Nadia Bokody: Sex blunder most couples make

It’s a common mistake many of us make it the bedroom – and it could be the reason your sex life is falling flat, says sex expert Nadia Bokody.

We are in the bedroom and he’s been down there for quite a while.

I want to say 20 minutes, but I’m not entirely sure; the clock’s just out of view.

All I know is, I’ve mentally compiled a shopping list (must stop lying to myself that a single tub of Ben & Jerry’s is enough to get me through the month), rearranged the furniture in my bedroom (note: shift dresser to opposite wall for more spacious aesthetic) and solved my friend’s work dilemma (Sarah’s just going to have to tell Alison she’s her colleague, not her marriage counsellor).

“Am I doing it right?” a voice suddenly inquires.

At this point, it feels like he’s more likely to lull me to sleep than anything else. But I don’t have the heart to tell him.

Instead, I coyly respond, “Yes, it’s amazing.”

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Nadia Bokody has revealed the common bedroom blunder ruining couples’ sex lives. Picture: Nadia Bokody/Instagram

I spent my entire twenties repeating versions of this scenario – lying back and willing partners to touch me in the ways I wanted, whilst never actually giving any feedback. It wasn’t until my marriage broke down in my early thirties, it occurred to me telepathy hadn’t been serving me particularly well in the bedroom department.

It’s odd that, as an outspoken businesswoman who’s confidently negotiated six-figure deals and led seminars in front of hundreds of people, I spent so much of my adult life afraid to speak up about what I wanted (and didn’t want) in bed. And yet, my situation isn’t at all unique.

Every week, I receive dozens of emails from people sharing intimate details about their sex lives in the hopes I’ll solve their bedroom dilemmas.

Without fail, the most common quandary women express is some variation of: “My husband doesn’t know I’ve faked my orgasms the last 15 years. I don’t know how to tell him.”

The messages from men tend to be about a desire to act out or simply disclose a particular fantasy to a partner – something along the lines of, “I’ve always wanted to try a threesome/tell my wife about my foot fetish/be submissive in bed, but I’m scared to bring it up.”

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We need to start talking about what we want (and don’t want) in the bedroom. Picture: Nadia Bokody/Instagram

What’s striking about these admissions, is how much more comfortable people are making them to me – a total stranger on the internet – than they are sharing them with their own partners.

For all the emphasis our culture places on monogamy, we have a bizarre way of carrying it out. Having sex with someone other than your spouse is an unforgivable sin capable of nullifying decades of love, while being in a sex-starved marriage void of meaningful communication is normalised.

I’m constantly bewildered by how low people are willing to set the bar in order to see out an arbitrary relationship contract. You don’t have sex anymore and can’t remember the last time you felt truly seen by your partner … but at least neither of you has cheated? That’s the metric we’re using to measure success? No one touched someone else’s genitals, so we’re all good?

More often than not, sexlessness and infidelity happen because people aren’t talking to their partners about what they really need. He wants more sex and feels short-changed it tapered off after the honeymoon, and she desires romance and resents the fact the last time he asked her on a date was before the kids were born.

Unfortunately, we’ve created so much stigma around sex, we’d sooner live a life of quiet disappointment than turn to the person we call our “partner” and admit, “This is what really turns me on, and this is what turns me off.”

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Lack of communication is the biggest mistake we’re all making when it comes to pursuing a great sex life. Picture: Nadia Bokody/Instagram

This is further compounded by the fact the majority of women don’t actually know what they want in bed. We’ve been conditioned to view sex as performative, and our bodies as vessels for male enjoyment, so it often doesn’t occur to us to explore what brings us pleasure. The result is a generation of women who are convinced they have low libidos that require medical intervention.

In reality, there’s no female sexual dysfunction epidemic going on; only women who’ve never given themselves the time or permission to enjoy their bodies and discover what turns them on (which is why I’ll campaign for every woman to buy a vibrator until the day I die).

Until we dismantle the shame we’ve been taught to feel around sex and get honest with our partners about what we really want, expecting our sex lives to get better is kind of like counting on a single tub of Ben & Jerry’s to last through the month.

Incidentally, these days I stock my freezer as generously as I give feedback to men in my bedroom.

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