Here’s a question that came my way that I think a lot of people will resonate with. My partner (male) and I (female) have mismatched libidos and this has been very hard for both of us because of the cultural garbage that we are fed about the different roles of men and women in sexual […]

Talking about sexually transmitted infections can be tricky. Most of the time, sex educators focus on how to have the conversation before you have sex. Reid Mihalko’s safer sex elevator pitch is a really good format for that: Reid’s Safer Sex Elevator Speech Write down your answers for each and then try it out on […]

I’ve been studying, talking about, and teaching workshops about shame for several years and one of the issues that comes up over and over is whether shame is always bad or not. I’ve been looking for ways to talk about this, since I think that shame does serve some purposes and can help us grow […]

There are a lot of reasons our sexual desires and interests don’t always match up with those of our partners. Changing tastes, medical or mental health challenges, busy work schedules, stress and juggling different demands, and simply having different libidos can make it hard to find a common ground. In both my personal life and […]

Hugo Schwyzer’s latest post on Jezebel, ‘I Suck’: How Guys Use Self-Deprecation Against You, makes a strong case that a lot of men use self-deprecation to avoid stepping up and manipulate women into soothing their shame and anxiety. I think he’s partly right that it’s often a defense mechanism that many men use to dodge […]

I’ve notice something. Or perhaps more accurately, I’ve given words to something I’ve been seeing for a while. There isn’t much room for delight in this world. That seems like a tragedy to me. I think that we’d all be much happier if more of us would give ourselves permission to feel it, to express […]

In the comments on my recent post, The Adaptive Value of Shame, I’ve been going back and forth with one person who’s of the opinion that shame is always detrimental. I disagree, and I want to unpack this a bit. When I say that there can be some value in the experience of shame, I’m […]