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It sounds like a 1930s propaganda film: Can Women Be Trusted To Uncage Their Sexuality? Alas, it’s actually the headline of a recent YourTango piece by dating coach Delaine Moore, whose self-proclaimed mission is “to help men and women going through divorce STOP falling apart and START becoming Fearless and Fiery.” She is also, according to her bio, “Canada’s leading authority on gender intelligence.” More
Yesterday, M.D. and board-certified psychiatrist Dale Archer talked to me about ten ways to tell someone the painful truth. Now, those ten techniques are all well and good and helpful and necessary, but then I started wondering how and when to know if spilling a painful truth is just a bad idea all around — for everyone involved. (I recently told my loved one about their chronic bad breath. Was that a misstep? No? Whew.) So I asked the good doctor to tell us when we never, ever should tell someone a painful truth, regardless of how much and how well we think it may serve them. (Opt for that little white lie instead!) Dr. Archer gave us two good pieces of advice, and I’ve added eight of my own suggestions to round out the list. Do you agree or disagree? Have any more specific examples to add to our tally, or, better yet, personal painful truth tales to tell — either on the giving or receiving end? Sound off in our comments section. Truthfully, please. More
Last night on NBC’s Parenthood, Crosby learned a valuable life lesson the hard way. Or, rather, Crosby didn’t learn a valuable life lesson at all. He had cheated on his fiancee, Jasmine, in a sloppy one-night stand, which caused her to kick him out of their apartment, and pretty much say: It’s over. Crosby then reacted by doing what most men do when they realize that they’ve been caught or they messed up or they understand that they’re about to lose someone or something that’s very important to them: He panicked. When this kind of thing happens, the cheater (in this case a man, but could easily be a woman) tends to overcompensate. He acts rashly — kind of like he did when he had the one-night-stand in the first place. He’s suddenly convinced that his only mission in life is to win his partner back, whatever it takes, whatever the cost. After all, a thief is almost always sorry after he gets caught. The problem is, once someone has fallen out of love with you, it’s pretty damn near impossible to make that someone love you again. More
Yesterday I published a post called Your Sexless Marriage May Be Perfectly Healthy, in which I asked Dr. Julie Elledge – a psychotherapist for individuals and couples who deals with many issues of sexual health – about what’s considered “normal” and “abnormal” when it comes to having sex (or not having sex, as the case may be) in a marriage or long-term relationship. Today, our our resident sexpert schools us on exactly what to do (hint: face your fantasies!) if you think you might be in a sexless marriage, and are less than thrilled by that prospect: More
You are in a sexless marriage. Scary phrase, right? In principle, maybe, but as it turns out, if you and your partner haven’t had sex in recent memory, it may not mean the end of everything. (Of course, it may, but there’s always hope.) I actually have a few friends who are in long-term sexless relationships, and to an outside observer, they really don’t seem any more dysfunctional than most couples I know who have regular sex as a part of their union. Still, curious about what’s considered “normal” and “abnormal” when it comes to marriage and sex, I asked Dr. Julie Elledge — a psychotherapist for individuals and couples who deals with many issues of sexual health – some questions about whether or not intimate, romantic relationships can exist and last without the s-word. Here’s part one of my Q&A with her on the scintillating subject of the sexless marriage: More
When I first moved to New York City at 22, I accidentally dated a man twice my age. I knew he was older than I was and had been married before, but I’d guessed he was in his thirties.
How wrong I was. Turns out, he was just a few years younger than my dad. When I discovered this, we already had our hands entwined in the back of a cab. I couldn’t pull away and say, “Never mind, now you’re too old for me.” So I acted very casually and shrugged, “Men age. Women rot.”
It was a saying I’d read at some point that didn’t mean much to me back then. But as I’ve grown older, wiser, and more, let’s say, creased, I’ve come to see its truth. Now I date men closer to my own age now, but none of them are worried about wrinkle cream for the face. Meanwhile, my women friends and I have begun the discussion: “Would you rather keep a youthful face or a youthful body?” More
Irritable Bowel Syndrome. Spastic Colon. My large intestine needs to see a shrink. It could use some benzos, or at the very least, Haldol. Maybe a stint in the psych ward. Unfortunately, my colon doesn’t have a separate brain and I can’t take it for psychoanalysis. (I probably wouldn’t want to hear the diagnosis anyway.) Fortunately, my brain (addled and atrophied as it may be) has been able to uncover all the wonders and horrors of dealing with and treating Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS).
In 1971, I was born a seemingly healthy, properly-pooping nine-pound baby. But things soon changed. In my terrible twos I was at least easily potty-trained. (You couldn’t get this kid on the toilet fast enough.) I skipped the entire Freudian anal-retentive stage. What was going on? Was it because my mother hadn’t breastfed me? Was it the Ukrainian evil eye from my jealous older siblings? No, proclaimed Dr. Zaber, it’s a sugar allergy. The catch-all digestive diagnosis in those days.
Out went any and all sugar, which only proved to make me a crankier child. Goddamn it, I wanted my candy and I wanted it NOW! More
I didn’t mean to become a junkie. It just kind of happened. My addiction to the prescription drug Ambien occurred back in 2001. There I was, in my late 20s, happily traveling to a lot of cool domestic and international locations thanks to my job as an editor at a travel magazine. But I’d planned to cut back on my usual 10-day-a-month work jaunts just for the summer, so I could do some serious hanging out at a pretty house I’d rented with a few other friends in New York’s Hudson Valley. It was going to rule: Long weekends, bike rides, nightly barbecues, cold beers, fireflies, picnics on the grounds of historic mansions, inordinate amounts of time logged at local swimming holes, and plenty of nights of good sleep in our sprawling, 19th-century caretaker’s cottage on a beautiful old estate outside a tiny town. Or so I thought. More
Want to know how to have great sex, take great photos, and have a stress-free vacation? We’re tapping the best experts for their tricks and advice for making your life better, six ingredients at a time. This week, we talked to Dr. Carol Queen, PhD, about how to make the most of our time in bed (right now). Check out her ideas and tricks for having great sex: More
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This is author Therese Borchard’s second post for Blisstree; she’ll be blogging for us on a weekly basis about all kinds of mental health, depression, and therapy issues. Find her debut post here. Have a question for Therese? Leave it in our comments section, below.
Maybe it’s because I just turned 40 over the weekend, or maybe it’s because I was asked to be a “relationship expert” for a dating website a few days ago (LOL), or that TV writer Tracy McMillan’s recent HuffPo piece “Why You’re Not Married” got under my skin, but I can’t stop thinking about how I ended up married with two kids when I was the one labeled in college “most likely to become an old maid” because 1. I preferred a tiny closet of a room for me and only me over a roomy quad with three other classmates, and 2. I hated men.
Furthermore, I’m confused as to why two of my closest friends who did everything right on the family track are still single in their 40s. McMillan would say it’s one or more of the following six reasons:
They are bitches. More
A few years ago, a friend of mine broke up with a terrific guy. Smart, funny, successful, and good-looking, he was, in anyone’s eyes, a great catch. So when I asked her why she let him go, I was completely and utterly shocked by her answer. “He’s just not romantic,” she said. My jaw hit the floor.
Why? I’m just not a romantic. I don’t enjoy flowers. I hate candy. And I would quite literally cringe if someone ever attempted to sing me a love song or write me a poem. My husband is the same way. We don’t (and hopefully never will) stare lovingly at each other or whisper sweet nothings into each other’s ears. In fact, when we make an attempt at romance it usually goes completely awry. Case in point: Years ago, on our honeymoon, my husband set up a full candlelight dinner on the porch of our private bungalow overlooking the beach in Brazil, complete with flowers, wine, and a guitarist in the corner playing soft music. Needless to say, by the end of the evening we had invited the guitarist to have some wine and dessert with us while my husband chatted him up about futbol and I taught him bad words in English. As wonderful and beautiful as the gesture was, it simply wasn’t our style. We had more fun just lying on the beach, sipping Caipirinhas, and rehashing the craziness of our trip (which is not an entirely unromantic scenario, I realize). But watching my husband yell at the airline in Portuguese about my lost luggage made me love him more than some stranger doing a bad Neil Diamond impression by candlelight ever could. More
I have a dirty little secret. As with many things, I blame it on my parents and my Catholic school upbringing.
I went to an all-girls Catholic high school, and yes, we all wore bouncy little checked skirts of the variety that child molesters favor and yes, there were nuns, though it’s worth noting that we never washed our super sexy wool (winter) or polyester (spring) skirts, and that the nuns got called back to the nunnery shortly after I graduated due to some unspecified scandal. They never returned.
In my high school, there were also bathrooms that smelled distinctly of vomit around prom time, and a strange importance placed on Valentine’s Day. It was a big, creepy deal in teen-girl prison. The flowers – mostly garish, generic red roses or carnation bouquets of the sort you’d expect from teenage boys in the suburbs – would start arriving the morning of February 14, along with the balloons and stuffed animals and chocolates in giant heart-shaped boxes. The pricey loot would steadily stream in throughout the day, a consistent flow of teen infatuation and crass commercialism. In fact, so much stuff arrived that the school didn’t allow its girls to collect their loot as it came in. Rather, it was all stored in the chapel until the end of day. Then, during final period, a list would go around with the names of all those lucky gals who had Valentine’s treasures waiting for them to pick up.
I was never on that list. More
Couples may be ahead of singles when it comes to frequency of sex, but that doesn’t mean it’s good sex. In fact, we all know that when you’ve been in a relationship for long enough, sometimes sex is just…sex. And though we all have friends who are uninhibited when it comes to pushing the boundaries of bedroom behavior, I’m willing to bet that the majority of us aren’t ordering sex toys online on a regular basis. (But if you are, check out our 10 Eco-Friendly Sex Toys for Valentine’s Day.) For those of us with a shallow sexually adventurous streak, we called on Debby Herbenick, Ph.D., research scientist at Indiana University and author of Because It Feels Good: A Woman’s Guide to Sexual Pleasure and Satisfaction, to give us her top five sex tips about come-hither creativity for the romantically timid — just in time for February 14: More
Hearty congratulations to Ella, who just won our Blisstree We-Vibe II Valentine’s Day giveaway! Ella will receive one brand-new We-Vibe II couples vibrator (color purple, retail value: $100) in time for Valentine’s Day, just for leaving her comment on our post.
Ella’s advice for keeping her relationship humming along in the bedroom? “Communication, honesty, and knowing when to give each other space.”
We like that idea, and now Ella and her Valentine will be able to communicate with each other as much as they like with help from the We-Vibe II couples vibrator. (But Valentine’s Day is not the time for giving each other space, people!) More
