A listener wrote in asking how to bring her male partner into her emotional experience of the sexual violence in the news. Especially without having to teach him everything first. I think many of you may have a similar question. So I made you an episode.
When sexual violence dominates the headlines, a lot of us end up either carrying it alone or doing the emotional labor of explaining our own pain to the people closest to us, with sometimes disappointing results. I wanted to offer a real way through that doesn’t ask you to choose between caring for yourself and being heard.
In this episode:
- Why naming your desire to be understood, even before you know how to say what you’re feeling, is itself a gift to your partner
- How to actually identify and name the emotions you’re carrying, rage, exhaustion, grief, fear, so you can ask for what you need
- A script for telling someone how you want to be received before you share something hard, instead of hoping they guess right
- The difference between a good response and a bad one, and what to do when your partner gets defensive
- Why this collective rage and exhaustion erodes desire, and what actually helps you come back into connection
- What men in your life need to hear, and why silence, even well-intentioned silence, doesn’t land the way they think it does
You don’t have to carry this by yourself, and you don’t have to be anyone’s teacher to be loved well. Let people show up for you.
Topics: sexual violence, rage, loss of desire, sexual trauma, relationship communication, intimacy coach
Resources mentioned:
- My original article: “What We Actually Need From You Right Now” at Pleasure Uprising Substack
- Rage Becomes Her by Soraya Chemaly (book) — Simon & Schuster
- Believed (NPR podcast) — npr.org/podcasts/510326/believed
- Roll Red Roll (documentary) — PBS POV
- Know My Name by Chanel Miller (book) — Penguin Random House
- Missoula: Rape and the Justice System in a College Town by Jon Krakauer (book) — jonkrakauer.com
Get my free guide: Get Out of Your Head: A Starter Guide to Releasing the Pressure, Shame, and “Shoulds” Around Intimacy at https://laurajurgens.com/guide
Follow me on Substack for deeper dives into the research and notes from my practice at https://laurajurgens.substack.com/
The Guide to Finding Your Secret Turn-Ons includes the Wheel of Erotic Emotions: https://laurajurgens.com/wheel
© Laura Jurgens, PhD, Pleasure Uprising. Quote with attribution and a link to the original. No reproduction in full and no use for AI training.
