Clint reviews a list of 8 ways that sex makes people healthier. Is it B.S.?

Dr. Jenn shares what Medieval Porn is to her and why she loved Tuscany so much. And Clint reviews a list of 8 ways that sex makes people healthier...including stress reduction, heart health, and boosting the immune system. But is it all BS?

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Doctor Jen, welcome across the world, around the globe and your man and
across my man. But I meantwith your man and your man. Uh
how it was great. I meanItaly was fantastic. Yeah. Yeah,

(00:22):
So we haven't talked in several weeks. I went to Miami. I had
a gig there for the start ofWomen's History Month that was around women and
rewriting our sexual stories. Super powerful. Then I flew on to Florence and
I was there for a few days, and then my man Reubin flew him
because he had a cancer research conferencein Tuscany, but we spent a few

(00:43):
days ahead of time for my fiftyfirst birthday there. It was neat.
I like, I've never been tothe hill towns of Tuscany, like these
small old medieval towns up on hills. Some of them are walled towns you
can't drive into. I freakin lovedit. That's stuff. Reuben jokes that

(01:04):
it's that I'm like super into medievalporn. You know how they say,
like food porn and travel porn,Like you look at photos and you love
that stuff. I am totally intomedieval porn, like those I love those
old brown stone buildings and winding littlepaths, and we stayed in this amazing

(01:26):
airbnb called the Artist's Tower in aSanjaminiano, which is one of the walled
cities. We were there for threenights and over my birthday, and it
was the freaking neatest thing, likewe were part of one of the remaining
tall towers from like the thirteenth centuryin Sanja Mignano that like the wealthy people
lived in. It was neat onone that we were on the fourth level,

(01:48):
and one side we overlooked one ofthe main squares that had a world
famous gelato place, so and thatalways had lines starting from like I think
they opened at nine in the morningand they had lines there immediate like tour
buses come in and stuff. Butso on my birthday we got some delicious
still lot of there. And thenon the other side of the apartment,
like our bedroom window was you getto see the backside of the town and

(02:12):
then these rolling Tuscan hills of greenand vineyards and the cypress trees and far
and it was just like it lookedso fake. It was so amazing.
It was like surreal. It lookedlike every painting of Tuscan you've seen,
but almost too perfect. It washard to take it in. It was

(02:32):
incredible. So this top of yourlist of places you've traveled. Ooh,
and what was the town? Whileyou're thinking about that, because I want
to look this up with images becauseit's San San Jim and Yano. So
it's S A N and then it'sG I M I G N A N

(02:54):
O. I came up. Itcame up without me even me. It
took me a good month to figureout how to pronounce it when we were
researching this a few months ago,until I finally can say it easily San
Jiminiano. Yeah, like the street, I'm right here, like you talk
about the cop like the brick streets. Yeah, and the brown buildings with
the ivy coming through or whatever thatis. Yeah, that's exactly. This
is exactly. This is exactly whatI would probably call heaven because when you

(03:20):
described that, when you first startedtalking about it, Yeah, even before
you describe your room, I went, oh, now I have to go
there because this is Oh yes,yet does look fake? Yeah? Wow,
this is incredible. Yeah, Isee that. So I will say
normally the way people visit San Jiminyanois that they come in on a tour

(03:40):
bus just for like a morning andafternoon, and especially if it's summertime.
I and imagine those streets are packed, and it's unpleasant and it probably sucks.
We were there in the off seasonone and two, we were staying
there, so in the mornings andin the evenings, nobody's there now.
Also, half the restaurants aren't openand they're closed for the season and stuff

(04:02):
like that, so we were definitelyoff I've never been to Italy off season
before, and like, it washard because we often were looking to dine
between like three and seven, orwe'd want a late lunch at two thirty
or something, or an early dinnerand all the rest So many of the
restaurants are closed, so even ifthey are open for lunch or dinner,
they don't open again till seven pm. So we were we definitely struggled with

(04:26):
that as tourists in the off season. But he was so he was so
neat to stay in that town.And then we'd just roll out in the
morning. One of us would taketurns going down to get our espresso or
our lattes and our croissants and ourlittle pastries, and then bring them back
up to the room, and Reubengot me like that breakfast in bed.

(04:46):
He woke up before me on mybirthday and he went out, and then
he was waiting outside the room tolet me sleep, waiting till he heard
me stir. Honestly, it waslike the sweetest thing. And he heard
me like get up to go tothe bathroom, and he comes in.
He's like, are you awake,And he's like, I've got your latte
and I've got some pastries. Andwe opened the windows and looked out on

(05:06):
this just amazing countryside and we wereplaying like cool Italian music and awesome.
It was so freaking And then thatafternoon we went and we didn't know.
We got a private tasting with theowner at a winery that's only ten minutes
outside the city. And she wasfantastic, like a fucking cool, badass

(05:27):
woman who was like same age asme, and decided to take us for
a private tasting because she had lookedup my stuff or saw my signature phile
and wanted to meet me because ofmy field of work. Really, oh,
it was just amazing, like andso she paired it. She made
us a bunch of bruchetta and toastedbread and cheeses, and we paired it
with like five different wines, andshe took us for a walk around the

(05:51):
vineyard and there was cats walking aroundlike it was just it felt so freaking
magical. Oh. So that wasthree days, three nights, three nights,
and then we moved and then wehad a day and then and we
went out some of those days andtraveled around to some of the other little
towns from there that were super neatand did some other wine tastings, and

(06:11):
then we were his retreat and notretreat. That was not a retreat.
His conferences are like freaking hardcore.His conference was forty five minutes north of
the town called Luca. Yeah.That is also a walled city, which
I absolutely loved and very much wantto go back to. Super cool town
and very like bustling town. Andit's got the wall is so wider,

(06:36):
it's a low, flat wall.It's another walled city. There's a whole
park up on it. So forlike three and a half miles around the
walled city, there's a park,there's greenery, there's soccer courts, there's
a whole path that people walk.You can rent bikes and bike around the
whole thing on the wall, onthe wall that surrounds the city. Yes.

(06:56):
Wow, so that was super cool. That's Luca. L Ucca is
driving me nuts. My wife's beenuh it says Luca. Okay city in
Italy, but Luca Tussan Gimaro manyway, God, my wife's been there
or not. Oh, she's beenhere, but she's been to Italy and

(07:18):
she said we have to go back. I've never been, so I'm like,
oh, yeah, well, andso I've been to this is I've
been to this is my third timeto Italy, but it's my first time.
Actually I've been to Florence for butto Tuscany. I just absolutely loved
it. And then he uh,I don't know, it's hard to say
because now I'm like traveling so much. Every trip has such unique, amazing,

(07:42):
beautiful experiences. Yeah. But thenyeah, so his conference center was
like forty five minutes north of there, up in like the mountains, so
we could see like snow capped mountainsin the distance. See. Yeah,
but that was definitely like he hadhardcore stuff in the morning. Then we'd
have the afternoons to go off andtour around and then and he most nights
had to be back in the evening, but then I had work and stuff

(08:03):
to do also, But that wasdefinitely way less relaxing because it was I
mean, his conferences are you know, hardcore, and then they and then
they start drinking, and then theydrink a lot. So I did join
them on two of those nights,but I can't drink that much. So
before we started with the eight Waves, sex is great for improving your health,
I just won't be ah, yes, but hold on, So if

(08:24):
you were going non business just forpleasure this place or Portugal, because you
spoke very highly of Portugal, orthat island you went to that you said
was real remote and you had totake the drive, like when we went
to Fiji. Yes, like thatone. Yeah, oh uh, you
were okay. If I had tochoose between those three, like which I

(08:45):
would go back to, Yeah,I'd go back to Italy. You would,
I think because Italy is just likeit's Italy, Like it's just so
the food and the culture and thepeople and like I just mm hmm.
And because I think Italy has morehas better infrastructure for some of its like

(09:07):
cool medieval stuff than like Portugal does, right now, Okay, so yeah,
and THENI is Fiji's uh yeah,I mean, and those are beautiful.
I want to go back to moreof those. But I part of
what I love Italy and places likethat is the mix of culture, like
the mix of the people and theculture and the history and the food and

(09:33):
all of that, just like andthe desserts versus like, you know,
Hawaiian Islands certainly has their own versionof that, but it doesn't scratch the
itch in the same way for me. So yeah, versus like your I
mean, I just I really loveEuropean countries in particular. So wait,
I was gonna say something though,was gonna say, Okay, you're gonna

(09:54):
love this. When I was inFlorence, I did a five hour oh
and that included transportation, gelato making, and pizza making class out at like
a Tuscan farmhouse. So it wasabout fifteen minutes outside of Florence, and
there was twenty six of us inthe class. And they just have like
unlimited kianti. You can just keepopening bottles and drinking and so like we

(10:18):
were, people were getting loaded.It was funny and fun I have video
of me tossing pizza dough in theair and like not following their directions very
well but not dropping it, andit was expanding and I was throwing it
in the air. And then thegelato maker we all picked different flavors,
and at the end we have aboutthere was about twelve to fifteen flavors of
fresh gelato we got to sample.And then because there's such connoisseurs of it,

(10:43):
like you take one that's this sortof basic flavor, but then you
put a little balsamic vinegar on it, aged balsamic, where you have these
other ones you take like like alemon or something, but then you put
some fresh rosemary on it and alittle sea salt and so like there it
was the freaking cool gelato experience.And then we all made our own pizzas

(11:03):
and put whatever topics we want andthen it's only ninety seconds in the wood
fired oven, and then our pizzaswere done, and then we all ate
our own mats of pizza. What'sup than crust? Yes, yeah,
yeah, oh it was delicious,But I did realize it's better with less
topics because when you really just gowith the basics of the margarita like it

(11:24):
really, just because otherwise you putthe topics and I'm always putting vegetarian toppings.
I think they add some water toit, yeah, and they make
it a little mushier. And whenyou just go with the straight margarita then
with some fresh basil on it,I was like, oh there was something
and I hadn't realized that. Soanyway, it was neat. I got
all the recipes and stuff. Ihaven't tried it out yet. I mean,
this stuff's intense, Like the recipesonly have like three or four ingredients,

(11:48):
but like it takes a long time. You know, in the pizza
doah, you're supposed to do itat two days in advance and all sorts
of stuff. So it was sofreaking fun and neat. Yeah that's great.
Now I'm freaking hungry. I knowit made me super hungry too.
I know. Well, I'm gladyou had fun. Okay, let's talk

(12:09):
work. I have super interesting otherwork stuff to talk about. But I
want to hear about my work.What are those eight things I want to
hear? I want to hear howmuch bullshit they are, because they usually
are where's the article from? Andthat's exactly why I wanted to share it
with you. So it's the sourceis let's see, the source is health
and medical news sex. So Idon't know anyway, whatever, let me

(12:31):
go back to this, all right. Eight ways sex is great for improving
your health. Let's see. One, sex is good for your immune system.
Research shows that people who have sexone or two times per week have
more Type A antibodies in their saliva. They help prevent illness and may defend

(12:52):
against human papalomavirus. The reported effectsof sex on the immune system are highly
variable, however, differing across thesexes as well as across other factors such
as mental health. Well, andit's interesting because I think the thing we
don't often know is that this iscorrelation, not causation. Maybe people who
already have stronger immune systems that feelhealthier want sex more. Oh, didn't

(13:15):
think about that. Okay. Yeah. It also says some of these differences
may be due to the changes inimmune function that occur across the menstrual cycle,
which may have implications for fertility.So that was the first one.
Interesting. Two sex improves sleep,which I do believe it does. An
orgasm causes the release of the hormoneoxytocin. Oxytocin, Yeah, took me
a second, which can help youfall asleep and experience deep restorative sleep.

(13:39):
More restless sleep also support your immunesystem. When asked about how sex,
either alone or a partner, effectstheir sleep, most people say that the
sleep sleep better after having an orgasm. They also say that they fall asleep
faster. So people think that sexis a good sleep aid. Yeah,
I always found it just riled meup more at night time. It didn't
do a good job. It doesnot. It does the opposite for me,

(14:00):
So that doesn't work for me,all right. Sex enhances heart health.
A study indicates that women who havesex frequently are less likely to experience
cardiovascular disease. Sex can improve God, are we already almost out of time?
Holy crap? Okay. It reducesstroke and heart disease risk in middle
aged men forty five to fifty nine. There's also some evidence for improved heart

(14:20):
rate variability and a lower death ratefor people who engage in vaginal intercourse.
And they're saying, you know,In addition, people who have more sex
or less likely to die of heartattacks or other causes. But some of
that can be attributed to the factthat healthier people may be more likely to
be having more sex as well.Yeah, that's what I was just saying.
So this is all seems to be. Most of these studies are correlation

(14:41):
and not necessarily causation. So butokay, all right, I'll give okay,
I'll take that one. And withoutgoing into it, sex burns calories.
It's a form of modern exercise,you know, likened to a brisk
walker climbing stairs. It isn't enoughto meet the extra recommendations of the American
Heart Association, which one hundred fiftyminutes of a really big exercise per week

(15:03):
in addition to weight training twice aweek. Sex can burn five calories per
minute, four calories more permanent thanwatching television. It also really like what
do you mean, Like, arethey just recording like the person who is
active thrusting, because I could seefor that. But if you're on the
bottom, you're just laying there,right, if you're or maybe you're moving
your hips and all whatever. Butstill if it's just the active intercourse,

(15:26):
like when they say sex, dothey just mean the active act of intercourse?
Because right, yeah, you couldbe on top, you could be
on bottom, how much are youmoving? But are you also including four
player including all of that other stuffthat I don't imagine burns that many calories?
So I think those are two generalizedI'm gonna I got to give a
little I don't know. Yeah,well, kind of the stamp of BS

(15:48):
on that one. Overall, Ithink Andrew Dice Clay had a valid question
back in the day. I mean, who did all the work in bed?
Oh jeez, all right, solet's see here and decrease pain.
Research shows that sex can cause therelease of endorphins hormones which suppress pain.
Vaginal stimulation has been found to blockchronic back in leg pain. Women report

(16:10):
that self stimulation can relieve menstrual cramps, arthritis, and headaches. True,
well, so, like I haveover the years at times used masturbation to
help relieve menstrual cramps, but usuallyas soon as I'm done, they come
back. So it does during thetime period that I'm turned on, but
it doesn't last. The only wayit could work is if I take like

(16:30):
ibuprofen or something. And sometimes theyused to be so bad sometimes and I
would have to count down to thattwenty minutes till the iberprofen twenty or thirty
minutes would kick in. If Icould masturbate during that time, it could
help sort of like bridge that untilthen the iberprofen had time to kick in.
So all right, and sex maydecrease the risk for prostate cancer.

(16:55):
It says men who ejaculate at leasttwenty one times per month were less likely
to get prostate cancer, according toa study in the Journal of the American
Medical Association. That what I do. I have heard that link for a
while, that there's a connection there. Yeah, this one's obvious. We
have two more of the eight.Sex can raise self esteem how people feel
about themselves as linked to their experienceof sexual enjoyment. Young people who enjoy
sex more also experience higher self esteemin a greater sense of autonomy. It

(17:19):
wouldn't be surprising if feeling better aboutyour self improves your ability to enjoy sex
as well as vice vera. Exactlyright, and so, but yeah,
so I would as I'm clearly playingDevil's advocate here, Like, what about
folks in long term relationships and onepartner who's just having like obligatory sex that
or like what we call unwanted consensualsex. So the person and this is

(17:44):
not uncommon in long term relationships thatone person who is way less desire knows
that their partner has very high desirewants it a lot more than they do,
and they don't want the sex,like their body's not asking for if
they're not interested, they don't wantit or need it, But they do
consent to it because they want tomake their partner happy, because they feel
obligated to do it, because theyfeel like it's their role, because they

(18:06):
want to smooth things over with theirpartner. So that realm of unwanted consensual
sex I think could both it enhancesthe relationship, but there's a chance that
it could lower that person's self esteemand that maybe they're not happy with themselves
for feeling like they have to givein or give in. Does that make
sense? That does make sense AndI never thought about it like that,

(18:26):
but yes, that does make totalsense. And finally, the sex reduces
stress. Some people find sex tobe a good stress reliever that can be
demonstrated biologically. Several studies have lookedat the effects of sex on the stress
hormone cortisol ortisol yeah, and onestudy looked at the effects of intimacy on
the stress levels of one hundred andeighty three heterosexual couples. But they found
was that in times of stress,higher levels of partner intimacy made it easier

(18:48):
to cope for women and to recoverfor both. And it's not just sex,
they're saying, from the studies thatreduce the stress, it's effects and
other types of intimacy. Yeah,well, there you go. It's interesting.
I was just interviewed for Prevention magazinearticle on cuddling and they were asking
about the you look distracted. Whyare you distracted? Okay, and they

(19:15):
uh, and anyway, so theresearch around cuddling points to interestingly, the
health benefits potentially of cuddling point toa lot of the same health benefits of
sex, like not pain reduction andstuff like that, but because you're getting
stress reduction, heart health, enhancedrelationship, trying to think of the other

(19:36):
one immune boosting. So what's reallyinteresting is that there's a lot of overlaps.
So maybe some of it could beabout the sex and the orgasm and
the release of neurochemicals in that way, but some of it maybe really is
the human to human skin contact andthe just the you know, the the
the nakedness of two human bodies togetherin a safe space may could be where

(20:00):
a lot of those benefits are comingfrom on their own. Huh. Yeah,
and now I've got a visual ofwhat exactly two naked bodies. Whose
naked bodies? I don't have facesto them. I just have the body
let me. Yeah, I alwaysdo that too. I can't quite put
faces on them. They're always justsort of faceless bodies. Yeah. Since

(20:22):
I was a kid, when Iwas old enough to masturbate, this is
something I find interesting and maybe mostpeople are like this, but they don't
admit it. We've got about threeminutes left, yeah, before this thing
shuts down on us with the zoommeeting. But I've never ever that I
can remember, masturbated to like anactress or a playboy person or always been

(20:44):
someone a woman that I know orgirl or whatever back in the day.
Okay, so she does have aface, but it's somebody you, So
it's not it's somebody Wait, somebodyyou have been sexual with before or something.
Okay. Yeah, and by theway, they have faces, because
it usually takes someone for me tothink of that. When I was single,
that I knew, right, Butbut just now, when I said

(21:07):
I'm picturing naked bodies, I reallydidn't have a face. I didn't.
Yes, yeah, it's almost likeyou were describing the gelato and the pizza
making class and I pictured it,and then when you started talking about the
two naked bodies and the quarters,yeah, yeah, yeah, Okay,
now I got that visual. Yeah, yeah, I yeah, I've never
been one like that. I'm fantasizedabout Hollywood people or people in movies or

(21:30):
anything like maybe somebody like in pornor something like that. But then it's
still if I'm imagining something while fantasizing, it's more faceless. It's more general
sort of bodies. But I can'tdo actual people or even people I know,
because it interferes with like that,Oh would they actually do this?
Would they be like this? Likeit needs to be something not not real.

(21:51):
Yeah, and I have to havea voice attached to it. Oh,
I have to be saying, oh, you've been a naughty boy.
Click here, will I spank you? Much worse than that, I'm not
putting my finger in your ass.I'm putting my arm up to my elbow.
I'm kidding. Glue thick glob Yeah, but I do hear hold on,

(22:15):
I'm grabbing a table leg. It'sreally I have to have the voice.
I I don't. I don't know. Maybe I lacked the imagination.
But looking at a magazine never workedfor me. Interesting, So you need
to know their actual voice. Andthen you hear them talking to you,
or you hear them moaning or likewhat and then and then But here's what's

(22:36):
funny. When I picture me talkingto them, it kind of ruins it.
It's like, no, shut thefuck up in your head's killing me,
Clint, shut up myself. Inthis case, I'm clip blocking.
Yeah, there you go, clipflocking, clip flocking, clip flocking.
We're about out of time. I'mthat's safely now. I want to go
to Italy and uh I'll get thisposted. Yeah wait side. I literally

(23:00):
got back from Italy and two dayslater went up to la and was in
Hermosa Beach and taught a retreat upthere the next day, and then this
weekend I was just in Austin forthe weekend. So because I was teaching
a retreat there also at like afancy resort. So I have been busy
on the road. I want totalk I'll talk about that work like the
retreats. I can't give details,but it's some interesting stuff to share with

(23:22):
you, but really going vulnerable withfolks and my own experience in it,
which is what I want to share. So love it. Let's do that
awesome all right, same time,same bat time, same bat channel.
Let's do it all right, DoctorJen Joe