There’s no ‘I’ in ‘Partnered Sex’ – Sexual Satisfaction as a Team Effort

If you want to have all of your life desires met all the time, my advice is that you stay single! Now I’m not going to sit here and say to you that ‘love is sacrifice’ because I don’t think it needs to be that way, but there is definitely some give and take. Getting the balance right in relationship is the key to success.

I like to think about relationships as playing a team sport. Let’s use basketball as an example. Firstly, you need to understand the rules of the game; what lines you can and cannot cross, how points are scored and what positions you are best suited to. 

Secondly, you need to know how to effectively communicate with your teammates (through words, movements or pre-planned routines).

Third; be able to understand and forgive a teammate almost instantly when they make a mistake. This is because you still need them on the court and back in action to win.

But perhaps most importantly, you need to be able to see and accept when the right thing to do is to let your teammate go for the victory goal because it just makes logistical sense.

Using the same metaphor, if one of your teammates is injured, you all chip in to pick up the slack so that the game goes on and you still have a hope of winning. The same goes for relationships and sexual concerns. It’s not just their problem; it’s the team’s problem and they work together for a solution.

If you look at your relationship like a game of basketball (or almost any other sport using the same analogy), you can understand that sexual concerns when in a relationship are a collective issue and require increased effort from everyone in order to win. Case in point; performance anxiety is the number one cause of erectile dysfunction in men. Performance anxiety is purely psychological, and is directly influenced by the way in which his partner reacts to sexual performance, as well as what the individual believes the partner is thinking.

To add insult to injury, if the partner does not see it as a couple issue, their attitude is likely causing a whole new layer to the concern around performance anxiety and loss of confidence. It’s a vicious cycle but can be easily avoided!

The most important thing to remember when you or your partner are experiencing a sexual concern is to communicate with one another about the concern as soon as possible. If you are unsure how to discuss the issue with your partner, scheduling a consultation with a Sex Therapist will offer some specific advice to resolve communication problems and address the sexual concern. This works for either partner. The longer you ignore the problem or don’t talk about it openly, the more stress and pressure it puts on the sexual relationship, which leads to even less function.

Relationships are not easy, we all know this. There is no harm in asking for help, and it is much more common than you think. We see hundreds of people seeking the help of a personal trainer to improve their physical fitness, yet a lot less people seeking advice relating to mental or sexual health. It is no less important, just less advertised!