CONTENT WARNING: The article contains explicit sexual references.

Erotic fantasies can tell us a lot about our needs and the state of our relationships, experts say.

In his book Tell Me What You Want, Dr Justin Lehmiller, a sex educator and research fellow at Indiana University, conducted a large-scale survey of over 4000 people about their fantasies. He found that 97% of people have sexual fantasies, the majority of whom have them frequently.

But while they may be part of everyday life, they can cause rifts in your relationship. One survey found that 70% of people believed their partners might be fantasising about another person, with men more in the dark than women in regard to their significant other’s sexual desires.

Whilst sex therapists like Miranda Christophers confirm that “the main reason for fantasies is arousal and achieving orgasm”, they also agree that our erotic fantasies can tell us a lot about ourselves, our needs and the state of our relationships.

Why do we fantasise?

Christophers, who is also the founder of psychosexual and relationship therapy clinic The Therapy Yard, says that most fantasies remain something that will never transfer into real life.

However, for some people, acting them out forms a big part of their sex life.

“I see a huge variety in the way people use fantasies, feel about their fantasies and even why they have them,” she says.

Psychosexual psychotherapist Lohani Noor says fantasies can signal an unmet need.

“Fantasies are not so much about the content, they’re about what we’re feeling as a consequence of what’s happening – and that is usually a feeling or dynamic that’s currently missing in your sex life."

Issues may arise when both partners are not in sync or even aware of one another’s sexual fantasies.

“I’ve met couples who are very happy in their relationship and then share their fantasies,” Noor says. “This then creates discord in the relationship. Those fantasies become weaponised.”

Mismatched fantasies can also create problems.

“Perhaps one person wants to act their fantasy out, but the partner doesn’t want to,” says Christophers. “Or they simply don’t like their partner’s fantasy. In all my years as a sex therapist, it’s rare that two people think the same way – so then it’s about working in sex therapy to make sure they don’t see their partner’s fantasy as a threat, but as an interesting insight into their tastes, turn-ons and thinking.”

The most common fantasies and what they tell us

Threesomes

In Dr Lehmiller’s study, of all the fantasies surveyed, the threesome came out as number one, with two-thirds of people having had this fantasy.

Another study from the University of Birmingham found that while threesomes involving two men and one woman were often stigmatised, more women were interested in this than two women and a man. Women in the study cited “providing a safer, less objectifying environment” as reasons that they would want to see two men interact sexually during a threesome.

For Noor’s clients, simply being desired by more than one person seems to be the number one reason her clients fantasise about threesomes: “Sex with multiple partners is like orgasmic bliss, isn’t it? This is hugely intoxicating if you don’t feel very desired in your normal sex life, or you have a lot of competing responsibilities.

“I find that the number one fantasy for women, for example, is about being so overwhelmingly desired that [the other people] lose control and are not responsible for their actions. But also, the woman is not responsible either, so it’s complete freedom,” Noor says.

“It could be the voyeuristic nature of it that turns you on, or the all-encompassing sensation of being touched by many. The threesome or multiple partners fantasy is great for your ego, but psychologically it’s also permission to just ‘let go’, and we all need that sometimes.”

Another version of the threesome fantasy, Christophers explains, is “cuckholding” – essentially “lending your partner out” to have sex with somebody else whilst you watch, join in or stay away and wait for the review.

Sometimes this is about a dynamic that is at odds with the dynamic in your real sex life. For example, “people might have fears about their partner being unfaithful, or have had that actually happen in the past”, says Christophers.

With the threesome or group sex fantasy, the problems both Christophers and Noor see are usually to do with jealousy or insecurity.

“Your partner might become confused and think that’s actually what you want to happen,” says Noor. “Or they might think, ‘I’m not enough. They desire somebody else.’”

One way of working through this is to discuss how the couple can create the feelings they want from the threesome fantasy without actually having to have a threesome.

“Fantasise about it together instead,” Christophers advises. “Talk about it. Role-play it, experiment with sex toys. I’ve seen it where people almost role-play that they are the other person in a threesome, creating a scenario to try out how they feel.”

Sex with the same gender

According to Lehmiller, same-sex fantasises are also much more common among women, with 59% of heterosexual women having fantasised about sex with another woman, whereas only 26% of heterosexual men have fantasised about sex with another man.

However, Christophers says: “These sorts of fantasies don’t have to mean anything in terms of your sexuality or sexual identity. Fantasies can be about the novelty, the variety, the taboo, intimacy or just pure excitement.”

It’s understanding the difference between “erotic orientation”, the things that turn you on, and “sexual orientation” – who you are attracted to.

Noor agrees these fantasies don’t have to have anything to do with your actual sexuality: “It simply means that whatever the sexual dynamics you’re having, there’s something missing – and you’ve projected that need onto imagining a same-sex experience.”

Partner swapping or swinging

If you fantasise about swinging with your neighbours, does this mean you want to make it a reality?

“No,” says Noor. “I have a couple who, when they have sex, talk about wanting to have sex with their friends, but they’re not remotely interested in an open relationship – it’s just part of their sexual dynamic.”

Does it even mean you’re attracted to them?

“Not necessarily. It’s more about the feelings those people elicit. If someone’s got a passive, submissive personality and you want to be dominated, they’re not likely to turn you on, no matter if you find them physically attractive,” Noor says.

Then there are the people for whom swinging is their sexual identity – for example, they are into ethical non-monogamy or polyamory, “and there’s a huge community out there for those people. That’s not a fantasy, that’s who they are,” Noor says.

Interestingly, Lehmiller’s research found that the most likely person to turn up in your fantasies is your own partner.

“It’s a real deepening of the connection,” says Noor. “There’s something hugely arousing about being so enmeshed with the other person [that] you can bring them into your fantasy so that their sexual experience becomes your sexual experience. It’s like Bonnie and Clyde – partners in crime. The ultimate romance.”

Sex with the boss

“The workspace is itself a fantasy escape,” says Noor. “We have the reality of home, where there’s maybe a shoe in the kitchen sink, then we go to work turned out impeccably and be a professional person day long. At work, you get to be somebody else, and the person you’re fantasising about does too.”

Should you be worried that you’re inappropriately attracted to your boss?

“No, I think it’s about the power dynamic, but also being wanted,” Noor says. “It’s like, ‘you’re so much more powerful than me, yet you want me and I have to say yes, because you’re my boss’.

“It’s about you wanting to feel completely adored to the point they can’t control themselves and their lust for you – which can make you feel incredibly powerful. It can also be about reclaiming power: maybe you have a boss who treats you badly at work and you fantasise about reducing them to a gibbering wreck.”

The dominatrix or submissive

Most people know the stereotype of the successful exec who likes to give up control and be the submissive in the bedroom because they can’t in real life.

A 2015 research paper on the “inhibition hypothesis” by Joris Lammers and Roland Imhoff centres on the idea that having social power in real life allows people to fantasise about what sexually arouses them, rather than what gender or social expectations dictate: hence the powerful male boss who fantasises about being tied up.

A sample of 14,306 men and women was used to examine the relationship between social power and sexual arousal for Lammers and Imhoff’s paper.

It found that the effect of real-life power on fantasising about sadistic sex (being the dominant partner) was stronger among women than men, while the effect of real-life power on fantasising about masochistic (submissive) sex was stronger for men than women.

“The sub/dom sex is a complex fantasy,” says Noor. “For example, you may fantasise about being the ‘submissive’ partner, being dominated, shamed or humiliated. This may allow you to release a long-held narrative about who you are - for example, I am a ‘controlling’ person - but you might hate being submissive in real life, it might make you feel really humiliated. So, there’s a dissonance between who you are in real life and what turns you on sexually.

“This might be confusing for your partner,” she adds. “They might then make a decision or even become afraid about who you really are.”

Christophers adds that actually, in sub/dom sex, it’s the submissive person who has the power, because they’re the one setting the boundaries and employing things like the “safe word”.

“They have to do this in order to relinquish control, so this may be the real feeling people with this fantasy want – to call the shots,” she says.