I said, “If you don't want to come toward me sexually, if you don't want to go deeper, I understand, and it's okay...

"But I'm ready for more, and I know you haven't been willing to opening up our marriage in the past, but I'm not asking this time. I'm telling you.

"I feel like I'm suffocating, and I'm going to unilaterally pursue other sexual connections.

"I don't not want to be married, I just don't want to be celibate.”

It wasn't just the words I was saying that Kurt heard. It was the clarity.

And I could never have predicted what it would bring forward in him.

I'd broached the topic many times before.

We'd worked for years on our sexual connection. Our first mind-blowing Tantra workshop was just a year into our relationship, in the late 90s.

When we had sex, it was usually good, often amazing, and I was baffled as to why afterward, he would avoid it so much.

I made clear that even though

....I don't have time to get on hook-up apps

...I don't have a desire to cultivate another relationship

...I don't have energy to navigate multiple relationships

....I know it's going to be messy to have sex with other people and keep investing in our relationship

It felt like a vital choice for me, like a drowning woman's choice to swim toward the surface before her lungs give out.

Once I made that clear, Kurt later told me, he could no longer keep deceiving me or himself. Over the next week or two, he revealed to me a host of ways that he had avoided intimacy with me while pursuing sexual gratification in secretive ways. It had usually only involved pornography or fantasy. But sometimes he involved other people. Sometimes people I knew. Sometimes riskier behaviors.

I was enraged. I was heartsick. I was confused. But when this man, who I love so much, finally came clean with me, I also felt a return of a sort of light, like “All right. Now we can get somewhere.”

I share this very raw, vulnerable experience with you with Kurt's permission. The reason that we're willing to publicly admit these details that are so embarrassing to us both is that we know that we are not alone.

It is profoundly common for couples to experience sexual dry spells.

One or more of the people in many relationships are

sexually avoidant
terrified of intimacy
survivors of attachment wounds
survivors of sexual trauma
bearers of generational relationship patterns

In fact, these burdens are more common than uncommon. Most couples have some spot where sex or communication or emotional closeness gets stuck because of something from the past or something being hidden in the present.

Because these problems are such an epidemic, and because we are finding our way through them, we want to name them. There is no "finish line," no triumph. But there is a journey, and it's pretty exhilarating.

We are transparent so we can help people know that they're not alone. I won't say I want to normalize pornography, sex addiction, sexual avoidance, intimacy anorexia or unaddressed trauma, because they shouldn't be normal.

I do want to normalize turning and facing the challenge. We, together, want to make commonplace the practice of deliberately healing it.

It's normal, when you're in a long-term relationship, to create a home together, complete with landscaping and furnishings, right?

In that same way, I want it to be really normal for couples to excavate their histories around love & s3x. I want every couple to discover the drivers of their current avoidance and compulsion around connection and eroticism. so they can enjoy love and pleasure in full bloom, unhindered by legacy burdens from generations past and from prior painful experiences.

I want you to know that no matter what you've been through, no matter how mysterious the stuckness or sexual obstacles between you, you can, as we did, get to the bottom of it.

You can focus on your side of the fence and get really clear on what you desire and on what you're willing to do to create the kind of relationship you deserve.

You can find your voice and use it to call your partner forward, to invite forward the best in them.

I know what doesn't work, and today I enjoy the fruits of having learned professionally and then in my own marriage, what does work. It all starts with one person.

And that's why I have created my new RECEIVE program. It's relationship and s.x mentoring just for women (defined inclusively). Those who joined the waitlist have heard about the program, but after them, you're the first to know. Registration is now open. This is how I help one woman singlehandedly elevate her relationship(s).​

Thanks for reading this far. If you missed any of the other messages in this series, you can read them here:

1. ​"From fighting all night to resolving conflicts with ease"​
2. ​"The sure-fire way to feel like your spouse's parent"​
3. ​"I would've left if it weren't for this"​
4. ​"I was allergic to being happy"​
5. ​"I thought my body was wrong"​
6. ​"My body felt betrayed by the times I'd said yes when she meant no"​

Love love,

P.S.: We just opened registration for my new relationship & s.x mentorship program for women: RECEIVE. Learn more and be the first to know when doors open.​

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Michele Lisenbury Christensen, MA Host of the Sex.Love.Power Podcast Love & Sex Coach for women, men, and couples ​ ​lisenbury.com​