A sex therapist on how to experience more "pleasure and joy"

Cyndi Darnell, sex therapist and clinical sex therapist, teaches couples how to experience more "pleasure and joy" in their relationships.

When it comes to sex, everyone seems to struggle, says Manhattan-based clinical sex therapist, sex therapist and relationship coach Cyndi Darnell.

"No one gets sex and relationship education," she said, "so people have confused sex education with reproduction. We are also told that sex is natural, and therefore , we don't have to teach it. If it was natural, no one would struggle with it."

In his new book 'Sex When You Don' t Feel Like It: The Truth about Mismatched Libido and Rediscovering Desire”, Ms Darnell, 51, from Australia, invites couples to reflect on the importance of sex to them.

"I wrote this book because sex is deeply misunderstood in our culture," she said.

She works virtually with couples and individuals in her practice, which includes “arousal, erotic experience and personal reflection on how your body feels,” Ms. Darnell said of her education and therapeutic work. She charges $250 for a 45 minute session for an individual and $500 for a 90 minute couple session.

"I teach people how their bodies work from a pleasure point of view. , and how to identify what makes sex meaningful to them,” she said. "Then I give them the skills they need to overcome the challenges they face while creating a richer and more fulfilling sex life so they can experience more pleasure and joy."

His services include everything from a one-question email option, which costs $190; online courses starting at $27; to a private weekend retreat for couples, usually held in a yoga or dance studio, for $8,000.

How are you different from a couples counselor or therapist ?

It's not meeting two or three times a week for years, reflecting on your childhood or your past. This is a virtual coaching experience that typically includes 10-20 sessions, focusing on your sexual present and future. We talk about their sexual history, what has been good, what they struggle with, how they would identify challenges and help them see that they are not broken. Together we strive to increase their eroticism with each other and their embodied experience of sex.

How do your sessions work?

Talking and teaching people how touching themselves in a way that is meaningful to them - usually exemplifying this with the use of puppets - they learn to connect with their own sensations and communicate this with their partner. I give them homework and activities to try on their own or with each other, from breathing practices to erotic massage techniques which they will then practice on each other.

J also introduces skills that put them in touch with what their body craves. Once they have a solid understanding of how their body responds to pleasure, I invite them to practice privately, asking them to notice what pleasure feels like in their body physiologically and what their internal narrative is like. Usually it's negative: "I shouldn't feel like this" or "I'm taking too long". It derails people's ability to retain pleasure because it produces panic or anxiety.

A big part of the practice is to stay aware and connected to his own pleasure and to what makes him feel good while being attentive to what is happening, and to what they are going through. This takes practice.

You provide an email option to a question. Why?

Sometimes people want an answer to a specific problem or question, like: Why am I having trouble having an orgasm? or Why am I not connected to my partner during sex? I answer this in a five or six page answer that includes suggested links, podcasts, books, videos, resources, and exercises or activities to try. What they're really asking is: Am I normal? It's them...