Naima B. Robert – My Husband Doesnt Want Me! Advice for Muslims on Intimacy AminahJayne ORourke
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Bismillah.
Bismillah.
Assalamu
alaikum everyone. Welcome
to day 2 of the intimacy conversation.
I'm super excited to be tonight is a
marathon.
We're starting at 7 PM
UK time right now and we are going
all the way to midnight.
Yes. We have a speaker
on the hour every hour. So make sure
you strapped in. You've got your water. You've
got your tea. You've got your coffee. You've
put the kids I don't know what you've
done with them
but insha Allah
everything is being recorded. It's all being live
streamed. You will be able to watch it
back if you don't manage to, you know
stick with everything.
But I would suggest definitely making sure that
you catch up on yesterday's talks and on
any talks that you missed today inshallah.
So first and foremost, I would just like
to
reiterate
why I decided to bring these amazing people
together and present this program for you guys.
And that is that
you know, subhanAllah. I've mentioned this, before and
I'm gonna mention it again.
In the past few weeks, we've had, you
know, 2 very beloved members of our Muslim
community return to Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala.
One was my brother Ismaeel Beaumont, Alayrah Hamel
and other is Sheikh Mohammed Sharif, Alayr Hamel.
And the passing of these two men who
were so known and loved by so many
because of their commitment to the well-being
of the community
is a reminder for us all.
I've certainly taken the reminder and I pray
every single one of you takes the reminder.
Because if Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala has given
you a gift,
a gift of knowledge, a gift of wisdom,
a gift of the ability to touch people,
to communicate, to teach, to guide, to comfort.
If Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala has given you
that gift,
wallahi it is upon you to strive as
much as you can to share that gift
before your light goes out.
So really
the goal of this particular conversation is to
help us
as Muslims to have healthier, happier marriages.
Because we know that the foundation of the
family
is
is the marriage. Right? It's the relationship between
the husband and the wife
and how they work together for the sake
of Allah to build a strong family. That's
the basis of our community and if anyone
knows anything about our community, it is that
we are experiencing
serious problems in the marital home.
And when people are not happy in their
marriage,
it impacts everything.
So part of the marriage conversation which is
my podcast on my channel. If you haven't
subscribed then please do so right now. But
part of the marriage conversation and then the
continuing
intimacy conversation
is around the idea that
if we can get our marriages right, if
we can learn and grow and evolve to
become better husbands and wives and spouses for
each other,
There is a refuge there
in this difficult world that we live in
where Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala has made us
garments for each other.
We can strengthen each other. We can support
each other and we can be a solid
unit
that will inspire,
motivate and guide our own children.
And that has a ripple effect because they
go out into the world with what we've
taught them. And they establish their families with
what we've taught them. So
having
unhappy marriages as the basis for a community
is just not good enough.
Having marriages where either the husband or the
wife feels
unfulfilled,
lonely,
ice isolated,
undesirable,
is not acceptable.
That is not what Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
has legislated marriage for. Con contrary to popular
belief,
marriage is
not just doom and gloom and hardship and
sacrifice.
There is joy. There should be joy. There
should be love. There should be pleasure. There
should be play, there should be exploration
and that's what this intimacy conversation is all
about. Please, while you're listening to this, if
you hear what I'm saying, if you're picking
up what I'm putting down, put a yes
in the chat. Okay? This is very important
and I want to go to our first
guest tonight to hear Amina,
what do you think of what I've said?
How important is it for us to have
that satisfaction within our homes? Or what impact
is the dissatisfaction having?
Well, I think
I agree with everything that you said. And,
you know, there's just so so much, you
know, to converse in regards to this. Because
even just this week, I read a really
sad, my heart sank kind of article that
a Muslim woman living in the west had
written, an English speaking Muslim woman. And she
was practicing. And she was 29, not married,
never been in a relationship.
And her article was about being touched and
wanting to be held. Right? Now I didn't
agree with her article. You may have read
it. You may have seen it online. It
kind of went around and did the rounds
like many of these things do.
And all it screamed out to me was,
you know, this lack or this inability to
show physical affection
where we can
in front of our children.
Hugs, kisses, you know, all the things we
know are halal. And I know there's differences
of opinion out there for this kind of
thing, but having soft eyes when we're speaking
to our family members, you know, and
doing the love languages, acts of service for
each other, you know, and finding ways to
communicate even in a nonverbal way or even
a non, you know, physically intimate and sexual
way
to illustrate to whether it's the children or
the adults in the house, you know, especially
the spouse. When the when the 2 spouses
are not coming together
and tasting the sweetness that Alaris said, this
is the sweetness for you.
Everything else around it, you know, these anger,
resentment,
frustration, like you said, dissatisfaction.
So I just couldn't agree more with what
you said, and it's so unpackable. Right? It's
like we like, you're gonna be here all
night.
Exactly. Well, that's why we're with you for
the next 45 minutes or so just to
just to unpack. So I think Insha'Allah
you know let's have a little firstly introduction
to you
and the work that you do. Please tell
the audience a bit more about yourself and
the work that you do and then we
can go into sort of how you started
talking
about, you know, issues that arise in Muslim
marriages inshallah
especially in the bedroom.
Okay.
Yeah. So my name is Amina Jane O'Rourke
for those of you that don't know me.
And I've been
a pastoral support companion, I suppose, in many
respects for about 10 years now to Muslim
women, both converts, reverts,
and born Muslim ladies.
And
I was a public servant during that time
for most of it. And in 2019, I
left my public service role so that I
could become a private therapist
for predominantly Muslim women and not exclusively. You
know, I
really love serving Muslim women. So I'm an
emotional freedom techniques practitioner
and advanced tapping therapist.
And
what that actually is is
it helps us
funnel down on some other things that cause
I mean, it can be used for almost
anything
in all honesty with you, but what I've
mainly used it for with, the Muslim women
that I serve is funneling down around the
anxieties that affect our quality of life every
day. And, of course, they come in many
shapes
and sizes.
So,
of course, in a therapeutic space, you know,
in that therapeutic relationship, ladies talk to you
about a great many things. And I'm also
on a number of online platforms where ladies
can anonymously share whatever it is that they're
struggling with and things like that.
And I actually
was giving out
advice to ladies who were sharing, you know,
like, marital frustrations, especially sexual frustrations in their
relationships.
And the women in the group started referring
to me as the * therapist of the
group, which was not an intentional thing. I'm
just being super helpful. I'm like, this should
be common sense for most of us. This
is life skills. This is basically, you know,
female for tour. We should know this. We
should be raised with this kind of thing.
And quite often, we're not. And I remember
asking,
a sister a few months ago, actually. Well,
we've we've quite it might have been last
year, in fact, subhanallah. The time is, like,
you've reminded us going just so fast. And
I remember saying to her, bless her, you
know, like, what kind of prep do you
ladies get before you, you know, get married
when you're having an arranged marriage? Or
I actually only discovered recently what a love
marriage was according to lots of Muslim community.
So the you know, we're still unpacking lots
of
concepts around you know, social concepts around,
like, how relationships establish and all that kind
of thing. And she said to me, nothing.
We kinda get sexual innuendos at The Mendy.
And I said, how old were you when
you got married? And she's like, 30. And
I was like, you had absolutely no *
education at all, like, before then. And she
was like, no. And she was like, you
just can't really ask anybody about that. And
I was
I said, that's awful. And she she probably
was thinking, is it? And I didn't mean
it, you know, to, like I'll be I
was shocked. I was shocked. I was shocked
that
as Muslims, we don't want other people, you
know, giving our children the * education because
there's lots of things in there that, you
know, don't correlate well with, you know, our
position on certain things and what we would
encourage at certain ages and without certain parameters
in place and all that kind of stuff.
And we know what those boundaries are. Most
of us do, I'm guessing, on here.
And but I thought, surely, we we must
have a halal alternative to educate our young
people and teach them that, actually, sort of
most of enjoyable things that you're going to
experience on the face of this earth, Allara
has decided this for you, and, you know,
it's even going to continue into gender and,
you know, you know, that's a big part
of the gender experience also, you know, and
we get a taste of that here and
how and
I was just so flummoxed that there's not
even sexual health is even even taking care
of yourself as a young lady. You know,
you can't even talk about labia or, you
know, clitoris or and let's just renew our
intention while ago even into
mentioning those things because even the terminology can
cause people stress, shame, and anxiety. So
we're here sincerely seeking solution
for things that bring us into sacred spaces
with Allah
Right? We're not doing this
for any other reason
than to connect with the humans he's placed
around us in divine decree so that we
can gain closeness to him and obedience to
him. Right?
So I meant to do that at the
beginning. I apologize.
So even talking about body parts according to
what they're actually called, you know, and being
able to, you know,
look after themselves. I was quite shocked. And
so many young heritage Muslims are actually sexually
active before they get married, quite often living
in the west, not all.
But even having a space to be able
to say, right. Okay. Unfortunately,
this mistake has happened, and having a safe
space to be able to process some of
that. And it all starts in the home,
like you said. Right? Because
not that I'm blaming parents for other people's
behavior. When young people grow up, they make
their own choices. However,
have we allowed emotional safe space for our
young people to grow in and ask the
awkward questions in the home so they don't
need to go and Google it, or they
don't need to go and YouTube it, or
they don't need to go on Instagram and
look at pages that because we all I
know that my social media is a beautifully
positive place because of the people I follow,
but I know not everybody is like that.
It's, you know, we are what we consume
kind of thing, even in visual content as
we know.
So I I believe I've gone on a
little bit of a tangent there, my dear,
Naima.
You're good. You're good. You're good. I
think we know what we're what I'm getting
from you is, you
know, part of what's brought you to this
space.
And we have an episode, guys. We have
an episode coming out of the marriage conversation,
which we recorded a while back. So that's
coming out. So make sure that you keep
an eye out for that.
But,
okay.
I had an experience,
where I was invited to Huddersfield
to deliver a talk on romance and marital
intimacy, right? To a group of Muslim women.
So
the first thing that I asked was
who asked for this topic?
Whose idea was it to have this topic?
Okay. Did the sisters ask for this or
did the brothers say she needs to talk
to the sisters about marital
intimacy. Right?
And I don't know. We didn't get an
answer to that. But what did come out
was
the number of sisters who eventually
did share that
they're not satisfied.
That they wish somebody would talk to their
husbands.
Right? That they wish that their husbands knew
better
how to please them. You know the importance
of pleasing them.
You know that they didn't want to just
be touched in that context but they wanted
to be touched outside of that context as
well. So what have you found to be
the case
with because and and again why I ask
this is because of the idea that we
have culturally
that only men experience desire, Right? That only
men have an appetite and therefore only men
become frustrated. Only men are dissatisfied. Only men
want more.
But that's not quite the case, is it?
What have you found? That's a that is
like an absolute myth, isn't it? It really
is because,
you know, if we actually look into our
own, you know, historic literature
around, you know, like, the, you know, the
scholars of the past who would specifically focus
on this aspect
of living life as a Muslim. So, would
you believe that? We had actual scholars who
focused on this, who spoke on this, who
wrote on this, and shared on this topic
alone. A lot of those were women and
big advocates for
that, you know, like, the female sexual appetite
is you know,
I can't remember exactly,
you know, which scholar said it, but she
was like, you know, the female sexual appetite
is, like, 9 parts, and the and the
most man's appetite is 1.
And she goes into all the different levels
of why that's the case.
And the reason I'm mentioning that is because
it is a myth and it is a
taboo
that, you know, women have you know, women
are not
you know, you do not have a high
* drive or high libido and type of
that type of thing. And, of course, they
absolutely do. Allah created them that way,
and it's all part of like, even in
a lot of the literature I've read is
that even if you're not in the if
you're not if you're in a space of
or sexual intimacy, should I say, with your
husband and it's not exactly ticking all your
boxes, keep doing it anyway and even increase
the frequency of it because that's going to
allow for your intimacy to really grow. And
I think, like, the number one problem we
have in the relationships is the communication. Right?
So it's like, this is, like it's awkward
for him. It's awkward for her. She wants
to communicate, but she doesn't wanna belittle him.
She doesn't wanna make him feel embarrassed. Or
she may have got super frustrated once and
said something she regrets, and he's never forgotten
it. And he carries that baggage every time
he goes into intimacy sexual intimacy with her.
And, of course, it's the reparative work, whether
it's an argument completely not related to sexual
intimacy or not. If we don't do the
emotional, intellectual, reparative work between husband and wife,
then we can't be emotionally and spiritually
and sorry. Go ahead.
Oh, are you on mute?
We can't be emotionally and physically. Please finish.
I have a point that I wanted to
draw up. Sorry. Yeah. It's that, you know,
like, we really can't be that wholly
physically, emotionally, spiritually,
intellectually,
you know, and sexually
vulnerable
in that space where we are gonna be
our most vulnerable if we're carrying a bit
of that baggage from before.
So
So there were 2 questions that came to
mind because one of the sisters well, several
of the sisters and this is something that
you may have encountered and guys let us
know in the chat if this resonates.
The difficulty of communicating
about bedroom
matters
with husbands who typically are not great at
communication
in general.
But in this area, it's like a no
go. So firstly,
how can
how can a woman who's been married for
a while, not newlyweds and people like that
But you know, you've been married, you've set
a pattern where we don't talk about this.
How can we break that pattern or disrupt
that pattern? That's my first question.
And then I'd love you to go into
the reparative
work because it's my first time hearing that
expression and I'd love for you to give
the viewers a bit more on what do
you mean by repairing in that context.
Okay. So firstly, I think women who've been
married a while,
and often find it a struggle to communicate
are often the best placed people to broach
that conversation.
You know, Allah,
I wish I had a more eloquent way
to say this right now because I wasn't
prepping for that. But we know that Allah,
you know, has blessed women with, like, this
incredible,
almost unconditional
good regard for a husband. So the point,
she's gonna stay with him. She's gonna stay
with him. She's gonna stay with him. She's
gonna stay with him. Right? And she's in
it for the long haul most of the
time.
She using open language.
And we forget how basic this can be.
Right? So if a woman was approaching a
husband and she wanted to, you know,
let him know that her needs weren't meet
being met, I would always suggest the conversation
starts
with her opening up to him
about
what what would he like?
Is there anything that's not happening for him?
Because when he finishes speaking,
she will then be able to say, okay.
It's my turn. Can I just share something
with you, something that I've noticed? And I've
been meaning to talk to you for about
about it for a while,
And I've not wanted to worry you about
it. I've not wanted you to to worry
about it or anything.
Using open language that usually starts without, you
know, it's not an interrogation. It's open language.
So when I say open language, you're the
link you're you're the literature lady here. So
you can probably do this better than I
can because I I do ad hoc or
and it almost always lands well. You know,
in the heat of the moment, if somebody
used to ask me a question in relation
to that, what about using language like? So
for example, let's have a think.
Even using indirect language, open indirect language, like,
don't you know that I would love it
if you x? And I'm not talking about
being in the bedroom at that time. I'm
talking about the intellectual intimacy and the, yeah,
the intellectual and mental intimacy that starts during
the day. Sometimes, I would love it, you
know, spontaneity type of thing, you know, and
you start that thought process. And that gets
his brain thinking that what on earth is
she talking about? This is not
this is not what we do. And what
she's doing is initiating a change in, you
know, the behavior of that part of the
relationship.
And
it's about having the courage in that first
instance because almost
in a lot of situations, not almost always,
but in a lot of situations,
he will respond very positively to that because
truth is he's been wanting and longing for
that too, that kind of spontaneity
or, you know, even that playful talk during
the daylight hours or even first thing in
the morning, unexpected times,
and always with smiles if we can bear
a smile.
One of the things that I wanted to
mention as part of this, and it's a
bit of a disclaimer, is when people have
suffered sexual trauma, whether it's men or women,
you're almost always I'm not aware of any
situations where that didn't need working through first
to be able to show up intimately
with your spouse. And that can feel very
scary,
you know, to men and women to do,
but it it can significantly block even communication
because of the the in enormous shame around
those things.
So even if you're not going to sell
not going to sell.
Even if you're not going to tell your
spouse tell your spouse.
I can hear myself on a minute.
Even if we're not going to tell our
spouse
about what's happened, either during a young adulthood
or during childhood,
I do highly recommend that people seek therapy
for that so that it doesn't show up
as,
something that blocks and causes some kind of
a block in your current relationship.
Because
trauma lots of people have been through trauma,
and there are ways and processes to process
that
and bring closure to that and not carry
it with us as we go forward. So
going back to, sorry, your initial question,
open up the path of communication and being
really brave and vulnerable when that's not your
habit.
If you're in this relationship this month for
the rest of your life, and this is,
like, straight to the sisters, obviously, I know
that this isn't necessarily a a sisters only
space at the moment, but
you have to brave that conversation. And, likewise,
if it's if it's the men, somebody's gotta
be bold enough and brave enough to say,
do you know?
I am spending the rest of my life
with you.
I love you a lot.
You know? And by the way, I was
thinking about this. One of the
indirect ways and I was gonna share this
later. I know other people have shared this,
right,
probably throughout this conference. Yeah. I hope you
know how to do this. Yes. Yes. Yes.
I've even asked you. Sorry.
I'm like, start a book club with your
partner, with you know, with your husband.
Share this. Read through it. This is gonna
initiate a lot of intimacy just reading through
this this text in itself because it's
all about sexual intimacy,
you know, in terms of,
having difficult conversations. You can giggle together about
it. You can laugh and say, oh, I
could never have said that to you. And
did you read this paragraph?
You can almost do it. It doesn't have
to be
we need to strip the shame away from
it and the embarrassment and,
you know, hold true space for each other.
I'm in this marriage with you, and I
am so happy to be here.
And one of the things I wanted us
to work on because we probably haven't had
the opportunity if we were married a few
years, if we've had a few children, or
we've both been working, or you've been working
a lot, I'd really like us both to
taste that sweetness that Alara has written for
us. And I know we both get tired.
If we use lots of we language instead
of I or you, it's less accusatory.
You know, like, you're not doing it kind
of thing. That. Yeah. I like that.
That's where I'm going with open language and
inviting language. It's we're in this together. You
know? It's not all you. It's not all
me, and you can proactively do
different things together without it all being on
you and all being on him. And I'll
be surprised.
I haven't had anybody come back to me
after that suggestion and tell me that that's
not been a significant step forward between sexual
intimacy together. Because it goes through, you know
his book. I'm sure you've read it. Yeah.
Goes through lots of different aspects of intimacy,
emotional intimacy, and all those kind of things
as well. You know? So
Excellent. Excellent. So would you advise people to
have
more conversation? Whatever the conversation is. Right? Whether
it's there's not enough or it's not varied
enough or it's not kind of doing what
it needs to do. It's not giving what
needs to be gave,
outside of the bedroom.
Could you repeat that, my darling? Say that
again. Sorry. There's a dog barking outside and
they're hoping that the AI is drowning it
out. Can you hear it?
Yeah. I can.
Do you recommend having those conversations outside of
the bedroom?
Yeah. I think if you yes. Because it
can be
almost it can put both people on the
spot,
and it can almost kill a moment where
you're about to be intimate with each other.
And it's like all of a sudden, there's
there's a blockade there. You know? Like, what
does she mean? But, also, there's a time
once you've had those initial conversations
about because Muslims I mean, I don't know
whether it's just Muslims or whether it's, like,
the general public. So, obviously, Muslims are my
frame of reference here,
is they tend to get very routine about
a lot of things including like, they call
it doing the deed, and I'm like,
don't call it doing the deed. So how?
The deed. Is that what it's called, guys?
Put in the chat if that's what you
guys call it, doing the deed. Mhmm. Interesting.
It almost sounds like a chore. Right?
Oh my god. I did not meet you
so that it would feel like a chore.
Okay. But, sis, hold on. Okay? I need
to push back on this. Okay?
Because the energy when especially wives talk about
intimacy
for a lot of women
They do see it like a chore.
What do we do about that?
Educate the younger men. I'm not sure we
can educate the older men. And as the
Gottman Institute did a really in have you
heard of the Gottman Institute? Yep. So the
Gottman Institute did a really
married ends. They get married again, do exactly
the same thing. Married ends, and they carry
on and they carry on. And this is
one of one of my only issues with
the polygynous conversation is, like, let's not lose
polygyny as an avoidance behavior for not
polygyny
as an avoidance behavior for not fixing up
what's wrong there.
You know? Because all of these women in
in your life deserve
all of the things that are failing in
the first. Right? You know? Like
so
the re the reason I mentioned this is
the Gottman Institute is a really interesting survey,
and the men are not likely to change
their behaviors,
but women
and they will go from part you know,
like, to wife to wife to wife, what
have you. And women are more likely to
change all of the behaviors
to stay with the husband
to make that marriage work than they are
to leave and just go on and do
the same
behaviors with somebody new, which is really interesting
because it it speaks volumes about
the emotional connection of women. Right? And I
think
if we just even look at that, that
kinda gives us a significant sign that, you
know, some men,
a lot of men, get to a stage
where they they almost consider themselves,
you know, like, no longer a student. And
we know that we're students till death. Right?
Like, this is sub and culture and lots
of other things will dictate, you know, like,
once you hit a certain age or once
you hit a certain status in your family
and all these kind of things, you no
longer
need to learn. And the truth is,
when your children are growing up and moving
out doing their own thing, that's a brilliant
time to reignite your passion for each other.
It doesn't matter if you're a little bit
older than you were before. It's like you
bet. You know, they still got a lot
of life to live, inshallah, together.
And it's an ideal opportunity. We really need
men to have safe spaces to be vulnerable,
and I don't even think that should always
be with the women. They need safe spaces,
I think, sometimes with men because I I
think we can only understand to a certain
extent
what their male subjective reality is. Right? So
Yeah. And I think this space of vulnerability
with women, but I don't think we have,
an absolute right to all of their vulnerability.
You know, like, we shouldn't get that squished
with lots of western concepts around, oh, you
should be 100%
try no. Men should have their stuff, and
women should have their you know, men should
have their spaces. Women should have their spaces,
and then they have the space when they
come together. So
I'm really sorry
because we've got I think we talked about
this when we spoke before. You've got the
post colonial hangover, if we could call it
that, legacy,
the lost legacy
of educating
both men and women
to a place where they can live fruitful
Muslim
thriving lives. And we know the education system
was deconstructed with colonialism.
You know, they separated,
like, the secular subjects.
Whereas before, in Islamic
education, throughout history of Islam, it's all everything
leads you back to Allah. Algebra leads you
back to Allah. Astronomy leads you back to
Allah. And it was all segmented off. So
deen became compartmentalized,
almost, you know, in the sciences of deen
and separated.
And the reason I'm going off on that
tangent is because it is so important in
relation to like, we real this is our
wholesome reality.
Like, it we don't switch it off.
And that text in the middle of the
day, I can't wait to see you later.
You know? Or whether it's a note that
you leave in the morning or whether it's
just an act of service that lets that
person know, I'm going to see you tonight,
and we know exactly what for.
The playful aspects,
a little bit of a loss for fixing
people of a certain age because
they're they're not really interested
Allah knows the truth and Allah knows. And
my advice to those women is to work
on finding the deep emotional fulfillment
that you can get out of other aspects
of life.
And that might sound like I'm copping out
and spiritually bypassing. I'm absolutely not copping out
and spiritually bypassing. If women are not gonna
get divorced and we're gonna stay in those
marriages, we can't force other people to change,
can we? And if it feels like a
chore and they won't have those conversations or
they're not open to having those conversations,
we can't force them to have those conversations.
I'm sorry.
I need you to actually repeat that
because I know no. No. No. I'm serious
because I know how many times we have
sisters and brothers.
But for the sake of argument, let's say
sisters who come to these conferences, come to
these conversations,
and
they know that their husband's not gonna listen.
They know that he's not available for this
conversation.
Right?
They're learning
what's possible.
They may even be seeing what's possible by
hearing other Muslim women having the conversation,
but they know
that's not what I have at home. I
know what I've got at home and it's
not this. So what you offered
as advice for sisters who may think this
is amazing,
may think this is so true, this is
so good, it will be so awesome but
I know that my old man's not for
it. I need you to repeat that again
because it's it's not an insignificant segment of
the population. Let's be frank, especially women who
have committed. They're in it for the long
haul. They're not about to divorce especially for
the sake of intimacy or something. Please, sis,
could you give that advice again? I need
everybody to pay attention to this, and make
sure that you're tagging your friends and sending
it to them, But it was really, really,
really good.
So my advice was if you have decided
to stay for the long haul and you're
not you know, you don't want to make
a significant change in your spouse, like, as
in, like, you're not changing spouses because there's
no guarantee. You you know, we always say
that grass is greener speech, don't we? It's
not always the case.
You have to work on yourself to find
deep emotional fulfilment,
and that can be done in a variety
of different ways
so that you're getting your deep emotional fulfilment
outside of intimacy.
Because that matters, and that will,
in an extreme way, affect your quality of
life and the joy you experience
every day.
And it almost, to an extent,
you may never have that intimacy box ticked
if you've decided to stay in that short
decision. And Allah knows best.
May Allah reward you for all the good
reasons that you've stayed for. Because he's not
always necessarily bad men. They're just not very
good at that conversation, or they're not good
at that side of things,
and you want to stay with them anyway,
there are other ways that you can find
deep emotional fulfillment while you're here
before we get called back to Allah. And
I know that's not exactly verbatim what I
said a moment ago, Naima.
But,
It was in the flow, and he's like,
can you repeat that?
I'm not used to repeating it straight after
because it's
It was a download, but it's it's something
really, really important.
Because, you know, we can have a conversation
all day long about what to do about
dissatisfaction in your marriage.
But, you know, at least giving people some
practical advice for how to cope in a
situation where they know that this that, you
know, that it's it's not gonna happen for
them. I think it's it's it's it's realistic,
and it's helpful. So just ask Al Qaeda
on for that. Knowing that
most of the time,
it's not you,
It really isn't you
as the woman if you're prepared to have
those conversations and the man's not
You're being you're being an inviter.
You're being a diee. You're inviting your husband
back to Allah through this conversation about intimacy
And if he doesn't want to take that
invitation,
call us. We can't force it,
but it doesn't have to define us or
take anything away from us for the rest
of our lives.
We can find deep emotional I 100% believe
that when we find emotional fulfillment and this
is not supposed to bypass any of our
sexual frustration, by the way. It's valid, and
it's important, and it can feel paralyzing, you
know, depending on who it's going on with
and where and why.
But we can find deep emotional fulfillment even
without physical sexual intimacy in this life. It's
an important part of marriage, but it's not
all of marriage, you know,
I suppose is the highlighted point there. Yeah.
No. And it's a and that's a good
point. It's a good point. Okay. So I'm
really, really happy
that inshallah those of you who are watching,
who have that particular situation, hopefully, you can
think more about what sister Amina said.
So let's talk about those who potentially
either it's too bad physically. Right? What can
they do when the frustration
is manifesting itself physically?
And then what kind of, you know, what
kind of communication can we be having to
tackle the dissatisfaction with regards to our spouses
inshallah. And also if you have anything to
offer the men as well, I would really
appreciate that because I know we have a
lot of brothers who'll be watching this and,
you know, they may be very sexually frustrated
as well. You know, they may be in
a dead bedroom. They may be in, you
know, a sexist marriage. You know, it's not
just one way. So what advice do you
have for them on the emotional side and
on the physical side?
The advice, I think, for the men is
well, yeah, in this equation that you've just
given me, I think it's much easier for
the men than it is for the women
sometimes
in the sense that
men,
brothers,
if your wife
and this is no you know, this is
not me accusing you. I'm not saying you
did something wrong. I'm saying
something in this world may have taught your
wife that she's not desirable, that she's not
sexy, that she's not ticking your boxes for
some reason, and that can really dampen her,
needs, her physical needs, her * drive. She
might not really be interested if she works
as well as being at home with the
children, has lots of chores and lots of,
you know, exhaustion and all that kind of
thing. If your wife feels
like you can't wait to see her and
I'm not saying,
you know, like, we see a lot on,
like, western media, you know,
with all of it doesn't have to be
all roses and I mean, roses are nice.
Gatewife roses.
But it's not roses every day. My point
is is that
if you let her know,
even once every few days,
that you have deep desire for her, and
it can be it doesn't have to be
you can let her know this without actually,
you know, in initiating sexual activity with her.
You can walk past her in the house.
You can hold her. You can flirtatiously,
you know, touch her because she's halal for
you. And Allah has made it this way.
Away from children, obviously, and away from, any
other family members.
You can take advantage of opportunities
and catch her off guard like that. And
when she feels desired by you, even if
she's put weight on after she's had children,
even if she's got wonderful tiger marks from
having children also known as stretch marks, even
if, you know, like,
her * are different since she's been breastfeeding
the children and things like that.
Yeah. This just reminds me, actually, and I'm
going to share it very quickly. Umrah bin
Khattab, may Allah be pleased, with him, had
this companion come to him, and he was
Umar, may Allah be pleased, with him. His
wife was arguing with him at the time,
and the other companion approached. I can't remember
the other companion's name. Allah forgive me.
And,
he starts walking back away from the house
because he can hear them having an argument.
And, a, say to him, says to him,
you know, what is it? What do you
need? And he said, well, I was coming
to you for a marriage advice, but I
heard your wife screaming. And I thought you
got enough of your own problems, so I
thought I would leave. And he said, no.
No. No. Come and tell me what it
is that you need. And he said, why
are you letting your wife talk to to
you like that? We all know about Umar
ibn Khasab. Right? We know, masha'Allah,
who, you know, like, a lot about his
life and everything and how respected and loved
he was by the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa
sallam alallahu.
And,
he said, why do you let your wife
shout at you like that? And he was
like, you know, she sacrificed her youth
for me to have the children, and she,
you know, saves me the cost of a
wetness. She saves me the cost of a
cleaner. She saves me the cost of a
cook. She saves me the cost of, like,
all these different servant folks that they would
have had around that time, because that would
have been a social norm for them.
So sometimes she needs to let some steam
off, so I let her let some steam
off. And this is at the time when
he was the caliph. May Allah be pleased
with him. He's letting his wife vent and
shout. Okay?
Why am I highlighting that? Because he says
a really important point. She sacrifices
her youth for me. So when we consider
that we're not going to be in our
you know, women
still need to feel desired, loved, longed for,
and invested in
Even as we grow in age, even as,
you know,
we we grow intellectually and spiritually,
there's always that innate feeling of wanting to
be desired by the person who you've committed
to for the rest of your life. And
if you can make sure that your wife
feels desired, and you can do that in
a variety of ways, You can send her
flirtatious text messages when you're not together. You're
allowed to do that. It's halal. She's your
wife.
I would advocate doing things like that in
the modern digital world world. Use it to
your advantage. You know, make promises about the
evening when you get home.
Talk about specific aspects of her and, you
know, like, how you love the way her
hair falls or, you know, the way the
sun shines on her eyes. All these little
things
help her
know, oh, he really does deeply love me.
And when she feels, you know, intellectually stimulated
by you and emotionally stimulated by you, she's
gonna be all for much more intimacy
most of the time. And I'm not saying,
you know, do it in a facetious way
or
in an insincere way,
but practice it. Practice sharing those bits of
information with her. Compliment
what a good mother she is to your
children.
Show her your appreciation.
Believe me, most of the time, a lady
* drive will go up when she's got
a husband that talks to her like that.
Okay? So and on the female side of
things
and it's all about what is balanced. Right?
So
I was talking about this the other day
to somebody else, and we live in a
hypersexualized
society, obviously. We all know this. This is
not new news. Well, we certainly do in
the western, and this is a global audience.
We're in the west.
There's billboards galore and bust
adverts everywhere. We've you know, like, it's just
it's just it's everywhere,
in the adverts on TV and all that
kind of stuff.
So
if you find,
like,
there's no one answer for, you know, like,
how much intimacy
is fair. Right? So if a husband has
got a really high * drive, he does
have to take into consideration if his wife's
working and she's got lots of other responsibilities,
and she's trying to make herself available to
him,
you know, bearing in mind that she might
not be working out of choice. They might
be she might be working to relieve financial
hardship. So there has to be a balance
there about that.
And I was reading,
recently about,
there was, one of the other Sahaba can't
remember his name a lot, forgive me. And
he was with Umar ibn Khattab when he
was the caliph again.
And a lady came, and she was complaining
about her husband spending all of his time
either at work or in worship and not
spending time enough with her. And she said,
I haven't got anything to thank him for,
basically, because he's never available for me as
my husband.
And,
the other companion, may I please, with him?
It was Kab or something like that. Might
not be pronouncing his name right, so Allah
forgive me.
Had said, you know,
if you've got 4 wives,
the other 3 nights are for Allah.
So if we even look at that very
basic
I know not everybody's got 4 wives or
2 or 3. So if in a monogamous
context, you're with each other every single night
You know, at least once a week
I think is reasonable and fair And this
is not,
one rule fits all. Some people like once
a day. That's fine if both parties are
up once a day.
There are some ladies who once a day
is not enough for them.
So whether you're a man or a woman,
I encourage you
if you're feeling sexually frustrated
in your marriage and you've communicated that and
your partner you know, your your wife or
your husband I keep referring to partner because
I'm not sure which gender I'm talking about
in any given one moment because I'm referring
to both,
is
you need to consider fasting from the things
that arouse you when you're apart.
So if you're consuming a lot of Bollywood,
Nollywood, and Hollywood that's making you feel aroused
because we know that there's lots of arousing
material in there, we need to consider having
a visual fast from that. And I'm not
talking about, like,
every like, never watching it. I'm saying
be vigilant about yourself, know yourself.
When I watched that particular program, it's like
there was something on,
last year called Bridgerton or something like that.
Right? Yes. Yes. We we we had another
sister another speaker yesterday referencing
Bridgerton specifically,
because this came up, you know, with how
to deal with desire especially if you're single.
Right?
And I love that you reiterated that point
because she said the same thing. She said
be mindful of what you're consuming.
So kind of soft * that's kind of
aimed at women like Bridgerton and other things
like that. She actually mentioned it. Sorry, sis.
It's just amazing that this this, synergy, across,
across so many of the speakers. Go on.
No. Well, exactly. So, like, when you look
at, like, we're all looking for something halal
to watch or something that's got rich, you
know, visual diversity in it. We're all drawn
to it. Right? Because it is about inclusion
and feeling belonging and all this kind of
stuff. I put register on. I had to
turn it off in 10 minutes because let
me tell you, I would never watch something
like that. And I was like, oh my
goodness. I said, I can't believe all the
one sits online and talking about watching this
program.
And it's because I've not seen anything that
graphic for a long time.
A really long time, like, be Muslim life,
you know, like, in movies and things like
that. That was the last time I saw
something like that. So I was like, well,
it's no wonder
people are feeling really sexually frustrated. They're consuming
that and even it's not just visual, you
know, like, some of the songs that people
are listening to. Because we know lots of
Muslims listen to music.
And there are certain, you know, there's certain
music that people listen to and it will
be it will arouse them, you know, like,
my mom, who's not Muslim, she used to
call it,
audio *. That's what she used to call
music.
She's like, I don't know. Anybody can put
this thing on, you know, like, because it
just because of the content of it and
the way it is. And I know some
people listen to it and some people don't.
But
be vigilant
on what we're actually consuming,
what we're and even on Instagram and even
on Facebook and looking at you know, so,
like, lots of ladies will look at other
ladies,
and they will compare themselves to whatever looks
like their live reality on Instagram. Like and
there's lots of people posting couples' pictures of,
like, you're not seeing lots of overt affection
and stuff like that, but there's always, on
the discover page, something that you definitely wouldn't
have clicked on before, that's got a little
bit more nakedness or oversteps the mark a
little bit.
And, you know, we can't completely protect ourselves
from it in the digital world that we're
living in, but we can be aware that,
it's a bit of a trigger for me,
that.
And also certain foods, you know, that we
and I know you've had a speaker or
you're having a speaker later today.
The beautiful
Lisa Maher Pamela. Yep. There are certain news
that you may not even know are giving
you higher * drive than you realize. Like,
dates. We all love dates. They are hot
food, and they're not meant for everybody. Like,
if you're a young person not married, you
probably shouldn't eat a load of dates.
Eat dates because they're good for you. But
if you're finding that you're struggling with desire
as a single person, that's one of the
things you might wanna consider swapping for something
else because it's hot and it's not for
dizzy, I can't sweet and all that kind
of thing.
So for women who are physically really struggling,
they need to assess why.
Today, I was tagged in a post on,
a group that I'm on.
And the lady who was anonymous
said that she's * regularly even though she's
married and she's watching * all the time
and her husband doesn't know.
And she said no matter she said, like,
even once a week is definitely not enough
for her. Her husband's
always, throughout the whole marriage, always had, you
know, this that compatibility
factor
and being able to come together knowing that
you don't completely align on that and understanding
each other's cues for what they need. Like
men, who've got a a wife with a
high * drive, you need to be sympathetic
and empathetic to that physically,
emotionally,
and spiritually because men aren't supposed to say
no to women any more than women are
supposed to say no to men. Your garments,
that's what it's about all about. Right? You
might have different narrations about that slightly, but
the truth is if men have got, you
know, commussed at the end, it's your she
you're a protection
from * and * for a lot of
women that are out there who are resorting
to that. So I have to say, women
should absolutely not be turning into *. That's
gonna initiate, you know, dopamine hits in the
brain,
and it's gonna alter the brain function, which
will become an addiction.
You know? And
I was so sad to see that post
because the truth is
when we find deep emotional fulfillment in our
own existence as independent
oh, not independent.
That's the wrong term. But as Muslim women,
because we're always, you know, either working together
or in a marriage or in a community
of some kind. When we find deep emotional
fulfillment in our existence with Allah,
You know, we can do without certain things
or tone certain things down. We really truly
can, and it takes analyzing
and
doing a lot of personal development work, which
I know you're passionate about as well. Like,
I love that you do the write your
story work. Absolutely love that because
it makes it about the women and their
journeys.
Validation and acceptance of every life experience as
being
that must have been, like, super hard and
what have you.
The reason why I'm mentioning that is because
women can find another focus.
And
when we talk about
hypersexualization,
whether it's men or women, we have to
go back to
balance. So it's if you physically,
emotionally, mentally, or spiritually can't fulfill that need
every single day for your spouse, just have
an honest conversation saying, look, I don't want
you to be disappointed with me. We're gonna
need to compromise on this, and I wanna
make you getting,
you know, what you need. And I wanna
make sure I'm getting what I need in
terms of, like, rest or whatever, you know,
whatever the other person's saying.
Communication,
you we've just gotta start speaking to each
other. It really is where the solution lies.
Yeah. I could I completely hear that and
that message has come through loud and clear,
sis, in your talk, which is that, you
know, this talk is all about, you know,
tackling sexual dissatisfaction and I think we can
all agree that communication
is, you know, is our biggest tool.
So guys, I need you to listen back
to this,
because there were lots of gems.
The studios from amongst us will be taking
notes.
If you do take notes and you share
them on socials, please tag us. Sister Amina
Jane O'Rourke. She's Amina Jane O'Rourke on Instagram
and other platforms.
Tag me so more people can benefit.
Sis, how can people get in touch with
you? How can they follow you? And is
do you have anything
at the moment available so that people can
work with you?
Yeah. So I
hold space for women only because of the
nature of the conversations that we have. Thank
you for that, Naima. And so
I started,
the hareem,
which kind of
it's actually not all about concubinage, by the
way. But and and I had debunked that
straight away. I was like, the harem is
about, you know, like, women being haram for
all the other men except the ones that
they're not haram for. Right? So but, basically,
a female only safe space, where we hold
an intimacy conversation once a month, and we
work through our emotional hygiene at home to
improve our, you know, mental and emotional connection
and physical connection with, everybody around us
where we can build our relationships
and also emotional hygiene at work. So I
run, like, a series of and that's like
the harem is supposed to
we're we're actually covering covering a lot of
parenting in August because it's the holidays, and
I want parents to have as many tools
in the toolkit, you know, to have as
peaceful time as possible.
But we always cover intimacy at least once
a month. It's the only workshop in the
membership space that isn't recorded due to the
sensitive nature of it. I want ladies to
feel like they can ask the awkward questions.
So we work a lot around body image,
even initiating intimacy. Because even though this topic's
about sexual dissatisfaction, I'm sure you know already
and you've probably got a speaker for it,
You know,
some women feel like they just can't let
go of that modesty aspect even with their
own husband in the bedroom, and we know
that that's the last place we need it
for. So
emotional processing really for the awkward conversations we've
talked about tonight. Like, I do a lot
of work with that, building confidence and clarity,
around having difficult conversations with the people we
love, whether it's a husband or a, you
know, extended family or colleague
so that we can still honor ourselves in
our own experiences. That's with Shifa Healing Co.
That's the private practice I established.
This is it's only £15 a month because
I wanted as many people around the world
to be able to access it as possible.
And I also obviously work 1 to 1
in a therapeutic space with women as well.
I love that. Sister Amina Jane O'Rourke, thank
you so much for being part of the
intimacy conversation.
Guys please share your takeaways in the chat.
JazakAllah Khayron for those who watch live. If
you watch this on the replay, please share
your thoughts and your takeaways and your moments
and do like the video,
comment on the page, subscribe and share the
video so that more people can benefit from
these amazing conversations.
Sis, you have been a light. You've been
a love. Thank you so much for being
here insha'Allah
and guys go follow sister Amina Jane on
Instagram. We will see you again at 9
pm UK time for our next presentation. Tonight
we've got Gabriel Armani. Guys we've got baba
ali in the house. It's gonna be lit.
We've got Hale Banani at the end of
the night. So we've got a lot of
really amazing speakers lined up. Sis, JazakAllah Khayr.
We'll see you on the other side Insha'Allah.