First, a thanks for posting it earlier for us eastern timezone folk.
I absolutely loved this post. Sex, centered on women absolutely increases enjoyment for all.
My wife and I are on our tenth marriage, not due to divorce we have been together for almost 20 years and we have made such significant changes in our relationship that we call them different marriages. It stems from a concept in Esther Perel’s book about marriage. Our first marriage was a patriarchy marriage where my value as a man stemmed from a certain ideal of manhood that both caused shame and resentment. My spouse felt that her value derived from her ability to have children.
Significant changes in our understanding of sexuality, gender identity, and patriarchy have made for an amazing relationship. Sex is not centered in penetration, procreation, or ejaculation; it is focused on intimacy and pleasure. Each has been able to see ourselves through the eyes of a loving partner and feel each other’s care.
Each marriage has been a deliberate decision to make something better, sometime with unintended consequences, yet we continue to be the best versions of ourselves and to approach marriage as an ever changing reality.
I posted it earlier for you Arturo 😊 Glad you noticed ❤️ and thanks for this beautiful comment- this has been our experience in marriage too- we have a completely different marriage now that we’ve both deconstructed the scripts we were handed of what it means to be a husband/wife.
"My wife and I are on our tenth marriage, not due to divorce we have been together for almost 20 years and we have made such significant changes in our relationship that we call them different marriages." Obsessed with this. I've noticed people who stay happily married often say some version of this.
Like Celeste wrote, there are 300 ways patriarchy fucks up sex. And there are countless reasons married sex sucks for women. But one of the reasons women often get interested in sex again after divorce is that most marriages are monogamous and, on average, women tire of monogamy long before men. In addition, the average woman is more sexually adventurous than the average man.
Women need novelty for arousal more than men do. Patriarchy is the reason most people think the opposite is true.
Polyamory is one way to deal with this reality. But another, underrated way to keep the spark alive is to find ways to inject novelty into your lives and bedroom. Try new things. Become dynamic, evolving, maturing people. Always be in the process of becoming someone new.
Polyamory was anti-helpful for me. I think the only way it would work would be if every member was equally attracted and in love with every other member. But humans generally don't work that way. So you get group relationships where people pretend everything is fine but it isn't, and if that's you, you ruined everybody's good time, didn't you? I am so against polyamory now, its a red flag. Promoters of it sound like cultists, explaining how their guru is all about love.
I think you might be confusing polyamory with group sex. Poly can be multiple separate partners and no hierarchy need be involved. The weirdness is when married people try to be poly, rather than people just being solo poly, IMHO
First off, thank you as always for a compelling piece. This was fascinating. I think I've mentioned this before, but I'm reminded of Kristen Ghodsee's book "Why Women Have Better Sex Under Socialism," probably because patriarchy and capitalism are mutually perpetuating 🤷♂️.
I believe the inspiration for the book was a post-reunification German survey that found that formerly East German women who had been living in a socialist model were more sexually fulfilled than formerly West German women, who had been living under capitalism. Her thesis is essentially that because capitalism requires surplus labor that (mostly) women freely provide in the home, and this free labor places women in a dependent relationship relative to men, women are more likely to be stuck in relationships that don't serve them - sexually and otherwise.
Where there is even economic footing, any woman is at greater liberty to exclude a man from consideration as a new or continued partner if they fail to provide more than just a paycheck. Equal footing/economic power = greater likelihood of an equal relationship (patriarchal norms remain an issue) = greater likelihood of a more equal sexual relationship.
There's more to be said about the commodification of our time, attention, and affections more broadly under capitalism, but that's for another day. Long story short, I think part of the remedy here on top of redefining norms is advocating for policies that improve economic bargaining power for women.
Interestingly, East Germany had implemented several feminist policy priorities before (sometimes well before) they came to the West, and sexual liberation was alive and well behind the Iron Curtain. In some respects Eastern European states were pioneers in this space.
Enjoyed the fantasy football and hobbies analogy! It’s like thinking cookies= oatmeal raisin and therefore thinking I don’t like cookies. And then trying a chocolate chip cookie and realizing, I do indeed like SOME kinds of cookies!!!! This definitely happened in my sex life and my husband and I have definitely discovered that the way to make our sex life fun, easy and mutually enjoyable is to center my perspective. The more turned on I am, the more I genuinely want to do things to him that he very much enjoys. 🔥
"my husband and I have definitely discovered that the way to make our sex life fun, easy and mutually enjoyable is to center my perspective. The more turned on I am, the more I genuinely want to do things to him that he very much enjoys." - this makes so much sense. We really have been sold a doozy by patriarchy!!!
This is great, I love the language you are using to describe this issue. I had to "rebrand" sex in my mind to stop looking at it as an obligation to a partner to fulfill their needs. Now I see it as "self-care" for ME! BUT, I could only do this with a partner who was willing to do the things I want and need, and more importantly to NOT do the things I don't want or like. I've gone from completely avoiding sex to 4-5 times a week or more!
Such a great point of not doing things you don’t like as equally important as doing the things you DO like. I think the things we don’t like is discussed so much less to spare potential hurt feelings but it’s important to 1. Know your desires and 2. Express them. Thanks Jennifer!
I've lost count of how often I've seen this pattern play out in my caseload of women who think they don't like sex and then discover they just didn't like sex with their husbands. Nor can I count the number of times a female client has confided to me that she thinks there is something wrong with her because she doesn't orgasm from penetration. 18.4% actually sounds like a high number to me. I attended a CEU course on this recently by sex therapist, Laurie Mintz, who said only 4% of women report reliably orgasming from penetration, and it's notable that they are orgasming from clitoral stimulation that occurs as a result of penetration. She also talked about how the obsession with the g-spot and "vaginal orgasm" set us back 50 years. I recommend checking out her book, Becoming Cliterate: Why Orgasm Equality Matters--And How to Get It https://a.co/d/4728UIS
SO low. I have had many conversations reassuring my female patients that there is nothing wrong with their anatomy and that if anything, women who orgasm from penetration are the outliers.
Love this! It reminds me of the books Becoming Cliterate, and Come as You Are. Both introduced me to the idea of orgasm equality, and helped me rewrite so many narratives that tie patriarchy to sex. Can’t recommend these books enough!!
& “OMG yes” is an amazing online resource for couples looking for science backed ways take women’s pleasure to the next level 🔥🔥
Wow. As a lesbian the last part hit me like a ton of bricks because that describes my sex life, and the normal sexuality shared by lesbians. I feel like there is a lot that lesbian and bisexual women could be sharing with straight women and men if they listened.
What's the opposite of hatred of women? Men will invariably leap up in response to this question to bellow out, "Misandry!! Wahhh!" (as if there even is such a thing. Pro tip: there isn't. Women don't have that kind of collective power.)
This is, of course, not just wrong - it's stupidly, obviously wrong in a logical failure kind of way.
The opposite of "hatred of women" is "love of women."
This is absolutely accurate to my experience. Also, to offer further anecdotal evidence in support of the fact that we associate sex with penetration, I recently went in search of dental dams, a form of protection used when giving oral sex to women, thinking they would appear in drug stores alongside condoms. Not only are they not there, but many drug store employees are confused when I ask about them. Either we do not appear to believe that STDs can be transmitted orally or we do not consider women receiving oral sex to be important.
I honestly thought I was the only woman who hated sex with her husband. It made me sick to my stomach. I’m thankfully now divorced. This article was mind blowing for me and I learned so much. Many thanks to the author. It should be posted in all barber shops worldwide.
This is such a great article. I preach to all my girlfriends that penetration is not sufficient for most women to orgasm and toys are generally necessary to achieve clitoral stimulation, as is the build up for women before the act of penetration. Think - touching, oral, dirty talk, etc. The sad thing is that marriage should be the ideal scenario to explore a woman’s sexual needs - a partner she can communicate with openly and trust with her desires, without fear of stds, with a mutually agreed upon plan for preventing pregnancy, and with time for the partner to get to know exactly what she needs to achieve orgasm. It boggles my mind that it seems like sex is an afterthought in many marriages and not one of the most exciting and pleasurable things you can do with your partner.
What a wonderfully refreshing viewpoint and article! I pretty much hated sex with my ex. I was forever doing more extreme sex acts with him, at his request, than I was comfortable with or interested in, while my desires were deemed to be too much work. The best organic orgasm I had with him was when he'd massaged my whole body for an hour. My body felt fluid and my pelvic floor was so relaxed that my vaginismus didn't make penetration excruciating. Having the pain that penetration caused me ignored for a decade took a big toll on my self esteem and emotional/physical health.
My ex would flip over and huff when I said no. Guilted, I'd give in. I've been single for over 4 years and having my body back - ALL MINE - has been bliss and worth the fleeting moments of loneliness I have from time to time.
I knew the relationship was terrible for me, unbeneficial, and added so little to my lived experiences, yet I stayed, cuz hadn't sex almost always been that way? Thank you so much for your article!
Celeste, I always love your posts but I think this one might be my favorite one to date. You have no idea how incredibly validating it is to read about other people who have experienced the same thing as you and to see that maybe you aren't crazy! Thank you for this and for all the work you do, it really is a gift!
Def not crazy!!! (I think this is esp the experience of Mormon women/ ex Mormon women for whom marital patriarchal sex is the ONLY sex they’ve ever known)
Really? It feels like I have wasted 3 decades of my, and more tragically my wife's, sex life. Why can't this sort of insight have been available in the 90s?!?!?!?!
I would've been so up for a much more playful and female centric approach to sex, but we were just SO IGNORANT! 😭💔
It's not TMI. When we openly talk about our human experiences, others know that they're not alone. Besides, it feels good to talk about it rather than keeping it bottled up, acting like everything's just swell. At least, it does for me.
She might have been, if she hadn't given up on me sexually 15+ years ago. This article perfectly explains the very understandable reason why she gave up on me/us. We are starting to explore reigniting our sexual connection, with the help of a professional.
First, a thanks for posting it earlier for us eastern timezone folk.
I absolutely loved this post. Sex, centered on women absolutely increases enjoyment for all.
My wife and I are on our tenth marriage, not due to divorce we have been together for almost 20 years and we have made such significant changes in our relationship that we call them different marriages. It stems from a concept in Esther Perel’s book about marriage. Our first marriage was a patriarchy marriage where my value as a man stemmed from a certain ideal of manhood that both caused shame and resentment. My spouse felt that her value derived from her ability to have children.
Significant changes in our understanding of sexuality, gender identity, and patriarchy have made for an amazing relationship. Sex is not centered in penetration, procreation, or ejaculation; it is focused on intimacy and pleasure. Each has been able to see ourselves through the eyes of a loving partner and feel each other’s care.
Each marriage has been a deliberate decision to make something better, sometime with unintended consequences, yet we continue to be the best versions of ourselves and to approach marriage as an ever changing reality.
I posted it earlier for you Arturo 😊 Glad you noticed ❤️ and thanks for this beautiful comment- this has been our experience in marriage too- we have a completely different marriage now that we’ve both deconstructed the scripts we were handed of what it means to be a husband/wife.
"My wife and I are on our tenth marriage, not due to divorce we have been together for almost 20 years and we have made such significant changes in our relationship that we call them different marriages." Obsessed with this. I've noticed people who stay happily married often say some version of this.
Like Celeste wrote, there are 300 ways patriarchy fucks up sex. And there are countless reasons married sex sucks for women. But one of the reasons women often get interested in sex again after divorce is that most marriages are monogamous and, on average, women tire of monogamy long before men. In addition, the average woman is more sexually adventurous than the average man.
Women need novelty for arousal more than men do. Patriarchy is the reason most people think the opposite is true.
Polyamory is one way to deal with this reality. But another, underrated way to keep the spark alive is to find ways to inject novelty into your lives and bedroom. Try new things. Become dynamic, evolving, maturing people. Always be in the process of becoming someone new.
Polyamory was anti-helpful for me. I think the only way it would work would be if every member was equally attracted and in love with every other member. But humans generally don't work that way. So you get group relationships where people pretend everything is fine but it isn't, and if that's you, you ruined everybody's good time, didn't you? I am so against polyamory now, its a red flag. Promoters of it sound like cultists, explaining how their guru is all about love.
I think you might be confusing polyamory with group sex. Poly can be multiple separate partners and no hierarchy need be involved. The weirdness is when married people try to be poly, rather than people just being solo poly, IMHO
What an interesting insight.
This is great insight❤️. I’ve never thought of it this way but it is interesting !
First off, thank you as always for a compelling piece. This was fascinating. I think I've mentioned this before, but I'm reminded of Kristen Ghodsee's book "Why Women Have Better Sex Under Socialism," probably because patriarchy and capitalism are mutually perpetuating 🤷♂️.
I believe the inspiration for the book was a post-reunification German survey that found that formerly East German women who had been living in a socialist model were more sexually fulfilled than formerly West German women, who had been living under capitalism. Her thesis is essentially that because capitalism requires surplus labor that (mostly) women freely provide in the home, and this free labor places women in a dependent relationship relative to men, women are more likely to be stuck in relationships that don't serve them - sexually and otherwise.
Where there is even economic footing, any woman is at greater liberty to exclude a man from consideration as a new or continued partner if they fail to provide more than just a paycheck. Equal footing/economic power = greater likelihood of an equal relationship (patriarchal norms remain an issue) = greater likelihood of a more equal sexual relationship.
There's more to be said about the commodification of our time, attention, and affections more broadly under capitalism, but that's for another day. Long story short, I think part of the remedy here on top of redefining norms is advocating for policies that improve economic bargaining power for women.
Wow! Fascinating! Thanks for this Taylor! Kicking myself I didn’t read this book before writing this article bc it fits in perfectly!!!
Thank you for this! Educating, eye-opening.
This is fascinating and interesting. Thanks for the insight.
can you link to the survey
Interestingly, East Germany had implemented several feminist policy priorities before (sometimes well before) they came to the West, and sexual liberation was alive and well behind the Iron Curtain. In some respects Eastern European states were pioneers in this space.
Women need to stop putting up with men who don’t care about them.
If he is simply using his partner in bed, he probably sucks as a human being in other ways. DO NOT MARRY OR DATE MEN WHO SUCK.
Hold out for a good guy. If the sex is one-sided, you haven’t found one.
Enjoyed the fantasy football and hobbies analogy! It’s like thinking cookies= oatmeal raisin and therefore thinking I don’t like cookies. And then trying a chocolate chip cookie and realizing, I do indeed like SOME kinds of cookies!!!! This definitely happened in my sex life and my husband and I have definitely discovered that the way to make our sex life fun, easy and mutually enjoyable is to center my perspective. The more turned on I am, the more I genuinely want to do things to him that he very much enjoys. 🔥
Oh cookies is even better bc it probably is about 18.4% of people who actually like oatmeal raisin 😂😂 Good one Jamee!!!
😂 my husband is one of those 18.4%
"my husband and I have definitely discovered that the way to make our sex life fun, easy and mutually enjoyable is to center my perspective. The more turned on I am, the more I genuinely want to do things to him that he very much enjoys." - this makes so much sense. We really have been sold a doozy by patriarchy!!!
Thank you for this 💜 it’s helped me understand a few things about my past experience. 💜
This is great, I love the language you are using to describe this issue. I had to "rebrand" sex in my mind to stop looking at it as an obligation to a partner to fulfill their needs. Now I see it as "self-care" for ME! BUT, I could only do this with a partner who was willing to do the things I want and need, and more importantly to NOT do the things I don't want or like. I've gone from completely avoiding sex to 4-5 times a week or more!
Such a great point of not doing things you don’t like as equally important as doing the things you DO like. I think the things we don’t like is discussed so much less to spare potential hurt feelings but it’s important to 1. Know your desires and 2. Express them. Thanks Jennifer!
I've lost count of how often I've seen this pattern play out in my caseload of women who think they don't like sex and then discover they just didn't like sex with their husbands. Nor can I count the number of times a female client has confided to me that she thinks there is something wrong with her because she doesn't orgasm from penetration. 18.4% actually sounds like a high number to me. I attended a CEU course on this recently by sex therapist, Laurie Mintz, who said only 4% of women report reliably orgasming from penetration, and it's notable that they are orgasming from clitoral stimulation that occurs as a result of penetration. She also talked about how the obsession with the g-spot and "vaginal orgasm" set us back 50 years. I recommend checking out her book, Becoming Cliterate: Why Orgasm Equality Matters--And How to Get It https://a.co/d/4728UIS
Wow so interesting- 4% is so low!
SO low. I have had many conversations reassuring my female patients that there is nothing wrong with their anatomy and that if anything, women who orgasm from penetration are the outliers.
Love this! It reminds me of the books Becoming Cliterate, and Come as You Are. Both introduced me to the idea of orgasm equality, and helped me rewrite so many narratives that tie patriarchy to sex. Can’t recommend these books enough!!
& “OMG yes” is an amazing online resource for couples looking for science backed ways take women’s pleasure to the next level 🔥🔥
Yes! Thanks for these recs Kate!
Speaking as a heterosexual man, I appreciate you compiling the interviews and presenting these points. Thank you!
Thanks Steve!
Wow. As a lesbian the last part hit me like a ton of bricks because that describes my sex life, and the normal sexuality shared by lesbians. I feel like there is a lot that lesbian and bisexual women could be sharing with straight women and men if they listened.
Yesssss!!!!!
Misogyny is the hatred of women.
What's the opposite of hatred of women? Men will invariably leap up in response to this question to bellow out, "Misandry!! Wahhh!" (as if there even is such a thing. Pro tip: there isn't. Women don't have that kind of collective power.)
This is, of course, not just wrong - it's stupidly, obviously wrong in a logical failure kind of way.
The opposite of "hatred of women" is "love of women."
Lesbians are the antidote to misogyny. <3
This is absolutely accurate to my experience. Also, to offer further anecdotal evidence in support of the fact that we associate sex with penetration, I recently went in search of dental dams, a form of protection used when giving oral sex to women, thinking they would appear in drug stores alongside condoms. Not only are they not there, but many drug store employees are confused when I ask about them. Either we do not appear to believe that STDs can be transmitted orally or we do not consider women receiving oral sex to be important.
Oh such a good example!!! Thank you Lexi!
I honestly thought I was the only woman who hated sex with her husband. It made me sick to my stomach. I’m thankfully now divorced. This article was mind blowing for me and I learned so much. Many thanks to the author. It should be posted in all barber shops worldwide.
Your Substack is my favorite, Celeste, thank you.
Thanks so much Nimai!
This is such a great article. I preach to all my girlfriends that penetration is not sufficient for most women to orgasm and toys are generally necessary to achieve clitoral stimulation, as is the build up for women before the act of penetration. Think - touching, oral, dirty talk, etc. The sad thing is that marriage should be the ideal scenario to explore a woman’s sexual needs - a partner she can communicate with openly and trust with her desires, without fear of stds, with a mutually agreed upon plan for preventing pregnancy, and with time for the partner to get to know exactly what she needs to achieve orgasm. It boggles my mind that it seems like sex is an afterthought in many marriages and not one of the most exciting and pleasurable things you can do with your partner.
What a wonderfully refreshing viewpoint and article! I pretty much hated sex with my ex. I was forever doing more extreme sex acts with him, at his request, than I was comfortable with or interested in, while my desires were deemed to be too much work. The best organic orgasm I had with him was when he'd massaged my whole body for an hour. My body felt fluid and my pelvic floor was so relaxed that my vaginismus didn't make penetration excruciating. Having the pain that penetration caused me ignored for a decade took a big toll on my self esteem and emotional/physical health.
My ex would flip over and huff when I said no. Guilted, I'd give in. I've been single for over 4 years and having my body back - ALL MINE - has been bliss and worth the fleeting moments of loneliness I have from time to time.
I knew the relationship was terrible for me, unbeneficial, and added so little to my lived experiences, yet I stayed, cuz hadn't sex almost always been that way? Thank you so much for your article!
Celeste, I always love your posts but I think this one might be my favorite one to date. You have no idea how incredibly validating it is to read about other people who have experienced the same thing as you and to see that maybe you aren't crazy! Thank you for this and for all the work you do, it really is a gift!
Def not crazy!!! (I think this is esp the experience of Mormon women/ ex Mormon women for whom marital patriarchal sex is the ONLY sex they’ve ever known)
This is both crystal clear and utterly confusing; joyful and maddeningly frustrating; liberating and humiliating.
All good feelings/thought.
Really? It feels like I have wasted 3 decades of my, and more tragically my wife's, sex life. Why can't this sort of insight have been available in the 90s?!?!?!?!
I would've been so up for a much more playful and female centric approach to sex, but we were just SO IGNORANT! 😭💔
It's not TMI. When we openly talk about our human experiences, others know that they're not alone. Besides, it feels good to talk about it rather than keeping it bottled up, acting like everything's just swell. At least, it does for me.
But you're here now and what an amazing discovery and won't your wife be pleasantly surprised by your new perspective!
She might have been, if she hadn't given up on me sexually 15+ years ago. This article perfectly explains the very understandable reason why she gave up on me/us. We are starting to explore reigniting our sexual connection, with the help of a professional.
Apologies if this is all TMI