HOW TO AFFIRM YOUR SPOUSE’S SEXUALITY

My personal take on sex has always been that it is not a performance but another means of expressing intimacy in marriage. It is Victor L. Brown that once wrote, "The lives of most people are their search for intimacy." Creating a real intimate bond requires time, effort, energy, acceptance and creativity. A marriage Counselor on one occasion said that “Affirmation is everything”. Affirming your spouse’s sexuality indicates that you not only approve of, respect and appreciate your mate’s sexual desire but you also accept who your partner is, warts and all.

Shortly, after my marriage in 1997, I came to the realization that a man (maybe my husband) uses sex to create intimacy and for an average woman like me, sex is another form of expressing intimacy. This major difference in our sexuality can sometimes put a strain on the relationship. This occurs mostly when there is a disagreement between the man and his wife. Back then my husband believed that sex could be used as means of resolve the issue at hand. I was of the opinion that the issued has to be resolved first, before, I could engage in such an intimate act.
A man's sexuality, his manhood, is primarily expressed through sexual intercourse; of course this is not the only way he demonstrates his sexuality. However, like my husband has told me on a number of occasions, his sexual performance with me, his wife, is an inseparable part of who he is. Therefore, it is erroneous for me think that for him it is just an act, it is indeed an expression of his needing me and if I fail to acknowledge that, I make myself just like any other woman in his life. So, affirming my husband’s sexuality is the ribbon that ties our relationship together. It is what makes our relationship unique and different and a major component of what makes our relationship a marriage; not merely a friendship, a roommate living arrangement or a business transaction.

My husband believes that for him to be totally affirmed sexually, I must be a willing participant and I must be able to enjoy the experience. The following are some of the ways that I have tried to be a willing participant over the years:
• See your spouse and his sexuality as inseparable and as a special gift from God to you
• Be grateful and thankful to God for your spouse’s sexuality
• Do not make sex in marriage about performance. Enjoy the experience of expressing your love on another level and not about having an orgasm
• Do not use sex as a tool for manipulation or punishment.
• Discuss and resolve conflicts, so that you do not have to come up with excuses on why you do not want sex. Your spouse will feel rejected, if you just give excuses.
• Listen to your spouse’s needs in bed and satisfy them, so long as they are not sinful or unholy
• Learn to laugh at your mistakes and not at your spouses
• Do not make uncomplimentary remarks about your spouse’s sexual organs, performance or actions during and after sex
• Be imaginative and creative: in your attire, location, music, location effects and position
• Initiate sex sometimes, not just when you want to get pregnant
• Encourage your spouse’s advances, even when you are tired
• Express your appreciation to your husband whenever you have had a wonderful time
• Let your husband know when you are enjoying the experience
• Talk to him kindly and gently if he is doing something wrong
• Never ever compare him to anybody else even in your mind
• Honesty is important in bed, but there are some things that you can’t change, so they are better left unsaid, you will know intuitively what they are
• Tell him the things you like about him in bed


HOW TO AFFIRM YOUR SPOUSE’S SEXUALITY
This is a subject I struggled with in and by itself and as such felt I had to evaluate the factors of my own sexuality before attempting to see her sexuality in an expansive or insightful way. Therefore, before progressing on this journey I need to take time out to reevaluate what I understand about the topic first from the familiar territory of the male sexuality.

Speaking as a man and for men (sic) I believe my sexuality is an interesting combination of my physical, emotional and environmental conditions and when these act in harmony it produces the perfect opportunity for experiencing and sharing one of life’s most rewarding experiences. However, as it is with us men folk who tend to see our relevance in the context of how well we, ‘perform’, ‘problem-solve’ and ‘achieve’, the issue of our sexuality can be a very serious matter indeed, and this tend to make us think about these things almost only about how it affects us solely. With this background I can now attempt to delve into the subject of how a man may affirm the sexuality of his spouse.
One of the first things I have had to learn is that my spouse is distinctly different – especially in the area of our sexuality. So, what is my understanding of her sexuality? Primarily that her sexuality runs not on gasoline or any singular variable but on a complex ‘feel good’ factor that is made up of a blend of her personality, psychology, physiology, current and past events, romance (whatever that means), other external stimuli comprised as widely by things such as words, touch, deeds, smile or frown, tone of voice, picking the right gift, my dress sense, a listening ear …. an interminable list I can tell you, and so I long learnt to keep an open mind.

This ‘feel good’ factor I have realized can be aided, encouraged, fanned and also (unfortunately also) truncated through a combination of actions, inactions, words or expressions by the object of her interest - me. Note my emphasis on ‘subject of interest’. If you are not a subject of interest it matters very little I believe to a woman what your views are as regards her sexuality.

This coincidentally, is distinctly different from how I or my men folk are designed to be excited, energized or stimulated which coincidentally is mainly by sight (its either he likes what he sees or not). Like I mentioned earlier other factors like environmental, emotional and physical conditions will also come into play but the order is 7Up (clear) like they say.
Returning to the subject, i.e. Mrs. Gogo, for me to successfully affirm her sexually, the following seem imperative:
• An understanding that her engine tends to start more slowly and needs early stimulation of the emotional kind, such as being made to feel beautiful, giving her a sense of security and being made to feel as the most important person (MIP) that she is. Like I am reminded more times than I can remember, “lovemaking begins outside the bedroom.” To affirm: begin foreplay hours or days ahead of schedule.
• That some level physical touch is almost always necessary before any real of excitement can be whipped up. For me, any small thing can light a fire to consume the whole house. To affirm: be patient and deliberate, remembering the instruction “line upon line.”
• That unlike myself that has to achieve a minimum level of “performance” (at least an erection or its equivalent – if any such exists), the same does not hold true for her and as such performance in the strict sense of the word does not hold the same level of criticality as it does with men. With this is mind dear brethren, we are encouraged to look beyond the act proper to successfully affirm our queens. To affirm: If in need of directions - ask!
• That in view of the less important requirement to perform, there are other avenues to satisfaction that are open to her like: cuddling after the fact, being handled fondly and patiently and being seen as more than a sexual outlet. Now that I think of it I believe that for her to be affirmed she must believe without an iota of doubt that what she offers cannot be replicated by any other woman on earth. If as we sometimes do, we give the impression that intercourse is a singular isolated act, this can give the wrong impressions that one “water well” can be just as good as another. To affirm: recognize and act in line with the full gamut of her sexual needs.
• That if we are to believe that there is an “intelligent design” by God of the sexes and marriage, we all (as elements of that framework) will only be effective to the extent to which we understand, appreciate and align with the blueprint of the grand architect. So what is that design and why has she been so assembled (fearfully and wonderfully mind you) to be as complex as an intricate software that has to be painstaking and deliberately navigated before it will put out as desired? Well just as my sexual drive as a man is designed to ensure that a healthy need and desire for my spouse is maintained (we can only imagine what the balance of relationships might have been like if we did not possess this drive that makes us seek out and try to please our wives). Conversely, I believe she must remain as a slightly tricky puzzle that is not too easily unraveled in order for us to be able to appreciate and value even more highly. Brothers, we are primordially hunters and gatherers by instinct and if there is no hunting down, breaking down, analyzing or some level of mini industrial effort associated with some tasks/ventures the objects of our attention may eventually lose our interest and we cannot have that, could we? To affirm: celebrate her difference and uniqueness.
• That as a man I tend to want to use sex to build and maintain our relationship, whilst she on the other hand will tend to want to use sex to express the condition of our relationship. To affirm: give her something to celebrate.

In conclusion, I posit to myself that to affirm her I must begin to accept our differences as a gift and that this is what makes us a couple and I must venture daily into an arena that still requires me to hunt (i.e. work for your food) and that the code of how to perform in this arena is divinely written into my DNA and I can be assured of success once I can accept that she beautifully different and worthwhile to be pursued.