Online course to navigate intimate connection after cancer

13 March 2021 (Day 380 after my surgery): This is about getting help with intimacy after cancer. I have a new body. For my wife it’s about having a partner with a differently able body. How do we connect intimately? We just completed Tess Deveze’s six week online course, Connection and Cancer. It has been extremely helpful.

We thought we were getting intimacy after cancer figured out, and yet it is still awkward. I am glad we took Tess’s introductory offer to try out this course. Every week you get a new series of short videos, a workbook and some helping resources. You can keep these forever and thus repeat the course as your circumstances change. See below for a summary and a link to find out more. Most importantly, she talks you through the homework very practically.

She makes space for all kinds of intimacy, whether you can or can’t have “conventional” sex. And she’s open to very different desires about sex, and different levels of libido. Nonetheless for me, as a horny old dog, there was enough erotic energy to keep it interesting!

Tess Deveze, sex educator and innovator extraordinaire

She is a remarkable occupational therapist with a specialisation in intimacy, sex and relationships. We first found out about her skill and effervescent energy when she presented the Soft Penis Pleasure workshop we took three months ago.

As a cancer survivor herself, Tess really knows how much deep angst can literally take over when our sexual capabilities and responses are destroyed or radically altered by cancer treatment. This kind of sexual dysfunction is often a by-product of cancer treatment and it is really another kind of cancer. It eats away at self esteem, sexual identity, and intimate relationships. It is insidious, destructive and difficult to address without help.

If you’re not the kind to ask for help in such intimate matters, perhaps this online course preserves your privacy just the right amount.

Our experience of the Connection and Cancer course

When we started we were daunted by both the cost and the fact that she gave us serious homework to do. Yet she explains that it takes time to rewire your relationship and your sexual responses for your new situation. And it has been deeply worthwhile for us. Here our one-minute video recorded a few days after completing the course:

For me as a man, this course was a big step in my journey to become less goal-oriented sexually, as originally guided by one of my great teachers Andrew soon after my diagnosis. Ultimately I am learning that it is much more about literally making love than having sex.

Intimacy after cancer: more about accessing the course

Given that so many online resources are offered free, you may be surprised to find that there is a non-trivial charge for this course. I think it’s important to recognise that Tess has invested a lot of love, care, learning and resources in creating this, and not all good things are free.

The Connection and Cancer course is for any partnership affected by any kind of cancer. Yet it is not for everyone.