CORRECTING SEXUAL PERFORMANCE PROBLEMS: SENSORY EXPERIENCES

The most effective way to enhance sexual pleasure is to enjoy your sexual response using all five of your senses: sight, smell, taste, hearing, and touch.
The most effective way to ruin your sexual fun is to fill your head with distracting and bothersome thoughts instead of sexual sensations. The classic way to defeat sexual pleasure is to repeatedly command yourself to stop worrying about your sexual response. This never works, because we are cognitively unable to process negative commands. Try this: Do not think about a white elephant. Now do not picture that white elephant's long, white trunk and floppy, white ears. Do not think about that white elephant's round, stumpy legs and enormous white elephant head. In order not to think about this image, you first have to picture it and then cognitively cross out awareness of the picture. In the process, guess what happened: you thought about the very thing you were trying to block out.
This is exactly what we do when we try to soothe ourselves about sexual anxieties by repeatedly reminding ourselves not to worry about performing during lovemaking. If we could hear and see a tape of what we run through our minds during lovemaking once we become anxious about our performance, it would probably go something like this:
"Okay, here we are, doing all right so far. Both half-naked, the lights are low, we're in the mood, all the right stuff is happening. I'm just not going to worry about whether my penis will show up for this performance—even though he sure has been on vacation a lot since my heart attack. I'm not going to worry about failing and disappointing my wife. I think I'll give her a little kiss. . . . "Now, where was I? Oh yes, Old Faithful—he's not what he used to be, but I'm just not going to worry about the fact that he's only halfway hard tonight. Oh-oh! She's touching me down there. . . . Maybe she won't notice. I'd better keep still; if I move my hips, Old But Not So Faithful Anymore Since My Heart Attack might bend in her hand, and then she'll know. But I'm just not going to worry about what she's thinking about my half-hard penis. That's it. I'm just going to lie here and not worry about any of this stuff. . . . Oh, Lord, help me not worry about any of this. ..."
Now, really. How many penises could stand up under that kind of pressure?
More effective and enjoyable than such torturous and misguided attempts not to worry is the strategy of filling your mind with so much pleasurable sexual sensory awareness that there is no room for worrying or not worrying.
Fortunately, most of us cannot consciously process more than seven pieces of information at once. You can use this fact to your sexual advantage by filling your mind with five chunks of sexual sensory information. Use each of the sensory channels to tune in to the sexual experience at hand, and you will greatly increase the odds that your body will respond with sexual pleasure. Look at your bodies as you are touching each other and making love to each other, or close your eyes and picture yourselves in your mind's eye. Notice the smell of your partner's skin or hair. Feel the warmth of your bodies coming together and the soothing and the unique combination of relaxation and excitement that happens during sexual arousal. Listen to the sexual sounds that you make together and exchange sexy and loving comments as you romance each other. Relish that familiar taste of your partner's mouth or shoulder as you caress. Fill your head with all this, and there will be no room for worrying.
Feeling somewhat anxious about making love is understandable following heart illness or following any prolonged period during which you have avoided sex. A loving and sensible way to bolster your ability to learn to relax and enjoy your sexual responses is to start from scratch and only gradually build up to full sexual involvement.
First, take time to practice tuning into your own bodily reactions to soothing touch, sexy thoughts, or sexy pictures. If you can, put aside any religious, moral, or emotional prohibitions that you may have against sexual self-stimulation. View this as a medical recommendation geared toward helping you regain confidence so that both your medical and relationship rehabilitation tasks can be addressed more successfully. Learn to become aroused, to lessen arousal by simply relaxing, and then to restimulate arousal.
Next, invite your partner to join you in relaxing sessions of sexual pleasuring. Free each other from any demands or expectations to "perform" during these pleasuring sessions. Agree not to have sexual intercourse for a while; these sessions are intended simply to be relaxing and soothing. Take turns massaging and caressing each other. Using warmed oils or lotions, give each other lengthy, loving, full-body massages, skipping your sexual body areas for now. While receiving this special attention, simply relax and tune in with all your senses. Then, with the same multisensory focus, lovingly massage your partner.
Once you have learned to remain reasonably relaxed during this form of loving interaction, you can begin to make your times together a little more erotic by incorporating manual or oral stimulation of each other's sexual areas. But do not turn this into pressure to perform sexually, either for yourself or for your partner. If you begin to feel distracted or tense, drop back a step and find the mode of interacting that is comfortable for you.
Gradually incorporate more specific erotic stimulation into these times of pleasuring each other. Use these massages as opportunities to expand your sexual comfort zones, both as individuals and as a couple. For example, it is very healthy and helpful to learn to feel comfortable making love to each other even if an erect penis and a lubricated vagina are not available during a particular lovemaking session. Remember, this is not a performance. Be loving, communicative, nurturing, and playful, and fill your mind with awareness of the sensations at hand.
Eventually, if you so desire, you might begin to incorporate controlled intercourse into these loving encounters. Take your time, notice yourselves as you make love. Avoid switching into any old anxiety-producing and intimacy-squelching ways of rushing or of demanding performance from self or other. Notice and appreciate your own and your partner's ability to create the experience of being on an island of refuge amid your overall life stresses. Get out of your minds and into your senses. By doing this together, you can enjoy your sexual relationship through all the days of your marriage.
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