Desire discrepancy is a set of differences about the quantity, quality, or types of experiences that a couple or a group want to have. So how can we talk about the different ways that two (or more) partners might access sexuality?

What happens when you grow up in a system (i.e. the church) that both refuses to talk with you about sexual health, and also encourages you to avoid having conversations that may result in one of you being angry before you go to bed?

We were thrilled to have Nicki and Stephen Pappas on to talk about what happens when one person in a partnership begins the deconstruction process before the other partner. This can be a really intimidating, vulnerable process for a lot of folks, and Nicki and Stephen talk about their process of simultaneously navigating exploration, discovery, hope, grief, and fear of abandonment.

Sadly, a person's dreams must serve the greater purpose of evangelism. And then when we consider gender, the complications here get worse. Women support the “dreams” of their husbands. Husbands support the “dreams” of the larger church dictated by the pastor and the broader goals of the American Christian church, often supporting white nationalism and other conservative agendas.

Purity Culture isn’t just a collection of pithy quotes and misappropriation of Scripture about bodies and relationships; it’s a myriad of businesses, media, and political systems that work together to showcase and reinforce the existence of particular types of relationships. Our guests, Teddi and Nick from the podcast Oh God I Forgot About That, study cultural and literary artifacts from the 90s and 00s and talk about how each of these got used and enhanced to propagate the larger goals of Purity Culture.

We're thrilled to have Teddi and Nick, co-hosts of the podcast Oh God I Forgot About That, to talk more about how their upbringings in Pentecostal communities impacted understandings of gender, dating relationships, and sexuality.

Join Julia and Jeremiah in an eye-opening episode as they explore the intricate dynamics of sexual positivity after leaving Evangelical, Mormon, and Pentecostal communities. Discover how the post-marriage script perpetuates myths about seamless sexual bliss and the importance of communication skills in fostering a healthy sexual perspective.

We’ve been talking about the first three levels of the Sound Marital House model from couples therapy gurus John and Julie Gottman. This week, Julia and Jeremiah talk about the fourth value: the positive perspective and how Purity Culture damages this practice for couples.

After our month-long foray into the disturbing literature from the Evangelical Christian publishing industry, we continue our new series The Sex Ed We Wish We Had.

Sixteen years ago, Linda Kay Klein captured the experiences of hundreds of women, herself included, who grew up within and confronted the consequences of the Evangelical purity culture movement in the 90s and early 2000s. Through Pure and her nonprofit, Break Free Together, Linda has created numerous spaces to bring folks together to share their stories about repression, bravery, and ultimately freedom. We are thrilled to have her as a podcast guest!

Tia Levings is a writer and content creator whose work explores the female narrative in patriarchal spaces. We are thrilled to have Tia share her experience of surviving and escaping a religious fundamentalist community, discovering healing and self-exploration, and using her story to help others find their own versions of healing.

Our focus within the sexuality and deconstruction sphere is on the relationships that have survived a church exit or the relationships that are forming for the first time without the rigid confines of the dictates of purity culture.

Luke and Lauren from the Filled to Flourish podcast talk about the ways that they learned to turn toward each other, and the ways that protected their relationship as larger religious systems turned against them when they practiced their relationship differently from the values of their families and religious communities of origin.