Pleasure Uprising: Desire, Attachment, and the Sex You Actually Want

What do you do when you’re always the one initiating sex, and you’ve started to dread reaching out?
This episode is for anyone who is tired of waiting for their partner to want sex, and it starts with the belief that keeps most people stuck: that the fix belongs entirely to the other person.
You are not imagining that something is wrong. A partner who avoids the subject doesn’t make the problem disappear, and this episode is not about letting anyone off the hook. It’s about the part that is yours to change, because waiting or pushing are the least powerful positions you can be in, and you have more room to improve the situation than it might feel like right now.
In this episode:
Why pushing, pleading, cajoling, and pressuring backfire, even when they get you sex in the short run, and what they do to desire over time
The difference between responsibility and blame, and why blame is never helpful
Six signs you may be adding pressure without meaning to, including keeping a clock on how long it’s been, explaining why your partner should want it, and going cold after a no
Why you can’t make someone want sex, but you can change the conditions so desire has room to show up
What to do instead of asking: playful invitations with a clear out, and finding out what would feel good to their body
You don’t have to keep waiting. Taking responsibility for your side is not the same as taking the blame, and it’s the part of this you can start on this week.
Topics: partner doesn’t want sex, initiating sex, desire discrepancy, sexual rejection, pressure and desire, responsibility vs blame
Send Laura Fan Mail
Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/
The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel
 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training.

A listener wrote in asking how to bring her male partner into her emotional experience of the sexual violence in the news. Especially without having to teach him everything first. I think many of you may have a similar question. So I made you an episode.
When sexual violence dominates the headlines, a lot of us end up either carrying it alone or doing the emotional labor of explaining our own pain to the people closest to us, with sometimes disappointing results. I wanted to offer a real way through that doesn’t ask you to choose between caring for yourself and being heard.
In this episode:
Why naming your desire to be understood, even before you know how to say what you’re feeling, is itself a gift to your partner
How to actually identify and name the emotions you’re carrying, rage, exhaustion, grief, fear, so you can ask for what you need
A script for telling someone how you want to be received before you share something hard, instead of hoping they guess right
The difference between a good response and a bad one, and what to do when your partner gets defensive
Why this collective rage and exhaustion erodes desire, and what actually helps you come back into connection
What men in your life need to hear, and why silence, even well-intentioned silence, doesn’t land the way they think it does
You don’t have to carry this by yourself, and you don’t have to be anyone’s teacher to be loved well. Let people show up for you.
Topics: sexual violence, rage, loss of desire, sexual trauma, relationship communication, intimacy coach

Resources mentioned: 
My original article: "What We Actually Need From You Right Now" at Pleasure Uprising Substack
Rage Becomes Her by Soraya Chemaly (book) — Simon & Schuster
Believed (NPR podcast) — npr.org/podcasts/510326/believed
Roll Red Roll (documentary) — PBS POV
Know My Name by Chanel Miller (book) — Penguin Random House
Missoula: Rape and the Justice System in a College Town by Jon Krakauer (book) — jonkrakauer.com
Send Laura Fan Mail
Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/
The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel
 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training.

When nothing has worked to fix your sex life, it’s easy to decide nothing will. You’ve tried a few things, they didn’t help, and so you stop trying. I understand why. But that conclusion is a belief, not a fact, and it’s the belief that keeps people stuck in their relationships and sex lives for years.
I recorded this episode on a walk around my neighborhood, up the steep hill I’d been begrudging and semi-avoiding for months. Somewhere on the climb I realized the hill wasn’t the problem. My negativity bias was. The same is often true of the things you’ve decided can’t change in your relationship.
In this episode:
Why avoiding a problem that feels hopeless makes it feel even more hopeless, and how that shows up as low energy, numbing, and overworking
The belief that the past predicts the future, and why you already know it isn’t true 
How I turned the hill I was dreading into my favorite loop, and what that reminded me about negativity bias
Why hope isn’t something that falls from the sky and hits you in the head like an acorn, and the simple writing practice I use to build it
What teaching kids and adults to swim showed me about believing change is possible
Why every hard change I’ve made, from quitting smoking and drinking to earning a PhD and building a business, started with hope before I was ready to invest the time, effort, or money to actually do it
Hope is the part you build for free. And it has to come first.
Topics: feeling stuck in relationship, improving your sex life, negativity bias, avoidance, building hope, making change
Send Laura Fan Mail
Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/
The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel
 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training.

This episode is about autism and sex, autism and intimacy, and the myths that keep autistic people from seeing what they bring to relationships. It's the first in a series on autism and relationships. 

A pattern I see in my work with autistic clients and their partners is that they come to me sure that the autism is the problem. It's usually not. There are usually just some specific needs to be addressed and some specific strengths to capitalize on. Plus, most autistic people I work with benefit from even stronger doses of what neurotypical people benefit from: clear communication, practice, and a plan. 
In this episode: 
Why "aromantic," "asexual," "no empathy" and "not interested in partnership" don't describe autistic people as a group at all 
The double empathy problem: autistic and non-autistic people misread each other in both directions, and only one side gets called deficient  
Why asexuality, demisexuality, queerness and gender fluidity show up more often in autistic people, and why none of that is a problem to solve 
The autistic strengths that also make great lovers
Sensory needs in sex (lighting, sound, smell, texture, pressure, pacing) and how to negotiate them like any other preference 
Why needing sensory downtime is not rejecting your partner 
What my client actually needed: not better "reading," but explicit questions, practice, and a plan 
Nothing about being autistic is a problem for relationships and intimacy. You have specific needs, like everyone else, and what's unique about you is likely what makes you a fantastic partner. 
Topics: autism and sex, autism and intimacy, neurodivergent relationships, double empathy problem, sensory needs, consent 
Send Laura Fan Mail
Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/
The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel
 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training.

"I want to create a relationship with my body, my mind, pleasure and intimacy that is rooted in my values & freedom, without guilt or shame. I want to have sex with someone I'm not married to and not feel dirty or immoral the next day." 

That's what my client Amber wrote on her intake form in June. She rated herself a 1 out of 10. Ten weeks later, she rated herself a 10. In this episode, Amber and I talk about how she made that giant leap. 

This is a conversation about building sexual confidence after divorce and letting go of sexual shame. Amber grew up in purity culture and came to me when she was just starting to date again, worried that her desire was too much and feeling that her job in bed was to make the other person comfortable. She tells you what she practiced to shift into owning her pleasure, receiving pleasure without shame, and letting go enough to get back into her body and enjoy the way it responds instead of judge it. She also talks about learning to accept her own desires and preferences for relationship, rather than worrying about being "too much" or assuming having needs means you have an attachment problem (which is not necessarily true). 

In this episode: 
How Amber learned to receive: lying back, being seen in pleasure, and accepting her face, her sounds and her shaking legs instead of being embarrassed by them 
What changed when she said her fantasies out loud to someone who didn't flinch, after years of feeling "insatiable" and dirty for wanting so much 
The anatomy lesson, mirror work and daily breath practice that changed how she feels about her vulva 
Asking for what she wants without apologizing, including an orgasm before penetration 
Why sex stopped hurting once foreplay took as long as her body needed 
How she went from freezing or fawning to saying no out loud, starting with low-stakes role play 
Why wanting more contact from a partner wasn't anxious attachment. It was having needs and not getting them met 
The sentence she prepared for the morning after, so shame didn't get the first word. 
Amber got here by listening to what her body asked for, one small decision at a time, and practicing until she trusted herself. If you're starting over after divorce, struggling with people-pleasing, feeling like you're "too much," or still hearing the voice of religious shaming in your head, this one is for you. 

Topics: sexual confidence, sex after divorce, sexual shame, receiving pleasure, purity culture, boundaries 
Send Laura Fan Mail
Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and "Shoulds" Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
 
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/
The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel
 © Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training.