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Heartache Transformed through uncomfortable honesty
Today, my guest is Jen Smith of The Unveiled Wife!
Scripture/Quote: Eph 4:12 “Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.”
Jen Smith of unveiledwife.com has been married for 8 years and has 1 son and another baby on the way! Her passion is motivating every post is to encourage other women in their role as a wife, focusing on the foundational principles about marriage revealed throughout the Bible.
Jen talks about the incredible struggle in sexual intimacy starting from their wedding night. But what began as an awkward and embarrassing first meeting turned into a marriage-saving experience.
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You’ll Discover:
- How Jen & her husband were not able to consummate their marriage for a long time.
- How she had such a difficult marriage, that both of them were ready to end it.
- How her willingness to be awkward and vulnerable in front of strangers helped.
- How her struggles with initiating intimately with her husband was actually rooted in her childhood.
- How so many relationships affect our marriage.
- The specific step-by-step process of how their marriage changed.
- How her expectations with God had to shift for her to be able to reunite with Him fully.
- How to step-by-step have a perspective shift with God.
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Tweetables:
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- “When you lack sexual intimacy in your marriage, it just amplifies every other issue that arises” tweet this
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- “God is glorified when we choose to stick together and stick it out even in the seasons of hardship and pain.” tweet this
- “It’s me being transparent in hopes of inspiring another wife to be transparent.”tweet this
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- “He allowed it to happen to teach us who we are and bring us closer to Him. We are way closer to Him now than we ever would have been” tweet this
- “If we had had a perfect life, we would have no need to get on our knees” tweet this
Jen Smith quote Links/Resources Mentioned:
Be sure to also check out Part II of Jen Smith’s interview: Episode 7!
Jen Smith quote
If you enjoyed this episode, would you leave us a review on iTunes? It will encourage me & it will help others find the podcast easier. Find out how at delightyourmarriage.com/itunes
Transcript
0:02
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.
0:19
Hello, and welcome. Thank you so much for joining me today. I hope all is going well with you and your life and your family and your marriage most of all. So I’m excited today, I just got an email Actually, I wanted to share with you. It’s someone that read my book, and he took the course online at to let your husband.com He and his wife read the book. And he said he read it in two days. And he said it’s fantastic. He wholeheartedly agrees with everything I wrote in there. And then he said, he’s actually a publisher and a bookstore owner in Germany. And so he’s wanting to see if I’d be interested in getting the book in German. So very cool. I’ll definitely let you know for any of our German listeners if and when the book is available in German. But anyway, I kind of wanted to share that with you. So I have on the show today, a really amazing lady. Her name is Jen Smith. And she is also an author. And her book is actually launching in just a couple of days. It’s called the unveiled wife. And Jen was so kind to let me read it before this show went live. And it is something special actually, I really think it’s going to help a lot of people. She’s so open and vulnerable. And I’m going to give a little bit of my thoughts on our next interview the next half of the interview. But yeah, you’d be surprised Jen hacks. Once you find her on online, she’s got a pretty significant following of women from all over the world. But you’ll listen, she’s a very humble and gracious lady. We talked even a little bit after the interview. And you can just sense her authenticity her. She’s so genuine. So anyway, I’m excited for you to hear her story. And she talks about the real challenge of sexual intimacy in her marriage from the get go. And I think that it’s going to be helpful for anyone out there who thinks that they might be all alone in this, figuring out what sex means in your marriage. Because no, there’s plenty of others who have been there you are definitely not by yourself on this one, honey. All right. Well, without further ado, here’s Jen. Welcome, delight your marriage listeners. I am so excited to be here with Jen Smith from unveiled wife. And welcome, Jen. I’m so glad
2:44
you’re here. Hi, thank you so much for having me. This is exciting.
2:48
Absolutely. It’s gonna be great. And Jen, would you go ahead and introduce yourself and share a little bit about your family and what your day to day life looks like?
2:59
Sure. So I just turned 29 years old. And right after that, me and my husband celebrated our eighth wedding anniversary. So he’s married for eight years, together for just over 10. And we have one little boy who is just my whole heart. He’s two years old. His name is Elliott. And we have another little on the way which we don’t know whether it’s a girl or boy yet, we’re gonna be surprised. And we’re so excited to you know, just be growing our family. And we’re just in that season of life. That’s kind of crazy and chaotic, but totally awesome. And yeah, that’s just a little bit about it.
3:40
That’s awesome. Was your first one a surprise. Also?
3:44
I know, I wanted to find out what we were having. And my husband didn’t. And so I, I won that. And I said, What’s with our next one, we will be surprised. And so he was patient enough to wait. And so when we found out we were pregnant again. We just decided that we weren’t going to find out. It’s pretty fun. I like having the two different experiences.
4:05
Yeah, yeah. Well, my husband, he and I had the same exact tug of war for our first son. And he one and then when it’s when I experienced the surprise, I was like, Oh, this is too good. So we did the second one a surprise too. So I love that you’re doing it a surprise. That’ll be fun.
4:23
Fun. That’s awesome. Yeah. Um,
4:26
so could you share with us a little bit about you and your husband’s personalities? how that looks?
4:31
Oh, I’m sure so I’m more reserved, quiet. He’s pulled me out of my shell a lot. But I I tend to be more of an introvert. He’s an extrovert. He is just very strong and his personality very opinionated, in a good way. And he loves to socialize. He loves to go out and do things where I tend to just want to stay home and relax. And but it’s good because we balance each other. So If we go out too often, I rein it in. And then if we’ve been in too much he pulls us out. So it’s exciting having the balance there with our personalities.
5:11
Mm hmm. Yeah, I love that. I love that. And this whole podcast is really about encouraging other wives in their marriages and their lives, and even in their walks with God. And so I’d be really interested in a scripture or a quote that has meant a lot to you over the years.
5:27
Oh, well, I mean, one of the ones that I have always claimed to you and my husband actually engraved it in my wedding band, is Ecclesiastes 412.
5:37
And I’m just going to break in here right quick and make sure the audience knows exactly the verse we’re talking about. So it says, though, one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves, a cord of three strands is not quickly broken. Okay, Jen, so tell me what this means in the context of your marriage.
5:57
And it’s such a beautiful depiction of marriage, but also community and how we need people in our lives, we need, you know, we need, we just need to rely on one another in marriage, and then in friendships, you know, other married couples come alongside us and say, We need help. And when we do that, and we go before God, it makes it, it makes life so much better, and so much easier to handle. It’s kind of like sharing the weight, sharing the load and the burden of just the day to day battles that we face. And we all face them.
6:28
I love that. I love that. I think that is so true. And when you’re relying on God for your marriage, and you’re, you know, together in that it’s, it’s so true. It’s just a much stronger bond. Yeah, that’s awesome. Well, I mean, you are just incredible at unveiled wife.com. You just encourage and inspire so many around the world. And it’s just an incredible thing to watch and follow. And I know that through reading some of your stories, it’s clear that this came from this wonderful vision came from some difficulty and some struggle in your lives and in your marriage. And so I’m really interested if you’d be willing to share that with our audience, because I can really inspire people, even the hardships in our lives, we can really help them because they might be going through the exact same thing.
7:18
Yeah, absolutely. We have a little bit of a unique story in that we were both virgins, when we got married, very eager to express ourselves fully with love and, and starting out that first night, you know, being married as husband and wife, we just could not come together, we just could not consummate our marriage, we I experienced a lot of pain every time that we tried to initiate sexually. And it was one of those things where we didn’t really know what to expect. And we had expectations, but we also didn’t know what would come of it. And my husband kind of laughed it off and say, Don’t worry, you know, it’ll probably just take a couple of days to get used to. But weeks turned into months turned into yours. And for three and a half years of, you know, the beginning of our marriage, I could count on one hand, how many times that we kind of came together it was it was awful. And when you lack in sexual intimacy in your marriage, it just amplifies every other issue that arises. And that’s exactly what we experienced. And so we we just went from day to day struggling. And I started isolating myself from my husband, because I didn’t want to anticipate the pain. So I was held. And then that just affected so many, so many other areas of our of our marriage. And so about the three and a half year mark, we are both ready to give up. You know, and I know that there’s people listening right now. And they might be in that situation or season of marriage where you feel like you’re at the end of your rope, you feel like you have nothing left to give, and there’s just no hope. And yet God saved us. God stepped in and through an invitation from my husband, he invited us to a marriage community group at at the church. And he said, at the time I even withdrew from God. So I wasn’t going on Sundays or anything and, and he said just come to this if not like regular church, and let’s just see what what it’s like. And at this point, I realized if I kept saying no to him, I was saying an ultimate no to our marriage, and it would be the end. And so we went on a Wednesday night. And we walked in and it was so awkward because all these couples are saying hi to each other and, you know, kind of knew each other. And here we are just completely broken. We we didn’t even want to talk to each other at that point. And we have a man came up and you know, asked if we were new and sat us down at his table. And that was the first time I’ve ever experienced anyone openly talking about marriage issues in a real way. People being transparent. And I truly believe that it was their bravery that inspired change in our hearts. and it didn’t happen right away. But we went back the next one day, and then one day after that. And I, I truly believe that their ability to be really real with us and transparent about their issues helped us open up about ours. And I was the first time that we had ever done that in three years. And there was so much healing that God allowed to take place during that time of just speaking, forced to hurt and the offenses and the issues that we were dealing with, and trying to seek help, you know, people giving us advice, or walking us through with prayer, and just really pointing us back to God and saying that we could not continue on without him. So if anyone is in that situation where they’re at their, you know, last rope, no hope just wanting to give up, I just encourage you to hang on another day, and ask God, even if you’re not really talking to God, right now, just just ask him a short prayer of help me, help me in my marriage, and give me hope for another day. And it’s amazing how a little bit of encouragement will help you get through that next day. And then you need a little bit more to get through the following day, but But God’s glorified when we stick, you know, stick together and stick it out, even through the seasons of hardship, and of pain. And he teaches a lot he teach, during that time, he teach me a lot about who I am. And the things that I was wrestling with in my heart, and, and being able to confront those issues really helped me in my role as a wife, you know, and being able to communicate certain things to my husband. And so I hope that’s encouraging for someone to hear.
11:38
Yeah, I mean, I’m just so grateful for your vulnerability and your willingness to be open about this, because this is such a common concern and struggle that people are just not talking about. And it’s in its source. I mean, it’s something that I went through in my first marriage actually, very, very similarly, where I just wasn’t able to enjoy the experience at all. And it was very painful. And it’s very interesting how the female brain works, because our physicality is so connected to our mental, you know, our insecurities or fears are so connected. So I’m interested, you know, especially with how that works. So, if you wouldn’t mind just kind of walking through. So I mean, the other thing I want to point out and pull out from this is that it was, even in the midst of, you know, your personality of being a little bit more reserved a little bit more, you know, holding back from social situations, it sounds like you were willing to go through the awkwardness of not knowing anyone in this space and walking in this room with all these people that probably you felt like they were all staring at you. And you know, who are the new couple that don’t even talk to each other. I mean, and I agree, it’s just something that if you are in a situation that’s anywhere similar, that it’s a challenge in your marriage, it’s worth it to go through that awkwardness and that uncomfort to then get to the other side. So anyway, can you kind of walk us through what it was like, after that meeting, and after going starting to go to those meetings?
13:16
Yeah, so it was very awkward. And it was hard, because, you know, sometimes when, when the topic did revolve around sexual intimacy, or just being closed in communication with your spouse, I would clam up. And I would get very emotional and just, I just wanted to weep, because I knew that that was such a hard thing in my marriage to do and other people were kind of like laughing about it, or, you know, sometimes making jokes just to make it light hearted. And that was that was really painful for me to experience. But yet through that awkwardness, the Lord revealed, revealed things to me like that it was necessary that I talked to my husband or that it was necessary that I try and initiate you know, you mentioned how the female brain really impacts our ability to be in an intimate place with our husbands. I, I realized that after hearing other wives open up and share about that, and I realized that when I initiate sexual intimacy with my husband, we actually enjoy it better. It’s like, it changes something in my mind, instead of just going through it to do this, or, you know, I don’t want to do this right now or a million other things that go through women’s minds. It kind of shuts it off, because now my my intentionality is driven towards what am I doing for my husband right now. And so that really did impact me and influence the way that we came together. And so it was, even even though being in that community group was awkward at times, it was so healing and so good for me to recognize who I am by seeing the reflection in other people. And you don’t and I’m not sharing this to say that you need to go find the huge community group with a lot of a lot of married couples. Although that would be great, you could do it with just one of the girlfriends, you know, one of their married wife, or two, or three, you know, and just getting out for coffee and talking to them, it really does influence how we perceive ourselves and our husbands.
15:16
So you would suggest getting a chance to just open up about these really difficult things?
15:23
Yeah, I think that I think and that’s one thing that I promote on unveiled wife is, be transparent, be willing to open up and so many of my articles is just me opening up and me saying, you know, well, this is how I used to view by finances. And God showed me a revelation. And it’s, you know, they’re different topics, but it’s nice, being transparent, in hopes of inspiring another wife to be transparent. And, and like I said, it doesn’t have to be with a ton of people, it could just be with one other girlfriend who’s gonna keep you accountable, or, you know, bounce ideas back and forth. And I just have found that, so rewarding.
16:02
If it wasn’t, it sounds like it wasn’t something that was normal to initiate. Prior to this, how have you kind of been able to kind of change your thought process about it, and then get to a place where you can initiate.
16:15
So initiation, it’s always been a struggle for me and I, I’m coming out with a book called The unveiled wife, where it’s about my marriage, but I do go into a little bit of detail with my dad. And then my mom divorced when I was only four and the insecurities that arise, it doesn’t matter what age you are, when your parents divorced, but it affects you. And for me, it caused a lot of insecurity in my heart, and in my mind. And as a young girl, or even a young wife trying to navigate an intimate relationship with the burden of so many insecurities. It was a struggle, it was such a struggle. And so in the book, I kind of go back to this one moment where I realized that in my relationship with my dad, I would withhold for weeks, until I heard from him until he called me. And I didn’t realize that I was doing that I just felt like if he cared, he would call me, right. And so I was I would withhold, and then God showed me that I was doing the same thing with him with God. And with my husband, I would hold out and I would wait until they fulfilled something for me. And it was because I was too insecure and too fearful of stepping out of my comfort zone to make a phone call, or to say, hey, we need to talk or to go to God in prayer. And so I’m, I explained that in my book, but it was such a huge revelation for me that so many of our relationships really do affect our marriage. And if we are living life without being reconciled to our dads or to God, it’s really going to affect our ability to do things like initiate in marriage, and whether that’s initiating sexually or initiating a conversation or initiating a time of play or laughter. It really affects all of that. And so until God gave me that revelation, when he did, I picked up the phone, trembling, and called my dad, and I was in my early 20s. And there should be no reason why that would have been hard, except I just had never really attempted to initiate in our relationship before. And it was a short, beautiful conversation, just, you know, a hey, how are you? I love you, what are you up to, and then we got off the phone, and I felt so accomplished. And like, I achieved something great, because I was obedient to what God is asking me to do. And so me and my dad went through a period of reconciliation in our relationship. And I feel like that really influenced my ability as a wife to, to just be able to initiate in my relationship in marriage.
18:48
I love that. And I just, there’s just so many good insights that you give, and one that you shared a bit ago was that without the sexual intimacy, every other issue is amplified in your marriage. And so I’m interested, I think that’s brilliant, completely. Because it really does. Sex is such a wonderful part of marriage, that it really is supposed to unify you as a couple. And so I completely agree. So what was it like to, you know, go through this marriage class, and how did you start to, to piece things together with your husband?
19:27
It was, it was difficult. I mean, it took, you know, two and a half years going to this on a consistent, you know, every Wednesday night basis for me to realize that God was transforming me from the inside out because like I said, it didn’t happen overnight. It didn’t happen in one conversation that happened over many times of us being tested, challenged and inspired to work on our relationship. And so like one night, we during our, you know, discussion time at our table, you know, maybe Somebody would bring up a story of how one, you know, one wife would be struggling with an issue, and then her husband would chime in about his perspective. And seeing it firsthand, like that made me realize that, you know, I do the same thing. And it’s actually manipulation, you know, so then God would start working on my heart and saying, Jennifer, you, you have a problem with, with manipulation with your husband, when you feel hurt, you feel like he needs to hurt. And so you do things in a way that will, will stimulate, stimulate that hurt, and, and it’s not good. And so and that’s just one example. But it was my testimony, after testimony, after testimony of hearing a husband and wife talk about their perspectives on an issue that would cause me to look at our marriage. And then sometimes it was just a matter of, you know, eventually these people became our best friends. And they would challenge us knowing that we struggled with sexual intimacy, and they would challenge us with things that were very hard, like, you know, try and do it every day for this week, you know, and we were never able to fulfill every single challenge. But it was just a matter of looking at our marriage in a new perspective, despite our hurts, despite our bitterness, despite the resentment that had been building up. And as we started opening up and, and taking on those challenges, or, you know, asking God to help us in certain areas, that’s when healing really took place. And, and it was cool, because we got to encourage one another, and support one another, me my husband, you know, throughout that process.
21:32
Oh, wow. And I love that you share how long it took that it took two and a half years. Because I, you know, it took a while to get probably to Well, you said three years of marriage prior to so you were out of your broken place at that point. And then two and a half years of investing in your marriage to actually get it to a really beautiful and healthy place. And I wanted to ask you. So you mentioned that you were also at a bad place with God kind of grew at that point. How did that shift in this during this whole thing?
22:07
Yeah, I didn’t realize that I had grown up with a bunch of expectations on God, I, I, I, I really struggled. And I shared this in my book, also that I grew up doing all the right things. I considered myself, you know, a really good Christian. Throughout high school and everything, I didn’t party, I didn’t have sex, I didn’t drink alcohol, or smoke. And I thought that by doing all these things, God was going to guarantee me, a blessed life, a perfect life, one without pain, or struggle. And, and I didn’t, I didn’t go around saying this in my head, it was just over time, I had built up these expectations of a perfect life. And leading up to marriage, I was excited for it, I was so excited to jump in and be a bride and, you know, experience life with my best friend. And then as soon as we got married, like that first night, we experienced so much hardship. And it was the first time I actually questioned God on some of my beliefs. And, you know, over that period of three years of, of just strain it, it really tested my faith, and the things that I believed about God. And it wasn’t until, you know, being a part of this married couples group that some of those things were pulled out, like, you know, just having conversations with my husband like, Well, why do you? Why do you believe those things about God? Or, you know, what are you wrestling with him about this week, and so often, I didn’t even want to talk about it, because I didn’t know how to formulate my feelings in a conversation I didn’t. I just, it was just so hard for me. And I was so overwhelmed by not having a perfect life and feeling that discontentment from it. But I just wanted to avoid God altogether. And it was really, it was really hard on me and my relationship with God, it totally changed everything that I had viewed of him growing up. But then I realized God, God showed me that he cares more about my character than my comfort, which meant that he was he was allowing not that he wanted me and my husband. I don’t know, if you know, is his perfect role that me my husband struggled with intimacy in our marriage. But he allowed it to happen to teach us who we are, and to bring us closer to Him. Because ultimately, we are way more closer to God now than we ever would have been. And how do we ever had a perfect life, we would have no need to get on our knees and pray to God and ask Him for things that were very dear to our hearts. So sometimes I think that God allows hardship and pain to be a part of our lives because it reminds us that we need to rely on him daily. And so again, if someone’s listening right now, and they’re just questioning why God Why are you reading this happened to me, it’s too overwhelming. I can’t handle it. Remember that he’s allowing those things because he wants you to call out him like that. He wants you to ask him what his will is for your life and to pray for that. Because if our lives were perfect, we would have no need for him. Right? So that was kind of the revelation that really helped me in my relationship with God.
25:13
I love that. And I so agree, it’s just so true that often the hardest things in life really bring us to our knees. And that’s when we get back to God. I love Mike, because one thing he said he’s willing, God is willing to take the chance to offend you. So that you’ll come back to him, if that makes sense. Like you, you could have decided that you know what, God I’m done with you, you didn’t do what you your, you know, your end of the deal, you didn’t do what you should have I did everything right, you should have made me have a great marriage, and you could have been offended, you could have made that as a reason to rebel and go away from him. And that was actually that’s a big part of my story of the brokenness of my first marriage that I came out of that marriage completely wounded and completely hurt. And, and I was completely offended at God that I had sought him out from what I saw was, righteously, and I did all the right things, those expectations that that’s not actually the way God set this world up. You didn’t set it up that I’m going to give you a perfect life. If you do xy and z. I can imagine that that was a shift that maybe happened over time,
26:21
like, oh, yeah, it was just a shift in my perspective, and understanding that, instead of having expectations of what God’s supposed to fulfill in my life, he was calling me to align my heart to his and asking for his world to be done. And that filled me with so much more hope to for being able to endure and persevere through hard circumstances. And so it was it was really just a perspective shift.
26:47
I love that. And can you tell me how that came about? So for example, was it through journaling? Or so if I’m thinking about a wife, who’s sitting there, listening is like, Yes, I need to change my perspective. But how does she like, step
27:00
out? Practically speaking, I feel like it was a matter of going back to his word and seeing what it really said, because I had, you know, read His word growing up, and I had a consistent relationship by learning who he was through his word, but I was also looking through it through the lens of, you know, hurt from my childhood, or, you know, hurt from broken relationships, or whatever was covering, you know, my eyes. And so I just went to God and, and searched his word for what His truth actually said. And there’s plenty of verses that do share that you will experience trials and tribulations, but Consider it all joy, because it will help you, you know, become more mature and complete. And so it was just a, it was a matter of going to His Word. So first and foremost, go to his word, to receive truth. Don’t, don’t just accept what you want to hear and make up things that you want to believe about God, just go to his word, and start reciting verses and write them down, you know, whatever you need to do to, to understand and grasp what, what he is saying to you. And also, yeah, journaling helped me a lot. I’m not the best journaler. But, but I do have that I have kept one for quite a few years. And it’s just, I really just like to write out my prayers to God, I feel like it really helps me concentrate, and lets me know like, well, what am I going through right now that I can talk to him about, and I’ll write down you know, the verses that I’ve read for the day. And so just a daily journal to help organize your thoughts and kind of express for me writing is a way that I express my feelings, it’s so much easier than talking. And so. So that’s, that’s my intimate time with God is sitting down reading His word and journaling. And if some people don’t know where to start in His Word, there’s plenty of devotions out there that will help you do that. If you’re a wife, I actually wrote a devotional out of the longing that I had to draw closer to God, it’s called wife after God. And it has verses like specific verses that will walk you through each day’s topic, and it’s a 30 day kind of challenge. And so that’s available or even she reads truth, or she reads truth.com has some great resources for going through God’s word, and they even have like Bible plans that you can that you can follow along.
29:29
That’s awesome. Well, thank you for answering that question. Because that was gonna be one of my next was so that’s awesome. And I’m excited to also dive into your story a little bit more through your books. I’m really glad you mentioned that as well. I want to ask how the group was set up the marriage group that you talked about, because it’s funny, my brother seems to have a very similar, similar story, that they went to a couple’s group, this marriage group and it just seemed just so wonderful. So I’m just thinking about people that might be listening that either have an influence in a church, or might be a leader of a church, or could talk to people about starting a group like this, like, maybe walk us through how it’s set up, you know, and, and how it was, how it was led, as well.
30:15
Okay. Yeah, we absolutely love it. It’s been something that’s been a part of our lives for the last, I don’t know, four years, five years now. And we moved states and actually the church, we started going to, we just started and launched a marriage ministry, just like the one we were a part of. So it’s been so great. We’re on our third week, and such good feedback. So if I can set up the theme for you, basically, you walk in and there’s a bunch of roundtables. And each week, there’s a facilitator at each table. And they sit at the same table each week. And when couples come in, if their new facility, facilitator facilitator will come in, bring them to their table, or they have the freedom to just go sit where they would feel comfortable. And then at the beginning, there’s a about 15 to 20 minute talk, or sermon or speech, preach whatever you want to call it. And it’s basically just pulling out a marriage principle from God’s Word. And it can be as simple as one verse or section of verses, you know, or or sharing someone else’s testimony, that could be really powerful. But the idea is just to get God’s perspective and design of marriage out on the table for people to discuss. And so like last night, we had our marriage group, and the topic was about forgiveness, and grace. And so after the teaching, there is about an hour of discussion. And the church would provide questions for this. And basically, the facilitators would just ask a question, and then everybody takes turns answering it. And sometimes you only get through one question, sometimes you get through all eight, sometimes you don’t get to them at all, because there’s some serious things happening within the couples, and they’re opening up and you take the conversation where it needs to go. And of course, that’s always putting them back to God. And, really, so everyone that comes each week, they tend to sit at the same table, because you want to walk through life with these people, they become your family. And we’ve just, we’ve had some, some great feedback and positive things happening in marriages, because of kind of this format of doing life together and going through God’s Word with the perspective of marriage. And you know, what, how we can apply it in our relationship with our spouse. So that’s a little bit about how it works. Yeah. And then throughout the week, you know, just calling people from your table and saying, Hey, I’m praying for you, or, let’s do a barbecue. You know, it’s just, it’s that community aspect of, we’re the body of Christ, and we need to support each other in this.
32:49
Now, does the person that gives the preaching at the beginning, are they the ones that also come up with the questions?
32:56
Yes, well, typically, or you can have a group, you know, help you with that. So we had a marriage pastor, a part of our church that led and did the questions at our old church. And then, because me and my husband were so passionate about starting one here, where we live now, my husband’s actually the one that’s leading the teaching, and comes up with the questions. And he’s just overjoyed with that opportunity to do that. And we were actually talking about how can we, how can we build a resource that will allow other churches to, you know, have a group like this? And so we’re letting that soak in on our hearts right now? And just asking God, if that’s something that he wants us to do?
33:37
That’s awesome. That’s awesome. Well, yeah, I mean, please. Sounds like that would be an awesome resource. Because, yeah, I mean, I want it to start at my church. So whenever you, you just let me know. Okay. But yeah, I mean, it sounds like that’s something that really can be started at churches around so for those listening, that’s, that’s really great insight. So I want to hear about how your marriage is now and kind of what’s come out of this the struggle.
34:08
Okay, for for those listening, I just want to make this really well known. Our marriage is not perfect.
34:17
Well, I’m so sorry. I’m gonna have to stop the interview here. We ran out of time, but just so you know, Jen doesn’t say anything crazy about her marriage. She’s just a very humble lady. And the truth is, all of us are working on our marriages constantly. That’s the That’s the nature of our relationship. It’s its dynamic, its doesn’t stay the same. So she’s got some wonderful insights on the next interview that’s going live on Thursday. So I’m really excited. I hope that you tune back in for that. And she actually says something towards the end of the interview. That really is pretty phenomenal. I was shocked at it was one of the major reasons she had so much physical pain during sexual intimacy. So I I think that’s going to really be helpful. Also, I’m on Facebook at facebook.com/belah Rose. So that’s B E L, A H R O S E. So go ahead and add me as a friend and we can stay in touch that way. I’d love to hear your story and what’s going on in your heart and in your life. Otherwise, today, spend time really, in God’s presence and get a chance to thank him for everything that’s beautiful in your life. And remember what Jen said, even in the struggles, the times where it seems the hardest, that might be exactly when God wants to meet you there on your knees. Alright, God bless talk to you soon.
35:37
Thanks for listening. If you’ve been blessed by this, why not share it? Until next time, live with love, wisdom and passion
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Jay Dee founded sexwithinmarriage.com to help Christian spouses in two ways: 1) to dispel the stigma often associated with talking about sex within the Christian context, and 2) to use that new freedom to discuss sex within marriage, facilitating positive change in Christian marriages in order to further glorify God.
He’s been married 13 years, has 4 kids and 1 new baby almost here(!). He shares the difficulties of his marriage, from sexlessness and pornography addiction for years to an incredible and passionate partnership with his wife!
Scripture/Quote:
I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who endowed us with senses, reason and intellect, has intended us to forgo their use. -Galileo
Get wisdom, get understanding; do not forget my words or turn away from them. Prov 4:5
In This Episode, You’ll Discover:
- Jay and his wife struggled with sex early on in their marriage.
- How he understood sex as he moved from singleness with the message of “sex is bad don’t do it” and then in marriage with the message of “sex is good, but you still can’t ask questions”.
- How a porn addiction and a misunderstanding of the purity in marital sex equaled years of a sexless marriage.
- How intimacy with his wife actually allowed him to quit the porn addiction.
- How pornography is an issue that is affecting at least 50% of the church currently.
- What many men feel when they view porn.
- How they’ve adopted a policy where orgasms are to be happening with each other, exclusively.
- Scientific understandings about male orgasms with oxytocin release.
- What an orgasm means for your husband.
Links Mentioned:
Tweetables:
For me, my faith is based on being able to see that God is logical. tweet this
Growing up it felt like divorce was worse than murder. tweet this
Women have about 7x more oxytocin in their bodies normally than men. Men approach that level when they orgasm. tweet this
How porn & negative ideas about sex almost broke them. Listen to their incredible story! tweet this
Transcript
0:00
delight your marriage episode four.
0:03
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.
0:21
Hey, I’m so glad that you joined me today, thank you so much for taking your time out of your day to be here with me. And I’m really excited because this is a fantastic interview with Jay D from a website called Sex within marriage.com. And he’s going to talk about his journey in marriage with his wife. And it’s pretty incredible, you can hear that they went through years of struggle and hardship and sex lessness and their marriage and addiction and just difficult things that is actually incredibly common. And people just aren’t talking about it and the roots behind it. So it’s really great. He’s got some amazing insights. And he blogs about these kinds of issues all the time on his blog. So I really encourage you to check that out. And at the end of the episode, this is the first half of our interview. But at the end of this episode, he talks about the results of a really fascinating survey that literally almost made me tear up as he was reading it. So it’s, it’s a pretty great episode, I think you’re in for a treat, so I won’t hold you up anymore. And here is the interview. Hi, delight your marriage listeners. I’m so excited that you are here. And I am stoked to be with JD from sex within marriage.com. How are you, Jay? Welcome.
1:41
I’m very well, thank you.
1:43
Great. Well, I’m really excited that you’re here with us. And I think it’s gonna be awesome to hear a little bit more about your marriage and your journey. And I’d love for you to go ahead and introduce yourself and your family and a little bit about your day to day life.
1:56
All right. So I’m Jay. And my wife is Christina. She writes with me on my blog. So some people who know us might know her a bit. We have four children with a fifth on the way due anytime in the next three weeks. And they’re they’re all ages eight and under. So it’s a very busy house. On top of that, we homeschool as well. So that’s usually what people’s heads explode.
2:28
That’s awesome. Yes. Well, I actually have a six week old little boy as well. So Oh, fun. And a one and a half year old. But the itty bitty ones are a lot of fun. Yeah. That’s awesome. So yes, very, very busy. Could you tell me a little bit about what it looks like, day to day life for you? Oh,
2:50
well, day to day life? It depends. My job situation has recently changed. So for the last seven years, I’ve been in one major contract, which just ended. And so right now between contracts, which means for the last two months, I’ve been at home and been able to just enjoy being with my family all day long. I really don’t leave the house much anymore, except to go to church meetings because I sit on multiple teams on there. So so my day to day life now is not what has been normal. Is it normal for most people. So right now it’s I get up in the morning, I’ve taken over the homeschooling because my wife is super pregnant. So I do Homeschooling with three of my kids, the three older ones from like, nine in the morning till noon. And then in the afternoon, I work on the blog, I work on my marriage coaching practice, which I’ve just started up and also work on trying to find new contracts for my my other job, which is actually software engineering.
3:57
That’s great. Well, I definitely want to hear also more about your coaching as well, a little bit later on. And would you also share just a little bit about you and your wife’s personalities?
4:07
Sure. So we are quite desperate in personalities. I have a very logical, I like facts and figures and very black and white, I tend to be either something’s you know, it’s true or it’s not true. That’s that’s kind of my big thing in life. You know, it’s trying to figure out what is true. And my wife is a very opposite and like if, if I’m, I’m pretty sure I am on the like Asperger’s spectrum, a spectrum. That’s how rigid I am in my structures in my head and conceptually, i She is the opposite. We’re pretty sure she’s ADHD. So she’s very much the wow, look at all the shiny things and what’s this thing over here and what’s this thing over here and always likes to see what’s new and what’s different than, you know, I want to try this and she I tend to be the people come to me and they’re like, Okay, I have a question and I need an answer. And people come to her when they’re like, I feel sad, I want someone to be compassionate. And so we, despite being quite different, we tend to work together quite well as a team. Because then I can be the hard line. This is the truth and what I believe, and she could be the, and this is why we love you.
5:26
That’s awesome. Yeah. Sounds like you both complement each other very well, in those ways.
5:30
Yes, it took us quite a few years to figure these things out. At first, we fought all the time, because we have such differing kind of views and lenses that we see the entire world through. And in one year, we figured out both of them that I probably have Asperger syndrome, and she probably has ADHD. And oh, wow, that just answers everything. And now we’re like, and this is why you’re doing that. And I could respond, and this is why you’re doing that. And then no, we understand each other. And we don’t get like upset and say, Well, you know, why are you doing this, we can understand why we’re doing it. And sometimes we can’t help it. It’s just the way our brains are formed. And sometimes it’s, well, we could work on this thing and try to get a little bit better. But it definitely has made things easier.
6:19
Yeah, well, I love that insight, because it’s just so important that frequently opposites attract. That’s a very common thing in marriage. And to recognize that that actually can be your strength. It doesn’t have to be your your weakness, it can be actually something that just like you said, I love the example of, you know, you might give the right answer. And your wife might say here, and here’s a hug, you know, that’s kind of how it’s beautiful. That’s a beautiful thing. You know, that this, this podcast is really all about inspiring and empowering marriages and wives. And so I’d really love to hear scripture or quote that’s meant a lot to you over the years.
6:57
I probably have two that are meant the most to me. One is biblical, and one is not. But they both deal with God. So I’ll do the nonmedical one first. The first quote I ever remember in my entire life is from Galileo, Galileo. And he said, I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with senses, reason and intellect has intended us to forego their use. And for me, this is just this huge, like, I’m supposed to think through things. Where I grew up in a church that was very much. Whenever I asked questions, people, I was always told why you just have to have faith. Which drives me insane. Because my, for me, my faith is based on being able to see that God is logical. And I view the Bible and the reason I believe the Bible is because it has this huge logical consistency within it. So to me, like my faith is based on Yeah, being able to see that and be able to think through things and work through things. And I know some people are very much the opposite. They’re just like, well, I have faith, and so I’m just going to believe it. And that’s, that’s good for them is doesn’t work for me. So for me, that was, that was a huge thing that kind of ran my life. And, and especially when I was struggling when I was a teenager to get answers to questions, difficult questions. You know, I was always running around asking, Well, why is there a hell? And why is God sending people there? And like, how can he be loving and things like that? And these are all questions that I basically got told, well, either you just have to have faith or stop showing up at this class. And then, paired with that was, I’m a big fan of Solomon’s writings because he was considered to be the wisest man in the Bible in Earth’s history. And so you know, his his, he writes in Proverbs four, verse five, I think he’ll just the first part, he says, Get wisdom, get understanding. And for me, that’s, that’s been like a driving force in my life, too. I want to know everything.
9:05
I love that. I love that I’m interested when you when you would venture out into the, you know, understanding these big giant questions that theologians debate about all the time. I mean, were you were you able to find answers that, you know, or that satisfied you? Or did it just, you know, whet your appetite to just cause you to want to dive in deeper, deeper, deeper? How did you kind of
9:28
both some of my questions, they took me a decade to answer Hmm. I’ve read through the Bible cover to cover three or four times now. This time, I’m trying to do it in Hebrew. So I have to teach myself Hebrew as I go, as I go, which is interesting, but that you get to learn even more things. So some of the questions Yeah, it’s taken me a long time. Yeah, sometimes decades to go. Oh, and that’s why that happens or this is why he didn’t know this, things like that. And, and other things I like, I don’t have The answer yet? And I hope I’ll get the answer someday. But if not, you know, after reading through the Bible, and learning all this stuff, I have seen enough to understand that God is perfect, his plan is perfect. And I can trust the holes that I haven’t filled in yet to be filled in eventually.
10:24
Yeah, I love that I’m right with their with Your wisdom is definitely one of my, my favorite words and favorite things to pursue. And I love also that, you know, God tells us to love him with all of our heart, soul and mind. And that’s sounds like that’s exactly what you’ve been pursuing, even from your first quote to your second. So I just, I just love that. And I’d love to hear how wisdom a lot of times is, is learned through the fire is learned in the midst of the storms. And so I’m interested in hearing a bit about your season of marriage, that was a struggle for you all. And kind of how you all went through that.
11:06
Probably the most difficult part in our marriage was right off the bat. We got married and we didn’t know anything about marriage, I can see i It seems that we grew up and got no training on this subject whatsoever. Which, which is unfortunate because I read so many things in the Bible about how happy you should train up your children to be good spouses and older ones should teach the younger one. Sorry, my daughter is interrupted. So right off the bat, we had struggles. Because we had never learned how to communicate properly as spouses, we didn’t learn anything about sex growing up. It was basically don’t ask questions. Right, which I think is a lot of the Christian experience is, you know, sex is bad, don’t do it. And don’t ask questions about it. Because that’s bad, too. And all of a sudden, we get married, and we’re supposed to have this flip. Okay, well, sex is good. And but you still can’t ask questions. It’s starting to change a little bit. And there’s a lot of us in the marriage blogging community, I think yourself included, that are trying to drive these discussions a bit to try to solve some of that. But I came into our marriage dealing with a porn addiction from since I was, I don’t even know how young probably in I got my first computer when I was 16. So I was at least four years in. Because I’m very technically inclined, I’m a software engineer by trade. And I have been since I was, since I was 12. I’ve been pulling apart computers and triggering everything. So I was on the internet before there was an internet. And, and as soon as people started connecting computers together, the first thing that gets shared is pornography and erotic literature and all this other stuff. So but yeah, by 14 1516, I had found it all. So that’s where I was in our marriage, or in our kind of the sex ideas that we brought in. And then my wife, she, because she didn’t get told anything other than what good Christian girls typically get told, which is, sex is bad, don’t have sex. And so on my side, I’m dealing with a porn addiction. on her side, she’s dealing with all these thoughts that I’m not supposed to like sex, sex is not a good thing. And so for the first, probably seven years of our marriage, six, seven, we basically had a sexless marriage. Which gets defined as 10 times 10 times or less per year. And I know, during one part, I think when we had our second child, maybe our first one, we had a nine month stretch where we didn’t see each other naked, even. We never had sex, we never like went to bed at the same time, because it was just, it was too hard. And we weren’t talking about it. Because you don’t talk about sex. And finally, we kind of just kind of woke up and realized we need to change something in our marriage, or we’re not going to make it. I mean, we don’t believe in divorce. And we both are on the same page on that, but we’re going to hate each other. You know, we might not get divorced, but I might kill you. Kind of thing. Right? And right. We always get this I don’t know, in when I grew up, it was almost you had that feeling that divorce is worse than murder. And at some point you if you don’t start working on things, and you’re constantly in the struggle, and every every time you talk it turns into a fight, because you have all this stuff pent up in everything. That yeah, eventually you start thinking like horrible things, you know about, well, I can’t get divorced, but maybe I’ll die like. It’s not as it’s not quite suicidal, but you’re at the point where they’re like, there is probably no light at the end of the tunnel kind of thing. I remember for a long time, my hope was that I had heard that women sometimes when they get into their mid 30s, that all of a sudden their sex drive increases. And that was my light at the end of the tunnel when I was 20, like to 23 that in a decade and a half, maybe this will turn around. And I’m not even sure what Christina is light at the end of the tunnel was if there was one at all. So that was that was our biggest struggle in our marriage. And then eventually, we kind of just went, Okay, we need to start working on stuff, or else we’re not going to make it. So we started looking around, like, okay, what are the biggest struggles in our marriage, and we weren’t quite ready to deal with the whole sex thing yet. So we started with finances, because
16:05
money is a little safer to talk about not much. So we spent two years working on finances. And recently, we learned how to budget and we actually started tithing for the first time in our marriage. And all these things like we I read through the Bible, because that’s my tendency is to do and find all the scriptures on money, which turns out, there’s more on money than any other topic. It’s incredible. And so we fix that, we started budgeting, and we’re like, Okay, we’ve got finances kind of sorted out, we’re not out of the hole, because we, we made a mess of that too. Again, no training. And I realized, okay, next step is communication. Because every time we talk, we get into a fight. But we learned how to communicate better, we learned how to ask questions in the right way, and how to not get mad when we asked, you know, when we get confronted with something, and then once those two things, those were kind of like big, weighty daily kind of things that were weighing on us. And then we finally said, Okay, we know we need to address kind of the sex thing. And at this point, my wife still, like she had no idea was still watching porn for the last five years of our marriage plus the five years before that. So, but she realized that, you know, she had, she was contributing to the problem as well in being like a refusal and gatekeeping kind of sex, saying, Well, no, that we’re not going to have it. So we I think she probably actually made the first step and said, you know, she spent, she spent a lot of time working through that. And one day, I actually made a promise to me, and she said, I will never say no, again. Which I have to admit, I can’t believe her. And now, now, I definitely believe her. And she doesn’t say no, she, she she will say, I’m really tired. And usually, then I’ll tell her, Okay, let’s go to sleep. But I think, and one of the things that we did, and she kind of did this to almost prove, right, that what I’m saying is real, is we did this seven days of sex challenge that I think I saw on one extraordinary marriage, which is another podcast by Christians about sex. And we we did that. And I was she said it, like, let’s do this thing. And I was like, There’s no way you’re gonna last two days. But okay, we ended up having sex 10 days in a row, taking a one day break and then doing another 12. And it completely changed our marriage around. And then all of a sudden, my brain was like, Okay, well, now you don’t need all this other stuff. And so I quit porn, and then told her that this is what I had been struggling with. So I didn’t actually come out until I, I dropped it. Because I’m a man, and we’re scared. of things like intimacy and being vulnerable. And, you know, we’d like to fix things before we actually tell people we had a problem, and now I solved it. Yeah, so that was that our big giant struggle for the first eight years of our marriage.
19:26
I just I just love that you, you’re sharing so openly the struggle because it’s just such a common struggle. It’s just so many marriages story, and yet no one is talking about it. And thankfully, you are on your blog. It’s an amazing blog. So if you haven’t checked out sex within marriage, you really need to, but it’s just a very very common struggle and, and porn even more. So. Maybe, maybe more. So this is a huge struggle that people just don’t talk about and something that even as a young woman, I struggled with coming upon a it was a site for homework, and then you know, I Talk about that a little bit on my blog as well. But it’s just just a huge thing. And I want to talk a little bit about how you were able to kind of get out of the pornography because I know that there’s so many people that are listening that I mean, this is the issue and it’s driving wedge in between their marriage, and it’s causing them so much guilt and shame, because it feels like you’re living a double life. And there’s just, it’s just a really hard thing that like billions of people are struggling with. So yeah,
20:28
the numbers we typically see is about 50% within the church, are struggling, currently struggling with porn. And if I’ve seen surveys where they surveyed pastors, and it’s the same number, it’s still 50%. Man. And I know I talked to him most of the pastors that I, I know well enough to talk to. And I’m seeing the same thing. The one that was the wall, I admit to it. Yeah, I’ve struggled with it. I’ve, I’ve been very blessed to have pastors who are transparent. And we’ll talk about these things. I wish I had learned to talk to them before I got married, and actually already had resolved their issues. But how did how did I deal with it? I do, that’s a problem. I cheated by having a wife that was willing to say, I will have sex with you every night for two weeks. And, and that’s not advice I can give to most husbands. When when wives come to me and say, we’re having this struggle in our marriage, what do I do? I say, you need to tell him, I’m going to help you with this. And I’m, I will be there whenever you need. You know, barring the obvious look, I’m at work. So we can’t do it right now. Or it’s Thanksgiving dinner, and everybody’s over, we’re not going to sneak off and go have sex. But that’s not typically time’s that he’d go on and sneak off and go watch porn anyway. So that shouldn’t be an issue. So I tell when the best things I’ve heard, and I can’t remember where I heard it, is to have this policy. And it’s kind of crude, but have, they say, the policy is in me or on me. Like, if you’re going to have an orgasm, it bet, like the wife should say, it’d better be on me or in me nowhere else. If I’m not involved, then I’m considering that cheating. Wow.
22:23
And I think that’s the best advice I can give to wives,
22:29
that for their husbands, the best advice is to come clean to your wives. Because as soon as they know what’s going on, you know, all of a sudden, you have this layer of accountability, and you don’t want to let them down. And now there’s a spotlight on it. And it’s a lot harder to continue doing something wrong. When you know, somebody knows you’re doing it. Yep. But that, that’s really hard to do, because it requires saying, I’m, I am hurting, and I’m doing something wrong. And I’m stuck and I can’t help myself.
23:01
On top of that the way pornography feels to a woman is just so painful. But I would be really interested in hearing how a man thinks about that. Because for a woman, it feels like he’s cheating on me. But for the man, it doesn’t feel like that. What does it feel like for a man?
23:23
We I can’t speak for all I could try to I could try to extrapolate based on who I’ve talked to and my experiences. But I know for a lot of them, it’s it’s less about sex, and more about intimacy. They have there’s this. It’s not all men, like some men are in marriages, and they’re having regular sex, they’re still stuck in porn. Yeah, and I think a lot of them, it’s just, it might just be a straight addiction. And then you’re dealing with something almost a little easier. Because if it’s straight, like psychological addiction, that’s a little easier to break because you have a marriage to fall back on. That’s mostly stable, more likely stable, but it’s in the marriages where they’re not having sex during a sexless marriage or their frequency is very, very low, like on that borderline kind of clinical sexless term, like 10 times a year or less, that often what they’re looking for is a sense of intimacy. And this whole feeling of orgasm makes us feel good because we get this huge rush of oxytocin, which is this hormone in us that makes us feel bonded and safe and secure. And I think God designed it to be that we feel this when we’re with our spouses, and it binds us together. It makes us feel safe and secure. And I don’t know if other people have noticed but if you can have a conversation right after your husband has had an orgasm, it will probably be the best conversation of your Marriage, because right at that moment, he feels absolutely secure and safe and happy. And if you can manage to get him not to fall asleep, you can have some really good conversations. And women get women drive on oxytocin, they have, I think it’s seven times the level of oxytocin that men have in their bodies. I think given period, the only time we get close is the 30 minutes after an orgasm, and then it levels off again, and we’re back to normal. So, so we see this constant struggle. That’s why generally not all the time, but generally, men, if they haven’t had sex in a couple of days, they’re like, I don’t feel loved anymore. Because they’re completely depleted of oxytocin, it’s gone. They’re like, on empty, and their wives are still like, I feel fine. But like, because they, they could generate so much of this stuff just in and of themselves. So I think, I think for a lot of men, it’s much more of an intimacy thing. I mean, there’s definitely a whole, you know, it excites your brain. And there’s the whole physical feeling and everything like that. But that can be that can be replaced, right? By your spouse. If you have a spouse who who shows genuine genuine interest with in you, and is willing to have fun in the bedroom, not just be like, Okay, it’s duty sex time, let’s go have it. Hurry up. Then, that’s what I’ve seen a lot of men say, say, you know, I finally kicked born. And it only happened after our marriage started getting better, we started having more sex. And it’s, I think a lot of it is driven by this this issue of intimacy.
26:58
Yeah. Yeah, I love that insight. And I think it gives, really, it gives so much hope to wives listening, that if you found out about an addiction that your husband has to porn, there’s hope in that there’s hope in this in the story from Jay, and it’s my experience as well is that when sex is happening in the marriage, it doesn’t have to be happening on the computer. It’s, it’s something you can change in your marriage. And I know as a wife, and as a woman, I think, the intimacy piece, hearing that that’s what’s happening through the pornography addiction, that helps us to understand and to forgive, and to move forward and to say, you know, it’s, it’s not that he’s choosing or trying to, necessarily choosing this other, you know, these pictures above you, if you could give to him what he needs, it’s possible to really move past that. And so I just want to encourage wives out there that that, you know, it’s going to take a lot of support. And you might need to reach out to other wives that can support you in this, you know, and to get to a place of healing and forgiveness. But to also get to action where you can be helping him through this, you can be potentially making a way that he can, like you said, kick the habit, you know,
28:15
not everybody there, I definitely come in contact with wives that say, No, we have an active healthy sex life. And he’s still addicted to porn, what do I do? And I basically said to you, he needs accountability. Like you can’t keep this in the dark, go and get him to talk to his pastor or someone else in his church, someone he trusts, chances are the person that he’s talked to me, he’s got a 5050 chance to say, they’re struggling with it, too. And if they’re not, there’s a pretty good chance they have in the past, and they kicked it. And they know where he is. And I don’t know what that number is of people who have dealt with porn in the past. But if it’s 50%, now we’re struggling with it. I imagine it’s a pretty high number of people in our church that have, you know, either are currently struggling with it or have in the past. I think most people are afraid of like, oh, no, if people found out my life would be ruined. I think a lot of people will be like, No, if you they found out they’d be like, Yeah, me too, buddy. I’m struggling with that true, we should form a group. Like, and I know, for a lot of us, like for myself, I was constantly I knew it was wrong. Half the time I’d rationalize it and say, Well, you know, my wife doesn’t want me so it must be okay kind of thing or, you know, whatever you find ways to rationalize it.
29:30
So the process of kind of getting out of this, it sounds like was a lot of your wife’s proactivity I mean, did you feel that you? You know, were a part of things working better. How did it kind of go?
29:43
Oh, definitely. I mean, I’ve always been kind of the researcher in the realm of marriage and sex. Because, well, I’ve been fascinated with sex since I was a teenager never really went away. So I was constantly sending stuff, you know, to my wife, what do you think about this? What do you think about this? And I think earlier on on that, I don’t think I did that early early on in our marriage. But once we actually started kind of talking about things and realizing we had issues, and we have to fix them. Because first, I think for the first while, we actually thought, well, this is normal. Everyone hates their spouses. You know, marriage, because all we hear is like, oh, marriage is hard work. And we’re like, okay, so it’s hard work. And there’s no joy. I think about five years, then I started sending her like articles I had seen from some of the early bloggers, or threads on the marriage bed, which is a forum for discussing sexuality and marriage from a Christian perspective, as well. And one day, she read something, and it was talking about refusers, which is the term kind of we give to spouses who say, No, we’re not having sex. And she flat out asked me one night to use the camera refuser. Me being the not always so compassionate, or politically correct. Answer said yes. She was like, Oh, okay. That was that was kind of it for the night, I think. But after that was, I think what started her big shift, you know, for her to actually, like she saw in herself. What I’m doing is not right. And not that what I was doing was bright by any means. But she, she managed to beat me at tackling her issues before mine. And so, I did I play a part in it. I think I definitely did play a part. And I was as much as you know, I said, Yes, you definitely fall within that category of refuser. As we define it kind of thing. I was out, she, my wife tends to beat herself up a little bit like, Oh, I’m not good enough kind of thing. At least she used to. She’s gotten much better at that. But, you know, I would always constantly say no, you know, you’re my wife, despite all our problems, I still love you the way you are. I want us to be better. But it’s not that you’re not good enough. So I was constantly trying to reaffirm her. And that and every step that she took, or backflip or whatever, it was always I was always trying to say, you know, it’s okay. It’s the fact that you’re working on it is amazing. You know, I think that’s, I don’t see that in a lot of spouses, like a lot of them that come to me. You know, they say things like, well, if she tells me No, one more time, I’m going to divorce her. Like, but she’s been working on it. Why would you do that? Like why? You need to recognize that she, she’s human, she’s sinful. You know, just as you are. Even when we try to work on our marriages, it’s not going to be perfect, we’re gonna mess up, we’re gonna say the wrong thing. We’re going to backslide and say no to sex, or we’re gonna backslide and watch something. We weren’t supposed to watch it or porn or read something or whatever. And I see it from wise to be like, No, if I ever cut my husband watching porn, that’s it, we’d be divorced. And be like, really, for one for one. You know, thing, you divorce him? I mean, how many times have you done something wrong in your marriage? You can’t be perfect. But that we tend to pick and choose these kinds of things that oh, this is worse than this one. And, and in a lot of people’s minds. You know, I hear from a lot of wives that say no, if I ever catch, catch him watching porn, we’re divorced. Like, Well, you got a 50% chance of catching him. Like you might not want to decide on that right
33:56
now. Yeah, I think as a wife, we need to recognize that in our husbands that this is a significant, significant temptation, a significant reality that that many, many men struggle with. And it’s cuz we’re designed and wired to really enjoy sex and really let it be such a bonding experience between man and wife. So So anyway, I I’m, I venture to say that Jay, some of the things that you’re saying, may be completely perspective shifting for some of our listeners. Because I think that’s common. I think women are so threatened by pornography, because it’s just like you said, the thing that I think we struggle with probably the most in intimacy is I’m not good enough. I’m not sexy enough. I don’t look good enough. I’m not all of these things. And so as a as a husband. You know, I love that, you know, your tactic was really to be affirming and to really say, you are good enough, and this is exactly I want you exactly how you How do you think wives can get over themselves in that mind game of I’m not good enough? How can they kind of be proactive and do that?
35:08
I think that’s an issue even regardless of the porn. Mm hmm. Like, I think a lot of wives. Actually, I ran a survey once. Because a wife emailed me and said, You know, I, I don’t think my husband finds me attractive. And she’s like, it’s not based on anything, or whatsoever, but I just have this sinking feeling that he doesn’t. So I ran a survey. Because it was an anonymous question. I couldn’t respond back to this person, I had no contact information for them whatsoever. I ran a survey basically asking wives, and husbands, you know, how attracted you are you to your spouse? And How attractive do you think they are to you? And I can’t remember what the number was for wives. I think it was something like under 40% of wives felt that they were attracted attractive to their spouse, like to their husband. And 96% of the husband said, No, I’m definitely attracted to my wife. In fact, the 96% said, as much or more so than when we got married. Wow, 96 and other four other 4% they weren’t like, No, I don’t find my wife attractive. They were just like, Well, maybe not as attractive as when she was 20. Like, for those 4%, I’m still like, what are you kidding, like? But it was such an overwhelming response. And I was like, Wow, 96% So I posted this thing. And, and immediately, I got this other email, like the next day, and from this same woman who had asked the original question, and she was basically told me, she was in tears, reading the survey results. She said, I had no idea. And she’s like, I wonder how many other women struggle with this too? Like, well, I can tell you from the data, most of them, right? So I think there’s this this huge issue.
37:06
Yeah, J, I’m gonna have to stop the episode here. But when he said that, and I, during the interview, I literally was starting to tear up. I mean, it’s just something that women don’t realize that they are so gorgeous, they’re so valuable. They’re so beloved by our Creator, God, and by our husbands. So, Jay, thank you so much. You just had incredible insights and wisdom. And the next episode is chock full of a lot more. So definitely check that out once it comes out. But I want to mention if this is maybe one of the first times that you’re really getting exposed to the male psyche, and how he thinks about sex, and what it means to him as a man, I’d really encourage you, I’ve written a book called delight your husband, and it’s really getting women through each one of their reservations. So that includes whether or not sex is godly, what he thinks about sex. It’s also going through all of women’s insecurities, in terms of our body image in terms of being vulnerable in front of our husband. And then it also goes through the very specifics of delighting your husband in the bedroom. So there’s a lot of things that women can be insecure about. And one of them definitely is whether or not I’m doing this right? Or is this is this the right way of going about it. So I really encourage you to check that out to let your husband calm. And it’s just a wonderful resource. It’s also a workbook, to really get them into go through and process all of these fears and anxieties and emotions, to get to the other side and really feel confident and free in your marriage and in your bedroom. So really encourage that. But again, thank you so much for joining me today. And there is a lot more to come. And I really believe that it’s going to be a delight to your marriage. So God bless you. I love you, and I’m praying for your marriage. Until next time, bye bye.
39:08
Thanks for listening. Stop by delight your marriage.com to check out all the show notes as well as many more resources and articles. Until next time, live with love, wisdom impassion
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