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Where Should We Begin? with Esther Perel

Sexlessness

Where Should We Begin? with Esther Perel

Esther Perel Global Media

Society & Culture, Education, Health & Fitness, Mental Health, Self-improvement

4.716.4K Ratings

🗓️ 17 November 2017

⏱️ 35 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

[Contains mature themes] A couple are first-generation children of immigrants, raised to believe sex should only take place in a marriage. Now that sex isn’t forbidden, it’s deeply uninteresting…to one of them. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0

What you're about to hear is an unscripted one-time couples counseling session.

0:06.5

It contains mature themes and listener discretion is advised.

0:10.5

For the purposes of maintaining confidentiality, names and some identifiable characteristics

0:15.4

have been removed.

0:17.2

But their voices and their stories are real.

0:30.0

How important is sexuality in a relationship?

0:36.4

The interesting thing is that if sex is good, it actually accounts for a rather small

0:41.0

part of the couple's satisfaction.

0:43.5

But if sex is a problem, it accounts for a huge part of those couples dissatisfaction.

0:48.8

I don't know if I would call it a wall or something has built up.

0:52.7

I mean, everything has sort of been devoid of its excitement.

0:57.9

So this is the couple that comes to me saying, we love each other very much, we have no

1:04.8

sex.

1:07.0

It's clear to me how much he loves me or she loves me.

1:12.5

It's been years since I felt wanted, he says.

1:18.1

And that distinction between loving relationships that are devoid of eroticism is at the center

1:25.5

of this couple's pain.

1:27.5

And we met online on one website.

1:32.5

Shady, which is an Indian website.

1:35.4

And I was a little bit older getting married, not older, but my upper 30s versus most

1:41.4

Indians are married.

1:42.9

You got to college and you're married, right?

...

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