CHAPTER 2

DOES GOOD SEX JUST HAPPEN?

THERE IT WAS in U.S. News & World Report: “Sexual Desire: Whether it’s dull appetite or ravenous hunger, millions of Americans are unhappy with their intimate lives.”

Good sex doesn’t seem to be happening a whole lot in America today.

Perhaps it’s partly because of our complex, busy lifestyles. But we think it’s also because so many people mistakenly believe that good sex just happens.

Maybe good sex did just happen when Uncle Pete and Aunt Audrey lived on the farm without electricity or a telephone and the house was dark and children were all snug in their beds by 7:00 p.m.

Then again, maybe not.

Doing What Comes Naturally

We once gave an engaged couple a copy of our book Getting Your Sex Life Off to a Great Start. The bride-to-be thanked us and said, “We won’t read it until later, because we want to just do what comes naturally.”

That young woman and her fiancé were in the top 1 percent of the nation in intelligence and education. They were spending time, energy, and money on wedding preparations, financial plans, and every other aspect of joining their lives together. But they didn’t want to “ruin” their sex lives by preparing for the complex joining of their bodies, souls, and spirits.

They remind us of Joyce’s 87-year-old grandmother, who told us years ago: “I don’t agree with what you are doing [referring to us as sex educators]. Adam and Eve didn’t need it, Abe and I didn’t need it, and neither does anyone else.” The belief that good sex just happens—that you don’t need to take responsibility for the quality of your sex life—is a myth perpetuated by many TV shows and movies. Men and women, usually unmarried, find themselves attracted irresistibly to each other; within minutes, it seems, they’re having passionate, erotic sex. It all just happens.

Sex doesn’t just happen; you make sex happen.

Most couples want to have that kind of gut-grabbing sex. For some, it does just happen. But for the majority, a lifetime of exhilarating, fulfilling, and nurturing sexual experiences will take deliberate action.

Except in cases of rape, incest, and abuse, responsibility rests with each person for the quality and quantity of sex. When you falsely believe that sex happens to you rather than that you make sex happen, you’ll tend to let sex within marriage slide into the doldrums. If you think sex is the automatic consequence of passion, you can proclaim innocence despite sexual behavior outside marriage. And if you’re convinced that good sex just happens, you may believe you’re no longer in love when it doesn’t.

Many people equate being in love with sexual passion. They have a hard time telling the difference between eternal agape love and temporary, erotic love. Dr. Lewis B. Smedes, in Love within Limits, explained the distinction:

Eros flickers and fades as the winds of desire rise and wane. . . . If eros keeps waning it will eventually die. When the loved one no longer wills to meet the lover’s needs, eros dies slowly. When the loved one leaves and does not come back, eros dies for lack of stimulation. When the lover has no more need of what the loved one wills to give, eros dies. Nourished by needs within the lover and the promise offered by the loved one, erotic love has no self-generating power. It is powerful, but it is not a power in itself.[2]

His bottom line: Both partners must will to keep sexual love alive in a marriage. Generally speaking, it doesn’t just happen.

What Have We Done?

As for the two of us, we’re blessed that our sex life has been delightful and natural from the start. We believe that’s because of our similar backgrounds and the preparation-for-marriage class that Joyce took before our wedding.

In a sense, though, we didn’t just do what came naturally. We applied what Joyce had learned in that class. And her eagerness to share that information with Cliff opened our communication about this vital dimension of our relationship.

We came from warm, nurturing homes that promoted a hard-work ethic and the value of setting and attaining goals. We saw marital and sexual happiness as a goal we could strive for and attain. That, we think, has allowed sex to flow as naturally for us as it has.

If you and your wife came to marriage as secure and confident individuals with healthy views of sexuality, realistic expectations, and adequate sexual knowledge, you may naturally share intense sexual gratification without much effort. You’re uniquely blessed; healthy couples can have healthy sex by doing what comes naturally.

For many of us, though, it’s not that simple.

When Natural Isn’t Natural

The Sexually Naive Male

We’ve written in several of our books about the sexually naive man. Because he was raised in an overprotective home, or for other reasons, he missed some steps in his sexual development. He comes to marriage not knowing how to express his sexuality naturally.

What went wrong for this man? To understand that, we need to know what healthy sexual development looks like.

During the genitally focused two- to four-year-old stage of development, a boy discovers his penis and realizes that fondling it feels good. If he’s shamed or restricted, his curiosity will be stifled; he won’t learn that his genitals are a natural, pleasure-producing gift God gave him. On the other hand, if he’s taught that his penis was designed by God with special feelings that are private and an important part of being a husband someday, he’ll probably have a healthy attitude toward this part of his body.

As the boy moves into the preschool years, his curiosity takes the form of questions about sexuality. If he’s affirmed for asking and given accurate information, he’ll move on to school-age exploratory play. At this stage he wants to discover whether other boys are made the same as he is, and how girls are different. If he’s taught boundaries and given information through books and talks rather than “field” experience, he’ll learn respect and acceptance of his sexual awareness.

Then comes preadolescence, the middle school years, full of hormonal energy. The boy notices girls’ development, may be aroused by it, and perhaps behaves inappropriately. We sometimes refer to this as the poke-and-run or kiss-and-run stage. Supervised group activities like passing oranges without using hands are good ways to help the preadolescent boy move into the adolescent dating years with confidence. Unfortunately, such innocent games are but a faint memory for many segments of society.

For the sexually naive man, this developmental process was interrupted at some point. He didn’t enter adolescence with confidence. He comes to marriage still behaving like the middle school oaf—poking, pinching, and grabbing are his “natural” way of sexually approaching his wife.

His natural is not natural at all. It’s a turnoff to his wife. As she responds with irritation, his confidence wanes—and he becomes even less natural.

If this describes you, be encouraged. Chances are you’ll respond well to the kind of training this book offers. With the help of your wife, some exercises, and information, confident sexual functioning is only steps away. With newfound competence, your natural will indeed be natural.

When Naturals Differ

Claudia came to marriage assuming that all men really want is sex. She expected her husband, Robert, to be the sexual pursuer. But in Robert’s family, his mother was the vibrant, aggressive one. His father was more laid-back, responding to the advances of Robert’s mother.

Robert and Claudia’s tension over sex started on the wedding night. She went to unpack her things and get ready in the bathroom, expecting his pursuit. He relaxed and turned on the TV, waiting for her to come to him when she was ready.

The result was that she felt unwanted. He, meanwhile, was baffled by her hurt and felt unjustly criticized when Claudia referred to the incident as proof that he didn’t desire her sexually.

Chris, another new husband, eagerly looked forward to his wedding night as the time to consummate his relationship with Angie. The two of them had been caressing, kissing, and fondling intensely during their engagement, impatient to move to intercourse. Chris assumed that he and Angie would pick up where they’d left off.

She, on the other hand, imagined they would start with the same level of involvement they’d experienced so far. When the night came, she lay on the bed of their elegant hotel room in her negligee, waiting for him to emerge from the bathroom. She pictured him coming out in nicely pressed pajamas.

When he opened the door, though, she was presented with his nude body—including a full erection. Having been raised naive and with negative messages from her mother about male sexuality, she froze. They were unable to consummate their marriage for months.

Your Eagerness Turns Her Off

Eric, a man we interviewed for our video series, The Magic and Mystery of Sex, described his marriage: “I was like a little boy in a candy shop. I just wanted sex all the time, and I couldn’t understand why we couldn’t do it all the time.”

A man’s sexual eagerness is often his way of seeking love. It may be difficult to understand why a wife wouldn’t want the same thing, but she often will feel used rather than loved by his pursuit. His eagerness pushes her away.

Men are more likely to connect and experience love through sex; women are apt to want sex as the consequence of feeling loved and connected. Understanding this male-female difference is central to negotiating a pleasing sexual relationship.

A woman needs to feel desired, but she also needs room to experience her own desire. If you always ask before she gets a chance to do the asking, she may respond as an expression of love; but over time her sexual intensity will dwindle.

Men connect and feel loved through sex; women desire sex as the consequence of feeling loved and connected.

When you’re tempted to ask or pursue, try affirming and connecting emotionally instead. Keep her hungry—not satiated, and not starving.

Your Interest in Her Validates Her

Remember Claudia, the new wife who thought her husband, Robert, wasn’t interested in her? She grew distrustful, critical, and demanding. Her expectations for sexual intimacy had been shattered. She felt negated. Her intense reaction made him feel inadequate and pushed him away even more—which, of course, increased her feelings of being unvalued.

Maureen, another interviewee for our video series, was concerned because her husband, Dan, wasn’t initiating sex. She worried that he no longer found her attractive: “Maybe he thought I was fat or something.” Yet she was beautiful and trim.

A wife is affirmed by her husband’s sexual interest if it’s expressed by connecting with her and delighting in her rather than by pursuing her body. When your wife feels honored, adored, and cared for by you, your physical interest will be further indications of your love.

Gary Smalley communicates this need in Go the Distance: The Making of a Promise Keeper by John Trent:

A wife is validated by her husband’s sexual interest if it’s expressed through connection and affirmation rather than pursuit or expression of need.

Honor is at the heart of all loving relationships—with God, our spouse and kids, our boss and co-workers. To honor someone is to attach high value to that person. It’s a decision we make regardless of our feelings. When we decide to honor someone, we’re saying the person is extremely valuable and important to us.[3]

When you don’t communicate how much you value your wife, when you express your sexual interest solely by focusing on your needs or her body, she’ll feel used.

As John Gray writes, men are motivated by feeling needed; women are motivated by feeling cherished.[4] That’s why men often try to initiate sex with their wives by expressing their needs; men think women, like they, are motivated by being needed.

That doesn’t work. But you can get both your and her needs met—if you recognize your differences.

When She’s Not Like You

Have you ever had a conversation like this?

You like the room cold; she likes the room warm. You want to get to bed quickly; she’d rather spend what seems like an hour preparing. You’d like her to be on time; she’d rather look gorgeous and be late to meet you.

You get aroused when she fondles your penis; she pushes your hand away when you come into the kitchen and grab her breast or stroke her. She’d love to sit on the couch and have an evening of just kissing; you think, Why would she want to kiss and get all excited if she doesn’t want to have sex?

You’d like an eager wife; she’d like a nondemanding husband. The list could go on and on, because there are hormonal and functional sexual differences between men and women. Here are some of them:

1. The effect of frequency. The longer the time between sexual encounters, the more a man wants sex and the more quickly he moves toward arousal and release. The opposite is true for a woman. The longer it’s been since she’s had sex, the less she desires it and the more time and connection she needs to experience pleasure and response.

2. Body involvement. For women, sex is more a “total person” event than a genital focus. That’s why women need to experience connection and love to feel sexual; men feel sexual when they’re stimulated and aroused. The total body response for women also explains why they tend to vary more from one sexual experience to another and from one woman to another.

3. Orgasmic response. Women have the capacity—not the necessity—to respond with multiple or sequential orgasms. Most men, however, require a rest period after ejaculation before they can be restimulated to another erection. That may be 20 minutes or 20 hours. A woman’s orgasm can be stopped at any point by internal barriers, fears, or external distractions; once a man starts his ejaculatory response, it can’t be stopped. If he wishes to delay ejaculation, that control has to happen before he is about to ejaculate.

4. Dysfunctions. Men can experience difficulty with getting or maintaining erections or ejaculating too quickly; women can have orgasmic pressure and inhibition. This is probably because men in our culture tend to be more active during sex than do women, and arousal is controlled by the passive branch of the autonomic (involuntary) nervous system. Orgasm, meanwhile, is triggered when the active branch of the autonomic system goes into action.

5. Readiness. We agree for the most part with Barry McCarthy, author of Male Sexual Awareness, when he says in an interview with Paula M. Siegel that

men are by and large automatic functioners: They come to the sexual interaction already anticipating it, already aroused, and become frustrated if their partner isn’t equally ready for intercourse. They measure their sexual satisfaction by quantity rather than quality. Women, needing some interaction to become aroused, are always playing catch-up with their partner. They tend to be much more concerned with the quality of their lovemaking than the quantity.[5]

The differences between men and women lead to the greatest conflict—and the most intense intrigue. We think of men as more predictable, easier to please, less complicated, and more basic. We think of women as the new, improved model; after all, they were created after men.

Women are more complex, less predictable. A woman is like an ocean—ever-changing, multidimensional.

You might say, “Why didn’t God make women more like men? It would be so much easier.” We say, “But how boring!”

And how impractical. For the combination of male constancy and ever-changing femininity is the key to keeping sex alive over a lifetime of being married to the same person.

The combination of male constancy and ever-changing, complex femininity is the key to keeping sex alive in marriage.

With every discussion of male and female differences, of course, individuals will find they’re the exceptions. Some women identify with generalizations about men, and vice versa. It’s important that you and your wife learn about your differences.

As you do, make those differences work for you rather than against you. Understanding them is central to resolving sexual conflicts and opening avenues of passion in your marriage.

Allow Space to Be Natural

Spontaneity is great if you’re happy with the results—if it brings the love, passion, and intimacy you and your wife want. For some couples, it does.

For most, though, doing “what comes naturally” requires a little planning. Anticipating being together builds quality, and the allotment of time increases quantity.

Looking Forward to It

Remember planning some of your most exciting dates? What made them special?

Probably it was attention to detail—making the conditions right—and anticipating the event.

For a married couple, enjoying a lifetime of exhilarating and fulfilling sex requires preparation. A great sex life is based on more than just bringing two bodies together because each passionately desires the other. That may work in the movies and early in marriage, but it’s based on the assumption that sex happens to you. The truth is that you are the ones who choose the quality and quantity of your sexual experiences.

Many couples fear they won’t be “in the mood” if they plan for sex. But planning can prepare your mood. If you arrange the conditions necessary for both of you, the quality and intensity of your sexual times together will escalate.

Anticipation especially allows a woman to meet the conditions she needs for an intimate time with her husband. Plan to eliminate or at least reduce the possibility of interruptions that kill passion. Turn off your phones, get the pets out of the bedroom, put up a DO NOT RING DOORBELL sign, make sure the children are asleep or staying at a friend’s house, feed and change the baby. (When our children were babies, we were convinced they had automatic sensors and did not want us to have sex.) Wrap up tasks and thoughts that are likely to preoccupy you.

Anticipation also helps a woman get in touch with her body and her sexuality. Fantasizing about the upcoming event, taking a special oil bath, shaving her legs, remembering past erotic experiences with you, or exercising can spark a woman’s sexual energy.

The Times of Your Sex Life

How often should you plan to be together? What kinds of togetherness should you anticipate? Here are six suggestions.

1. Daily check-ins. Couples who connect physically in some way every day will have sex more often and enjoy more pleasure when they do. Daily connecting times can happen around leaving for work, coming home, after dinner, at bedtime, or whenever works best for the two of you. If daily physical contact isn’t happening naturally, look together at your schedules and select a time to connect.

Daily connecting times might last five to fifteen minutes or more. Use them to share the content of each other’s day, check on how your relationship is going, pray together, and read together.

And kiss. Celebrate your relationship with kisses. Kiss softly and tenderly, passionately and warmly. Kiss when you feel sad or happy. We see kissing as the barometer measuring a couple’s intimacy and passion. Rarely have we had a couple seek sexual therapy who were still kissing regularly and passionately.

Couples who connect physically daily will have more frequent and more enjoyable sex.

Ask your wife how she feels about your kissing. If either of you isn’t happy with the other’s kissing, take an evening to show and tell each other how you like to kiss. Take turns leading. Note that a good kisser is usually not too hard and not too tentative, not too wet and not too dry, lingers but not too long, and uses his tongue gently and playfully but not forcefully. Try seeing how many ways of kissing you know.

2. Quickies. We don’t recommend five to seven minutes after the 11:00 news, but “quickies” are a snack that can keep most couples going until they have time for a more nutritious delight. Although in general all sexual experiences must be mutually satisfying, quickies can be for one or the other or both of you. They can include intercourse, orgasm, or ejaculation, or none of the above. They never violate; they are engaged in only by mutual agreement. They may give more to one than the other, but they never take from one in a depleting sense.

A quickie can be fun—an afternoon delight, a sunrise special, or a bedtime snack. They can’t be the mainstay of your sexual diet, though. You can survive on them, but you won’t grow.

3. Regular dinners. We recommend that regular sexual times happen about once a week, or more or less depending on each person’s needs. Plan these encounters to bring your worlds and bodies together; to pleasure and enjoy each other; to allow arousal, release, and intercourse as desired.

These “meals” should be satisfying for both spouses, occurring when neither is fatigued or rushed. Both should be active participants, free to pursue their desires without violating the other, communicating verbally and nonverbally their likes and dislikes. Weekly “dining” with these conditions will help keep a relationship alive and thriving.

4. Smorgasbord. To add variety, try a time together in which you’re free to ask for what you want. Each partner takes a turn choosing favorites from a list—written or not—of sexual activities. You might have a “his” night and a “hers” night. Or take turns being pleasurer and receiver.

5. Nouvelle cuisine. Many restaurants these days feature light, delicious fare creatively presented. The flavors are novel, the tastes linger, and you finish the meal satisfied but not full. Nouvelle sex is much the same. It seeks not so much to satiate but to satisfy with newness, wonderful sensations, and visual enjoyment. Create your own excitement; try using ideas from the “Ten Ways to Have Fun with Sex” section in chapter 11.

6. Gourmet delights. A diet of gourmet meals would be too rich, but being left with that overfed feeling is enjoyable every now and then. Occasionally take a whole day or weekend to fully appreciate each other. As with your other encounters, it should be mutually desired and enjoyable. You’ll find it can be a wonderfully satiating experience.

Whatever the focus of your time, be sure to set it aside. Our guideline for your private relationship—romantic and physical— is fifteen minutes per day, one evening per week, one day per month, and one weekend per quarter. We suspect following that formula for time to connect and care will leave both of you happy and satisfied.

Time allotment formula for a successful marriage: fifteen minutes per day, one evening per week, one day per month, and one weekend per quarter.

Negotiate Your Sexual Relationship

Sometimes good sex just doesn’t take place naturally. Sometimes you want to discover greater love, passion, and intimacy in your marriage.

When that happens, set aside time to identify your differing needs. Negotiate a mutually satisfying sexual relationship. You may even want to do it in writing.

To begin, individually write out or say how you’d like your sexual relationship to be. Here are some questions to answer:

Add anything else the two of you would like to include in your plan for sexual intimacy.

Negotiating a sexual relationship may seem like a cold approach. But you’ll be surprised how much warmth can be sparked when two people feel that their sexual needs are heard and respected and when a plan for those needs is instituted.

You’re different, you and your wife. It’s unrealistic, at least in the long term, to expect that good sex will happen naturally without working out those differences.

Great sex in marriage requires much more than a natural response to passion. When the initial blaze of a new relationship cools a bit, the transition to a deeply fulfilling sexual life that will last for decades requires focusing on your relationship in general and your sex life specifically. That transition is most likely when you know yourselves and each other intimately, behave lovingly toward each other, are trustworthy and trusting—and anticipate and plan for your sexual times.