Episode 77. Reclaiming Desire (Part 1): Empowering Women to Own Their Sexuality in Marriage
Building Sexual Agency: A Guide for Conservative Women of Faith in Marriage
Sexual agency—the ability to understand, own, and make conscious choices about your sexuality—is one of the most powerful ways to deepen intimacy in marriage. And yet, for many conservative religious women, this topic feels complicated, even taboo.
At Marriage IQ, we’ve seen how silence, shame, and unexamined beliefs about sex can quietly erode connection between spouses. To explore this further, we sat down with Amanda Louder, a certified sex and marriage coach, to talk about how women can build sexual agency while honoring their faith, values, and marriages.
Rediscovering Your Sexual Identity
Healthy sexual connection with your spouse starts with a healthy relationship with yourself.
For many women raised in conservative religious homes, sexual beliefs were inherited—not chosen. That’s why developing sexual identity is key. It’s about asking yourself:
What do I believe about sex, my body, and pleasure?
How do my faith and integrity guide my choices?
Which inherited messages about sex are life-giving, and which ones no longer serve me?
When you know who you are—one of our Marriage IQ cornerstones—you can approach intimacy from a place of confidence rather than guilt or obligation.
Amanda’s Formula for Healthy Sexuality
Amanda shared a powerful framework for developing a healthy sexual self:
Awareness → Agency → Alignment
Awareness: Get curious about your thoughts, feelings, and beliefs about sex.
Agency: Make intentional, conscious choices instead of reacting from fear, shame, or habit.
Alignment: Ensure your sexual decisions reflect your faith, values, and integrity.
This formula honors both identity and intentionality—two core pillars of strong, thriving marriages.
The Six Principles of Sexual Health
Amanda also introduced the Six Principles of Sexual Health by Doug Brown Harvey. These principles act as a roadmap for cultivating a safe, connected, and mutually satisfying sexual relationship:
Consent
Non-exploitation
Honesty
Shared values
Protection (from STIs, HIV, and unplanned pregnancy)
Mutual pleasure
Healthy intimacy grows when both partners can trust that these principles are honored.
Why Consent Still Matters After “I Do”
One of the biggest takeaways from our conversation is this: consent doesn’t expire when you get married.
In some faith traditions, women are taught that sex is a duty or that refusal is wrong. But when intimacy happens without genuine, enthusiastic consent, it can cause deep emotional and relational harm.
Amanda put it plainly:
“Anything after a ‘no’ can be considered coercion.”
In marriages where ongoing consent is valued, couples create emotional safety—which is the foundation for true intimacy.
The Cost of “Duty Sex”
Too many women quietly endure unwanted sex out of obligation, guilt, or fear of rejection. Over time, this can lead to:
PTSD-like symptoms
Loss of emotional connection
Resentment toward a partner
Lowered sexual desire and pleasure
This isn’t God’s design for intimacy. Healthy sex in marriage is mutual, connected, and chosen—not endured.
From Reactive to Proactive: Building Sexual Agency
Developing sexual agency means moving from a reactive stance (“I go along because I feel I should”) to a proactive one (“I choose this because it aligns with my values, desires, and relationship goals”).
Practical steps to get started:
Reflect on your personal boundaries and desires.
Communicate openly with your spouse about them.
Initiate intimacy from a place of choice, not obligation.
Stay curious about your evolving needs as an individual and a couple.
This is where insight and intentionality come alive in your marriage.
The Language of Empowered Intimacy
Sometimes, agency starts with finding the right words. Amanda offered examples of loving, empowered language:
“I love being close to you, but right now doesn’t work for me. Can we plan for tomorrow?”
“I want to connect tonight—entice me.”
“I love you, but I need rest tonight. Can we plan something special this weekend?”
These phrases communicate boundaries while keeping the emotional connection intact.
Redefining Sexual Intimacy
Finally, Amanda encouraged couples to broaden their understanding of intimacy. It’s not limited to intercourse; it includes:
Cuddling
Kissing
Massage
Other forms of sensual, non-penetrative touch
By expanding the definition of intimacy, couples create more opportunities for connection and pleasure, even when energy, desire, or timing don’t perfectly align.
The Bottom Line
Building sexual agency doesn’t mean abandoning your faith—it means aligning your sexuality with your integrity, values, and identity while cultivating mutual respect and deeper intimacy in your marriage.
When women embrace sexual agency, marriages thrive. Couples experience greater connection, more joy, and the kind of sexual intimacy that reflects God’s good design.
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0:02
Welcome to Marriage IQ, the podcast for the Intelligence Spouse.
I'm Doctor Heidi Hastings.
And I'm Doctor Scott Hastings.
We are two doctors, 2 researchers, 2 spouses, 2 lovers, and two incredibly different human beings coming together for one purpose, to transform the stinky parts of your marriage into scintillating ones using intelligence mixed with a little fun.
0:34
Hello lovers, and welcome back to another exciting episode of Marriage IQ.
We're really excited about what we're going to talk about today, but before we start, I want to couch it in some historical understanding of how marriage IQ even came to be.
0:54
For those who may have not been listening, our first or second episode, it's been a while now since we've talked about this, but in my PhD program, my research was on religious women who had experienced betrayal trauma.
1:10
And through the research, one of the things that I was looking at was how betrayal impacted their sexuality and published an article on that.
So one of the findings that came out of that was as the woman had started to heal, they were really curious and mournful in a way about their sexual experience thus far, from the beginning of their marriage, through betrayal and even through healing.
1:42
And they wanted to understand what healthy sexuality was all about, what it was like, what a more intimate relationship might be like.
And some of them dove into it and studied on their own.
Some longed for it and wanted to learn about it.
1:58
And it just really got me thinking about how important it is that we have discussions, open discussions, honest discussions on sexuality for women who may be a little more conservative, whether they're Christian, whether they're Muslim.
2:16
Jewish women in my study tended to already have a better grasp on that.
But for those who didn't, whether it's through religious scripts, whether it's through social scripts, whether it's through family narratives, whatever it is, we are proponents of having language of sexual agency that allow women to have the best sexual experiences, bus the marriage, having better sexual experiences.
2:46
And sometimes not only is it important for women to hear and understand these ideas, this language, learn this language, but also for their husbands.
And so during this time, I was kind of poking around looking for podcasts that would be able to help women who didn't want, like, wild and crazy ideas about sex, who wanted it within a perspective that they felt really comfortable with.
3:14
And one of the podcasters that I found during that time was Amanda Louder.
And we're really excited to have Amanda join us on our show today.
And thank you so much, Amanda, for being here.
Thank you so much for having me.
I'm excited to be here.
3:31
We're really looking forward to this conversation.
So Amanda's a certified sex and marriage coach who helps Christian men and women specifically overcome their obstacles to create a more emotionally, mentally, and spiritually and physically intimate relationship.
3:46
And I'm guessing you may even have people who aren't Christian but who also have those more conservative morals that are looking for help in this area.
Yes, absolutely.
So Amanda's the host of the Sex for Saints podcast over 7 years now that she's been producing that podcast over 1,000,000 1/2 downloads, which we really look forward to that someday.
4:11
That's really fantastic.
So congratulations on that.
Thanks.
In addition to being a code to Mendez, also a wife to Kevin and mom and stepmom to five kids.
So you got a busy life.
Wow.
It's getting a little bit more calm.
Our last two are at home.
4:27
They're going to be seniors this year, so most of them have grown and flown the next.
Are moving along.
Yes.
We're looking forward to being MD nesters.
It is so fun.
Let us just tell you, we're what, four or five years in now?
And it's such a fun time of life.
4:43
Good.
Us, we're doing podcasts.
In Amanda's spare time, she also enjoys reading, watching her kids play sports, fishing and camping.
OK, Amanda, one thing we talked about here on Marriage IQ is identity.
We want to learn a little bit about who you are and how this all came to be.
5:03
I mean, not everyone turns into a marriage sex expert, right?
No.
So tell us about you in just a few minutes.
OK, well, I've always wanted to be a sex coach.
I'm totally kidding.
So I grew up in a very loving, conservative home where my parents really didn't talk to me about sex at all.
5:27
I got some really bad advice from my mom, but right before I got married the first time.
And that kind of propelled me into some really bad patterns in my first marriage.
So my first husband and I were married for 13 years, and it was a very hard marriage.
5:44
There was a lot of emotional abuse and the sex was a really hard part of our relationship as well.
And so I would just basically do it whenever I had to get him off my back for a little while.
I didn't enjoy it.
I didn't have pleasure.
I didn't experience an orgasm for 12 years.
6:02
So it was a really hard part.
And in an attempt to maybe help things get better overall in our marriage, I said, well, maybe if the sex gets better than our marriage will get better.
And so I decided to dig in and confront a lot of the shame that I felt around my sexuality.
6:21
I didn't understand that that's what it was at the time, But one afternoon I was watching Oprah.
This is back in the day when she was on network television and she had on two sisters that were sex experts. 1 was a urologist and one was I think a psychologist and they talked about women and sex in ways that I had never heard before.
6:40
And so I started listening and reading more about them and what they did.
I started reading books and really confronted things head on and I actually got to the point where I finally experienced pleasure and an orgasm and I actually really enjoyed sex.
But the marriage was still really bad.
6:56
And so we ended up divorcing.
Fast forward, I met my husband and you know, one of the questions he asked when current husband, current husband.
Yes, Kevin.
And you know, right when we got we were getting married, he was like, do you like sex?
And I was like, yes, yes I do.
7:12
And we talked very openly about sex before we got married.
We saved that part of our relationship until after we were actually married.
But it was something that was important to both of us and something that we have consistently worked on to make an important part of our relationship throughout our marriage.
7:29
So when I found coaching in 2017, I was originally coaching women who were struggling in their marriage and contemplating divorce.
And I found that many women were struggling with sex in their marriage and that's why it was so hard.
And one weekend I was with a bunch of girlfriends on a little retreat and the subject of sex came up like it often does, and I started talking.
7:54
I had a lot of knowledge because I have been studying for so long.
And they said, Amanda, you have to change your niche to sex because we've learned more from you in a weekend than we have in 20 years of marriage.
And I was like, oh, I don't know if I can do that.
But I felt very strongly that maybe this is my path.
8:14
And I came home and I talked to my husband about it and he was OK with it.
And so that's what I did.
And my business kind of just exploded from there.
That was right before COVID, So we had all these women who were stuck in the house with their husbands going, he wants to have sex all the time and I don't, and we got to fix this.
8:34
So that's when my business kind of exploded.
But it's been such a great journey.
You have learned a lot, I'm sure, in this road to helping women and men embrace sexuality in positive ways.
What are some of the biggest things that you've learned on this journey?
8:50
Yeah, I've learned that we don't do a very good job of educating people about sexuality, at least in this country and in our families and our religions and in culture at large.
And so there is a lot of people who really don't understand what healthy sexuality is and how to integrate it into their life, much like they integrate other aspects of their life.
9:14
I want to go back a little bit.
Yeah.
You said you learned about sex, that you're able to orgasm, have pleasure with your ex-husband, but it was not enough to save the marriage.
And so this is a really key point I think really important, which is that sex is so amazing.
9:37
And it's also not talked about as it's very taboo.
I'm glad that there are people like you doing this in a way that's not taboo.
At the same time, learning how to have a great sex life is only a part of the whole ingredient list.
9:53
It's not going to necessarily save a marriage, although it can certainly, certainly help help a marriage and even enhance ones that are struggling.
But I think that's such a great point that you brought up though.
You started learning this before you were divorced.
It wasn't enough to save it, which again, it sounds like there's a whole lot of other peripheral stuff going on.
10:14
That that didn't sound salvageable, I think is a very important point about a scintillating sex life, a scintillating marriage.
It it may not save the marriage.
And that's why I think of our 4 foundational cornerstones, identity, intentionality, insight, and intimacy.
10:33
Intimacy is the last because if some of those others aren't in place, it may not make a huge difference in in making the marriage better.
So yeah.
So here you are, you're podcasting, you have lots of listeners and etcetera.
10:50
You're you're successful.
That sounds fantastic.
Yeah, it's been pretty great.
Tell us what the biggest overall thing is that you've learned.
I think that first we need a good relationship with ourself.
So I think that probably goes with your identity podcast Cornerstone.
11:06
Absolutely.
I think that's foundational if you do not have a good relationship with yourself, if you don't have intimacy with yourself.
And the way that I define intimacy is that you are known and you are knowing that your partner.
But if you don't have intimacy with yourself, then it's impossible to have intimacy with a partner.
11:25
What does that look?
Like that means understanding what your values are, understanding who you are at your core, what your integrity demands.
It means knowing what you think and what you believe.
I think so many of us just run on autopilot that we just kind of go through the motions of life and we don't stop and think about what do I actually think about this?
11:48
What do I believe about this?
And if you are religious, a lot of times we take a lot of those values and beliefs from the religion, but we don't take the time to go.
Is this actually something that I want to believe that I want to think about?
We've just kind of adopted those instead of truly thinking about them, and I think that's really important part.
12:07
Of it.
And I found that maybe they took partial narratives and amplified that in certain areas or one person's perspective and amplified that in another area, or they were emotionally and well, from a human development perspective, they were just not mature enough to totally understand what was being said in a full context and so made assumptions, made their sexual identity around these very, very, very narrow narratives and ideas.
12:45
Have you found that?
Yes, absolutely.
And we get that from family, too.
Family, of course.
That's probably the biggest one right there.
Yeah.
I mean, you know, we hear different things in the culture and in our families and and religion.
And then most of us don't take the time to actually figure out what do I actually think and believe.
13:01
And I think that's really important.
Wow.
That does sound like, well, at least two of our cornerstones.
Identity intentionality requires sitting with yourself.
I tell people all the time this if this is not crazy people to sit down with yourself, have a meeting with yourself and have a discussion with yourself.
13:19
Not nuts, you're not psychotic.
It's important to run by different scenarios in your head.
Hey, what do I think about this?
What do I think about that?
Come up with your own values, your own ethics and write them down.
Be intentional.
13:36
And that's what you're saying, Amanda.
That's what I'm hearing you say is really the foundation of this fabulous sex life begins with sitting with ourselves for a long period of time and just thinking.
But I think for women especially, sometimes it's more helpful to hear different ideas and then say, I align with that, I don't align with that, I don't align with that.
14:00
And yes, I can, I can take that.
What do you think about that?
Yes, absolutely.
So you guys have your 4 cornerstones.
My formula for this is awareness.
We have to be aware of what we think and believe and feel and all of that.
14:16
And then we have, we use our agency, yes, so choices to bring ourselves into alignment.
So with our integrity, So awareness, agency and alignment is what I talk about the most.
And I think that happens individually and then again in the marriage.
14:33
So the awareness is looking at the options that are out there, being aware of ourselves and being aware of what the possibilities are, the lenses to put on for looking at our sexuality perhaps.
And then agency were big proponents of agency.
14:52
Amanda, do you think that it's harder for women to create their own sexual identity than it is for men or not?
And why?
Yes and no.
I think both men and women fall into very much the stereotypes.
15:11
I mean, of course you always have people that are outside of the stereotypes, but men fall into it too.
Just it looks different than women.
OK, I could go with that.
I think that we just did an episode on women's identity and realizing how hard it is to be a woman today.
15:29
I mean, it really is because there's so many expectations that they put on themselves and other people.
It's very, very, very difficult.
Whereas with men, it does seem to be, in my experience anyway, much more straightforward and especially regarding the sexual experience, like we don't experience pain women might during sex.
15:51
I mean, and then what?
What do you do with that?
How do you interpret pain and pleasure together?
It can be really confusing for a woman.
It can be, but there is also, you know, cultural expectations that are put on men that make it really hard for them to, you know, they think that they need to be the sexual one all the time and that they need to be the leader and know everything.
16:12
And it often becomes very much about performance, and that's not helpful for them either.
I can go with that.
So what would you say are the most important elements of having a healthy sexual relationship besides your formula that you talked about, which I love, that's so good.
16:31
So when it comes to healthy sexuality, I always go back to the Six Principles of Sexual Health by Deb Ron Harvey.
Have you talked about those before?
Well, I don't think we specifically have on the podcast.
I've written them in my dissertation and other areas, but I don't know that we've done that.
16:50
So I would love for you to share those.
OK, that's what I always go back to when people are asking what a healthy sexual relationship looks like, how to teach their kids about healthy sexuality.
It always comes back to those and I think they're so encompassing.
So they are consent, non exploitation, honesty, shared values, protection from St. is HIV and unplanned pregnancy and mutual pleasure.
17:16
And when you have those things in place, then it's very protective against trauma and you're much more likely to create a healthy sexual relationship for yourself and as a couple.
So of those, what do you Teach First?
Or do you just look at all six in a relationship?
17:33
Well, I mean, all of our very important, but we always start with consent because I think that is the foundation for a healthy sexual relationship.
I don't think how many people understand how important consent still is in a marriage relationship.
17:49
I was scrolling through Instagram just the other day and saw a post by I don't even know who saying that it was a woman saying you know once you're married your body is your spouse's and consent does not belong in marriage.
And I was like whoa wait a minute.
18:06
That is highly problematic for both men and women.
Consent is still very needed, but people don't understand the full extent of consent that anything after a no is considered coercion.
So if a husband initiates and the wife says not tonight, he's like, oh, come on, it's been so long, like, I really need this from you.
18:31
And that's considered coercion.
And then it's no longer consensual.
Like, that's really not going to create a great sexual relationship.
I also talk a lot about Doctor Cammy Hearst's dissertation research where she talks about consenting to unwanted sex, which is happens a lot with women.
18:51
We're finding it like more in like religious women in the United States do a lot of consenting to unwanted sex.
A lot of people would call this duty sex, right?
But they're saying yes, but it's not actually wanted.
19:07
And so when you're consenting to unwanted sex, there's a lot of things that show up in relationships because of that PTSD like symptoms.
There's relationship issues, emotional issues, sexual issues, pleasure issues that all come about when women are consenting to unwanted sex.
19:27
So that consent piece is really important.
Why do they consent if they don't really want?
It A lot of times it's because they think they're supposed to.
That's what a Good Wife does.
They do it to manage their husband's emotions.
They don't want to deal with the consequences of saying no.
19:42
So whether that is, you know, frustration, anger, disappointment, pouting, whining, cajoling, you know, withdrawal of love and affection, they don't want to deal with that.
That's too hard for them to deal with.
And so they do it.
There's also the fear that he will turn to pornography or have an affair or leave and she will be left.
20:06
I mean, a lot of the women that are in the survey, you know, don't have a lot of education and they've.
Kind of got married and wanted to be a stay at home mom.
And so they would lose their housing, their financial stability.
And so all of this motivates them to say yes to something that they don't actually want.
20:24
So what if I think all that's true?
What if the wife experiences ambivalence about who she really is?
Seriously, all those reasons you told me are true.
20:41
I believe them all.
At the same time, these are all reactive responses.
Well, I don't want to get kicked out of the house or my husband to see porn or have an affair.
These are all reactive type responses which are true.
I do not doubt these happen.
20:57
Which is why agencies support.
Important, but what if it's the bottom of all this with the wife is that she has not sat down and figured out her own identity and she's ambivalent because a lot of women, I know, you said men have trouble with identity too, and I get that.
21:17
It seems to me that women have a harder time because they're dealing with so many paradoxes in their life.
Absolutely.
One of them of many is sex.
And she may be.
21:33
Very fast.
Yeah, even.
Yeah, one of many paradoxes in a woman's life is sex.
And she is ambivalent.
And as a result, because she doesn't think about her identity, she doesn't resolve that ambivalent identity.
21:51
She has these reactive responses that that you just said that are all true.
She doesn't want these bad things to happen, so therefore she will do duty sex.
Does that sound right?
Yes, absolutely, absolutely.
Which is why it's foundational for her to understand her identity and have that awareness around herself first.
22:09
I mean, so much of what I'm coaching women on is being not reactive, but rather like, who do I want to be?
How do I want to show up?
What do I want to create for myself so that she is not needing to react to things and can actually make choices that align with her integrity.
22:29
And I think most women want to have a good marriage and have a good sexual relationship.
They just don't know how.
And so teaching them how to not be reactive and to be proactive in their life is essential for that.
22:45
That darn Victorian era, that kind of still has great influence today on the way that we view women as supposed to not know.
I.
Supposed to not use their agency and just submit.
23:02
I think Victoria, yes, I would heap blame on her too.
However, I don't think Victoria is the only person to blame here because if you look back through history, through all of history, humankind, it, it's, it's a pattern that women are in that role.
23:25
That is the nurturer they raise the children, they are a little bit more in the background.
And we're trying to push back against thousands of years of this, including Victoria, which you're right, I totally agree.
23:45
You're, you're correct.
We're headed to Africa, to Rwanda in a couple of weeks and educating women there, unhealthy sexuality, on trauma, abuse, all of those things which are such a huge part of that culture.
And they know nothing about Victorianism.
24:02
So, yeah, so it's a nice thing to say, but you're right, there's a much greater history.
Well, it's, I don't know if it's in all cultures, but.
It's biologic, you know, DNA oriented women and men, the orientation between them, the two sexes.
They think women start out from that standpoint of being the supporter.
24:24
And what I'm hearing you say, and I, we agree with you, is that the women really need to learn how to have a proactive voice in their own lives now if they choose to be submissive in the bedroom, hey.
24:43
That's their choice.
That more the better, right?
But but the difference is that they have chosen intentionally to be that submissive person, right?
That's the difference I think that I'm hearing.
You get out anyway.
Absolutely, Absolutely.
When it comes from a place of agency, then I think that makes a huge difference in the outcomes.
25:04
So language seems to be another area that the women in my research struggled with sexuality.
Can you speak to how you help give women language to use?
What are some of the things that you teach, the research that you use to back it up, if there is any, on how having language to support that sexual agency is so important?
25:31
Well, a lot of what we're doing in coaching is running through scenarios and role plays of what things look like in their relationship.
And a lot of times I will have them be their husband because he know they know exactly what he's going to say.
25:48
Nice, right?
I like it, and then I play them and how to speak in ways that are empowered but still kind but honest, loving and compassionate, but not submitting to things that they don't want to and giving them that language and running through those dialogues and role plays with them.
26:13
Help them see how they can show up differently in ways that are actually going to strengthen the marriage and strengthen them as a person, rather than this compliance that leaves them feeling stuck and trapped and not feeling great.
26:28
Can you give us some examples?
Yeah.
I'm very curious if you can go through an example of.
A or more than one, yeah.
Yeah, so let's say, you know, a husband comes home from work and starts putting the moves on, and she's just not there, OK.
26:47
And in the past, she might have been like, no, this is not what I want.
Leave me alone.
Quit touching me.
I'm cooking dinner, right?
And instead, she can say, you know what?
I love to be touched by you, but just now is not working for me.
Can we do this later?
Right?
27:03
I love, I like she's expressing that she likes it in certain ways without rebuffing him or let's say she's just really, she's so exhausted after her day and just really not in the mood.
Instead of saying no, this is no, absolutely not.
Don't you see how tired I am?
27:19
I just want to go to sleep.
Just saying like, I love you.
I can't tonight.
Can we plan on tomorrow?
And maybe you can do these things to help me tomorrow night so that I have more energy for you.
I love it.
OK.
You know, another thing, you know, maybe she's just not feeling it.
27:36
So rather than saying no, saying entice me.
Oh.
I like that.
OK, because we know that so many women are responsive desire rather than spontaneous desire.
And I actually don't love those terms because I think we're all responsive, just some people respond a lot faster and easier than others, depending on their accelerators and brakes well.
27:59
As a man I I might take a little issue with that, but I get your point.
I understand.
But like, if you can be open to being touched and it becomes a place where you can say, you know, entice me, let's see where it goes, right?
28:20
And maybe it doesn't go anywhere.
And then you have to have the strength to say, you know what, thank you so much for trying, but this is really not working for me.
And and not feel like just because he's tried that you have to do something that you don't want to do.
28:35
I love that.
Wow, That is fantastic because women do carry around a lot of baggage from a lot of things that have happened at work, parenting, managing a lot of different things.
So that's that's great language.
28:51
I think, though I love the entice me thing.
I think though, they probably need to be in a certain headspace that may you know, which I'm sure you teach, but I mean, but hey, it's an option, right?
Yes, I think that.
29:08
Well, entice me doesn't mean I have to go to the headspace.
Entice me means.
Entice me to convince me that this I'm in A at least in a headspace that's a little bit curious.
Yeah.
And you're not quite there yet, but.
And then why now?
You're willing to try because it leaves at.
29:25
Least it leaves that door open just a little bit.
For the husband, I mean, I hear a lot from husbands how painful it is for them to be rejected over and over and over.
And I feel for that.
And I think that, you know, women often feel like it's either, it has to be either a yes or a no.
29:41
And when we can say no, but I'm willing to try or like, no, but can we plan for another time?
And then you have to follow through, right?
It can't just be this perpetual pushing them off, but really getting to the space where like, let me help.
29:59
Let's stay connected even in the no.
OK, like that.
Is really good.
That's great.
You know, just I'm not feeling it tonight, but I would love to snuggle.
There you go, right.
That's a way to stay connected.
30:15
Like I, I really don't feel like I don't feel like penetrative sex, but I am open to giving you a blowjob or a handjob.
Like you get to decide where that line is.
Like when we define sex so narrowly as like penetrative sex intercourse, we lose so much possibility.
30:35
And so, you know, like I would not be open to sex, but I would love to just have a good make out session.
Like there's so much possibility there that can help you stay connected without it going all the way if you're not ready for that.
Hey everybody.
This conversation with Amanda Louder has been so rich that we didn't want to rush it.
30:54
It's we're splitting it into two parts.
In this first half, we laid the foundation for self-awareness agency and the six pillars of sexual health.
But there's so much more ahead.
In Part 2, we'll dive deeper into the real life application, what consent looks like inside of marriage and how to build emotional safety and also how to communicate desire without fear or guilt.
31:15
So if today sparked something in you, don't miss out on the next episode.
We're just getting started.
