Ep 8- Reclaim Your Pleasure & Heal Your Sexuality | with Deanne Rose

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I am super excited to welcome Deanne Rose to the episode today. Deanne is a holistic sexual wellness coach and educator who went from experiencing anxiety and depression in a unaligned marriage to unleashing her pleasure and empowering herself as a divine feminine woman.

Today she helps women become more empowered in their sexuality and live their best lives. Hope you enjoy this conversation.

Y: Thank you so much, Deanne for being here with me today. I'm really glad you decided to join me.

D: Absolutely! I've been looking forward to this.

Y: Awesome. Your name on your zoom name is Deanne Rose, The Unbridled Woman. Why is it so important for women to learn to, to be unbridled, to be free?

D: There's a point in our life where you start to question why you do things and why you keep repeating the same old things and ask yourself, what else do I wanna do?

What else is true for me? You have this choice. I think that's so important, and especially for women, that we do have a choice. We don't have to be tethered to a certain way of being, of acting, of showing up. We have a, a choice of what's more authentic for ourselves.

Well, my lowest point was 2015 when my husband at the time wanted a divorce after 23 years. I had been struggling with anxiety and depression for like three or four years before that. But I wasn't listening to it. I had two girls and they were 15 and 13 at that time. I was the stay at home mom. I had a little massage business on the side and I was just going with the flow. I had done all the things that I thought I had to do. I went to school, I went to college, I got a job, I got married, I had kids. And the anxiety and depression was definitely a key that was telling me things weren't aligned with what was in my life at that point. And then the divorce happened and that was the pivotal time of like, okay, so like what do I need to look at about myself and how I'm showing up in my life?

Who am I and what do I believe in now? And how can I go forward into. It’s like it was a gift that I got to like rewrite a different story. You know, I get to write a different story with my life now and how do I want that to show up so this doesn’t happen again.

Y: So with the work that you do, helping women reclaim their pleasure, I'm wondering where was your pleasure at when the marriage was coming to an end?

D: We were definitely more roommates than anything. I was like, well after the girls are in college we'll reconnect, right? The intimacy really, really wasn't there. I was actually in survival mode with the anxiety and I was in a day-to-day survival mode.

It’s hard to bring pleasure in when your root chakra is like, AHHHH!! I was very deregulated and it was just like, I gotta do all the things. When you're in that deregulated state, it's definitely hard to have pleasure.

When I first got into the relationship that I am in now, one of the things he asked me when we were getting intimate was, What do you like? I was like, I don't know. What do you do?

Looking back at that there was all this shame of like, I don't even know what feels good for me. No one ever asked me and I never asked myself! So I was like, Whoa, I need to look at that.

And even if I would’ve had the voice to say, I don't like that. I would’ve just been like, eh, all right. I'll just take it and maybe it'll get better. I'll just not date you anymore.

Y: Thinking about dating back then, how did you feel about it and how long did it take you until you felt ready to start putting yourself out there?

D: I was very fortunate because my ex said he wanted a divorce in January of 2015, but we didn't actually finalize a divorce until December so I had this whole year started doing that more work on myself then and getting my anxiety in check, feeling better, feeling more empowered. I thought dating was just going to be fun, not thinking anything would lead into a relationship. However, I met my partner that I've been with for almost seven years now, in January of 2016.

We went on a walking date and I immediately wanted to hold his hand. I felt that safe and comfortable. I listened to my intuition and my body. I'm like, this is safe for me, let's explore this. And it just ended up the way it did.

Y: Wow. The pull of you wanting to hold his hand like that is such a natural thing, and it doesn't sound like your head and your anxiety and anything was involved at all. It was just like this peaceful coming together and like your body was telling you, yes, this is right. There's a whole other type of healing and growth that happens within relationships that you can't get on your own.

So this moment where you and your partner were being intimate with each other, and he asked, what do you like and you didn't know. Tell me about your journey from that moment to where you're at now.

D: One of my good friends was all into the divine feminine goddess. So she would always talk me, oh, you have to connect to the goddess within you! And I'm like, well, alright, how do I do that? So like anything, I think things just started coming to me.

In 2018 I met this woman. She was the epitome of this divine feminine. She was not only just beautiful to look at, but when she walked into a room she had this energy and I was like, oh my gosh. I want that, I want what she’s having! Like, what is that?

Y: How did you experience her? What was she like?

D: I just saw this woman in her power. You know, asking for what she wanted and just having this joy that would emanate from her. Like this inner piece of like she's comfortable in her skin. All of those things, like I wanted for myself, I saw in her.

It was through her that I got introduced to Layla Martin, who I took a year-long program with around sex, love and relationship. The six months of that program was inner work and it was really profound. I didn’t know anything about my body, how it works and how to bring in inner bliss. And

what is this pleasure? Not only like sexual, but how can I see pleasure in life in general?

Y: Do you remember the moment where you first felt that pleasure?

D: I remember doing a practice called Yoni Disarmoring. And I was really getting close to my cervix area and that's a very sensitive place for women. There's a lot of traumatic energy stuck there and I remember. Through that process, just crying. I didn’t even know what I was crying about. This was just this tears. I'm like, I don't know what these are for. Even the way I was crying was different. It even sounded like a different person.

Y: Wow.

D: And I realized that this is deep, deep healing. This could actually be really deep ancestral healing that's happening. I really, truly feel like there was a cosmic shift there. It brought more an awareness that I am connected to so much around me and even the women before me, women I’ve never met.

And it was through more work like that, understanding our inter-connectiveness with everything that I found pleasure.

Y: I had a moment with my own womb. I was taking a bath, and I just put my hands on my womb and I don't even know why. I was pretty relaxed. I didn't have a plan what I was doing and just put my hands there and I started talking to her and all of a sudden, I asked her for forgiveness for things she had been exposed to. From the trauma that she was exposed to, the objects that she was exposed to, everything. And I just asked her for forgiveness. And same thing, I started crying. It was like a little grieving thing, but also, I could feel her love. She wasn't upset or anything like that, but I needed her to forgive me for putting her through that. In that moment too, was this bonding and also a promise that I'm never gonna expose her to things like this again. Like, you are holy, you are sacred. And I feel like that really contributed to my own journey to that divine feminine and feeling my own sensuality, my own pleasure. I think I had to address some of that trauma that my womb has experienced.

D: And that’s the pivotal point to get to, is seeing yourself as this sacred being. And having that discernment now of like, all right, who am I going to allow in this sacred temple?

Because when we are sexually active with somebody, there's this energetic connection and we do take some of their stuff on. When you're aware of that and when you can see yourself as this sacred goddess it's like, okay, who's going to be able to come into these doors?

Y: That is something that has changed so much for me.I just left my five year relationship and before that I was having sex to have sex. I am not there at all anymore. I am like, no, you may not. And even if I have someone that I'll feel safe with or connected with, I just wanna make sure that there is like a good amount of time where that safety, that connection gets built up. So I don't wanna rush.

Y: What do you think are the first couple of steps for someone who might be very afraid of physical intimacy, who might have no real connection to their divine feminine, to their body, to their womb?

D: What’s important to start with, especially while dating, is to get more of a breathing practice because when we breathe we become more grounded our bodies. I like to also bring in dance because that also gets us connected into our bodies and feeling. Not the choreographed dance. Start music and you just let your body hang and just start to move. Those are the most beautiful dances ever that come out. I think that's when freedom starts. Then they start to take off the bridle, like I don't have to dance a certain way.

What I suggest to my clients right off the bat is yoni gazing. It could be very uncomfortable at first. Using a mirror and actually looking at your yoni. I don't know about you, but when I grew up, you don't touch it. You don't look at it.

I think the only time I ever looked at my yoni was when I was younger and was trying to use a tampon and I had to figure out which hole it went into.

So getting affiliated with what it looks like. And giving that appreciation. And again, like what you did with your womb, to tell it, you're so beautiful. You create a relationship with your yoni.

A breast massage is really beautiful because in Tantra we have different polarity points. The women receive through their yoni and they give out through their chest. The chest is also the portal for the opening of the yoni. So a nice breast massage and becoming more connected to two parts of ourselves that can give us pleasure. That's the woman who starts to come into a room and feel very empowered.

Y: How did these practices help you get to know what you like in terms of intimacy?

D: I've been with my partner for a while, so we even kind of know what each other's likes are. But things change, so I definitely suggest like if there's any deeper conversations that have to happen that they don’t happen in the bedroom. They happen outside in a more neutral spot, so it’s able to be received.

Y: Oh my God. My ex and I always had those conversations in the bed as it happened and it was just, it took the air out of everything and it ended up being like, well, okay, we're gonna be intimate now. Something's gonna happen, and then we're gonna end up in a big, long discussion. So I just don't even wanna bother. So it's such a good point, don't have those conversations in the bed, in the bedroom or wherever you are attempting to be physically intimate.

D:

If I was still dating I would have the talk about intimacy sooner than later, to kind of feel out this person.

If you say, this is what I like to do, or like, if this was happening and I said, stop, how would you react? And seeing how they’d react, if they automatically get defensive.

Y: And even having that conversation to put them on the spot and see how they react to having this conversation.Cause that's gonna be important that they're open to receive what, what you have to say. And that they're able to navigate that.

D: How, how are they receiving you? Asking for what you want or saying what you don't like. It’s all a dance too.

You know, when I first started finding my voice, I’d just blurred out. It’s kind of like a child trying something new. With practice you get a little bit more refined.

I highly recommend especially women who date, to follow Allison Armstrong because she gives really incredible advice about relationships, if you're heterosexual, about men and how to relate to them.

In general, men, they're here to be of service, to please. They wanna open the door for you. One of the things I had to look at when I started studying under her, was I did emasculate my ex-husband a lot.

Y: They want to do things for you so it's just allowing that to happen. When we come into our feminine and the man provides for us, is in service to us and that allows us to let go to surrender and to be in that feminine space, which feels so good and relaxing and calm and peaceful. Whereas the other, doing things ourselves, that doesn't feel good, that feels tight and controlling and tense. So even though we might have to learn a little bit of a new language, in the end we're gonna feel so good.

D: Yeah. When you say that I have this image of the goddesses in my mind. The two energies of the Shakti, the divine feminine and Shiva is the divine masculine.Usually the divine masculine is either laying down or like somehow supporting the Shakti, the goddess above.

The divine masculine is that being, and the divine feminine is the becoming. She gets to basically dance.

Shakti gets to dance on Shiva, the divine feminine gets to dance and not to take over, but it's the platform for which the divine feminine can just be. And the divine masculine is also the container.

Like looking at the banks of a river. The divine feminine is allowed to flow with all the water. By itself, this could be very destructive. You have flooding and all that. So the divine masculine, or the banks of the river, contains her and she’s still flowing. And she's going everywhere, wherever she wants. It’s allowing her, that container to be in the most heightened version of herself. So she's not all over the place.

Y: Amazing. I'm recently single, so I'm back in the dating field myself. And, and this is just so inspiring and

I'm just so excited to see what's next for me. Experiencing the relationship where the containment that a man can provide for me while I flow, while I experience joy while I let go of my control.

D: It’s important to remember, a lot of men have been conditioned by the feminist movement that the woman can do things for herself. They might not be comfortable with that, but that's what they feel like they have to be. So, if they're not opening your doors, it doesn't mean that they don't want to. They've aired on the side of caution; they don't want to offend. So that's the point where the woman can speak up. It's like, you know what I really love when men open the door for me, cuz it really helps me, me feel more feminine.

When women can come into their power, they become the teacher to the man. Be the woman, be in your power, and gently lead that man into his highest potential.

Y: Yeah, I love it. If you were to give one piece of advice to women starting to date, what would that one piece of advice be?

D: I would suggest that they start to know themselves. And that they do that work to know themselves first. If you don't know what you want, you don't know what you desire, you don't know what your truth is, you can't expect that other person to know or the universe to attract to you what is in your highest good.

If you're all over the place, those are the kind of people that you're gonna into your life, like the ones who are all over the place.

Y: Yes. Yeah, great point. What is your favorite music right now or your favorite song to dance to?

D: I love to dance to piano music actually!
Y: Really?! interesting!

D: And then also to anything that has like a percussion or drums. I kind of feel like a little ballerina or something.I think it opens up like my fairy energy.

Y: Oh, I love that. Where can women go to find out more about you?

D: My website is deannerose.net And I am on Instagram as @deannerosecoaching. I have a Facebook group called Everything Sex and Intimacy.

Y: And there's some great sex and intimacy tips on there, like really unfiltered as well, and just the things that we're all wondering about. You very openly and honestly explain it. So I definitely recommend people check out your Facebook page.

Well, it's been such a treat chatting with you today! I loved hearing about your journey and how you got started with feeling pleasure in your life, and connecting with your divine feminine. Thank you for sharing all the tips! It was a good reminder to bring back some daily practices into my life. So thank you. Thank you for being here.

D: You're welcome. Thank you. My pleasure. My pleasure.

LINKS:

Deanne’s website

Deanne’s instagram

Deane’s fb

Deanne’s fb group- Everything Sex & Intimacy

Allison Armstrong- insta dating tips

Breast massage how-to video

I would love to hear from you. What did you think of this episode? If you want to dive further into the convo, send me a DM and I'll be happy to chat.

Yvonne