The Mother's Guide to Sex: Enjoying Your Sexuality Through All Stages of Motherhood

Introduction Moms Have Sex? Who Knew! As soon as we started spreading the word about our idea for this book, we knew we were on to something. Parents instantly responded with curiosity, enthusiasm, and almost desperate nods of approval, while folks without kids looked politely puzzled. And who could blame them? Although volumes have been written about motherhood and sex, the two subjects lie on parallel tracks that rarely intersect. Parenting books never explore how a mother can expect her sex life to be transformed by the demands of child rearing. Sex and relationship books for parents suggest tips for "keeping the flame alive" that depend on creating the illusion that you don't have kids. And neither ever addresses how honoring your own sexuality through all the phases of your life sets a powerful example that enables your children to grow into responsible, sexually fulfilled adults. The Mother's Guide to Sex reaches out to women who want to integrate the joys of a satisfying sex life with the joys of motherhood. We offer tips, anecdotes, and practical information about sex and parenting, supported by advice from medical experts, sex experts, and the most valuable experts of all -- other mothers. Mothers First While we like to think that all parents can glean useful information and perspective from this book, it is written first and foremost for mothers. We are unabashed in asserting that mothers need and deserve a book of their own -- their sex lives have been invisible for far too long. Women simply aren't raised with a sense of entitlement to sexual expression, and mothers face the double bind of social attitudes that deem maternity and sexuality mutually exclusive. Most mothers can testify that the desire for a fulfilling sex life didn't disappear when they had children; it simply got buried under an avalanche of conflicting demands on their time and attention. A woman's sex life undergoes significant changes from the moment she decides to have a child, and she has to navigate these changes with no more than the occasional tidbit of information from a kindly nurse or relevant anecdote from a straight-shooting friend. The legions of mothers who visit sex-related discussion boards on parenting Web sites -- swapping tips on everything from waning desire to remaining kinky -- reveal a profound hunger for an explicit discussion of sexual issues. Ask a mom about her sex life and you'll get responses ranging from "Sex? What's that?" to "It's better than ever, but it took a lot of work." If you're partnered, you're probably not surprised by the statistic that parents living with children spend only about twenty minutes each week being intimate with each other. If you're single, perhaps you wonder how to be fully present for your kids without neglecting your own desires. You may have picked up this book because a sexual drought is making you long for "the good old days," or you may be curious to explore how your newfound maternal power and passion can enhance your sex life. Either way, we hope you'll find much in these pages that challenges your assumptions and fuels your desires. The Moms Speak We wanted our discussion of mothers' sexuality to reflect the concerns and experiences of a full spectrum of moms -- married, single, heterosexual, lesbian, adoptive, and biological -- so we posted a survey in several places on-line, including Hip Mama's Web site. Imagine our delight when over seven hundred impassioned responses poured in. We heard from women whose experiences ran the gamut of maternal sexuality, from sexually confident fertility goddesses who were reveling in a sexual rebirth to mothers stymied by theSemans, Anne is the author of 'The Mother's Guide to Sex: Enjoying Your Sexuality Through All Stages of Motherhood' with ISBN 9780812932744 and ISBN 0812932749.