Language of Love with Dr. Laura Berman - Is Wanting More in the Bedroom a Betrayal?

Episode Date: August 20, 2025

What if the thing you crave most is the one thing you can’t say out loud?  You love your partner. The sex is good. But there’s more inside you—a desire you’ve never voiced. Not because it’s wrong… but because you’re terrified of what might happen if you do. Will they judge you? Will they feel like they’re not enough? Could it change everything?   In this Language of Love session, I connect with Kelly, who’s been married for five years and loves her husband deeply. Their sex life? Pretty solid. But there’s a part of her that wants more. She has desires she’s never shared—and she’s terrified that voicing them might hurt his feelings or make him think he’s not enough. So what do you do when you want to grow sexually with your partner, but you’re afraid it could backfire? In this session, we talk through: Why it’s not a great idea to talk about fantasies in the middle of sex (and when to do it instead) How to open up these conversations in a way that feels safe, honest, and even exciting The “Fantasy Box” game I love recommending to couples who want to spice things up together How to find creative middle ground when your fantasies don’t totally match If you’ve ever held back something in the bedroom because you didn’t want to rock the boat, you’re going to feel seen in this one. And if Kelly’s story sounds a little like yours, I’d love to hear from you. Email me at [e-mail]—your story could help someone else feel less alone. Want more tools for connection and pleasure? Head over to my website, and check out my latest book, Sex Magic, for a deeper dive into unlocking spectacular intimacy. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey, I'm sex, love, and relationship therapist, Dr. Laura Berman, and for the last 30 years, I've been helping people learn to love and be loved better. Welcome to the Language of Love Sessions. This is where I get to work with you one-on-one, on air. You, my listeners, my goal in these sessions is to empower you to enjoy better relationships, both with others and with yourself, and to help you embrace how precious and sacred your body, your love life, and your sexuality really is. It's time we all become fluent in the language of love. Welcome to Language of Love Sessions, where I get to work one-on-one with you, the listener,

my peeps, whatever's on your mind about love, sex, relationships, my mind, body, spiritual perspective. I am here for you. I love hearing from you. I love being able to talk to you one on one and have an interaction and exchange where I can really work through things with you. And I also love answering your email questions. We've been getting a lot of those lately. You can email if you want to be part of the show and work with me one on one as part of it. Or if you just want me to answer your question on the air, you can email to languageoflovepod at gmail.com, languageoflovepod at gmail.com. Here is an email from Kelly saying, Hey, Dr. Berman, I've been with my husband for almost five years. And while our sex life is good, I have desires and fantasies

I've never shared with him. I get nervous bringing it up. I don't want to embarrass him or worse, make him feel like what we have isn't enough? How do I ask for what I want in the bedroom without hurting his feelings or making it awkward? I want us to grow together sexually, but I'm scared it might backfire. Well, I'm curious, Kelly, what your fantasy is, right? Like if it is, I don't know, I want to have sex with another man while you watch, that's trickier to bring up than I want you to tie me up or I want you to spank me or I want you to pretend to be X, Y, Z, you know? So if it involves another person, let's say, then maybe we should talk some more about it. But let's assume I'm going to work on the assumption that it doesn't.

And the sky's the limit in terms of fantasy and role play and exploring whatever it is you want to explore there. And so let's talk about how to bring it up. First of all, don't bring it up during sex. Don't bring any feedback up during sex other than maybe a little bit of direct positive direction. And obviously, if something is hurting or feels really unsafe, you should say something. But otherwise, I really encourage people to give most of the feedback outside the sexual scenario when sensitivities aren't high and it can feel really uncomfortable to get that feedback or talk about fantasies in the middle of sex, especially if it's something that

he's not prepared for. So I would have a conversation with him outside the bedroom. Like maybe let's say you've had sex the night before and it's the next day and you could say, you know what, Annie? I really loved last night. You know, I love our sex life. And I was listening to this podcast about fantasies. And I'm just wondering, like, maybe we should talk about they talked about how important it is to talk about your your fantasies together, which, by the way, I talk about all the time. And so I was thinking that we could kind of play a game and just see if, you know, I'm wondering if you have any fantasies that you would like to act out or play out with me and I can share fantasies that I have and see if he's open, right? If he says, oh, no, we don't need any fantasies, then get back to me because we have to have another conversation. But my guess is that he'll be curious.

And then you tell him, look, you know, I have this fantasy that blah, blah, blah. And this is how it would go. And this is what it would look like. You know, give him a chance, obviously, to give his fantasy, too. And then talk about it. Hey, it's Dr. Laura Berman. I've been a sex, love and relationship therapist for over 30 years. And the main question I always get asked is how the heck do we spice it up in a long-term

monogamous relationship? Well, if you want to take your love life, your sex life to the next level, whether you're in a relationship or not, check out my free course on quantum sex. It's going to teach you how to take your sexual response to the next level, capable of full body orgasms, how to use sex magic to manifest your dreams. and how to connect on an even deeper level sexually with your partner. Just go to drlauraberman.com and you'll find it right there on the homepage, the Quantum Sex free course.

Check it out. Let me know what you think. I don't know. I mean, it shouldn't hurt his feelings, especially if you're making clear that you love your sex life and you feel complete and it's an amazing connection and all of that is great. and it's an and, not a but, I would love to bring something else in. You know, I think in a long-term relationship, it's really valuable to keep exploring, you know, do you have any fantasies

or do you have any desires you'd like to explore in the bedroom, you know, and stay open to it. I even have couples do this game that I call the fantasy box. And this works great in long-term relationships where some of the spice is starting to go. You can make a fantasy box where you sit down and you say, okay, we're each going to list out all the fantasies that we have that we'd like to work out to do together. You know, obviously this isn't, and it shouldn't be about, have a fantasy about having sex with my kid's swimming coach or whatever, you know, not about a real person, but about each other or role plays or imaginings or sexual acts or places you want to have sex or things and props and toys you'd like to explore, right? Write them all down. And then

you agree. We aren't going to judge each other. We aren't going to freak out, okay? We're just going to share these with each other, and we're going to try to make a common list of fantasies we are both willing and hopefully wanting, but at least willing to explore. So you each read your list without judgment or freaking out, and you kind of negotiate the master list, right? So maybe one of you wants to have sex in a public place and the other would never do that and is too like would never ever but maybe okay so what you want having sex in a public place is kind of a little bit of exhibitionism and a little excitement and danger that someone can see you know maybe we could do it on our terrace at night you know in the dark when where no one can see us but

potentially the neighbors could, you know, or maybe we do it in a locked bathroom somewhere where nobody can come in, but we're actually in a public place. So you can find ways around happy mediums, let's say, for a lot of these things. And some of them will be an absolute no-go and that's okay too. And then once you have your master list, then that becomes something that you pull from. So the way the fantasy box works is that you write them all down on little slips of paper, the ones you've agreed on. You put them in a box and maybe once a month you pull one out. And whoever's fantasy it was is the one who kind of sets the scene or organizes the details or is, you know, runs the show. But you get to kind of play with these fantasies intermittently

throughout time and throughout your relationship. And you get to keep updating and adding to the box together. So you can even play something like that with him and include your fantasy or fantasies in that too. So hopefully that gives you a place to start. Keep us posted on how it goes, Kelly. And if you need any more guidance, you can always reach out to me at languageoflovepod at gmail.com. Thanks for listening. Bye.