Does your partner know what turns you on or turns you off? Do you know for yourself? It can be tough to figure out what’s in our erotic template, especially when life stress gets in the way of accessing our emotions and sexual self. 

In a long term relationship, it’s common for one person to have more of a responsive desire – meaning they need physical or emotional stimulation before they feel turned on and want sex - while their partner has more spontaneous desire, meaning they feel aroused seemingly without any external prompts. The spectrum of spontaneous to responsive desire is wide and nuanced, like a coral reef (I’m workshopping that analogy. It’s not entirely terrible). Please consider this spectrum as having a variety of experiences within the grey area between the extremes. 

At Rouse, we often receive requests from couples who are experiencing a “desire discrepancy,” or a difference in sex drives. While this can be due to a variety of factors, sometimes it’s related to responsive versus spontaneous desire. 

We’ll look at reasons why some have different levels of access and interest in sex later. 

In the last post, I gave an overview on responsive versus spontaneous desire, a spectrum of desire popularized by Dr. Emily Nagoski. I want to spend some time unpacking these terms to understand what they can look like, what they can actually mean, and what helps someone be responsive or spontaneous. 

Important note: Please understand the intent behind posts like these. This is not to fix you or correct you. We’re looking to understand your beautiful self. Take a moment, get indulgent with your time on this post, and give yourself the space you deserve to understand yourself.

Benefits to responsive desire:

Responsive desire gets a bad reputation. This type of person can be seen as the one with low libido, too particular or too sensitive, or have terms like “frigid” or “prudish” thrown at them.

Fuck that.

Let’s take a moment and acknowledge some potential benefits of responsive desire:

• It gives you time to stop and smell the roses

  • You can take time to be aware of your surroundings and be attuned to your emotional wellbeing

• Given the right time and space, you can be exploratory and creative when learning about your sexual self

• You can attend to many sensory experiences to help yourself slow down and welcome desire and arousal

• You can have the time to intentionally set your surroundings to “set the mood,” however you want to define that

What helps someone be responsive:

How can you tell if you’re a person who has more of a responsive desire? What are ways to help you be more responsive?

• You like or need a lot of slow, warming up to feel turned on and get attuned with your body and pleasure

• You enjoy and/or benefit from slow, intentional movements 

• You like to plan and predict certain parts of your sexual experience

• You were socialized as a female

• You were shamed to feel like accessing your pleasure and desires are inherently wrong and immoral

• Your expression of sexuality is policed or controlled due to your gender, race, ability or socio-economic status

• You were conditioned to only consider the dangers of sex like STIs or pregnancy

• You were conditioned to believe that it was up to you to put the breaks on your partners pacing and speed

• Sometimes dissociation is involved due to an overwhelmed nervous system related to anxiety or trauma

As you can see, a lot can go into being responsive. Both things that give you access to your pleasure, as well as the social conditioning that shuts down female-bodied people.

To put it another way, it can be hard to be “spontaneous” when you’ve been trained to only consider the dangers of sex, or to be responsible for the “no.”

While responsive desire shows up in all genders, it is generally reported by female-bodied people. As a cis man writing this article, I want to acknowledge that I don’t have those lived experiences of being trained and policed to shut down my desires out of fear of pregnancy. I’d love to find out about more readings, podcasts, videos that I can engage in to expand my knowledge and understanding. Feel free to comment below with your suggestions, all mediums welcome.

Further reading:

Check out this expert roundup on reigniting your desire, including quotes from David Khalili, Founder of Rouse Relational Wellness.

I recommend books from female-bodied authors like Pleasure Activism for further reading on the politics of pleasure.

Want to help Rouse?

We’re just starting out and getting our name out there. If you’re finding this information interesting and useful enough, we’d be honored if you shared it with those you think would enjoy our work. 

Feel free to follow us on any of our social media channels to help us continue to make sex-positive, socioculturally informed sex and relational health information easily accessible for others.

Updates:

We’re hiring! 

We’re looking to meet sex-positive clinicians and other healing providers who want to give excellent care while not worrying about the business side of private practice that we didn’t learn in graduate school. 

We’re looking for those who are:

• Dedicated to working in an anti-racist, sex-positive and feminist environment

• Hold a current and unrestricted associates license or full license in the state of California

• Has some background in couples therapy or sex therapy

• Passion to learn more about couples therapy and sex therapy

• Able to work 15+ hours per week

• Available at least one weekday evening and/or one weekend day

• Those within the BIPOC and LGBTQIA+ communities are strongly encouraged to apply

• Preferably located in or near San Francisco in order to use the Castro office

We are an equal opportunity employer and offer a competitive percentage split while taking care of the rent, marketing, payroll, taxes, software subscriptions, HIPAA-compliance and other boring business stuffs. More benefits to come as we grow.

Reach out to us to start the conversation! Bonus points if you’re a colleague or former student looking for this opportunity!

Take care and see you next week!

Hears and handbags,

David F Khalili, LMFT


Bio: David Khalili, LMFT is a sex therapist and couples therapist in the San Francisco Bay Area. He works with individuals and relationships via telehealth focusing on sex and anxiety, multiheritage couples, and burnout. David enjoys spending time with his fam, watching trash TV, and exploring his new found “outdoorsy” self.

Rouse Relational Wellness is a sex and relationship wellness center featuring sex-positive, trauma-informed therapy for individuals and relationships. We also offer couples intensives, professional consultations, and workshops. All of our services are available online and our office is located in the Castro district of San Francisco, California. If you would like to learn more about our services, please visit us here.

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