SWM 078 – August 2021 Questions – Catching spouses with porn, birth control, Zoloft and PE and more

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Today we’re answering more questions from our anonymous Have A Question page.  With everyone coming back from vacations, we seem to be getting more questions again, so today we have a dozen to get through.  

Just to remind you, the Christian Married Sex Virtual Conference is coming up soon, you can still get your tickets here to get access to a lot of good, Christian speakers on the topic of sex.  As well, we’re going to be starting our Becoming More Sexually Engaged course up again this coming week for any Christian wives who are interested in improving their married sex lives in a more targeted way.

Now, let’s get to the questions.

Question 1 – Snoopy wife caught husband

I feel like a snoopy wife but I go through my husband’s activity log on his phone. I have seen that at one point he’s been YouTubing sexual videos. He is a man of faith and I feel like he knows it’s wrong. I have told him how I feel about that but how do I approach him about it without him knowing that I snoop?? I get angry when I find out and wonder why he does it when we have a VERY healthy and active sex life.  What should I do?

First, you tell him you snooped.  If you feel this was a violation of privacy, then you apologize and you ask for forgiveness.  Personally in my marriage, that wouldn’t be considered “snooping”.  We don’t have private lives from each other, so it wouldn’t require forgiveness as it wouldn’t be a breach of privacy.

Second, one sin doesn’t cancel out another one, so even if you snooped and it was wrong, that doesn’t excuse his behaviour.  Apologize, ask for forgiveness, then get back to what you wanted to bring up.

Third, don’t accuse him – share what you saw and ask if you can help.  You’ll have a much better chance of a positive outcome if he doesn’t feel like he’s under attack.  I understand that you’re angry – that’s a fairly typical response, but it’s also not a terribly helpful one.  I would say it’s likely more productive to cultivate feeling compassion for him and a desire to understand.  

Going to your husband and saying something like “I’m sorry, I looked at your phone, and I feel that was a breach of trust/privacy, and I would like you to forgive me for that when you’re ready.  But I also would like to talk about what I found.  I’d like to understand why you feel the need to look at women on YouTube and how I can help you with temptations like this in the future.” is likely to be more productive than “I looked at your phone and I can’t believe what I saw! Aren’t I good enough? Don’t we have enough sex? What’s wrong with you that you have to look at those women on YouTube?!”  That’s just going to put him in a defensive position, he’ll probably retaliate about the snooping and you’ll both be angry and will have driven a wedge between rather than using this opportunity to get closer and move the marriage forward.

Question 2 – Is orgasming the same as cumming?

Hey Jay Dee, I have two questions here.

Is orgasm the same thing as cumming? From what I have heard orgasming is exclusively only for women that “get off”, rather than when a man gets off it’s not as intense and doesn’t qualify as an orgasm, therefore it’s cumming.

Also, I have heard there are ways for a man to be able to feel the pleasurable sensations of cumming while not ejaculating, that they are two separate actions but happen so close together that a lot of people mistake it as one.

Is it possible to separate these two actions and be able to cum multiple times before ejaculating? How?

Thanks

Colloquial terms like “cumming” tend to be vague.  It could be talking about orgasm, or ejaculation, or both.  That’s why they’re not used in medical contexts – because they aren’t specific.

Men tend to orgasm and ejaculate at the same time, so cumming tends to refer to both as a package deal.  More women, on the other hand, tend to separate orgasm from ejaculation, so cumming tends to refer to orgasm, not ejaculation. Not always, though, as sometimes people do refer to female ejaculation as cumming.

But I never heard anything to suggest that men don’t have orgasms, that only women do, or that the amount of pleasure qualifies whether or not it’s a real orgasm.  

And yes, in theory, it’s possible for men to separate orgasm from ejaculation, and ejaculation is what causes the release of prolactin (in ~90% of men) resulting in a refractory period and loss of erection (about ~10% don’t experience this).  No one is quite sure if everyone can learn to do it  – though anyone claiming to sell a course teaching you how will say every man can.  

However, the general consensus for a method to learn is basically to get as close as possible to the point of no return and then stop, squeeze your PC muscles to try and stop the ejaculation from occurring and see if you can have the orgasm, but not ejaculate. Repeat that for days, weeks, months, possibly years and maybe you’ll manage to do it.

Question 3 – OMGYes

Hi, do you know anything about a site called OMGYes? I came across it several times and it looked quite interesting. I know there is a lot of masturbation, but on the other hand, there seems to be a lot of information that would be useful for couples too. I would be interested in your opinion! 

I think OMGYes has deceived many Christians by promising educational content mixed with pornography and making it easy to rationalize paying for porn.  

I think everyone would be wise to stay away from it.  If you want to learn how to pleasure your spouse better – practice on your spouse.  You don’t need to pay to watch other women masturbate to tell you how your wife likes to be touched.  You’d be better off spending the time learning how to communicate about sex with your wife without shame or inhibitions and then devoting time to practice.

Question 4 – Ejaculate colour

I’m 72 pretty active for my age. I masturbate frequently. I love edging myself close to orgasm then stop. I’ve noticed I have a lot of precum during these sessions. My amount of sperm has decreased with age when I ejaculate, being more clear than white ropes like years ago. Is this all normal for my age?

Clear or white is considered healthy.  Different colours can indicate a health concern and the consistency tends to correlate with the frequency of ejaculation and water intake.  That’s about all the information I have on that.  

Question 5 – Encouraging senior sex

Should senior husbands be more active in encouraging their wives to remain sexually active?

I believe it is the responsibility of whichever spouse’s drive is higher to encourage the lower drives’ spouse to be more active sexually, regardless of your age.  Eventually, there may be a time when sex becomes medically unfeasible or even impossible. In those cases, I’m afraid there’s not much that can be done.  But until that point, there’s no reason not to continue having sex.

Personally, I hope we continue to have sex when we’re seniors.  The kids will be out of the house, periods and pregnancy worries will be a thing of the past, we’ll be retired and hopefully have met all our financial obligations and be living debt-free.  It sounds like a wonderful time of life to have some stress-free sex.

Question 6 – Wife won’t “finish” oral sex

Hey, my wife and I are running into an issue, for the past few years, I have been asking her to let me finish in her mouth during oral sex.  Let me say first though I am not annoying or mean about it, she knows I want it and that is as far as I go, no pressure.  The other night we were talking about it, she brought it up and I told her all the reasons I want to finish in her mouth.   I told her I don’t expect her to swallow, and she said she has no choice that it’s easier if she did, which honestly really turned me on.   The problem now is that she says the amount of ejaculate is too much.  In her words “I could fill up a pint glass”. Is there anything I can do to decrease the amount and also the “force” of ejaculate?   That was another thing she said that I could shoot 5-10 feet if I orgasmed outside of her. Lol. She has no problem doing oral, I enjoy being down there on her too, it’s just she won’t let me finish. 

This is an extremely common conflict in marriages.  It’s one my wife and I have ourselves, but I decided years ago that it wasn’t worth it.  Asking just led to fights, which just led to resentment and less sex overall.  Plus, even if I won and she relented – that’s not how I wanted it to happen.  So, I took it off the table.  She’s aware that it’s a desire of mine, but there’s no pressure to engage in it.  If it never happens, I’m perfectly okay with that, because, in the grand scheme of things, our sex life is amazing, with or without that one activity.  But, if I forced the issue on that one, I’m fairly certain I’d lose some of the trust that has taken us decades to build up and that would probably negatively impact our relationship, both in and outside of the bedroom.

Because from our side of things, it seems simple – “She has no problem doing oral, why not let me finish?  I let her when I do oral on her after all.”  However, there’s a fairly large difference between the two.  For many women, having their partner ejaculate in their mouth comes with a few challenges:

1. The idea – The concept of ingesting someone else’s (even your husband’s) bodily fluids for some is just too much to get past – particularly one that came from the genitals.
2. The taste – Some men’s semen just tastes really bad from what I hear, though many people say diet can radically change this, even make it taste good.
3. The texture – I think the most concise description I’ve heard is that it feels like a mouthful of warm snot – drinking more water can apparently help with this as most people are dehydrated on a regular basis.
4. The volume – Some men ejaculate a lot, which it sounds like your wife is complaining about.  This may reduce with age, or by ejaculating first once earlier, then engaging in oral sex later.
5. The force – again, a complaint of your wife’s, and same mitigating strategies as volume.

But that’s a lot of stuff to get past which men generally don’t have to deal with.  If she was keen on trying to do it so that she enjoyed it, maybe you could work your way through the list, but since she’s not really on board with it, you’re going to be fighting an uphill battle.

So, my advice – drop it.  It’s not worth it.  

Question 7 – Wife searched for porn

I found out my wife had searched for porn on her internet history.  In a roundabout way, I found the searches I wasn’t looking for it, just happened upon it.  When I asked her about it she denied it. Finally, after telling her I didn’t believe her excuses like “someone else must have hacked her phone” or “I was drinking and I don’t remember looking that up”  she admitted to it. so I am not sure what I am more upset about.  The watching or the lying.   I really feel it is cheating and I don’t trust her.  Also, her search terms have me hurt.  The worst one to my mental health is “big d**k” according to the history I found I can’t tell if she actually watched it or not, but the search is there.  I am pretty well endowed so it’s not because I am small. I can’t get all of this out of my mind and wondering what I should do.  I do know that she had some health issues where we couldn’t have sex for 6 months and I fought hard and didn’t look at any porn myself even though I wanted to have orgasms I think porn is pretty gross anyway.  I feel slighted hugely because I abstained until she was healthy again.   I’m worried that this is going to ruin our marriage and I will not enjoy sex with her anymore.  If you have any suggestions I am all ears.  I can’t really afford therapy right now and my church doesn’t have any counselling. 

My guess is that you’re hurt by the breach of trust.  You were tempted and fought to overcome the temptation and managed to make it through.  She succumbed to it.  I think feeling betrayed in a way is a completely natural reaction.  I also think it’s likely unproductive.  You seem to indicate this as well as you feel this may ruin your marriage.  If it does, it will be due to your reaction as much as her actions.

So, the question then is – what to do?  I would see if you can open a dialogue about it.  That may be hard because she seems to feel that it’s a vulnerable topic – that’s probably why she lied about it.  She’s likely embarrassed and scared.  My guess is she knows it was wrong, but may not be ready to admit it yet.  It’s humbling to admit you did something to break trust in a relationship.

So, I’d maybe start by helping her feel less vulnerable and more understood.  Maybe something like “Honey, I understand, I’ve felt tempted by porn as well in the past.”  That would help her not feel alone.  Then offer help, rather than condemnation. Offer to be there whenever she feels tempted, to help her with her temptation by providing a real relationship, not a fantasy.

In short, reframe it so that you look at her with compassion – as a human with a sinful nature, as we all do, who needs love and support.  That’s how you get through trials like this.  Because one day, you may need her to look at you in the same way.

Question 8 – Birth control for Christians

Hi Jay! I have loved your podcast, having been raised in a very conservative small church that never talked about sex- unfortunately, that upbringing led to several painful experiences. However, the Lord is good! He redeems and I’m so thankful he does. I am now in the process of becoming Catholic and am also dating a man who is in the same process as I am. We are having a lot of conversations about the future, and are planning out our timeline at the moment. We’ve been seeing a counselor since a few weeks into our relationship because we knew we were moving in the same direction and wanted to make wise decisions and be kept accountable. Neither of us are virgins and are really working hard to set ourselves up for a win later on. My question lies with this: is birth control actually sinful? The Catholic Church teaches that to contravene God’s design for sexual relations is a mortal sin. I have asked my Catholic friends and other women who ascent to that belief, but I am not sure that I do. It wouldn’t prevent me from joining the Catholic Church because ultimately I know if not using birth control is what the Lord says is right, then I will submit to that. But because I do not actually want children, and neither does my boyfriend, it would be a hard submission for us and we want to make sure it’s actually right. To give you some context, we have both studied Koine Greek and he is pursuing a master’s in theology, so we are both actively studying this, as well as all of the resources we can think of… which is what brought me to bring this question to this forum! Also, using hormonal birth control isn’t an option for me anyway due to some health complications, so our options would be limited anyway. What do you feel are the ethics of using birth control? And, what are some options for contraception that some of your supporters use that are non-hormonal?

Here’s where I get into trouble – because you’ve asked me my opinion, and my opinion in most things does not line up with Catholic doctrine – because, well, I’m not a Catholic.  I’m a protestant for a reason – we protested against Catholic theology. In fact, the denomination I’m in is a split from protestants because we don’t think mainstream Christianity went far enough away from the Catholic church and still follows too much of its doctrines.  On that point, some in the Catholic church actually agree with us.

“People who think that the Scriptures should be the sole authority should logically become 7th Day Adventists” Sentinel, Pastor’s page (Fr. Leo Broderick), Saint Catherine Catholic Church, Algonac, Michigan, May 21, 1995

So, if you’re looking for a Catholic answer, I’m not a good source.  For myself, no, I don’t think using certain kinds of birth control is sinful in the least.  I do agree with them that going against God’s plan for sex is sinful, but not that birth control in and of itself is against that plan.

Now, as some of our supporters mentioned in the private forum, if you believe it’s a sin, then it would be wrong to go against your convictions.  However, in your case, you have no such conviction.  But, then that’s further complicated if you profess to be Catholic. My understanding is that you also profess the Pope to be the vicar of Christ on Earth, which, by extension, makes his (and ultimately all Catholic doctrine) infallible.  Then you have an issue, because a Catholic who does not agree with Catholic doctrine is, well, problematic in the Catholic faith.  

Protestants don’t quite have the same issues because, well, we don’t have a person who we believe to be infallible to tell us which viewpoints are correct or not, and so there is more room for interpretation.  As such, you get people who join denominations without agreeing to all of its precepts.  I would consider myself one such adherent because I disagree with my denomination’s official stance on some things.  However, I don’t know how you do that when the supposed voice of God is present and ratifying the doctrine you profess to agree to.  I suppose that’s why there aren’t “denominations” of Catholicism, though I would imagine there are less talked about or recognized theological schisms within the religion.

So, all that said, I suppose my stance is that you should do your own research, as you’ve been doing, and then act in accordance with your convictions rather than asking someone else to tell you what you believe.

To answer the specific questions though, check out my post on Birth control options for Christians.

Question 9 – Wife’s smell

Hi Jay, thank you for having this anonymous forum. My question is of a delicate nature. I can smell my wife’s butt when we are making love, especially in the doggy style or any other rear-entry positions. In fact, I have been trying to avoid these positions as much as possible as the smell can be very strong and overpowering. We have been married for a few years, and it has always been the case. Perhaps recently I have just gotten more sensitive. I have no idea what to do. Please help.  

There aren’t really any options other than talking to your wife about it.  Marriage involves uncomfortable conversations sometimes, and if you want a good marriage – learn to have them.  There’s a pretty good chance that she’s going to be offended and upset because she feels embarrassed and vulnerable.  Even with good intentions and the best phrasing, I think that’s still the likely outcome.  It doesn’t mean it isn’t the right thing to do.

So, start with “I love you, and, I want to talk about something that you’re not going to like.”  That way you give her permissions to be upset, which is likely going to happen anyway, so you might as well lean into it.

Question 10 – What sexual behaviour is prohibited

What sexual behaviour is prohibited in the Bible?

Short answer – anything not involving your spouse is out.  Anything involving someone other than your spouse is out.  Anything that causes harm (which doesn’t mean pain), be it physical or mental I would also say is out given the principles of love in the Bible.  I think that’s about as succinct an answer as I can give.

Question 11 – Zoloft and PE

This is less of a question and more of an update. I messaged you previously about what you knew about using Zoloft to help with PE. I had just gotten the prescription from my Dr and was looking for advice. I’ve been using it for a couple of months and the results have been great. I take 50mg in the morning and 50mg about 4-5 hours before sex. I’ve also tried 50mg the day before and the day of. Both ways work the same. We have to plan a little more but that hasn’t been an issue. I’ve gone from less than a minute to easily go 8-10 minutes. It’s been a lot of fun. I’d recommend talking to your doctors if you have PE it’s been a great change for us. 

That’s awesome!  Thanks for the update.  If you struggle with PE, that might be something to look into.

Question 12 – Multiple wives – again

Why are you twisting up what King Solomon said,     “As a lily among brambles, so is my love among the young women. – Song of Solomon 2:2” which you brought out, is CLEARLY not talking about “one wife” anyone with a brain knows that “brambles” are plural meaning more than 1 as well as the literal wording of “women” which is also plural, and when read from the KJV which is where you should have read it from it reads “As the lily among thorns, so is my love among the daughters” again “thorns (plural)” and “daughters(plural)” it shows his love was for the many “daughters”, it’s very clear you’re not addressing the questions with biblical understanding, you speak of Solomon as if he was Nimrod, strong but stupid. Your comment about “God gave him this wisdom but he still got multiple wives” is ridiculous, the only one that made a mistake concerning wives was David who committed adultery, otherwise God would have addressed Solomon on his wives, which he didn’t because there was and still is absolutely nothing wrong with that, and if YOU truly believe in God, you would be speaking the truth on this matter, as far as what happened to Jacob and his wives it’s clear you haven’t red on, it tells you NOT to marry “sisters” because of the family rivalry, NOT because it happened to be more women.

Leviticus 18:18 KJV

 “Neither shalt thou take a wife to her sister, to vex her, to uncover her nakedness, beside the other in her life time”

So if you are truly for God i encourage you to look deeper into this topic, the person that asked you the question had a great point about Jesus the same yesterday, today, and forever , and you did as well when you mention how he didn’t come to destroy the “law” or the “prophets” (The Old Testament) meaning unless he “Clearly States” in the New Testament “Men should not have have more than one wife” then it’s still an option, i know there are scripture that mention having “one wife” in the new testament you may be able to use to argue, but with that being said, it still doesn’t speak “against” having more, and where there’s no “law” there’s no “sin” so you’d be lying saying men cannot have multiple wives if they chose.

Alright, so, let’s start with the Song of Solomon 2:2 passage:

Like a lily among thorns, So is my love among the daughters.

I think you’ve misread the quote.  This is not saying he loves all the daughters (or maidens, or thorns, brambles, etc..), but rather that she stands out alone against all of them.  The contrast is clear – she is the single love out of all the options available to him.  She is the one lily among all the thorns that he rejects.

I think the MSG version makes this clearer:

A lotus blossoming in a swamp of weeds that’s my dear friend among the girls in the village.

She echoes the same contrast back in the next verse saying “Like an apricot tree among the trees of the forest is my beloved among the young men.”  It’s a singling out of her husband from among the other potential suitors.

If we went with your interpretation, then we’d have to believe that not only is it okay for men to have multiple wives, but for wives to have multiple husbands.  You’d basically be okaying polyamory.

As for the rest of the examples – every time a husband has multiple wives in the Bible, it leads him to trouble.  Doesn’t matter if they’re sisters or not.  And, as you say, there’s a clear command that men shouldn’t have more than one wife – I’m not sure how you twist that into permission to have more than one.  

And your “where there’s no law, there’s no sin” from Romans 4:15, you’ve taken in a very odd direction.  That’s not a statement to say that every sin has to be spelled out explicitly or else it’s not a sin.  

That would suggest that murder, theft, adultery, idolatry and all the other 10 commandments weren’t sins for the first 2500 years of human existence.

Cain murdered Abel before murder is called a sin, so, why would he get punished? Because murder is a sin, whether or not there is an explicit law telling you it is.  In the same way as the Israelite’s tabernacle imperfectly reflected the Sanctuary in heaven, the Law in the Bible is an imperfect reflection of God’s perfect Law.  It is immutable, unchanging and whether or not you’re aware of it doesn’t change the absoluteness of it.  

In other words, things are not sins because God told us they are sin.  God told us they are sin because they are not loving.  I’m hoping I’m saying that in a way that’s clear.  In short, the arbiter of what is sin and what isn’t is God – not the Bible.

So, no, I reject your premise that “if God didn’t say it’s wrong, then it’s okay”, especially in cases like this where God did clearly told us His intent for us.  As you said, there are multiple verses about men having but one wife.

If you want to read more about my thoughts on this topic, I suggest you check out the post When did God stop allowing multiple wives for a more in-depth discussion.

And those are the questions for last month.  October is coming up soon, and so I’ll be working on September’s questions shortly.  You still have time to get yours in if you want it answered in the next post.  Also, if you would like to be a part of answering them and join the discussion, check out our supporter’s page to get access to our forum.  

As always, a big thank you to all our faithful supporters who discuss the topics, share their thoughts and viewpoints and help keep our ministry going.