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Relationships

Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

Marriage and erotica

43 replies

AlsoKnownAs17 · 07/10/2013 18:22

I'm a bit embarrassed to ask this so have created a new account especially. I hope no one minds.

Parenting hit our marriage hard and we ended up going to counselling. It helped a lot but we've never really got our love life back. So we recently started going to a sex therapist. (For the record, it was my idea.)

We've been tasked with talking about what each other likes, which has been a bit awkward but we're getting there. I knew H liked porn, which really doesn't bother me, but it's just never work for me. (Please don't think less of me for not being anti-porn - I know a lot of MN members are strongly against it.)

I know H is trying hard, so I've been thinking about trying to find some erotica that would work for both of us. I've had a look as some websites that are supposed to be porn made by women for women, but it still seems quite male oriented, so I was hoping there might be a few mums who might be able to help.

All the DVDs I've seen trailered online have things I don't like, bums being slapped, people being tied up, lesbian or group sex. I don't mind the close up bits, it's just all the sort of sex I don't want me and H to have that I keep finding.

Can anyone help? (Please be gentle with me. I know it's a dangerous subject.)

OP posts:
AlsoKnownAs17 · 08/10/2013 11:59

How would you feel about role play?
It's something I've wondered about, but we've not discussed it yet.

I might put Don't Look Now, Betty Blue and Y Tu Mama Tambien on our lovefilm list, even if they're not quite what I had in mind

My DH is going to be very pleased you started this thread wink
Glad to be of service. Blush

In the meantime, I think we have a winner in www.erikalust.com
Absolutely beautiful, and assuming the trailers are both representative and less explicit than the full versions, I think her films are exactly what I'm looking for. Thanks.

OP posts:
LividofLondon · 08/10/2013 12:07

OP have you tried searching for "erotica"? I've just had a look and found some stuff that's far better than the usual cliched rubbish...I'll PM you some links Wink

friday16 · 08/10/2013 12:28

Youve not seen Dont Look Now??? Its a classic and one of the most realistic depictions of marital sex ever commited to celluloid

"Look, love, it's a film that starts with the death by drowning of a child which rips a couple's marriage to pieces. It ends with the death of the husband, stabbed brutally to death (spoilers? Hell, the film's near forty years old: in other news, Rosebud is Orson Welles' wife's clitoris a sledge). Throughout the film their marriage becomes more and more difficult as she falls into the hands of a pair of charlatan "mediums" who convince her that they can communicate with their dead child, and it is by desperately trying to prevent the loss of his wife to grief, as he has lost his child to drowning, that the husband is stabbed. The whole film is a chronicle of a death foretold, and it's perfectly obvious from the first few shots that no-one is likely to end well. Laura and John Baxter start out with their marriage in tatters, and by the end there is no marriage.

But we'll get a bit of a thrill from the sexy bit in the middle. (Although actually, the intercutting with them getting dressed afterwards means that even after they have made love, they are still distant from each other)."

It's one of the greatest films of the 1970s, and a film I could never get bored of. It was a double-bill with The Wicker Man on original release: that must have been quite a night out. But a film to make a couple having difficulties with their marriage feel closer to each other? Surely, m'lud, you are having us on.

Sunnysummer · 08/10/2013 12:28

I second the Secret Garden book by Nancy Friday - it's a sort of collation of women's fantasies, so it isn't necessarily a turn on in itself, but is very enlightening!

Also, agree that books and written word can be sexier. Have you tried literotica.com and similar? Advanced search reveals every conceivable kink (and then some) Smile

friday16 · 08/10/2013 12:29

Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!

Is that the one with Victoria Abril masturbating with an Action Man in his wetsuit outfit?

AlsoKnownAs17 · 08/10/2013 12:51

But a film to make a couple having difficulties with their marriage feel closer to each other?
OK, might give that one a miss. There's one film that had a sex scene in (it shall remain nameless because I'm not ready to confess the detail) which is something I'd really like to try, but as most of the film was about murder and sexual abuse, it was never going to promote a fruitful discussion.

Also, agree that books and written word can be sexier. Have you tried literotica.com and similar?
As mentioned, books haven't worked for us as a couple.
Someone else suggested literotica.com I've had a look, and it's mind boggling, so I might go back, but for now I'm looking for something more visual. Thanks anyway.

Is that the one with Victoria Abril masturbating with an Action Man in his wetsuit outfit?
ShockConfusedBlush I just saw the movie trailer. Not sure what to say!

OP posts:
Darkesteyes · 08/10/2013 13:29

Ok friday it was suggested because the OP was asking for something not too hardcore.

Friday how did you expect Sutherland and Christies characters to get dressed after sex Was he suppossed to put her knickers back on with his teeth?

"lets get a thrill from the sexy bit in the middle"

Translated ......lets slut shame some posters.

AlsoKnownAs17 · 08/10/2013 14:03

Friday, Darkeyes, please don't get angry with each other. This has been a really helpful, encouraging and positive thread for me, and I'd hate anyone to get upset about anything in it. Please!

OP posts:
friday16 · 08/10/2013 14:29

Friday how did you expect Sutherland and Christies characters to get dressed after sex Was he suppossed to put her knickers back on with his teeth?

The point is that Roeg edits that sequence in a deliberately (oh, God, it's that word) problematising way, and it symbolises all that is wrong with their marriage as well as all that has been right. I just don't see how, either in its own terms or within the context of the film, it is romantic and joining.

Firstly, look at when it occurs in the film. We've seen them growing further and further apart after Christine's death, and the strong implication is that this is the first time they've made love since then. The lovemaking follows immediately on from Laura being told by Heather (the blind "medium") that she can "see" Christine. Look, we're being told, it's Christine's death that has driven them apart, and it's the promise that Christine might still in some sense be alive that draws them back together. She initiates the lovemaking, not him. But we suspect, and are then shown, that Heather is not a medium but is a charlatan; even their love making arises from a deception. This isn't magical realism, so the central fact of their marriage is that Christine is dead, and whatever they do is not going to change that. Laura has not accepted Christine's death, so their lovemaking is a symbol not of them coming closer together, but of Laura's refusal to accept reality. They head out into the empty hotel and then the silent streets.

Secondly, the sequence itself is actually ice cold. We don't hear the sound of them making love, or even talking; the sound track is elegiac music more suited to closing credits. It starts with the "scale" theme that played over Christine's death. The Baxters are making love together, but each time they're seen responding to each other's love making there's a sharp cut to them getting dressed separately (we don't see them dressing afterwards, although we know the shots are from "afterwards": the lovemaking and the dressing are intercut from the outset). In those shots of them dressing, you only once see them both in shot, and in that brief shot John is walking past the door and does not pause. They don't speak to each other, and their expressions are mostly deadpan. John, finally, chooses a tie, puts on his jacket and adjusts his watch before pouring a drink. He looks broken, not exultant. Laura seems to be happier: she tosses the lipstick in the air and smiles. But is that because of making love, or because she has been given the promise of Christine?

For one brief moment, they have been able to put Christine's death aside, but that fantasy will kill one of them.

It's a staggeringly good film. The lovemaking scene is utterly crucial to the film, and that it was shown on BBC up until 1983 which that sequence cut shows just how stupid censorship can be. But, seriously, you just can't read that scene as about reconciliation and redemption, and to suggest it as a film for the OP to watch given her situation seems odd.

Thisisaeuphemism · 08/10/2013 14:52

Um, about Don't Look Now.

Brilliant it is. And that scene is sexy. But overall, is the film likely to get you in the mood? um, if you like being chased by killer dwarves in red, then maybe.

AlsoKnownAs17 · 08/10/2013 16:03

Ah I hadn't realised it was the scarey killer dwarves in red coats film.
Yeah, I've seen that, and as I remember the scarey killer dwarves in red coats, not the sexy scene, I'd guess it doesn't need revisiting.

So please can we forget about it ladies?

OP posts:
Thisisaeuphemism · 08/10/2013 17:44

I can't say the visual stuff does it for me- except maybe James mcavoy doing it with Keira knightly in the library -
Nb- don't watch atonement to get you in the mood!

geminigirl · 08/10/2013 17:46

In that case to lighten the mood, how about Austin Powers- the spy who shagged me? I've never seen it but it sounds like a intelligently written piece of erotica. Grin

misty75 · 08/10/2013 18:50

Try writing erotica for each other. Perhaps ban sex for a time-limited period while you're doing this. Perhaps even ban orgasms while you're doing this.

geminigirl · 08/10/2013 19:20

How about showering together and washing each other? It can be very sensual and nurturing for you both without it being sexual, you could progress to telling your DH that you are going to have a candlelit bath or shower and you hope no-one is going to be spying on you there as you soap yourself all over.....hint hint, wink wink nudge nudge....

SolidGoldBrass · 08/10/2013 22:14

Reading erotic literature together is likely to be cringey rather than arousing (and I agree that Don't Look Now is more about killer dwarves than hot sex) - reading some while on your own can get you in a horny mood or give you some ideas. An author who writes romantic erotica (ie not too kinky and with an emphasis on loving relationships) is Victoria Blisse - I'm recommending her as someone who can actually write; a lot of the stuff billed as 'hot romance' is semiliterate drivel.

Darkesteyes · 08/10/2013 22:48

friday i concede Your write up at 14.29 is a bloody good summation of the film.

Thanks I didnt know it was shown with that sequence cut until "83. Thats crazy.

AlsoKnownAs17 · 09/10/2013 11:30

Perhaps even ban orgasms while you're doing this.
Ha ha! That's the last thing we need after the last 5 years - less orgasms. (Am I sharing too much?)

How about showering together and washing each other?
Things like that have been suggested in our therapy sessions too.

Reading erotic literature together is likely to be cringey rather than arousing
When we tried reading erotica to each other H just didn't find it worked for him, and I just couldn't stop giggling.

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