Fizbin,
I appreciate your response, and thinking about your questions has provided me some clarity as to where to go next.
I believe the “happiness” file has helped. She holds my upper arm now when we sit together on the couch, and I tell her that this pleases me. She occasionally will rub my shoulders or ask if I want my feet rubbed. We started the counselling in the end of July, so it may have helped with that.
Also, I believe the “I love sex” file has helped some after just a month. She will sometimes stroke my perineum and balls during foreplay, she now comes to bed completely naked and immediately dives under the covers, her hands are a little more active on my back. If I leave a dimmed lamp on, she turns it off. If I light a candle on my side, then she will leave it on, but will frown or subtly communicate displeasure. But in general, I believe she is enjoying the twice weekly sessions more and is more engaged.
As we move forward, I want her to enjoy and desire the new behaviors that we are adding. I don’t want to end up where she will do them but only begrudgingly do them. Some of the posts describe men whose wives are giving them oral while communicating that they don’t really enjoy it (obviously that seems to be success compared to no oral). However, it seems there are 3 general situations. Not performing the behavior, performing the behavior out of duress due to some form of leverage, or joyfully performing the behavior. I don’t want to sacrifice having her joyfully perform the desired behavior by pushing too hard or being too abrupt. I realize there may initially be some anxiety or apprehension for her as we expand her behaviors, but I want to wait until she is enjoying each new behavior before I move on to the next one. I try to be conscious to reward her by expressing my pleasure to her whenever she is doing something new that pleases me. I try to be neutral (not respond) to the resistance.
Given all of the above, I am now trying to determine what to train for next. Probably I will work with lighting and eye contact. The eye contact will help build more emotional connection during our sex, and I believe it will be more reinforcing for her because of the emotional reward and will increase the chances of progressing joyfully through each step.
After that I am trying to determine what would be the easiest next direction – masturbation progressing to mutual masturbation, or naked massage, or stroking and licking progressing to oral.
Lastly, if I continue with a few phrases from the happiness and I love sex files, do I necessarily need to add any obedience or submission phrases this early? I suppose this can be done at any point along the journey.
Thank you,
EJ
