Ian Kerner is a licensed marriage and family therapist, author and CNN contributor on gender and relationships. His latest book is a guide for couples.
Almost every day I meet couples in long-term relationships and lament the loss of missing the early days of great sex.
“What’s wrong?” They ask each other and me. “How do you start having great sex again?”
For some, searching for “great” sex is a reason to cheat, open a marriage, or even divorce. But before taking drastic steps to pursue great sex, I always beg couples to reconstruct their “sexuality” and instead seek “sufficient sex.”
Originally coined by sex therapists Michael Metz and Barry McCarthy, the term encourages couples to pursue positive and realistic meanings in their intimate lives. In other words, just because you can’t go back to the early days of hot and heavy, doesn’t mean you can’t have a good sex life 2.0, if not the same as version 1.0.
“We are a great source of research and research into the world,” said Justin Lee Miller, a senior research fellow at the Kinsey Institute at Indiana University. “But good sex is fun and satisfying sex without the expectation or demand that it will be perfect every time, as it is rarely perfect. It’s a way to get closer to sex with realistic expectations.”
As a couple, life is filled with plenty of stressors, sex should not be an additional source of pressure. Rebecca Sokol, a sex therapist based in New York, adds that some people often have “misconceptions about what makes sex so great.” “They’re going to work hard on this amazing sex idea rather than getting pleasure from the sex that’s in front of them,” Sokol said. “We often need to learn what we bring from films and porn, and instead embrace and enjoy what real sex looks like. ”
Here’s what you need to know about good sex:
Predictable sex is the best. why? You can be more comfortable, relaxed and enjoy yourself. One way to keep things predictable? Add sex to your calendar.
“We know that many benefits of a healthy sex life (personal satisfaction, a greater sense of life in a relationship) start when couples have more meaning when couples have sex once a week to encourage couples who have sex.
Sex schedules don’t make it sexy, but it’s more likely that it will happen.
“To prioritize calendar intimacy, as we plan what’s most important, helps prevent it from falling to the bottom of the to-do list. Expectations can also build excitement,” noted Dr. Rachel Needle, a community member at the Modern Sexual Therapy Institute in Florida.
Small acts of affection, such as holding hands, checking in with each other, sharing laughs, nurture an overall connection that promotes sexual desire, Needle told me. She suggested encouraging intimacy and relaxation during your scheduled rendezvous by organizing your bedroom, lighting candles, playing soft music, and checking in for yourself how you feel.
Communication is important and it’s not just about having fun. Great communication with your partner before, during and after sex is important.
“Communicate in advance about your desires and needs, communicate about how you feel good and what you don’t care,” Lehmiller said.
You can also create a “sexy time menu” and place anything that brings fulfillment and joy to you and your partner, giving you a fun spin on your sex talk. You can then select from the menu to select it. I know that no matter what I do, I will leave my fulfilled experience.
Good sex is related not only to the body but also to the brain
It’s true: the brain is truly our biggest sex organ – and foreplay begins in the mind. Share fantasy with your partner, read erotica with each other, and watch ethical porn together. You get ideas.
“Couples who have a lot of sex use their imagination to fantasize and otherwise maintain erotic perspectives during sex,” Sokol said. “They learn to eroticize their partners and themselves at the moment, so they can move into an erotic state.”
“The only biggest complaint for older people about sex life is that ‘old ways don’t work anymore,'” Lehmiller said. “What are the fun and possible changes over time? But that doesn’t mean that sex has to get that good.”
That doesn’t mean you have to calm down. Instead of continuing to get closer to sex as you did when you were younger, start adapting sex to a place in your life. If you are creative, ambitious and open to exploring, sex can become more and more in your senior year, especially if you are already used to your partner. Learn what you find fun and ask what you want.
When you remove expectations about what sex should be, you can turn it into what you want. “Gender” does not need to be synonymous with “sex.” Whatever the shape, adequate sex is based on pleasure, not performance.
“If joy is the goal of a sexual encounter, performance anxiety tends to decrease and the chances of playfulness increase,” Dillon said. “Try to get closer to intimacy with the idea of, ‘Are you enjoying this now?’ “How about?” As long as you both enjoy this experience, you’ve had quite a bit of sex. ”
So the next time you worry about your sex life getting old or not being able to accommodate the early days of your relationship, stop focusing on what sex isn’t and start thinking about what it is. It makes it great.
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