When I speak at marriage events, I always give people the opportunity to ask anonymous questions about sex.
Usually there is a question that reflects the struggle a wife is having with reaching orgasm, yet she doesn’t want her husband to feel bad that he isn’t able to make her have an orgasm.
Maybe she fakes it to protect his ego. Or maybe she doesn’t, and they struggle through awkward silence.
Either way, they aren’t on the same page about pleasure, possibly even tiptoeing around the struggle. But they never really address it, and as such, they set in motion this pattern of more sexual frustration and isolation, not less.
To unravel this and weave something better, let’s start with some solid foundation:
As a husband, remember that it is not a sign of your manhood that you bring your wife to climax. I’m not saying you don’t have an innate desire to do this (most men do). I’m simply saying that making yourself solely responsible for her orgasm invites a crazy amount of pressure into your bed.
It’s too much pressure on you. And it’s too much pressure on her to build up your ego and reassure you. This dynamic is not doing your marriage any good.
As a wife, faking orgasm or deciding it’s okay to always go without one also is not doing your marriage any good. And it definitely is not doing your husband any good. There are no heroics in faking orgasm or downplaying your deep desire for one — even if your heart is in the right place.
And I know your heart is in the right place. I get that you are trying to shore up his manhood, and make him feel like a sexual superstar. You love the guy. I get it. But just as he is not solely responsible for your orgasm, you are not solely responsible for him feeling secure in his sexual manhood.
You both have responsibility in climax (your own and your spouse’s).
Do you deeply love each other? I am willing to bet you do. Do you agree that pleasure makes sex better? Of course it does. When all is said and done, sex where both a husband and wife experience pleasure is better than sex without pleasure.
When you get on the same page about all of the above, you’ve set a good foundation.
And that foundation gives you something on which to build! Let’s be builders of fantastic sexual intimacy in marriage! Here’s a great way to go about building:
Show and Tell
Understanding not only what will make you climax, but also what will make that orgasm incredible, means you have to be willing to understand your own body. And you have to be willing to show and tell.
Words like “more” and “yes” and “no” and “not quite” definitely have their place, but you need to expand your verbal repertoire beyond one-word feedback. Challenge yourself to say things like, “I really enjoy it when you run your hand lightly up my thigh” or “it turns me on so much when you play with my nipples” or “it drives me wild when you kiss my neck while firmly stroking my penis.”
You get the idea. Specific words on specific sexual touches.
Sure, this may seem awkward at first, but that’s just because none of us get any practice telling someone how to arouse us. We just don’t. They don’t cover that sort of thing in school, because let’s be honest — that would be a little weird.
So our practice ground for verbally telling each other what is arousing is marriage! Push through the awkwardness and I promise you it will become much easier to talk specifically about sexual touch, positions, needs and desires.
Same goes for SHOWING.
Sometimes the best way to increase your arousal is to actually SHOW your spouse. Take their hand and put it where you want it. Or use your own hand to guide their hand as you both together master a technique — your hand with your spouse’s hand.
Key to show and tell is a posture of love. This isn’t about forcing any particular act or harsh correction as you master different sexual techniques. Sexual intimacy in a marriage is an exclusive playground meant for the two of you alone to explore pleasure and build one another up.
Posture of love, people. Posture of love.
Lower Your Defenses
Within that posture of love, don’t be so easily offended if your spouse is showing you or telling you what they need for arousal. Contrary to what the movies or cover of Cosmo may portray, phenomenal sex is rarely instantaneous and definitely not the result of mind-reading and assumption.
Throw “mind-reading” and “assumption” out of your bag of tricks because they are lousy resources. Intuition and discernment are better avenues, but even those alone are not going to do it.
You and your spouse are going to have to listen without defense and mutually seek to understand what the other finds pleasurable.
Make Your Spouse’s Orgasm Incredible
By this point in the post, you can tell I’m a big fan of arousal and orgasm. If as a married couple you can BOTH find pleasure in your spouse’s orgasm as well as your own, your sexual intimacy will be beyond what you ever could have imagined.
Certainly, I like to climax. I really do. But equally as enjoyable for me is when I can help my husband experience that sensation as well.
Some people may think that because I write and speak on sex, my husband and I have never had to work at making our arousal and sexual connection incredible. But the exact opposite is actually true.
We are much better lovers now because of the effort we’ve put in. We show and tell. We lower our defenses. And we make each other’s orgasm incredible.
What will it take for that to be your reality too?
And for more posts specifically on orgasm, go to my orgasm page. Also check out the post 5 Reasons Faking It is Hurting Your Relationship.
Copyright 2018, Julie Sibert. Intimacy in Marriage Blog. Links may be monetized.
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Great post Julie. Personally I’ve never faked it. But my issue for many years was not wanting orgasm. It wasn’t high on my radar. Actually more often than not it wasn’t on my radar. It wasn’t until I had a huge change in thinking did orgasm become high on my list of desires. Now, being pleasured is equally important to me as pleasuring my hubby. It’s so much better that way.
In nearly 4 decades of marriage, my wife has never experience a true “O”. She has many health issues that have reduced her chances of obtaining climax. But she is okay with this. Her goal is not the “O” but rather experiencing intimacy.
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Such a great post for couple. It’s normal that couple get really intimate in the beginning then sometimes it kinda fades but if there is communication and both makes the effort to make each partner satisfied then its a deal.
I think wanting to give your wife an orgasm is inherent to our nature as men. It’s not easy at all to just tell men that it doesn’t make you less of a man if your wife isn’t receiving pleasure sexually. Also, in almost every article or book or blog I’ve ever read, almost 100% of the woman’s pleasure is placed squarely on the shoulders of her husband. I see so often that men “don’t know how to be a good lover” or men need to “step up” and figure out the techniques to help their wives orgasm. Or of course, make sure you’re able to hold yourself back from orgasm long enough to give your wife all the pleasure she wants.
Now, I’m all for all of that and I think men should do everything to give their wives the absolute best sexual experience possible. But I almost never hear anything similar for women in the other direction and it’s implied that if you aren’t doing all of these things for your wife that you are a bad lover. It’s never implied that a woman can even be a bad lover as long as she lays on her back and willingly has sex at all. I think we need to change how we talk about sex in general if we want to change how men and women think about sex.
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If anyone can relate to this, please respond. I personally have never orgasmed during sex. Oral sex is the only thing that does it, cuz it directly stimulates the pleasure spot. However, we use condoms as protection during sex. And this could be part of the problem, and it just dawned on me. A week ago, we tried a little without one. And it was so much better for both of us. There’s a chance I could orgasm when we don’t use one. It also made me realize that a condom feels scratchy almost. I also didn’t feel any pain when he first entered without using one. A condom makes me feel a little pain. There’s proof that God designed it to be done in the raw. Sadly, we’ll probably continue to use condoms. I don’t believe in taking pills.
Hmmm I’ve experienced having issues with orgasm. My only way in 12 years of marriage is for us to use the vibrator for clitoral stimulation for me to climax… we’ve tried all kinds of manual stimulation for the clitoris during sex but the vibrator is the only thing that gets me to the mountain top. I would love to not “need” the vibrator for climaxing
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