TRC REMIX: Purity Culture, Painful Sex + Debunking Shame Narrative with Dr. Celeste Holbrook
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Welcome to the TRC Remix Series #4. If you’re not sure what this series is click here for more info!
Today’s TRC Remix episode is with Christian Sexologist Dr. Celeste Holbrook. In this conversation we unpack her experience growing up in purity culture, and her painfully awkward experience of having sex for the first time on her wedding day. Dr. Celeste offers insight and challenging questions like: How do we define sex? Why do we define it that way? What is sexuality? How is it different from sensuality? Dr. Celeste is raw, honest, and incredibly helpful in navigating a healthy, shame-free conversation around sex, desire, and pleasure...so here we go!
The Moment They Were Waiting For
When she first had sex, it was extremely painful and not enjoyable for her.
"I thought I was going to be rewarded with great sex."
This disconnect between Celeste and her husband began to erode their relationship.
"I felt a lot of shame for not living up to what I thought I should be sexually."
She realized she never had good sex education. She decided to embark on a journey to unlearn shame, and to learn her body in a fresh way.
Deconstructing Sex And Shame
"I went through that process so that I could enter into a sexual space and feel worthy of pleasure and sex that felt good."
After experiencing breakthrough and pain-free sex, she made it her mission to help others in similar circumstances and pivoted from studying behavior to sexual behavior.
"Although it's a natural biological thing, it doesn't come naturally. You have to learn how to do it just like riding a bike."
Madonna Whore Complex: "You're shamed if you have too much sex and you're shamed if you have no sex. There's this pendulum that we can't seem to step out of."
What Is Sexuality?
Sexuality is way more than just sex, desire, or physical intimacy.
"Sexuality is far more than that bottom layer of what it looks like biologically."
What Is Sex?
A lot of single Christian women are wondering about physical boundaries in sex.
75% of women don't climax from vaginal sex—they climax from clitoral stimulation.
Freud told women that to have an orgasm through clitoral stimulation is to be infantile.
In 1998, neurologist Helen Connoll put the clitoris into the journal of sexual medicine.
"Limiting the term 'sex' to 'penis' and 'vagina' is marginalizing and produces shame."
Pleasure gets confused with hedonism, but pleasure is acknowledged in Matthew 6:26.
"We can't have a conversation about pleasure and spirituality without having a conversation about sensuality."
What is Sensuality?
"When we think about us as sensual beings, we are literally experiencing the creation and the creator through all five of our senses."
Sensuality can be as simple as being in the moment. We can't experience our senses in the past or future… only the present.
What does celibacy mean to you when sensuality and sexuality are closely related? You can embrace sensuality in these smaller ways before we have sex.
Books To Read:
Sexless in the City by Kat Harris
Sex God by Rob Bell
Good Christian Sex by Bromleigh McCleneghan
Shameless by Nadia Bolz-Weber
Come As You Are by Dr. Emily Nagoski
If any parts of this conversation have felt triggering for you, just know that whatever you're feeling is valid. There is no judgement. Validate your feelings and then question why those feelings are coming up for you. "Our God is one that encourages curious questions and sincere questioning." Celeste has so many resources for you, including...
Resources:
20 sex-enhancing questions for free on her website.
She also offers free 30-minute discovery calls. If you have questions about anything we talked about today, go to her website and click on "30 Minute Discovery Call."
She also has courses for one on one consulting if that feels right for you.
Keep up with Dr. Celeste on Instagram at @drcelesteholbrook.
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