We can often project our own stories and wounds onto situations that come up in relationships and sex which are not actually in relation to the problem we are speaking to our partners about. Often we need to take a look underneath the surface to understand better what's going on for us. Our reactions to situations may be patterns that are keeping us stuck or in stories which are not helpful in communication nor helpful in healing our sexuality and relationship to self. We may be experiencing conditioning around what our bodies should and shouldn't be doing and attaching our sense of worth based on that.
Understanding how we feel about situations and breaking them down into emotions and understanding what the core wounds are will enable us to slow the whole experience down and choose to do differently next time.
By choosing to do differently what happens is that our response creates a different type of reaction from our partner. Because when we are feeling wounded, we lash out and and our partner, also feeling wounded, will lash out or withdraw in return. Here's an example and my reply below it...
"Last week my partner went out for a couple of drinks and we had sex when he got home, he didn’t ejaculate. Then a few days later we had sex again and he didn’t ejaculate, he had been drinking. We had a fight and I told him that he barely touches me and doesn’t even ejaculate when we have sex. I think I upset him. He told me that I don’t even make noise and it sounds like I’m not enjoying it when I do make noise. I'm not sure what’s going on."
My reply...
I hear that in your fight you brought up that your partner barely touches you and that he hasn’t ejaculated the last couple of times after sex.
‘I’m not sure what’s going on’
I would like to invite you to explore your feelings around him barely touching you.
How do you feel? Ensuring you name some emotions. Name as many emotions as possible to fully have ownership of your emotional experience. See if you can get a list of at least 5 but aiming for 10.
Then can you narrow it down to a core emotion? Core emotions are anger; surprise; joy; love; fear; sadness.
Then what ‘story’ are you creating about this?
What are you saying about yourself?
Is there a wound coming up for you?
I would then invite you to repeat this process around his ejaculation too. What are the emotions and what are the stories?
Then explore, are there any similarities? Are there certain emotions you are defaulting to in your relationship and when you are feeling upset? Also is the ‘theme’ of the story the same, similar or completely different?
With this information, what would you like to do moving forward?
How do you want to feel in your relationship?
What are your needs?
Once you are clear on these goals, how can you ask for what you want?
How can you be responsible for those needs and ask for them to be met while respecting that your partner’s needs might be different?
This is a beautiful opportunity to create deep and meaningful conversations, create vulnerability and experience a deeper connection to each other.
Regarding the not ejaculating, if it is only happening when he is drunk, then it sounds like it might be linked to the drink rather than there being a regular problem of delayed ejaculation?
Carla Crivaro is a trauma-informed and certified Sex, Love & Relationship Coach, she works with men and women internationally to reach their goals in delicious sex, profound love and authentic relationships. Carla helps men and women understand themselves and each other, sexually and relationally, in and out of the bedroom. You can reach her at hello@carlacrivaro.com.
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