my sex therapy resources
[Full Disclosure: This page contains affiliate links. As an affiliate, I receive compensation if you purchase through these links, at no extra cost to you. You can read my complete disclosure statement here.]
browse my sex therapy resources by topic
infidelity
✻ When You’re The One Who Cheats: Ten Things You Need To Know
“This is a book for anyone having an affair or indiscretion of any kind and who is confused, unsure and looking for answers. When you’re the one who cheats, it can feel like you have no options. This book can help.”
✻ After the Affair: Healing the Pain and Rebuilding Trust When a Partner Has Been Unfaithful
“This book helps guide both hurt and unfaithful partners through three stages of healing: normalizing the crisis, deciding whether to recommit to their partner, and rekindling trust and sexual intimacy.”
✻
“This book lets you eavesdrop on a handful of intrepid couples as they engage in twelve intense weeks of group counseling. As you listen to their stories, you’ll learn how to stay interested in your partner in the good times, how to communicate in the stressful seasons, and how to keep your love alive in the normalcy of everyday life.”
✻ The State of Affairs: Rethinking Infidelity
“Affairs have a lot to teach us about modern relationships—what we expect, what we think we want, and what we feel entitled to. They offer a unique window into our personal and cultural attitudes about love, lust, and commitment. Through examining illicit love from multiple angles, Perel invites readers into an honest, enlightened, and entertaining exploration of modern marriage in its many variations.”
menopause
✻ TedTalk: The Menopause Manifesto
✻ The Menopause Manifesto: Own Your Health with Facts and Feminism
“Just as she did in her groundbreaking bestseller The Vagina Bible, Dr. Jen Gunter, the internet’s most fearless advocate for women’s health, brings you empowerment through knowledge by countering stubborn myths and misunderstandings about menopause with hard facts, real science, fascinating historical perspective, and expert advice.”
✻
“This book uses groundbreaking science and research to prove that the most important factor in creating and sustaining a sex life filled with confidence and joy is not what the parts are or how they’re organized but how you feel about them.”
✻ Website: The Menopause Method
✻ Website: North American Menopause Society
women's sexual health
✻ Come As You Are: The Surprising New Science That Will Transform Your Sex Life
“This book uses groundbreaking science and research to prove that the most important factor in creating and sustaining a sex life filled with confidence and joy is not what the parts are or how they’re organized but how you feel about them.”
✻ Website: OMG YES
OMG YES is a game changer. Buying a “season” gives you access to evidence based techniques for women to find and increase pleasure. The videos are of real women talking about their experiences and showing how they use the techniques for their sexual pleasure.
✻ The Vagina Bible
“OB/GYN, writer for The New York Times, USA Today, and Self, and host of the show Jensplaining, Dr. Jen Gunter now delivers the definitive book on vaginal health, answering the questions you’ve always had but were afraid to ask—or couldn’t find the right answers to. She has been called Twitter’s resident gynecologist, the Internet’s OB/GYN, and one of the fiercest advocates for women’s health…and she’s here to give you the straight talk on the topics she knows best.”
✻ Pussypedia
“There is still a shocking lack of accurate, accessible information about pussies and many esteemed medical sources seem to contradict each other. Pussypedia solves that with extensive reviews of peer-reviewed science that address old myths, confusing inconsistencies, and the influence of gender narratives on scientific research––always in simple, joyful language.”
✻
“Honey, I’m too tired” may sound like just another excuse but for millions of American women, it’s simply the truth. They may settle for no sex at all or the obligatory “I’d better do this for my marriage” sex often to the detriment of their relationships. In this guide, Dr. Laurie Mintz shows women how to bring their libido back to life.
Mintz, a psychologist and sex expert, has been there, both personally and professionally. She shares her own story, as well as the stories of her many clients, as she puts forward her foolproof step-by-step guide to bring passion back into your life. Complete with case studies and exercises, this sex-cure-in-a-book will help readers feel sexy and sensual again!
non-monogomy
✻
“Attachment theory has entered the mainstream, but most discussions focus on how we can cultivate secure monogamous relationships. What if, like many people, you’re striving for secure, happy attachments with more than one partner? Polyamorous psychotherapist Jessica Fern breaks new ground by extending attachment theory into the realm of consensual nonmonogamy. Using her nested model of attachment and trauma, she expands our understanding of how emotional experiences can influence our relationships. Then, she sets out six specific strategies to help you move toward secure attachments in your multiple relationships.”
✻ Polywise: A Deeper Dive into Navigating Open Relationships
“Polyamorous psychotherapist Jessica Fern and restorative justice facilitator David Cooley share the insights they have gained through thousands of hours working with clients in consensually nonmonogamous relationships. Using a grounded theory approach, they explore the underlying challenges that nonmonogamous individuals and partners can experience after their first steps, offering practical strategies for transforming them into opportunities for new levels of clarity and intimacy.”
men's sexual health
✻ The Penis Book
“Let Dr. Spitz – clinical professor at UC Irvine’s Department of Urology and a regularly featured guest on The Doctors – become your best friend as he fearlessly guides you through the hairiest and the scariest questions in The Penis Book. An unflinching, comprehensive guide to everything from sexually transmitted infections to the science of blood flow, The Penis Book prominently features an easy-to-follow holistic five-step plan for optimum penis health, including plant-based eating recommendations, information on some penis-healthy foods, and suggested exercises for penis wellbeing”
women & pelvic pain
✻ Hello, Down There: A guide to healing chronic pelvic and sexual pain
“Dr. Milspaw’s conversational approach to understanding how “it’s all connected” guides the reader through easy-to-learn techniques that retrain the brain and nervous system quickly and effectively. Utilizing research from the fields of psychoneuroimmunology, mindfulness, neuro-linguistic programming, emotional freedom techniques, and self-hypnosis, Dr. Milspaw provides more than 30 interactive, recorded exercises the reader can enjoy again and again.”
✻ The Pleasure Prescription: A Surprising Approach to Healing Sexual Pain
“Coauthored by a women’s health physical therapist and a sexuality educator, The Pleasure Prescription outlines an approach that many women may find counterintuitive: that their own sexual pleasure may be a pathway to overcoming pain. Research shows that decreasing pain allows for more pleasure; conversely, the stories highlighted in this book suggest that increasing pleasure can help diminish a woman’s experience of sexual pain.”
✻ Website: Finding a Sexual Health Specialist for Vulvovaginal Pain ISSWSH
“ISSWSH” is the International Society for the Study of Women’s Sexual Health. You can search for a sexual medicine specialist by city, state and country (or name) using this directory.
✻ Website: Finding a Pelvic Rehabilitation Specialist
This is a directory where you can search for pelvic rehab care in your area.
desire
✻ Enduring Desire: Your Guide to Lifelong Intimacy
“Co-authors of Men’s Sexual Health, Michael Metz and Barry McCarthy have come together to inspire and motivate readers in their newest book, Enduring Desire. Real-life examples and clear, helpful individual and couple exercises allow readers to reach for realistic and high quality sexual satisfaction as a couple. Throughout the book, the authors promote positive, realistic sexual expectations without commercialism and the hyped, exotic promises that only set people up for disappointment. The message is down-to-earth and full of joy for all couples from their 20s to their 80s”
✻ Better Sex Through Mindfulness: How Women Can Cultivate Desire
“A pioneer in the use of mindfulness for treating sexual difficulties, Brotto has helped hundreds of women cultivate more exciting, fulfilling sexual experiences. In this accessible, relatable audiobook, she explores the various reasons for sexual problems, such as stress and incessant multitasking, and tells the stories of many of the women she has treated over the years. She also provides easy, effective exercises that listeners can do on their own to increase desire and sexual enjoyment, whether their goal is to overcome a sexual difficulty or simply give their love life a boost.”
✻
“These are astonishing times for sex. With a click of the mouse you can learn the names for sex acts your grandparents never knew existed. But are people any happier in bed? Probably not. Research from the Kinsey Institute suggests that 25 percent of American women in heterosexual relationships are markedly distressed about their sex lives. Dr. Stephen Snyder’s unique approach has helped over 1,500 individuals and couples master the erotic challenges of long-term relationships.”
✻ Mating in Captivity: Reconciling the Erotic & the Domestic
“While Mating in Captivity shows why the domestic realm can feel like a cage, Perel’s take on bedroom dynamics promises to liberate, enchant, and provoke. Flinging the doors open on erotic life and domesticity, she invites us to put the “X” back in sex.”
out of control sexual behavior
✻
“Sex is at the core of our identities. And when it becomes a compulsion, it can unravel our lives. Out of the Shadows is the premier work on this disorder, written by a pioneer in its treatment. It includes the latest research–and to address the exploding phenomenon of cybersex addiction–this third edition identifies the danger signs, explains the dynamics, and describes the consequences of sexual addiction and dependency. With practical wisdom and spiritual clarity, it points the way out of the shadows of sexual compulsion and back into the light and fullness of life.”
✻
“This book is a collection of letters that reveal the raw and intimate details of the life of a sex addict. It depicts a journey that starts at a turning point: Getting caught! Moving from pure denial through the recovery process to acceptance and beyond.”
✻
“Katehakis’s relational protocol, presented here, blends neurobiology with psychology to accomplish full recovery. Her Psychobiological Approach to Sex Addiction Treatment (PASAT) joins therapist and patient through a relationally-based psychotherapy―a holistic, dyadic dance that calls on the body, brain, and mind of both.”
early ejaculation
✻
“The New Male Sexuality addresses the most urgent questions of men today–and of the women who love them. Bernie Zilbergeld reports findings from his twenty years as a psychologist specializing in human sexuality, as well as those other experts in the field, and shares his own and his clients’ experiences. the result is the most comprehensive guide ever to enhancing desire and arousal, focusing on pleasure rather than performance, and keeping sex exciting and fulfilling.”
✻
“It is estimated that 30 million American men have problems with premature ejaculation. This book contains the latest, scientifically-based, multidimensional methods for overcoming all types of premature ejaculation and includes a complete relapse prevention program.”
religious trauma & sexuality
✻
“Sex, God, and the Conservative Church guides psychotherapy and sexology clinicians on how to treat clients who grew up in a conservative faith―mired in sexual shame and dysfunction―and who desire to both heal and hold on to their faith orientation.”