Normalize therapy.

Who ever starts their day by thinking, “Hey, I’m going to have an affair today?” Doesn’t happen! But, how many people do you know – or maybe this has been you – that find themselves one day asking, “How did this affair ever happen to our marriage?”

Our prayer in writing this is that it makes someone who is reading, suck air and go “OH BOY – it’s time to make an about-turn because I’m headed for a serious marital train wreck!”

While we can never be “safe” from the risk of an affair, we can take measures to safeguard our marriages.

As the Bible says, “Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed that he does not fall.” We need to remember that none of us are invincible, but we also need to remember that some of us are at more risk than others. If any of the following points describe you, then you need to take extra precautions to guard your marriage against an affair.

The following risk factors are from a meta-analysis done in 2010 by Tsapelas, Fisher, and Aron. While this is quite a list, it is so important for each of us to be aware of the risks to our relationship.

1. Relationship satisfaction (how satisfied am I with our marriage?)

Boredom

Lack of emotional support

Frequency and quality of sex

Felt love

Low agreeableness

Low conscientiousness

2. Mental health or psychological issues

Psychopathology (depression, anxiety, etc.)

Narcissism (thinking high of self)

Excessive alcohol consumption

Childhood sexual abuse

Role modeling by father (generational infidelity patterns)

Attachment anxiety: spouses who are uncertain of the availability of spouse and cope by seeking reassurance from and clinging to their spouse

Attachment avoidance: spouses who doubt the availability of close relationships with others and cope by avoiding behaviors that promote intimacy

3. Self-perception

More socially desirable = more infidelity

Women more motivated by the need for intimacy and self-esteem

Women more motivated by dissatisfaction with marriage

Men overall have a stronger desire to engage in sexual infidelity

4. Social factors

Lack of religiosity

Higher-income (opportunity, entitlement)

Work that involves touching clients, discussing personal concerns with colleagues or clients, or working alone with co-workers

Moving onto more positive things! Here are three things that you can do to strengthen and maintain your marriage while decreasing the risk of an affair.

1. Keep Deepening Your Love

The best way to protect your marriage is to build a strong attachment bond. Sue Johnson (2004) puts it this way: “Become a source of security, protection and contact comfort for your spouse. Assist each other in difficult emotional circumstances and in developing a positive and potent sense of self.

In plain English, invest in your marriage!

Show love and consideration to one another.

Share the power in your relationship (listen to episode 003 – Receiving Influence, for more information on what this means).

Learn to be there emotionally for each other, so neither spouse has a desire to look elsewhere for that emotional bond.

And last but not least – be sexy! Date, flirt, wink, tease… the list could go on!

2. Own Your Stuff

Sometimes it is easier to bury our feelings or to blame others for them than it is to face the feelings directly. Oftentimes though, facing them is the only way we can find healing from them.

Face any mental health issues – seek outside help.

Face any past sexual abuse, poor role modeling, brokenness: seek healing

1 Corinthians 7 tells us no to withhold our bodies from our spouse. It is ok to be a low desire spouse if that’s all there is to it, but if you pull back from physical intimacy because of deeper issues, don’t let your history, your brokenness, your victimization become your dominant message. Face these things - seek healing.

Watch for an entitlement from positions of power (e.g., pastor, business owner, teacher) or wealth

Be aware of how you have been socialized about your sexuality

Be aware of how your work situation creates vulnerability to affairs and take extra mental/emotional steps to protect your marriage (speak well of your spouse, keep in touch through the day, etc.)

3. Be Intentional About Your Well-Being

Make good choices in your life with regards to finance, fitness and food.

Dads: be(come) a spiritual leader in your home.

Have some great same-sex friendships that will encourage you to grow (don’t just get together with the girlfriends to complain about your husbands…)

We do go into more detail of each point in our podcast, so go listen to that now. And if you’re someone whose marriage has been hi-jacked by an affair, we’d love to be in touch. Please reach out!

After going on a vacation, have you ever noticed the fact that oftentimes your family and friends are more excited about your vacation than you are? Sure, a lot of us enjoy our vacations, but they can be kind of stressful too! Why is it that we expect uninterrupted bliss, but the reality is most of us have our little spats, our frustrations and disappointments on vacation?

Holidays are necessary and biblical. Even Jesus Christ would encourage his disciples to “come apart and rest awhile”. So yes, we need holidays!

Why then are there so many challenges and dissatisfactions around our vacations?

One good explanation comes from Rosenblatt & Russell. They conducted a study on our expectations surrounding our vacations. What they discovered is that people have very high expectations for their vacations and tend to idealize them. They cited that people expected to come back from their vacation totally revitalized after having a time of intense and loving family togetherness, and also becoming one with nature. In reality, vacations aren’t usually 100 percent awesome, but for some reason we expect them to be.

How can we correct this?

1. Head in with realistic expectations!

No couple has a perfect marriage and no family gets along perfectly. Even if it looks like they do on their blog – they don’t! So, be prepared for some of the same interpersonal difficulties to arise on vacation as they do at home, but don’t treat them like they’re the end of the world and the end of the happy vacation.

Be aware of dynamics of traveling with other people. It will change things and if you can anticipate this and are prepared to make the adjustments it will make the vacation go a lot more smoothly.

Also, be prepared to negotiate and compromise during the planning for each day and realize that every vacation is not going to hit the ball out of the park.

2. Talk about the “division of labor” before you head in!

While this doesn’t sound vacation-like, daily maintenance is a part of any vacation. Talking about it ahead of time eases the stress surrounding it. For instance, discuss and decide who is going to be responsible for meals, decision making, packing, childcare, etc.

Be aware of your own sense of entitlement. Do you tend to come into your vacation with the thought that you deserve a break and are going to do nothing? Or is this vacation a time when you could serve your spouse and lessen his/her load?

Caleb gave the example, on this weeks’ podcast episode, of trying to get out of the campsite in the morning. Because he always left first in the mornings at home, he never saw the work it took to get three kids ready for the day. When camping, he would sit in the car and get frustrated that the girls and I weren’t ready when he said “Let’s go!” It was a mind shift for him to realize that he could help brush their hair before I braided it or make lunch. By doing these things, it made my load easier too. (I suggested that he could braid the girls’ hair on our next vacation, but for some reason he didn’t jump at that…)

3. Plan together!

This is a discussion that needs to take place before you book any holidays. Together with your spouse, talk about the big picture and what you both want to achieve with your vacation.

Do you want adventure? Rest? Contemplation? Family visit? Hot or Cold climate? Sports (ie. Skiing)? Hobby (ie fishing)? Romance? Touring all over or staying in one place and exploring deeply?

There may have to be some compromise. Agree to do one type of vacation this year, and another next year depending on the desire of each spouse.

Realize that if you both need a vacation to reduce stress, having kids along will make that extremely difficult. There are times when dropping the children off at their grandparents or with some close friends for the weekend and having a complete break is necessary.

And last, but definitely not least, talk about money! What can we afford for this vacation?

In 2003, Chesworth interviewed lawyers about vacations from the perspective of what they saw in their clients. She found that most divorces are initiated because of disagreements over finances. She also discovered that 80 percent of lawyers she interviewed said there was a noticeable increase in divorce proceedings following vacations and holidays.

You can spend a big chunk of money on your vacation for a fabulous adventure but that can bring a huge amount of stress into your life. Instead, save some money ahead of time and create a budget that you’re both committed to sticking too. You may miss out on doing some things on your vacation that sound so exciting, but you will come home a lot more peaceful knowing that it’s all paid for and you’re not in debt.

And I have to say, it only took Caleb and me 14.5 years to figure this out. In January, we sat down and had our “vacation discussion”. We decided what we wanted to do and where we wanted to go this year. We then estimated what it would cost and figured out what we needed to set aside monthly to have enough saved. This approach was a lot less stressful and definitely worth the uncomfortable discussions up front!

We would encourage you to take these three suggestions and apply them as you plan your next family vacation. We know you’ll have a stress-reduced holiday if you do!

You know, even if you are committed to your marriage, you can still make it a miserable experience. Today, we will look at three negativity traps you can fall into and how to get out of them!

If you have ever felt yourself stuck in a rut of negativity, you know how draining that can be on you and your spouse. Negativity is not something anybody should dwell on. So, as we explore the topic today, we also want to remind you that except when it comes to related medical complications, happiness is very often just a choice.

Yes, if you train yourself to make the choice of happiness 10, 50, 100 times a day, you are going to infuse A LOT of joy into your marriage.

The three types of negativity we are going to look at today are rumination, bitterness and ingratitude.

Rumination

Rumination is going over and over the same bad negative things again and again. It usually focuses on the past or present (vs. worrying which focuses on the future). Along with focusing on negativity, rumination brings with it a with a desire to understand what happened; however, there is usually no conscious responsibility to take action that comes along with it.

Rumination gives an excuse that says as long as I keep hashing the situation through and figuring it out, I don’t actually have to take the responsibility and deal with it.

A study from 2008 (Noeln/Hoeksema, Wisco & Lyubormirsky) found that rumination consistently predicts the onset of depression. In other words, where there is a pattern of rumination, you are putting yourself at risk for depression.

That’s why it is important to stop the negative pattern and instead focus on the positive. While we do need to take the time to ponder our failures, figure out what went wrong and come up with how we can do things differently in the future, something constructive needs to come out of this way of thinking. Remember, focusing on the positive results in happiness!

How can you do this? Take what we call “happy breaks”. Play happy music loudly, jump on your trampoline, or go for a run.

It is also a good idea to plan a problem-solving session where you’re actually going to sit down and deal with the issue. Don’t ignore what goes wrong in your life. Instead, balance out the time you spend thinking about it, and take breaks of happiness at regular intervals.

Another great way to knock rumination out of your life is to get your eyes off yourself and onto someone else. And of course, it’s always a good idea to focus on the relationships closest to you – especially your marriage!

Bitterness

Unforgiveness registers in body stress, and there is plenty of research that shows how stress impacts you physically. It can also cause medical and mental health problems.

When it comes to the offenses that come at us, although we can’t control them, we can control our response. Will you become angry and bitter? Are you going to let stress and its effects consume you? Or are you going to forgive and move on?

Bitterness can also create a victim mentality – it gives you an identity of being a wounded individual. Once you have this mindset, it is easy to stay there and ruminate, but really, you’re hurting yourself more than anybody else.

Something to help us overcome bitterness is empathy. Remember that hurt people hurt people. If you have been hurt or wounded, try to understand that the offense came from someone who is most likely hurting inside. Empathy is the understanding that if I had walked in their shoes up until this point, who am I to think that I would have acted any differently? Empathy stops our pride and keeps the bitterness at bay.

Ingratitude

Gratitude is a state of being thankful. It is something that has to be cultivated and expressed often. When it comes to our marriages, it is easy to take our spouse for granted and fall into the habit of ingratitude as a direct result. A great way to throw little positive tidbits into your marriage is to learn to notice the kind and selfless acts of your spouse and acknowledge them with gratitude. Affirm what you want to see more of in your spouse.

Going further, express appreciation not only for their inputs into your marriage (those little acts of kindness), but also for who your spouse is as a person (character-based).

Remember, happiness is a choice and gratitude helps to create happiness. Choose joy for your marriage.

Q&A Section

Today Caleb wanted to discuss the question, “How do we decide when to have kids?” and brought up a few concerns that many people raise (such as finances, travel, choices, etc). We would love to hear your thoughts on the matter as there are so many differing opinions on this topic. Please give us your opinion in the comments below.

Why do we spend so much time comparing ourselves to others? Is it a fear of rejection? Of not being good enough?

Making comparisons is never healthy, but in the context of marriage, it can suck the soul right out of it. It is draining and destructive. Why? It's because it leaves us looking for what we don’t have instead of focusing on what we do have.

Often when we are comparing our spouse to others, we are just cherry-picking certain qualities that we want to focus on, but we need to remember that the person we’re comparing our spouse to comes as a whole package.

As long as you think that something out there will make your life better, you’re denying reality. You’re also taking away from yourself the opportunity to develop your own appreciation for the beauty of your own marriage, your own spouse. So, what should you do when the urge arises? Make the choice to see in your spouse the beautiful compliment for who you are.

There was research done in 1982 by Sanders & Suls that stated some interesting findings on this topic. For example, they found that a sense of equity induces satisfaction. One way to look at this is, if I think that I put a lot more into our marriage than my husband (comparing my efforts to his) I will feel deprived. On the other hand, if I perceive that my husband’s efforts are equitable, then I will be more satisfied.

In other words, if you want to transform your marriage, work hard to make sure your spouse feels equitable in terms of contribution.

Another finding in the study was that if I feel good about my marriage, comparing it to others will make me feel even better. Oppositely, if I feel bad about it, comparing it will make me feel even worse.

Either way, making comparisons to your marriage is not healthy. If you feel something is lacking, you need to talk directly to your spouse about what is happening.

Before doing so, start off by asking yourself, "Do I have a perception problem or is there actually a shortcoming? Then have a conversation about it! Don’t let things fester while you compare your spouse to others.

If the problem is your attitude – own up to it and change it. Focus on the positive! If there actually is an issue with your spouse, bring it up and talk it out.

In Isaiah 45, a word picture is painted of a clay pot arguing with its maker. In a lot of ways, this is what we are doing when we are comparing ourselves, or our spouse, with others. We are saying that God should have made me (or my spouse) this way or that way… It is a rebuttal of God’s wisdom in creating you and is just a breeding ground for jealousy.

Comparison does not solve anything. It only creates a sense of dissatisfaction. Instead of lamenting on what we don’t have (but can see in others), we need to focus on what is right here, present in our lives.

Q&A Section

Referring to the article, 10 Habits of Happy Couples, Edwin asks: “Is this just the things that happy couples do already? Or if unhappy couples start doing them, they will become happier (note, I didn't say happy). Do you have to change feelings to change behaviour or does changing behaviour change feelings?”

I thought Caleb and I were going to disagree on this one. What do you think? Let us know in the comments below!

In the podcast, Caleb referred to Episode 003, Receiving Influence From Your Wife. Go have a listen or read to find out what he was referring to.

Where do you go with your stress? Do you take it out on your wife or husband? Or do you take it to your spouse?

I know, I know, there are a lot of jokes about marriage adding to your stress… The great thing about marriage though, is that its design is perfect for the management and reduction of stress.

One of the fundamental invitations of Jesus Christ was to give rest/relief as  Matthew 11:28 states, “Come unto me, all who labor and I will give you rest.” Obviously, we can’t save our spouse, but we can be the secure sounding board that will give them relief from outside stresses. God wants us to be at peace and at rest and has designed marriage as a tool to get us to that place in our lives.

How does this work?

Before we go on… If you haven’t listened to (or read) Episode 15, go do it now.  Listening with understanding is the key to reducing your spouse’s stress.

Talk it out! Try to talk for 10 to 20 minutes about a stressor and give as much detail as possible. Something to keep in mind is that this is for stress outside the relationship, this is not related to relationship issues! Those need to be talked out too, but that is not what we’re discussing here.

In general, men seem to feel obliged to solve a problem, while women take their husband's problem and make it their own. Don’t do either! Caleb and I have fun with this as we notice ourselves doing these stereotypical things.

Husbands: Just listen. I was meaning just listen to your wife, but again, listen to Episode 15 too! It’s about listening to understand. Just hear her out and make sure you understand what she’s telling you and more importantly what she’s feeling. Don’t feel you need to solve the problem!

Wives: Again, listen! Listen to understand. Don’t make his stress your problem and get wound up and fuel the fire and make his stress bigger (I am SO guilty of this one). I know that the she-bear wants to come out when our husband is criticized, but making his problem our problem doesn’t help him or us. Just hear him out. Make sure you respond in such a way that he knows you heard him. What he really needs is wound down, not wound up!

Oh yeah, and make sure you trade roles. Sometimes Caleb gets home and I’m so busy ranting and raving and de-stressing that I forget to ask about his day. And by the time he’s done hearing about mine, he doesn’t want to add his own stress!  Ok, maybe I’m exaggerating here (at least I hope I am!) but make sure you take turns hearing each other out.

That’s the fabulous thing about marriage – it’s a safe, secure, non-judgemental place to air everything out.

Why doesn’t this always work?

Protector: We know a guy who feels he needs to protect his family from his stress. So instead of talking to his wife about it, he takes it out on his wife and kids in anger and harshness (and yes, that is his own confession). 10 minutes of talking it out and receiving empathy from his wife would make such a difference in this situation.

Fear of Dependency: Another reason for not sharing stress, is the Fear of Dependency (if you haven’t listened to Episode #9, go do it now). Some people, especially men, feel that they need to stand alone and not depend on anyone.  This really puts up barriers to intimacy.

Other ways to use your marriage for stress relief?

Comfort Sex: Sexy Marriage Radio mentioned that there are different kinds of sex, and using sex for comfort is one of them.

Gifts/Pampering/Popcorn: Yes, popcorn is my comfort food and if I’m stressed, Caleb knows I’ll enjoy it. It has become a joke between us now, but seriously, find out what is a comfort to your spouse and give it to him/her!

Go on a date.

Show Empathy.

Review

In review, marriage should be a safe harbor. It is one of the few places you can get a non-judgmental listening ear and receive honest, supportive feedback. Talking about the stress in your life and receiving empathy from your spouse creates togetherness and increases intimacy while decreasing stress levels.

There is a verse in Ecclesiastes 4:9-10 that says “Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil. For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up!”What a blessing to be in a marriage where you have a spouse to lift you up (or calm you down, depending on the situation)!

Q&A Section

Our question-asker this week again wanted to remain anonymous, but she asked, “How do we ask our husbands to do things without treating him/making him feel like a child?” Have you ever struggled with this? Go listen to the podcast to find out what Caleb and I think.

PS. If this was your question and we didn’t understand the angle you were coming from, please clarify!

How awesome does it feel to be completely understood by someone – to feel that they ‘get’ you when you are explaining a problem!? Do you want to be a spouse that is able to give this blessing?

Listening to understand is one of those skills in marriage that doesn’t have a very sexy label, but is going to go a long ways towards building a thriving, passionate marriage.

I know you’re probably thinking, “But everyone knows how to listen, right? How could it be such a skill?” The reality is, most of us listen to respond, rather than listen to understand!

Listen to Understand: 4 Methods

There are 4 kinds of active listening responses: clarifying, paraphrasing, reflecting and summarizing. These come from the work of Cormier and Nurius.

1. Clarifying

Rephrase to understand. Try using, “Are you saying…?” or “So, you mean…?”. By rephrasing what was said and repeating it back to the sayer, clarifying helps to deal with ambiguity and vagueness.

For example:

Wife [after hectic day]: I just feel like it never stops.

Husband clarifies: Are you saying you’d like me to be more involved with the kid's bedtime routine? (pulling clarification from the context of the day).

On a complete side note here – all you ladies, listen up! Try to avoid “women-speak”. If you need help, ask for it. It is so much easier on the relationship, and on ourselves, than hinting and hoping our husband catches the hint!

2. Paraphrasing

Rephrase your spouse’s content and repeat it back to them. This helps them get more specific. It also helps them to know if you’re interpreting their meaning correctly and lets you dig a little deeper into what they really mean.

For example:

Husband: I tried talking to Fred about his lack of results in sales last month, but it was really difficult. He would hardly say a word and I don’t know what to do with him.

Wife paraphrases: Fred is not responding when you’re trying to coach him?

3. Reflecting

Reflecting is like paraphrasing but pulls the ‘feeling’ words out. This is huge for communicating that you understand, and for helping your spouse to feel understood. It helps them identify core feelings, issues, and concerns. It really goes past the content of what they said to the process of what they’re feeling about a situation.

For example:

Wife (for the full effect, read this out loud - take a big breath and let it all come spilling out in a rush!): Little Jimmy came home today and blasted in the door, threw his backpack into my arms and blew right by me shouting over his shoulder that he was heading to the neighbor’s to play on his new game console.

Husband: So you felt disappointed? Maybe kind of hurt and angry about being treated like you were his maid rather than being greeted respectfully as his mom?

(At this point, I, the wife, would yell YES and fall into his arms because he actually understood me!!!)

4. Summarizing

Summarizing really ties multiple pieces together. It is a combo of 2 or more of clarifying, paraphrasing and reflecting.

For example:

Husband: I am just so done with my brother, Joe. I am sick and tired of his negativity and criticism all the time. It was great when he was in that sales job but since he’s been unemployed it’s like he’s so bitter and hard to be with. I don’t know what to do with him or about him now.

Wife: Sounds like you’re kind of sad about losing the old Joe that you knew and enjoyed so much. Are you saying that you wish you could find a way to help him?

Listen to Understand: Other Tips

That sums up the four kinds of active listening, but another great tip is to use good questions.

Use open questions rather than closed questions. Open questions require a longer answer, while closed questions only require a yes or a no. Rather than asking, “Did something happen today?” (yes or no answer), you could ask “What happened today that made you upset?” (needs a few more words!).

As we’ve mentioned before, be aware of the timing! Some times are just not great to have deep discussions. You know those times: right before company comes over, or on the way to church, or in front of the kids. If something comes up that you want to discuss so you can listen to and understand your spouse better, put it aside. Agree on a time to return to the topic, and make sure you do just that.

Nonverbal cues are also essential to show your spouse you’re listening. Things as simple as head nods, open gestures, and posture (no arm crossing and turning away), or even silence can go a long way in showing your spouse that you’re listening and understand what he/she is saying. Eliminate distractions, turn off the TV and the cell phone (or at least ignore it if it dings), and show your spouse they have your undivided attention.

So, next time your spouse says something, try clarifying, or paraphrasing, or reflecting, or summarizing. Ask an open question. Their response may just surprise you.

Q&A Section

A question from Mike: "we are in a time of life when taking my wife out for a date is hard work. We have three kids under 6, and in addition to the family, I'm trying to balance my work and our ministry. Do you have any good suggestions for how I can more consistently date my wife?”

This is such a good question! We’ve definitely gone through this and I’m sure you have too. Listen to the podcast for our answer and let us know if you’ve got some suggestions that have worked for you that we can pass on to Mike.

Thanks to KH Wilson for a great iTunes review!

A Ritual of Emotional Connection

This is a quick episode again as we are still vacationing in South Dakota!

Dr. John Gottman, a leading researcher in the field of marriage therapy, encourages couples to establish what he calls, "rituals of emotional connection."

There are hundreds of possibilities, but in this episode we share with you a quick one that we practice nearly every day. We use it in that busy time between getting home from work and eating our evening meal together.

What is 5-for-5?

It's simple, and it's geared typically towards husbands who come home to their wives after work in the evening. It could be tailored to fit your circumstances if they are different.

What I do is spend five minutes, right after I get home, within five feet of Verlynda. That's 5-for-5: five minutes within five feet. I put my iPhone down and just spend the time finding out about her day, and talking to her about mine.

Now, life is never so simple that eight or ten hours can be summarized in five minutes, but it's a quick summary. More importantly, it's a quick way to reconnect and fortify that healthy sense of togetherness.

HT to Michael Hyatt for this tip!

Give it a Shot

And let us know how it goes.

Or, maybe you've developed some quick-and-easy ways of connecting. We'd love to share those with other members of the OYF clan so please feel free to reach out on Facebook, Twitter or shoot us a note.

Please leave a comment below!

We hope you're having a great summer too!

I know we all can come out with some doozies in a rip-roarin' marital. However, one of the most important rules of fair fighting is: the threat of divorce is never on the table.

Divorce: Unjust if In Jest?

So this is a short episode because we are on holidays! But we wanted to leave you with a good tidbit to chew over.

We've noticed a few different folks mentioning that their spouse threatened them with divorce, if they did or didn't do certain things. Now, we don't want to be too severe, but...

This one is simply unacceptable.

Marriage is a sacred, permanent covenant that should only ever be broken by the passing away of one's spouse. In the heat of an argument, some have thrown this question into the fray in a manipulative way as a scare tactic. That is never acceptable.

But what is surprising is the number of folks we've heard recently using this as a passing remark. "Oh, if you ever went out in public dressed like that, I'd divorce you!" Is that OK to say?

We say, "No!"

Learn the Language of Distress

Now we can certainly understand that there are some things we feel very strongly about. But to use the threat of divorce, even in a flippant way, is a small but unnecessary threat to the sanctity of the marriage bond.

There are other ways of expressing distress. Instead of creating a threat, give your spouse a window into how strongly impacted you are (or might be) by their choice. Try, "If you ever went out in public dressed like that, I'd feel like I was with my grandmother instead of my wife. Please change!"

Stop and Think

So this is just us asking you to stop and think before you speak.

Understand what is bothering you so severely.

Frame that into a language your spouse can receive without feeling threatened, and language that opens up your heart to him or her.

We hope you enjoyed this!

Remember, we'd love to hear from you. Please leave us a review on iTunes or send us your comments or a question for a future episode to [email protected].

And thanks for putting up with our mini-episode while we enjoy a family holiday in the Black Hills of South Dakota!

Consider a couple who has been married twelve years. They are sitting on opposite ends of the same couch on a Sunday afternoon. The kids are at her sister's. She is folding laundry. He is half-watching something on his phone. Neither of them is unhappy in any acute way. But neither of them has touched the other in days, and the silence in the room is not a peaceful one. It is the silence of two people who are not sure what their physical relationship is for anymore.

That couple shows up in our practice often. They are not the couple in crisis. They are the couple in slow drift. And the question they bring is some version of this one: what is the point of sex in a marriage that is already past the early years, when the children take most of the energy, when desire does not announce itself the way it used to, when frequency has quietly dropped without either of them being sure when?

It is a fair question. And the honest clinical answer is that sex in a long-term marriage is not what most people grew up thinking it was. The point is not procreation alone. The point is not pleasure alone. The point is not even closeness in the abstract. In a long marriage, sex serves at least five distinct functions: pair-bonding, repair after rupture, stress regulation, differentiation, and mutual pleasure. Each one can do something in the relationship that is hard to replace.

When these layers are alive, sex feels like a place the couple comes back to. When some of them stall, sex starts to feel optional, or transactional, or like something to negotiate. And when most of them stall, couples start asking the question that brought them to our office in the first place.

What Sex Actually Does in a Marriage

Most articles on this topic frame sex as either reproductive or recreational. The clinical reality in a long marriage is more layered than that. Here is what we see sex actually doing in the room, in roughly the order it tends to surface.

1. Pair-Bonding (The Nervous System You Share)

The first job sex does is keep two nervous systems tuned to each other. When you have sex with the same person over years, your body learns to associate their voice, their breathing, their skin, with a specific cascade of neurochemicals. Oxytocin releases at touch and at climax. Prolactin and endorphins flood the post-coital window. Some studies find measurable drops in stress markers, including cortisol, that can carry into the following day.

This is what attachment researcher Sue Johnson calls the "hold me tight" function of physical intimacy: it is not just an act, it is a regulation. In couples who are otherwise safe with each other, regular sexual contact often seems to make co-regulation easier in the rest of life too. They reach for each other faster when one of them is upset. They de-escalate quicker after a fight. The shared nervous system is more responsive because it has been kept in practice.

When that practice slows, you notice it first in the small things. Bedtime conversations get shorter. Touch in passing gets rarer. The couch on a Sunday afternoon gets quieter. The bond is still there, but it is no longer being topped up.

2. Repair After Rupture

Sex is one of the few channels through which couples re-enter emotional contact after conflict. It is not the only one, and it is not a substitute for the repair conversation. But for many couples, especially those who find words difficult after a fight, physical reconnection is part of how trust resumes.

This is worth saying carefully. Sex cannot fix what has not been talked about. If one partner is hurt and the other reaches for sex without first reaching for the hurt, the sex will land as bypass and the hurt will go underground. The order matters: acknowledge, repair, reconnect. When that order is honored, the physical layer becomes part of the healing. When it is reversed, the physical layer becomes one more place the rupture is felt.

3. Stress Regulation

Recent research is clear that sex has a measurable effect on the stress response. A 2024 study in Health Psychology found that sex on a given day was associated with lower next-day blood pressure and reduced stress reactivity. Older work on cortisol and partnered sexuality points the same direction: in safe, wanted sexual contact, regular intimacy can help dampen the baseline tone of the stress system.

Most of the popular write-ups frame this as an individual health benefit. The more useful clinical frame is couple-level. When two people share a sexual life, they share a stress-regulation tool. Hard weeks land softer. Worry about the kids, about money, about aging parents, finds a place to discharge that does not require either of you to fix anything for the other. That is not a small thing. In our practice, the couples who have lost this layer often describe their relationship as feeling "heavier," even when nothing major has gone wrong.

4. Differentiation

This is the purpose nobody talks about, and the one we find ourselves explaining most often. Differentiation, in the Bowen and Schnarch tradition, is the capacity to stay yourself while staying connected. Sex with a long-term partner is one of the most precise tests of differentiation a person ever encounters.

In the early years, novelty does most of the work. Later, you have to keep showing up as a particular person, with particular wants and a particular body that has changed over time, in front of another particular person who knows you. You cannot hide behind newness. You cannot collapse into anxious pursuit ("just tell me what you want me to do") or avoidant withdrawal ("I am too tired, every time") without something going slack between you.

A mature sexual life in a long marriage is in some sense the practice of being seen and choosing not to flinch. That is hard work. It is also part of why couples who do this work tend to describe their sex life at fifteen years in as deeper, not thinner, than it was at year three.

5. Mutual Pleasure

And then, of course, pleasure. Pleasure was always one of the purposes, and we do not want to bury it under the clinical machinery. Bodies were made for this. The point worth naming is that pleasure in a long marriage looks different than pleasure in a new one.

Researchers like Rosemary Basson and Emily Nagoski have reframed how desire works, especially for women, in ways that are useful here. Spontaneous desire (the lightning bolt of wanting that comes out of nowhere) is one mode. Responsive desire, where arousal arises in response to context and touch rather than preceding it, is just as legitimate, and tends to be more common in long-term relationships. Couples who understand the difference stop waiting for spontaneous desire to return and start building the conditions in which responsive desire can show up. That single reframe can spare couples from the assumption that something is broken.

Why Frequency Is Not the Right Question

The question we hear most is, "How often should we be having sex?" It is the wrong first question, for a clinical reason. Frequency is downstream of meaning, not upstream. When the meaning is intact, the frequency tends to follow at whatever rate the season of life allows. When the meaning has thinned, no number on the calendar will fix it.

That said, the data is interesting. Greenblat (1983) found that three-quarters of couples in their first year of marriage were having sex more than twice a week, and that this dropped to about 1.5 times per week by year six. Sprecher and Schwartz (1995) confirmed that age is the strongest predictor of decline, followed by relationship happiness and the presence of young children. Twenge, Sherman, and Wells (2017) showed that across the population, adults are having sex about nine fewer times per year than adults were in the 1990s.

What the research consistently does not show is a magic number. The closest thing to one is a single-study finding that subjective well-being tends to improve as sexual frequency rises up to about once a week, and then plateaus. The clinical takeaway is not "have sex weekly or else." The clinical takeaway is that frequency is a follower, not a leader. When the meaning is tended to, frequency has a better chance of finding a level that fits the season.

That level may shift over the years. Exhaustion is real. Small children are real. Perimenopause and andropause are real. Health changes, medication side effects, and aging bodies are all real. None of those make a marriage broken. They make a marriage a long marriage. The work is to keep the meaning available while the frequency moves with the season.

How Mutual Desire Actually Works

One of the older findings on couple sexuality is from Byers and Heinlein (1989), who studied who initiates and how partners respond. Two things stood out. First, men initiated more often than women, which surprised nobody. Second, men and women responded to initiations at almost identical rates. At least in that study, the cultural story that women refuse and men pursue was more complicated than people often assume.

What they also found is that sexual satisfaction predicted both initiation and response. Satisfied partners initiated more and accepted initiations more. Dissatisfied partners initiated less and refused more. What often sits in the middle is meaning. If sex is felt as mutual, desired, and worth protecting, frequency is usually easier to talk about and tend. If sex has started to feel like a demand, a chore, or a measure of someone's adequacy, the system collapses on both ends.

This is where the responsive-desire frame matters. In the early years of a relationship, desire often arrives spontaneously and either partner can act on it. Later, especially for the partner with lower baseline drive, desire tends to arrive responsively. The interest is not absent. It is just not pre-loaded. It needs context: a relaxed evening, an unhurried conversation,...

Sometimes it is just too scary to let someone else make the decisions. Other times the fear of losing someone is so powerful we won’t even let ourselves get close to them. These sound rather extreme but are more common in marriages than we might think. Let’s take a look at what triggers these fears.

Again, we want to acknowledge the research and wisdom of Dr. Weeks and Dr. Treat in examining these fears of intimacy. To recap from Part 1 and Part 2, fear is present in all of our lives to varying degrees and comes with many, many faces. How should we deal with fear? Acknowledge it, name it, and talk to your spouse about it. Always move towards it, not away from it, and you will disempower fear!

Fear #5: Fear of Losing Control or Being Controlled

Weeks and Treat state, that “Healthy relationships are based on mutual control. Partners share the power and control in the relationship.” That is our baseline and our assumption here, that there is some give and take to the control in the marriage. We see the balance in the Bible verse that precedes the classic text about marriage in Ephesians 5: “Submit yourselves to one another”.

Submission is not something to brow-beat your spouse with – it is something to be mutually given in marriage!

Alright, back to the Fear of Control after a little side rant there… :)

A spouse with this fear may actively resist or else passively give in to their spouse. This fear is actually very complex as a person may fear that getting too intimate will result in a loss of control of one’s life. There are two levels of meaning here:

Giving in or fighting control gives us a diversion from having to have deeper discussions that involve mutuality: which really is an intimate activity. This is why it is a fear of intimacy. By being controlled or by being controlling I can keep you out of my inner workings. Both are avoidance strategies.

The deeper meaning is that losing control means feeling engulfed by the spouse. I lose myself, and my self-identity, if I am not in control. Often these folks will search (and this is paradoxical) for someone to complete themselves (a strong partner) but then need to recoil from that to preserve the little sense of self they do have. They don’t know who they are or what they want.

If you are in the first group, you will not let your guard down to let others know you. Often there is an assumption that the knowledge that comes from being vulnerable will be used against you. At the same time, you may not know how to assert yourself properly.

This often comes from parents who were over-controlling and did not promote competency and maturity. You may have been a child set up to take tasks beyond your capability and then had your parents stand back and watch you flop.

These marriages have a hard time with intimacy because it is more parent-child than equal to equal. It is regressive. It creates something that parallels what happened in your family of origin where your parents were over-controlling.

Again, the response is to own your stuff and then work through the task of piecing your identity together. It will be a challenging but wonderful journey. You will benefit from having a supportive spouse who respects boundaries and will lift you to that equal-to-equal place rather than buying into the parent-child pattern.

Fear #6: Fear of Abandonment/Rejection

In normal relationships, we all take this risk: the more we emotionally invest in our relationship, the more it hurts when the whole thing goes down in flames. Bring the fear of abandonment or rejection into this and it really complicates things.

If you have been hurt, you are wary to get too close too soon or to get close at all. If you have experienced traumatic abandonment (like death, divorce or desertion of a parent) and never had the opportunity to work through that, then it is even more severe. Or sometimes in adulthood, we can go through relational experiences that really build this fear up as part of our psyche.

The belief that is carried from all those experiences is: the best way to protect myself is to never get close to another person, then I’ll never go through that trauma again. For these people, the question “Is it better to have loved and lost, or to never have loved at all?” has an obvious answer!

Is it better to have loved and lost, or to never have loved at all?

Traumatic abandonment often makes a person believe that “I am unworthy and undeserving of love. Others are unworthy of my love and trust because they will hurt me. At the same time, there is this powerful drive to find worth and love. So I’ll want to be in a relationship and may even invest more in the relationship than my spouse, but I’m constantly insecure about it.” Phew, those are a lot of thoughts to be wrestling with!

How do we heal this?

This takes a lot of work! You need to learn the skill of who to trust, and how to trust. Start to undermine that voice telling you that all people are bad, untrustworthy, and will eventually hurt you. Then take time to reflect on the source of this fear and to work through that to gain healing. (This is good work to do with a therapist, especially one well versed in attachment theory.)

Start replacing unhealthy responses or thoughts with healthy, functional ones. The verse that comes to mind is “As a man thinks, so is he.” There is a retraining of the brain where you create new neural pathways that are grounded in a healthy view of reality.

Again, the underlying thread here as we’ve seen with our other fears it to name and acknowledge them, and then move towards them.

A big favor to ask all our readers today – please let us know what you think of our articles. You can leave a comment below, or send us a question or comment to [email protected]. We love feedback of all kinds, seriously!

Q&A Section:

From Anonymous (and yes, this is actually a real person who didn’t want to be identified – we’re not making these up!): How do you broach “intimate” subjects with your spouse – such as sex, pornography, suspicion of cheating, do-you-really-love-me-anymore?

A great question that we are sure all of us can relate to at some point in time in our lives! Listen to the podcast to hear the answer.