Sex Within Marriage Podcast : Exploring Married Sexuality from a Christian Perspective

SWM 125 - Rethinking Duty Sex. Check out the blog post here for more details and links.

I've had a lot of conversations with couples as well as husbands and wives individually lately about what often gets called "duty sex" or "pity sex." For those who don't know, duty/pity sex is when one spouse gives in to sex, not because they desire it themselves, but because their spouse does. They might have sex for many reasons, including feeling obligated, pressured, guilty, to keep the peace or to "get them off their back."

The problem is that these negative reasons are often the only ones considered, and so any situation in which one spouse wants sex and the other agrees to it without having an internal desire of their own is seen as unfavourable.

But there are some excellent reasons to have what's commonly considered "duty sex" or "pity sex," and often, the conflicts I see in marriages are not that it's because of those reasons I mentioned above but instead about something positive and loving.

So, in this podcast episode, we're going to talk about reframing duty sex in those situations.

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Lastly, if you like our podcast, click here to give us a rating, and leave us a review. They help others know this is a good resource to help with their marriage. You managed to find us, help someone else do the same and receive the same benefits to their relationship.

SWM 124 - My daughter's speech - A vaccine against the epidemic of transgenderism. Check out the blog post here for more details and links.

Today I've got something a bit different than the usual fare. Last year, for our 100th episode, I had my eldest daughter present her 4H speech as I felt it fit the scope of this blog. This year, she wrote a part 2. She won at her local club, and placed second at districts. So, we thought we'd record a version for the podcast again. Rather than give away any of the speech, I'll just let you read it. If you do want to go back you can read the first speech here.

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If you'd like to discuss the questions as they come in, consider joining our private forum.

Thank you to all our faithful supporters!

If you'd like to support our ministry and see it grow, check out our support page for more info.  Even $5/month makes a difference.

Lastly, if you like our podcast, click here to give us a rating, and leave us a review. They help others know this is a good resource to help with their marriage. You managed to find us, help someone else do the same and receive the same benefits to their relationship.

January and February 2023 Questions from our anonymous Have A Question page.  Check out the show notes here for more details and links.

In this episode, we are tackling the subjects:

• The monthly masturbation challenge
• How do I make anal sex enjoyable for her?
• Periods and vacations and sex
• Aging and orgasm struggles
• How do I know if I’m in right?
• Does fantasizing about my husband make it a shared experience?
• Condoms for handjobs
• Resources for newlywed virgins

Here are the links I mentioned during the podcast:

• FullyLiving.com Marital Mastery Virtual Webinar
• Becoming more sexually engaged Webinar (for wives)
• Is it okay to engage in pegging in marriage?
• Do Christians have sex during their period?
• Can you have sex during your period?
• Christians, anal sex and anal play
• The DivaCup and why I love it (by my wife Christina)
• Our Sexploration List
• The Limon by MinnaLife (sex toy - bullet, rumbly and quiet - on a rediculous sale and the last of their stock)
• SWM 082
• SWM 085
• Intended for pleasure - Ed and Gaye Wheat (book)
• Married Sex - Gary Thomas and Debra Fileta (book)
• Book reviews I've done

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If you'd like to discuss the questions as they come in, consider joining our private forum.

Thank you to all our faithful champions!

If you'd like to support our ministry and see it grow, check out our support page for more info.  Even $5/month makes a difference!

Lastly, if you like our podcast, click here to give us a rating, and leave us a review.  They help others know this is a good resource to help with their marriage.  You managed to find us, help someone else do the same and receive the same benefits to their relationship.

SWM 122 - How to make your spouse more attractive to you. Check out the blog post here for more details and links.

If you look online, you can find tons of videos, articles, podcasts, products and more about how to make yourself more attractive to your spouse or potential partners. I mean, it's everywhere. You can also find resources to help you make your spouse more attractive by changing them. What you don't see much of, though, are resources to help you change your mindset to make them seem more attractive to you without changing them.

We all know the phrase "beauty is in the eye of the beholder," but rarely, if ever, is it used to recognize that you, as the beholder, can change what you're attracted to.

Upcoming Events:

• Marriage Mastery Virtual Summit - I'm speaking at 3pm EST on March 9th, 2024 about why you should have a varied sexual repertoire
• Becoming more sexually engaged webinar - for Christian wives

Resources:

• 37 Questions for spouses to ask each other about sex
• Our Sexploration List - Sample

Follow us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter

If you'd like to discuss the questions as they come in, consider joining our private forum.

Thank you to all our faithful supporters!

If you'd like to support our ministry and see it grow, check out our support page for more info.  Even $5/month makes a difference.

Lastly, if you like our podcast, click here to give us a rating, and leave us a review. They help others know this is a good resource to help with their marriage. You managed to find us, help someone else do the same and receive the same benefits to their relationship.

SWM 121 - Why marriage should be hard work. Check out the blog post here for more details and links.

I made a post on social media some time ago saying, “Marriage is hard, divorce is hard, choose your hard,” and someone asked me if I then disagreed with some other bloggers and podcasters who say that marriage is and should be easy.  This post expands on what I wrote in response to that question.

There is a trend these days to water down Christianity and make it easy.  In the times of the early church, being a Christian meant persecution, possibly even death, and they still willingly took on that challenge.  These days, people want Christianity to be comfortable and easy. We see many churches that are more social clubs than ministries, many pastors who are eloquent speakers but not doers of the faith, and many teachers who scratch those itching ears by telling you that being a Christian should be easy and comfortable.

For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables. But you be watchful in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry. 2 Timothy 4:3-5 (NKJV)

We see some of this in the prosperity gospel, but also elements of it bleeding into mainstream Christianity. Even if they claim to reject the prosperity gospel on the surface, aspects of it still infect their teaching.

In particular, I see this in the teaching about marriage.  Some few are teaching that marriage is and should be easy.  So, in this post, we’re going to tackle this false teaching and explore why it’s false and what that hard work is so that you can have a fantastic marriage, not because it’s easy, but because the work is worth it.

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If you'd like to discuss the questions as they come in, consider joining our private forum.

Thank you to all our faithful supporters!

If you'd like to support our ministry and see it grow, check out our support page for more info.  Even $5/month makes a difference.

Lastly, if you like our podcast, click here to give us a rating, and leave us a review. They help others know this is a good resource to help with their marriage. You managed to find us, help someone else do the same and receive the same benefits to their relationship.

SWM 120 - How you may be making your birth control methods ineffective. Check out the blog post here for more details and links.

A few years ago, I was talking to a client during a coaching call, and we got off on a bit of a tangent about condom use. I explained a few ways that people tend to lower the protection of condoms when they use them. He was, well, shocked because he'd done many of them and had no idea that every time he did that, he was increasing the chance of conception.

And so, I've had this post idea on the back burner for quite a while until last week, when I mentioned in response to an anonymous question that if you don't want kids, you shouldn't have sex because even condoms and birth control are not perfectly effective when used correctly - and most people don't know they're not using them correctly.

When I posted that, one of our supporters asked if I could write that post, so here we go, because, well, my supporters do so much for me, I'm happy to help them out.

In this post, I'm only talking about the birth control effects, not the effect this could have on STDs/STIs. I'm also not going to address every birth control method, just the three I hear about the most. I’m also not going to be discussing natural family planning, but that is, at best, a delay method, not a method of birth control.

So, here are things you may be doing to mess up your birth control plans.

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If you'd like to discuss the questions as they come in, consider joining our private forum.

Thank you to all our faithful supporters!

If you'd like to support our ministry and see it grow, check out our support page for more info.  Even $5/month makes a difference.

Lastly, if you like our podcast, click here to give us a rating, and leave us a review. They help others know this is a good resource to help with their marriage. You managed to find us, help someone else do the same and receive the same benefits to their relationship.

November and December 2023 Questions from our anonymous Have A Question page.  Check out the show notes here for more details and links.

In this episode, we are tackling the subjects:

• How do you use a vibrator?
• Is roleplaying marriage a sin?
• Will a dildo make me unsatisfied with my husband?
• Wife makes excuses about everything
• When to start talking to your kids about sex?
• Wife caught me watching porn
• Is masturbation without porn a sin?

Here are the links I mentioned during the podcast:

• Introduction to Talking Dirty
• Marriage Coaching
• Why masturbation is a problem whether you're married or single

Follow us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter

If you'd like to discuss the questions as they come in, consider joining our private forum.

Thank you to all our faithful champions!

If you'd like to support our ministry and see it grow, check out our support page for more info.  Even $5/month makes a difference!

Lastly, if you like our podcast, click here to give us a rating, and leave us a review.  They help others know this is a good resource to help with their marriage.  You managed to find us, help someone else do the same and receive the same benefits to their relationship.

In sickness and in health. Check out the show notes here for more details and links.

The traditional wedding vows go something like "I take you to be my wife/husband, and I do promise and covenant, before God and these witnesses, to be your loving and faithful husband/wife in plenty and in want, in joy and in sorrow, in sickness and in health, as long as we both shall live."

Unfortunately, I don't remember my wedding vows. I remember picking some. I remember memorizing them. I remember reciting them, from memory, during the wedding, despite having the flu and a fever. But nearly 23 years later, I don't remember what they were.

I'm sure they contained something like "in sickness and in health," though.

This past month, we got to test those vows. For those who are on our mailing list, you know I've been dealing with a pinched nerve in my back, which has left my one leg nearly useless and in a lot of pain. It's been about a month now, and I am, just today, starting to walk sometimes without a limp, and I just started driving again. I still can't walk far - my leg gets sore and tired after only a couple of minutes of being on it, but the pain is down to achy instead of "I want to cut my leg off." So, I'm making progress.

But the last month has been challenging.

For myself, well, it's been painful - my nerves are short-circuited, so it hurts in varying degrees randomly, the muscles cramp randomly, and part of my leg is numb.

SWM 117 - Why do I want sex when I'm sick? Check out the blog post here for more details and links.

Well, it’s winter here, which means cold and flu season.  So, of course, the last couple of weeks, it’s been rolling through our family of 7.  Christina and I were the last to get it, and it seemed I got it worse than her.  She complained about being sick but still working out multiple times daily (playing Supernatural on the VR - in case any others are fans).  For me, I was barely making it through my desk job and not making it some days.

But at night, we’d crawl into bed, and I was still interested in sex, I think more than usual even - her, not at all.  That made me wonder - what is it about being sick that makes me want sex more?

Unfortunately, my head was too fuzzy to research or write an article; here we are, a week later, and I’m ready to tackle it.  So, let’s dig into being sick and sex and why some may want sex when they’re sick, and even more so when they’re sick.

Follow us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter

If you'd like to discuss the questions as they come in, consider joining our private forum.

Thank you to all our faithful supporters!

If you'd like to support our ministry and see it grow, check out our support page for more info.  Even $5/month makes a difference.

Lastly, if you like our podcast, click here to give us a rating, and leave us a review. They help others know this is a good resource to help with their marriage. You managed to find us, help someone else do the same and receive the same benefits to their relationship.

SWM 116 - Why do I always have to tell my husband how to help? Check out the blog post here for more details and links.

Lately, I've noticed a trend on social media where famous creator couples make videos of the wife telling the husband that visitors are coming over and they need to prepare. In response, the husband goes and starts cleaning out the attic and crawlspace, going through keepsakes, and performing other tasks that do little to achieve the intended goal of getting ready for guests.

Of course, they're doing it as a light-hearted joke, but it points to a common conflict in marriages - women often feel they have to ask for the same help repeatedly. Even in the non-hyperbole versions of these videos, the husband typically mows the lawn, cleans the driveway, and fixes issues in the front of the house, such as rewiring a light. In contrast, the wife worries about cleaning the house's interior and preparing food. Invariably, the wife gets upset that he's not helping with what she sees as important tasks.

And in media, be it TV, movies, or social media, they all generally side with the wife.  The joking videos mentioned above always point and laugh at the men. Why is this?  Is it just that men are inept?  Are they blind?  Inconsiderate?

So, here are my ideas of why this happens - which you are welcome to disagree with in the comments.

Interested in our Intimacy Advent Calendar? Check it out here.

Follow us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter

If you'd like to discuss the questions as they come in, consider joining our private forum.

Thank you to all our faithful supporters!

If you'd like to support our ministry and see it grow, check out our support page for more info.  Even $5/month makes a difference.

Lastly, if you like our podcast, click here to give us a rating, and leave us a review. They help others know this is a good resource to help with their marriage. You managed to find us, help someone else do the same and receive the same benefits to their relationship.