What if you and your spouse chose one area of your relationship to focus on—and committed to it for 30 days straight? That’s the heart behind our tradition at Get Your Marriage On called Sextember—a month dedicated to intimacy, playfulness, and connection in marriage.
In this episode, I share the surprising backstory that inspired Sextember, including a 30-day experiment that transformed not only one woman’s marriage but also her happiness and even her appearance. You’ll hear how this idea grew into a challenge for couples everywhere, why September is the perfect time to reset patterns, and how you and your spouse can join in this year.
Plus, I’ll tell you about our upcoming Virtual Getaway: The Anatomy of Arousal—a spicy, nourishing, two-day experience you can enjoy together from home or a hotel.
If you’re ready to have fun, grow closer, and see the before-and-after difference in your marriage, this episode will show you how to make Sextember your best month yet!
Transcript
This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors or inaccuracies. For the most accurate and complete experience, we recommend listening to the full podcast episode.
What would happen if you focus on one area of your relationship that you know can improve and you just focus on it for 30 days straight? What do you think will happen as a result? Today I want to record a podcast episode totally unscripted about the origins of sex September. Now, for those of you who don’t know.
September is coming up. this is what we have a tradition at. Get Your Marriage on. We call it “S*xtember”. It’s s*xy September and it really is a month to celebrate intimacy in a marriage. And I think the timing is great ’cause kids are back to school. And it’s a time you try to establish, you know, better schedules, better patterns, and what not a better time than to see if you can improve an area of your relationship that needs improving.
But that’s not where it began. Let me tell you a backstory. So a few years ago I picked up this book, I have it in my hand. It’s a, uh, it’s a big red book. It’s out of print, and the title says, and this [00:01:00] is what got me to buy it, right? It says, the Great American Sex Diet. By Laura Corn. Laura Korn was in a TV industry.
I think she’s like a newscaster or producer or something, high stress job. And there was a period of time where she had a lot of deadlines, a lot of pressures, and she just was neglecting her marriage. Her husband would, you know, he was really sweet and really patient with her, but she felt kind of bad turning him down for sex all the time, and she was just stressed and wasn’t in the mood.
One day this came to a head and she realized I didn’t like who I was in my marriage. I didn’t wanna be this way anymore. So she vowed then and there that no matter how she felt for the next 30 days, she’s going to have sex with her husband. Come hell or high water, I’m gonna do it.
And, she did it And actually she had a great time. She loved it there. There were some days where she just didn’t feel like having sex, but she pushed herself to do it because she kept this commitment to herself. It was something she wanted to [00:02:00] do. And even though she was tired or wasn’t in the mood at first, she always finished every time with her husband.
Just so glad, uh, that it happened. And of course, he was totally on board with this plan. It was great. And anyway, after 30 days, she noticed that, you know, she felt happier. Their relationship is back on track and she’s like, I can do it. I can do that. I, love, who I am now. I love how I feel. Okay.
Around this time she was looking at photographs of herself, ’cause I guess in the publishing or newscasting, whatever, there’s a lot of like photos for magazines or whatever. Anyway, she found a photo of herself prior to her 30 day challenge, and she was looking at it compared to the photo of herself after her own personal 30 day challenge and her jaw dropped.
She’s like, holy smokes. In the after photo, I look younger. My skin is so much like healthier, my hair is shiny. I, I look thinner. [00:03:00] I look so much better. I look so much happier. And you can see it in my eyes. It’s so true. So she was shocked at the difference just with that before and after contrast. So then she had an idea, she’s like, this challenge for myself has made such a big difference. Maybe this will make a big difference in other marriages too. So she recruited, I think 19 couples to help her in an experiment. And she challenged each couple to go on a diet with her, a sex diet, and she’s really clever. she used a lot of like, you know, cooking metaphors like, we’re gonna add some spice here, or we are creating a menu of options for you to do to kind of keep things interesting and fun.
And anyway, so she challenged these 19 couples to take a before picture together. And then for 30 days have sex every day if they can, or whatever their plan is. And then an after picture and, uh, just basically write about their experience. So she compiled all their [00:04:00] stories, all of the challenges they overcame, to make the challenge happen.
And gathered the before, after photos and then went to a book publisher and said, yes, that’s a great idea. We’re gonna make a book out of it. And so, anyway, that’s the book I got. Anyway, all 19 of these other couples experienced something magnificent in their 30 days too. So I wanted to do this experiment in my own marriage.
What if now sex every day for 30 days isn’t practical with my marriage the way it is, but. What other areas of our relationship do we need to focus on? Well, it’s probably checking in every day or communicating emotionally.
Maybe it’s addressing stress. Maybe it’s kids get in the way of intimacy, so we need to come up with a better system of bedtime or whatever it is so we can guarantee we have more. You know, necessary couple time together. Or what if it’s, we have certain hangups in our relationship that we actually haven’t addressed, that it is time to finally address.
What if we just need to play more together and not have the pressure of it needing to be [00:05:00] sex, but it can be, I don’t know, playing a card or a board game together or just something fun that we both really enjoy that’s connecting and pleasurable. So, after 30 days. We are definitely happier, more connected and um, I dunno if we lost weight, but we sure feel a lot healthier, right?
Because there’s so many benefits that come from, uh, this intimate connection and from sex specifically, that come into our lives when we have more enjoyable, purposeful, and nourishing sexual experiences, especially with our spouse, that bond between that. husband, wife grows so much stronger. Okay.
Then in creating the Intimately US app, as September was coming up one year, this is four years ago, I wanted to make it special. So, uh, we baked into the app. This Sex September challenge and how it worked is starting on September 1st, the regular intimacy challenges that you get daily. Or disappear and you’re instead presented with an option [00:06:00] to create your own challenges for one month.
And I give you lots of options. I think there’s over 70 suggestions and they’re categorized by areas in your relationship where. Couples typically get stuck when it comes to sex. It could be, you know, they’re bored in the bedroom. That might be it. Or it might be we’re just tired and stressed. It could be, uh, kids getting in the way and all the major objections why couples say they’re not having as much sex or as enjoyable.
Of sexual connection, right? So we categorize those, we put those in there, and then in the app, we make it really easy for you to assign, I wanna do this challenge on this day, or this challenge on that day. And you can also create your own and make your own, and you fill up your calendar for the next 30 days, September 1st through the 30th.
Now, there is no requirement to have sex every day. actually, the point isn’t to have sex every day. We call it sex temper, just to be catchy. What it really is, is about an intimacy challenge. What is one thing we can work on in our marriage for the next [00:07:00] 30 days that if we did. We will have a better, healthier relationship.
We will feel better about ourselves. Our health will improve, and all these other benefits that come from that intimate relationship, right? That’s the question you ask yourself and you work, you collaborate with your spouse and create this 30 day plan. Now to make it more fun, ’cause I like challenges, uh, if you can complete 20 out of 30 of those challenges, so in other words, in the month of September, 20 days out of the 30, then you’re automatically entered into a drawing for prizes.
Right. We like prizes, and the prizes are fantastic. We have like, sex toys, we have lingerie, we have courses, we have books, and, just a lot of fun things for the bedroom and for your relationship as prizes. So that’s the gist of sex timber. So my dear friend, I want to invite you to think about this for a second.
If you could shift one thing in your relationship that will make a positive [00:08:00] impact and you can just work on it together as a team for 30 days, what would it be? Would it be smiling more? Would it be hugging a little bit better before you part for the day or when you come back together? Would it be reducing criticism?
Would it be, you know, getting the lingerie out of the drawer or would it be, um, shaving. And looking into just showering a little bit, just coming to bed a little fresher. Would it be, uh, working on gratitude in your relationship and so on and so on? What is it in your relationship?
I invite you to pray about it. I believe in prayer. I believe in answers to prayer. And make it a goal. Make it a thing. Make this September the thing. That you’ll look back on that if you were to do a before and and after picture, you’d go, yes, definitely. I feel the difference. I can see the difference in our photo.
So please try it out. And if you do take a before or after photo, if you’re willing to share it publicly, I’d love to [00:09:00] collect these photos and make a special blog post on my website with testimonials of couples that have done this. I think it’d be very powerful and the way to show the world that yes, in marriage sex is a beautiful, wonderful thing.
And maybe it’s not just sex, but like focusing on intimacy. And strengthening this marriage is absolutely great work, and it’s kind of fun and look at the benefits you get from it. I also wanna make sex September a little more fun and special. So as a grand finale, I guess you could say the last weekend in September, that September 26th and 27, I’ll be hosting a virtual getaway.
It’s kind of like a retreat, but it’s only, uh, two nights. And this is how it works. You and your spouse can get a hotel, Airbnb, or if you wanna stay home, send the kids to grandma’s house and you’re gonna join me live. Friday night, Saturday morning and Saturday night, and I have a, a special guest coming. I have a very fun plan.
you’ll get a workbook [00:10:00] and, you’ll get, basically prime instruction from me in the comfort of your hotel room or your home. Now I’m doing this over Zoom webinar. Webinar means you are not on camera. You only see me, you can interact with me, of course, over the, the chat messaging thing. But I’ll guide you through practices.
Now, these are gonna be some black belt sex techniques, some of them, uh, practices that are all focused on arousal in the marriage. We’re calling this a virtual getaway, the anatomy of Arousal. So that might give you a little clue as to what we gotta talk about. It’s gonna be really hot and a little bit spicy and super nourishing for your marriage.
Now, regardless if you’re newlyweds or you’re a seasoned couple, I promise you’ll walk away this weekend with something new that will nourish and strengthen your marriage for months and years to come. This is gonna be a fun weekend. Now, I’ve put on [00:11:00] weekends like this before. so the content I’m teaching in this virtual getaway is different.
Different from our in-person retreats and different from the other ones that I’ve done before. This one’s a lot more focused on arousal and anatomy and other things connected to that, so you’ll find those details on my website. You’re invited to join and make it part of your, celebration of your sex temper and, make it something memorable for you and your spouse to really get behind and enjoy.
Thank you for listening. And, I love getting your emails. I love getting your messages on our Instagram, on our private Facebook page and all those places.
It’s such a great place for me to interact with you and. I thank you for inviting me to, share a few things that I, I hope, help strengthen you in your marriage, especially intimately. I think this work is really, really important. I will catch you next week. We’re gonna get back into interviews very soon. for the summer, we took two months off [00:12:00] of interview style podcasts. Now we’ll get back to interviews. I have some fantastic, amazing guests that you do not want to miss and, go get your marriage on.
