66. Sex Series Week 5: Sexual Issues & Dysfunctions with Dr. Glenn and Phyllis Hill

In this episode, listeners are invited to explore the complexities of marital intimacy overshadowed by past trauma, physical challenges and addiction through the compassionate insights of Dr. Glenn and Phyllis Hill from Connection Codes. The journey promised entails a path towards healing and a profound emotional bond between partners.

Together, the hosts delve into the intricate dynamics of sexual trauma within marriage, emphasizing the importance of acknowledging and addressing old wounds for their dissolution. Utilizing the 'issue-specific core emotion wheel,' they navigate tender memories and advocate for the 'power of the ooh,' a simple yet impactful expression of empathy strengthening spousal bonds.

Listeners are also encouraged to challenge their perceptions as the discussion also addresses the misunderstood condition of vaginismus, shedding light on its emotional foundations that contribute to a significant majority of cases. The discourse underscores the essential relationship between physical affection and emotional security, emphasizing the need for a tranquil sanctuary for sexual pleasure.

Furthermore, the conversation explores the emotional weight often carried by men and women in response to sexual rejection and the importance of seeking external guidance when stuck in patters of current or past sexual addiction.

Ultimately, the episode serves as more than just an informative resource; it's a heartfelt guide tailored for couples striving to honor God's design for sex within the sanctity of marriage. Through transparent communication and shared empathy, listeners are offered insights to enrich their connection and strengthen their relationship.

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Discount on all Connection Codes courses with the code JAY!
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Hills' Bio:
Dr Glenn Hill is a marriage and family therapist, clinical sexologist, Connection Codes
coach and author with a private practice in Nashville, TN. He considers his greatest
credential to be his 40-year marriage with Phyllis. He enjoys doing absolutely anything
with her, especially traveling and spending time with their family of twenty.

Phyllis Hill is an entrepreneur, Connection Codes coach and the engine that keeps
everything running. She enjoys the partnership and adventures she and Glenn share
and loves being “Honey” to their ten grandchildren.

The pain of their early married years along with decades of research and experience led
the Hills to the founding of The Connection Codes. They counsel couples, families,
individuals, churches and businesses in building deep connection. They are passionate
about the Connection Codes because of the effect on their relationship, as well as
seeing the effect for countless others. It is the Hills’ mission to take the Connection
Codes to everyone on the planet.

Connect with Lauren:
Instagram
Facebook
Connect with Jason:
Jay’s Instagram
Jay’s Facebook
BraveCo Instagram
www.braveco.org

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

All right, everybody, welcome back to Dates, mates and Babies with the Valetins. As always, so good to be with you. We are in the middle of our series on sex. Last week you guys got to enjoy kind of a part one conversation with Dr Glennon Phyllis Hill of Connection Codes and we actually have them back this week to have a follow-up conversation and we're so excited to have you guys. Thank you for being with us.

Speaker 2: 0:22

Oh, thank you guys Always love it. So excited to have you guys. Thank you for being with us. Oh, thank you guys Always love it.

Speaker 3: 0:25

Well, today we're going to do a little bit of Q and a um. These are some of the, I think, the the biggest questions that we get, that we get about sex and and maybe some of the hardest, because a lot of people don't answer these questions and we don't talk about them a lot.

Speaker 1: 0:41

but we really felt like it was important in this series to kind of address some of these main topic questions and so Well, specifically under the umbrella of sexual issues, you know, people experience disappointment and surprise in in some areas when, inside of marriage, maybe they encounter some issues, maybe some, maybe there's even some like dysfunctions happening that are surprising to them. And again, it's not a topic of conversation that is just out there for anybody to access. But, dr Glenn, specifically with your sexologist background and your guys' work together with so many couples, we really wanted to get an expert on the line, so to speak, in some of these areas. So, yeah, thanks for helping us with some of this Q&A.

Speaker 3: 1:31

A lot of people struggle in their sex life because of past trauma right, their past experiences and past trauma and I know that, again, we could talk for hours on any one of these subjects. But what do you say to the person who's you know had a bunch of past experiences that were just really horrible, what's like the you know? What are you encouraging them to do with their trauma? How do we start to address it?

Speaker 4: 1:59

Yeah well, trauma and there's all sorts of things that can be traumatic and then lead to a trauma response, but typically it's a pain experience. So they just have to process that pain, not once, not twice. It literally, I have no idea might be 20, 50, 100 times. We do what we call an issue-specific core motion wheel. They're focusing on that specific issue and they process through that Again, not necessarily just once. It may be repeatedly, but that pain is stuck in the system and if it doesn't get processed it's going to stay stuck in the system.

Speaker 4: 2:38

We shared on the last episode just a few weeks ago for us that Phyllis just got hit with a pain from we think it was about 30 years ago and there is no moving past. It would be easy to say to her babe, we've been together 46 years. That was 30 years ago, let it go Move, move past it. You know why are you resentful? Why are you bitter? Why are you not forgiving? It has nothing to do with that. It's just a pain experience that she's having and she needs to be able to process that pain. There is no statute of limitations on pain or trauma and we process it through every time it happens.

Speaker 4: 3:14

And was I involved in her pain? Yeah, I was. Was I the source of that pain? Was I 100%, 30%, 8%? I don't know. I don't even know how to quantify that.

Speaker 4: 3:24

We call that the court case. You know we go to court and prove. You know, was that Glenn's fault or Phillip's fault? I don't know. I just know she felt pain in it. Has she experienced pain about it more times than I actually did it? Probably I might have done it three times and she experienced pain from that 50 times. I don't know 50 times, I don't know. And she has that right to experience what she experiences.

Speaker 4: 3:44

But we've gotten really, really good at processing through whatever it is. We call it the power of the ooh. The ooh is the first phrase where we're able to just ooh each other, and there's lots of versions of the ooh, but it's just something audible where I can hear her pain and I get it. That's what happened for her. We can't figure out the why. We don't even ask why with the connection codes, because we can't figure out the, the why. You know, we don't even ask why, uh, with the connection codes because we don't know why, uh. And even if we figure out why, it doesn't really help us. We just want to find out what happened.

Speaker 2: 4:10

It's important with our trauma, uh, that the partner knows they don't have to fix it and uh, and often we are lost with each other. I know, you know, lauren, you and I have shared a lot about your mom's journey, both when she first got diagnosed and then through all the treatment and then through her death, and we have processed with each other a lot, partially because I walked that journey too and I know what that feels like. And at no point was I trying to fix you. I was just holding space for you.

Speaker 2: 4:54

And you know sexual trauma we need to hold space for that and I think often we don't know what to do with it and it's uncomfortable for us to the point where we either want the person to just move on, like we want to encourage, we want to cheer them up, we want to downplay it, maybe we want to kind of. Even sometimes our verbiage you know, we've really harmed each other like even with the verbiage of healing, like using that word it can cause someone to feel that they are broken still, instead of going. Oh, the brain remembers things and the emotion behind it is remembered and so it comes back out at any point. You can't plan that when it's going to come back up for you and it's important to have a safe space within your marriage where you can turn to your partner and say, oh my word, I just had this horrible flashback from my childhood where maybe you experienced sexual abuse, and for that to just be able to be said and there doesn't have to be.

Speaker 2: 6:15

I think that's where we've gotten lost from each other. Is that the partner feels that they have to fix something. No, you just have to make space for that and it doesn't have to last. It doesn't have to be a 30 minute sit down conversation, it's just a very quick one minute, two minute. I'm going to make space for that and it lifts. It's just an incredible experience when someone makes space for someone else's trauma.

Speaker 4: 6:41

Yeah, and I want to go specifically as far as what that can look like. And every couple is unique, because every human is unique. But sat with a couple, they've been connection codings for just a few months and not been involved sexually for many years and they were going to have their first sex date. They started kissing, making out. They said it was incredibly passionate, and then they were laying beside each other and he moved kind of to get up on his elbow and she got flooded with fear and she told him I was so proud of her because, again, pretty much every marathon maybe, I thought it would be like woman, don't do that or you're gonna mess everything up. Are you kidding? This first time you've made out passionately in however many years? And she said, oh, I just got hit with fear. And he did the three phrases. He said, oh wait, what happened with fear? What did I miss, babe? And she said I don't know. You just shifted and I just felt fear. And she processed through the fear.

Speaker 4: 7:39

They started touching, making out again and then a few minutes later, similar thing happened. She felt fear. She told him in the moment she processed it the vast, vast, vast majority of couples would never do that. She gets the fear. You just shut up, woman, keep doing the thing you are. You have a responsibility here and you better put out. And so now she's just going to disassociate, right, you know he's going to get the sticky tab and a slot B Hooray and he gets a dopamine hit. Yeah, it feels good, but they didn't connect through it. They actually disconnected so, but they were only able to do that because they have done the core emotion. Well, I don't know what we're up to now Many, many dozens, maybe even 100 or more times, so that she's able to, in the moment, recognize the fear and to verbalize it. And this guy hit with fear. It's beautiful, oh my gosh. They were sharing the story. It's just so powerful and that's all. It's that simple. It's not easy, but it is that simple, totally Authentic, thank you.

Speaker 1: 8:40

That's so good, okay. What would you? What should a couple do? That's so good, okay. What should a couple do if the woman, specifically, is having a lot of physical pain during sex that's negatively impacting their sex life? I know that's a really common experience, especially early on in marriage. What should a couple do if that's the situation?

Speaker 4: 9:02

Well, let me start out with saying sex should never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever ever involve unwanted pain. So, and culturally, for centuries, we said oh, you know, woman is, it's just going to hurt the first few times. And what we do with that? Which pisses me off and I did it too with this woman early on in my life I've said oh, that's just the way it is, it hurts for the female. What we do with women is the first sexual encounter. If they've had some level of abstinence, he sticks tab A in the slot B. It's painful. He just told her the working definition of sex. Sex equals pain. And it's the darndest thing. The next day she doesn't want to do it again.

Speaker 1: 9:45

I wonder, why yeah.

Speaker 4: 9:48

But you know, and her body is telling her that equals pain. Do you want to do it? We did a ton of water skiing on our honeymoon because Phyllis figured out, if we're out on a boat with other people, ain't none of that sex stuff happening. And I set that up Now, it was not on purpose, it was not from bad intention, I was completely uneducated the true definition of the word ignorant. But I set it up because the second day I said hey babe, how about that sex thing? And she's like hold on, let me check. Sex equals pain. No, I'd rather go water skiing. And we did over and, over and over again.

Speaker 2: 10:17

Well, and your body remembers the pain, like I. You know, we always tell the water ski story, but it was my body. I'm saying protect my body, protect myself. And it's not even that I was consciously aware of that, it's a subconscious protect, protect. And so the pain. And it's interesting, we who was it?

Speaker 2: 10:45

This summer, we went to the conference and the pinners right, and they are in their 80s and they were talking about that vaginismus, that, oh, my goodness, now the studies are in the 90% that women with vaginismus it's emotional, it's connected to emotional, and that those studies.

Speaker 2: 11:08

Now I mean, in some ways it's very sad because for so long vaginismus was corrected through surgery because it was like, well, there's no other hope here we're going to have to just alter the vagina to make this work, realizing we've got to figure out what emotionally is creating this, what is shutting this down, what is holding there and that pain should not be there. So it's almost like you need to talk to someone, talk to an expert. I would definitely recommend Glenn he has a private practice to make an appointment to really figure out. And that's what, like the pinners, you know, that's what they've been brilliant at is helping couples to see that it is not a physical thing, it's an emotional, and to really go down that road and again, I want to make sure I specify it's not because she's doing it on purpose.

Speaker 4: 12:04

I'm making this up. She's not going well. I'm just not going to be sexual with you, right? Not at all. This is all subconscious. Uh, the vagina is a muscle and that muscle tightens up just like your eye blinks whenever somebody puts their hand towards it. And if she has not had been involved sexually before, this is the first time anything of that size has been inside this muscle and the muscle goes. Nope, nope, don't think I'm going to do that.

Speaker 4: 12:29

And so then and this just lights me up I'm thinking what in the world is happening here, and I believe it's malpractice. So then we go, you know what we can do. We'll cut that muscle some and then you won't be able to resist the penetration. Ah, we did it. I'm like are you kidding? And that's literally been done who knows? Tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of times. So it is very much my, our experience that way, way into the night. We don't say a hundred percent of anything with psychology, because humans, everyone's unique. There's 8 billion of us on the planet but way into the 90 percentiles is an emotional issue. Something's happening, something funky is happening that is blocking this muscle from relaxing and we have to deal with that. And, yes, we can do certain. The problem is the surgery works but you've literally cut the muscle. Same thing would be, you know, if Jay has a muscle spasm in his arm. We're like, well, we can fix that, we'll just cut the muscle yeah.

Speaker 4: 13:26

As me anymore, jay. No, it's not, there we go. It was a successful surgery. Well, no, his arm doesn't work. That's idiotic. It's amazing, wow.

Speaker 1: 13:35

Gosh, thanks, okay, that's good.

Speaker 3: 13:38

What if one or the other partner is not able to orgasm? And we know usually this is the woman you know, statistically speaking, the majority of the time. How do they like? How do they get help with that? You know what's the overarching challenge with that.

Speaker 4: 13:54

Are you talking about us personally? Yeah, sure.

Speaker 2: 14:02

Well, I mean we laugh, but that was our story. I had no idea how to orgasm in the early part of our marriage and I concluded very early on that I was just broken, concluded very early on that I was just broken, so had no idea how to even understand the clitoris, how to just explore that. And you know we did. We have mentioned our masterclass. That's on our website Partially. That masterclass was created in a very slow speed way to acknowledge that we got to go really slow, like we have to figure out the female body and it's not going to happen in 15 seconds, it's not going to happen in a minute. And you know, part of the orgasms is and we mentioned this, you know, in the last episode is being able to feel safe and to be able to let go.

Speaker 2: 14:56

And there's. There are very much you know and I appreciated your question last week about that, lauren as far as brakes and accelerators like. You've got to understand what is happening for you so that you can create that safety. You can create more accelerators in your life. And sometimes when you start to look at your life you realize brakes and accelerators don't just affect us sexually.

Speaker 2: 15:21

If you are out of balance in your life and you know, sometimes we have the terminology you are so stressed out, you're so overwhelmed, that's going to affect you sexually as well and that will affect your orgasms and your ability to orgasm, because your mind is going a million miles a minute in all the stressors of our life and all the things that are overwhelming us.

Speaker 2: 15:48

And that is the power of the core motion wheel to start using it, to get to start identifying, because we don't even know what overwhelmed means. We assume we know for each other, but for one it may be under the fear that's firing, someone else it may just be under sad, who knows? And so you got to get emotionally balanced for your body to start to be able to tune in, and that you know the orgasm is a lot connected. So you know it's not just a physical. Well, I stimulate my clitoris for five minutes and I don't feel anything. Well, there's more to it than that and there is to be able to go okay. I think there's so many parts of my life that are just out of balance that I've got to figure out how to get this back in a healthy way.

Speaker 4: 16:35

Yeah, we covered that in the sex masterclass that other than fire and sharp objects, and those used cautiously, anything feels good to an erect penis. The female is not that way. The female is so much more complex. Complex is good, not bad. Our computers are more complex now than they were 30 years ago and nobody's buying the 30-year-old computers. So complex is good, but it is complex. We just have to be aware of that.

Speaker 4: 16:57

And, specifically talking about brakes and accelerators, to understand brakes. A brake's not necessarily a stop, it just slows you down and that can literally be things like laundry piled up on the bed and I encourage people to get out of the bed, go in the backyard or whatever. But just a half variety. But she needs to know that. But she needs to feel safe enough and it could be him as well. But they need to be able to be safe enough to convey that to each other. Where she's able to say that's a pain point, that's a sad point. For me, this is laundry and all I can do is think, oh my gosh, I've got to get the laundry done. And all I can do is think, oh my gosh, I got to get the laundry done. And he's sitting here wanting her to be this wild, crazy sexual lover and all she's thinking about is laundry Not on purpose, she's not doing it on purpose. It's freaking laundry right there, you know, six feet from her. So yeah, she's distracted by that, but she has to feel safe to tell him.

Speaker 3: 17:47

Do you think the majority just real quick, of the hang up for a woman Like I know several women who you know have never orgasmed before and it's been, you know, three, five, six years of marriage and do you think the majority of that is you know they have a hard time emotionally engaging, or do you think it's a mix of they don't know how to stimulate themselves, the man doesn't know how to stimulate her, like is there any? Yeah, I mean, maybe speak to that a little bit.

Speaker 2: 18:22

Well, many of us I mentioned it in the last episode we have generational curses that have just kind of been handed down to us. We have a lot of fear that have just kind of been handed down to us. We have a lot of fear that we're going to sin.

Speaker 2: 18:32

We've created a box that is really small and there's there's so much fear, and I know that my own story I could. You know, I never, I had never masturbated before I was married and I'd never touched my own body, and I didn't even want to see my body naked, like even standing in front of a mirror naked for me, I mean, I just was like I had never done that. And so to go into marriage and all of a sudden, be comfortable just being naked, I wasn't, and I wanted the lights off, I wanted it dark, I thought I only wanted sex to happen under the covers, and it was just like there was so much shame around it for me and make connected to guilt as well. Like this, this is dirty, this can't be holy, this can't be right.

Speaker 2: 19:22

And so I personally had to get through a lot of my beliefs to find the freedom in it, to to find uh, this is meant for pleasure, that you know. This body is created to feel these sensations, to, um, to experience this. And and then there was fear. Even in letting glenn into that space like to, to be that vulnerable with him, to be that out of control, felt really scary. And so it was. You know, even though once I figured out how the clitoris worked, there was still so much emotion at this point because it was already so far into our married life, like we had had so many sexual encounters already that had nothing to do with my pleasure or my or having an orgasm, and so I had a a lot to unpack at this point in, because it was so far in already.

Speaker 3: 20:23

Yeah, that's good, awesome. Okay, what should a man do that's experiencing a risk erectile dysfunction? We know that quite a few men nowadays are experiencing that. Dr Glenn, what's your advice to those guys?

Speaker 4: 20:40

Well again, 8 billion people, lots of variety. So it's very difficult to, it's easy to overgeneralize and it's dangerous to do so. I have never dealt with a case of erectile dysfunction that was not emotion-based.

Speaker 3: 20:53

Wow.

Speaker 4: 20:54

It doesn't exist. There probably are some men out there that it's not, but I've never seen that. And again, the problem with our science is it works. So I can give you a pill where. Look at that. You got a big, massive ere. Uh, when it by biographers came out, they said nine hours. I want to meet the dude. Just walk around with an erection for nine hours isn't bothered like what the heck are you talking about. Anyway, now they shorten it four hours because they were having all sorts of problems, um, anatomically but or physiologically. So, uh, something's happening that's blocking this.

Speaker 4: 21:30

The, the cortexes are in charge of bodily functions such as an erection, and when the limbic system is flooded, it's a smoke-filled room and you can't read the eye chart across the room. It's not because you're an idiot, it's not because you're not educated, you don't know your alphabet, it's because you can't see the eye chart. So that's what's happening is the limbic system is flooded, the cortexes are not functioning and it's incredibly. Again, I'm faith-based, I think God designed it. It's genius, the incredible delicacy of getting an erection and maintaining an erection. It's darn near impossible. And so if you knock the cortexes off, kilter a little bit with unprocessed emotion, it's almost a miracle that anybody's getting an erection because it's so delicate as far as the valve it's just a tiny, tiny window that you can maintain an erection. So men are losing their erections because they don't feel safe. And again, this is a gross generalization, but men are losing their erections because they don't feel safe. What I say to groups and I'm not popular in that because the ED industry now is over a billion dollar industry, and I'm not real popular in that Because I say, look, we don't need to help guys get an erection, we need to help them find a safe place to put that erection. And that's the problem is that they don't feel safe. And I also believe that's part of the genius of monogamy, long-term monogamy is then you develop that safety.

Speaker 4: 22:53

I would not want to hook up on a weekend with a girl. I don't think I could get a direction. I really don't. I'm not going to try it, but it would just feel so weird. I'm so partnered with Phyllis sexually and so I'm amazed. I'm 62 years old, I'm older than I've ever been before, and it amazes me. This woman can do like literally six, eight seconds or something, and I get an erection. I'm like what the heck is my deal and I always make fun of her. I'm like this is not fair, it's not right. You can have to like dance or something in front of me to even get my attention and she gets out of the shower naked for some bizarre reason, and then I'm just like, oh babe, I'm getting the signal you're sending. She's like what, that I need a towel. I'm like no, no, no, the sex thing. She's like what?

Speaker 3: 23:36

That's funny.

Speaker 2: 23:37

But it is emotional. I mean he is emotionally safe with me and I know that wasn't the case. That's not the case. In a lot of relationships, A lot of marriages the male doesn't feel safe anymore is that the male doesn't feel safe anymore, the husband doesn't feel like he feels, especially because an erection is sexual for him. And she is saying that's gross, that's disgusting, you're disgusting, you're gross. You know, I don't want to. I feel pressure, get away from me. I feel pressure. Well, eventually that emotionally has a huge effect, effect, absolutely, and then he doesn't feel safe anymore and so he's telling his body no, no, no.

Speaker 3: 24:18

And so eventually the the body hears that and says yeah, no, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna get interested anymore because that's not a safe place yeah, you know, we know so many men are struggle with, um, uh, ed, simply because of, you know, long prolonged use of pornography and sexual addiction, and so you know the our bodies aren't meant to to use sex like a drug and expect to work, you know, and so, anyways, I know, for guys that are listening to this too, like it can take your brain a while to heal if you've been a porn addict for a long time. That's one of the side effects, you know, unfortunately, is social anxiety and erectile dysfunction and, yeah, just a dysregulated nervous system Along those lines.

Speaker 1: 25:16

I did want to ask this question because I know that it is. It's a common question that we get with people, men or women, who have had a past including sexual addiction, whether pornography or otherwise. I think when people get married and they experience a lot of hardship in their sexual relationship, there's often a question you know, how do we know? Is what we're dealing with today connected to your past of sexual addiction, even if it's not a current addiction? How do we know and what do we do? Whether, again, whether the male or female? But what would you say to that couple who's asking that question?

Speaker 4: 26:01

Well, I mean, I sit with a lot of couples who are in that exact scenario. They probably will need some outside coaching, and you know it's so difficult to speak in generalities, but a lot of couples there has been enough detriment that they need some outside input and that's. You know a lot of what we do.

Speaker 2: 26:22

But you know, on the other side of that I would say, like for my story, I, you know, I was the good girl. I came into marriage, like I mentioned a second ago, I had never masturbated, I'd never touched my own body, I had never seen porn, I had never done all the things right, I had saved it for this special moment and and I was still wrecked and.

Speaker 2: 26:46

I still suffered and didn't know what was happening.

Speaker 2: 26:49

And I, you know, our honeymoon night I mean our first, our wedding night was like I went into a really dark place afterwards, didn't talk about it, didn't talk to anyone about it.

Speaker 2: 27:02

I was shocked, I was disappointed, I thought God had left me, like I did all the things I thought God wanted me to do just to keep this sacred. And then it wasn't sacred. And so I, just for those listening, I do want to give you hope that if, if your background is whatever, whether it's porn or you were very sexually active before getting married, and or if you were even a prostitute before getting married, that does not mean your story is different than my story. Like, we share the commonness of the confusion and of the trauma and of the disappointment and of the all of those things. And you know, we know that God is a God of your redemption and we can bring the purity back into our marriages and we can bring the purity back into our marriages. And but you got to process a lot of emotion around all of it, whether you've got a story of going the purity culture route or you've got someone else's story that just got a lot of porn in the past or all those kinds of things to realize we've just.

Speaker 2: 28:10

All are people that have to process our emotions and really see the healthiness of that and that I have to process it just as much. And that's not my story. That's not my ground.

Speaker 1: 28:23

I think that's such a powerful point, phyllis, and I think it's a good reminder to people that are listening that you know in general and a huge part of why we wanted to do this series on sex, specifically on our podcast, which is aimed at emotional and relational health really is that when we don't understand the God's design of A the human being, b the covenant of marriage and C the lifeblood of connection inside of marriage, then we miss it. Whether we're coming, like you've said, phyllis, from a background of purity or a background of promiscuity. If we don't actually understand with our hearts and our minds the design for sex in marriage and what does a marriage covenant actually mean, what does it look like, and and how do we maintain connection in that space, how do we grow connection in that space as our priority, then we're going to be in loads of pain, regardless of background. So I think that's that's our aim and that is why we're so grateful that to have had you guys on the podcast Um last week and this week is just what you bring to this conversation is so critical, it's so crucial and so many, many married couples without having you know.

Speaker 1: 29:39

We learn all these things growing up. We learn math and science and all the core subjects, yet somehow we become adults and we don't have a clue how to connect to our own emotions. We don't have a clue how to communicate through them, and we sure as heck do not know how to include other people in a covenant space inside of that chaos that's happening in our brains and in our hearts. So the work that you're doing is absolutely it's absolutely mission critical work. So thanks so much for contributing to the conversation. Glenn, I see you want to input one more thing.

Speaker 4: 30:16

I'm just dying to say that last thing.

Speaker 4: 30:18

Most people and culturally. And again, this is an old message, centuries old that sex is. You don't even say a phrase like all the honeymoon's over, the honeymoon phase is over. I'm 62 years old and we're starting to get good at this. It rocks my world, it blows my mind.

Speaker 4: 30:36

And if you had said to me just 20 years ago if that was possible, I would not have believed you. Because and again, all of the literature out there goes oh, you know, forties, fifties, sixties, whatever you know that's, that's over that stage. It's not true. But there are I do not know of messages out there that are saying oh my gosh, once you hit your 50s and 60s, then you're going to really rock and roll.

Speaker 4: 31:03

And we tell our pre-married couples and I am convinced pre-married couples don't have to go through the the brutal experience that we went through and that most people go through but I always tell them I hope they have the worst sex of their marriage on their wedding night. And then it's amazing, they have a blast. And I always tell me if you're not laughing about sex, you're not trying hard enough, because sex is funny, but then it's just a journey and you never reach the sexual vista. And what the message we've given is oh yeah, in your twenties or thirties or whatever, that's going to be your hot years. No, those are your learning years.

Speaker 4: 31:38

It's just a continual exciting sexual adventure, and it gets more and more powerful. We were the slow kids in the group. We remember all of the disconnects, the disasters, so we were late starters. But I just want people to know that no, you're 50s, 60s, 70s. I've never sat with a couple in their 90s, so I can't speak to that. It's amazing. In the 70s, and it's amazing. The genius of what I'm convinced is God's design.

Speaker 1: 32:09

Thanks for saying that, but honestly, that's such a hopeful message and such a misunderstood fact about life.

Speaker 3: 32:17

Yeah Well, guys. Thank you again so much and thanks everyone for joining us for this sex series. It's just been so fun. If you guys are interested in connecting with the Hills, there is a 40% discount code. Y'all are welcome. Use my name. Just use J, j-a-y.

Speaker 1: 32:37

Guys, we wanted to let you know, too, about our upcoming marriage intensive. Starting on April 16th, jason and I are running a six week intensive. Our goal is to get 30 couples to jump on board with us. We want to spend six weeks with you helping to shore up foundations, or even lay some good foundations for marriage help you level up your, your toolkit for how to approach covenant um connection with your spouse.

Speaker 1: 33:06

We know that people experience pain inside of marriage and often it's just because they don't have the right tools to help navigate the hard a hard spot. So, um, jump over to Jason and Lauren, to valetoncom and check out information about the marriage intensive If you're interested.

Speaker 3: 33:19

Otherwise we'll see you next time. Bye.