I am Carrot Cake: A Lesson in Erotic Empathy

Six and a half months after their son was born—though their sex life together had resumed—their erotic connection was not the same. Despite being consistently attracted to each other, they identified a lack of fulfillment and enjoyment. Something got in the way.

While processing their last sexual interaction in session, I learned:

His favourite position was her on top. He described loving the regal positioning of her physique enveloping him in full view with the added ability to grab hold of her thighs in synchronic rhythm. This remained true for him throughout her pregnancy and since the birth of their child. His desire, he believably explained, had not lessened, but had actually grown.

Recently, she stopped intercourse while on top and moved away from him, apologetic and ashamed.

She spoke of feeling most turned on when she is distinctly less visible, in contrast to his preference. She has great difficulty navigating the changes to her body since pregnancy. With facial expressions of disgust, she talked about the loose skin around her midsection and breasts that no longer feel like hers. “It's not the weight gain,” she says, “but this heavy skin suit I'm wearing that I just can't feel sexy in.”

She began to recount what happened that weekend: “I was on top, and I felt good to start, I knew he was proud of me and happy I initiated. I wanted to feel close to him, I wanted to excite him—but then suddenly I just lost it.”

“What did you lose?” I encouraged her to go on.

“It didn’t matter that it felt good. I felt the skin against itself flopping and all gross and I thought ‘I’m repulsive, I can’t do this.’ I had to stop.”

He jumped in, with a hand gently placed on her forearm. “Why did you stop?” he asked. “I couldn’t understand it. It felt so good and I’d missed that feeling. I couldn’t understand why you just stopped. You know I don’t find anything about you repulsive.”

“But I am; it’s gross when I’m so exposed...”, she covered her face with her hands, elbows resting on her knees.

“Okay, to be fair, I see how you feel different. I’m not ever trying to convince you that you don’t look different. It’s got to be hard to feel so different. I guess I just need you to know I love seeing you. As you look today I just love looking at you. I really do,” he pleaded.

Erotic empathy is the ability to allow your partner to find you attractive even when you don’t feel you are. It is the active practice of accepting that your partner can experience you in a light that you yourself do not see nor understand. Erotic empathy, specifically, is the skill of empathic perspective-taking while in a state of erotic connection.

Empathy, outside of eroticism, is the ability to see something through the perspective of someone else; it is a non-judgmental interest in their lived experience.

I don’t love carrot cake. My partner loves carrot cake, and watching him consume it allows me to focus on relating to—and enjoying!—his enjoyment while distinctly choosing to not understand the specific preference. I empathize with it. And in so doing, I focus on his enthusiasm.

Let your partner eat the cake and don’t tell them it isn’t good. Who am I to tell him it isn’t good because I wouldn’t want it for myself? If he wants it, I will do what I can to support his enjoyment.

I am carrot cake. I frankly don’t find myself to be that delicious, but why convince him that I am not? I love and enjoy him, and want him to enjoy me, so I do my best to erotically empathize with his desire for me. My fear of him seeing me as I see myself must not interfere with his right to want me. Especially, when focusing on his desire for me helps me return to my erotic sensations. His desire for me is one of my greatest turn ons.

Back to the couple: The next time they were intimate, she distinctly chose to empathize with her partner’s enjoyment. In doing do, she was able to focus on, and become increasingly aroused by, her partner’s clear display of arousal.

Seeing him turned on turned her on, and also replaced her self-consciousness. “He really does want me. Its hot, and I hadn’t taken the opportunity to notice it enough.” By embodying her capacity to arouse him, she finds pleasure again in being arousing and aroused. In empathically erotic pleasure together, her body’s imperfections don’t change – they become less important.

*Photo credit: Instagram food blogger @butteryourbiscuit_