Ok, this good girl is blushing right now, but I’m hitting publish anyway!!
I am thrilled to welcome Sheila Wray Gregoire here today. She is a Christian speaker, columnist, and author. She loves speaking about marriage, parenting, and keeping our eyes on Jesus. She lives in Ontario, Canada, with her husband of 20 years and her two daughters, whom she homeschools. You can find her blogging at To Love, Honor, and Vacuum.
She has written 5 books and has just released her latest title, The Good Girl’s Guide to Great Sex!!
I love the way that Sheila is able to delve into a sensitive topic and speak with frankness, biblical wisdom, and grace. Thank you, Sheila, for laying it all out there for us!!
This is a great go to book if you need any ideas or advice on the topic of sex!
I was able to ask Sheila some questions on some of the topics covered in her book. Here is our interview:
Joy: What are you best quick tips to help a woman get in the mood?
Sheila: We women need to realize that sex is primarily in our brains. We don’t work like men. Men are aroused before they make love; we women aren’t usually aroused until we start. So if you’re waiting to start panting in order to make love, your sex life will become awfully rare!
But because sex is primarily in our brains, we can then take a bit of control. Make sure you can concentrate! If you have a ton of stuff going on in your brain, bouncing around like a pinball machine, get it out before you start to make love. Talk. Go for a walk with your husband. Tell him, “I don’t need you to solve anything; I just need to get all this out so that I can be fully there with you later.” That will get his attention!
Then, do the things that make you feel close to your husband throughout the day. Text him. Phone him. When you’re together at dinner time, kiss him. Often we stop kissing because we don’t want to promise something we may not want to do later, but then we lose something that makes us feel close to our husbands.
Finally, just think about sex in a positive way. We women can often think of reasons not to have sex–I’m tired, I’m grumpy, he’s been distant, the kids will be up early–but let’s put as much energy into thinking of reasons to have sex! How about: sex helps you sleep. If you’re exhausted, make love, because you’ll fall asleep faster and sleep deeper. It makes you feel closer to your husband. It makes you feel more intimate. It can be relaxing. All of those things are great
Joy: What is your best advice to the woman who wants to enjoy sex with her husband, but has issues from her past that keep her from doing so?
Sheila: This is such a common problem. Whether it’s past abuse or past relationships, we can bring a lot of baggage into marriage. And when I conducted my surveys for The Good Girl’s Guide to Great Sex, I found that one of the biggest sources of baggage was having sex with the man you did marry before the wedding. It isn’t just past partners that can haunt you; it’s sex with the man who is now your husband. You feel guilty about it. Sometimes it was too quick and you didn’t feel any pleasure, and now you doubt you can. All kinds of things can hinder our ability to truly enjoy sex now.
In the book I talk quite a bit about how to walk through this, but I think the main healing comes from recognizing again that sex is not primarily a physical thing. It is an emotional and spiritual connection. And if you can work on that true intimate connection while you make love, sex can take on new meaning. It isn’t something degrading, or disgusting, or shameful, or even just mildly unpleasant. It can be something truly beautiful.
So spend some time just touching each other while you’re naked together. Don’t worry about actually making love; just spend fifteen minutes when you touch each other when you’re not allowed to do anything else. Feel how intimate it is, and how your body can start to respond just from feeling love.
And then pray about it. It sounds really corny to pray before sex, but God does know what you’re doing, and He made it to be wonderful for you. So pray first. The more connected we feel spiritually, the more sexually drawn to each other we will be. Even read a Psalm together every night before you go to bed. As you begin to let God into this part of your relationship, you’ll feel more how much it is blessed and how much it actually is sacred. And that’s the key to actually being able to enjoy it on all levels.
Thank you SO much Sheila for sharing with us today! I pray that this information will help all of us in our marriages today! If you want lots more great advice from Sheila on this topic, go get her book, The Good Girl’s Guide to Great Sex!!
Thoughts to share?
