Note: This was originally published at PESI-UK. You can read the original blog here. What are the tasks for couple therapy in the wake of infidelity? How can we help clients to recover from betrayal trauma and move forward together? And what do ‘new monogamy contracts’ have to do with it? Ahead of PESI UK’s Women’s Trauma Summit this week, leading sex therapist and author Tammy Nelson outlines the crisis, integration, and vision stages of this work in the light of a cultural shift from morality to transparency. Couples who have worked through infidelity and tried to recover can have a difficu ..read more

You need to add a widget, row, or prebuilt layout before you’ll see anything here. Sometimes market predictors can reflect what we see in our therapy practices and forecast what’s likely coming our way. According to a recent analysis published in Business Wire, we’ve seen upticks in the use of sex toys over the past several years, especially among women. The reasons vary. Awareness of sex toys, lessened stigma, and couples’ acceptance of sex toys as intimacy enhancers play a role. The COVID-19 pandemic, which limited people’s ability to get out, date, and hook up, also played a considera ..read more

Recently Kristen Bell shared with Upworthy how her husband, actor Dax Shepard, is able to openly share with her who he finds attractive – without jealousy, insecurity, or judgment.   “He can tell me [about] someone he finds attractive, female or male, ’cause he pauses the Olympics on a lot of runners, but it doesn’t make me feel like he’s going to leave me for that person because I’m not allowing my self-esteem to be affected,” she told Todd Perry in the recent article. First, who doesn’t love Kristen Bell? Now we have even more reason to respect her and her relationship with her hus ..read more

The staff and faculty at the Integrative Sex Therapy Institute (ISTI) have been carefully monitoring the news around the repeal of Roe vs. Wade. As the Director of ISTI, as a sexologist, and as a certified sex and relationship therapist I am disheartened and disappointed in the decision of the Supreme Court to remove the rights granted to Americans for almost 50 years. ISTI affirms that a safe, respectful environment is vital to experiencing a healthy sex life. The decision handed down by the Supreme Court damages this fundamental need. As an institution dedicated to the continuing education o ..read more

Nick Levine recently wrote in Vice Magazine What Is ‘Radical Monogamy’? Reflexive monogamy is an assumption we make that we’ll find our one true person (usually of the opposite sex) to fall in love with and when we marry them, we will automatically stay monogamous. Sex educator Robyn Ochs Radical describes monogamy, on the other hand, as a choice, when one asks themselves, “what kind of relationship do I want?” and the choice is monogamy, versus just falling into it when they choose to commit.  Radical monogamy is ‘choosing’ to be monogamous when there is pressure from the outside world t ..read more

[Note: This article is cross-posted with Dr. Tammy’s article on Medium.com. You can read more about Imago Relationship Therapy with a case example here.] Being in a relationship is the most challenging part of being alive. We struggle to connect and at the same time, we want the freedom to grow. We want independence and we want security. We want to be seen and we want to be left alone. We want to be desired and we want to desire. We want things on our own terms and we project our frustrations onto our partner. Without a lover, we may feel lonely but with a partner who doesn’t understand us, we ..read more

Open monogamy is in the public eye now more than ever before. We have seen couples like Will and Jada Pinkett Smith talk about their flexible monogamy, and how happy they are being in love while dating other people. In addition, we have also seen the attitudes of young people evolve as they challenge what “commitment” means to them. We are experiencing a huge cultural shift in the way we look at relationships.   For many couples, however, thinking about opening their relationship challenges all their beliefs about traditional monogamy and can seem frightening even if it sounds intriguing ..read more

Excerpt from Open Monogamy: A Guide to Co-Creating Your Ideal Relationship Agreement By Tammy Nelson, Ph.D. Being a couple does not make you one person. This may be against popular current opinion, as our romantic version of love seems to be some kind of idealization of oneness, of completing the other, of finding one’s other half. Being differentiated means that you each have different interests and are not merged into one person just because you are a married couple. Love today seems to be a perpetual pursuit of the “other” in order to complete an empty sense of self, one that is destined fo ..read more

When you discover that your partner cheated on you, it can feel like your world is ending. You rewrite the whole history of your relationship. Everything the two of you built together comes into question. Because of the affair, you wonder who they really are and if they were ever honest with you. If you open up to family and friends about the affair, you’ll hear lots of advice, some sympathy, and if you’re lucky, words of love. It can be hard to know who to listen to; you question yourself and your own judgment. You doubt your intuition, forget how to trust yourself, and may even devalue your ..read more

This article picks up from Part 1, where I talk about Will Smith’s revelations about his relationship with Jada Pinkett Smith and what they show us about non-conventional relationships. Once we understand that we are individuals, we can open a space for communicating our needs while listening for our partner’s needs as well. Communication Is Vital “There were significant endless discussions about, what is relational perfection? What is the perfect way to interact as a couple? And for the large part of our relationship, monogamy was what we chose, not thinking of monogamy as the only relational ..read more