On the couch with Tracey

Perhaps unsurprisingly for a woman who’s authored best-selling books with titles like Hot Sex: How To Do It, Quickies and The Sex Inspector’s Masterclass, Tracey Cox kicks off this interview by telling me that she’s both naked and wet. Unfortunately, she’s also hundreds of miles away, so I don’t get to see anything.

“Oh, is that Olaf?” she calls down the phone line. “Sorry, love, but my timing is a little off. I’ve literally just stepped out of the shower. Can you call me back in three minutes? Ta!”
While the hilariously-named Ms. Cox dresses herself in her London home, perhaps we’ll use those three minutes to explain exactly who the woman is (and why her surname is so funny). Born in Devon 45 years ago, but mostly raised in Australia, Tracey is an internationally renowned sex, body language and relationships expert. Or ‘sexpert’, if you prefer.
Although she’s sold over a million books in 20 different languages and writes regular relationship columns for Closer and Glamour magazines, she’s still probably best known for her TV work. She has presented a number of hugely popular sex and relationship programmes – including The Sex Inspectors, Would Like To Meet, Under One Roof and Date Patrol – and appeared on everything from Oprah, The Today Show and Discovery to Sky News, CNN and Richard & Judy.
Strikingly attractive, highly articulate and very open-minded, she’s sort of like a Nancy Friday for the Noughties – and for the naughty (she recently launched her own range of dildos and sex toys).
“Sorry about that, love,” she laughs. “But probably better to do this with my clothes on, eh?”

OLAF TYARANSEN: As a sex therapist, do you find yourself becoming busier after Valentine’s Day because it tends to put people’s relationships into crisis?
TRACEY COX: God, it’s like a car crash night to me, Valentine’s night. So I’m surprised that I’m not inundated for advice after Valentine’s Day. I think what happens on Valentine’s is that people either split-up or, even if it’s awful, I think they’re in denial for a bit. I think it comes about a month later – the asking for advice bit.
Do you approve of the idea of Valentine’s or do you think it’s a daft idea to have a specially designated day for romance?
What I don’t like is the connotation that’s put on it. It invariably causes problems if one person in a couple – and it’s invariably the female – puts a lot more store in it than the male does. And we do that whole transference thing where, because it’s important to us and he doesn’t make a fuss, that must mean that he’s not into us. Which is crap! He just doesn’t think it’s important. So I would say: it doesn’t really matter what Valentine’s Day means to you, it’s what does Valentine’s Day means to your partner that’s really important. That’s what you should be thinking about.
And then there’s the people who feel left out of it all...
I think there’s a tremendous pressure on singles on Valentine’s Day, it’s really hard for them. There’s something about it that makes even logical, intelligent, single people who are quite happy being single the rest of the year absolutely freak-out on.
Your accent’s a bit strange, if you don’t mind me saying. You’re from Devon originally, aren’t you?
Ha, ha! My accent’s bizarre actually! I was born in Devon and I started out with the broad Devonshire ‘ow-now-brown-cow’ type of accent. Then my parents took me to Australia when I was 10. And then I married a Canadian guy. Then I went to live in New York for a bit. So it’s a bit of a hybrid accent.
The reason your family moved to Australia was because your father was having an affair in England?
Yeah.
Do you think that’s what sparked your interest in a career that has to do with relationships and sex?
I was reading an interview with another author recently, and he said when you become who you become – or who people presume you are – then you look back on your life and you think ‘Well, when did I actually decide to do this?’ You find yourself reading all sorts into things that probably weren’t there at the time just to try and make sense of it for the bloody reporter! Ha, ha! But I’m sure my father’s affair did have an affect on me. But I think it was a combination of that and also of having a big sister who worked in family planning – which made me naturally interested and quite un-embarrased about sex.
So when did you first manifest an interest in writing about it?
I can remember entering a creative writing competition in Australia when I was about 13. It was a cross between Enid Blyton and some bloody porn novel. I found it the other day and it was about this couple going off into a cave and they end up having sex in this cave. And I remember giving it to my mum and saying, ‘Do you think this is any good?’ And she looked at me – and now I recognise that look as her going, ‘Jesus Christ! How does she know about sex if she’s never had it?’ Anyway, I entered it and I actually think I won. And then I remember in school, in around Grade 12, doing this whole essay thing about a swear word. And they wanted to expel me even though I was a really good student. So I remember always being challenging and unafraid of sex from quite early on.
To get back to your father’s affair...
Oh yeah. When I was 16, I discovered that my dad had been having an affair for 10 years. And when I met her, it was very clear that she was sex and my mother represented love. And it remained that way, though he ended up marrying her and stuff like that. But I remember thinking to myself, ‘Whoa – what sort of powerful emotions are this?’ How come one could override the other, and yet it still didn’t make anyone happy? So, yeah, I suppose that was a seed.
You’ve written that 16 was the age where you lost your virginity, but you didn’t have sex again for three years...
No – two years. Don’t exaggerate! Ha, ha! I hated losing my virginity. I thought I knew every single thing about sex and I just hated it. And I went straight home and told my mother and said, ‘What on earth is all this about?’ It was bizarre. It was because I knew the mechanics of it, but I just didn’t quite figure how it would actually work. I didn’t realise that people would move! I don’t know where I got the idea that people wouldn’t move, but...
Describe the scene for us.
I remember we had the rug, we had the condom, I had my watch all set so that when midnight came we were going to do it. And it was just the greatest non-event in all of my life. It was just rubbish! And I remember saying that to him. But bizarrely, looking back, I don’t think he came either. It was his first time as well, and most guys orgasm within about two seconds flat on their first time. And I don’t think he did. I think I just went after about two seconds, ‘Right, that’s it, I’m not interested now, bye!’ And afterwards, I thought, ‘What the hell is all the fuss about?’ And then, I wound up going out with this other guy. Ironically, they both had the same name – they were both called Peter Kelly. I remember saying to him, ‘I don’t do sex’ or something, and he said to me, ‘I bet you will later’. And then of course, suddenly, it was like, ‘Oooh… so that’s what I’ve been missing out on’. And it was fantastic. I think he was into foreplay and the other guy probably wasn’t.
You used to edit Cosmopolitan in Australia. Is that where the writing about sex began?
Well, obviously I was writing about it when I was 12. Ha, ha! No, because I had the degree in sex therapy, even though I didn’t use it, I was always torn between do I do that, or do I go into journalism, or do I get into writing? I ended up going into journalism. And because of my degree, and because of my sister, I knew a lot about sex and had always been massively interested in it, so I ended up being the one who wrote the sex column and wrote the sex stories and all that sort of stuff. And also because my sister was still working in family planning, whenever she’d do a top-up course, I’d trot along with her.
But at what point did it become a serious career?
I edited Cosmo. But even when I was editing it, I still used to go on TV and talk about sex. Because Cosmopolitan very much represents sex – particularly in Australia, but I think here as well. So I’d do lots of little TV slots, even though I absolutely hated them. But then I left Cosmo and started writing freelance and I just ended up specialising in sex and relationships. Mainly because I was getting commissions from the likes of German Cosmo, even though I was living in Australia. And those were the days when you had to use a bloody fax rather than an email. And they were commissioning this stuff and I was thinking, ‘This is odd. Why on earth are they commissioning someone in Australia to write about sex?’ It was such a hassle for them. And then it sort of dawned on me that perhaps I was writing about it differently to everybody else. People kept on saying to me, ‘Where can we buy your book?’ So I ended up writing one.
Did you write it on spec?
It happened under bizarre circumstances. I was out at a party. And I’m a bit of a drugs-nerd, in that I’d never done anything. And I was talking to this person who said, ‘Oh you should really write this book.’ I said, ‘Actually, I’ve got this idea’, and they said, ‘Oh my God, I know this publisher, I can get it read by Monday, just stay up all weekend and do it!’ Now, unbeknownst to me, this person was coked off their head. I had no idea. So I was like ‘Oh my God!’ I went home like a good little girl, stayed up all weekend, wrote it and sent it into this publisher. I found out later that this person had absolutely nothing to do with it. And then I ran into a friend who used to work in magazines but had moved into book publishing, and told her about it. She said, ‘Shit, give me a look at it.’ So I gave it to her and it was commissioned within a week. And then, ironically, five years later, I got a bloody rejection letter from that first publisher saying, ‘We don’t think your idea will take off.’ I wrote back and I was like, ‘Really? It’s available in 140 bloody countries now’. Ha, ha!
How did you get into the TV work?
Well, when the book first came out in Australia, not much happened – because nobody buys books in Australia. But then my publisher went to the Frankfurt Book Fair, and England and America bought it for quite a sizeable amount of money. And then there was a big media tour organised here and in New York. And I just went and appeared on a few TV shows – morning shows and stuff. And then, next thing, I got offered a TV show over here in England. I was on a plane back here within about two seconds.
Was the show a success?
It was awful. It was on Sky One and it was called Hot Love. It was like a Trisha Godard type show, but it was so awful I don’t even want to tell you. But, from there, I did Would Like To Meet, which was a dating show, which is probably where most people got to know me. But since then, I’ve done most chat shows – I’ve done Oprah, I’ve done The Today Show lots in the States, I’ve done all the shows over here.
When I started out they were very nervous about putting me on the morning shows. I’d get all these big chats beforehand, l ike don’t use that word, don’t say this or that, how are you going to put this? – they were very nervous. But now I can say whatever I want. I think if you don’t use slang and if you talk about sex in a serious way I think people can cope with it.
Your Sex Inspectors show featured cameras in the bedrooms of real life couples. Are you aware that there’s been an internet explosion in people filming themselves having sex and then posting it up?
I think it’s good that people push themselves out of their comfort zone, because I think for years people were told that for the best sex you had to be so relaxed and feel comfortable with your partner, you had to have bloody rose petals scattered around, do massages, blah, blah. I mean – hello? How boring is that? And no-one – if you say to them ‘what was the best sex of your life?’ – no-one ever says, ‘Oh, it was when my husband scattered rose petals around the bed’. They say, ‘When I bloody had it up against a wall with somebody I shouldn’t have been with!’ Great sex is erotic, it’s dangerous, it’s naughty. And I think pushing yourself is the way to keep it going long term.
So are you recommending infidelity?
Well, there are ways to do it. One of the books I’ve just written addressed that whole topic of how you can be naughty without actually putting your relationship at risk. And I’m so not into other bodies in the bed. But you can be monogamous and also push it.
What would you recommend?
I think things like, you know, going to a swingers club and not actually participating, but just going and seeing what’s going on. Or having a lapdance or something, or going to a peepshow. Just doing naughty things – where you’re not actually involved with other couples but you’re in that environment – is good for you.
You’re a relationship counsellor, but you’re also divorced...
Yeah, but remember I don’t do one-on-one counselling. I counsel via the media. I think there’s this perception of me that I have a clinic or something, and I sit there and I counsel people. I think I’m just a person that’s much more clued-up than the average person on my topic. I mean, I’ve got the degree and I’ve spent years specialising in sex and love, and a lot of my friends are psychiatrists, psychologists and sex therapists. And I definitely think I know equally as much as they do. Probably more, actually.
I was just asking how can you counsel other people’s love relationships when you’re divorced yourself.
My first book was Hot Sex and my second book was called Hot Relationships. And when I wrote that, I remember a friend saying to me, ‘You can’t write a relationships book because you’re divorced!’ And I did think about it, but then I thought to myself, ‘Shit! I’d much rather actually take advice from somebody like me, who has had all sorts of different types of relationships and experienced a lot of what I write about, than I would from somebody who met Mr. Right at bloody 19 and was all snuggled up and has had this lovely, smug, perfect marriage’. How can they advise people on relationship problems?
Everybody’s blind in their own relationships so, in your own personal love life, do you ever find yourself making the same mistakes you advise other people to avoid?
I do make mistakes, but I know what they are as I’m doing them. I know my relationship patterns so well.
You’re known for having a predilection for younger men.
Ha, ha! I’m trying so hard not to! But I don’t think it’s that I’ve got a thing for younger men. I think that I don’t meet that many men of my own age, number one, so there’s less people to choose from. And when I do they’re nearly always married or in a relationship. And if somebody’s married or in a relationship, I just don’t go there.
Do you believe in monogamy?
I think it’s bloody hard. I do believe in it, though. What’s that thing when you’re an idealistic cynic? I see it not working all around me, but I still think that if you find a person at the right time of your life, and you choose sensibly, and also with passion on top of that. Because I chose very sensibly with my husband. And I adored him, but there was no sexual attraction there. It was so cruel! It was like six out of seven things were absolutely bloody perfect, and there was no sexual attraction – on my part, anyway. And that became hard. And I left that marriage because I thought that I was probably going to end up having an affair in time – and there was no way I was going to do that.
What’s your opinion on the way sex education is taught in schools?
Don’t bloody get me started on that! I wanna do what Jamie Oliver did with School Dinners. I think the sex education in England is absolutely atrocious. Not only sex education, but relationship skills. I mean, teach people how to bloody survive in life and have relationships. We ought to be teaching teens how to not have sex, even though the rest of your crowd are having it, and still be able to function with your friends. And somebody should be teaching that in school.
So what do they teach?
They keep going into this stuff of ‘this is how to put on a condom,’ ‘this is safe sex’ and so on. It’s bullshit! I mean, it’s great that they’re doing that, and it’s necessary, but, unless you do all the other stuff with it, it’s just bullshit useless information. When they’re in a group and they’re out with their girlfriends and every single one of them is shagging somebody and they’re not, all this information is pointless. What they need is a class in how to say no and not be unpopular. So I really wanted to get the BBC or somebody like that to allow me to do that.
Wouldn’t they?
I’ve had interest to a point, but then at some point they all get scared.

Do you think that women are more sexually mature than men? Or are we all equally to blame?
I started off thinking that men and women are the same, but they’re not. The more they discover about the brain, the more they realise that men and women are not the same at all. But I do think that men are much more simple creatures. I think women are definitely much more emotionally intelligent than men are.
Are you looking for a long term relationship?
I am – and I’m actually in one at the moment! I’m actually back with an ex at the moment. We’ve been out three times – this is the third time round – and there’s an intense soul-mate connection there that keeps pulling us back. And it’s absolutely intense. I’ve only ever felt it one other time in my life, and that was with my husband. I don’t believe in Mr. Right, I don’t believe there is only one person for you, but I certainly believe that there are people that you just have this instant appeal and attraction with.
Did you ever want children?
Well, that’s a bit of an interesting one because, when I was about 30, I actually got told that I couldn’t have kids. So I sort of sailed through life thinking that I couldn’t. It’s quite easy when you know you can’t. I always think that the relationship comes first and then you have the kids. I never wanted kids so badly that I’d have the kids on their own. Then this guy I’m going out with now, I actually fell pregnant to him accidentally – obviously, not realising that I could get pregnant – about three years ago. And that was like, ‘Shit! Okay, well that’s bloody interesting!’ I’d gone through all my life not even factoring in children. Maybe I would’ve made a few different choices. I don’t know.
And then I would have had it, but I miscarried and then it was like ‘Bloody hell, what do I do, now that I know I can have children?’ And I just thought about it and decided that I still didn’t want to do it unless I was in a relationship that I was going to remain in for the rest of my life.
Then I had a suspected brain tumour, believe it or not, and through that I had to go and get some other medical tests done. Then I found out that I had some other bizarre thing – a hormone thing – which meant that I probably wasn’t going to be able to naturally conceive. So I just thought ‘Ah, forget it!” Ha, ha! It was all too hard! Anyway, I’m a bit old now – at 45.
Well, I don’t know. Not these days...
Oh yeah, that 67-year-old woman had kids recently. I think it would very much depend on... I would say I probably won’t. But maybe I’ll meet somebody who’s already got kids. I dunno.
Are you religious at all?
No, not at all.
What’s your opinion on the likes of the Vatican getting involved in people’s sex lives?
I get so angry about it. I spend a lot of time trying to fix people – particularly Catholic girls – who intellectually are perfectly normal about sex, and then bloody psychologically, because of the way they’ve been brought up, are convinced that it’s bad. The Catholic Church absolutely infuriates me.
Finally, is Cox really your surname or did you just change it for your career?
Ha, ha! It’s my real surname! I would’ve been a lot more original. Do you know what, though? It could’ve been a whole lot worse because my mum, bless her, originally wanted to call me Randy. Could you imagine it? ‘Hi, I’m Randy Cox and I write about sex!’ Oh dear!

Tracey Cox’s most recent book, Superhotsex is published by Dorling Kindersley