How to satisfy your sexual desire when you are separated from your partner? For many couples who each live in their own apartment, confinement can be complicated. Some may then have the idea of turning to what is called a "cam plan", a sexual intercourse by screen interposed, using their smartphone or a computer. Tuesday, in the show Without appointment, the sexologist Catherine Blanc answered the question of Marvin, a listener who, unlike his partner, does not appreciate this practice at all.
Marvin's question
During confinement, my boyfriend and I are separated in our apartment. To make up for the lack of sexual intercourse, my boyfriend regularly offers me a "cam plan" (having sexual intercourse by video interposed), to make him happy I do it but I don't like it at all. How to make him understand ?
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What is the point of a "cam plan"?
It is to maintain his excitement and to know that the other submits to his desires, to his fantasies. It keeps the desire of the requester alive, but for the second it is not necessarily that. We can say for a while: 'it's reassuring, he cares about me'. But one can also have the impression of being an object of pleasure, of desire, to make up for the lack, but not necessarily in the respect of a relationship.
Not everyone is comfortable touching each other through a screen, even with a trusted partner?
It is not only through a screen. Lots of couples would never have the idea of masturbating one before the other, because they would feel revealed in a savagery of their sexuality. It is one thing to touch the other or to be touched, it is quite another to formalize a sort of scenario of pornographic actor. For some it is very exciting because there is the idea of exhibitionism, but not everyone is an exhibitionist. There is also the fear of being filmed and of being recorded.
Should we be wary when we indulge in this kind of practice?
In love relationships we do not do everything and anything. Prove that we love we put ourselves at the mercy of the worst, it's a curious idea. In any relationship we put things in place to protect ourselves, there is the time of love and disenchantment, the time of comfort and confidence, and also the time of betrayals.
But it's complicated with sexuality. To stay on guard too much is to have a prohibited sexuality, not to have reservations is the possibility of putting oneself in painful situations. I have patients who allow themselves things, then when they get home they think and live in fear. Sex is a power relationship over each other, and we measure the extent of the other's power over ourselves.
Can we simply replace these "cam plans" with pornography?
But do you always have to see sex to be sexually active yourself? Our imagination is perfectly capable of inventing all stories, not with an actor or an actress but with his partner. You can stage your partner as you wish in your reverie, and that won't put him in danger.