Kindness Isn’t Intimacy

Duty Sex Is Killing Your Marriage What Men Misunderstand About Women and Sex (And Vice Versa) Why He Wants to Be Wanted and Respected, Not Accommodated Patterns underneath the arguments couples keep having Why obligation is never being chosen Kindness Isn't Intimacy The Wedding Night Switch that Doesn't Flip Handling Rejection What Bishop's Should Know

 Raw Transcript:

Many married couples don't talk honestly about sex. My guest is Rhonda Far, a Latter-day Saint intimacy and sex expert
who works mostly with high achieving men. She calls the bedroom the canary in the coal mine for the whole marriage. We get into duty sex, rejection, why a man
wants to be wanted more than accommodated and the wedding night switch. It gets a little candid, but it's great information. This episode is brought to you by Go and Do Travel and
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So Rhonda, you work with high achieving men. What is the biggest problem they come to you for?
Well, they come to me because they want more physical intimacy in their marriage usually. And it could be important to
tell you their circumstance or stage of life. They usually come to me as well.
It's often when their youngest children are in high school or entering college.
Sometimes they are just becoming empathy nesters, but they often come to me sensing some urgency in the marriage, a
need for um a shift in the balance of emotional, physical, intimacy, and they can sense something's not quite as
they'd like it to be, but they often don't know exactly why they're coming to me, honestly. So they're just trying to discover what is up. You know, I feel
different. I'm in a different stage of life. Uh maybe I mean obviously especially if they're empty nesters,
it's that's that's a big jump in a big change and it probably shifts the dynamic with the marriage, right? I mean
it's all of a sudden you have 100% focus as far as those around you on your wife and and she the same with you, right?
Yeah. I I said it like this to one of my clients recently. He was talking about stepping away from his business. They were at a point that they could be more
um connected with each other in their goals and how they chose to use their financial um acquisitions. And I said, I
want you to think about this choice and how careful you're being with the way you step away. And then I want you to think about what if you were in a position where your job quit on you and
they just left you one by one to to highlight what's happening to his wife, right? Because he was feeling a little bit of frantic um energy around her like
she's upset and I don't know what to do and I can't make the children be this way or that way to help her. And I said, "Yeah, because her job's quitting on
her. She didn't have this careful arrangement of how she'd like to exit." So, and it's not completely quitting. I want to be fair to that. They're just moving out. Obviously, she's still a
mother and they're still parents, but it's it's hard.
How does uh you know, Gottman finds that there the couples that stay together usually turn toward each other's
uh you know, small bids for attention, right? And that those that stay together usually are more sensitive to that, that
they are they can they can sense a little more a little more conscientious on what their partner needs. uh in in
contrast to those that don't and aren't very conscientious of those things, those couples don't stay stay together as much,
what what is the most common thing that you think men miss in that bid for attention or but what is the most common
thing men miss about what their wives are kind of looking for with that attention?
Ask me again if I don't answer this quite right, but I think one of the things most of my clients fall into and the wives too are very rolebased
relationships. Meaning the men are very oriented toward financial providing provisions. Okay? And they feel like
when they do that, that is the measure if they're being a good father, a good husband. And in some ways it is, right?
In some ways it can be very very good if they're doing that. But I think what they miss is the emotional connection.
Um, you've probably heard that saying, how you do one thing is how you do everything.
It's very tricky for high achieving men especially to go into the office or wherever their career takes them.
And to feel all of that validation and that skill set in seeing a problem, knowing exactly how to fix the problem,
knowing exactly how to hone in on things that aren't working, right? and then come home. Imagine what it feels like to a wife and children to say, "I know
exactly how to see every problem in this home. I know exactly how to quote fix." I'm saying that in quotation marks for those of you who are just listening. Fix everything and I'm going to make sure I
point that out all the time so we can keep this ship running efficiently.
Yeah, we might do that, but we're missing the connection piece because when we're on at work, that end outcome
of productivity is beautiful and it yields a lot of um reward usually. But
in the home, that same skill set often yields a lot of disconnection and to
your point, oversight in the emotional and smaller bids of connection.
So being conscientious, let's say, and looking out for, you know, what your
spouse might need. What? And and again, I mean, I know you you work mostly with men, so I'm asking this from a man's
6 minutesperspective, but what is the difference between a man who's kind and a man who's a pushover?
Right? And how is a wife going to see that difference?
And maybe even if the man doesn't, right?
What what what is what what what where do you Does that ever come up for you?
Does that ever an issue? Is like the respect issue?
Well, the first thing I will say is um more frequently than seeing the issue or the problem, we feel it. And I think
both the husband and the wife usually feel that something's a little disconnected if we can pause. But that's something that I see with the high
achieving men a lot a lot too is they are so work oriented go task focused that it's hard for them to slow down
enough to actually be really present and feel. So that's the first thing. Um, but
7 minutesI also think that when we are in a marriage where we are trying to figure out connection and um we're trying to
figure out how to be kind to use your wording.
Sometimes we can overlook true connection because kindness is and respect even. I think it's a great thing. These things are great, but they
don't really require us to be intimate, right? I can be kind to somebody and say the nice things and offer them nice
things, trips or provisions, right? I can take care of them. But intimacy requires me to be able to know you and
see you and to be able to offer myself as I can know and see myself. And so I just think it's really different.
Kindness and respect are not the same as intimacy. And we feel that gap.
Yeah. Yeah. you kind of sense that what let's say is there one specific habit I mean speaking about both
8 minutesspouses is there one specific habit that you usually recommend that that you see the most amount of change from if you're
recommending something to them yeah and this is not a simple answer but I will answer it to the best of my ability
the more understanding and awareness you can have of yourself the more capable you will be to be seen and validated as
you are. I have a thought and an idea that all of us husbands and wives, we sometimes seek it in different ways, but
what we all want is to be seen and loved as we are. And if I don't know myself well enough to offer that to my spouse
or I don't feel like it's emotionally I'm going to use the word safe, but what I actually mean is it's not a good idea if I reveal my thoughts and feelings to
you and and you're really critical about that or you're quick to try and fix me.
um it's going to be really hard for me to connect or be connected to if I don't know myself well enough to offer it and
if I don't know myself well enough to tolerate the discomfort of you being who you really are even if it's invalidating
to me. So there's a lot of self-awareness and tolerating emotions in this.
So it's not a matter of just saying I'm putting myself in a bubble in my relationship just by myself because that's just saying well I don't want you
to know me. It's internal, more internal. What do I know myself? Because I I think that's the first question. Do you even know yourself
to know what you're going to be able to reveal to someone else? Does that make sense?
Absolutely. I mean, how can I offer myself to my husband if I don't even have the language to put to it? A lot of people will come to me and and tell me
that it's so difficult and I I have a lot of empath empathy, by the way, for these people, but it's so difficult because nobody understands them. And so
that's when we have to do the work. Do you understand yourself? And if you don't, that's ground level zero. That's
10 minutesthe foundation because the more language you can put to something, first of all, the more solid you get in yourself and the less you need that from other people, right?
But then the more capable you are of articulating so somebody else can give their best shot at understanding. And by
the way, I often tell my clients too, like it's like when you have children, somebody could say, "Oh, it's really hard," or "It's really expensive," or
they're going to have emotional issues or relationship issues, and you're like, "Oh, yeah, yeah, no, got it. Check, check, check." But then when you do it
and you experience it, you're like, "Oh." So I often tell my clients, listen, you can do your best to articulate and share yourself and be
intimate in that way, but nobody can fully understand what it's like in your body, with your personality, with your
history, you know. So we got to be be careful and our expectations as well.
So, I remember when my wife and I early on dating ourselves here, uh,
11 minuteswere first married, we had John Gray's book, Men are from Mars and Women are from Venus. And I know some people have moved on from that to some degree, but
it really helped us. It helped us understand each other a little bit more.
And, uh, you know, John Gray sold over 15 million books at this point.
How important is it to understand women for men? And how important is it for women to understand men? Now, obviously,
you have individuals and everybody's a little bit different. But if you can get that generalization of
the sexes down to me, you can open up a lot more communication and understanding just from, okay, I know where maybe she
is coming from or he is coming from here. It's not the way I think. I don't react the same way. I don't have the
same needs or sometimes wants in in in a marriage or in the bedroom, etc. How important is that to understand the opposite sex?
12 minutesWell, I think you're um leaning towards this idea of being able to think about your thinking. So, when my husband thinks very differently than me, my
knee-jerk response might be frustration or hurt or whatever. But if I know that I can pause and evaluate what he said
and why he said it potentially why he said it, you know, and why my response is the way that it is. One of the things
that I like to say is, "Oh, even if it hurts, even if I have a strong response to that, at least I can see that it
makes sense where he's coming from or it makes sense even why my response is what it is." So I think that's hugely
important to be able to have some generalizations. Speaking of that, um this is a big generalization.
Men often measure the health of the marriage based on frequency of and you know compatibility physically with their
physical intimacy. Women often measure the health of the marriage emotionally.
Now that's not entirely true. If you're a woman who's a higher desire for physical intimacy, you're completely normal. I want to be really careful about this. We don't want to make anybody feel defective,
but it is helpful to be able to understand that. But more than generally, I think it's really important to sit down one-on-one and talk to your
partner and ask some really hard questions so you can know each other and yourselves better, like what?
Well, how do you feel most loved? What do you think you see in me that maybe I don't see in myself? and be willing to
consider and um understand the validity of some of those statements and also be
emotionally solid enough to be able to tolerate those feelings and and if you disagree with it to be able to have some conversations. But um I think those two are are really good starters.
Okay. So, one of the things that John Graves talked about was men going into their cave and women wanting to talk
14 minuteswhenever there's a problem. And that is very true for me and my wife. That is my original reaction is that there's a problem. It's like I just kind of want
to exit, right? That's my initial thought is and response is is flee.
Um and hers is no, I need to talk, right? And I think that is the case with a lot of men and a lot of women. How do you reconcile that? How do you bring
that together? Uh, obviously men need to not go in the cave as much, but do women not need to try and talk it out as much
or where's the balance there? Is there a balance?
I saw this meme recent rec recently that said there are those people who need to regulate alone before they can talk and there are those people who need to talk
so they can regulate and feel solid to go on their own and then those two get married. So, I'm not sure if it's
gendered, but but certainly it is very common for the men to need some separation. Um, I think it goes back to
what we were talking about being aware of patterns and dynamics in your relationship because one of the things I
tell my clients often is you're going to maybe um have an argument that repeats over and over about the way you fund
your children's extracurriculars or college. Or maybe your argument over and over is about the physical intimacy. Or maybe it's about religion. I don't know.
But one of the things that I see over and over is it's almost never about the thing you think it's about. It's about
the pattern that we keep repeating underneath, which is what I think you're speaking to. If you're always going in the cave and I'm always so sad and
offended, then I'm not going to figure out these surface level things, right?
cuz you always leave me or I'm too needy or whatever. Sometimes I just tell my clients if we can take that and put it
on a shelf and and figure out our patterns underneath and talk about the pattern then we get to have a completely
different conversation and potentially more productive conversation.
Do you there's a lot and I think there's a lot of validity to this uh but a lot of
psychologists, therapists, etc. and and and social uh sociologists etc. will say
I mean there's been studies on this right where where men want respect more than they want love and that women
want love as the top their top you know desire in their relationship. They want to know that they're loved. Men want to know that they're respected. So for a
man, often times it's, you know, am am I good enough? Do I have what it takes to
be the man? Do I have what it takes uh to lead my family? You know, whatever that might be. And I, you know, often
times for a woman, it's it's am I worthy of your love? Because, you know, sometimes maybe I don't feel worthy of your love based on your actions.
uh how does that play out in the relationship? And and I mean honestly does it does it play out in the bedroom as well?
So I want to be really clear and and stay within my u within my understanding. I hear more about the
desire. Men want to be desired more than loved. So maybe respect is a big part of this too. Um but yeah, it absolutely
plays out in the bedroom. I think um most of us actually, even men included, feel like deep down maybe we're not
lovable on some level. The other thing that I see a lot with my clients, especially as high achieving men, is
they've grown up being taught that their output, right, their productive nature
or their ability to be dutiful is what's going to earn the respect or the desiraability. And so even in their mind
when they are doing the thing to earn the respect or the desiraability or or whatever they think that is synonymous with love sometimes.
And so it really gets a little bit tricky. Again that speaks to the pattern going on underneath the surface level
issues. And and for the women again many of my clients are in marriages that are sort of duty based. And for the women they're giving love right all day. I
think they're more inclined to feel the emotion of love and to be comfortable in that emotion sometimes and express it more overtly and more openly. And it
would make sense when you're offering it in that way that you would have a desire for it to be returned and um to have
your cup filled in that way, so to speak. But again, that's where we have to pause and ask some hard questions and
be willing to um receive feedback that can be invalidating potentially. So these hard questions are they the same as how do I dig down below these
superficial problems and find the patterns?
Yes. And you know they can be some variation of how do you feel most loved by me or when do you feel least loved by
me? Um some variation that you can make them unique to you. But again we have to know ourselves. We have to know
ourselves to be able to ask those questions and to answer those questions.
What do women most misunderstand about men's sexuality?
That's a loaded question. I'll do my best to answer it. I am a woman. I work more with men, but I think
I think a man's desire a man's desire for physical intimacy for sex sometimes gets
misinterpreted as being used as being seen as just an object.
And I can certainly understand why that happens. And and that might be valid in some cases. I want to be really careful
with the climate of when this podcast is coming out. I want to be really careful.
That could be true. So, I'm not trying to say that that's not true. However, many men, that's when they feel love.
They feel like they're giving love. When that's how they receive love. And for and again,
I want to be careful how I frame this, but for many men, that is the thermostat of the marriage.
Mhm. So, it can feel really personal, especially if the wife is not in the mood, but she's been taught that we need
to manage his feelings or this is our duty. Again, that pattern that we unintentionally co-create can get
really, really unhealthy. And I don't want to blame either side for this.
um if it's okay to take a tiny little exit from your question.
I was recently working with a wife and she grew up in a Latter-day Saint family and was taught, you know, zero sex
before marriage. She really thought there was no thoughts of sex, nothing, trying to really shut all that off. Or her husband was coming into it, you
know, he he hadn't had sex before marriage either, but very excited about it. Maybe a little bit of experimentation.
So when they come into the marriage, he expects it to all flow seamlessly. And she felt so much pressure to make him
happy, so much pressure to keep showing up in that way. And one of the things she shared was, I didn't have time to learn anything.
It went from zero to trying to fulfill his expectations and then to manage his mood as they were in med school and
really working through some very stressful times away from family. It felt like a way to kind of make him happy. They were both complicit in the dynamic, but really missing the mark.
And and as you can imagine, decades of not connecting, not intimate
sex just was how it lived. It seems uh you know
this is always interesting to talk about this in public but uh it seems to me that in many ways sex does end up being
kind of a mirror of your relationship. I mean I look at to some degree I mean whether it's the mood of my wife or it's
sex playing out it's there is a thermostat to that I think for a guy especially because for a woman more than
a guy typically there there is an emotional
on-ramp before sex much more so than with men right and so if things aren't right then
that sex is going to be right that as compared to okay this is good we're you know things are taken
care of but if there's a pattern if there's something that's always been wrong there's something underlying this that is going to be more difficult I
23 minutesthink for a woman to engage in the way you would want her to engage because because this has not been solved
and it's just still there and there's resentment and there's other issues that are at play so for me I have learned that okay that's whether it's sex or
whether it's my wife's mood. Not that that, you know, it doesn't mean that I'm always the problem, but it means there's
a problem and and it becomes a kind of a mirror to okay, how am I doing or how is the relationship doing that fall in line with things?
Yeah. One of the ways I describe it is the physical act of sex is usually just the byproduct
of a culmination of other things. One of my mentors just says it's the canary in the coal mine, right? It's not the coal mine, but it is the canary letting you
know something's wrong. Um, one of the things that might be helpful to think about for the listeners is for our
nervous system to be able to receive and and not just sex, but knowledge, food,
but also sexual pleasure. We have to be in a regulated state to be in that connected, vulnerable spot and receive.
Obviously, I mean, through um sexual aggression and things, you can do the act without being regulated, right? Like
that happens. But to be in a really connected state, you want to be in that parasympathetic nervous system state
there. Um and when we are in duty mode, trying to manage somebody else's emotions, that's survival, right? When
we are in that have to because that's what we're supposed to do. That's not
the state of pleasure. This is a little bit graphic, so you can edit this out if you need to, but um one of my clients
were was talking about the early stages of his marriage and he's like, I just didn't know. I just thought it would
seamlessly work. And his wife and he and I were kind of talking about it and she's describing it like I want you to imagine if you did not want to do
something like whatever it might be that you had to lie down in the most vulnerable position,
the most exposed position and literally let somebody else enter your body. Like imagine
what that would be like. He was horrified. He cried.
a decade of not understanding what that was like. Now, again, back to
um this being the byproduct, the canary in the coal mine. If we're in that state and we don't feel safe for whatever reason, and and by the way, I want to be
fair. Some people come into a marriage where there has been sexual abuse that's not your fault, right? And and your partner might still feel very
disregulated and have to relearn safety in that way. Um, but if we can find that emotional safety, that intimate
connection that is more loving, it only stands to benefit both. Because if we go back to if a man really wants
to be desired more than accommodated, which I think is almost always the case.
It's very hard for a man or woman to be desired when their partner feels like they have to do something, right? That's not desire. That is accommodation.
So for us to be able to get to that connection point, it really changes.
What do men most misunderstand about how a woman experiences sex and arousal?
Well, you may have heard this. It's not my my phrase, but um men are microwaves, women are crockpots. Have you heard that?
Yes.
Right. It's like super quick. So there was a man, he's like, "You don't understand. You can go to the store and look at cantaloupes for crying out loud and be like, "Oh, women bodies, you
know." Um, I think there are a couple things. One of the things is it's a slower progression for most women. Not always. I want to be really careful
here, but it is usually a slower progression, meaning the safety, right?
The the connection throughout the day, being able to um put some of the burdens and things going on in her mind at ease.
It is a slow progression, which I think is really annoying sometimes for husbands. Why can't it just be hot, quick, spontaneous? And sometimes it can be, right? Want to be careful about
that. So that's one thing. But the other thing is I think when a woman is not in a place where she can receive sexually,
sometimes it's not personal to the male, right? Sometimes it's not personal. And as we said before, many many of my
clients anyway, I'll just speak for the people I work with right now. um they are measuring the health of the marriage through that frequency that sometimes it really has nothing to do with them.
Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't.
And that's where we have to use the communication, right? And the connection and and the knowability
does is it at least a rule most of the time, maybe all the time, I don't know, but if if the relationship is better,
the sex is better. H that's a good question. Let me think about that for a moment. The first thing
that comes to my mind is if there's a reason for either partner to have a negative association with sex prior to
the marriage that has nothing to do with the partner they're with. I would say that's a big exception that that's not necessarily the case because we could have formed that earlier in life.
I do think often if the emotional connection is there, there's a better chance that you're going to feel more
safety in that parasympathetic state when you come together sexually. And so
I do think there is probably um not always but a high correlation with
emotional connection and safety. And then if we feel safe, I mean if we can go, this is David Snarsh's work, but if
we can go to sex being a place of play, exploration, fun, like literally a way to give and receive love.
That's where most couples do feel desired. They do feel connected.
I I've talked about that with people before and they're like, "What are you talking about? Give and receive love, explore together, play." like they'll
often say that's never even crossed my mind to think about approaching it that way.
Speaking of uh he says that the low desired partner controls sex,
right? So how does the higher desired spouse stop
um being held hostage without being a bully about it?
This is a tricky dynamic and maybe more than we can tackle in a couple of minutes here, but this nods to the pursuer and the retreat relationship.
Meaning the more you pursue, you think about animals in the wild, even when you pursue something, what's it going to do?
Run faster, further away, right? And this is the higher desire, lower depart um lower desire partner dynamic.
It's not fun. It's a really tricky place to be in. But sometimes we have to pause because the more we chase, the more we pursue,
the further they go. So the pausing is where we get present with where we are.
We have those hard conversations. We take that hard look at ourselves. Is there something about me that truly is not desirable right now? Man, that's
hard to look at. Is there something about me that is valid and legitimate that I want to bring to my partner maybe
in a more mature way? Right? Because this is not the question you asked at all, but I think it's helpful to marriage. We can tell our partner everything and really um just let loose.
I used to do this, by the way, self-disclosure early in my relationship. And I thought I was such a great communicator because I would say everything how it was. Or to your point,
we can go in our cave and avoid and um you know, well, I'm not saying all the things, so we might think we're the the
better partner that way, but really neither of those are super emotionally mature, right? Unbridled self-expression
on the one end might be telling everything, but in a really immature way, right? And completely closing off and avoiding on the other end. What we
want to do is find that middle and elevate. Can I be aware of myself, regulate, and then communicate that
honestly and kindly? So I don't remember why I took that detour but um I do think
the pursuer or the one who is fleeing right avoidant if either of us can pause
and get comfortable being present and asking the hard questions in our dynamic and in that pattern to go back to that language noticing the pattern and
32 minutesgetting help with that that is the place where we have a chance to pause and choose something different but it's hard to be here. The pursuer often gets very
antsy when they stop pursuing. It's tricky.
You brought up duty. What What is duty sex and what does it do to a marriage over time?
So, duty sex is exactly like it sounds.
Um I think most of your audience probably understands like doing things in a dutiful way, whether that's
religious duties, whether that's duties within the home, right? We can do that with love sometimes, right? I It's It's
not always terrible and bad. The problem is with duty sex is we're doing it because it's our duty. Our partner is
rarely going to feel chosen and desired, which is really what most of us want. So
we can fulfill the act of sex without feeling connected, without feeling that
chosen sense that we're after, right? Without feeling seen. So duty sex is doing it because we're supposed to and sometimes
because we have to and like I mentioned earlier, sometimes to manage their mood so they won't be angry and poutdy for three days, right? Or sometimes it's not
even about their mood. It's because our mother's mother told us that that's what we needed to do when we got married.
This is hopefully a dying um rhetoric that anyway hopefully it's we're leaving that but some many of my clients were
told this is what you do. You just do it.
Our partner rarely feels desired and we rarely feel fulfilled either of us.
Okay. What are the top two or three complaints that a man brings about their wives sexually?
Number one, frequency.
I think most men think that it's not enough. Mhm.
Um, number two, I think there that mismatch of do I really need it? This is
um I don't want to say an argument, but it's a debate I hear a lot in my world.
Do men really need sex or do they just want it? Right? Need versus desire. Um, so I think that's a really hard one.
And then this third one is going to seem a little unfair to my client, but I'm going to say it. Um, and I don't think it's as shallow as it might sound coming
out of my mouth, but I work hard. I fulfill my part of this bargain. Like I do all the things like I provide for this family so well.
Don't I deserve to come home and be wanted? And I don't know if that's a complaint.
I I think it's a mindset that uh some of us fall into. So, this might fit into some of that.
You know, what about rejection? How big of a deal is rejection to a guy or the higher desired spouse, so to
speak. You know, why how big of a deal is the rejection and what does that do?
Can I turn that question back on you for a moment? Being the only man in this conversation because I have thoughts, but just speaking in generally, I
actually would love to hear your thought first if you're willing.
Wow. Uh I thought I was interviewing you. Okay. Well, I I I I would say
you the biggest I think that with anything with a guy, right, with a guy for starting off with asking a girl for a date,
right, that there's always the issue, well, I'm supposed to be the initiator and but but I'm always making I'm always at
that risk. I'm always vulnerable to this because you know even with a asking on a first a girl on a first date it's I I am
as a whole it it's almost like as a whole I am being rejected right it's not just well you don't want to go on a date with me it's more of a
sense of I've been rejected me who I am right and I think it's the same thing even with sex is it's there there is
that sense of as you said I'm not desired I'm not desired. And so that's that's
pretty tough. And so if if and especially if you have a guy that is
has a high sexual drive and he's asking often, then that is
going to play a major role in his life consistently. is if there's often rejection to that, then
you know you you've you you've got a major problem that you're dealing with consistently, maybe for months, years, decades even.
Yeah, absolutely. I want to be clear with your audience. I'm a female and I don't purport to ever fully understand what that's like from a male
37 minutesperspective, which is why I kind of turned it around. I can offer some answers based on what my clients tell me and based on what we coach through. Um,
but I I think you're right. It's so deep within us that rejection that it's not just she doesn't want sex right now. It
feels like a deep rejection of who we are. And for some of my clients, it feels almost intolerable. And to your point, when that goes on over time over
and over and over, what some of my clients have done is try to fully cut off that sexual desire. I've had clients who say they pray daily for that to go
away that they try so hard to not even want it anymore to relieve that pressure
to caretake their spouse and and which I don't think is healthy either. Just like I know men that I know of men that have done that.
Yeah. So just like it's not super healthy for a woman to engage in duty sex all the time. I also don't think it's super healthy for a man to feel
responsible for his wife's emotions and completely cut off his sexuality. I love the men I work with. I am a mother of
all sons. I have only brothers. I love these men. I am not judging and criticizing. And that's why I also want to be fair that as a woman, I don't
fully understand it. And it's so deep that I have seen so much pain, crying, begging God to take these things away.
very deep.
So Jennifer Finlay F has said that a a man needs to be able to handle that rejection when there is a no from his
wife without sulking without withdrawing, right?
Uh and put in context in in the sense that you know at least it's here or there or whatever it might be. Not you know if
it's constant then that's different, right? Yeah. But, uh, is that right? Is that do you think that that's right?
You've got to be able to handle it. I mean, sometimes it's there's got there's probably good reason for for a rejection.
Yeah. And I you may notice this by talking to me.
I struggle with saying right or wrong across the board. That's just a personal issue that I have. Um, but at least I
know this. If you can't tolerate rejection, you're going to have a wife who has no agency. And if she doesn't
have agency and she's under constant pressure, you will never feel desired because it won't be authentically coming
from her choice. We all want to be chosen. So yes, we do. And and women too, right? We have to learn how to
tolerate our emotions. That's a huge part of my practice is teaching people to be present in uncomfortable
situations. That being said, I think you can learn how to have your own back.
That's how I say it anyway. To have your own back while you're tolerating emotions, which might mean, why is this
so hard for me? Do I have language for that? And while I can tolerate the emotion, I can also communicate my experience to you and let you know me
and let you know what it's like in my rejection if I choose to. That's not unbridled self-expression. This sucks
and you always and you never. That's not what I mean. But it could be like, "Wow, when the timing is right anyway, if she's open to it, when you said no, I
understand you had a hard day or you had these things going on." But it felt like my chest collapsed a little bit and a sucker punch to my gut. I'm learning how
to deal with that. But I also want you to know what it's like on my side. Can you tell me what it's like on your side when you know I want sex and you're not
in a place to offer that back to me? Can you tell me what it's like for you? So that's what I mean about knowing
yourself, communication, presence, and what is tolerating emotions.
How many couples actually ask those questions?
Those who have not sought out intentional help, probably few. My clients, a lot of them. So I mean, it's
tricky for sure and it's it's potentially so invalidating. So I want you to know, I know this is hard. I know
this is not the norm, but I also know it's possible because I see it every day.
Being that we're in the age that we're in, what how much of a role does pornography play in this? You you're
discussing these things with men and and that, you know, I don't know if that's a common question for you to bring in because that needs to be addressed if
that's the case. Uh, how how often is that a problem and how does it disrupt things?
Pornography is often a part of my client's lives. Not always, but often.
And I think first of all, it might be helpful to understand um why I think it's so enticing. Number one, I mean, obviously you can choose
anything you want and it's at the touch of a screen or a button, right? So, super enticing. I think number two, it's
a way of feeling sexual without having to be vulnerable and exposed, right?
Like we're not risking rejection when we're pushing a button on a screen.
We're not having to be knowable or completely like open in the most exposed ways, right? So I think it's very
desirable in that way. There is a high chance of pleasure and completion every single time, right? Like we learn that.
So I think it's very enticing that way.
Um, the other thing that I see a lot is we're often just manning our emotions.
It's a quick dopamine hit. Um, when we're stressed, when we're tired, when we're bored, it's just a quick way to go
get that. And so, I think we're also managing the discomfort that you and I were talking about that most of us are
not used to tolerating, right? It's not just rejection, but so many other emotions. So yeah, I think it it's a
often present in my clients lives and and those are some reasons why.
Give us a turnaround story. A man that's come in, he's had problems, sex is a big issue. Give us a success story from someone.
So one of my clients who I'll I'll use the one that I was talking about earlier who they moved away, they were newly married, he expected sex all the time.
She had no idea and it wasn't great for her and she felt all this pressure. Um, when he and I started working together, we started talking about being knowable.
So, everybody wants more sex. They don't want to be more knowable. But to me, that is the type of intimacy that then opens the door for the sexual intimacy.
So, he started talking to his wife about things that he was learning of asking her questions and she was like experiencing emotional whiplash, which
we found out later, right? because I was just working with him in the beginning and she was very uncomfortable. Why are you saying all this? Why are you
addressing you know all these past hurts and all these feelings? Um then she started to learn about being knowable
and letting him be knowable and they don't have a perfect marriage. they have worked through
lots of duty sex patterns and lots of rejection sensitivities and all those
things. Um, and she just shared with me recently that he had been gone on a trip and he came home and and you know tried
to pursue her and she said, "I felt it immediately like you haven't been with the kids and you don't understand." And then the next day she said, "I realized,
oh, like he was making a bid for connection." And so she was able to go in and say, "You know what? When you came home, I was tired. I realized I
didn't understand what you'd been through. You didn't understand what I'd been through. We were trying to get to the physical without connecting." And
she said, "I was able to apologize to him and we were able to connect, but they are consistently not necessarily
not running into speed bumps. I don't think that's quote success. I think it's noticing the speed bumps, being able to
think about your thinking, think about your um knee-jerk responses, and then having the awareness of yourself and
letting your partner be knowable and being able to reeregulate, which I think goes back to Gottman,
right? It's it's not do you fight, it's how does that play out? How do you fight? How do you repair?
Yeah.
So let's say a man has given up on his sex life. Okay.
And maybe there is no solution. I mean that it takes two to tango, right? But
what what's step one for that man? I mean without coming to a therapist right away or or an expert, what what is step one for that guy?
I think step one is asking himself, where is my wife right about me?
What is she seeing in me that maybe isn't desirable and am I willing to look at that?
Maybe even asking her that doesn't mean he has to agree with it. But if we're willing to tolerate the information, the
feedback, to me, that's step one, being able to tolerate the discomfort of that feedback. And to your point, I have seen
many men who were really working hard and it didn't solve everything. Their
wife wasn't able to um fully embrace and choose for whatever reason. But to be
able to accept invalidating feedback and tolerate that discomfort, I think is how you open the door to truth and connection.
All right, let's switch to the women here. What I'll make it very generic. What What
does a woman want from a husband in a relationship?
It's hard because I do feel like sometimes uh we generalize too much. So I want to be careful with this and just say to the women, if this is not your
experience, that's okay. I do think that women want to feel that love and connection emotionally as a general
rule. Meaning, if I'm having a hard day with whatever it is, I want to feel like I can sit beside you and you can tolerate my emotions without trying to
solve them. You can sit beside me and put your arms around me, hold me, say I love you without having to make those feelings go away.
John Eldridge says that a woman wants to be pursued and play make a be have an irreplaceable role in in her relationship.
How do you pursue in a relationship where you've been married for 20 or 30 years? What does that look like?
Can you be more specific in the question? Pursue sexually. Pursue in general? Yeah, I would say sure. sexually.
Well, hopefully you're continuing to learn and evolve. I mean, I've been married how many years? 27 years, almost
30 years. And hopefully you're continuing to evolve, communicate, try new things. And that doesn't have to be
like something crazy acrobatic. I don't mean that, but continuing to communicate and figure out different ways to
communicate. Um, I think in any marriage, no matter how long you've been married, you can continue to notice the
things in your partner that you verbalize. This is something that's so common with my clients. They expect
those feelings that they feel to just be shown in action. And and sometimes that's through sex. Sometimes that's through a new car or a trip or whatever
it might be. I think sometimes it's as easy as verbalizing the thoughts and feelings that you're
having about your partner that are favorable and loving. But I mean, if you keep growing in intimacy, like that
emotional intimacy, it's this is really hard to describe if you haven't experienced it.
But even if the actions look very very similar sexually, the experience is so different. And I have clients time and
time again say, "Oh my gosh, I have never felt that connection." So we we often talk about novelty, too. Right?
That's really exciting to men changing it up and women too, to be fair.
Sometimes the novelty is emotional novelty. When it's different, you can feel it.
It's really hard for me to explain it here, but I think as long as we keep growing and keep being honest and and start verbalizing things and and being
knowable, It really is endless. I mean, that's like saying in your job, you've worked at a job for 30 years. Does it ever feel exciting? Does it ever feel different?
Hopefully. I mean, maybe if you're in a factory worker and you hate your job, it doesn't. But if you're in something that you love, you're going to find ways to
You're going to be different at different levels, you know, every day you show up.
How much of a woman's attraction to her husband? We we've talked a little bit about this. You've talked about the high achieving guy that's working all the time. He feels all the positive feedback
he gets at work and and maybe that changes when he gets home and he just expects well this is what I should be receiving. But how much of a woman's
attraction to her husband is based off of his confidence and direction in life as compared to
all the small thing or let's just say how he treats her normally how that's treated. You know I I don't mean to really contrast that but they're they
are two different things. Mhm. Well, to your point, I think it's really hard to fully tease that apart, but here's what I would say, and this is just based on
my experience. Um, somebody else might have a different experience. I think in the beginning, like what pulls you in, gets your attention initially, that confidence is probably pretty high.
Like, if we had a pie chart here, it would take up a lot of it. That being said, when we're in the intimate
daytoday, my observation is that percentage of attraction goes down. Because while that
does create a sense of safety and trust overall, right, in my financial well-being, my physical well-being, can you keep me safe in a dark alley? Those types of things.
Emotionally, if you don't feel safe with that person, then that's going to go down. So, I don't know if I I articulated that well,
but it's like, can you protect me from the world versus do I need to be protected from you? Does that make sense?
52 minutesYes. That was my next question actually is on safety. How important is that uh that that you're in a self? That
would be mostly with your husband. How important is it that a woman feels safe?
And you know, and from a sexual side, how important is that to be able for for her to be able to be vulnerable, right?
Or playful or whatever it might be if she actually feels safe with you. And
how would a man recognize what that would mean?
Yeah. Well, first of all, I think it's paramount because if we just go back to biology, we we won't even go into the social sciences for a moment. If we just go
back to biology, if you don't feel safe, you're not going to be able to give and receive pleasure. This is even kids that
come from abused homes, they can't learn, right? Because you can't receive that information because you're worried about the threat, not the openness to be
present to retain and receive. So, it's paramount, first of all. And again, I
feel like a broken record in saying this, but how would a man know if his wife doesn't feel that way? you're going to have to ask. You're going to have to
talk about it, right? And that again, I want to be really careful here. It might not even be his fault. I have had clients who the trauma, the lack of
safety was not the husband's doing, right? Sometimes it has been, sometimes it's not. But that's where that
emotional, that communication, that intimacy outside of the bedroom lays the foundation.
Like back to what we said earlier in the conversation, it's the canary in the coal mine, right?
It it's telling us something. When it starts whistling and we don't like the the sound it's making, can we go back and and be honest and knowable
about what's underneath the patterns that we see? So in a religious community and as Latter-day
Saints, for men, but I would say especially for women, how do you help
h how does a woman transition from the modesty talk and the the the you know, no, no, no, no, no, no. and and you're the gatekeeper and all of this to Yes.
Yes. Yes. and you know, flip a switch on your wedding night and and move into a position of now this is the opposite.
Everything's great with this man. I can I can turn that switch. How difficult is that? What can we change in the leadup
to that? both as the woman and the husband. Understanding that most things aren't super quick when it
comes to the emotional states that we're talking about today. Um, I also want to validate the male side of this before I go in to answer your question. I've seen
many men have a lot of trouble flipping that switch. Um, I I think I even shared this story with you before. One of my
clients, one of the saddest uh stories is him talking about how he was told that it would be the most important,
special, most fantastic act of his life to be physically intimate, sexually intimate with his wife. And he was so
looking forward to that. And the ecclesiastical leader at that time said, "You need to keep a few things in mind
though, you know, like uh he was told some old information, I think, but no oral sex and no pornography and all these things."
He said, "First of all, I walk away from that interview before I was even married feeling like a complete failure sexually because he was like, I was really looking forward to one of those things
and had already done the other, you know, and so he comes in with so much shame and and even for him, flipping
that switch was so difficult." But to your point, to the female side, um I I I
think women engage in those thoughts and and pornography, maybe not as much as men do, but they also engage in that as well prior to marriage. And and so I
think similar things, you know, they can come in with similar feelings of ashame and all that. That being said, I often
do encounter women who really did turn it off. It was a little bit easier for them to completely turn it off. And so when they come in completely
inexperienced, they are blindsided. And so are the men, right? There there are plenty accounts of people who can't have
sex on their honeymoon or even weeks, sometimes months afterwards because of the incompatibility for for many reasons. Um, and so it gets really
tricky. But to answer your question, what can we do? I think if we have somebody that we can trust, in fact, I
think it's really helpful to maybe see somebody prior to marriage and talk about these things, help facilitate a conversation that you've never had before, right? And and really kind of
normalize some of these things. But if you have a female mentor in your family or who you're close to, I think it can be really important to learn some of
these things. Like it might not happen the first night. It is supposed to feel safe even if not completely comfortable all the time. It is supposed to feel
like you're loved and you know that you can say no if you need to. I think it's important for us to normalize talking
about some of these things instead of sending people blindly into the dark and saying figure it out. Here's
my last question and and this is a little bit sensitive maybe because it's a churchy type of question, but what do
you wish bishops knew more about bishops knew more about intimacy
problems between husband and wife? Now, for me, first of all, I don't understand going to a bishop for that. I I just
don't get it. I've never done anything like that. But a lot of people do. And and so why what what do you wish just something simple that that bishops knew?
I need to think about this for a minute.
I feel a little on the spot with this question. Um I want to be careful with it
because it's bishop roulette. Honestly, it is. Let's be really clear about that because I've heard some bishops who have handled things so beautifully and and
just sort of normalized normal human behavior and some who have not. So, I'm going to be careful about that. I think
I wish bishops understood developmentally appropriate thoughts and actions. That's what I'll say. Um
because some things are developmental and we make them such moral taboss and I don't want to
get more specific on that because not my calling not my way above my pay grade for today but um I think if bishops
understood sexual development more they could handle more appropriately
when even teenagers teenagers husbands wives come in and say, "We're having these
problems." Um, I just think they could be more equipped and and honestly, if we could give every
every human, not just bishops, the Relief Society president, the the congregation, a lesson on emotional intelligence.
I think it would change the world. I think it would absolutely change the world if we could raise the emotional EQ
of the humans. Awesome, Rhonda. Thanks so much. Really appreciate your advice and your insights, your experience. I think uh this is one of those topics
where there isn't a lot of communication.
There's not a lot of talk and for on both sides, both men and women. And so I I think that it's important to do this.
I wanted to do this because I think people need to hear it. If anything, just articulate it. put something in your mind that you can think about,
right, and reflect on in your own life and the issues that you might have yourself. And and it's obviously such an important part. I mean, whether you're
looking at the relationship or the bedroom, I mean, these are very important things for married couples to
get right and do the best they can. So, yeah, thanks for having me. It's literally a survival skill. We don't often think about sex in that way, but
that's how the human race continues, right? It is primal. It is survival. It is emotional. It is spiritual. Like this
is one of the acts that I think it hits every pocket here. Like we're coming at it with, you know, so many
facets and and it is vitally important and often taboo to talk about. So, thank you for letting me do that here. Fantastic. Appreciate it.
Yep. Absolutely.