[Two Pronged] He wants me to be tighter down there

Rappler’s Life and Style section runs an advice column by couple Jeremy Baer and clinical psychologist Dr Margarita Holmes.

Jeremy has a master’s degree in law from Oxford University. A banker of 37 years who worked in 3 continents, he has been training with Dr Holmes for the last 10 years as co-lecturer and, occasionally, as co-therapist, especially with clients whose financial concerns intrude into their daily lives.

Together, they have written two books: Love Triangles: Understanding the Macho-Mistress Mentality and Imported Love: Filipino-Foreign Liaisons.

Dear Dr Holmes and Mr Baer,

This may seem like a small issue, but I think it is a very important one for spouses, including my husband. 

I need your help. My husband and I have been married for more than 15 years and we have three children.  My husband is a good, hardworking man who you could classify as an OFW because he is out of the country 10 months of the year.

I noticed that with my first two children, we were very sexually active. Now, at 40 years old, he very seldom initiates sex. When he is here on vacation, it takes 3-5 days before he initiates sex. That didn’t used to happen.

Sometimes, he tells me he thinks his sexual ardor is diminishing. I must admit this new behavior is hard to get used to. I know he is faithful and has no other woman as he always reassures me that he doesn’t.  What I noticed, though he didn’t use to mention it, was that he feels I am too loose “down there” so we do things to make me tighter. 

I also noticed that he always watches porn.  

Is this natural, Doc Holmes? Mr Baer? 

Sometimes, when we have sex, I hear him asking me if I f-cked somekne else, if someone else had stretched out my vagina. 

Once, after we made love, I asked him if he could really bear to have another man make love to me.

He told me to forget about what he said, to delete it from my brain. 

It seems he is only satisfied if we use the position where he feels I am tight so he gets satisfied. But why is he like that? I don’t understand. 

Please help.

Ina

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Dear Ina,

Thank you for your email.

Let’s look first at the issue of flagging sexual ardor. It is perfectly natural for your husband (let’s call him Dan) to feel less sexually vigorous than he did 5-10 years ago, just as it is common for couples who have been married for 15 years to engage in sex less often than when they were newly married. This is, of course, a generalization but there is nothing wrong in conforming to the norm.

In your email, you imply that your husband is more comfortable than you are with the current situation which you find “hard to get used to”. If this means you and he have different sexual appetites and/or perhaps different expectations regarding marital sex,  again this is a common occurrence.

In the past it was believed that men typically reached their sexual peak in their 20’s while women reached theirs in their 30’s. More recent studies have questioned this but the indubitable fact remains that a mismatch of sexual ardor during the lifetime of a marriage is quite likely and quite understandable.

All sorts of daily issues and events impact on sex drive and it would actually be totally unrealistic for both partners to expect to maintain a constant interest in sex every day of their lives. 

Watching porn in the Internet era has seemingly become more the norm than the exception. It generally is not problematic unless it becomes excessive and/or the watcher begins to prefer it to ‘the real thing’.

You say Dan “always” watches porn which suggests that it you feel it has become a substitute for sex with you, either because his libido has decreased or because you fear you are too loose to satisfy him.

Looseness is a problem that can be resolved by exercises and/or by surgery (I leave it to Dr Holmes to comment further). However, sexual satisfaction can be achieved by many different routes and vaginal sex is only one of them. You have after all a veritable cornucopia of options – manual, oral, anal etc. -including, if Philip Roth’s Portnoy is to be believed, raw liver though anecdotal evidence seems to favor the more prosaic melon.

It seems that you and Dan need to sit down and have a serious discussion about your individual needs so that you can come up with a mutually satisfying solution to your issues. The sooner you do this, the sooner both of you can start to regain your old intimacy.

All the best,

JAF Baer

 

Dear Ina:

Thank you very much for your letter. As Mr. Baer suggests, perhaps I should first focus on what seems to be the physical, and then touch on the other emotional aspects of your problem that Mr Baer has not yet discussed. 

I will not discuss the physical extensively as search engines are replete with advice on tightening the vagina.  All I wish to add is that, if you really are too loose to provide sufficient friction for intercourse with your husband, then Kegel exercises can help.

However, in addition, let me introduce 3 women who strongly suggest squats in addition to Kegels to help with pelvic floor disorders (“loose vaginas” and sneeze pee—peeing when one coughs, sneezes or laughs—being a common result).

Lisa Gillespie is a Nutritious Movement™ certified Restorative Exercise Specialist with a private practice. She is “passionate about helping women banish ‘sneeze pee’ and learn to move comfortably.

Katy Bowman, MS, a biomechanist by training, is known the world over for her success in reducing pain and solving pelvic floor mysteries.

Ina May Gaskin, midwife and author, who once said “Squat 300 times a day, you’re going to give birth quickly.”

If all these women are right, I daresay you are going to have a vagina that can also crack walnuts.

And now for the emotional part: you worry about whether you are too loose down there and I agree strongly with Mr Baer that communicating face to face, heart to heart is of utmost importance.

One teeny weeny suggestion:

You wrote: “Once, after we made love, I asked him if he could really bear to have another man make love to me.”

I understand completely why you asked him the above in the way you did but the phrase “Can you really bear…” smacks of disbelief and yes, even disapproval and this is not the way to get him to open up to you.

I can only imagine how hurt you must be about the words he used, his porn watching, etc. Added to this pain is your fear that there is something you lack (a tighter vagina). In fact, in the light of all this pain and anxiety, you are to be commended for responding as well as you did. Not every woman could be as gentle as you were.

However, I still suggest as much gentleness as you can still muster when bringing up your sex life because of his asking you to “forget what he said, delete it from your brain.” I suspect he is even more insecure and frightened than you. 

While not trivializing your concerns in any way, women have access to information or at the very least, an awareness of loose vaginas being a problem. It has been written about endlessly in women’s magazines (admittedly sometimes not too credibly) and occasionally in seminars, doctors’ offices and even among good friends. Your poor husband has little information and far less reassurance he can avail of.

My hypothesis is that it is not your “looseness” per se (if indeed you even are) that has caused this change in your sex life.  I think it is more that your husband gets turned on fantasizing about your having sex with another guy. Plus, not just any other guy, but someone who can do it so relentlessly and has an enormous enough penis (apparently much bigger than his) that he has made your vaginal canal noticeably bigger.

The idea of being turned on by such an image can scare anyone who is unaware that fantasies are just that—imagined scenarios that can turn one on but need not be something you want to happen in real life.

In the same way it would be great if you considered the possibility that there may not really be anything wrong with you, it would be just as great for him to realize there is nothing wrong with him for having this fantasy. Neither of you are lacking in anything. 

A superficial suggestion would be to role play if that turns either of you on.

However, it sounds like your concerns are much deeper than the merely physical.  Might I suggest that you first talk several times about your love lives, sexual concerns and where you hope your relationship is going. If you feel you need more than this, perhaps it would be time to go to a professional, be it an ob-gyne, a therapist etc  Please write us again if there is anything we can do for you. 

All the best,

MG Holmes

Need advice from our Two Pronged duo? Email twopronged@rappler.com with subject heading TWO PRONGED. Unfortunately, the volume of correspondence precludes a personal response.

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