectionate way? How often do you touch him in a sexually provocative way? How about in a teasing way? How often does your spouse touch you in these same ways and how do these types of touch make you feel?

As you observed yourself and your spouse, you may have discovered how infrequently the both of you show love and affection through touch. On the other hand, you may have noticed that you touch affectionately but not sexually. Like Dianna you may have discovered that “hugs are all that is left.” If this is the case, you are already a step ahead in the program. Still, it will benefit you to further increase your level of touch or to experiment with new ways of touching one another affectionately. It will benefit you because affectionate touch is the building block for tired women to rekindle their desire.

The Wordless Language of Love

Affectionate touch is basic to a loving, sexual, relationship. Touching your spouse with affection is a powerful way to say, “I love you.”Recall from the communication chapter that when our verbal and nonverbal behaviors conflict, we give most weight to the nonverbal ones. The same applies to the language of love. Saying “I love you” without words can be even more compelling than saying it with words. Conveying love and affection through touch can be the most potent, even intoxicating, message of all.

No wonder studies show that one of the predictors of a woman's marital satisfaction is how affectionate her husband is. Affection also bolsters physical health. Perhaps you recall that hugging decreases blood pressure. In one study, women sat very close to their spouses, talked with them for ten minutes, and then hugged them. Even this short-lived affection lowered blood pressure. Affectionate touch is a healthy — and health-enhancing — way of communicating love.

A Language for All Ages

Did you ever notice how young couples in love touch each other almost constantly? Often people say things like, “Isn't that sweet?” or, “They are so adorable.” Likewise, have you ever seen an elderly couple holding hands or showing other forms of physical affection? Have you smiled at the sight? Have you hoped that you and your spouse would be like that in your later years? The reality is that you can't expect to be affectionate later if you aren't now. Affection is an important cornerstone of all phases of marriage. It's time to start talking this language now.

The Many Words of This Silent Language

There are countless ways to show affection or love through touch. Here are some of the many ways:

The possibilities are endless. Can you think of other ways of showing affection to your spouse? How about ways you would like him to show affection to you?

The Way They Like It and Like You Mean It

When working with individuals who have marriage concerns, I often instruct them to touch their spouses affectionately more often. Frequently, this touch is reciprocated without any discussion: as one spouse ups the affection, so does the other in response. Likewise, when working with a couple, I give them an important first assignment: each should initiate affectionate touch five times a day. Before embarking on this homework, I have the couple discuss what type of affectionate touch they like the best. Some people prefer a shoulder rub whereas others prefer a hug. It's good to know what type of affectionate touch you favor, as well as to know what your spouse likes. Often in relationships, we tend to give what we want — rather than finding out what the other person wants and giving them that.

Likewise, sometimes we get stuck in our patterns of giving affectionate touch; we touch in ways that seem perfunctory and devoid of real affection. Sam and Ellie often held hands but it didn't really feel loving or connected. It felt habitual and emotionless. What helped them was to hold hands differently — to use their thumbs to caress one another as they held hands or to hold their hands in new and different positions. Even this small change prompted them to notice and appreciate each other's touch more.

Start “Talking” Now

It is important that you start speaking the silent language of love now. To regain your sex drive, you and your husband will need to increase the amount of meaningful affectionate touch in your marriage. You can do this without discussing it, and see if your spouse follows in kind. If not, you can address it with him more directly. Or, you can address it with him directly from the start.

illustration touch homework (choice a)

Start touching your spouse affectionately several times each day. If you already engage in affectionate touch, increase the amount of this kind of touch and vary it in terms of type of touch to make sure that it is meaningful and connected, affectionate touch.

illustration touch homework (choice b)

Talk with your spouse about the importance of affectionate touch to reviving your sex drive. Tell him that you would like for both of you to touch each other in an affectionate way several times a day, or that you would like to vary and enhance the intensity and connectedness of the type of affection you already share. Say for example, “I would like us to touch each other affectionately more every day” or, “I would like us to purposefully touch each other with genuine affection every day” as an opener for this discussion. Discuss the types of affectionate touch you both like. Then, be sure to remember to touch your husband in the way he likes.

More Silent Love Language: Talking with Your Gaze

Up until now we have been focused on physical touch. But, talking with your eyes is another powerful way to speak love without words. The notion of speaking love with one's eyes is often used at couple's relationship retreats, where “soul gazing” is practiced. During soul gazing, partners look deeply into one another's eyes. As they do, they have some form of physical contact such as holding hands or putting their hands over one another's hearts. As couples look deeply into one another's eyes, they are instructed to focus on communicating love through their eyes. Sometimes they are instructed to coordinate breathing. If this activity appeals to you, explain it to your husband and tell him you would like to give it a try.

If soul gazing doesn't appeal to you, you may still want to extract the basic principle: a loving gaze. Remember to actually look into your partner's eyes. In the early stages of a relationship, couples report spending time gazing into one another's eyes. Later, we are often so busy running around that we don't stop to look anymore. Try to slow down enough to consciously, and lovingly, look into your husband's eyes, if for only a few seconds. Make a real connection, even if fleeting, with your eyes.

In accordance with the notion that much of this book is best digested and tried in chunks, I encourage you to put this book down and work on communicating love and affection, using both your hands and your eyes, for a week before moving on.

No-End-Goal Touching

Hopefully, you are now enjoying giving and receiving love and affection through touch and gaze. Continuing this affectionate touch is paramount to recovering your sex drive. Now, it is time to crank up the heat a notch. It is time to add in No-End-Goal Touching.

How it Works: The Pleasure of No Pressure

To understand the premise of No-End-Goal-Touching, take a moment and think back to when you were a virgin, before you first engaged in intercourse. Do you remember what my mother's generation would call “heavy petting” or what my children's generation call “making out”? Can you bring to mind a sexual encounter from these days? When I recently asked Dianna to recall such a time, her wistful reply was “It was wonderful.” Like Dianna, perhaps you recall becoming wet and excited, even though you knew the evening would not end in intercourse. After all, reminisced Dianna, “What could we really do in a car parked in my parent's driveway?”She wondered, “Perhaps some of the excitement was the lack of pressure itself.” Like Dianna, do you remember a make-out session that resulted in moist underwear and a throbbing vagina? Perhaps you even came home and masturbated. If you had no one to confide in, you may have even wondered if your degree of lubrication and excitement was normal. Did all girls get this hot?

What could we really do in a car parked in my parent's driveway? Perhaps some of the excitement was the lack of pressure itself.

— Dianna, 54

No-End-Goal Touching is designed to warm you up. It is designed, quite literally, to get your vaginal juices flowing again. Its ability to get you excited lies in the fact that there is no pressure to actually have sex. Non-pressured sexuality is probably the exact opposite of the pattern that you and your husband currently find yourselves stuck in.

Likely, you have responded to your husband's invitations for sex by saying, “No, I am too tired” a number of times. If your spouse is like the husbands of many tired women, he has become discouraged by this. He has slowly ceased to touch you affectionately. He has stopped reaching out to you as often, or even at all, with sexually provocative touch. This decreased affection and eroticism has likely further dampened your sexual desire. It has also contributed to turning sexuality into something that is cut off from the rest of your life. If you are like most tired women and their husbands, sex has become an all-or-nothing proposition. You probably currently hesitate to start anything that you can't finish. This is quite problematic because it leaves you crawling into bed at night exhausted and, as seventy-five-year-old Nadine said earlier, “cold as ice” as well. There has been no “defrosting.” No-End-Goal-Touching can fix this.

The Napkin Dropping Trick

For No-End-Goal Touching to be effective, you have to engage in it at times or in places where sex is out of the question. This works both because of the lack of pressure and because our sexual desire often increases when there are barriers to fully satisfying it.

You can suggestively caress your husband's inner thigh under the table during a dinner with friends. He can do the same for you, perhaps even allowing his hands to covertly rub your vaginal lips through your pants. My friend Evelyn's husband “accidentally” drops his napkin when out to dinner with friends; when he reaches or crawls under the table to get it he finds a way to slip Evelyn a very sexually erotic touch, particularly if she is wearing a skirt. One time Evelyn anticipated that Bill would do this and the surprise was his when he found that she wasn't wearing underwear under her long, flowing skirt. This same couple has been known to pretend they are cold at the movie theater, putting a coat across their laps and engaging in extraordinarily provocative touching of one another — touching that doesn't lead to intercourse in the movie theater but gets both of their juices flowing for a later time.

Certainly, all non-demand touching doesn't need to be quite this intensely sexual. You can have a five minute make-out session on the couch while your child is taking a bath. You can nuzzle one another's ears. You can shower together in the morning and engage in some sensual and lathery touch that doesn't lead to intercourse. You can slip your hand in your husband's pants pocket and give his thigh a squeeze. He can stroke your rear-end or breasts, for just a few seconds. No matter what you do, the point is to integrate suggestive touching into your daily life.

What Turns Up Your Heat?

Before engaging in No-End-Goal Touching, you need to know what type of sexual touch you and your partner find most arousing. Just as the type of affectionate touch that individuals prefer varies, so does the type of sexually provocative, non-demand touch. Do you get excited when your partner nuzzles your ear or neck? Caresses your thigh? Kisses you passionately? As was the case with affectionate touch, it's important to know what type of sexually provocative touch you and your husband each prefer. Knowing this will prevent you both from making the all-too common mistake of giving what we ourselves desire — rather than what our partners crave.

When in the midst of No-End-Goal Touching, remember to use the mindfulness focus you learned in the Thoughts step. Fully immerse in the pleasure for these few minutes. Also, communicate what you like, either during or after the encounter. After a particularly provocative make-out session, you can let your husband know that it worked and that your vagina is throbbing. Or, you can simply tell him how nice that felt.

What About Finishing the Deed?

Despite its effectiveness to help build passion, No-End-Goal Touching is often met with skepticism. The concern centers on the tension between sexually provocative touch and “finishing the deed,” or having intercourse. The husbands of women who have lost their sex drive sometimes fear becoming further sexually frustrated by these exercises.

In therapy, my job is to convince these husbands that No-End Goal Touching could be frustrating in the short run, but is likely to get their sexual needs met better in the long run. I tell them that, believe it or not, they will most likely come to enjoy No End-Goal Touching. I remind them that even in the most sexually active part of their relationship, not all touch led immediately to intercourse or orgasm. I remind them that in the past, a hot session of lovemaking would often be followed by provocative touch and talk the next day, including at times when sex was impossible. The old pattern was that a hot romp in the sack would lead to Provocative Sex Talk and No-End-Goal Touching, both of which would keep the arousal high until another hot session of lovemaking. I explain that we have to start this cycle back up again and that a good place to start is with No-End-Goal Touching. I can't converse with your husband, but you can have him read these paragraphs or using your newfound communication skills, you can explain this to him yourself.

illustration touch homework

Talk with your spouse about the importance of integrating sexual touch into your lives. Tell him that you would like to give this a try. Tell him that you would like to add this type of touch to your daily life together. Say for example, “The book I am reading recommends that we get sexual at times that we can't actually have sex. I would love to do this.” As you discuss this exercise, be open to discussing any concerns he has about increased sexual frustration and share with him the notion that even if this exercise is frustrating in the short term, it will likely result in more sex in the future. As you explain No-End-Goal Touching to him, open a dialogue about what kinds of sexually provocative touch you both like the most. Then, continue to give your affectionate touches, but also add in this type of touch, ideally on a daily basis.

While you are starting with once-a-day No-End-Goal Touching, this type of touch builds upon itself. It is so much fun that you are likely to naturally increase the frequency as you learn to savor these hot moments.

Playtime

Another exercise sex therapists sometimes recommend is taking turns pleasuring one another. This homework revolves around a series of turn-taking exercises often recommended for couples that have significant anxiety around intercourse. For couples dealing with this and other potentially serious relationship and sexual concerns, this tends to be a cumbersome exercise that is best done as a homework assignment while in therapy. However, its basic principle is quite useful for women who feel too tired for sex and is thus explained here. The idea is to take turns playing with one another's bodies. It is best if playtime includes a focus on whole-body stimulation and is taken slowly. The idea is to give each other pleasure, without intercourse. During playtime, one partner pleasures the other, with the partner being pleased under no obligation to reciprocate or to reach orgasm. It is this lack of pressure for intercourse and orgasm, as well as the non-mutuality, that makes this exercise so effective. The giver can learn what it feels like to give pleasure and the receiver can fully relax and revel in her own pleasure without worrying about if it is time to do something for her partner or if she is expected to orgasm soon.

This playtime can come in several varieties. For example, your husband could pleasure you and receive nothing from you in return. You could do the same for him at another time. Or, you could both take turns pleasing each other, in the same evening.

Playtime will help you get over the idea that every sexual encounter has to be equally pleasurable for both partners. This is a false belief that can get in the way of the give-and-take that is part of any good relationship, including a sexual one.

Self-Pleasure

Another important way to get your sexual juices flowing is through masturbation. Some women used to masturbate frequently, but now feel even too exhausted for this. Sandra describes masturbation as “another relic of my sexual past.”

Masturbation is another relic of my sexual past.

— Sandra, 51

You can't just wait until you feel horny to masturbate. If you do, you may never masturbate. While horniness used to be the signal that it was time to masturbate, you need to reverse this equation. You need to masturbate to get horny. Instead of waiting to pleasure yourself when you feel sexual desire, you can create sexual desire by touching yourself. You can also masturbate to refresh your memory of all the benefits of sex. In a survey of more than 2,000 women from their teens through their nineties, many reported masturbating to relax, to get to sleep, or to relieve menstrual cramps.

Masturbation is also a good time to practice mindful sex. Practicing a total immersion in the physical sensations during masturbation can help you achieve this state more quickly during sex with your partner. Masturbation is also good time to rediscover the old ways you used to like to receive pleasure or to experiment with new ways to excite yourself. You can touch yourself in new ways, with different degrees of pressure, in new places or in new positions. You can try reading erotica or watching an arousing movie before masturbation. You can buy different lubricants and discover what you like and don't like. You can try making different sex sounds and see if any get you aroused. Some women like to experiment with a variety of vibrators. The goal is to pleasure yourself and to pay attention to what works best for you. You can use what you learn simply to enjoy yourself, but also importantly as knowledge to enhance your relationship with your spouse. You could tell him about your new methods, or show him. If you don't feel comfortable with this, don't worry. Just turning up your own sex drive a notch through masturbation will help.

illustration touch homework

Find some time (even just five minutes a week) to touch yourself in a sexual way. You don't need to have orgasm as a goal. Simply experiment with ways of touching yourself that bring arousal and pleasure.

What you may find is that you get aroused in ways that are new or different. Or, you may discover that some of your old standards do the trick. Another important discovery might be that touch can lead to sexual desire, rather than needing to feel desire before engaging in touch. Or, maybe you already knew this, but need to think of it in a different way. The next section will help you with this.

Getting in the Mood: Not the Same as Duty Sex

If you are like many tired women, you have been having sex when you are “not in the mood” but once it gets going it works well. Afterwards, you may think or say things along the lines of “That was good. We should do that more often.” But, still, you lament not being in the mood and this lesson is quickly forgotten, until the next time you force yourself to have sex without first having the physical ache of desire. You think of this in a downbeat way. You think of this as forcing yourself to have sex. You talk of having duty sex. Duty sex starts and ends without physical desire. But, not all sex that starts with no desire ends this same way. Some sex starts dry and ends in intense sexual excitement, even orgasm. This is because of the reversed equation.

The Reversed Equation

In your younger years, your sequence of sexual activity was: Physical Desire illustration Sexual Activity illustration Sexual Excitement/ Orgasm.

This is what I call the “Feel Horny, Have Sex” order of events. This is what you are hoping to reclaim. You want to have physical desire lead to sexual touch. While the techniques in this book are aimed at this goal, it is important for you to understand that there is also another solution you can employ. This method involves using your psychological desire for sex (a desire that has hopefully been enhanced by doing your homework!) to propel you to engage in sexual activity and to allow this sexual activity to get you horny.

This alternate sequence of events is as follows:

Psychological Desire for Sex illustration Sexual Activity illustration Physical Desire illustration Continued Sexual Activity illustration Sexual Excitement/Orgasm.

This is what I will call the “Have Sex, Feel Horny” or the “Touch to Desire” order of events. This is where you have sexual encounters to get horny rather than waiting to be horny to have a sexual encounter. In metaphorical terms, this is akin to knowing that your car can be cold when you start it, but that it will warm up while you drive. You can still experience a very pleasant drive, even in winter. When explaining this to my client Rose, she also used a transportation metaphor. “Oh, I understand. Sometimes a leap of faith is the only available form of transportation.” Rose went on to say that “Feeling confident that sex will be good once it gets going could propel me to have it, even when I'm not in the mood.”

Feeling confident that sex will be good once it gets going could propel me to have it, even when I'm not in the mood.

— Rose, 44

Be Proud of Yourself

If Rose has sex when she isn't in the mood — and if it is good sex — I hope she will feel pleased with herself! And I hope you do the same. Rather than continuing to think of the good sex you have as duty sex, another option is to view it in a positive light. Feel pleased with yourself for having sex to get horny, rather than lamenting what is wrong with you.

If you do this, you won't be alone. Two studies found that many women who lose their sex drive do not feel bothered by this. A very recent study led by a Massachusetts General Hospital physician surveyed about 32,000 women whose ages ranged from eighteen to older than 100. Findings indicated that 43 percent of the women had some kind of sexual problem, including 39 percent who said they had issues with low sexual desire. But, only 12 percent of the women were distressed about their sexual problem. While this study didn't examine how these women had come to feel unbothered, perhaps it was because they didn't allow their lack of sex drive to interfere with having a marvelous sex life.

While this sounds like a contradiction, it's not. In fact, many of you are already are doing this. You are already using your psychological motivation to have sex. You are using touch to get you excited. Keep doing this and add in a new mantra. Tell yourself, “I am happy with myself for making sex a priority,” “I'm proud of myself for being so motivated to have sex,” or something along these lines that works for you.

Thinking this way will help you recover your drive, because it is another form of positive thinking and because it will propel you to have sex, an act which itself revs up your libido. This new way of thinking will also help you to maintain a great sex life through the inevitable ups and downs of your sex drive.

If It Is Fun, It's Not Duty Sex

The main point is that great sex doesn't always have to start with physical desire. Just because it doesn't start with physical desire doesn't mean it is duty sex. This is the difference between “It was awesome and I'm going to make sure to do that again soon!” and “I am glad I got that over with for the week.” Using the “Crockpot Formula” will make it much more likely that you'll react positively.

The “Crockpot Formula”

Not enjoying sex due to a husband's lack of good sexual technique is different than being too tired for sex. Still, your husband's sexual techniques and your ability to give him feedback about them deserve additional attention. How much time your husband takes with foreplay and his specific way of touching during foreplay are especially important.

Your Hot Button: Let's Call It Sex

The traditional definition of foreplay is the caressing that takes place before intercourse. Such wording implies that touching is useful only as a lead-in to the main event, with the main event being intercourse. Given that most men orgasm during intercourse and that, according to the Hite Report, 70 percent of women don't orgasm during intercourse, this is a male-defined way of talking about sex. Some sex experts, and some women I talk with, say it works best if the woman can have an orgasm separate from intercourse. A few go further to say that this works best if the woman's orgasm occurs before intercourse. If these women were defining the words, the clitoral caressing (and orgasm) that occurs before intercourse would be called sex and intercourse would be called post-play. Sex expert Lori Buckley prefers the term “sex play” to foreplay, pointing out that clitoral stimulation (by oneself, one's partner, or a vibrator) can occur before, during, after — or even instead of — intercourse.

This is not to say that women don't like intercourse. Lots of women enjoy intercourse tremendously. It is just that the vast majority of women require clitoral stimulation to orgasm. For women, the orgasm “hot button” is the clitoris. The clitoris has more nerve endings than anywhere else in the body. Learning this helped one of my very religious clients get comfortable with asking her husband to stimulate her clitoris. “After all,” she said, “I think my clitoris must be God's gift for me. He put all those nerve endings there for a reason.”

I think my clitoris must be God's gift for me. He put all those nerve endings there for a reason.

— Natalie, 38

During intercourse, the clitoris is only indirectly stimulated and this is why only a minority of women orgasm through penetration alone. Those women who do orgasm through penetration alone often say they do so in the woman-on-top position; this may be because of the friction of rubbing the clitoris against one's partner's abdomen or the shaft of his penis. Another theory is that women who have orgasms during intercourse have clitorises that are closer to their vagina than those who do not. The bottom line is that in order for a woman to reach orgasm, she generally must have her clitoris in contact with something and it must be stimulated.

Despite the paramount role of the clitoris in women's orgasms, sex experts are quick to tell you not to ignore other parts of your anatomy. Many women report that they receive great pleasure from having their breasts caressed. Others report feeling positive erotic sensations in the upper front wall of the vagina, the location known as the “G Spot.” Still, many sex therapists and the majority of women will tell you that for the most reliable and intense sexual pleasure, women need men to take time stimulating their clitoris.

I told him that he needed to take a lot more time with me and slow down. I told him no more “wham bam thank you ma'am.” After that, we had a wonderful sex life for the rest of our marriage.

— Nadine, 75

How much time? There is great variability among women. Like-wise, an individual woman herself will vary, depending on many things. Among these are her level of exhaustion and her ability to focus and have mindful sex. Still, averages are interesting. On average, men take four minutes to reach orgasm, once they begin intercourse. Women take somewhere around eleven minutes and this is not eleven minutes of intercourse. It is eleven minutes of stimulation. Not all women know this. Even fewer men seem to know this. What's more, women often don't tell men this. Women don't always tell their husbands that they need time to get aroused or how to arouse them.

Tell Him You Are a Slow Cooker

Jean has been married twenty-six years and she has never told her spouse directly what she needs. She says that lately he has been more focused on this, because of his awareness of her attraction to another man and his fear of losing her. He now tells her that he wants her “to be as finished as I am.” But, Jean says, “He is ready to begin to be intimate at ten or eleven at night and I don't even want to get into talking about mechanics at that point. I just want to get it over with and get to sleep.” Jean emphasizes this point further, “Sure, I could tell him to do this or do that. But, by the time he is home and ready, I don't want to bother.” Jean also says that she was raised in a very prudish household and isn't all that comfortable talking directly about sex. “I don't even know how I would explain it to him.”

The best way I've heard this explained was by Lana, a woman in her fifties who, despite a full-time job as a school teacher and a part-time job as a manicurist, has a very satisfying sex life. She said, “This is because Brian knows that men are microwaves and women are crockpots, and he tells me to take all the time in the world to get warmed up.” This echoes the sentiment of Nadine, my seventy-five-year-old friend quoted earlier about being warmed up through affectionate touch. Nadine educated her husband early in their marriage about what she needed. “I told him that he needed to take a lot more time with me and slow down. I told him no more wham bam thank you ma'am. After that, we had a wonderful sex life for the rest of our marriage,” says Nadine. Both Nadine's husband and Lana's husband learned that women take longer to become sexually aroused than do men.

If you're tired and stressed-out, it's important that your husband understands it will likely take more time for you to get aroused. It takes time to let go of stress and focus on physical feelings and sensations. If your husband doesn't know that you are a slow cooker, I encourage you to find a way to tell him this.

Tell Him What Ingredients Work Best

You will also benefit greatly from telling your husband about the way you like to be touched or what turns you on. Knowing what you like and being able to communicate this is perhaps the most important tip for sexual satisfaction. All of the information about women's arousal presented above was based on averages. That means that not all women fit these patterns. Knowing what you like and telling your husband this is of critical importance. Telling him once isn't sufficient either, because the type of clitoral stimulation that women need to orgasm can change from one sexual encounter to another. For some women or during some sexual encounters, too much direct clitoral stimulation can become uncomfortable. To receive the type of stimulation you want, you can say “move your hand here or there” or provide specific instructions or requests (“softer please”). You can also communicate your desires by guiding your husband's hands the way you want them to go.

Although it doesn't eliminate the need for talking during sex, it is also very useful have an explicit sexual discussion about what you like and want over coffee or dinner. For this Kitchen Table Sex Talk, it might help to take out the list you developed in the Talk step about both the conditions you need to make sex more optimal and explicit sexual requests that you have. While talking about sex is something that many people find awkward or difficult, it is critical. That is why Talk was the foundational T. It's time to make your bed rock with the bedrock of communication.

He knows that men are microwaves and women are crockpots, and he tells me to take all the time in the world to get warmed up.

— Lana, 57

illustration touch homework

Talk about Touch. Talk with your husband about any of the following that you think would enhance your sex life: being a crockpot, ways to warm you up, the type of sexual touch you find most arousing, the conditions you need to make sex most optimal, or any other specific sexual requests that you have.

Please have this talk now, but anticipate having more discussions after you check out all the spicy ways to heat up your sex life that are the focus of the next chapter!

meet wanda, a thirty-eight-year-old nurse who recently told her husband about the crockpot metaphor. She also told him that most women needed an average of eleven minutes of clitoral stimulation. Then, the next time they made love, she reminded him with a grin, “Remember, I need my full eleven minutes!” Her husband responded with seriousness, telling her to “Take as much time as you need.” This helped Wanda to relax and her relaxation resulted in her enjoying sex more than usual and having a wonderful orgasm. In fact, Wanda actually came quicker than she normally did because she wasn't feeling pressured about or focused on how long it was taking.

Touch Step Wrap-Up

You NEED affectionate and sexual touch on a daily basis to recover your sex drive and to keep it alive. Affectionate and sexual touch shouldn't be limited to the bedroom. Such touch needs to be fully integrated into your life and your relationship. That way, it becomes a natural and enjoyable part of your interaction with your spouse. You and your husband need to learn to touch each other affectionately several times a day. Slowing down enough to look into each other's eyes is also important. In other words, you and your husband need to take time to speak the powerful and silent language of love on a daily basis. You need to let go of the myth that all sexual touch must end in intercourse. Instead, you need to engage in provocative touch, especially at times and in situations when there is no way you could actually “finish the deed.” To get your sexual juices flowing, make this No-End-Goal Touching a part of your daily routine. Try revving your sex drive up further with playtime; doing so will help you shatter the myth that every sexual encounter needs to be equally as pleasurable for both people. Also, please remember that just because you start a sexual encounter with no interest doesn't mean that it is duty sex. You can start a sexual encounter with little or no physical desire, and end up having great sex. You can use touch to get you in the mood. Do this and pat yourself on the back! To make sure that sex is great — whether it starts with physical desire or not — tell your husband that you are a slow cooker. Explain to him how women, especially tired women, need a lot of foreplay. Tell him about your hot button, your clitoris, and how you like to be touched. Keep telling him. Talk with your husband all about the touch you need and then revel in the feeling of his hands caressing your body. In short, allow affectionate and sexual touch to keep things steamy!