How many of you have some deep burning desire to try something new or different in the bedroom but are worried about the judgement from your partner?
He likely sees you as someone who ‘isn’t like that’. And this persona that you have accidentally created of yourself due to fear, has you almost feeling trapped in your bedroom experiences.
You would like to explore things, fantasies that you may have or kinks you’d like to try.
But you worry that he may have less respect. May love you less.
You fear his reaction.
The way to a deeper connection inside and outside the bedroom is vulnerability. Speaking our truth, even if we don’t know how it will be received. I’m here to tell you that how they receive it is a sign of their own conditioning. That it has nothing to do with your worth, your values or your desires - everything you want and all that you are, it’s all valid. Coming to a place of self-love and self-worth gives you the power to be able to have these open conversations. To get the intimacy you so strongly desire. To get the sex life you crave for…
I’ve previously shared an article about how women get bored in the bedroom 1 to 2 years in a long term relationship. That they crave more variety. I experienced this myself.
With all my relationships.
It’s what led me to do my training as a Sex, Love & Relationship Coach. I thought to myself, ‘I’ll get better sex for myself, learn some coaching skills and help mothers who have anxiety with the skills I learn.’ That was my original reason for going into the coaching. However, within a few weeks of starting the training, my body could already feel huge shifts. A burning deep inside my pussy and womb that wanted to be released. I was coming home to my sexuality, my womanhood, my power.
I was cultivating a confidence and self-worth that enabled me to ask for what I wanted and to understand that if it wasn’t met with the support and grace I deserved, that it wasn’t about me. It was about him, my husband and what his own wounds and triggers are.
He had been working away for 3 weeks. When he came back, I sat with him for a chat. I listed all the things I wanted to do in the bedroom (and outside of it) and that I wanted to open our relationship but didn’t know how I wanted that to look just yet.
He received it with graciousness.
He was challenged partly by his own feelings of possibly ‘not being good enough’ for not automatically knowing what I wanted in the bedroom. Also a level of doubt about maybe I didn’t want him anymore if I was looking for relations with other people.
The bedroom stuff we mainly dove right into. Certain elements he wasn’t too sure of but building the trust and intimacy between the two of us meant that with time he began to be more open to new things I was suggesting. This uncertainty I could have met with shame and rejection. I could have taken it personally that maybe he won’t love me anymore or maybe he will judge me. However, by me holding space for his discomfort and seeing him in his wounding, meant that he was able to work through it to be able to come to a place to begin to accept and work through his own conditioning.
We spent many months too discussing how our ethically non-monogamous relationship would look, until we finally decided to do it. And this in itself requires frequent revisiting and checking in as new learning opportunities arise and our growth edges pushed.
I feel in a way I can talk even more openly now with my husband than I ever could. We even talked recently about what fear separation or divorce really means (which I’ll share my views on another time).
What it took to get there is self-love, self-worth, recognising my stories and conditioning, seeking support in the form of coaching from my peers when I needed to work through something particularly difficult and… trust.
Trust that whichever path I am taken on, it will lead to me to growth, more love and deeper more meaningful connections. Just maybe not in the way I had expected it.
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.