Jens and Soraya look at me expectantly. Their sex life isn’t going as they’d like, and they hope to change things up with my help. “I’ve tried absolutely everything,” Jens begins. “I bought her a nice toy, a voucher for sexy lingerie, a weekend at a fancy hotel… But nothing works; she’s just never in the mood!” He sighs, throwing his hands up in despair.
“Gosh, Jens, it does sound like you’ve tried really hard,” I respond understandingly. “It’s so annoying that you’re trying so hard and it still doesn’t seem to be helping.” He nods and then looks at his wife. Soraya sits beside him, dejected. “Sometimes, however…” I continue cautiously, “the more someone tries, the less desire for sex their partner gets.” I look at Soraya. “Is that perhaps the case with you too?”
Soraya looks a little startled. “Um, maybe… actually, yeah,” she stammers. “Well, great! Now I’m definitely not doing anything anymore!” Jens responds irritably, then stares stoically out the window.
Soraya shuffles her feet a bit and then asks: “But how is it that more initiative can lead to less desire?”
I explain to her that everything sexually stimulating is like pressing the accelerator, and everything that isn’t arousing is like pressing the brake. Then it’s about the interplay of the accelerator and the brake. This way, we can understand that when the accelerator is pressed hard but the brake is also pressed hard, there’s no desire for sex, even though there’s a lot of sexual stimulation. But when the accelerator is pressed very lightly, while there’s no brake at all, there might be a desire for sex, even though there’s little arousal.
I see Jens listening attentively, still looking out the window. “Okay, I get it so far,” says Soraya, “but how does that work for us?” “Well,” I reply, “when someone has a low sex drive, people often look for a solution by adding more sexual stimulation… and that can definitely work. But sometimes the problem isn’t the accelerator, but it’s the brake that’s pressed too hard. Do you understand?” Soraya starts nodding in agreement. “Absolutely! There’s so much going on, I’m just running errands and taking care of everything all the time…”
