'It' Doesn't Just Happen

A lifetime prescription for sizzling sex

Clifford L. Penner and Joyce J. Penner

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Do you remember the anticipation of going on a date with your future spouse and how desperately you desired one another? And how the sexual tension seemed to mount as you moved toward marriage? Today you may be wondering, "Where's our energy and desire for sex now?"

After 20 years as sex therapists, we're convinced that good sex in marriage doesn't "just happen." Couples who keep the sexual spark glowing through the changing stages of marriage are those who are deliberate about their sexual relationship.

Early Years

Setting the Stage

Vibrant married sex depends in part on getting off to a good start. Newlyweds must compare and work through their conflicting expectations. The most common surprises couples face are differences regarding how often they have sex and who initiates it. If couples discuss and negotiate their differences, they can avoid a good deal of frustration and confusion.

A few possible solutions to differences in desire are: compromise on frequency; the husband brings his wife pleasure with or without release, even if he doesn't feel the need himself; the two can cuddle while the husband or wife bring him release; increase the amount of nonerotic cuddling; or enjoying sexual intimacy without intercourse or orgasm.

Surprisingly, couples often think they are arguing about frequency when the real issue relates to who initiates sex. In therapy, when we ask spouses how often each of them initiates sex, a common response is that the husband initiates sex 90 percent of the time and the wife 10 percent. And yet when we ask the same couple how often they each desire sex, he answers three to four times a week, and she says two to three times a week. Frequency isn't the issue, so what's going on?

Men and women differ in how they initiate sex. The wife, for example, might snuggle with her husband and give him a few kisses. If he takes her overture one step further, he seems like the one who is initiating sex since he has become more direct. Over time, this pattern leads a couple to believe the husband is always the pursuer and the wife is never the initiator. Better communication and reversal of roles can help break this negative pattern, as was the case with Jim and Jenny.

Jim feared that if he left it up to Jenny, they would never have sex. However, he was surprised to learn that she actually enjoyed preparing for and initiating time with him once she gave herself permission to overtly express her desire and he gave her the space to do so.

For some couples, expectations aren't the problem area. Instead, they must work through past sexual experiences that have a way of creeping into their relationship and destroying the joy of new discoveries and unique experiences, as Tony and Beverly learned.

Naturally shy, Tony didn't date much in college. The few relationships he did have involved limited physical contact because of his Christian values. Then he met Beverly. She was everything he wanted in a wife—except she wasn't a virgin. Knowing that Beverly had been sexually active with several serious boyfriends left Tony caught between his attraction to her and his desire to enter marriage as a virgin and marry a virgin.

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Originally published in: Marriage Partnership, 1997, Summer

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