Are We Saying that Wives Don't Have to Make Love?
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- Опубликовано: 6 сен 2024
- Episode 231 of the Bare Marriage Podcast!
When we talk about how God made sex to be mutual, intimate, and pleasurable for both, and how, if women don't want sex, the answer is to figure out why, we invariably get people saying, "so you think women don't have to have sex then?"
Today on the podcast we look at the 90% problem vs. the 10% problem. In 90% of cases where women don't want sex, there's a reason. Let's focus mostly on the 90%! But guess what? We actually talk about the 10% too!
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THE PRODUCTS WE MENTIONED:
Our book The Great Sex Rescue
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The Orgasm Course
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The Boost Your Libido Course
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THINGS MENTIONED IN THE PODCAST:
Our podcast on obligation sex, and the post that goes along with it
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The podcast where we discuss Emerson Eggerichs saying you can't tell if a woman is aroused--and a follow-up podcast going into more detail on how evangelical writers portray female orgasm
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More podcasts on libido: 3 ways to talk about libido differences, and have we made sex into a yes space for men?
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We really need to understand the difference between our species needing sex to survive…and individuals needing sex. Individuals do not “need” sex-we desire it. I say this as the spouse who had higher desire. I haven’t withered up & died.
Yeah, I don’t remember the term “need” being used in my sociobiology and bio-anth classes. We would talk about *drive* both in humans and animals, but not “need”. Animals are hardwired with a *drive* to procreate. But neither they nor we will die individually for a lack of outlet.
Just like we can’t “sublimate” a need for water with food or air. Those are separate needs that we will individually die without. We can sublimate a drive for sex because it’s *not* a need. (It’s just a very strong drive for most.)
Perhaps it's more accurate to say that the MARRIAGE "needs" sex to survive if one spouse has a high physical and emotional desire for sex. If one spouse feels emotionally neglected for one reason or another, they are not receiving the sexual intimacy they desire, there's a high likelihood that the marriage is going to end.
Positive sex is needed as part of a couple building a family with longevity, and families are a building block for civilization.
Civilization is foundational for ensuring regular, safe and reliable sources for water and food, among other things, for most people.
Very hard to survive alone forever.
@@davidfrey5654I hear sentiments like this a lot, but I can’t help but wonder what happens when one half of the marriage suffers a devastating accident that renders them incapable of sexual intimacy? Whether we’re speaking of stories like Joni Erickson Tada, or the anonymous soldier who’s had a tragic encounter with an incendiary device … are we now setting the precedent for their spouses to abandon them because the marriage “needs” sexual intimacy?
Asking as a member of the military community…
@@davidfrey5654 so is this why men are more likely to leave their wives when the wife gets a difficult health condition (that often takes sex off the table) than wives are to leave their husband? Because the men only meant “in sickness and in health, as long as I’m getting sex”?
Bros, stop the lie.
We WANT sex. We don’t NEED it as often as we tell ourselves we do.
So Doug Wilson not only condones marital rape, he’s actively *advocating* for it. If his wife ever gets fed up, he’ll be in jail. (Depending on Idaho’s laws.)
Where does he condone marital rape?
I actually felt like I had to "die" to myself and the extreme emotional pain that was created by my husband's emotional/spiritual abuse and pull myself up and do it anyway. I was mad at myself and devastated thinking God was so disappointed in me because I couldn't figure out a way to just shut off my emotions and do it. I truly thought I was supposed to be able to do that. Where did I learn that? Christian marriage books and church sermons. 😔 I am very thankful for you both and what you are doing to change this mindset.
A lot of women are being sexually abused but don't realize it, and feel guilty for being miserable during sex.
So what are things like now?
@Charles.Wright I gave and gave and gave like a "good" Christan wife is led to believe she must, until I was almost destroyed. The abuse never stopped no matter how much I gave or how hard I tried to love him.
The "girl dreaming of her wedding" stereotype never fit me. I was more excited about the honeymoon, which ended up being awful (he was totally self-centered, just like the "joke" implies). He followed that advice, and I allowed it.
I could have cared less about the big church wedding, I would have happily gone before the JP to get married and spend my money on the honeymoon. None of what he says was true about me as a little girl or a woman. It is a stereotype.
I was super excited about sex with my husband, yet it WAS all about him, always. The "joke" is not a joke when this is actually the reality that some of us have had to live with. The reason I stayed in an abusive marriage is not because I am weak or stupid. It is because of my love for God and the teaching and "jokes" like Josh's that led me to believe this was how it is supposed to be, and I was wrong to want anything different. Words have power, and words from a pastor carry even more weight. I find it super hard to comprehend that men defending him do not see or understand this. Words have the power to alter someone's life forever. Even so-called "jokes." Which in this case is not a true joke because #1 it’s not funny. #2 It is harmful. It is more like an underlying pattern of harmful thought that is told as a joke to make it more palatable.
If it were possible for you to put yourself in the shoes of a little girl who hears this message growing up, over & over and internalizing it. A little girl who becomes a woman hearing her entire life that sex is more for her husband than her, that it's required of her as a wife and is treated like she is going to need to add it to a list like mundane chores after she is married, yet still be required to be excited about it. She is simply a receptical to be used and told what to do....stand here, wear this, do that. Yet she, too, is a sexual being with all the God-given capabilities to experience amazing, vibrant, intimate sex with her spouse. She goes in with so much desire, hoping to have reciprocal enjoyable intimate sex, but he has been taught too. He has been told his entire life that sex is a need for him and that he is entitled to it, and he is taught that even GOD himself says this is true. He is not taught a thing about truly imtimate God honoring sex or how to please a woman and include her in this most intimate act created by God to connect two people. Most likely, he's received most of his sex ed from porn. So that is his mindset. He's been told his entire life that he gets to tell her to stand where he wants her to stand, wear what he wants her to wear, and do what he wants her to do in real life and in the popular, hip, cool, pastor " joke" form.
How am I, you ask? I am doing amazing. My abuser abandoned our marriage after 17 years. He walked away from our children and terminated his parental rights. My children and I have overcome some of the most devastating traumas you can heave on a person, yet by the grace of God, we are stronger as a family now than we've ever been. He's gone. His abusive entitled mindset is gone, and we are happy with a home full of love, respect, and joy.
Thanks to Shelia and other advocates, my children and I have learned that God does truly care about us. He cares about how we are being treated, and He cares about correcting our thinking in terms of what scripture says. Sex is not meant to serve the pornified mindset of anyone. I've lived it. I know well where those kinds of "jokes" with that kind of mindset originate. Our culture is saturated with it, and the church is allowing it to filter through into the teaching and preaching and claiming it is of God. It's NOT.
The fix is to realize our wrong thinking and apologize when we hurt others, then adjust our thinking and teaching/preaching. Instead, I see people defending it as a joke and never truly considering the damage it is doing to the little girls & little boys, the teenagers, and the devastated wives like I was sitting in the pews thinking they have to suppress how it is making them feel (like an object) because a man of God is saying it and people are laughing.
You can't fully understand because you see it from your viewpoint, but we are trying to tell you it it harmful and most can't muster up enough empathy or curiosity to actually listen or see if there is any truth to what Sheila is saying. Instead, they defend and continue to not listen because their mindset won't allow it. That grieves my heart, but this is why I am so thankful for resources like what Shelia offers because it finally gave a voice to the internal pain I suffered for years. I've been set free to heal and be whole and to know I am worthy of requiring/expecting more than being an object to anyone's wrong thinking. Joke or not.
@@TheMandybug thank you for being transparent and thorough. So sorry to hear of all you've gone through. I hope and pray that you continue to heal and grow in the knowledge of God
"Are We Saying that Wives Don't Have to Make Love?" - yes you are. You're pretty consistent about obligation sex being wrong and rightly so. However you are also saying that women normally do want sex, if the five things are in place - the 90%. The difficulty is that if sex has stopped completely (after the 10-15 years of giving service sex, like you say it will) and stopped for many years, then getting her to even consider sex again is hard, as 3 of the five things imply that at least some sex is taking place (lack of pain, orgasm and emotional connecting during). It feels coercive to even raise a desire for sex.
So yes, fix this stuff early. Make use of the excellent sex education that is available these days (not least from Sheila), that just wasn't around when we started.
All my life I’ve just wanted to love someone. I don’t need sex. I truly just want to be connected to someone. I’ve never needed sex for that. I hate living in a culture that doesn’t seem to realize people like me exist.
I find it interesting that that 10-15 year mark might also coincide with perimenopause, when hormones are beginning to change our bodies. Hmmm.
Thank you once again for this freeing message!
It would also be worth doing an episode on Christian women who waited for their wedding night and then found out it was her husband who did not really want sex or couldn't have sex.
Or also marriages where sex is good until it isn't, because he either does not want to anymore or cannot for medical reasons.
I hear more and more stories about this.
agree. I think the focus on women feeling obliged is because that is an actively taught issue in so many places, so needs a loud voice to shout down those who create damage.
But any mismatch in desire, or performance is also something we should not be afraid of talking about. If we see sex as essentially leading to his climax inside her then yes impotence or other medical matters can create a barrier. However if we see it as deep physical intimacy then he could meet her needs without his own climax. Not wanting as in low interest or asexual is its own matter.
It can be pretty disheartening to be part of one of those relationships in the 10%, or even 1%, where none of the advice applies. Struggle regularly trying to find anything to address the issues we have, but can't find anything and just start feeling more and more hopeless over time. To be honest, as a guy who deeply cares about my wife, and devotes all of my attention to trying to serve her needs when she's willing, but still almost never happens, it feels pretty crappy for 90% of the advice to be "the guy is being a jerk who doesn't care about taking care of his wife" :(
Note, I would NEVER take this to mean that she is obligated. I just struggle with figuring out how to handle going through dealing with needs and such. It kind of feels like the advice for guys in a marriage where there isn't something they're doing that's causing the problem is "Just suck it up, guess you're stuck with a need that will never be met, your problem".
Hi Matt! I get that. The 10% problem doesn't always mean you're doing something wrong. It could be sexual trauma in her background that needs to be dealt with. It could be horrible messaging that she grew up with that makes sex feel depersonalizing and shaming (please have her read The Great Sex Rescue for that!). It could be that she's just exhausted. The key is to get to the root, because women were created to be sexual too. If that's been turned off for your wife, I hope you can figure out why.
Sheila of course has an excellent reply! I encourage you to consider marriage therapy for this, as well as you and your wife each having personal therapists.
It's something you can't do on your own, you need to work on this together. If one or both of you aren't satisfied with your sexual life as a couple, both of you have responsibility to work on finding possible solutions and then working through them. Good communication is key
Most women work outside the home, then come home to work their next job- cooking meals, helping with kids' homework, doing laundry, cleaning up after everyone, getting the kids ready for bed, preparing for the next day's work, etc. ...if the husband spends all that time watching TV and then expects her to have boundless energy for him, it's just not humanly possible for her to do everything. Women are natural servants and natural caregivers, but husbands and wives need to work as a TEAM.
@@SheilaWrayGregoire Yeah, we're both seeing our own therapists and a couple's therapist and making slow but steady progress. My question is more figuring out how to handle my own side of things while we work on it, under the expectation that despite being married that I'm not expecting enough progress in the therapy to find any relief from the urges or satisfaction of those needs from the marriage bed for at least months. It gets pretty depressing... and she is perceptive enough to pick up on it when I do get down over the situation, which just gets her depressed and increases her anxiety. Which increases my anxiety and depression because I want to support her in her healing and it feels like a great moral failing on my part that I have these feelings and can't sufficiently control my emotional expression of them. Which leads to a whole cycle of depression and angst.
Yeah, this is probably all well outside the realm of the sort of stuff you can deal with, I suppose I'm just depressed/frustrated and needed to vent :(
Can or does emotional, verbal, psychological abuse, & betrayal be a cause of painful $€×? I have gotten threats that if I don't put out, the relationship is over. It's a ton of pressure after the yelling, threats, and bullying with no interest on his part to act like and be a gentleman.
Sweet friend, he is abusive and you need to leave!!!
Yes, Sheila’s research finds that can definitely cause pain.
Please do not stay with this man. He is not healthy or safe.
Please, please try to record these threats - and *secretly* if its legal in your state/province. Please.
Just joined your Patreon, but I don’t have Facebook.
Do you post on instagram?
Thank you both for all you do!!
I wanted to have sex all the time until I discovered my husband was watching porn. At one point I wasn’t able to have sex just had a baby, was in a car accident… eventually we didn’t have a good marriage and I was mentally exhausted from being the primary caregiver for our kids, making sure all the bills got paid. You name it, I did it. And worked a full time job in law enforcement and was working towards my degree. I didn’t want to have sex because I was simply exhausted. And yeah, I don’t know how many times I’ve been told just have sex. He needs it! So glad I found this video
26:26 This feels like such a "WELL DUH!!!" moment because um, of COURSE???!! Any healthy & mature female adult would agree so it makes me so confused when the alternative is presented as a "fact". It just doesn't make sense!!!!
'Any healthy & mature female adult' would agree that women want sex. Okay as an asexual woman I am happy to agree that many women, the majority, want sex. But some of us (and some men too) just don't. No trauma just how I am/or not wired
Sure we don't "need" sex, but as a social species we do need companionship. As a single person who is socially isolated having a pleasant conversation with a female greatly makes me feel better. My primary interaction with the women is employees in the doctors office and restaurants and cashiers. Strip clubs are too degenerate, I wish I could pay a woman to do something wholesome such as go hiking or canoeing.
Hey ladies, I’m a guy and I enjoy your content. Can you do a podcast on non-virgin women marrying virgin men? This is something that I’ve been thinking a lot about lately. I’m a virgin myself. Over 30% of young men in the United States are virgins while most women are not. The same applies globally. An increasing number of men are adult virgins while adult women virgins are at an all time low. I don’t care if my future wife is a non-virgin, taking her virginity isn’t a priority for me. I’m asking because most women (Christian women included) do not want to marry a virgin man, especially if she has had sex. Most women don’t want to teach a man how to have sex. That’s just how it is.
There’s very few couples I’ve seen - online and irl - where the the man is a virgin and the woman is not. I want to hear your take on this topic and any advice for a virgin guy with a non virgin girl. Thanks.
I wonder how much of this dynamic (if actually a trend) is tied to the defensiveness men almost universally have - sometimes a pretty intense, not-rarely punishing defensiveness. Esp, *especially* defensive in bed. You might be sweet and respectful, but so many women have been punished by masculine defensiveness that they want to avoid fraught situations. AND there is a real fear that he does have sexual experiences, but attached to p*rn. Men who "learn" via that habit tend to be cruel in bed, in the mix. *If* my guess is on-mark, this is a problem that has to be fixed w men, by men. Men need to work on their egos (as a group & individually) & defensiveness. And avoid p*rn. Trust comes separately and down the line.
I married a virgin when I wasn’t one. It was frustrating for me, not because of his inexperience but because of how ashamed I was to talk about my sexual needs and wants and how badly purity culture had messed with the both of us. It was so hard to verbalize what I wanted and still is, 10 years and 5 kids in because of the extreme shame surrounding female sexual pleasure. For women from these backgrounds it could be easier to try to find an experienced man than to try to break that mental conditioning, but for me personally, I was more afraid of marrying a virgin, because to me it was something that he could hold over me and shame me with. That he had come into the marriage a virgin and I, the woman, who was supposed to be more modest and virtuous, hadn’t. It created a potential power dynamic that terrified me.
This is maybe a tangent, but what's up with the statistic that young women are so much less likely to be virgins then young men? Who are they losing their virginity to, if not young men? Is this higher number speaking to girls having lost it through abuse by a family member, or sex trafficking?
It never mattered to me if a man was a virgin or not. I'd prefer that to a promiscuous one, which many men are today.
@@user-qp2qe5gf9b Why is it important to generalize what women want? Shouldn't they be allowed to have personal preference? I'm not sure I follow the implication.
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Would you ever consider interviewing Karen from the happy wife School.
That book is still extremely focused on pleasing a man like he's a good king, before asking him to acknowledge your own needs. So while it was one of the only books I read, that made marriage look survivable, it's still wrong. She focuses on filling up the husbands needs like he's an immature child, before approaching the idea of conversation, let alone a hard one.
I'd think she should be interested in learning more from Sheila than the other way round. (She does at least acknowledge that libidos can swing the opposite way of the norm. That was huge back in the day. But is it really asking for much?)
Yikes. I’ve listened to two of her videos-one downplaying the existence of trauma, which is quite contrary to the book Sheila is promoting. She & Sheila have dramatically different approaches. One from a place of research…the other apparently pulled from her nether regions. I believe Rebecca has told us what you get when you pull things out of your…