What Our Fantasies Mean and Sex Coaching with Dr Lori Beth Bisbey | Transcript
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Hannah Witton
Welcome to Doing It with me, Hannah Witton, where we talk all things sex, relationships, dating, and our bodies. Hi, everyone. Welcome back to Doing It. How are you? How are you? I am doing very well, thank you for asking. I cannot wait to introduce you to this week's guest, Dr Lori Beth Bisbey.
Lori Beth is a psychologist, and intimacy and sex coach and she is just so wonderful and open about the work that she does in this episode, and some of her personal experiences. At one point in this episode, she describes a personal experience of sexual violence and I will put timestamps in the description, and in the show notes, which are on our website if you want to skip that part. Remember to look after yourself first. We also talk about topics around sexual violence and trauma in the context of sex therapy and coaching more generally, throughout the episode. A lot of ground is covered in this episode, I was curious to learn about the difference between sex therapy and sex coaching. We talk a lot about sexual fantasies, what they really mean about our deepest darkest desires, and how they might be different to what we actually want in real life, and how best to use our fantasies to benefit us, rather than holding us down with shame, embarrassment, or confusion. We talk about consensual non consent fantasies, and some of the problems that clients come to her with around desire and arousal. This was such a fascinating conversation, and I hope you think so too.
As usual, you can find all of the information about things that we talked about and further references in our show notes, which are on our website DoingItPodcast.co.uk. And let us know what you think over on our social media, we are @DoingItPodcast on Twitter and on Instagram. And without further ado, here is Dr Lori Beth Bisbey.
Hello, Lori, thank you so much for coming on and chatting with me.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
My pleasure.
Hannah Witton
I'm so excited because I feel like every time we've met, I've always just been like so intrigued by everything you have to say, and so now I'm really happy to kind of like, get to corner for like 30 minutes and like ask you everything I want. Yeah, so firstly, what is a sex coach? Because that's what you do? What does that mean?
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Well, so what that means is that I help people to have fantastic sex lives, and I do that primarily through talking and through helping people with exercises.
Hannah Witton
Ooo exercises.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Yeah, no, I don't do anything physical with folks. But I give people a lot of different ways to get embodied, and a lot of different things to try, in order to build confidence and tackle problems.
Hannah Witton
What kinds of things can a sex coach help someone with? And what can't you? Like at what point do you need, like therapy? Do you know what I mean, like what's the difference between like sex coach and sex therapist?
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Aside from education, in general, the difference between therapy and coaching is that therapists look backwards as a rule, right. They start from the present, they look backwards, they handle issues in that way. They may work in the in the, in the present with exercises and things but primarily, they look to the past. Coaches look from now to the future.
Hannah Witton
Right, okay.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Coaches don't deal with large psychological issues, as a rule. Now, I'm also a psychologist, so I'm also a therapist. So what my sessions look like are probably different than some other people's because if there's an issue that I see, I'm not going to ignore it, right. I can, I can deal with that and I can make the distinction with a client between something that's therapy versus something that's coaching.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. And you would like explicitly say beforehand, like what that you were switching like from in from one mode to another.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
I would, I would say is is that, you know, for example, let's say a trauma comes up, that they're having trouble dealing with, I would say, look, this is traumatic, right, and really needs to be dealt with in a therapy session and we can deal with that if you would like. And that's a separate session, and we talk about how we're going to go about doing that and, and you make a really big distinction. Things that usually need therapy are things like intense trauma, long standing sexual disorders. So, for example, if you have have vaginismus, sex therapists tend to have more training around that than sex coaches.
Hannah Witton
Because, potentially, vaginismus, for some people, might have been caused by some trauma.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Yes. But even for those who it hasn't been caused by for trauma, it's not something that is necessarily standard. And sex coach training is really varied, right, so but it's not really standard of the sorts of things that sex coaches tend to deal with. It's more of a therapy thing.
Hannah Witton
So what are the things that sex coaches are like, very well equipped to help with?
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
All, it, you know, depends on the coach, right? Sex education is one of the big things. Anatomy, understanding anatomy, helping with orgasm, problems with for men with keeping erections. So techniques and tricks, you know, that sometimes requires medication as well. As a sex coach myself, I specialise in gender, sex, and relationship diversity. So I deal a lot with people who are trying to own their kinks, trying to become comfortable with polyamory, or making a transition to polyamory, or consensual, non monogamy, people who are in power exchange dynamics and BDSM. A lot of shame, I spend a lot of time working with people around shame, and getting rid of shame.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, I was gonna ask, are there like specific coaching needs like, or is there a different coaching approach when you're addressing different relationship styles?
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
I mean, you need somebody who knows about the relationship style. That's the specific need, I am what they call knowledgeable, which means that that I actually have experience with these things. So I identify as queer, polyamorous, and I'm in a 24/7 power exchange relationship, so BDSM. So as as a result of that, people don't have to explain the general concepts to me, they just have to explain their relationships and their particular issues to me. The problem is going to somebody who doesn't understand these things, is that you have to teach the coach or the therapist,
Hannah Witton
Yeah, you find yourself, like explaining yourself rather than like, okay, we've got a mutual understanding here, right now we can address the topic at hand. Yeah.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Absolutely. And nobody wants to spend their money to explain to a therapist how you live, right, you know, your general lifestyle.
Hannah Witton
I kind of, I've thought about this before, not in terms of like sex therapy, or sex coaching. But I was like, if I were to ever get therapy, like so many of my, like issues, I think the things that I would bring up are to do with like, being on social media and like having a presence online. And I'm like, how the hell would you find somebody like a therapist, who's also an influencer so they understand it?
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Well, and I mean, you know, so, you know, there, there are some of us who do have quite a social media presence.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, true.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
You have, you know, a bigger social media presence, but I think you need to talk to somebody who understands the specific problems that come with that.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. Yeah. And I guess it, yeah, the same. I hear a lot of friends of mine who are queer and often, like, either look for queer therapists or like, therapists who like specialise in that and I've had queer clients before.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Yeah, I mean, so in the UK, Pink Therapy is like the foremost organisation for gender, sex, and relationship diversity training for therapists, counsellors, coaches, and is a phenomenal organisation. And they have a directory, and their Pink Directory is the therapists who have some experience in the area, varying levels of experience, but that's the first place I would look if you fall into any of those categories. If you're looking for a therapist. Coaches is a little more difficult, difficult because there is no sort of central directory, so you need to question people.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, cuz there's like a directory. There's like certain like career paths that you go down and like certifications and stuff you need to become a therapist. Is there an equivalent of that for coaches, or is it a bit mish mash, like lots of different institutions offering different qualifications
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
it's mish mash. And even for therapists, It's not a quick, clear career path in that, in the United Kingdom, they separate counselling from therapy, and they're all different styles. And you never know, a counsellor could have just as much training as a therapist, for example, in the UK. And in the United States, that's not the case, because everything is regulated at a state level.
Hannah Witton
Okay.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Whereas here it's not. And so for coaches, there are some career paths, there are some certifications that you can find, but there's no agreement as to whose certification is the one that you should have, for example.
Hannah Witton
Right, do you think that like, it's a problem, or and it should be more centralised? Or it's fine?
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
I mean, I've been here for 30 years, and, and I lived in the US for 27. I did my training in the US. I think it's a problem, I think it's a problem because people have no idea what they're getting. That doesn't mean that somebody has to have an extreme amount of training. But it means that there needs to be a baseline of what being a coach means, for example, of what being a sex coach means. And there should be ways to grandfather people in for experience, because these professions have been around for a long time. And some people have been practising, very well, for years, so they shouldn't be eliminated from practising because some new scheme comes in. But I think for clients, it's a real problem, because they have no idea
Hannah Witton
Of like what to expect?
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
No, they've got no idea what to expect, they have no idea if, somebody charges a lot of money, they don't understand why, right. So they'll think that sometimes, you know, somebody who charges a lot of money and somebody who charges a small amount of money, that's because of experience, right? So, you know, I have 30 years experience, I probably charge more than somebody who's just come out of school.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
However, sometimes somebody charges a lot of money, because they're coming from a business coaching framework, for example. And so that's how they've learned to charge and they may not have a lot of experience, or education. I know of one situation where a young woman came to me and said that she'd contracted to see a coach, on sexual issues, and the coach was, I think it was like 300 pounds an hour.
Hannah Witton
Wow, steep.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Yes, steep, steeper than me even. And she contracted to see this woman, and she went to the first session, and she wasn't terribly comfortable. So she decided to look into this woman's background and the woman was a yoga instructor. And she was in her her bio, it said she was a self taught coach. So you need to, you need to actually check out -
Hannah Witton
Yeah, do your research.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Do your research and see, you know, does this person know anything? And if they offer it, not everyone offers it, and you shouldn't think badly of someone who doesn't offer any free intros, right. Because not everybody does. But if they offer it, take advantage of the free intro session to ask them questions, to see how you feel about the person. Most of us are not insulted if you decide not to work with us because we don't feel like the right person for you.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, that's just part of the job.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
I'm not for everyone. And I know that, and I don't have a problem with that, you know, not an issue. And if I can, I'll help you find the person that will fit you better. If I know what your issues are, I and I get a sense of you, I can say, well, you know, these four people, you might want to try them because they're, they may suit you better.
Hannah Witton
Have you ever had sex coaching?
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
I never had specifically sex coaching. No. I had therapy related to sex and trauma. So I got it there sort of. But no, I had a mentor and that was kind of -
Hannah Witton
A sex mentor.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Yeah. Well, that's not unusual if you're part of BDSM lifestyle, rather than just doing it as an episodic practice. People.
Hannah Witton
Like other people in the community.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Yeah.
Hannah Witton
Kind of like help teach you the ropes.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Yeah.
Hannah Witton
Literally the ropes in some cases.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Literally the ropes. I mean, I have to say that I had a mentor long after I was in the community, right, because I started doing this stuff in the dark ages. So, but no, I had a mentor because I I identify as leather and I, I wanted to be part of a particular community. So I had a mentor to introduce me to sort of the usual rules and practices, to talk about my personal growth progression with, and that's another thing that coaches do is they do a lot of personal growth work. So sometimes people come to see you not because they're having a sexual problem, but because they want to explore, and they want somebody to help guide their exploration.
Hannah Witton
Ooh, yeah, yeah, I see that like, yeah. It doesn't necessarily have to be like, I've got this problem, let's deal with it. It's more. Yeah. It's like, Look, like you said at the beginning, like looking forwards, being like, what else could there be?
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Absolutely, and I have to tell you how much fun that is.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
That is so much fun to do. I do VIP days sometimes with clients, which are quite dear, but they're great fun. I did a VIP day with a woman where we looked at desire. So we spent the whole day exploring erotica, and doing creative exercises, and things to look at what her desires might be, because she wasn't sure. She was like, I haven't a clue.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. It, I think a lot of people are quite clueless about that, though. Because we never really, we're never encouraged to interrogate our desires, like to really think about like, oh, that thing turned me on. Or like, right, or sometimes, like when I'm like masturbating, I fantasise about this, and then this thing pops into my head. And I didn't even ask it to be there. Like, what's that about?
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Well, I mean, because you know, we take in stimuli all day, and you never know what's gonna, what's going to turn you on sexually. And it's, it's one of those funny things where not only we're not taught to focus on our pleasure, so of course we don't focus on our desire. And this is one of my favourite workshops to do, right, to get people looking at desire, and really focusing on expanding your fantasies, you know, what might be interesting, what might be fun. But the other part of that is to understand that now some of these things you may want to do. Some of the things you may be interested in doing, but others you may not. It's no big deal, like some things can stay in fantasy, you don't have to act on them.
Hannah Witton
So here's my question, and this is maybe a personal question of mine as well actually, how do you know which fantasies are just fantasies and which ones you want to try out? How you supposed to like, figure that out?
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
I mean, that one can be difficult. So what I said, what I say to people is, the more far out the fantasy, and the more complicated the fantasy, the more you want to have some thought about whether you want to try to enact it. For example, lots of people have abduction fantasies -
Hannah Witton
Right.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Now, I know people who create abduction scenes, so it can be done. However -
Hannah Witton
The logistics are a nightmare.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Yes, the logistics are a nightmare, and it's also far more intense than your fantasy will be.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
I mean, people have rape fantasies all the time. It's still like number three on the fantasy hit parade.
Hannah Witton
What's number one?
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
I don't know these days, it changes.
Hannah Witton
It changes with the times.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
It does. I mean, you know, number one used to be same sex liaisons.
Hannah Witton
So basically, it's just whatever is taboo.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Yeah, yeah. But rape is -
Hannah Witton
Right now, it would just be like sex with somebody outside of your household.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Thats right, that probably is the number one fantasy. Actually touching someone outside your household.
Hannah Witton
Oh, my God. A hug, a handshake. Oh, I'm quivering.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
I know. I know. It's terrible isn't it, it's so sad, but the truth. But you know if the other thing about rape fans, so rape fantasies can be really intense, and wonderful, and fantastic. But when you enact it, that can be something different entirely, and particularly if you're somebody who has experienced sexual violence.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
That gets confusing for people. So it's like, I have rape fantasies, and then I was raped. Does that mean that I wanted it? No, it doesn't. The fantasy doesn't have anything to do with the reality. Most of our fantasies don't have some ugly stranger, or some person that we loved suddenly betraying us by doing something like that, right.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, the way that I've heard it explained to me is that with those kinds of fantasies, because it's all in your head, you are 100% in control.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Absolutely.
Hannah Witton
And obviously, if you were an acting out, or then that, you know, even even if you've negotiated beforehand, there is still like somebody else involved, so you don't have like 100% control in those scenarios. You can't control somebody else's behaviour.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Well, and and you know, what the thing is, is that people who actually want to act this out, are usually people who want to give up some control. And giving up control is bloody exciting. I mean, I love it, right. But it also means, if you actually hand over control, you hand over control to the limits of the negotiation. That doesn't mean you can't take it back. We always like to clarify for people you know, if you're playing with somebody, or involved with somebody who is sane.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
You can take it back, you can end things. But the whole point is that you hand over control. That's, that's the fun of it, right. And so sometimes that means you end up doing things you didn't want to do, or something that's scary or, you know, you work into things or something, sometimes you try something and it just doesn't work out. So I've seen people trying to enact like, my favourite one is a pirate fantasy. Right, and it was great
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Yeah, and I thought it was wonderful, but it was great fun in her head, but when they enacted it, it just was clumsy. And she said, they laughed the whole time, and she was really upset by this. And I was like, why are you upset? You had a great time laughing with your partner, right?
Hannah Witton
Love it.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
This is life.
Hannah Witton
But it wasn't like, it wasn't like the sexual, sensual experience that was in her head.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
No, and I said so great, so put it back into fantasy.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Right, something's you know, you don't want to act on. So things are just really messy, like somebody who was fantasising about oil wrestling, which you can do. But, you know, the fun part is the wrestling, I guess, I've never done it, but I'm told the fun part is the wrestling. The not so fun part is getting the oil out of your hair, or off you're skin, cleaning up.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Right. Well, if you do it in fantasy, you don't have to clean it up.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, it's less messy.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Right. So sometimes that's a consideration. Sometimes people are afraid of getting arrested because they're fantasising having sex in public.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Some people still do it. But I would suggest, that if you don't want to, you need to think through that one.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, I love the the main consideration of like, should I enact my fantasies, it's just like logistics. Let's think practically here about it.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Well, yeah, that is the main consideration really.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
I mean, obviously, if you're fantasising about something, and people do and I want to kind of deshame this one. People fantasise about non consensual activities, right. They don't only fantasise about being the victim, they fantasise about being the perpetrator. And just as if you fantasise about being the victim, that doesn't mean you want to be a victim in real life, fantasising about being a perpetrator does not necessarily mean you want to be a perpetrator in real life.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. And like, I guess it must be quite difficult, though, for people to like, work through the those feelings of shame around like, oh, but if I'm fantasising about this, does that mean that I actually want it because that doesn't align with who I see myself as a person?
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Yeah, I mean, and and the more extreme the fantasy, the more that that does that. And those are the times that people come and seek seek either a therapist or a coach. Actually, often they seek a therapist, and unfortunately, often they seek a therapist who knows nothing about the area. And so if they hear I'm fantasising about, you know, beating someone until I draw blood -
Hannah Witton
Oh okay, they're like, alarm bells.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Right, they're like, oh, my God, oh, my God, this person needs help immediately. Because when the reality is that most people who are having the fantasy, don't want to do that non consensually. And that what you need to be exploring with somebody is, is this is something you want to do consensually, or is this even something you want to do?
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Right, is it hot in your head, but not hot in the idea of actually acting it out? Then there's also when people get turned on by stuff that is, in fact, was non consensual, and then they freak out about that. So -
Hannah Witton
I've heard that's so common.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Incredibly common.
Hannah Witton
Like, like, if you're watching, like a non consensual scene in a movie or a TV show, or something?
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Yes, absolutely. So there's two reasons that that happens, right? One is arousal non concordance, which is the body does it's thing.
Hannah Witton
Oh, yes, I've heard of this.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
So, arousal non concordance is when your body reacts to something sexually, but you're not enjoying the experience.
Hannah Witton
And it can happen the other way around as well, where like in your brain, you're like, super aroused, but your body's just like, haha, no.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Absolutely. And so that's one thing. But the other thing is when you're really turned on, and so I did, I wrote my erotic memoir this year. And yeah, so it's it's the way it's set up is there's a piece of erotica, a piece of memoir, and then some analysis about the emotional themes. Now, my life history is pretty intense, and I play really hard. So, you know, it's not for the faint of heart, but it's a lot of fun. But, so there's, you know, fetishes, and BDSM, and consensual non consent, and there's also, I was the victim of some severe sexual violence. So when I, when I put the piece of erotica, and then I put a little buffer and then there's, you know, the piece of my life. And the person who was mentoring me as I was writing, came into one session one day and said, you need a bigger buffer, and I said, hey, okay, what's up, and they were really upset. Because I was just just turned on by your life experience, I didn't realise where the fantasy ended. And I, you know, I turned around and said, well, I'm still turned on by parts of my life experience that were, you know, at the time were horrible.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
But have come back in my fantasies. So if I can't sort that out easily, I don't expect anybody else to be able to.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
You don't need to feel bad about that. What turns us on, turns us on. That doesn't mean that we want to, to hurt somebody. That doesn't mean we want to act without somebody's consent. It's just in our heads.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. Or in our groins.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Or in our groins. And the funny thing is, is it's like it's so common, and people just don't want to talk about it.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. And I guess, in terms of like, that buffer between the erotica and then your real experience, life doesn't give you nice buffers.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Exactly. And even though I put in a little buffer, right, and it's like a paragraph, the reality is life doesn't give you that. And as an as somebody who suffered sexual violence, I can tell you that one of the biggest things to get over for me, and the hardest part, was the shame of being turned on by things that he did to me. And, and being mortified that those were the fantasies that I had, that stuck with me. They were things I wanted to try beforehand, or I had tried beforehand. Mostly wanted to try, cuz I was 19 when this happened, and then they stuck with me.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
And they were the things I want, I wanted to react, retry and re-enact. And they were the things that gave me the most intense orgasms, and I just was mortified by myself. Yeah. So it took a long time to be able to integrate that.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. And I guess, like, it comes back to I was saying before about like that the control? And yeah, it's the consent. So like, you're, you know, we sometimes it might feel like we're not consenting to our own fantasies, I guess, and that's where, and that's where that, like you said, that feeling of shame comes from where you just like, wait, I didn't ask for this, why brain coming back here.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Well, and I think there's a really big difference between intrusive stuff, which I, which I had for years, because I had post traumatic stress. So intrusive thoughts and a fantasy that pops up, right. And also, some people have obsessive sexual thoughts. Excuse me, and, but they have a particular feel to them. Right? There's no desire element to them. There's a disgust, it's a disgust, it's thought disgust, usually. So and they pop up when you're not masturbating. So that's a good clue. Right? If it pops up, when you're not being sexual, or you're not thinking about being sexual, it just pops up out of the blue.
Hannah Witton
And there's no desire associated.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Right, and there's no desire associated with it, then it might be obsessive, or it might be an intrusive recollection. And so that's something that it's worth, you know, getting some help with. And that's definitely a therapist thing, not a coach thing, usually.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, so kind of changing the topic slightly. How did you get into coaching, and was like sexuality always a passion? Or is it something that you stumbled across through training as a psychologist? Or because like, obviously, your your lifestyle and your work are so intertwined, did they kind of like happen simultaneously? I'd love to know.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
So what happened was that I went to university at 17 to study broadcast journalism, because I like to report, I like to write, I like to be in front of the camera, and be on the radio. So this is what I thought I was going to do for a living and at 19, and I already had I mean, I've always had submissive sexual desires, at nine I made myself a bubble to live into await my master -
Hannah Witton
It was always there.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Always, and what I didn't understand was the gender was really irrelevant for me. At that time I did that took me a long time before I really understood that I identified as bisexual fairly early on, but it really isn't about the gender for me, it is totally about the energy, which means that my people look, can look very different from each other, Right. Because it's their it's, their power that I'm interested in, and the energy, and the edge that I like, not the gender doesn't matter. So so I knew I was different, then. I remember talking to my friends about it and they all thought I was weird. So I was like, okay, I better shutt up and and and and I found the erotica I needed and and kept this up and through to going to university, and the first person that I did anything with was a great relationship, and we've stayed close since I was 17. But at 19 I met this guy, and he was really probably the first serious dominant, who was into BDSM, that I had ever met and the experience was wholly traumatic. I mean, first of all, not wholly. The first two weeks were great, and then he started doing things I didn't consent to, when I withdrew my consent he didn't stop. So he had me for five days, captive, and it was pretty horrific.
Hannah Witton
Oh my goodness.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Yeah, it was pretty intense. So I got PTSD as a result of that. And I changed my major and I went into psychology and education. And because I decided I wanted to help people who had been through similar experiences, and so, for me, sexuality, and sex, and gender, and trauma, were intermixed so that was the kind of stuff that I was interested in. And as I went through graduate school, I did more work around this because I realised that yes, I definitely was different. And no, there was nobody talking about this stuff. Now, keeping in mind that I was in graduate school from 1985 to 1989, right. So this was quite some time ago and there was no real internet to go looking things up on. So I did a bunch of work around this, and I had some training and then I moved over here and I was working with people and I just continued to seek out training and other people who had more experience. Um and I split my practice for a very long time I did, I did a small practice that was around a sex, sexuality, and relationships. And the rest of my practice, I was doing family court work, and lots of family court work and trauma. And about five years ago, I decided that I really wanted to start dialling down the family court work, and dialling up the coaching and stuff. So I went and actually took a coaching course, because I wanted to see if what I had learned in my episodic trainings was, you know, a good enough foundation. So I went and took, I did a two year coaching course. That was more than five years ago now, my God. But yeah, I did a two year coaching course, and so that I could get certification with the International Coaching Federation, and I did the sex and intimacy stuff in various places but I have done and continue to do stuff with Pink Therapy because yes, Pink Therapy.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
And so that's how I ended up doing this. So now, I spend most of my time speaking, writing, coaching, and doing therapy around sex, sexuality, relationships, and trauma.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. Wow.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
I'm having a great time. I mean, I -
Hannah Witton
Oh good.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
I, no, it's, it's, although some of the work is really intense, the nice thing about doing work with people, as opposed to doing assessments, is that you get to see them make the positive change. And so you go along with them on that journey. And it's, I just love stuff like that.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. And that at the beginning, you said, like about how coaching is about helping people like have fantastic sex lives.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
That's right.
Hannah Witton
So I'm curious what, in your experience, is like the most common thing that's, like the obstacle to people having a fulfilling sex life?
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
There are two, one is shame. The number one is shame. They don't talk about it.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
You can't have a fantastic sex life with a partner without ever talking about sex, right. You know, it might be fantastic a couple of times, but it's not going to consistently be fantastic if you never talk about it. Right, because we change over time, and various things happen in life. So that's number one is shame. And number two, which is related I think, is not really knowing what your desire is. It's not understanding pleasure -
Hannah Witton
Right, yeah. Like in terms of like, emotionally and physically, like how your body works, but then also what turns you on.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
What turns you, I mean I end up spending more time with people on the emotional but interestingly enough, I mean, I do get, you know, teach people their own anatomy sometimes. And like, for example, I had a client who was in her 60s, and I, offhand, said something about, you know, the size, the actual size of the clitoris, and discovered she didn't really know her own anatomy. And so you can't make any assumptions that just because you're of a certain age or certain experience that they actually know how their bodies work.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. Um, so I've got a few questions that some of our listeners asked on our Instagram.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Go for it.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. So this one says tips for developing a more loving relationship to one's own body/sexuality?
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Spend a lot of time exploring yourself and rigorously combat shame wherever you come across it.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, it's like ongoing work.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Yes, it is. I mean, you can, you know, it gets, you can get some coaching to get you on the right into the right habits and the right path to do that. And particularly, if you have somebody voice in your head, that you've internalised telling you, you're you know, you're too fat, you're your body's misshapen, you're not attractive, all those things, it's worth actually attacking those things and learning how to attack them so that you can get rid of most of that. But most of us are our own worst critic. So you have to get into a habit, a habit of treating your body well, and talking nicely to your body, and playing up your own attractiveness to yourself.
Hannah Witton
Is it a case of fake it till you make it is that?
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Sometimes. And if you're not finding any progress, you definitely need to go get some some professional help. Like if you're trying it and you say affirmations, and you know, you're looking in the mirror and you're telling yourself how beautiful you are, and you're asking people who think that you're sexy to tell you that, and you're doing all these things, and you're still not getting there, then get some help to get rid of the stuff that's stopping you, which is usually the voice in your head that tells you you're not good enough.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. This person wants to know, how do you get over the barrier of penetration when you've never been able to manage PIV, penis in vagina?
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Start with small penetration, right. Start with finger, preferably your own.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
I mean, I see it and you laugh. But seriously, sometimes you is it somebody else's pet penetrating you, not you penetrating it. So start with a finger. Once you manage a finger, graduate up to a couple, sometimes using a dildo, a slender dildo, there are vaginismus sets that help people deal with with expanding so with
Hannah Witton
Like little dildo Russian dolls?
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Yeah. Dilators. Yeah, that's what they do, they look like little dildo Russian dolls, they're great. But you might want to use a dilator set if this is something you've not been able to manage, just so that you help yourself, because you have control over that. So instead of giving it to a partner first, do it yourself and then have a partner do it with you. And then we're and workup and get to know the penis that you're wanting to put in your vagina. Right, really get to know it, explore it, look at it, touch it, taste it, smell it, feel it, feel it when it's half hard, feel it when it's full hard, see at its biggest, at its smallest, really get to know it, so that you can feel comfortable with it so you take away the fear of that away.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, and the penis owner as well. Good to get to know them too.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Well, yeah, I mean, I'm assuming I shouldn't make that assumption, I know. But yeah, it's helpful to get to know the penis owner to please know the penis owner well, because if you know the penis owner well, then they'll go at your own pace.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
If it's a fear of yours, just make sure your partner understands how freaked out you are. And then it's not them, that it's a general freakout, this is something you've never been able to do.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
And if you don't have a partner, still do it now, right. Work with yourself now so that when you do have a partner, if you really do want penis in vagina sex, it's going to be less daunting, it'll still be daunting, because you won't be fully in control.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, that's great advice. How to navigate different sex drives in a relationship? I feel like I get asked this a lot, and I always just signpost people to Emily Nagoski's book.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Yeah, Emily Nagoski's book is great. There. You know, look, this is a difficult one, right. I end up with working with lots of couples, where this is the issue. There are a variety of ways of going about this. You gotta negotiate, I mean that the bottom line is you have to really communicate well, and you have to negotiate and sometimes if you're monogamous, it probably means somebody is masturbating a lot, right.
Hannah Witton
Yes.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
That's reality.
Hannah Witton
Can confirm.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Yeah, you know, so that you work so that both of you get what you want. If you, if you are considering non monogamy, or your non monogamous and this is the place to negotiate other partners.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
But first, you've got to negotiate with each other. And you've got to talk about the elephant in the room in a positive way and stop fighting about it, or or avoiding the subject altogether.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, I think like from personal experience, when it when it when you treat it as like, I want this, well, I want something different, and then you're just like fighting your corner and you're trying to get what you want, that doesn't help. It's like what's best for the relationship is what you should both be striving to get towards like, together like working out what that point is.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Remember that in any good negotiation, nobody comes out of it completely happy. Right. Because we all give up something in order to meet it a place in the middle that serves the relationship.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, and yeah, I guess it like what's more important to you? Like the relationship being healthy and happy? Or like you winning?
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
And yeah, and so if you spot that you winning is a problem, then then go deal with that, because that is a sure relationship killer.
Hannah Witton
Um, and this is kind of related this question, but it's more kind of, I guess, for an individual, how to improve your sex drive. But also, I'm curious if you gonna question the question like, does your sex drive need improving? Like, is that even a thing that we should be considering?
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
I mean, that's I that's where I would start, is why do you think you need to improve your sex drive? Who told you that it's not good enough, where it is? Now, if you're somebody who used to have a good sex drive, and it's dropped, and you want to get back to where you were, fair enough, you might want to improve your sex drive. Whenever, whenever a sex drive has dropped, significantly, I always recommend that people go and get their hormones checked, right. I guess because you will not believe how often hormonal changes where there's actually a problem that can be easily corrected, are the culprit for that. But there's also you know, sex drive can drop because of depression, because of stress. There's so many reasons that people have a very variations in their sex drive. So
Hannah Witton
Yeah, and it can just fluctuates all the time.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Absolutely. So my first question is, why do you want to change this? And then if you do want to change it, well rule out any physical issues, and then, you know, sometimes it's fake it till you make it. When sex drive is low, people don't think about sex, and because they don't think about sex, they don't masturbate.
Hannah Witton
I remember when I was single, if I was having a lot of sex, my sex drive is really high. But then if I went through a dry spell, my sex drive, like after like, maybe two or three weeks, I'd be like, not even thinking about it. But then as soon as I would have sex again, my brain would be like, all the time, please.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
But I have to tell you that that's so terribly common, so people masturbate more when they're in relationships. Because their sex drives higher, so you can fake it till you make it, set up a masturbation date with yourself. Martha Tara Lee is a sex coach out of Singapore who I absolutely love. She's a sexologist, Dr Martha Tara Lee, and I had her on my show once and she talked about having a full day masturbation date with herself
Hannah Witton
A whole day
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
A whole day where she spent the day exploring herself, and masturbating whenever she felt like it.
Hannah Witton
I love it.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
And so yeah, get to know yourself, set up a date, that will increase your sex drive.
Hannah Witton
Perfect. Well, Lori, thank you so much for chatting with me. This has been like, just hugely insightful, and just absolute pleasure.
Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
My pleasure. Lots of fun.
Hannah Witton
Thank you. Thanks for listening. Bye. Thank you so much for listening to Doing It. If you enjoyed it, I would really appreciate it if you left a rating and a review. You can find show notes at DoingItPodcast.co.uk and do go follow us on social media and I'll catch you in the next episode. Bye.
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