“The need for love and intimacy is a fundamental human need, as primal as the need for food, water, and air.” – Dean Ornish
I saw a headline the other day about marriage being a place where sex goes to die. Like a lot of the subject matter dealing with marriage, it’s a myth.
That’s not to say that sex, intimacy, and affection aren’t often problematic. Issues around sex and money are the two most common arguments in marriages. But marriage is not the reason. It’s really about how personal these two subjects are and how difficult they are to navigate.
Research shows that married people have more and better sex than those who are single. But that may be a function of availability. And, if you’re not satisfied with the quantity or quality of sex and intimacy in your marriage, it doesn’t matter what the research says.
One of the biggest challenges is due to what happens when you’re under the influence of the “in love” phenomenon. When you and your partner are flooded with the hormones and neurotransmitters during this time of your relationship, sex is often frequent and passionate. It sets the bar incredibly high.
And if you use that standard for the rest of your marriage, you will inevitably be disappointed. But that doesn’t mean the passion and intimacy has to die.
The reasons things drop off are many. One of the biggest ones is that the two of you stop spending enough quality time together. When you are first in the throes of love, you spend a lot of high-quality time together. But over time, you let it slide. You let other things take priority and try to fit in sex. Of course, the quality will suffer.
Another effect of being “in love” is that the level of desire is high. Because you are both so into it, it doesn’t take much to bring you pleasure. Again, as the stressors of life and changes that come with age and childbearing, both desire and what it takes to enjoy sex shift.
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Most sexual interactions end in orgasm for men. That is not always true for women. While women have a specific body part whose sole purpose is pleasure (the clitoris), there often is a gap when it comes to orgasm. The bigger the gap between the two of you, the greater the chance your wife will be ambivalent about getting “busy”.
There’s also the issue of sexual vs. non-sexual touch. If you only touch your wife when you’re wanting sex, you will train her to shut you down. Sprinkling unconditional affection throughout the day lets her know that you care about connecting with her, not just getting some.
I know that men want more from their wives than just sex. Affection and connection are important to you as well. With several of my clients, the lack of affection was more painful than the lack of sex. Both are important for a healthy, complete marriage.
Being able to talk about what you each like, making time to be together on a regular basis, and dealing with any other issues in your relationship are all key to having a great intimate life. If you’d like more passion and intimacy in your marriage, you need to address these things.
So, if your physical intimacy isn’t what you want it to be, how much longer are you going to struggle before you’re willing to do something different?
If you’re ready to make a change, reach out and let me know. I’ve got you on this.
