Aftercare
What is sex “supposed” to be?
There are so many messages out there giving examples, fantasies really. Some of them aren’t helpful.
One time, I had a client tell me they thought sex was supposed to be where she and her partner are attached at the mouth in a passionate kiss, pushing through the door while tearing each other’s clothes off. And if it wasn’t like that every time, then were they really even in love?
I hope we all can agree by now, that behavior is the exception rather than the rule. And if that’s the expectation, then one is set up to be disappointed in the long run.
In the last two newsletters, I’ve been talking about the Dual Control Model of Sexual Response. We have a Sexual Inhibitory System (the brakes) and a Sexual Excitatory System (the gas pedal) and these two have a big impact on how we experience arousal and responsiveness. We get going (or we’re stopped) from a mix of visual, emotional, and psychological cues, and there’s such a wide range of inputs including internal (i.e., feeling confident) to external (i.e., the smell of our partner. If they just got back from a 7-day solo camping trip in the wilderness, take note of your attraction before and after that first long, hot shower).
Did any of you learn this stuff about sex in school? Probably not. And it’s all so important. Everything we’ve talked about so far falls under the “before” experience. But what happens after is just as important as what happens before.
In Chocolate After Dark, you get some guidance in the short videos for what happens after the experience. This can be a cue towards what aftercare can become going forward.
I asked someone who bought Chocolate After Dark about what he was taking away from the experience. Here’s how he described it:
“I'm not gonna get too graphic, but she's laying on my chest and we laid that like that for a long time. I said out loud to her, this was better than sex—and I meant it. As a man, we're trained to not say things like that. It’s supposed to be all about sex, but Chocolate After Dark wasn't. It was this level of intimacy that I long for. That's what I'm carrying with me from this experience: how to recreate those moments.”
Me, after hearing that:
If you want to learn more about the before and after (and maybe, the during), I encourage you to check out Chocolate After Dark. For only $97, you get a DIY chocolate paint recipe made by my co-creator, The Tao of Chocolate, and roughly 45 minutes of short instructional videos from me to help you build intimacy and explore your desires with your partner, in the comfort of your own home.
What does aftercare look like for you? Do you think about it in terms of how sex should be? Let me know in the comments below!
xxoo,
Lanae
P.S. See what my client had to say about his experience with Chocolate After Dark…the words that stuck out to me were “BETTER THAN SEX…”