How do you leave the guilt of your sexual past behind you? Can you escape the baggage from past lovers and move forward in freedom?
Today we’re looking at how to deal with misperceptions about sex. And let’s face it–a lot of those misperceptions come from our sexual baggage.
When I give my Girl Talk event, when I talk sex & marriage at churches, we have a Q&A period where people can write down anonymous questions. And invariably some of those questions revolve around sexual baggage. Recently, in the Niagara area where I was speaking, we had two different ones! Lots of women are dealing with sexual guilt.
When I wrote The Good Girl’s Guide to Great Sex, I conducted surveys of several thousand women. And one thing I found is that less than 40% of committed Christian women are virgins on their wedding night. Not just that, but more than 1/3 of the women who weren’t virgins expressed major regret over that. It’s really impacting their relationships now. (You’ll have to get the book to get the exact numbers!)
God made sex to be AWESOME!
It’s supposed to be great physically, emotionally, and spiritually.
Feel like something’s missing?
Here’s an email that was sent to me that’s quite typical of what women ask:
Reader Question
I had a great number of sexual partners before I met my husband, starting in my early teens. I had a horrible upbringing. My husband didn’t have as much experience, but he did have some bad habits. Our engagement was short, but filled with pre-marital sex almost from day one. Our entire dating and engagement period, even our wedding feels like one big shame to me. I can’t even look at pictures of us when we were dating because I feel so disgusted, knowing what we were doing. I don’t like looking at our wedding pictures either. Ever since the honeymoon sex has been strained. I feel that I can’t trust him. He was willing to take anything he could before we were married. True, I wasn’t stopping him, but that doesn’t help now. He once asked me why was the sex so great before we got married, as if to ask what he was doing right at that time. I told him we shouldn’t have been doing that in the first place, and I have no fond memories of our pre-marital sex, although I suppose it was compelling at the time. It just makes me feel like he doesn’t understand what happened. It’s very discouraging.
She goes on to say how she wants to initiate sex, and she wants to make her husband feel loved, but she just doesn’t enjoy sex with him very much because it still feels wrong. Here’s what I said to this woman, and here’s my message of hope for you who are in the same situation: Yes, what you did before your marriage was wrong–both with him and with other guys. Now, God didn’t say “no sex until marriage” just to be mean. He knows it’s for our best, because when we wait for marriage for sex, then we can work on emotional connection first, rather than forging what can be a false intimacy. It’s a better foundation for marriage.
But that is in the past, and when you married, you became one flesh–a different entity in God’s eyes.
He has already paid for all the things that you did. He has erased it; it’s time for you to allow it to be erased. Yes, you did something wrong. Yes, people seriously took advantage of you (and sounds like they hurt you in the process). But please do not let that become your identity. You are more than that. You are precious. You were bought at a price. If you keep feeling shame and keep feeling that anger at yourself, and at your husband, for what you’ve done, then you’re not giving that sin to Jesus to cover. You’re saying, “What Jesus did isn’t big enough for me.” You may always have regrets about your wedding night (I do, too, for different reasons.) But nonetheless, that is in the past, and you don’t want the past to impact your future. Your wedding was a letdown was NOT because God wanted to punish you or because God was angry with you then. On your wedding day, God was looking at two new people who were forging a new and holy union, and He was happy with you. It’s just that you weren’t happy with yourself.
Today you need a clean break, where you allow yourself to associate sex with something completely new.
When we have sex before we’re married it can get really confusing. Because there’s no commitment, sex isn’t really to say “I love you”; it’s more to say “I want to feel good”. And yet we know that’s shallow. So that whole idea of “feeling good” becomes associated with something shameful–even though, now that you’re married, feeling good and feeling intimate can all be part and parcel of the same thing! And what she is experiencing is very, very common: Many women had sex lives that seemed awesome before marriage, and then once marriage came along, sex seemed shameful and dirty. Sex may have been fun with past lovers, or even with our current husband, but now it’s not. Our libido is gone. And many husbands get jealous of their wife’s past lovers, or miss the hot, sexy girlfriends they once were.
So how do we rediscover sex and make it an expression of love?
Here are 5 steps to put the sexual past behind us, deal with sexual baggage, and embrace who we are today.
1. Forgive yourself and leave sexual guilt behind.
I’ve written more about this before–a letter to those who feel as if they’ve lost their sexual purity. God does not want you burdened by this. This one thing is not bigger than your relationship with God.
2. Forgive your husband–and pray for a touching of God’s hand in his life.
One of the hardest parts for this woman is that her husband doesn’t seem to share the guilt over what they did before marriage. That could be for one of two reasons: If it’s because he’s comfortable with the fact that you’re both forgiven, then celebrate! But if he’s trying to relive that period in your life, or if he doesn’t really think it’s wrong, then he may not know God that well. That’s when it’s time not to try to make your husband feel guilty but to simply pray that your husband will meet Jesus. Feeling guilty does nothing; knowing Jesus does everything. So don’t lambaste him over his lack of guilt. Just pray! And then be honest about what you need to forgive him for. Even say it out loud to him:
I know I was a willing participant in what we did before marriage, and I do want to apologize to you for that. But I also feel like you took from me something that you shouldn’t have taken. I want to forgive you for that, too, because I want us to have an awesome marriage and an awesome sex life, and I am working at moving forward. But I want you to know that it’s been hard for me, and if you could help acknowledge what we went through then, that would likely help me to move on now. Even if you don’t feel it was wrong, if you can see how it hurt me, that would help me so much.
3. Work on your emotional connection and your sexual connection at the same time–so the association between the two sticks.
Try to make sex into something that is new and beautiful. Take baths together and just touch each other. Lie naked together and talk and explore, just with your fingers. Cuddle naked and talk–about memories, about dreams. You can even read a psalm together! Make nakedness and intimacy something that is beautiful, rather than dirty. Try to spend some time, in bed, just kissing, rather than “getting to the main event”. You take the initiative rather than him, and focus on trying to kiss him to show him that you love him, rather than just to get him aroused (you’ll likely find this gets you far more in the mood, too). Practice touching him to say, “I love you”. Intimacy can actually be sexy!
4. Take practical steps to cherish your husband.
Here’s what often happens when we let sex interrupt our relationship before marriage: sex replaces the emotional intimacy we’re supposed to be growing, and so instead of working on feeling close emotionally, we feel a false sense of closeness because of sex. What’s the solution now? Grow your emotional closeness and grow to new levels of communication now! Get more vulnerable with each other. Talk together more. And go out of your way to show him love. Think everyday, how can I tell him “I love him” in a new way? Challenge yourself like this. Do it inside the bedroom and outside the bedroom. As you start focusing on your connection, you’ll find that your sex life takes a new turn. It’s not just about that physical rush; it’s about cementing a bond. Don’t focus so much on “I have to have sex with my husband” as much as you’re focusing on, “I want to find new ways to feel love for him and show him love!” This change won’t happen overnight. It takes work to retrain your brain to think of sex in a new way, especially when you have a lot of scars. But Jesus is big enough for your scars. Commit yourself to moving forward, and then make it into a game to find new ways to express how much you love your husband. Kiss him a bunch of different ways and ask him which one makes him feel the most loved. Ask him to do the same to you. Make it fun! And you just may find that your body reawakens!
God made sex to be awesome in my marriage, and God doesn’t want anything to steal that from me. So I am not going to let my thoughts stand in the way!
5. Decide to stop dwelling on your sexual past.
Finally, the only way to stop dwelling on your sexual past is to stop dwelling on your sexual past. It’s like what I wrote in this post about overcoming jealousy of your husband’s sexual past: We’re told to take every thought captive to Christ (2 Corinthians 10:5). When thoughts enter our heads, we have the choice to either entertain those thoughts, or to reject them and replace them with something else. If you start getting upset because your husband isn’t feeling guilty, you can say:
We are a new creation together that was bought at a price, and God wants us to have a great time together today!
If you see a group of teenagers and find yourself wishing that you had those years to do over again, you can say:
My story was not what I wanted it to be, but God has used it for good in my life, and it’s amazing to see how far I’ve come!
If you start becoming resentful of sex because it’s pulling you apart, you can say:
God made sex to be awesome in my marriage, and God doesn’t want anything to steal that from me. So I am not going to let my thoughts stand in the way!
Is it hard? Of course. But it is not impossible. Ultimately it is a choice only you can make. So with that, I want to leave you with this thought:
Don’t let memories of your past wreck your marriage today.
“If anyone is in Christ he is a new creation”
2 Corinthians 5:17
NIV
Let me know in the comments: What do you struggle with when it comes to putting sexual baggage behind you? Is it hard to forgive yourself? Let’s talk!
Sheila Wray Gregoire has been married for 29 years and happily married for 24! She loves traveling around North America with her hubby in their RV, giving her signature "Girl Talk" about sex and marriage. And she's written 7 books. About sex and marriage. See a theme here? Plus she knits. Even in line at the grocery store.
I also had past lovers and deep shame that I brought into my marriage. Although my husband and I enjoyed our sexual intimacy, for years I would hear a little voice in my head—whenever I wanted to have sex or enjoyed it “too much”—saying I was still that “slut.” I carried that weight of guilt with me all the time. I repented to God several times, tearful confessions with a longing for my slate to be wiped clean. Because I still felt tainted by my past.
What made the difference for me? Definitely that retraining of my mind. Specifically for me, it all hinged on letting 1 Corinthians 6:9-11 really sink in. I read it over and over and over, reminding myself: “And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.” I leaned into that past tense, that my forgiveness was a done deal. Slowly, that new perspective took hold, and one day it was as if I looked up and realized the voice had disappeared. Or really, it had been replaced by a new voice saying that I deserved hot and holy sex in my marriage, not because of anything I had done, but because God wanted to gift that to every marriage—including mine.
J, thank you so much for being open and posting this. I’ve read 1 Corinthians so many times and somehow, reading that section today seems like I’ve never read it before, and I really hope I can stop the tears before going back to work! Retraining one’s mind is never an easy thing, I fight with it constantly; I’m so glad you were able to lean on God to do that!
Oh, that’s so wonderful! I love it when things like this happen!
You’re welcome, Michelle. I also like when such things happen. Blessings!
Love your article today Sheila I really like the line you haven’t given your sin to Jesus. Jesus is such the reason for all the healing in my life todayIt is so awesome. Here is how I invited Jesus into my heart. My pastor asked us a congregation to pray with him. The prayer went something like this :Jesus I invite you into my heart to take all my hurt away d love me and become my friend. I know that you are the answer to all my prayers. you Have paid a price for me and I am thankful. I said this prayer with conviction and I still to this day will say that prayer with my pastor any time he offers. I love that prayer. It has given me so much freedom. The only other thing I would add is that along with this prayerYou got to do the work and if you do all that with conviction Down to the periods behind Sheilas suggestions. I will absolutely eat my hat you don’t see results! God Bless you all and have a great day!
After 36 years of marriage I found out my wife had been kissing her boyfriend of 2 months when she was in Bible School. I had always been taught that you never kiss on the lips until you are serious about each other and heading for marriage. I was also of the feeling of the necessity of sharing all of our past with each other before marriage or coming clean before each other. It was devastating to find out after all those years I never had her virgin kiss which I thought all along was mine. We have a fantastic sex life however I fall asleep each night thinking of her being kissed by another guy.
Bill, I’m sorry you feel hurt, but the vast majority of people do kiss before marriage. And your wife chose you 36 years ago. It was you that she wanted to marry, and it was you that she did marry, and it was you that she gave her life to. It’s now your choice whether you will fully embrace her, or whether you will punish her for something that she can’t change.
I’d suggest reading this post on how to overcome jealousy, because it is important. And then, please, let this go. If you allow this to hurt your marriage, you are choosing to live in bitterness rather than in love. Which choice do you think Jesus would make?
My ‘undealt with’ sexual baggage is from after my wedding. I feel all clear about the premarital sex, as I didn’t know God, and I didn’t know any better at the time. The stuff that I have trouble with is the more recent stuff – my sexual immorality after marriage. I feel great shame for it, but I don’t know how to fix it. I have repented (confessed to God and my husband, and turned away from those behaviours, I try so hard to do everything ‘by the book’ these days), and I feel as though I am forgiven by God, but my husband has not yet forgiven me (for the stuff he had no part in), which is understandable, I caused him great pain and suffering, but I don’t know how we can move forward from here.
He is not a Christian, and there is some sexual fantasies that he asks me to participate in (just ‘describing’ them to him – like I’m reading erotica, but I have to make it up – not actually physically doing them) that I feel are definite sin. It makes me feel sick and I have gotten to the point where some nights I am crying in the shower because I don’t want to go to bed in case he asks me to do these things. Because I really, really struggle to say no. There have been times that I have said no, and it leads to a big fight, that can last for hours,well into the night, and he just doesn’t take no for an answer. Most of the time, the only way these fights end is because I am so so tired and I just want to feel good again, so I give in, and relate the fantasy to him. He doesn’t see anything wrong with the fantasy, or with asking me to do something that I don’t want to, because ‘I gave put him through so much that I should be willing to give him anything he wants’ and, ‘it’s just a fantasy, it’s not like he’s actually doing these things’.
He doesn’t seem to be able to hear me when I say that what we are doing is not right,and that I want to move our marriage forward, towards being a proper one flesh again, and that to do that we need to focus on sexual intimacy that is ‘just us’, and completely mutual. I worry also that these increasingly ‘out there’ fantasies are going to escalate, like porn usage can/does, especially because they seem to be used as a crutch to deal with the hurt that my affairs have caused, as in they are the ‘only thing’ that makes him feel better.
I don’t know what to do. I know that he is a good man who loves me very much, who I gave hurt so badly, and I feel like he is kind of ‘sick’ (like, ill, not a sicko) and that is what is causing this, but I don’t know what to do to help him when he doesn’t see anything wrong with what he is doing. And I struggle so much with saying no, because it is really my fault that he is so broken in the first place. One of his arguments is that based on my past decisions, I am not really a good judge of what is right for our relationship, so he doesn’t want to listen when I try to tell him that continuing this isn’t going to move the marriage forward.
…too long for one comment…
Sometimes I think that it would be so much easier if he was a Christian, because I could just quote the bible to him and he would actually believe what it said, and want to follow it. But I know that that is not really the answer, either, as I see plenty of Christian men (around the Internet) who have a very very warped view of marriage and sex, so I try not to make the idea of a Christian husband an idol of mine.
I also sometimes get angry at God for not ‘finding me’ BEFORE I committed adultery and screwed up so royally. Like, if we hadn’t gone through all that, life would be much easier now! Why didn’t He come into my life and stop me from screwing it all up like that??? But, I do really know why…because I wouldn’t have paid attention, because I didn’t feel like I needed saving. Afterwards, I knew I needed Jesus to save me from myself.
E. This is probably more Sheila’s place to answer you but I just see that you’re doing these things out of guilt and you’re only feeding more guilt I would say to you please don’t hurt yourself anymore you haven’t given your sin to Jesus. Jesus is such the reason for all the healing in my life todayIt is so awesome. Here is how I invited Jesus into my heart. My pastor asked us a congregation to pray with him. The prayer went something like this :Jesus I invite you into my heart to take all my hurt away d love me and become my friend. I know that you are the answer to all my prayers. you Have paid a price for me and I am thankful. I said this prayer with conviction and I still to this day will say that prayer with my pastor any time he offers. I love that prayer. It has given me so much freedom. The only other thing I would add is that along with this prayerYou got to do the work and if you do all that with conviction Down to the periods behind Sheilas suggestions. I will absolutely eat my hat you don’t see results! God Bless
It’ s very serious and extremely sad what you are saying! You both need urgent help from someone professional, a pastor, psychotherapist or an authentic priest, someone whom you both trust and look up to. Plus a lot of prayer! You will not manage to get out of this situation by yourselves!
What he is doing to you is too strong for him to fight alone. And you need to figure out the reasons why you have been unfaithful to him. There is a lot in your marriage to be dismantled very carefully and then put together clean by a very good and wise third party who genuinely knows how to deal with these things!
Marriage is definitely NOT a place for manipulating the other spouse, regardless of the mistakes he has made, or fantasizing about who knows what when your real spouse is close and palpable to you. He is using you to take revenge on you. Seek help! This is not a healthy marriage but a battlefield which consumes you both! And you both deserve better!
If your husband is not a Christian it’s up to you in the first place to ask for help and then see what kind of help he is willing to accept. This is by no means an easy task; it ‘ll take time and a lot of work from both of you. It’s very clear from what you’re saying that you are deeply affected by his behaviour, and yielding to his demands does not do any good to him either, on the contrary.
Be strong, chin up, assume your marriage and never forget that it takes two to build it! Whatever the mistakes you’ve made, NEVER assume more than 50 % of the situation.
Both of you lack love and are asking for it in a wrong way. You need to be guided to what real love is. You need healing. And your husband needs to find out what forgiveness means, especially when you love.
I apologize if I’ve been to direct or judging. I pray for you to find the strength and desire to change the course of your marriage to a better path! Blessings!
Thank you very much for your comment. I agree that this is not a healthy dynamic, and I have to say, it feels good to actually share this burden in a safe place (even if it is only online, I don’t feel like there is anyone irl that I could share this with).
I have worked through my reasons for my adultery, and that is now firmly in my past. Our marriage is much better than it used to be, but this issue is obviously something that still needs to be worked on. My husband doesn’t believe in counselling (or, agree with it???) so that wouldn’t actually be helpful in our situation. I am trying to work up the courage to be (as Sheila writes in her book 9 thoughts….) a Peacemaker, rather than a Peacekeeper. But it is so hard. I am trying hard to rely on God and keep hoping and praying that His strength will be found in my weakness. I know that He is the great Redeemer, and I have hope that our marriage will become all that He has designed it to be. I bought Sheila’s book 31 Days to Great Sex the other day, and am hoping that we can find some healing working through the exercises. I haven’t brought it up with hubby yet though, once again, just trying to find the right words, and the courage to ask him! Prayers are much appreciated!
You need counseling even if your husband won’t go. A counselor can help you draw proper boundaries and work through things so you don’t feel guilty for telling him no when something is wrong or harmful.
Oh, E, I’m so sorry! That is just one big mess, isn’t it? So much guilt and hurt flying around, and it really isn’t the way it’s supposed to be.
You’re right–you can’t feel really intimate again until you embrace truth and doing the right thing in every area of your marriage, and that includes focusing on true intimacy in bed.
I’d really suggest that you see a counsellor over this. Tell him that you love him dearly, that you want your marriage to grow close, that you want to have awesome sex, but you aren’t comfortable relaying fantasies that you feel cross a line, and that even though you crossed a line in the past, you want a fresh start. You want both of you to respect and love each other, and you don’t feel right now like he’s respecting and loving you.
Just because you did something wrong does not mean that you have to accept being treated badly now. That won’t help your marriage. Have you read 9 Thoughts That Can Change Your Marriage yet? I’d check that out, and I really hope that helps! Saying a prayer for you.