Well, as much as it may feel like you’d be okay to never have sex again, your partner might not be so keen on the idea. And remember, you once liked the guy enough to make a baby together. Surely, there’s a spark at least smouldering in there somewhere for him.

But how do you go from smouldering to hot again?

Take it easy on yourself
There is no rule about when you should start having sex again. The postpartum period is a time of huge changes in your life. Some women are ready for sex after six weeks, others six months. You’ll know when you’re ready.

Talk about it
He can hardly know how you’re feeling about sex if you don’t tell him. And no, “Get your hands off me, it’s enough with the baby sucking the life out of me without having you pawing at me” is not considered effective communication, despite how true it may be.

Make a date
If you’re not ready for sex, you can still be intimate. Date nights, baths, tender kisses and massages are all good ways to physically nurture each other until you’re ready to have intercourse again.

Love yourself
A lot of women feel like their body has been taken over by aliens after giving birth. Doing something nice for yourself — like getting a pedicure — will make you feel prettier, sexier and like you may actually have ownership of your body again one day. A trip to the gym will not only make you feel better physically, the endorphins and adrenalin will help kickstart your libido.

Don’t ignore your guy
New fathers sometimes feel rejected when he realizes mom’s found a new first love — her baby. Make an effort to include him.

Josey Vogels is a sex and relationship columnist and author of five books on the subjects. For more info, visit joseyvogels.com.

That’s where today’s glut of young adult fiction can play a role. Fiction is full of characters young people can relate to who are facing things they’re facing, or opening their minds up to things others may be going through.

As Virginia Euwer Wolff writes in True Believer, a coming of age story of 15-year-old girl that, “In the sex class we have to take by school law where they showed condoms and scared us about AIDS, they said sexuality is the most confusing thing about being a teenager.

“I am sure this is correct because I strained my ears to hear over the racket of kids making a joke of the class waving condoms on their fingers hooting. And also because the sex teacher said it four times.”

In her book Two Moons in August, Canadian author Martha Brooks grapples with the tangled emotions of a young girl coming to terms with her mother’s death one summer, and falling for a boy who moves into her neighbourhood but who already has a girlfriend.

And Diana Weiler is one of the few authors who writes books aimed specifically at teenage boys, a group not exactly known for it’s voracious reading habits. But if there’s anything that’s going to get a young guy to turn off the TV or the video game and pick up a book instead, a book that deals with sex is probably a good bet. If it’s one that deals with some of the confusing emotions and issues he’s currently facing, all the better.

The other brilliant thing about young adult fiction is that it offers another tool for plenty of parents, most of whom, quite frankly, would rather have root canal surgery than talk to their kids about sex.

And let’s face it, how many teens really want to talk to their parents about this stuff anyway? That doesn’t mean you can leave a pile of books beside your son or daughter’s bed and tell them to have a good life. But a good book, offers the opportunity to open the discussion, and to broach some of the issues that might not otherwise come up.

Josey Vogels is a sex and relationship columnist and author of five books on the subjects. For more info, visit joseyvogels.com.

If you haven’t heard of “vajazzling” yet, well you’re obviously not with it. Heck, they even talked about it on Fox News. Jennifer Love Hewitt brought the term to the mainstream when she confessed in some TV interview that she’d had it done as a pick-me-up to get over a broken heart.

Vajazzling is when women bedazzle their private parts with rhinestones and gems. While you’re at it, you might as well dye the region your favourite shade of pink.

Of course, women have been getting fancy for a while now; be it a full Monty Brazilian wax or shaping their pubic hair it into a portrait of George Clooney (okay, that might be an exaggeration, but hearts and lightening bolts are not, honest).

Frankly, I think all this “enhancing” is getting ridiculous. What was so wrong with the original model? When did this become an area where women feel they need to pimp, polish and deck out like a hot rod? And why are women doing this? When you read about most of these things, you inevitably come across some comment saying it’s all about “restoring women’s sexual confidence” or some such baloney. I’m not sure exactly how bedecking the area in gems and jewels is a confidence booster.

It’s bad enough that women feel pressure to keep up with all the latest fashion, make-up, hairstyles and shoe trends, now we have to start worrying about what our vagina is wearing? 

Josey Vogels is a sex and relationship columnist and author of five books on the subjects. For more info, visit joseyvogels.com.

But it seems to me there are very few books focused on how to be the best single person you can be. Which is too bad, because we all know that the only way to find a relationship is to be the best you can be when you’re in your best shape as a single person.

And when I say “in shape,” I’m not talking endless squats and a high-fibre diet (though getting in physical shape and feeling healthy does help you feel good about yourself). I mean getting in shape emotionally and mentally.

This can be tough in a society that acknowledges every stage of coupledom — anniversaries, moving in together, marriages, kids — but rarely celebrates the joys or marks the milestones of single life.

A study that came out a few years back said that, today, most typical urban-dwellers cohabited an average of nearly four years and were married about 18. The rest of the time — an average of about 19 years — they were dating or alone, with no steady companion.

Given we spend as much of our lives being single as we do partnered, surely being single deserves a little more respect. So, while it’s hardly a match for all the advice out there on how to get your relationship in shape, here’s my advice for getting your single life in shape:

• Enjoy a Saturday night at home alone with a movie and a glass of wine without feeling like a loser.
• Host Christmas in your own place with your own friends.
• Relish the fact that you get the whole bed to yourself.
• Enjoy a solo candlelit dinner at home.
• Treat yourself to dinner at a fancy restaurant.
• Travel on your own. You always meet more people this way.
• Enjoy the fact that you can make plans without having to consult anyone but yourself.
• Remind yourself that you get to be the “cool” aunt to your nieces and nephews without having to foot their college tuition.
• Stay out all night without having to check in.
• Realize that you’re just as imperfect at being single as most people are at being in relationships.
• Remind yourself that most married people have just as many moments where they feel like they wished they were single again as you wish you were in a relationship.
• Know that you’re happier on your own than in a mediocre relationship.

Taking a relationship on the road not only lets you know whether your date’s a criminal, spending day and night together challenges your ability to put up with each other’s moods and reveals just how long you can circle an area late at night looking for a hotel room before one of you snaps.

If it’s a road trip, you get to play the “Which Way Do I Turn?” game. Always good for a fight.
You’re inches away from the intersection, there’s an 18-wheeler on your rear end and he’s screamin’, “Which way do I turn?! Which way do I turn?!” and you’re frantically searching for too-small-to-be-on-the-map corners on your 1954 map for a road that doesn’t exist anymore.
Then you discover just how long you can go without speaking to each other once you finally haul yourselves out of the ditch.

It’s easy to understand why people enjoy travelling alone. When you’re travelling alone and you get lost, you can simply admit it instead of driving in circles with him repeatedly saying, “I’m sure it’s just around the next corner, I remember from when my family came here when I was six weeks old.”

There are lots of wonderful things about travelling with a partner. Discovering you travel well together can really solidify a relationship.

It helps if you like the same things. If your idea of a vacation is paddling your way to an island in the middle of a lake and setting up camp and his is five-star hotels, it might be a problem.

For their first trip together, a friend of mine dragged her devoted city boy camping. She said it was like camping with Felix Unger, you know, the anal half of the Odd Couple?

Sure, use the last of the drinking water to wash your hands for the fourteenth time in 10 minutes. Though the benefit is that the Felix Unger types come up with ideas like softening your hard-earth bed with leaves, she laughs.

Ultimately, it’s not the where, when, and how of travelling together that are important, but your ability to go with each other’s flow.

Though, you might want to get yourself a fully updated GPS before you go, just in case.

Josey Vogels is a sex and relationship columnist and author of five books on the subjects. For more info, visit joseyvogels.com.

Like Stan, in the early seasons of South Park, who vomited uncontrollably when his love interest, Wendy Testaburger, so much as talked to him.

And, while you may not have vomited — or, as Wayne so eloquently put it “blow chunks” — when you got near someone you did fancy, you’ve no doubt experienced the sweaty palms, felt an elevated heat rate, or got that feeling that you just may, well, blow chunks.

Obviously, this kind of reaction doesn’t mean you’re technically allergic to your love interests; not in the way my husband is to wasps or my mother to shellfish, anyway.

Sure, it may feel like you’re going to die if, say, the object of your affection doesn’t return the feeling, but a few shots of tequila — not epinephrine — is more likely to cure your ills.

But what if you were not necessarily allergic to love but to the person you love?

According to Darcy Keenan, an Ottawa-based natural therapist who specializes in allergies, one can certainly have an allergic reaction to someone else if they’ve eaten foods you’re allergic to or used certain cosmetics or products that cause you to have an allergic reaction

I’ve also heard of cases of women being allergic to her partner’s semen. Something to do with her antibodies not getting along with his antigens and causing a reaction.

Keenan adds that semen is affected by what a man eats and drinks, and thus, well, “You can extrapolate from there,” he laughs.

Ted Edwards, an allergy expert I spoke to in the U.S., said that using a far-too-complicated-to-explain-here allergy clearing process called Cerebrospinal Kinesiology (even the name sounds complicated) he was able to help a young woman get over her allergy to her mother!
So maybe you can actually be allergic to another person, possibly even someone you really like. Which would really put a damper on cuddling.

As for being allergic to love, well, I definitely know a few people who seem to freak out every time it comes near them. You know the type. Every time a relationship starts to get serious, they find a way to sabotage it.

Though I suspect this is less a love allergy to love than an allergy to getting hurt. If only they could develop an EpiPen for that.

Josey Vogels is a sex and relationship columnist and author of five books on the subjects. For more info, visit joseyvogels.com.

Maybe this is because men feel they have to say this because women with a little meat on their bones are made to feel like they will automatically be less desirable and therefore must be reassured they are still indeed dateable while meaty men don’t feel the same pressure?

After all, I don’t think I’ve ever hear a man say, “Do these jeans make my butt look big?” as a roundabout way of looking for reassurance from his partner that she is still physically attracted to him. And, on practically every married couple sitcom, the wife is a perfectly shaped babe while hubbie’s usually, well tubby, and none too bright.

I don’t think it’s so much that women as a rule simply prefer their men meatier and dumb (though I’m sure some do, the meatier part that is, just as some men genuinely do prefer a little meat on their women’s bones) but because socially, it is more acceptable for men to be heavier than it is for women. 

Also, because women live with the pressure to be thin their whole lives, they are possibly more accepting of a less than perfect body on a man. But maybe I’m giving women way too much credit. Because when it comes to physical attraction, women and men can be equally shallow.

A man may say he likes a little meat on a woman’s bones, but I guarantee he wouldn’t feel the same if all that extra meat was concentrated entirely around her middle and her thighs. And, while women may be a little more forgiving, given the choice between her dream guy having six-pack abs or a gut from drinking too many six packs, she’d opt for door number one.

We are a fat-phobic society. Remember that short-lived reality show last year, More To Love, featuring heavier women vying for the love of one equally hefty bachelor? Most of these women had either never dated or spent their whole adult lives being passed over for thinner girls.

I remember one woman describing the show as her last resort in her attempts to meet someone.  Though come to think of it, little fuss was made over the size of the bachelor these women were vying for.

He was in no way trim but none of the girls seemed to think this was an issue. So maybe women are more accepting of a guy with a little meat on his bones.

What do you think? Are women more accepting of heavier men than men are of heavier women?

Josey Vogels is a sex and relationship columnist and author of five books on the subjects. For more info, visit joseyvogels.com.

At least that’s what we’re told the research says.

But Bella DePaulo — a social psychologist based in Santa Barbara, Calif., and the author of Singled Out: How Singles are Stereotyped, Stigmatized and Ignored and Still Live Happily Ever After — says that, scientifically, this simply isn’t true.

For example, she says, much of the research looks only at those who are currently married.

“Those who divorce — well over 40 per cent who marry — are set aside,” she explains.
“Those who got married and hated it get to leave the married group. But when those researchers compare the currently married to, say, the people who have always been single, they do not look only at the 50-some per cent who are most satisfied with their single lives.”

DePaulo further challenges this research in her book and through her Living Single blog for psychologytoday.com.

So, why do we perpetuate the idea that marriage makes us happier and healthier? DePaulo believes that, as a society, this mythology about marriage is very appealing and comforting.

“The mythology says that if only you get married, you will live happily ever after and you will be healthier and live longer, too,” she says.

“The mythology presents marriage as a magical solution: Find ‘The One’ and all of the important pieces of your life will fall into place.”

And, in an age when women have more control than they used to over their financial security, their sex lives, and their reproductive potential, and that they can pursue all of those possibilities without marrying, adds DePaulo, the only way to continue to sell this myth is through psychological arguments.

“The mythology is that you can never know true happiness or the best of health unless you marry.”

In fact, one could argue that marriage can even be detrimental to one’s health.

As at least one happily married man I recently posed the question to can attest, the only health benefits he’s discovered through being married is a “healthier” waistline.

While being happily married doesn’t guarantee better health, there are things you can do to maximize the health benefits of being married.

Josey Vogels is a sex and relationship columnist and author of five books on the subjects. For more info, visit joseyvogels.com.

OK sure, I was a bit of a tomboy but I somehow knew immediately that it was my new super short haircut that had confused her. “I’m a girl!” I whined rather meekly as my 10-year-old brain was forever etched with the message: Real girls have long hair.

And, an informal Twitter survey seems to back this up. While most men and women agreed that it really depends on the woman, when pressed, most men admit they prefer long hair.
There may be some evolutionary evidence to back them up. According to the lab coats, the quality and length of a woman’s hair serves as a marker of genetic strength and overall health and thus, her desirability as reproductive material.

Of course, by this reasoning, women should be all over men sporting long ponytails and, well, let’s not go there, shall we? (In fact, for a hilarious and very practical guide to all things men say/do/wear that are dating deal breakers, check out Undateable: 311 Things Guys Do That Guarantee They Won’t be Dating or Having Sex).

Still, in one study published in the research journal Human Nature, researchers found that women who had originally been rated by a test group as being less attractive were rated far more highly when shown with a longer hairstyle.

Interestingly, as they get older, past their reproductive years, most women choose shorter haircuts because they are considered more “age appropriate.”

Of course, men are not ruled entirely by their inner cave man and some men told me they actually prefer short hair on women of any age.

Of course, even from an evolutionary perspective, shiny, lustrous short hair would be a better sign of health than damaged, dull long hair. But, the truth is, some women just look pretty darn sexy in short hair. Still, culturally, we strongly associate long hair with sex appeal and femininity. Short hair is associated with boyishness and asexuality.

Obviously, we communicate a lot with our hair. And, unlike other parts of our body, it’s one thing we can easily change and manipulate. Which is why I actually admire women who can rock a short haircut and look sexy.

It’s as if she’s thumbing her nose at traditional notions of female sexuality and telling the world that she doesn’t have to buy into it. That she can be sexy on her own terms.

It almost makes me want to go out and get a sexy, short haircut. If I could only get my inner 10-year-old on board with the idea.

Josey Vogels is a sex and relationship columnist and author of five books on the subjects. For more info, visit joseyvogels.com.

The sexy Burt Reynolds chest rug of the ’70s is long gone. With the rise of the metrosexual in the ’90s and the more recent trend of “manscaping,” seems men are getting massaged, waxed, polished and, well quite frankly, acting like a bunch of girls.

Men now make up nearly a third of all spa-goers, according to the International Spa Association, which oddly seems to only carry stats on U.S. spas.

The Canadian Spa Association didn’t have stats, but one can assume more and more Canadian guys are also getting massaged, waxed and polished.

Personally, I’m quietly impressed by a guy who’s confident enough in his masculinity to have his dry skin buffed by microbeads of volcanic pumice as they do in the Defense Zone Facial for Men at The Camelback Inn in Arizona.

And frankly, women have long known that you have to be tough as well-manicured nails to endure a genital waxing.

While there seems to be some concern that all this primping and pampering is threatening more traditional notions of masculinity — real men are hairy, smell like horses, and don’t fuss over their looks — I think it’s about time.

Given the work women have been putting into their appearances for ages, it only seems fair that guys at least worry a little bit about, oh, I don’t know, their back hair.

Still, there’s a fine line, it seems, between maintenance and high-maintenance when it comes to male grooming.

As my cousin’s daughter, Angela Vogels put it: “It’s nice if men put some effort into their appearance but high maintenance men are a turn-off. I like to be the prettiest one in the relationship.”

That fine line is emphasized by the fact that most spas clearly try to make the experience as “ungirly” as possible with manly sounding packaging like the Tough Guys spa package at Ocean Key Resort & Spa in Key West, Florida or the The Gentlemen’s Urban Defense Facial at the Four Seasons Hotel Chicago.

The Men’s Zone Spa at Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas features a big screen TV so guys can get pampered while watching the game. They can even bet while they get buffed.

The insane popularity of the brilliant Old Spice campaign launched recently (check it out oldspice.com/videos) is the perfect example of this new masculinity.

Today’s man is manly enough to ride a horse backwards or sail a yacht but sensitive enough to buy us diamonds and offer us two tickets to that thing you love.

Josey Vogels is a sex and relationship columnist and author of five books on the subjects. For more info, visit joseyvogels.com.

She flashes you a quick smile. And not just one of those curt, closed-lipped smiles flashed out of awkward politeness. It’s a genuine, sweet smile that brings her eyes and open heart into the game.

It’s a smile that automatically makes you smile back. It’s a smile that in one split second says … you’re in.

And the smile is probably one of the most universally understood forms of communications out there. A smile immediately communicates openness and fun and makes others feel at ease.

Research has shown that when you smile, your body releases endorphins that send a feel-good message to your brain. And when your smile causes that cutie from across the room to automatically smile back, her body also releases endorphins that make her feel good about herself. So with one quick smile exchange you’ve said: I’m happy and her brain has told her that she is happy and associated that happy feeling with you. Who needs pickup lines when you’ve got all that going for you in a quick flash of teeth?

Of course, while a successful smile exchange will get your foot in the door, don’t make the mistake of throwing it open and waltzing on in. You’re liable to scare the person off. Instead, move in slowly.

According to British sexpert and body language expert Tracey Cox, women are more likely to respond if men approach them from the front. Men are best approached from the side.

And, once you’re in the person’s personal space, Cox offers some other body language signs that signal the person is into you, like shiny eyes.

“The eyes don’t lie,” says Cox. “Sparkling eyes denote interest, and this can’t be faked.” Also, she says, the raised eyebrow flash is unconscious and indicates attraction and interest.

A woman will show interest in a man by looking straight at him, playing with her hair, flashing her wrists, gliding her hands over her arms and neck, whispering and leaning into the conversation, moving her head closer to you and smiling broadly.

Men show interest by raising their eyebrows when they first meet you, raising them while talking, stroking his tie or smoothing his shirt, and trying to attract your attention with a masculine “cowpoke” stance, and an “open” face.

And, when you do finally open your mouth, Cox has some advice.

You have two ears one mouth, use them in proportion.

“The more you let the other person talk, the more fascinating they will think you are,” says Cox.

Josey Vogels is a sex and relationship columnist and author of five books on the subjects. For more info, visit joseyvogels.com.

In a study at the University of California, San Diego, 78 sedentary middle-aged men (their average age was 48) did aerobics every other day for an hour. After nine months they made love 30 per cent more often and masturbated 50 per cent more often.

That’s because exercise not only relieves stress, relaxes you, increases your energy and stamina, and improves self-esteem and self-confidence (all very sex-positive), working yourself into a big, smelly sweat actually also makes you randy. Cardiovascular exercise elevates endorphins in your bloodstream and increases adrenaline and testosterone (in women too) — all the things your brain needs to make you want to say, “Do me!”

There are other sex-specific benefits from exercise. For women, regular exercise keeps your genitals nice and fit. Like other muscles in your body, the ones around your vagina get flabby with age leading to incontinence or a prolapsed uterus. As fun as all that sounds, regular exercise can help to avoid these problems.

And guys, you’re not always going to be the studly young things you are now. Men’s levels of arousal and their ability to maintain erections wane as you age. Regular exercise will keep your blood pumping … everywhere.

Also, a good set of butt and lower back muscles will give you stamina and keep you from collapsing while you’re doing the deed.

Abs of steel, strong thighs and a decent set of shoulders don’t hurt either, and that goes for men and women.

Finally, sex in itself can be a good workout. During a good session of sex (the kind that leaves your legs rubbery and your head light), your heart rate multiplies as much as three times, and your breathing is almost twice as fast.

You can also burn between 200 and 300 calories. And a good, toe-curling orgasm helps tone every muscle in your body. Most cardiovascular fitness routines recommend that to get and keep fit you need to raise your pulse and keep it an increased rate for 20 minutes, two or three times a week. So if you can’t afford a gym membership…

Josey Vogels is a sex and relationship columnist and author of five books on the subjects. For more info, visit joseyvogels.com.

Women may not have the same isssue, but diet can also affect women’s levels of desire, arousal and lubrication. Also, if you’re eating well, you feel better about your body and feeling good about your body and feeling sexy go hand in hand.

Food itself can be sexy. While there is no scientific proof behind the aphrodisiac quality of certain foods, studies have shown that chocolate — often touted as an aphrodisiac — contains phenylethylamine (PEA), a chemical that is also released in the brain when you fall in love.

And one of the reasons shellfish such as oysters are considered an aphrodisiac is because they’re loaded with zinc, important for sexual vitality.

Texture is often what makes foods we tend to think of as aphrodisiacs so stimulating, like the creamy, sweet texture of chocolate or the juicy flesh of a ripe mango.

The word itself derives from Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love and mother of Eros (the Romans knew the two as Venus and Cupid). Aphrodite rose naked on a scallop shell from the sea foam generated where the genitals of her father, Uranus had been hurled after his castration in one of those divine disturbances common in Greek mythology. The Fates assigned the goddess only one duty: To make love. Not a bad gig.

When it comes to food and sex, where, how, and with whom you eat can be just as important as what you eat. Sharing a first meal with a new lover can be very exciting and revealing. A person’s table manners can speak volumes.

Cooking for a lover can also be a real turn-on. Going to the trouble of finding out what they like to eat and then shopping, cooking, decorating the table with flowers and candles and cracking open a nice bottle of wine makes them feel pampered and special. Talk about foreplay.

Finally, there’s nothing like cooking a meal together to test the power dynamics of a relationship. If no one loses any fingers or ends up with a meat cleaver in the head by the time you sit down to eat, the relationship might stand a chance.

Bon appetit!

Josey Vogels is a sex and relationship columnist and author of five books on the subjects. For more info, visit joseyvogels.com.

Because you know what he’s talking about right ladies? C’mon, admit it. You hear yourself say it to your girlfriends: “He’s a reeeally nice guy, funny, considerate, a real sweetheart. I don’t know what it is, but I’m just not attracted to him.”

Am I right?

Why go for funny, sweet, considerate when we can go for indifferent, self-centred and manipulative? So much sexier.

So, why do women love bad boys? For some women it’s about the challenge and the excitement. Nice guys are too predictable. They want to love them, but the good girl in them wants to rebel. And since society doesn’t like bad girls, they let bad boys bring out the rebel in us.

“I want to be comfortable but not bored,” a bad-boy addict girlfriend tries to explain. “I’m not sure that exists so I go for the thrill instead.”

One could also argue that going after guys who are clearly lousy long-term relationship material is like the female version of “commitmentphobia.” It’s less scary to long than to genuinely love.

Some women latch on to the naïve belief that she’ll be the one to turn him around. Of course, one could also argue that being attracted to people who make us work a little harder for it is simply human nature. Just as many guys are drawn to indifferent, rebellious “bad girls” who keep them guessing, we all like a bit of a challenge when it comes to relationships. It’s not that you have to turn into a lout to get a date. But the problem with some nice guys, is that, well, they’re a little too nice.

Women do like to be treated nicely but they also appreciate a guy who’s willing to stand up for himself. It’s very hard to respect a guy and believe he likes himself enough for us to like him if he’s willing to take whatever a woman dishes him.

So you can be nice without being a doormat. And you can be self-confident without coming across as an arrogant, well, jerk. And hey, if you ride a motorcycle, it might not hurt.

Josey Vogels is a sex and relationship columnist and author of five books on the subjects. For more info, visit joseyvogels.com.

But I’ve always maintained that a less-than-perfect body carried with self-confidence is way hotter than a flawless body carried self-consciously.

If you carry yourself with sexual confidence, no matter what size or shape you are, people buy into it.

It’s like advertising — you know that miracle cream isn’t really going to erase wrinkles and make you look years younger immediately but, the way they sell it, it’s darned convincing.

You are your own best marketing machine

Also, if you put your sexual life on hold until some undetermined time in the future when you’ll lose 20 pounds, you are denying yourself pleasure now.

Like my favourite makeover stylists Stacy and Clinton of TLC’s What Not to Wear always say, “Buy clothes for the body you have now.”

Stop criticizing your body and focus on what you love about it. It’s gotten you this far in life. It deserves a little appreciation. Embrace and focus on what is going on between you and your partner, not what’s wrong with your body.

To help boost your sexual self-confidence and improve your body image, get naked with yourself.

Pour yourself a glass of wine (or two) and strut around your house or apartment when you’re alone (probably best to draw the curtains).

And just because guys don’t sit around and whine to each other about their saggy thighs — “Oh God, Doug, I just hate my gut.” “Oh c’mon Steve, you look great!” — doesn’t mean body image isn’t an issue for them too.

The best way to make your partner feel like you love his or her body is to send out a steady message of acceptance.

We tend to slow down the compliments as we get more comfy in a relationship, when they’re really most important. No need to lie. Just focus on things you genuinely like about your partner and mention them often.

Help your partner accept the things they don’t like by complimenting them and making them realize you’re in love with them as an entire package, which means you love the wobbly bits too.

Though you might want to find a better way to phrase it.

Josey Vogels is a sex and relationship columnist and author of five books on the subjects. For more info, visit joseyvogels.com.

But when your idea of health is getting to the gym five days a week and eating a diet of fresh veggies and lean protein while your partner’s idea of living healthy is not to “biggie” their fries, it can cause friction in the relationship.

With Olympic Fever still in the air and Spring Fever right around the corner, it’s the perfect opportunity to try and get your fitness goals in sync.

Of course, “Honey, get your fat butt off the couch and come to the gym with me,” is not likely to motivate your partner. In fact, the word “fat” should never be uttered, according to Tina Tessina in an article on thatsfit.com. Tessina, a psychotherapist and author of How to Be Free and Still Be a Couple says the best way to raise the weight issue is to approach it from a health perspective. Instead of telling your partner they’ve gained weight (duh, honey, really?), gently bring up the topic by saying, “I want you to be around for a long time and I’m worried about your health.” ?

Yeah, I know, they’ll know you’re just finding a nice way to say they’ve packed on a few, but it may make them more open to doing something about it if you’re at least nice and supportive about it.

Nagging your partner or criticizing them will only send them straight for the nearest bag of potato chips. Instead, influence by example. Prepare healthy snacks for yourself and keep healthy snack options in the house.

Rather than radically changing your diet and eliminating all your partner’s favourite foods, make subtle changes. Switch out the hamburger for ground turkey in the chili, for example. Go grocery shopping together so you’re both involved in meal planning and food choices. Also, while not exactly a candlelit dinner, it’s still an opportunity to spend some time together.

Research shows that up to 94 per cent of couples stick with their fitness programs when they work out together. Just make sure the activity is something you both like. If you’re a gym bunny but your partner would rather eat glass than get on a treadmill, find activities you’d both enjoy, like bike riding, hiking or, I don’t know, nude mud wrestling.

Hey, don’t laugh. Regular exercise may make you want to get naked with each other on a more regular basis. Studies show that people that exercise regularly feel better about themselves, perceive they are more sexually desirable and experience greater levels of sexual satisfaction.

Technology has certainly helped to bridge the gap. But while things like webcams and Skype, texting and email can literally keep you connected when school, work or even war separate you for long periods of time, these new technologies don’t always make long-distance relationships easier.

In fact, sometimes they can even make things worse.

“One of the problems with email when you’re in a long-distance relationships is that you can’t express tone and it’s easy to misread things,” explains 32-year-old Lisa, who’s boyfriend of two years is in Australia for a year for work.

“Emoticons help a bit, but there are limitations. Once in a while we deal with bigger emotional stuff by email, but we try to avoid it,” she continues.

“It can be tempting to write things in email you wouldn’t say to each other in person and, once it’s in writing and you hit send, you can’t take it back.”

Texting can be great because you can send each other quick “hits” throughout the day just to let the other person know you’re thinking about them. But, because technology has trained us to expect constant and immediate communication, if you don’t get a returned text immediately, it’s hard not to fill the empty space with doubt about why you haven’t heard back.

In some cases, communicating more often can even push long-distance couples apart.

Gregory Guldner is the director of the Center for the Study of Long Distance Relationships in the U.S. He also spent four months as an emergency physician in Iraq.

In an article in Forbes magazine, he says that, in the military, for instance, tools like satellite phones have broken down some barriers that would have better been left standing.

“Technological communication can interfere with the separate worlds that people are trying to maintain,” Guldner is quoted saying.

“When a soldier is pinned down in combat and his wife is at home trying to deal with a broken dishwasher, they can’t really relate to one another.”

And communication technology can only take “that long-distance feeling” so far.

Lisa and her boyfriend have regular video conferencing “dates.”

But, says Lisa, “While it can be fun to watch a movie together on a Saturday night while we’re both on webcam, sometimes, the experience just makes me miss being physically together even more.”

I tend to agree. And every time another political sexual scandal comes to light, I can’t help wondering how all of us would stand up if our ability to do our job were based on how we conduct our private romantic lives.

But his privacy isn’t the issue, many other media columnists and commentators cried. The issue is that he lied about it when confronted by the media.

How can we put up with a politician who lies? Right, because politicians have such a great reputation for not lying. Would we have been happier if he’d simply come right out and said, “Yes, I’m a big old cheater”? 

No, of course not. That would be political suicide. Giambrone knew this. He admitted as much in a text to Kristen Lucas, the young university student with whom he was having an affair, when explaining why live-in girlfriend Sarah McQuarrie and not Lucas would be by his side during the campaign: “It is important for the campaign … I had to have someone political,” he wrote.

So, while the rest of us run around wrestling with the realistic challenges of finding, keeping and maintaining love in a social landscape of constantly shifting and expanding sexual mores, we still expect our politicians to project a 1950s sitcom image of family stability. 

In other words, we want our politicians to be human, relatable and accessible but still morally and ethically less flawed than the rest of us.

Ultimately, I don’t care about the sex life of my politicians and, yes, I do care about their honesty. But, maybe if we didn’t expect our politicians to come across like Ward Cleaver with June at his side, they’d feel less pressure to lie about their perhaps-less-than-perfect personal lives.

By the way, Hugh Beaumont, the actor who played Ward Cleaver on Leave It To Beaver — the ultimate 1950s family sitcom — had an absent father and his own real-life marriage ended in divorce.

“This wretched day of massive expectation and zero appreciation needs to be destroyed,” he states in the press release announcing his plot to destroy this “disgraceful holiday.”

Cataldo doesn’t explain exactly how he plans to off Valentine’s Day — take Cupid out with his own bow and arrow? Lobby for a ban on scratchy lace? — but his cynicism about what is increasingly referred to as the “Hallmark Holiday” is becoming all too common.

Sure, I understand the “I’m single and thanks for reminding me how loveless my life is” resentment and the “God, please don’t let me fail the test of proving I love you because I bought you lousy carnations instead of roses” pressure.

And yes, I agree that it’s a bit of a goofy, made-up holiday designed mostly to keep the consumer wheel turning. I’ve received hundreds of emails from companies reaching to come up with a Valentine’s Day angle to pitch their product.

How about a free strawberry recipe iPhone app courtesy of the California Strawberry Commission? Hey, strawberries are red.

I’m not saying you have to fall for some idealized, unrealistic notion that your love can be neatly expressed once a year with a heart-shaped box of candy or a strawberry recipe iPhone app.

But “gathering a large amount of sympathetic malcontents together and declaring February 14 as a Day of Hate,” as one anti-VD internet campaign encouraged people to do, is a bit of a cop-out.

This year, instead of spending all that energy resenting the unrealistic romantic ideals shoved down your throats by the greeting card and candy companies, use the day to stop and appreciate the love in your life.

The other day my brother — who is single by the way — said that if they cancel Valentine’s Day, they might as well cancel Christmas.

And, as with Christmas, you can choose whether or not to get caught up in the commercialism.

For me, Christmas is less about shopping and more an opportunity to spend time with friends and loved ones — to eat, drink and be merry.

Similarly, Valentine’s Day is an opportunity to stop, take a good look at your honey, preferably across a candlelit table adorned with some good food and a nice bottle of wine, and say, “Hey, you’re really special to me and I’m glad you’re in my life.”

And, if you’re single, take the same opportunity to get together with friends, take a good look at them, preferably across a candlelit table adorned with some good food and a nice bottle of wine, and tell them, “Hey, you’re really special to me and I’m glad you’re in my life.”

Happy Valentine’s Day.

First of all, I doubt the kid “stumbled” upon the definition. It’s pretty much a rite of passage to look up “dirty” words in the dictionary when you’re a kid. I’m sure kids today are not different.

And while the parent who complained may have found the definition — “oral stimulation of the genitals” — to be “graphic,” I’m not quite sure how else one would define it.

In fact, I’m pretty sure the definition of the word “genitals,” which this kid no doubt immediately looked up after “stumbling” upon the oral sex definition was equally, if not more graphic.  

But luckily, the children of Riverside County will soon be protected from “stumbling” upon any graphic definitions as the district spokeswoman Betty Cadmus told the local paper that while “it’s hard to sit and read the dictionary, but we’ll be looking to find other things of a graphic nature.”

Are they serious?

These days, any kid with access to a computer and the ability to type the words “oral sex” into a search engine can get a lot more than a simple definition. In fact, they can get definitions of it in Spanish, Italian and/or German as well as instructional videos on how to do it, pornographic images, and videos of it being done to information on how to protect oneself from STDs when doing it.

Still, banning books for their sexual content goes on all the time. In fact, while the kids of Riverside County were being protected from definitions of oral sex, students at a school district in Virginia were being protected from young Holocaust victim Anne Frank’s innocent description of her vagina in a 1995 version of The Diary of a Young Girl.

Recently, it’s been reported that teen pregnancy is on the rise for the first time in years. Some say this is no coincidence that this is happening after 10 years of mandated abstinence-only until marriage sex education in schools that has excluded or prohibited educators from teaching about contraception and condoms to young people in high school.

Keeping information about sex and sexuality doesn’t help kids. Giving them solid, realistic and accurate information about it does. And frankly, I’d much rather my kid find out the definition of oral sex from a credible source such as the Merriam Webster dictionary than a really seriously graphic porn website like oralsex101.com.

Frankly, given the unapologetic and blatantly provocative response from the site’s management, I think the whole thing reeked of a publicity stunt, so I don’t care give them any more free publicity by naming the site.

But, stunt or no stunt, it did raise the question about how honest we are when it comes to the importance of looks when it comes to meeting people.

While most guys in my own very unofficial survey admitted that looks matter, most at least tried to pretend that what attracts them physically to a woman went beyond the superficial, with several citing “a woman’s eyes” as the first thing that draws them in. Hands came in a close second.

“They’re lying,” countered one of the many women I asked who cited “sense of humour” as what turned her crank. That’s right, because looks are only more important to men. “Oh, and a developed upper body, of course,” she added. Bingo.

Another male respondent pointed out that both eyes and a sense of humour are ridiculous answers. “What am I going to say? ‘Man, look at that woman across the street, great eyes, and what a funny hat, she must have a great sense of humour.’”

Okay, so maybe we’re all lying to ourselves. Looks do matter. Still, when pressed, most people will tell you that, when it comes to attraction, looks might get your foot in the door, but if they don’t like what greets them once they get inside, they’re just as likely to turn around and walk back out.

As American first lady Michelle Obama told Glamour magazine when they asked her for dating advice, “Cute’s good,” she said. “But cute only lasts for so long and then it’s, ‘Who are you as a person?’”

Ultimately, when it comes to lasting relationships, having similar morals, values, worldviews and goals in life play a way bigger role than physical attraction.

In fact, given the importance of all this other stuff, physical attraction seems like a pretty misguided and unreliable starting point when it comes to finding a mate.

Maybe I should start should start my own exclusive dating site for the rest of us. What do you think? averagelookingpeoplwithlotsofothergreatstufftoofer.com? No beautiful people allowed.

According to a recent survey by FindLaw.com, married women between the ages of 18 and 34 today are more likely to know about and manage a couple’s finances.

“We found that younger women, in many ways, are the most money-savvy among married couples,” said Stephanie Rahlfs, an  editor with FindLaw.com, a website that provides information on marriage.

One might argue that this is simply another domestic responsibility women have taken on in order to maintain control. Women today are better educated than previous generations.

I certainly know that when my husband assumed we’d pool our finances when we married almost five years ago, I was just a wee bit taken aback. Okay, I practically snapped his head off at the suggestion. This can become especially acute when the post-Christmas spending hangover creates more than the usual relationship tension around money.

I’ve since mellowed and recognized the benefits of working together as a team to reach our financial goals and we’ve found a way of handling our finances that works for us.

Frankly, I couldn’t imagine not having a major role in managing our finances as a couple as my mother was. And yes, I do handle our finances for the most part.

Partly because I have been handling my own finances since I was 18 and partly because, oh hell, okay, I’m a bit of a control freak…and he wouldn’t do it right anyway.

Seem like a lot? Well, that’s nothing compared to thinking about it every 52 seconds as Dr. Louann Brizendine claims they do in her book The Female Brain. Other results through the years have placed the frequency of men’s sexual thoughts everywhere from “every three minutes,” to “every 15 seconds” with “every seven seconds” topping the heap.

In their book Don’t Swallow Your Gum: Myths, Half-Truths, and Outright Lies About Your Body and Health, pediatricians Dr. Aaron Carroll or Dr. Rachel Vreeman point out just how ludicrous this latter seven-second claim is.

“If we assume that the average male is awake for 16 hours a day, each man would have to think about sex more than 8,000 times a day. That’s about as many times as a person breathes while awake,” they write.

It’s not just the math that makes these claims ridiculous. How can you accurately calculate how often someone thinks about sex in a day anyway? After all, if a poll asked you to keep track of how often you think about sex, wouldn’t you then be thinking about how often you think about sex, and therefore be thinking about sex constantly, thus skewing the results? Which raises another problem with these claims: What exactly constitutes a sexual thought?

So what’s the point of our constant obsession with how often men have who-knows-what-kind-of-fleeting thoughts about sex?

The only thing these sketchy statistics ever seem to want to prove is that men have more who-knows-how-fleeting sexual thoughts than women. By comparison, in the onepoll.com poll, women think of sex just five times a day or 1,825 times per year.

And compared to once every 52 seconds in Brizendine’s book, women only think of it once a day.

Instead of constantly perpetuating this ultimately unfounded idea that all men are walking around with nothing but sex on the brain while women —with their dearth of dirty thoughts — are clearly more sexually repressed, wouldn’t it be a lot more helpful to have more quality-over-quantity analysis about the nature of men’s and women’s sexual thoughts?

Then again, if that were the case, what would lame comedians and sitcom writers come up with as a premise for all their jokes?

MORE SEX DRUGS
Thanks to the huge popularity of erectile dysfunction drugs like Viagra, the race is on to develop drugs to treat other sexual problems such as premature ejaculation and “female sexual dysfunction.” Eventually they’ll come up with a drug that will simply simulate sex entirely, taking the performance pressure off everyone.

CELEB SEX CHANNELS
Thanks to our continuing fascination with the sex lives of our politicians, sports figures and celebrities, we’ll no longer be satisfied with the occasional scandal or “leaked” sex tape. Entire specialty channels will be devoted to airing the sex lives of the rich and famous. 

MATCHMAKING MEETS SCIENCE
Pseudo-scientifically based matchmaking will be the next big rip-off, I mean trend, in matchmaking. Scientificmatch.com claims to be one of the first online dating sites to use DNA testing in creating dating matches using a cheek swab test. The site says a better biological match means “better sex, less cheating, and perhaps even healthier children.” Hey, and if you actually like each other, bonus.

NON-HUMAN DATING
First there was the Japanese husband who confessed to his wife that he had a virtual girlfriend, a character from an addictive Nintendo DS game called Love Plus. Then, another Japanese guy married his Love Plus girlfriend in front of a live audience, an emcee, the bride’s virtual video game girlfriend — who made a speech — and a priest (a real, live, human one). He even took her on a honeymoon to Guam. Well, he took his Nintendo DS to Guam, that is. With the sophistication of robot technology on the horizon, expect to see plenty more non-human “dating.”

THE RETURN OF OLD-FASHION DATING
In reaction to the rise of more technology-driven approaches to dating and matchmaking, expect to see a movement back to good old-fashioned courtship and romance. In fact, Vancouver-based slowdancenights.com has begun holding single’s events where they play nothing but slow dancing music all night long.

Stairway to Heaven anyone?

Happy New Year.

First of all: no actual duking. Second, according to a new study out of the University of Texas at Austin, couple fights are best diffused through the careful use of “analytical” key words. Words like “think,” “understand,” “because” and “reason.”

By “careful,” I’m pretty sure they don’t mean telling your sweet, honey, darling, binkie-poo that you “'Think' the reason he never 'understands' anything you tell him is 'because' he has no sense of 'reason' and must have been dropped on his head when he was a child.” That isn’t going to diffuse anything. In fact, you’re more likely to achieve the opposite and spark an atomic-level explosion.

Using insults and condescending language rarely wins an argument.

Neither does badgering your partner into talking. You know what I mean: “What’s wrong?” “Nothing.” “C’mon, what’s wrong?” “Just forget it.” “C’mon, talk to me.” “I don’t want to talk about it.” “Fine.” Silence. Of course, that’s when you really kick in. “I have ways of making you talk,” you glare.

Needing to always be right is another useless tactic. If you’re one of these, ask yourself what’s really more important: being right or being happy and getting along with each other?

Also popular and less than productive is the old sweeping blame game. If any phrases that begin with “you always,” “you never,” or “why are you such an utter and complete dumbass” are about to come out of your mouth, bite your tongue and count to ten. Then try rephrasing your comments in ways that express how you feel rather than what what’s wrong with your partner. “I’m feeling frustrated…,” “I’m trying to understand…,” you get the picture.

Of course, despite your best efforts, sometimes a fight escalates before you both even know what hit you and you suddenly find yourselves overwhelmed by if-you-say-another-word-my-head-is-going-to-explode frustration. If this happens, the best and only solution is to walk away, calmly, (that means no running after him out the door in your underwear) and regroup.

You can both cool off and deal with whatever was there in the first place — if it really was anything — later. More often than not, stress, exhaustion, or too much Bailey’s-laced coffee turns up as the underlying culprit.

Happy Holidays. Hope you survive!

– Josey Vogels is a sex and relationship columnist and author of five books on the subjects. For more info, visit www.joseyvogels.com.