Seriously. Yes, you read that correctly: guys, take your penis for a walk. No not on a leash (unless you’re a bit kinky!)

What do I mean by that rather absurd suggestion? I mean, get connected with your penis.

After a couple of really full and busy years, I had hoped 2020 would be slower-paced, but I wasn’t expecting it to be like this! With the bushfires at the start of the year there was no annual beach holiday to refresh and recuperate, so I thought a ‘stay-cation’ would be good as I could potter at home and get the house and garden looking good (when it wasn’t too smoky to go outside that is). And…I’m still pottering at home. The house and garden are looking amazing! I am fortunate than I can still get out of the house go to my clinic to see clients, mostly online.

It is interesting to see how clients are reacting to the pandemic restrictions. There are couples who are finding that spending more time together is solving their problems as what they mostly needed was more downtime together. Others are finding the forced time together is highlighting and exacerbating existing problems, bringing their troubles to the fore and forcing them to address them. Some single clients are withdrawing from the world while others are reaching out and finding that the longer ‘dating’ required at this time means they are forming better quality connections.

For me, at the start of the pandemic,... read more

Our five senses of sight, sound, smell, taste and touch are wonderful tools to explore sensuality and eroticism. By suppressing or enhancing the senses you can create and experience all kinds of enchanting pleasures.

Here are some suggestions to inspire you in your own sensual adventures:

From my column in Body+Soul

Question: "My wife and I have been married for 10 years. We have a great sex life and we tell each other everything - so why won't she masturbate in front of me? I think that it's hot and would bring us closer together, but she says it's embarrassing. I want to do it in front of her as well but she thinks it's too private. How can she think this when we've lived together for more than 10 years? Am I being unreasonable? Should I just give up or keep trying?"

If you look at all the other sex advice sites on the Internet you’d think the secret to great sex was only through sex toys. If you read the advice in popular magazines you’d think the secret to great sex was only through being in some fabulous position. And if you read the advice in the endless spam that gets past your email junk folder, you’d think it was only in some little blue pill.

 From my column in Body+Soul

Question: "My husband and I have been happily married for 10 years and recently he's wanted a lot more sex. At first I thought it was great, but he can't seem to keep his erection up and I can't help but feel disappointed. He's started smoking marijuana a lot more heavily lately - could this be to blame? What can I do?" 

Answer: There is so much pressure on penises. The poor things are supposed to rise to attention on command, stay hard for hours, only ejaculate when desired - and if they can’t do that, then the sex is considered poor, he has 'failed'. No wonder so many men suffer from performance anxiety!

As a society we’re adding to that pressure with all the porn that’s being watched, with endless footage of big hard cocks that appear to last for hours (never mind the reality that there are teams of women off set whose sole role is to keep the leads hard). And even on a more positive note, now that we quite rightly acknowledge the female partner’s right to pleasure, that can also add to pressure.

So, let’s take the pressure off your partner’s penis by looking at sex... read more

Gabriel Garcia Marquez wrote the acclaimed novel 'Love in the Time of Cholera'. Now I'd like to write about 'Love in the Time of COVID'.

It would be easy to say there are more important things to focus on right now, but what is more important at this time than love and relating? And what better time to bring this to the fore, than now, when we are isolating ourselves?

So many of my clients say that they don't have time to connect. They are either too busy, too stressed or exhausted - and their relationships and intimacy suffer as a consequence. With this crisis, we can't be busy (except for our wonderful health professionals who are working so hard to protect us). A client case from this week exemplifies this. They'd had to cancel their overseas wedding scheduled for next month. As sad as this was, there was also a feeling of time and space, time to stop being so incredibly rushed and overwhelmed. Time to refresh and rejuvenate. Time to let their souls catch up.

From my column in Body+Soul

Question: I’ve been seeing my new boyfriend for six months. We’re really well suited, in and out of the bedroom, but there’s something troubling me. He doesn’t climax when I go down on him. I’m 32 and haven’t encountered this before. He says he loves what I do, but I’m starting to get a bit of a complex about it. What do you think?

Answer:  We’re a little too focused on our sexual KPIs (key performance indicators) in this society. Sex has to ‘achieve’ something, it’s goal-focused, and that goal is orgasm. And not just any orgasm, a very specific peak orgasm. If you don’t achieve that, you haven’t performed up to standard. You’ve failed.

But wait up a moment, that performance approach might be appropriate in the workplace, where there are quotas and deadlines and outcomes to be met – but in the bedroom? Do we need to take that performance focus into our sex lives, with all the pressure and expectation that accompanies it? Where’s the enjoyment in that?

I say a big no to the performance model of sex! Of the countless clients I see with sexual ‘dysfunctions’, the bulk of them are actually perfectly fine,... read more

To have great sex you need to be able to switch off and focus at the same time: switch off from the rest of the world and focus on what's happening right here and right now. You need to be able to lose yourself into the experience.

One of the main reasons I hear that people have trouble getting in to sex or getting around to sex is that they can't switch off and become present to the connection, so clearly this is a skill that modern people are in need of. Even if you are having decent sex, improving your ability to let go and be present in the experience will make the sex better and better.

So how to learn that skill? Learn to meditate! The better you get at meditating, the easier it is for you to sink in to sex.

From my column in Body+Soul

Question: My husband of 10 years and I have recently started seeing a marriage counsellor, and I feel like she’s on his side, and our sex life is ruined because of it. Why? Because my husband doesn’t like to kiss deeply, and the counsellor says he doesn’t have to if he doesn’t want to. Kissing has always been a point of contention in our relationship, because I love a good, deep kiss and it seems to me like a cornerstone in sexual intimacy. But now he’s flat-out refusing, and is very smug about it. We started seeing a counsellor because we had drifted apart. Is this the final straw to make me end our marriage completely?

Answer: This is why you should always see a couples therapist who is trained in sexuality as well as relationships. This situation is far more complex than ‘he doesn’t have to if he doesn’t want to’. Can you imagine going to a dietitian because your health was bad, in part because you don’t eat vegetables and being told by the dietitian that you don’t have to eat vegetables if you don’t want to? That would be absurd! We know that vegetables are an essential part of a good diet and... read more