With so much going on in the world today, you might have multiple issues weighing on you. Pressures at work, worries about your family, or health concerns are all common. They can trigger anxiety that causes physical reactions, including rapid heartbeat and hyperventilation.

If these sound familiar, check out the Insider article How to deal with overwhelming anxiety: 6 skills from therapists for regulating your emotions. Reviewed by our therapist John Mutziger, it offers tips on how to combat anxiety and lower your stress level.

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We need little bites of re-entry in order to remind our nervous systems that we can feel safe again, that we are as safe as we can be now. Big bites are likely to be too much to handle. 

If you plan to meet a friend, do it for 30 minutes, not an hour. Work your way up to that three-hour air-conditioned hangout.

You can also slowly take some calculated risks. For example, leave the hand sanitizer behind. Put your mask in a place it’s not as easy to get to, maybe in a zippered bag. This might feel scary and that’s okay. If you’re as safe as you can be (likely vaccinated and near others who are likely to be vaccinated), then this is a bite-sized risk.

Manageable bites that get increasingly closer to life without the overwhelming anxiety is the goal here. Just flooding your system might be helpful but it’s not usually a self-compassionate approach 

Practice ways to mitigate your anxiety

If you notice that fear response during a bite sized excursion, consider sitting with it and letting it pass. It’s a train going through a tunnel. It will pass. Maybe notice where you are, find 5 blue items in a space.

Consider utilizing a 0-100 scale to help you keep track of the intensity of your anxiety and also how it changes. Mostly just out of curiosity, not so much to control the anxiety. The data you can collect will often speak for itself. What makes the anxiety better, worse, the same. How does time change the level? How does any particular activity, person, place, etc?

It’s usually important to ground yourself in the present. Not so much to check your body for symptoms, but moreso to recognize the parts of you that are alive and connected to the universe. How does the floor feel beneath your feet? How does the air feel on your skin?

Don’t expect immediate change

It’s okay to be anxious, worried, scared. We’ve had good reason to be very scared for a long time now. And our nervous system remembers and is trying to keep us safe. But we’re as safe as we can be now. So it’s okay to feel anxious and keep doing things anyway.

Don’t be ashamed. Anyone who seems like they’re not worried is likely feeling anxious and allowing that anxiety to co-exist with daily living instead of the anxiety running the show 24/7. We’re all experiencing this together.

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Our greatest concern for the feasibility of online sessions was with regard to couples. In our sessions with couples, we have figured out some great workarounds. One of our favorite new techniques is to have each partner participate from separate devices in separate parts of a home. Interestingly, we are finding that couples are doing a better job of turn-taking in conversations during these video therapy sessions!

This article in Vice by Caitlin Flynn outlines more ideas for continuing to ensure you’re getting the most out of your video therapy sessions.

Looking for some support?

If you would like some support for your relationship, or your sex life, feel free to reach out to us. LIIST has an outstanding team of therapists. We specialize in helping individuals, couples and relationships navigate difficult times.

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You have all this time on your hands. Now what?

When thinking about sex, lots of time is a great thing. Many people are often rushing through sex because life has its own schedules to be managed. Right now, you can have sex like you’re on a vacation! (No, this is not a vacation, it’s a pandemic and we are existing with way more anxiety than usual. Sex also helps reduce anxiety and increase our sense of connection during this time of social isolation.)

Start by using your hands!

Great sex often starts with some wonderful sensual touch. You can start by suggesting you play with your partner’s hair, massage their feet, or caress their hands. This could be especially nice for those who have a heightened anxiety level right now. People often hold a lot of tension in their bodies, and loving caresses might help relieve some of that embodied stress.

Giving a great hand massage

Here’s an idea for how to give a great hand massage.

1. Ask your partner. “Could I play with your hand for a bit?” If they say yes, then proceed. If they say no, respect that decision and maybe ask them if there is another way they would like to connect with you or if they would be open to playing later.
2. Oil up! Hand lotion could be useful here. Massage oil and coconut oil are also good options. Start with a small amount, you can always add more later. Cover your hands in the oil first and then place a bit more in your hands as you get ready to massage your partner’s hand.
3. Gently place your partner’s right hand on their lap. Cup your partner’s right hand between both of your hands. Hold their hand between yours for a few moments (slowly count to 5).
4. Turn their hand parallel to the ground and start by massaging their wrist. Using your thumbs to apply pressure is a good option.
5. Check in about the pressure of your touch, “you good?” “would you like me to go softer?” Add more oil as needed.
6. Move up from the wrist to the back of their hand. Feel the space between each extension of the finger in the back of the hand.
7. Slowly count to 10 for each space you massage.
8. Turn their hand over, so the palm of their hand is facing you. Now, massage the palm of their hand. Start with the base of their palm, the space closer to their wrist, then the space near along the base of the thumb, then the space between each extension of the finger into the hand.
9. Check back in every once in a while with either “is this good?” or gazing into their eyes for non-verbal confirmation.
10. Next, you’ll go finger by finger, starting with the pinky and moving toward the thumb. As you move up each finger, apply a bit more pressure at the tip of the finger as you let go.
11. Go slowly. Count to 10 for each finger.
12. Move their left hand to their lap. Pick up their right hand. Repeat steps 4 through 11.
13. Pick up both hands and cup them between yours. Slowly count to 5.
14. Consider giving each hand a little kiss and lovingly gazing into your partner’s eyes as you end your great hand massage.

You can do this for any other part of the body.

Take what you’ve learned about giving a great hand massage and apply it to other areas of each other’s bodies. If you want to play with massaging each other’s full bodies, start with the feet and move up the body to the head. At first, consider avoiding breasts and genitals or other erogenous zones. If you want to play with greater levels of sexual energy, try teasing erogenous areas but not purposefully stimulating them for the purpose of orgasm.

Take your time.

You have lots of time, right? So there’s no rush to have intercourse or reach orgasm. If you really really want to, that’s great. Enjoy this sensation, play with it, tease it, fantasize with your partner about what you’d like to do with them.

A simple trick for talking dirty.

Try this out: “I can’t wait to ____ your ___ until ____.”

Not sure what your or your partner would be in to?

At LIIST, we use this wonderful worksheet from Autostraddle.

The way we use it:

• On your own, fill out the bubbles on pages 1 and 2
• Get together and compare notes, using page 7 to help you learn about what you are both in to and how to team up to accomplish your dreams!

Curious about adding in a toy?

If you already have some toys to play with, now might be a great time to enjoy them again. Perhaps you could come up with new ways of incorporating a familiar toy into your play. If you’re looking for some ideas, you can find a list of our favorite toys here as an Instagram story. If you’d like a custom toy recommendation, feel free to reach out to either Sara Rosen or me, Dr. Torrisi, for a bespoke curation of toys. We also have an exclusive discount list for some of the most popular toys at LIIST.

Enjoy!

Enjoy this time together. If you’d like some more personalized support for your relationship or your sex life, feel free to reach out to us. LIIST has an outstanding team of therapists who specialize in helping individuals, couples and relationships navigate difficult times.

Check out other posts for more info.

I will write another post for those who are still working away from home right now.

If you don’t have a partner (or would rather do something on your own first), check back later for another post about solo sensual play.

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“[Dr. Torrisi], a certified sex therapist based in New York, told VICE that this moment is essentially a compatibility test for a lot of couples, old and new. The coronavirus pandemic is going to reveal not just how they respond to this specificsituation, but also how they might deal with other rough life moments. “Being in a high-stress moment for a long period of time in a relationship… that’s gonna happen,” Torrisi said. “Whether it’s COVID[-19], or someone getting really sick, losing money, or losing a job, there’s a million ways that you will be stressed in a long-term relationship. This is one of those moments.”

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Some examples include:

Dipsea

Bawdy Storytelling

Quinn

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To view the slides from their lecture, click here.

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