Revisiting How Can I Have a Great Sex Life? with Dr. Alex Katehakis

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Sex therapist Dr. Alex Katehakis started studying sex in her 30s, after years of struggling to build and maintain romantic relationships. Her early work in the field of sex addiction helped her to work through her own sexual issues and to understand healthy sexuality in new ways, including busting the myth that “penetrative sex is the end-all, be-all to sex and sexuality.” This episode’s practice is about learning to talk about sex—with ourselves, our partners and our kids—and how these conversations can lead to better sex.

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Transcript

SPEAKERS

Claire, Dr. Alex Katehakis

Claire  00:09

Hi, I’m Claire Bidwell Smith. And this is NEW DAY, today we are going to talk about sex, which is something I’ve been doing in my own life, or at least trying to, just this morning, I was in bed with my husband, sleeping toddler in between us, and I told him about the conversation you’re about to hear. I said to him, according to this renowned sex therapist that I just talked to you, we should be having conversations about sex, I should be like asking you what you’re into and telling you what I’m into. And he was like, okay. And so I asked him, then, how do you feel about having conversations about sex? And he said, fine. And inwardly I was like, shit. Turns out, I’m not fine. I’m actually nervous to talk about sex. So I ended up changing the subject and scheduling the chat for another time. Sex is so weird. And it’s scary to talk about, or at least it’s uncomfortable. I think it all goes back to shame, though, right? We’re afraid we’ll be judged or rejected. I’ve even noticed in my therapy office that sex and money are the two subjects that people seem to have the most secrets around, the most shame around.

Claire 

Both of them are loaded. Sex and money seem to tap into every area of our life. And the way we handle them is usually symptomatic or symbolic, of even bigger things going on beneath the surface. But all these things, we’re scared to talk about money, death, sex, need to be talked about. When we don’t address this stuff. It just spills out in a bunch of unhealthy ways. My guest today, Dr. Alex Katehakis is the clinical director of center for healthy sex in Los Angeles. And she’s recognized as a leader in the field of integrative sex therapy. In prep for this interview, I thought about a lot of things. I thought about my own sexuality, my sex life as a married 43-year-old woman, I thought about the ways in which I first learned about sex, and about how sex has changed for me over the years. And that led me into thinking about my daughters, and all the ways they’re already beginning to learn about sex and sexuality. And all the ways that looks really different for them than it did for my generation, both good and bad. How do we talk to our kids about sex? How do we talk to our partners about sex? No, like, seriously? How do I do that? I also asked Dr. Katehakis about porn, what are the effects on our kids and our relationships, she has great ideas for all of this. And I even asked her about her own sex life, and she was not nervous to talk about it. Let’s get into it.

Claire  02:47

Hi, Dr. Katehakis.

Dr. Alex Katehakis 

Hi, Claire.

Claire 

Thank you so much for being here.

Dr. Alex Katehakis 

Thank you for having me.

Claire

I start every show asking my guests the same question. And that’s, how are you doing today? But how are you actually doing?

Dr. Alex Katehakis 

Let’s see, I’m a little bit busier than I normally am. So I think I’m pretty centered today. But I also feel kind of a lot of background disturbance, you know, that’s in the world between the news and the pandemic. And so I’m aware of all of that. And at the same time, I’m excited about, you know, well, not the change of season in California, but the change of light indicates that fall is coming and the weekend and things of that nature. So I would say it’s sort of mixed for me today.

Claire 

Yeah, it sounds like it, but a little balanced too. So tell us how did you get into sexology?

Dr. Alex Katehakis 

Well, Boy, that’s a long story. It’s like how far back do I go with that? The desire for education about sex happened in my early 30s when I couldn’t put a love relationship together. And I didn’t understand why things weren’t working. And also, in my late 20s, my parents divorced after 30-35 years of marriage. And so I just saw everything falling apart, and really no roadmap for how to be in a long term committed relationship that was sexual over time. And from there, I got an internship and the only place I could find that even talked about sex was where they were treating sex addiction, which I’d never heard of before. And so I was sort of working through my own sexual issues while I was learning about sex and sexuality in a clinical setting.

Claire  04:34

Do you think it all starts in this adolescent time period and the messages we receive? I’m thinking about this a lot. I have a 12-year-old daughter, she’s my oldest and she’s moving into puberty and I’m reflecting a lot on what I was that age and the messages my mother gave me. My mother was very sexual, very open and she was often walking around naked and she was very sensual and she was very excited for me to get to know my body. And so it’s very positive. And when I got my period, she threw a party for me, you know, but took me out to lunch. And we celebrated. And it was kind of fun and exciting. And I’m thinking about that a lot as my daughter is moving into this phase. And I really feel like I’ve never had any shame about my body or sexuality because of her introduction with that. And so how much do you think is rooted in that place, those early beginnings?

Dr. Alex Katehakis 

I actually think it starts earlier. I think it starts, you know, as early as kindergarten, that, you know, when we start to talk to children appropriately about their bodies, and their body parts and sort of support them? And what feels pleasurable and good, and what’s private? And who can touch you and who can’t. We’re teaching boundaries in age-appropriate ways from the get go. So that, by the time a girl, or boy reach puberty, they have a sense of their emerging body.

Claire  06:00

What do you think the biggest mistakes we make as parents are in terms of when we start talking about sex? How we start talking about it, all of those things?

Dr. Alex Katehakis 

Well, I think it has to do with, you know, early education, there’s a saying that, you know, if you think you should talk to your kids about sex, or internet pornography, it’s too late. By the time you start thinking about it, yeah. So I think it has to do with the sex positive messages as soon as possible. Because we have a body and we’re in a body. And this body is designed for pleasure. And when we don’t normalize pleasure, it gets pornographize, and it gets made to be dirty and shameful. And shame is so toxic when it comes to sexuality. And if a child’s sexuality is tampered with, or humiliated or shamed, it’s going to go underground. And that’s when people start to have real problems with their bodies.

Claire

What I see around me and my friends or other parents that I interact with is a lot of fear around talking about these things, though, I don’t think they feel like they know what to say. And I think that they also worry that they’re going to encourage their children in ways that they don’t mean to. What do you say about that?

Dr. Alex Katehakis 

Well, I think it’s the opposite of that. And if a parent feels ashamed of their own sexuality, they’re going to feel ashamed talking about it, you know, the more comfortable parents can get with their own bodies and their own sexuality, the more able, they’re going to be able to talk about it with their children and children are open, they don’t think it’s dirty or wrong until you start to or we start to put that on them. And this idea that if I educate my child about their body, and their sexuality, they’re just going to go off the rails is the exact opposite of what happens. You know, when you don’t invite something in, when you don’t talk about it, kids get very curious. And their hormones are really starting to be activated in this pubescent time, they’re going to be sexual. So they’re either going to be sexual in a way that is positive, that is appropriate that they’ll come talk to you about, or they’re going to do it behind your back. Which is far more dangerous than doing it explicitly.

Claire  08:14

What are the basic components of a healthy sex life?

Dr. Alex Katehakis

I would say it depends on the person and who their partner is, if they have a partner, and what stage of life they’re at, also, because what’s healthy for, you know, a 23-year-old would make a 63-year-old pass out. But the depth of relatedness a 63-year-old might be able to muster is one that would make a 23- or 33-year-old, possibly really uncomfortable.

Claire 

That makes sense. I was really surprised when at around 35-36, I had the highest sex drive I’ve ever had.

Dr. Alex Katehakis 

Well, that’s the women hit their prime in their late 30s.

Claire 

You know, I hit 35. And I’d had two kids at that point. And I kind of just figured, okay, it’s gonna, you know, be downhill from here. And instead, it was the opposite. Yes. But it was it was enjoyable to see, which is surprising. What do you think are other myths about sex that we get caught up in or that we don’t realize? I mean, I feel like it’s changing all the time. And we’re talking about it more and more and more, you know, collapsing these myths, but there’s still a lot out there.

Dr. Alex Katehakis

Yeah, I mean, the sexual landscape is as fluid as people’s sexuality is fluid now. So that’s really exciting that there’s less pigeonholing of people. There’s more fluidity, men are admitting to more fluidity also, with less shame, because pleasure is pleasure. So I think some of the myths are that, you know, after you have a child, you don’t have sex anymore, or as you age, you don’t want to have sex or, you know, masturbation is bad for you. I mean, a lot of the old vestiges of our puritanical way of thinking can hang around and that level of shame and repression really wreaks havoc on people’s sexuality. And the Mithen I’m most interested in busting right now is that penetrative sex is the end all be all to sex and sexuality. There are a myriad of ways to be sexual. And you know, the skin is the biggest organ in the body, and it’s the most pleasurable organ to be touched in some ways. And so really recognizing and bringing sensuality and sexuality into our everyday lives, is a part of starting to rattle some of these ideas that sex is strictly again, about penetration. And that’s certainly what pornography, perpetrates, right?

Claire  10:43

Yeah, I have a lot of thoughts and questions about pornography, more questions, really. That seems to have been the ideas around that have been changing a lot, too. But again, as I’m raising my oldest going into puberty, I’m thinking so much about pornography, when she’s going through, what that’s gonna be like for her, what the other peers around her are watching, and what will be expected of her or thought about with her sexually. And you know, and then just like partners, and pornography, and ourselves and pornography, like talking to me about pornography?

Dr. Alex Katehakis 

It’s a very complicated, you know, question, because first and foremost, it is a speech right that we have, and it can be incredibly fun and pleasurable. It just has to do I think, again, with intentionality. What is our intention for why are we doing it? What does it do to us? Is it additive? Does it create a dependency? In some weird way that’s uncomfortable? I think one of the sort of earmarks or tells for me is, after somebody is engaged in any sexual experience, how do they feel afterwards? You know, is it additive? Do you feel good about yourself? Do you feel like something fundamentally just changed in a positive way? Or do you feel achy or dirty or humiliated? Not because you want it to be humiliated and that was part of the game, right? Or the sex play, but because you’re left feeling like part of your dignity was taken from you? So if it is any sexual act between consensual adults is additive, then there’s no one correct way to be sexual? That’s why it’s hard to answer for me to answer this question, what is healthy sex? I mean, my question is, well, what is it for you? You know, today, it may be different tomorrow also.

Claire  12:33

How do we begin to ask that question for ourselves? You know, how do I begin to ask myself what healthy sex is for me?

Dr. Alex Katehakis

Well, I think part of it is really being in touch with the body. But what does my body want? What do I want to experience of myself, and something that we might be talking around that I think is really important is that none of us just have one aspect of who we are. And I think this plays out, when you see roleplay whether it’s in porn, or in erotic stories, or when Halloween comes and adults dress up, and they’re sort of alter egos. And we think of a lot of times, we think of roleplay as being something that sort of corny, or it looks like bad, you know, community theater or something like I don’t want to dress up like a waitress because I feel like a jerk or dork or something. But it’s about I think, in its purest sense, it’s about contacting these other aspects of ourselves. Because we have so many different aspects to ourselves, we’re not just one thing all the time. And there’s a play state to those aspects. So whether it’s a younger self, or an older self, or a more assertive, or aggressive self, or a more, you know, submissive self, or a […], or exotic, whatever you want to label it. These are aspects that are placed aids and play is fundamental to healthy sex. When we can, you know, laugh and feel free and give up control with each other, then all sorts of interesting things happen and I think that’s really where the realm of the erotic lives.

Claire  14:47

How do you kind of open these doors maybe if you’ve been in a relationship for a very long time, and maybe you’ve had one kind of sexuality with your partner, you know, very routine sex or you know, just kind of a narrow way of and then suddenly you’re exploring your sexuality in a new way are these sides of yourself? How do you go about bringing that into your relationship?

Dr. Alex Katehakis 

Well, I think it first has to start with some kind of conversation in a way that’s not threatening to the other by just talking, just having conversations, whether they’re hypothetical or not about, what would it be like if or something I would like to try is? And how would you feel about that. And I think the receiving partner has to be very careful about dropping their judgments. When we get scared, we tend to get defensive, and we tend to get judgmental. So if you and I were partnered, and you said, hi, you know, we’ve been having sex in the same way for whatever, 15 years, and I really want to try having sex with a cowgirl hat on and I’m like, oh, my God, that’s so weird. Why would you want to do that? Because I’m uncomfortable with it. As opposed to saying, oh, that’s unusual. I didn’t even know you have a like that.

Dr. Alex Katehakis  16:04

Where’d you get it? What about being a cowgirl is so arousing or exciting to you. And I might not have ever thought of that before. But the act of being open to it may find me finding it incredibly arousing or erotic. Or I might think it’s kind of funny and hilarious, but you’re so turned on by it, I’m going to go with it anyway. But as long as it doesn’t take me out of my integrity, it does, it doesn’t make me feel like I’m compromising myself in a way that really doesn’t feel good, then I think if it’s for the good of the whole, and there’s an exploratory part of it, that I would go along to see what’s in this for me also, what might I learn about myself also, that I find to be exciting, too.

Claire 

It feels like this almost might take a pre conversation about, hey, let’s sit down and have a conversation about sex. And I’d love for you to, you know, suspend immediate judgment or, you know, maybe doing that before you get into it. So you can really start to talk about those things.

Dr. Alex Katehakis 

Right. And also letting your partner know that you’re, you know, satisfied with your sexuality and your sex life, and that you love them and appreciate them and you’re attracted to them. But you’ve been thinking about this is, you know, your body’s changing, or you’ve read something or seen something that you’re interested in, and how do they feel about that? So I think what you’re pointing to Claire, is this notion of let’s talk about our talking like, how can we talk about this in a way where we’re open to each other and willing to see what we might discover. And sometimes those conversations in and of themselves are arousing. And, you know, that can lead to some kind of exciting sex without the cowboy hat ever even coming out.

Claire 

Just that you brought it up and started to talk about that opened up a hole.

Dr. Alex Katehakis 

Exactly, yes.

Claire

And what happens? If you’re not attracted to your partner anymore? I feel like I have a lot of married friends who are just like, oh, we don’t have sex anymore at all. And I’m just not into it, or going through phases, you know?

Dr. Alex Katehakis  18:14

Well, I think we know now that, you know, Americans are having less and less sex. I mean, we have less sex now than we did in the 90s, [..]. And that’s happening, I think, as a result of the massive amount of stress that we’re under. And also with the advent of electronics, you know, people would rather look at their Instagram page at night in bed next to their partner, then turn towards them. So part of it is looking at where are the ways that I avoid sex and sexual contact? And what is the purpose of sex? That’s another question is why have sex in this relationship? This marriage? What does it mean to me?

Claire 

Because is that different for everyone?

Dr. Alex Katehakis 

I think so. You know, I think sex can be when we’re trying to have a baby. Versus it’s for stress relief, or I really want to connect with my partner. And when people stop having sex, it’s generally because they’ve lost a novel connection with each other. It’s not exciting anymore the way it once was, because we’re householders, we’re parents, we’re workers, we have a million different roles going on. But when people can stop and ask themselves, why am I in this marriage? What is the purpose of this person? Are they just a functionary, you know, that brings home a paycheck and helps me rear children? Or this person was once my lover? Where is the lover in this person? And that requires time, it requires close and eye contact. It requires saying, how are you doing? What do you struggle with? There may be many conversations before it leads to a sexual connection with the other.

Claire 

Do you think in order to view your relationship has healthy; you have to be having sex regularly. And how much sex?

Dr. Alex Katehakis  20:04

No, I don’t, I think that’s also a pressure. And again, just like there’s no one kind of sexuality, there’s no one kind of relationship. I think relationships go through phases, the way bodies have moods, like you might be in the mood for sex today and not tomorrow. And so sometimes it can be really tense, because something’s going on, like workwise for one person, or both people or you’ve got a child that’s sick. And then other times, you can feel unbelievably close and have a heart connection that feels like you’re deeply in love with your partner, but not necessarily sexual with them. And other times, you know, when people do finally have sex, they’re like, oh, my god, that was so easy, and it felt so good, we should do this more often. So if it’s not that big of a deal, we tend to put a lot of weight on it also, instead of thinking about what is good for the relationship, how do I keep this positive emotional connection with my partner, sex is a way to do it, because sex is really just a release of a bunch of neuro chemicals that make us feel good, that gives us a sense of well-being, and also deepen our attachment to the other person.

 

Dr. Alex Katehakis

But I think it becomes problematic when people don’t talk about it for long periods of time. And then both parties are getting their sexual needs met, typically through masturbation, and sometimes masturbation, and porn, and sometimes, the porn can take over the relationship altogether. And then there’s another problem where one party feels terribly betrayed or rejected because of that. But if you’re in a relationship, and you can say, hey, let’s go for a walk and talk about, you know, why we don’t have sex, or let’s acknowledge that we’re not having sex right now. And it doesn’t mean I don’t love you, or I’m not sexually attracted to you. But I just want to say that that’s what’s up for me at this moment. And I don’t know why. And can the other person again, hear it without rolling their eyes or getting angry or defensive about it? Let’s just look at the landscape of our life right now. And what’s going on?

Claire  22:11

That sounds so nice and easy, but it’s not like those conversations feel so hard when they have to really happen, you know, I think we do get so afraid to bring these things up. We’re so afraid of that judgment or rejection. And so I think, I think often we really avoid those conversations. But it sounds like if we could just have them like that they would solve so many things.

Dr. Alex Katehakis

Yeah, I mean, the avoidance of the conversation makes it worse. And that’s when people end up in our offices, as you know, where they’re at, you know, this critical mass, they’re ready to walk out the door and divorce each other. They’re so angry and hurt because of all the projections, because nobody’s really talking to anybody.

Claire 

Right? So at what point should someone go see a sex therapist?

Dr. Alex Katehakis 

Well, I think it depends on, again, what’s happening for them. If both parties are frustrated, they want to have sex, they don’t know how to approach each other, they’ve had these conversations, it can often be helpful to have a third view on what’s going on. And to really challenge you know, each party’s assumptions and help them look at the way that they’re blaming and shaming their partners, as opposed to taking responsibility for what their part is in it. And that’s usually the problem people have in any marital dynamic is that there is a dynamic between both parties. And each person is responsible for their part in the dynamic. And when we can get honest and say, oh, wow, every time you say, you know, day, I say night, I just realized I say night all the time. Because when I was a kid, I had to fight for every single piece of reality that was in my world. And I keep perpetrating that on you. Which is very different than saying you’re wrong. Or you’re always telling me I’m wrong. I’m looking at what I’m doing. That opens up a whole different level of conversation. And there’s an open heartedness to that too.

Claire  24:12

Yeah, I think it really helps to have a third party like a therapist with these conversations. Because often I think couples go through the same cycle over and over, they have the same argument over and over here. And they say the same things over and over. And so to sit down with a third party to do that, you can kind of break that cycle and hear things new. Hear yourself, you know, and in a different way.

Dr. Alex Katehakis 

Well, that would definitely be an indicator for couples therapy, that repeated cycle where you’re just hearing yourself say the same thing over and over again. And I would challenge people to be curious about why do I keep saying the same thing over and over again? What am I not seeing? What can I do differently?

Claire

What about masturbation? Is that a normal healthy thing? I feel like I’ve heard a couple of people say that they feel betrayed by it when they’re in a relationship, whether it’s with porn or not. And I guess it depends, right?

Dr. Alex Katehakis 

Yeah, I think a lot of people don’t talk about masturbation with their partners also, like again, I mean, it’s just so interesting to me that this area from the waist down is so taboo. And men have their penises in their hands several times a day. Because a penis does all these different things. But women, you know, don’t typically touch their vaginas, unless they’re using a tampon or something along those lines, but the clitoris only serves one purpose. And that’s for pleasure. And for orgasm, it doesn’t do anything else, you can’t get pregnant by it, you can’t urinate out of it, it’s just for pleasure. So this idea that we shouldn’t be pleasuring ourselves, or it’s not okay, or we don’t share it with our partners is all wrapped in shame, that I’m ashamed that I have this body part, I have this secret body part, that’s got, you know, millions of nerve endings in it that I shouldn’t touch or anybody should know about. So I think masturbation is a part of one’s personal sex life.

Dr. Alex Katehakis  26:41

And I think when people can talk to each other about it doesn’t mean you have to report how many times you’re masturbating a week or what you’re doing. But you can share with your partner that you do and maybe what you like about it, or what you fantasize about, or what sex toys you’ve bought recently, or that you found this cool little personal vibrator. And that can be a part of a couple sex life also is watching each other masturbate. But that requires a certain amount of adult sexuality. This challenge of watching your partner watch you have pleasure can be very difficult for people again, because of shame. Or they do it because it’s a performance. It’s not a vulnerability for them.

Claire 

Yet to me that it I just it sounds so intimate and vulnerable.

Dr. Alex Katehakis 

But it’s about being seen and known and looked at and being an object of arousal for the other. And this can get tricky too, especially with feminist thinking is that well, I don’t want to objectify myself, for my partner. And I think when women are secure enough in their sexuality and their personhood, their objectification of themselves can be quite erotic and quite powerful. And so often we expect that our partner is going to know what to do. Like there’s all this mind reading that goes on. And that’s a myth also, and an old practice that, you know, you’re supposed to know how to bring me to orgasm, but I’m never going to tell you anything. About what I like, what I don’t like, what’s okay, what’s not okay. And that’s part of what creates all these problems between people. And again, that’s wrapped in shame. It’s about knowing your body, knowing your arousal, knowing how to create an energetic charge in your breath, in your pelvis, so that you’re bringing your full body arousal to your partner, and not being in this sort of strange codependent dance where you’re having sex and you’re just tracking your partner, and you’re wondering if they’re okay, and do they like this? And do they think I’m sexy? And, you know, people are so busy in their heads, that they have all these performance difficulties, both men and women.

Claire  28:56

Yeah, that sounds very familiar. Like, just a lot of stories I hear about sex and kind of just how it usually is, is you’re not telling your partner anything that you want, just hoping it maybe happens. And then feeling not satisfied if it doesn’t, and not never saying anything.

Dr. Alex Katehakis 

Right. And a lot of women, I think, violate themselves because they have penetrative sex, when they’re not really lubricating, they’re not really ready. But they just do it anyway, instead of stopping and saying, I need some lubrication, or I bought this great lubrication, I want to try and having it at the ready, like taking care of your own sexual body, and knowing what you like and what feels good, and what you want, and being able to talk to your partner about it.

Claire  29:37

But man, does this have to start? This has to have to change with how we start talking about this with kids. I mean, where and when do we learn these kinds of things?

Dr. Alex Katehakis

Well, I think it’s too young to talk about this in some ways to teenagers. For them, just the experience of having their bodies touched feeling their bodies get aroused. In this kind of simple and wholesome and sweet way is enough. What I worry about for a lot of young people is that they’ve watched so much pornography, that they think that pornography is sex. They don’t understand that it’s make believe, right? That it’s an even porn actors say that, you know, at home sex is not the same as porn sex, or sex when they’re on the job. So that is worrisome to me and problematic. So it’s about teaching young people that what you see in porn is not real people sex, your bodies are going to respond differently, it’s going to go slower. Also letting girls know that they don’t have to let boys ejaculate on their face, just because that’s what boys see in porn. And that’s what they think is okay. So really being an explicit conversations with them about what’s okay, what isn’t what feels right to them, and not to violate what feels good to them. Because that starts to smash their intuition. And that’s all they’ve got really.

Claire  31:03

Yeah. I think that we need to really be emphasizing how important it is for parents to be having these conversations, because I think they’re afraid to talk about it a lot. How is your sex life changed over the years? And how has your work impacted that?

Dr. Alex Katehakis 

Well, it’s impacted me greatly. I mean, when I first started working in the field of sex addiction, I was like, Oh, my God, I was single. So it was like, I never want to have sex again.

Claire 

Why?

Dr. Alex Katehakis 

Well, because I was hearing about all these, you know, endless stories of infidelity, and betrayal. And I would go to like a restaurant bar with a girlfriend. And I’d be like, oh, my God, somebody and here’s a sex addict. I felt like my sexuality got shut down for a while doing that work. And over time, as I started to feel more secure with the work itself, I started to make contact again, with my feminine entity, because it really impacted the way I dressed at work and covering up and all of that. And I think I’ve, you know, certainly reached a balance with it at this point where I allow for my female energy and femininity, but I’m still dressed appropriately for the work I do. And so I’ve gone in and out of phases when I was writing erotic intelligence, you know, I was sort of experimenting with my husband about everything. I thought, I can’t write this unless it’s really working. So that became like a clinic or the work I was doing.

Claire  32:24

How was that for him?

Dr. Alex Katehakis 

That was great. Yeah, I mean, and so we’ve had a vital sex life over the years, we’ve been married for 22 years now. But it’s changed also, as we’re both older and in different decades of our lives. And this is why I’m looking at what does it mean to have an ageing body, and to still be very attracted to and in love with at times, you know, like most people, at times, I don’t want to see my husband, I just want to know, he’s in the other room breathing. And other times, I feel like I like crazy in love with him. And so I’m able to hold on to and I think we all have to hold on to, you know why we got into this relationship to begin with, what we love about this human being, and how we express our sexuality on a daily basis, that may not have to do with, as I said, penetrative sex or genital contact, but there is a liveliness to the sexual play and the sensuality. And that can come in the form of, you know, texts, or things we say to each other. When we see each other, it can come in all sorts of forms that are playful and loving.

Claire 

So I feel like I need to go ahead and ask you a last question. Otherwise, I’m going to keep you here for two hours. And can you guys have any more questions? I have a lot. We might need to bring you back. But one of the last things I’m really curious about is, is exploring sexuality in terms of gender in terms of preferences these days, I identify as, as straight but I remember being in like ninth grade and having a dream about a girl in my class a sexual dream about it. And it was, it was wonderful. But then I woke up and was like, Oh my god, no, I can’t it was an you know, this was the 90s. And sure, it was changing then, but still, even then I thought, okay, I can’t, I can’t talk about that, or have that dream. And now I’m watching my daughters emerge into this world. And it’s totally different. Like, there’s no way they would wake up from a dream like that and be worried about it, which is amazing. Like, they have kind of every possibility open to them about right, how they want to be sexually, who they want to be with how they want to identify. But at the same time, they also seem a little overwhelmed and confused, because there’s so much there. What do you have to say about all this?

Dr. Alex Katehakis  34:44

Well, I think you know, my understanding is a lot of young people are just identifying as bisexual to be inclusive, because they don’t know or they’re still they’re open to possibility and experimentation. And I think that’s really lovely and beautiful and some people might not like me saying that. Because these rigid, you know, gender roles and rules that get prescribed creates so much repression. And I think if somebody’s natural tendency is towards a particular gender, that’s going to shake out anyway. So if they experiment with having a girlfriend, and that’s kind of fun and safe initially to find out about their sexuality, then okay. But things shift and change, as I say we shift and change over a lifetime and trying different things. And then questioning do I like that or don’t I, I think is a healthy way of examining one’s sexuality. So I think as a parent, it’s what you were saying before, what the gift your mother gave you, it’s just about being sex positive, and saying, well, tell me about that? Or what scares you about that? Or what do you like about it? What do you think you should do? Do you want me to tell you what I think you should do. Because at some point, you have to remember you are a parent, and you do get to weigh in and say this is and you know, your child. So you don’t want to push them in the direction of being you know, that’s the other danger. It’s either sex negative, or overly sex positive, which can create other problems.

Claire  36:14

Overall, I’m kind of heartened to see how it’s all unfolding, though. Telling my girls, you know, just like people, you know, you can make whoever you want, however you want, whenever you want. And you don’t have to pick one thing to be right. I mean, right now, it’s changing all the time. Like you said.

Dr. Alex Katehakis

Yeah, I had a crush on my second-grade teacher. She was beautiful. She’s female, I still remember her. But I didn’t, you know, grow up and marry her. So it’s just all about being open and looking at possibilities. And I really appreciate you saying that. And I think we are in a major socio-cultural revolution right now. Like everything is up for grabs and topsy turvy. And I think that’s where we started this conversation, part of it can be very dysregulated and create anxiety and lack of surety and part of it is very exciting, because changes are afoot.

Claire 

Thank you so much. This was a pleasure to talk to you.

Dr. Alex Katehakis 

It was lovely to talk to you and to meet you, too.

Claire 

I think we’re gonna have to have Dr. Katehakis back, because the more we talked, the more questions I had for her. Some of my big takeaways from this conversation were that it’s never too early to talk to your kids about sex. That conversations in general around sex are a good idea with our kids, our partners, ourselves, but that we have to be careful not to resort to judgment or shame when we have them. That sex isn’t strictly about penetration or orgasm. I love that Dr. Katehakis reminds us to tap into our own personal pleasure, and that we should even be doing this with our partners. I think some of the big questions that all of you out there can be asking yourself are what does a healthy sex life look like for me? Why am I having sex? How do I feel after I have sex? What makes me feel sensual? What do I fantasize about? These might be questions that you ask yourself, maybe you journal about them, or awkwardly pose them to your partner in bed.

Claire  38:13

The point of asking these questions is ultimately to create a more fulfilling sex life. So when you ponder them, see if anything comes up that you need to work on. Are you stuck on something? Is there an issue you’re not addressing? Something you’re ashamed of? You can talk about this with your partner or your therapist, or you could even see a couples therapist together. And to go deeper on the subject, I really recommend Dr. Katehakis’ workbook mirror of intimacy, daily reflections on emotional and erotic intelligence, and also sexual reflections, a workbook designing and celebrating your sexual health plan, or check out her show the Alex Katehakis podcast. As always, thanks for tuning in. We’ll be back next week with a great conversation with Dr. Alauna Curry, about trauma, empathy, and what happens when therapists fall apart and have to deal with their own trauma.

CREDITS

NEW DAY is a Lemonada Original. Jackie Danziger is our supervising producer, our associate producers Erianna Jiles, […] our engineer, music is by Hannis Brown. Executive producers are Stephanie Wittels Wachs and Jessica Cordova Kramer, Lily Cornell Silver and Claire Bidwell Smith. NEW DAY is produced in partnership with the wellbeing trust the Jed Foundation, and Education Development Center. Help others find our show by leaving us a rating and writing a review. Follow us at Lemonada Media across all social platforms or find me at ClaireBidwellSmith.com Join our Facebook group to connect with me and fellow NEW DAY listeners. Hear advice on how to live with more purpose and satisfaction and suggest tools that have helped you. You can join at facebook.com/groups/newdaypod. You can also get bonus content and behind the scenes material by subscribing to Lemonada premium. You can subscribe right now and the apple podcast app by clicking on our podcast logo and then the subscribe button. Alright, that’s it for us. Thanks for listening. See you next week.

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