“Keep yourselves above any domineering or
unworthy behavior in the tender, intimate relationship between husband and
wife. Because marriage is ordained of God, the intimate relationship between
husbands and wives is good and honorable in the eyes of God. He has commanded
that they be one flesh and that they multiply and replenish the earth (see Moses 2:28;
3:24).
You are to love your wife as Christ loved the Church and gave himself for it
(see Ephesians
5:25–31).
Tenderness and respect—never
selfishness—must be the guiding principles in the intimate
relationship between husband and wife. Each partner must be considerate and
sensitive to the other’s needs and desires.”[i]
There’s a recent concept that’s being addressed in the
sexual education society. It has to do with our physiology and how our
physiology reacts, responds and functions, and how these reactions are not
always directly connected to our state of arousal or desire for sex.
For centuries, many societies have lived with the cultural
belief that, if the body responds to sexual stimuli, it means that that’s what
the person consciously or unconsciously wants emotionally and maybe even
spiritually. After all, ‘actions speak louder than words’.
Or do they?
Sometimes, how a
person’s body reacts to stimuli does not match their mental state. This condition
was coined ‘arousal non-concordance’. Sexual
educator Emily Nagowski defines non-concordance as “…a lack of predictive
relationship between your physiological response, and your subjective
experience of pleasure and desire.”
In plainer terms: How your body responds to sexual stimuli
does not always mean it’s liked or wanted.
Have you ever experienced
this in your life?
Have you ever, as a male, gotten an erection at a time when
you weren’t feeling particularly turned on? Or felt annoyed at your body’s
arousal? In a classroom? Doing your
homework? In a business meeting or working out at the gym? A temptation to
stimulate your genitals when you really didn’t want to? This is arousal
non-concordance.
Have you ever, as a woman, been at a concert and felt
stimulated by the vibrations of the music, even though you weren’t thinking
about sex? Read something in a magazine or book, and felt yourself getting
turned on even though your thoughts and intent may have been far away from such
things? Have you been physically stimulated by your spouse, maybe even became
vaginally lubricated, but you didn’t really want sex? These could all be
arousal non-concordance.
For a married couple, this could mean that, even though your
husband has an erection or your wife’s vagina is well-lubricated and her
nipples are erect, it does not necessarily mean they as a person are aroused or
in the mood for sexual intercourse.
In a darker vein, have you or someone you’ve known been
molested, and you or they responded physically to the stimulation that was
received, but felt confused because the body responded, causing the offender or
others to think you or they ‘must have really wanted it deep down?’
In situations such as these, you may have felt like there was
something wrong with you. But studies[ii]
have shown a distinct separation between the body and the mind in situations
such as these.
It’s like Pavlov’s
experiments with dogs. The dogs were presented with food, the dogs salivated,
and a bell rang.
Food, salivation, bell…until just ringing the bell would
cause a physical response in the dogs.
Did that mean the dogs wanted to eat the bell? No.
It meant the bell now was associated with a triggering
stimulus, and the dog’s bodies responded physically. The bell wasn’t wanted or
liked, but the dog’s bodies responded to the bell, as a positive response to
the pleasure of being fed. Our subconscious will always move us toward pleasure,
even if our conscious rationalizing brain is on other things.
In similar manner to Pavlov’s dogs, our bodies and the sexual
part of our brain respond to sexual stimuli, whether we want it and like it…or
not. When we don’t really want it, this again is arousal non-concordance.
Ms. Nagowski further explains, “Research over the last 30 years has found that genital blood flow can
increase in response to sex-related stimuli even if those sex-related stimuli
are not also associated with the subjective experience of wanting and liking.
In fact, the predictive relationship between genital response and subjective
experience is between 10 and 50 percent. Which is an enormous range.
You just can’t predict
necessarily how a person feels about that sex-related stimulus just by looking
at their genital blood flow.”[iii]
It’s important to note that this can also be true in
reverse. A husband or wife may be totally in the mood and ready mentally,
emotionally and spiritually for sexual intimacy, but their body may not be. Erectile
challenges, vaginal dryness, pain and/or lack of sensation affect many couples
for many reasons. Some circumstances are best addressed by a medical
professional, especially where pain is involved. Sometimes the body may just
need a break or some additional warming up. These can also be examples of arousal
non-concordance.
What is the best way
to know if our spouse is truly aroused and ready for sex?
We can’t know by checking bodily signs and believing those
over what our spouse is telling us. If there’s “no” in her mouth, and yes in
her bodily responses, believe her mouth. If his penis is flaccid, but he says
he’s really in the mood, believe what he says over what his body shows.
Communication is paramount here. Some suggested questions
you could ask ( if you are the spouse in the mood to initiate a potentially
intimate situation) are:
·
Dear, are you feeling turned on?
·
Would you like to talk or get a back or foot
rub? What do you need?
·
Would you be willing to have sex with me? How
can I help you feel more aroused?
·
Since you’re not in the mood, would a quickie be
ok? Is there anything I can do to help you relax first?
Your spouse may not be in the mood, but he or she may still
be willing to help you feel good and feel loved at any given time.
If they’re not able to feel good about making you feel good,
then plan for an encounter later when he or she is more ready and willing or
has had some time to warm up to the idea.
If our spouse needs time to recover from the last intimate connection
or is struggling with a recent challenge that is affecting them emotionally,
respect the “no” and bridle desires for the time being – it won’t be forever.
And, if you’re the spouse who needs a break from sex, the
best results come from communicating with your spouse what you are experiencing
and letting them know “I love you, but can we schedule this for later? I need
some time to recover or get my head okay with the idea.” This can be romantic
too.
It does help the relationship to show that you respect them
and their body. Don’t take their arousal for granted just because they have an erection,
or their vagina is responding to your touch.
It can also help us to have an understanding that sometimes
the body wants something that the mind doesn’t want – in gospel doctrine, this
relates to the principle of the ‘natural man’ in some respects.
“For the natural
man
is an enemy
to God, and has been from the fall
of Adam, and will be, forever and ever, unless he yields
to the enticings of the Holy Spirit,
and putteth
off the natural
man and becometh a saint
through the atonement of Christ the Lord….”[iv]
While some may believe that the body is inherently evil
because of its tendencies to seek pleasures by conduct ourselves in ways that are
away from Christlike behavior, perhaps we may reconsider that belief in the
idea that the body instead responds to pleasurable stimuli because that’s what
it’s designed to do by God. It’s not inherently evil or something to wish to
get rid of or cast away. We can’t run away from our bodies anyway; they’re
forever part of us.[v]
Bodies need direction from the spirit, and the Holy Ghost,
so that we can feel more strongly our love for God and our love and connection
to each other so we can more fully enjoy our marital intimacy.
For marital intimacy to be a complete and fulfilling symphony
of experience, the body, mind and spirit must all come together in the arousal
process.
Being aware of arousal non-concordance can also help us more
perfectly live the counsel President Hunter gave to keep ourselves above any
domineering or unworthy behavior in the tender, intimate relationship between us
as husband and wife, so that tenderness and respect—never selfishness—can
be the guiding principles in our intimate relationships.
[i] Hunter,
Howard W. Eternal Marriage Student Manual, pg. 141
[ii] Suschinsky
KD, Lalumière ML, Chivers ML., Sex
differences in patterns of genital sexual arousal: measurement artifacts or
true phenomena? NCBI, 2009 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18343987
[iii]
Nagowski, Emily, TED – The Truth About Unwanted Arousal. I want to emphasize
that I don’t recommend her talk or endorse her work overall to my readers –
many of the concepts and relationship constructs she uses are worldly ones not
based in gospel truth. Her concept of arousal non-concordance, on the other
hand, does fit with what we learn in the scriptures and from living prophets.
[iv] Mosiah
3:19
[v] “After
resurrection, the spirit will never again be separated from the body because
the Savior’s Resurrection brought total victory over death. In order to obtain
our eternal destiny, we need to have this immortal soul—a spirit and body—united
forever. With spirit and immortal body inseparably connected, we can “receive a
fulness of joy.” In fact, without the Resurrection we could never receive a
fulness of joy but would be miserable forever. Even faithful, righteous people
view the separation of their bodies from their spirits as captivity. We are
released from this captivity through the Resurrection, which is redemption from
the bands or chains of death. There is no salvation without both our spirit and
our body.” – Johnson, Paul V. “And There Shall Be No More Death”, April 2016
General Conference. https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2016/04/and-there-shall-be-no-more-death.p16?lang=eng
