The organization was founded by Belah Rose who saw the crisis of marriages everywhere and wanted to ring the bell of HOPE! She heard a speaker admonish the listeners: “Don’t decide what you want to do with your life based on what others think you should, the money, or even ‘the sure thing.’ Instead, answer the question: ‘What is the work that needs to be done?'” For Belah, Delight Your Marriage was the resounding answer to that question.

Marital Health Assessment

When you’re not sure why things aren’t changing, and you feel you’re throwing darts in the dark — it’s vital you know where you’re standing right now to improve strategically.

DYM Ep36: Understanding the Female Orgasm with Dr. Jessica McCleese - Delight Your Marriage

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Hi there! Belah here. Today is Part II of my interview with Dr. Jessica McCleese of enhancingthedance.com where she mainly talks about the wonders of the female orgam, how it works, and why it is the way it is. You might think that something is off whenever you don’t feel like engaging in the act of sexual intimacy with your husband, but there’s actually nothing to worry about because that’s completely normal, according to this psychologist and sex therapist. She discusses the reasons on this episode! Join us as she shares helpful tips and tricks that could be helpful in delighting your marriage.

Check out Part I at delightyourmarriage.com/35

Scripture/Quote:

“As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another.” Proverbs 27:17

“Wait for the LORD; be strong and take heart and wait for the LORD.” Psalms 27:14

You’ll Discover:

Why we misunderstand the female orgasm and how men and women should understand what is actually going on!
How science can help understand why a woman like cuddling…way more than you would have thought
The three chief ingredients that Dr. Jessica McCleese practices in her marriage
How your belief affects how you interpret everything that happens around you
How to shift your perspectives and be more positive to help your marriage grow
How being encouraging toward your partner can work wonders on your marriage
TIPS for sexual intimacy!
How sex is a reflection of how we feel in a relationship, in general.
How this hormone plays a HUGE role in the phenomenon which is the female orgasm
Why women take much longer to “get in the mood” than men

Books & Resources Mentioned:

The Confirmation Bias

The Gestalt Theory

Covenant Lovers website, or you can go to Atrium Psychology

A Celebration of Sex: A Guide to Enjoying God’s Gift of Sexual Intimacy by Dr. Douglas Rosenau

Sexual Intimacy in Marriage by William Cutrer and Sandra Glahn

When Two Become One: Enhancing Sexual Intimacy in Marriage by Christopher and Rachel McCluskey (especially helpful for anyone in the Catholic tradition)

Tweetables:

Sex is just a part of a relationship, but it is an important portion.
Sex is a reflection of how we feel in our relationship in general.
Aim to see the positive in your spouse.
Working on a part of your relationship really means working on all of it.
The truth is, sex is so much more than just something he hopes to get from you. It really is a bonding experience.
For women, even though the sex is great and they love orgasm and they love that part, the best part is still those moments before.
God reveals so much of Himself in marriage.
Women take a little bit longer to warm up sometimes. It takes about 15-20 minutes of foreplay before they get in the mood.
Wait for things to happen because God is moving.

Thanks for listening! I hope you are encouraged to live in wholehearted intimacy!

Love,

Belah

—

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Transcript

0:00
Gillette, your marriage episode 36.

0:04
Welcome to the delight your marriage podcast, the show where you hear from amazing and inspiring wives sharing their struggles, triumphs, and advice for this journey called marriage. Here’s your host belah rose. Hello, hello

0:21
and welcome. God bless you, I hope that you are having a great day. Now I am thrilled to share with you today’s broadcast. Now first of all, let me mention that my next webinar, which is basically soup to nuts how to make him a wild with desire for you, his dear wife, I want to invite you personally delight your marriage.com/webinar go there as soon as you can, to sign up because there is limited space, I’m only a permitted a certain amount to get on the webinar, and even only a certain amount to sign up. So please do that as soon as possible. Again, drive him wild with desire. Now, today, I have got the second half of my awesome interview with Dr. Jessica MacLeish. She is a sex therapist. And she really packs some great information. In the second part, if you haven’t listened to the first part, she actually goes through her story which is riddled with some sadness, absolute sadness about sexual abuse and some other, you know, difficulties even up to the present day, but she’s so willing to share today she gives us some awesome insights about female orgasm and what it means when a woman is like, not really in the mood tonight, how she can get past that in a really practical way. And I share something that I learned LIS literally just the other day that has really helped in my own intimacy. So I’m just excited. What you’re going to learn and discover maybe about yourself that you had no clue about before now. So listen in. Again, delight your marriage.com/webinars Sign up before it’s too late. I’d love to see you there live. Okay, God bless you. We’ll talk on the other side.

2:14
I would love to switch gears and kind of if you could share about how things have kind of progressed and what your marriage looks like now and and how you feel if you could share, like how you feel in intimacy now that you’ve been through this process.

2:28
Sure, sure. And yet things are quite a bit different. Yeah, I don’t mind initiating. Yeah, it’s a you know, it has changed that the beautiful thing about it is when you realize that intimacy really is a gift from God, all of a sudden, you can get to that place where it’s not just a physical act. And man, people tried to describe sex in so many ways, right? It’s the glue that holds you together, and and then they try to come up with all these analogies. But I don’t think in our finite minds, we can do that, really. So sex is a part of the relationship. And it is not the most important part at all. In fact, if you think of all the time that you have together, the time that you’re actually having sex is a relatively small amount of time. You can your 24 hour day, and 52. You know, it was 52 hours in a week. But no, that’s not right. But you know,

3:21
yeah, yeah, there’s that. Right, that’s right, whatever it is, it’s much smaller percentage, you’re totally

3:28
just a portion of it. But it is an important portion. It’s an important portion. And you know, what I’ve realized in couples is that, that when their sex lives aren’t going so great, they have a hard time connecting and other areas as well. So it’s a very important piece, but again, just a piece, it’s a part of the package. So I would say you know, the best thing about really starting to understand how wonderful intimacy can be is that that comes over and other parts of your life. Certainly understanding what God says about sex makes your sex life better, and that it makes your marriage better. So the sex life is part of it. But when you start seeing Gosh, my you know, my God wants me to delight in my spouse. And it’s not just about sex, all of a sudden, you’re not just loving on your spouse or delighting your spouse when you’re orgasm together. Now as it is I you know, I really delight in my spouse when we go sit at coffee and read a book together and write together I mean, our nose in our own book, and everyone’s while commenting on it. So, you know, it’s wonderful. I can sit back and watch him cook dinner sometimes and just think, man, I’ve got a I’ve got a really great husband and God has really blessed me. I just had an instance actually sitting at a family dinner that was a large well, not even a dinner. It was my brother’s birthday party. A large event won louder and more crowded than we prefer. But I remember just sitting back and looking at my husband and thinking my goodness, so much has changed in the three years since he brought me back to town. taxes. And he’s taught me a lot. He’s taught me a lot about grace and about love. And all of those are things that you can learn through having a healthier intimacy and a healthier sexual relationship. Because you know, when you feel like you’re being used in a sexual relationship, it’s not going to end there, either, you’re going to feel like that outside of the bedroom also. So sex is a reflection of how we feel in our relationship in general. So if it’s not going well, oh, my goodness, work on it, work on it and aim for the best, because? Because it does really seem to be a reflection of your relationship in general.

5:33
Wow. Yeah. That’s very cool. Yeah. And so a couple of things. I love that you talked about that. When your sexual connection is good, you start to being able, that’s kind of frees up space that now you can work on things that you didn’t even have the almost like the Yeah, the space to really be able to dive into otherwise, is that kind of what you were saying about, you know, if it’s good, it kind of helps you be able to get better in other areas, too.

5:59
Yeah, absolutely. I really like that the freeing up space. And yeah, absolutely. Because you’re right, it can become over encompassing when that’s, you know, and like, for instance, when I was first married, and thinking about how it was being used all the time, that during intimacy, I mean, I thought that constantly anything that I was asked about, or anything that was said to me, I, you know, I felt that. So yeah, I think absolutely, you’re right, it frees up space to realize, kind of where you really stand with one another, I guess, and then help you to see the positive in one another.

6:34
I just think that’s brilliant. You’re so right. I mean, I was just recently kind of thinking about this. And that resentment, that bitterness will follow you everywhere. And obviously, you live with this person, you spend a lot of time with this person, maybe they’re responsible for your kids or any other, you know, aspect of your life, the bills, everything, like once that resentment gets going, my goodness, it’s so easy to just be that fire of resentment and bitterness. And then every experience and interaction you’re having, it’s just more of those, almost like proofs that oh, they’re just, they just care all about themselves, then they don’t care about me. And, and it goes that way. It’s interesting, because so on my first marriage, because this is what I was reflecting on, you know, that’s the way I saw him in every area, because definitely, I saw him in that the intimate area in that way. But I’m interested, because now the dynamic is so so different in this marriage, where I’m so delighted and excited to have intimacy and I’ve learned just so much of God’s holiness, and purposes in it, that I’m excited about it. I’m excited that this is one of his deepest needs. And I want to fulfill that and feel fulfilled myself. And then we go on in this life together. I mean, it just, it’s a strange thing that maybe a shift in perspective, or how would you kind of qualify that? How would you talk about that difference?

7:55
Yeah, you know, I think a shift in perspective is right. And there’s a concept and called the confirmation bias, and it comes out as social psychology. And the idea is that whatever your belief is, anything you see is going to give you evidence to that belief. So in other words, if I feel like my husband is using me, then if he asks me to pick up dinner on the way home, I’m going to feel that there too, yeah, see, there’s proof no is using me. But if instead I say, Well, gosh, you know, my husband loves me a lot. If he asked me to pick up dinner on the way home, I’m just going to take that as Oh, well he must not have time. But now we get to sit down and eat together I get home. So the same situation, vastly different response because it depends on your perspective. So we can it can choose how we see the world in some ways, but we’re greatly influenced by our past and how we see the world. So part of it is waking up and saying okay, I’m going to see things differently I’m going to work towards this. But knowing that sometimes it takes a little bit of work if I decided on the day my marriage which I thought I had that I was going to be fully devoted in love my husband with all my heart. Yeah, you know, maybe would have helped if I said that every day and kept reminding myself but some of it it took getting past those old ugly influences that showed me that my momentary thoughts at the altar maybe weren’t right. So you know, part of it really is aiming to see the positive in your spouse. And remembering that even when these other things seem to contradict that a little bit you know the truth because we don’t expect perfection right? We can’t expect perfection from our spouse because my goodness, we can’t give that to them. So we can write perfection but we can expect really doggone good and so we can look at them and keep expecting good and and I think that helps but you’re right it’s a perspective switch for sure.

9:46
Yeah. Yeah, yeah, I just yeah, thanks for thanks for mentioning that confirmation bias. That’s brilliant. I noticed in me so I tried to go running in the morning either in the park or at the gym. I try to do some physical While I’m talking to God and, and I always try, I’ve got a habit that I’ve developed over the years, just of every time I glance up at the sky trying to thank God for something. And just because I feel like that’s an open window to God. And, and, and I noticed though when I don’t do those things in the beginning of the day, suddenly, I haven’t even noticed all the good things in my life, I haven’t noticed how grateful I am for, for my husband and for my kids and for this apartment and for the food that we’re eating, and for the friends that we have in the church that we have, and the family and all these things that really are great things in my life, and I would miss them sorely. If they went away tomorrow, I would so so missed them. And yet, we don’t take the time often to remember and thank God for them. So I love that you kind of set it in that if if we’re looking to confirm something, so often it will be confirmed. So so why not kind of decide that early and often that we are going to confirm the good things that the blessings that we’ve been given. Now, I think we have to couple that I guess, I’ve got so many more questions for you. But I want to ask you, when you hear of couples that are really going through the wringer and their sexuality is bad. I mean, of course, every every situation is different. But if they spent time just focusing on their sexuality, is that going to kind of tie them over to work on everything else? Or would you have to say? Obviously, there are things that you just can’t say sex needs to be worked on? First and foremost, how would you kind of figure that out in terms of priority if a couple’s going through figuring out that?

11:35
Yeah, sure. And you’re right, every situation is different. So this is, of course, a general explanation of that. But in general, I’ve seen people do blogs about, you know, seven steps to make your sex life better. And all this in. And the truth is, it’s just, it’s just not separate, it’s really not. And it’s a piece of our relationship, it’s an important piece, it’s a small piece, we look when we look at the time that’s put into it, but it’s not separate. So they’re thrown out all these psychology terms, so apologize for that. But there’s this theory, called Gestalt in what the idea behind the theory behind the theory is that if you take these little pieces, and they just don’t mean as much they don’t hold as a metric carries much weight is if you take those pieces together as a whole, it’d be like a puzzle, you can hold all the pieces in, or you can hold half of the pieces in your hand. But until you have the whole, it’s it, they’re just pieces. And so I think sometimes we try to take sex and we think, Well, gosh, if sex was better, maybe we’d get along better, or we’d have a party, or we would do this and that. Or if we had sex more often, or if we had sex left less often for some. But the truth is that just that’s just a portion of it. It’s just one part of your relationship. Yes, an important part, but just apart. And so you really can’t separate sex. And even when people come to me thinking, well, we just need to work on our sex lives. The truth is, you need to work on you. You need Yeah, ship. So you know, God doesn’t do that, to us, he doesn’t put us for this is, you know, this is the Christian piece. This is a psychology piece. This is a wife, this is a mom, every piece of us is all together. And we stand before God like that. And so really, that’s how we are in relationship with one another to it’s hard to see it sometimes in our own brokenness, but we stand whole before one another. And so our sexual relationship is a part of that wholeness, but, but working on any part of your relationship really does mean working on all of it.

13:41
Yeah, that’s just brilliant. It’s just so true. Yeah, it’s just so true in my life, in the lives I’ve seen, it really is. I mean, you bring all of you into the bedroom, everything that you are, all of your selfishness, all of your distractions, all of the food choices you made that day. You know,

14:00
yeah, that’s funny that you say that, because it I didn’t really describe it like that. At first when we were talking about, you know, when I first got married, and our sex lives are tough, but gosh, it was tough. Like, yeah, man, that first year was tough. It we could have blamed it on any number of things. But the whole thing was just doggone tough because I wasn’t in a place where I could give all of myself and so my husband was having to be married to half of a wife, I guess, or a portion of a wife. And yeah, it all in. So, you know, I mean, it’s definitely true. Anytime we’re struggling with anything in our relationship, we need to examine the whole part, not just the one little piece that we can see in front of us.

14:42
Yeah, that’s so good. Yeah, it’s almost like the little piece that we see is the fruit and then we’re we’re trying to clip off the fruit when when the the bad root or the bad soil or something more. Something deeper. Yeah. Wonderful. Okay, cool. Well, I hate to move on but I need to do I asked you, what do you think the three chief things that have been central to your marital success? So far?

15:07
30 things? Well, yeah, gosh, that’s a good question. I would say, first of all, we really kind of fight for our marriage. And we fight hard for one another. So it’s not none Mississippi like we’re barely holding on. And we’re trying to fight. Just when value marriage, and we talk about it with one another, and we talk about it with other people. And so neither one of us are it all strangers to having people joke marriage, or talk badly about marriage, or talk badly about their spouse. But we make sure we don’t do that. We tell people how proud we are to be married. I just told someone recently, she said she was scared of marriage. And I said, Oh, sweetheart, don’t be it’s a fantastic way to spend your life. It’s, you know, people get all worked up, sometimes about how hard marriage is. And we’re honest about it. We’re like, Yeah, it’s not for the faint of heart. But it’s fine. And you should do it. Yeah. So I would say that’s a big one, you know, we we fight hard for our marriage. A second one, I would say, our problems or issues, the things that we have to work through. Now I’m sharing one now that we have worked through, but yeah, but the things that we need to talk about, we talk about amongst ourselves. If I have a problem with my spouse, my friends are not going to know about it. First, he’s going to know, and we’re going to work through it together. And same thing with me if he has, you know, an issue or an annoyance with me, he’s gonna let me know not as buddies. So we talk about that stuff between ourselves first and foremost. And then I think, you know, talking about intimacy is really good, too. And we definitely do that. And whenever we feel like we need to, because there’s some kind of an issue, or sometimes just we bring it up and say, Hey, let’s see, let’s talk some things out and see what we’re doing well, and what we’re doing. Maybe it could use some improvement. And you know, my treating you with respect that sort of Yeah, so, so both emotional intimacy, and you know, physical intimacy, I would say, definitely make sure that you talk about that with your spouse, mechanic, get on the same page with one another. do workshops together, buy books together good Christian books, not, you know, anything great. Yeah. But yeah, but yeah, I would say do things to build your marriage. Because, you know, it’s a day to day commitment. It’s not a commitment you make just one time in being one while while we sometimes recognize it, like I spoke of that moment earlier, why I really realized, wow, I want truth as being one as a becoming also it doesn’t just happen because you get married, it happens because you work it and you make it happen. So yeah, I would say those are those are kind of sense in Vegas.

17:43
Yeah, no, that’s, that’s great. Now a couple of things I wanted to pull out from what you said was, how you fight hard for one another you value marriage. And I just love that and, and that also that the two of you are those the first, I mean, any communication that’s happening about the marriage that it doesn’t first go filter through your friends opinions, or ideas or whatever, it’s going first to your partner, which is awesome. And you also mentioned that you’re doing things to build the marriage, I love that phrase, build your marriage, it’s just, it’s such a better picture of something that you’re doing day in and day out, you’re building this masterpiece of life together, which is, oh, it’s so good. And I remember early on in my marriage, with my husband, D and I call him D on the podcast. But he, he and I both kind of because we both had had previous marriages. And we both kind of had this like, kind of this fear of okay, everything, every time we have an argument, it’s just ticking bomb until you know, everything is gonna explode, and we’re all gonna go our separate ways or whatever. And that was a really key part in our marriage was to realize no, we are building something day by day. It’s not, you know, when it’s not this tenuous going to break apart at any moment. It’s building, you’re building a house, you’re building this huge structure together. And every experience matters. And I think that was also something that I didn’t understand in my past marriage where, you know, every critical argument, every critical thought, these patterns, these habits that were negative, it just didn’t seem to matter. And then all of a sudden, we’re left without any anything, we’re left without anything because we, you know, and the opposite was like tearing it down, day in and day out. So brilliant stuff. Now, I wanted to ask you, we’ve talked a lot about tips and intimacy so far, but if you’re comfortable if you could share a tip or advice specifically about sexual intimacy that maybe a wife could implement tonight, what could you give us?

19:42
Sure. Let’s see something that could be implemented tonight. And you know, I think sometimes we just forget the basic concepts of encouraging one another. Yeah, so that can happen inside and outside of the bedroom. But specifically for wives we forget sometimes because Yeah, we expect our husbands are so big and strong. And the truth is they, they really do need that encouragement from us. So I would tell you today to night, and find a way to encourage your spouse, and maybe even initiate sex tonight, if you can, and encouraged him in that let them know how good it was give them something specific not, you know, not just a high five at the end or something. Yeah, a baby, when you did this, that was really great. Nobody’s done well, because men, men love that. And he will love to hear that from you. And it’ll also let them know that you’re not feeling used, because you’re willingly giving yourself to Him. And just really enjoying that moment with him. So I would say that’s something that you can implement tonight and be encouraging. And if, for whatever reason you can’t initiate sex tonight, you don’t have to to be encouraging, you can encourage in other ways as well. So find a way to do that tonight. And just let your spouse know how much you love them. And give them a specific a specific detail of what you love about him.

21:01
Yeah, that’s really good. Instead of just a baby, you’re greener. Yeah, it was great, honey, no worries. I like that a lot. Yeah. One thing my husband encouraged that I was shocked about was he Well, and now we do it every time almost is we’ll ask each other what our favorite part was. Yeah. Yeah. And that was like a brilliant. For me. It was mind blowing, like, oh, I guess we could talk about that couldn’t wait. And then and then you learn you learn what they like, they learn what you like, and you know, it just kind of as as positive thing. And yeah, but I love that. You mentioned the specifics. That’s very key. Absolutely. Now I remember actually, now that I’m thinking about my questions that I sent, you was actually the question was, What tip? Could you share that you wish someone let you in on earlier? And I’m wondering, was there a different answer for that one?

21:53
Well, yeah, actually. Okay, we’ve talked about it a lot already. But my tip would just be that sex is for the woman also, because I you know, I really just didn’t believe that at first, and, but that it is, and what’s really weird, okay, here’s a factoid for you and interesting little women, we, we all release oxytocin. And oxytocin is that little hormone that makes us so close to one another, makes us feel all cuddly. So women release a greater amount of it during foreplay. And so that’s why foreplay is really important for a woman. Well, men release release their greatest amount of oxytocin at orgasm. And so this, this theory, I think, that some women have sometimes have it’s for demand is because, because, man, I’m sure a lot of guys after orgasm, they are really cuddly, and they love you so much. Yeah. And sometimes the women are a little standoffish, because maybe they haven’t had enough foreplay. Which, by the way, there’s another tip too. If you’re not getting enough foreplay, ask your man to hold off a little bit and slow him down a little bit and enjoy that foreplay because that it’ll help you both enjoy the sexual relationship more. And the interesting thing is, is well, while in some ways, yes, sex is a release for a man in in, that’s true in some ways. But the other part of that is he really genuinely enjoys being with you. And not just because of an orgasm, but because physically, his body is releasing oxytocin and he feels closer to you than any other time is when he’s had that moment with you. So keep that in mind that he you really are bonding yourselves to one another. And I was never told that before Mary Yeah, you know, and I would, it sounded just like it was rules. And you have to do this. And your man may leave if you don’t do this, and but the truth is, sex is so much more than than just something that he hopes to get from you. It really is a bonding experience.

23:54
Oh, I just love that. What a great factoid thank you for well, it’s so so the husband releases the most, or the most oxytocin that he feels are guesses released into his blood is at the point of orgasm for him. And for the wife, the most is actually dumped into her bloodstream during foreplay. Is that what that’s what it is? That he that is no cool. Yeah. It’s interesting

24:19
how God puts us in a relationship like that, where we, we have to help one another out. Yes. So it really isn’t about you. It’s about your spouse, but at the same time, it is about you. Yeah, it’s an interesting little place. God fits us.

24:34
Yes. Well, and I also love that because I think a lot of women, I think I felt this way myself is just, I feel like orgasm is a wonderful experience. And I really enjoy that that part of the gift but at the same time, you know, every now and then I’m just like, I’m not really I don’t need that to be okay with the experience that we’ve had. And I love that now I understand it’s because I’m already feeling all that oxytocin And I’m sure there’s, there’s some kind of a release happening with orgasm for females. Okay, just not as bad. Okay, that is so funny because

25:09
when women and men are surveyed that that’s kind of a response that you get overall, you have something or, you know, a mentor asked, What do you love most about sex? And they’re kind of like, what are you? What do you mean? Apart? Right? And for women, if you ask, they have all this build up and all this excitement of Oh, and he says, when he does this, and he touches me here, an orgasm isn’t usually their response. Right? That’s not all men and women are like that, of course. But that’s those general terms. But yeah, for most women, they just enjoy that foreplay so much more, because that’s where arousal builds, and that’s where their bodies are feeling really good. And, and that’s where they’re releasing the most oxytocin so they feel most bonded. At that moment, even though the sex is great, and they love that part. And they love orgasm. The best part is those moments before.

25:57
See, that is so good. And those wise husbands that are listening will take note. When she’s asking you to slow down, it’s because that’s her favorite part. And that’s going to make her want the experience more often and more frequently, if that’s, you know, what the man is craving, which generally is the case, so? Ooh, that’s so good. Jessica, thank you for that. So full of great tips. Okay, well, cool. Well, I’d love to ask kind of the question on, you know, due to your specific marriage, and, you know, the challenges that you’ve had, and you shared, you know, a heartbreaking challenge that you’re still going through, and, I mean, what opportunities have you had to serve God to get to know him through your marriage?

26:39
Sure. You know, I think we just learn more about God through marriage. And I said earlier, something about you know, iron sharpens iron. And yeah, I didn’t know until I was married, and not right away, because I had to work through my kind of garbage there. But so I didn’t realize till quite some time afterwards. But man, God just reveals so much of himself through marriage. So we learn, we learn what it’s like to deal with sometimes, and maybe feeling a little broken or feeling like we don’t quite, you know, made up which is what we go through with God also, and, and we can learn what it’s like to just step back and say, Okay, well, if you say this about me, if you say I’m beautiful, even though I don’t feel it, then I’ll go ahead and take that and say that it’s true. So I think we can just sit back and just learned so much about God and about how he wants to be close to us. And even the way Scripture describes that, you know, he’s waiting on his Bridegroom and, or the, we’re waiting on the bridegroom, and we’re the bride and, and then he’s gonna one day join us to him, I think it’s just such a beautiful picture. So marriage kind of gives us a look of what our relationship with God should ultimately be one day. It’s not there yet. But I think that’s why it’s so important to work on your marriage and to let your spouse work on you and grow you and for you to grow in that process. Because there’s a bonding that happens it really is, it just almost can’t be explained with words. It’s something that you kind of have to feel and be a part of, kind of like God, like we can’t necessarily give all these explanations to why we’re Christians or why we believe in God or the things that Yeah, but we can still it we can know it’s true. And I think that’s what marriage is supposed to be to is sometimes, even, you know, when we’re feeling a little bit doubtful maybe that how things are going or we’re feeling like there’s struggles that we don’t know if we’ll get past. And sometimes we just have to rest in that truth that God is bringing us through and he’s gonna help us out. And his ultimate goal for us is to stay with our spouses. That being said, That’s of course in a healthy marriage, if you know if you’re being abused that brings in all kinds of other situations, but ultimately, you’re in a healthy marriage. Definitely. God wants us to stay committed to one another and to love one another. And to continue becoming one and he just teach us so much about himself during that process.

28:54
Yes, yes. That’s all I have. Yes, that’s right. You know, I just I realize there’s one other thing I wanted to agree with something you said earlier also about the foreplay thing, it’s just a tip that I realized recently that sometimes I feel and this goes along with everything that we’ve talked about, but sometimes I feel like this pressure of like, okay, I know sex is important for us it’s important for you it’s important for me but I just don’t feel this you know, sense that I can do this right now. And it’s interesting it just just the other day I had that feeling and I was like what, how can I get through this and and again, now that you’ve given this tip about the oxytocin release about the foreplay what was helpful what ended up being really helpful for me was to kind of just be okay with that and be okay with the fact that I only want to cuddle and and and what ended up happening was after we started cuddling, I’ve then I was able to actually engage but I I took off that pressure of love Like we have to do something right now. And anyway, that might be a tip for someone out there that can can kind of talk this through their husband or let him you know, listen to this podcast and let him understand a little bit more of sometimes the pressure is just too much. And then, but then if you get that release that oxytocin release during the foreplay, it might be something to kind of get you going. Do you have thoughts on that as well? I

30:22
think you’re absolutely right. So if the guys listening in, and don’t cuddle, hoping that it’ll be okay. It may not. Yeah, it would not at all be out of the norm for that to be the response. You’re absolutely right. Because that cuddling is sometimes all it takes to realize, hey, I think I do feel aroused. After all, I do want to be with you. And well, and also women just take a little bit longer to warm up sometimes. And so estimates are somewhere around 15 to 20 minutes usually have some kind of foreplay before they’re really feeling in the mood. So absolutely, absolutely. That is a great way if you’re not feeling in the mood thing, get in the mood to just cuddle up a little bit together and maybe make out a little and who knows that may put you there.

31:06
Cool. Cool. Yeah, that’s great. I like that you said that, you know, don’t have that expectation, like don’t feel resentful if it doesn’t end up happening. But it definitely could. Oh, with a capital C, it really good. Awesome. Okay, well, so then Can you recommend a book or a program to a listener that might be going through some of the things that you’ve shared already? Sure,

31:29
I actually, I have a few that I really love. So there’s one called covenant lovers, that’s actually a program in I’ll get their website for you. It’s probably covenant lovers.org, I think. But there’s several people trained in that it’s part of an organization I’m a part of, as well. But if you’re interested in it, you can look on their website, and they can, they can tell you where workshop is happening. So that was actually a workshop that you attend with your spouse. And they just, they do a great job at helping increase the intimacy, and communication wise, but definitely, it’s really all about sex, and how to bond with your spouse. And in an intimate way like that, learning about erogenous zones learning about the differences between males and females. It’s just really fantastic. And it comes from a book called celebration of sex. So actually, that book is fantastic also, and you can definitely get that book and read it. And that’s by Dr. Rosen, owl and Dr. Neil. And so they have a great book, it’s got some pencil drawings in there of different sexual positions when you’re pregnant. And when you’re experiencing pain, and when you’re really sleepy. So it’s just practical and great. Check it out. And it also talks a little bit about any kind of sexual disorders that might be going, going on orgasm problems, erection problems, it’s all in there. So it’s a great book. So that’s one another really good one is called sexual intimacy in marriage. And it’s William to Tre, I think it’s how you say his name, and Sandra Bland gland, and a doctor and a therapist writing the book together. And so they talk a little bit about some medical issues and answer a lot of a lot of questions. Both of these are from a Christian perspective, really fantastic books. And then a final one. And especially if you come from the Catholic tradition, you would love this book. And it’s by Christopher and Rachel McCluskey, it’s called when to become one. And there are a couple that come out of the Catholic faith and they, but for anyone, it’s really good. But you just might find it really speaks to you if you have that same faith tradition, because they use a lot of their faith tradition within that book. And they talk about how to really bonded with one another, while making love and how to do that as a couple. And they talked about a whole love making cycle. And so they’re fantastic also, and I’ll make sure that you have links to all of those.

33:48
Awesome, yeah. And we’ll have that all on the delight your marriage website. I’m so glad that you mentioned the covenant lovers. And I think the.org is not the right one. It looks like.com might not be either, so

34:00
I’ll have it linked. Okay. Well, they might be working on it right now too. But it’ll be fixed by the time this is airing. So

34:05
yeah. Oh, perfect. Yeah. Okay, so I’ll have the right links and everything but that brilliant. I love the idea of the live workshop where you’re really learning to connect in a hands on way. That’s really nice. Um, okay, cool. Well, then, if you could go back to the first year of your marriage, and sit yourself down, what is one piece of advice that you would give to you?

34:26
Sure, you know, and I’ve already said, you know, some of the struggles we’re dealing with, but I go back to that scripture I had about waiting on the Lord and, and you can still move during that time, but just kind of sit back and wait, I have a tendency to push into rush and to try to make things happen that maybe aren’t supposed to be happening yet. That’s what I would tell myself and especially during that really hard year of man, I would blow up sometimes thinking this is the way to solve it, you know, our yell really loud, and that’ll help. Oh, sure. So I think you know, I would tell them Myself, Just wait, you know, just calm down, chill out, hold on, and wait, wait for things to happen because God’s moving. So that’s what I would say I would, I would hope that I would have a little more patience. If I can go back a year. Yeah, the first year in my marriage and try to start all over again.

35:19
Yeah, no, I hear that. Yep. Yep. So good. Well, where can our audience find you,

35:26
you can find me at www dot enhancing the dance.com. And when you go there, you’ll be able to connect with me on social media. So I’m on Twitter at Dr. mcleese. And I’m on Facebook. And they’re actually supposed to be changing that one too, enhancing the dance. Right now. It’s it Dr. mcleese, as well. But you can find those by going to my actual website, enhancing the dance.com. And I’ll have some webinars up there that you can look at and videos and things like that. So that would probably be the best place. And you can also contact me right on the website, I’ll get an email from you. And I answer all my emails myself. So you can feel free to ask any questions you have by going there.

36:08
I love that. And I love the name by the way. Yeah, and, and, and you also are moving to Virginia. So you’re going to start doing more Skype counseling, I mean, could someone reach out to you if they’re interested in counseling with

36:21
you, and they can, there’s actually a tab for that on my website. So I have a consulting link where you can go and you can actually, you can start with a free consult, like I said earlier, I think you should be able to do that with any therapist. So if you think you might be interested on the actual homepage, there’s a place where you can schedule a free consult with me. And then I’ll get information from you when you do that, so that I can contact you. But you can set up a time and everything on there. And then if you’re interested in consulting, you can do that through the website as well. So there’s a tab where you can set up your consultation appointment. Also, I do recommend go ahead and do the free consult first see if you even like being online or if that feels comfortable for you. And and see if you’d like me.

37:05
Yeah, no, I love that. Well, I’ve actually done therapy via Skype before and myself. And it was it actually worked great. It’s so if anyone is, you know, concerned about anything, I mean, you don’t have to travel anywhere. It’s just, it gives a lot of ease. And you can tell Jessica is such a you know, open heart and such a giving spirit, she would be just a wonderful fit. I hope that that those that you know, have just felt this like desire to get your marriage in the right spot, and the spot that God wants it. It’s just it’s invaluable. To get the resources to go through the processes you need to to come out on the other side. And I think it’s beautiful that you were able to hear Jessica’s story from, you know, from the hurt and pain she experienced all the way up until today of how she’s actually able to get others on the other side of the very big mountain, she had to climb herself. So, so good. Well, Jessica, Dr. mcleese, thank you so much for everything you’ve given. Just been brilliant. Thank you so

38:03
much for letting me be a part of it. I absolutely love you. You’re such a sweetie. And so thank you for inviting, like I did myself in, but thank you.

38:14
It was mutual. Absolutely. It really was. Okay, well, God bless you. We’ll talk more soon. All right, thanks.

38:26
Wow, fantastic. Jessica, thank you so much. It’s just wonderful to get to know you better, and be able to talk about some of these really insightful things about how women experience sex and what it means when she’s like, actually, I would like to wait a little bit. And, you know, for the wise husband, he’ll understand that that’s how she enjoys the experience and getting close with you even more. So. I love this, make sure if you’re listening, if your husband and your wife needs some of this information, send it to her and vice versa. Also, keep in mind that if your friends are unaware of some of this stuff, or you would just like what Jessica talks about, if you just like some camaraderie in this arena, get it you know, start with just forwarding them this link, why not? You know, the worst you can do is is they decide they don’t want to talk about it openly. Okay, fine, at least you know, but why not start some of those conversations and start that companionship. And I’d love to see you on the webinar, delight your marriage.com/webinar it’s going to be a wonderful time. I’ve had some amazing feedback already. Actually, one wife came on the webinar and I offer a video course at the end where I ask women if they’d like to really know soup to nuts how to make their husbands wild for them and them only. That’s the video course. But anyway, I had a wife of 27 years purchase and then she said she’s so sweet. She said she’d like to purchase it for her daughter. And then she said she I’d like to purchase it for a stranger, just in case I knew someone in need, because she just knows this material is going to change lives. And I’m just so grateful for that. So please come on the webinar. I’m going to give you the keys the practicalities and answer questions that you might have about that video course because honestly, God is doing some really cool things through it already. Okay, we will see you there and God bless you, praying for you and and I’ll chat with you more on that webinar. Bye.

40:33
Thanks for joining. If you’ve been inspired by the show, would you help spread the word? If you take a moment to review and subscribe others can find us more easily. Find out how to delight your marriage.com forward slash iTunes. Until next time, live with love, wisdom and passion

DYM Ep36: Understanding the Female Orgasm with Dr. Jessica McCleese

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