Though my husband Kip and I rarely acknowledged it, sex was certainly getting in the way of marital bliss. He wanted it a lot more than I did. Compared to how women are being depicted in the media, I felt like an undersexed loser. When counseling failed to get to the root of my problem, I tried techniques recommended by popular sexperts in books, TV, and magazines for upping my sex drive. Redbook said the key to a passionate marriage were on page 98. But for me, the answer was never on page 98. I'd Rather Eat Chocolate is the chronicle of my adventures through Sexpert Wonderland to cure my "dysfunction." It's been a poignant journey; writing this book has given Kip and I new insights into our marriage. Some of those revelations were wonderful, but many were quite uncomfortable and just the writing of this book took its toll. We had to dig very deeply into our psyches, and what came out was not always pleasant. There are so many things I wanted to hide from him and he wanted to hide from me. No book can encompass all we've gone through. It was painful to remember the arguments loud enough to wake the neighbors. Slamming doors. Silences that lasted for hours on end. Accusations, denials, defensive stances over everything from porn to strip clubs to secret fantasies. Imagine, in the meantime, writing through all of this. At times it was just plain painful for me to sit down at the keyboard and other times it was cathartic. We did have a lot of good times together. And there was a real foundation of love. But during the bad spots, I didn't know if all the emotions we both were going through would be worth it. And Kip had real doubts himself. In hindsight...of course it was worth it. However, while I was going through it, drinking cup after cup of coffee while sitting at my desk literally writing my heart out, or sitting in coffee shops crying my eyes out, I wondered how we made it at all. Yet Kip and I came through to the other side. Naturally, all of our experiences had to be distilled down to fit a certain space between the book covers. But I think it captures the best and the worst, the saddest and funniest moments we've had. In fact, there was a lot that was just plain silly, absurd, and laughingly ridiculous. Sometimes I did feel like I was at the Mad Hatter's tea party. When I'm writing about sex and my adventures in trying to up my libido with sexpert advice, things are bound to get comical. And many times that brought Kip and I to a place where we could laugh with—and, make no mistake, sometimes at—each other. The resolution we come to is not for everybody; some may find it definitely favoring a woman's lower libido rather than meeting a man's higher sex drive. (I was roundly raked over the coals for that by some reviewers. It's never fun getting an occasional beating in the press.) Notwithstanding, I think women like me, and there are estimated to be tens of millions of us, should stop being held up to a male standard of sexuality. I didn't want to try to trick myself into feeling more desire than I did, or give Kip excuses every week. By understanding my drive is within the normal curve for a woman, he no longer feels cheated and I don't feel like a miserable failure. That freed us to find new ways to work with each other given our naturally divergent drives, not in spite of them. We took more than a few wrong roads to get there. I wanted to believe that I could up my sex drive by listening to the sexperts on TV and in self-help sections telling me how I could be the proud owner of a muscular libido—if I just worked at it. Did the heavy lifting. While I'm working up a sweat trying to work up a sweat, Kip can stand there getting casually horny looking at the cover of a Cosmo magazine at the checkout stand or (ah-hem) the checker behind the stand. by. Just part of the vague feeling of randiness most guys walk around with. Easy breezy. I suspected I was never going to have the robust libido of Kip. Or of most men for that matter. For so many women attaining lust is illusive—a mystery. For men, it isn't. The differences between the sex drives of men and women appears much larger than the differences of drives within the sexes respectively. Culture, repression, lack of good sex ed? Was it me? Maybe. That was something I needed to personally explore for myself. Joan Sewell Join Joan's Mailing List!

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