• Does sex influence your happiness?
• Do you consider sexual satisfaction in terms of sexual frequency?
• Would comparing your sexual frequency with others affect your happiness?

An extensive study by Tim Wadsworth, including 27,500 men and women aged 40-80years in 29 countries and using the Global Study of Sexual Attitudes and Behaviors, found a relationship between frequency of sexual behavior and happiness. The more sexual frequency—the more reported happiness.

While this study confirmed the findings of earlier large sample studies with regard to the correlation of frequency of sexual activity and happiness, Wadsworth’s study added another dimension. He found that when respondents compared their frequency to the sexual frequency of others, their happiness decreased or increased depending on whether their frequency was lower or higher than others in their reference group!

What Does this Imply?

If we consider statistics as starting points for thinking, than these findings invite self–reflection and mutual consideration of sexual satisfaction and social comparison for ourselves and with our partners.

The Frequency Factor

There clearly is evidence that when we control for age, physical health, gender, educational levels etc. sexual activity is associated with well being and happiness.

But is the happiness from sexual activity only a function of frequency?

Yes and No. When you work with couples and look at the findings from other couple studies it seems that active ongoing sexual connection does matter; but, it is more complicated than just numbers.

• It is valuable for you and your partner to know that many studies suggest that sexual satisfaction is a complex and multifaceted construct.  Notwithstanding what else is happening in your life that makes sexual intimacy more or less likely, multiple aspects of sexual behaviors such as frequency, types of behaviors and expectations all affect one’s sexual satisfaction and your satisfaction as a couple.
  • It is particularly important for heterosexual partners to recognize that there are gender differences that very much color issues of frequency, triggers of arousal and even behavior after sexual connection. Men take their cues from their bodies—something that affects frequency. There is an automatic connection for men in thinking about sex, in visual cues and …
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Most couples know the positive sounds of silence–the mutual experience of sharing time and space together without needing words. Be it walking the dog together, cooking side by side or listening to music–it is the silence of connection and love.

Many couples also know the silence that reflects tension, conflict or disconnection. Unable to speak beyond the necessities of daily life, these couples report, “ We just don’t talk anymore!”

If we recognize “ talking together” as a metaphor for the communication of confidantes, the special interest of partners and the pillow talk of intimates, then we understand that this is a silence that can start to feel emotionally deafening.

Why do couples who once had so much to say end up feeling this way? Is it inevitable as time passes in a marriage? Is there a way back?

Years together need not result in negative sounds of silence.

Yes, events can disrupt harmony and patterns can erode vitality, but if couples are curious rather than blameful about the silence between them, they may find some reasons and remedies to speak together again.

The Reasons:

If we look closer at those partners who end up sitting in a restaurant with nothing to say, painfully aware of the couples happily chatting around them, we find that partners are often unaware of what they may be doing or what has happened to shut down the verbal connection.

Here are some possibilities:

• The Monologue: Sometimes a partner is in so much need of attention, affirmation or containment by the other that they never stop talking. More interested in what they have to say, they barely realize there is no space for dialogue. The listening partner often complies as audience for a time but there is no real ” we sharing ” and eventually no reason to continue talking.

• The Critique: Sometimes speaking has become unsafe if one or both partners imply by verbal criticism, overt disinterest or non-verbal gestures that what the other is saying is of little interest or importance. Some are embarrassed or enraged into silence. Some give-up. Some find outside confidantes who want to listen—while the silence at home …
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While the definition of intimacy may vary depending on the relationship, it is generally felt to be the “ authentic” connection between two people. As such, the connection reflects a mutuality of loving feelings shared and expressed in thought, affect and behavior.

A host of factors including safety, trust, effective communication and sexual exclusivity have been identified as important for intimacy between partners.

Less discussed and perhaps surprising, is the importance of the “capacity to be alone” in establishing true intimacy.

What Is The “Capacity To Be Alone?”

• Originally coined by the British pediatrician/psychoanalyst, Donald Winnicott, the “capacity to be alone” refers to the development of individuality that starts with the infant’s ability to be alone in the presence of the mother.
• It is the child’s ability to move from the sense of the mother’s compassionate, comforting and loving presence, to his/her ability to hold on to her presence, even when alone.
• This internalized sense of the comforting mother develops into the psychological capacity to regulate anxiety, self-soothe, and experience a true authentic self. In essence, this is the capacity to be alone.

Why Is This an Asset To Intimacy?

• True intimacy starts with a comfort in your own sense of self.  If you like yourself and feel comfortable, you will be able to relate in a real and genuine way with another person.

You won’t have to be what someone else wants or needs you to be.

• True intimacy is possible when you have the “capacity to be alone” because it implies choice. You may want to be with someone. You don’t have to be with someone because you fear that being alone leaves you without stability or value.

You don’t have to cling to someone to avoid abandonment or avoid someone for fear of rejection.

• True intimacy is possible when there is psychological separation or room for partners to come and go from each other physically and psychologically.

• Couples often report that when they are apart from each other during the course of the day, they think more positively and romantically about each other than at any other time.

Neurochemistry supports …

In a culture of cell phones, text messages, Facebook, tweets and instagrams, the definitions of privacy and secrecy are challenged and at times blurred.

You read my emails?

I can’t report every move I make in the course of a day.

Why can’t I check out my high school girlfriend on Facebook?

When it comes to relationships, partners often underestimate the importance of privacy and the danger of secrecy.

Privacy in relationships reflects trust and enhances intimacy. Secrecy in relationships impairs trust and impedes intimacy.

What is Privacy?

Privacy is defined as the state or condition of being free from being observed or disturbed by other people. It is the state of being free from public exposure and attention.

Why We Need Privacy As Individuals

Psychologically, we understand that whereas secure attachment is key to early development, the growing capacity of the child to internalize this attachment and to separate–to have room to be, to play alone, to have private thoughts, to have space, to develop an authentic self–is crucial.

Why We Need Privacy In Relationships

As adults we continue to need different degrees of privacy to re-charge, regulate stress and nurture a sense of self–be it a solitary hobby or reading the paper alone.

We also need intimacy. We need to be and share with another, to be known by them in a way that no one else knows us.

Boundary Changes in Relationships

As such, in committed and intimate relationship, our individual boundaries of privacy change. In most cases, we choose to share bedrooms, sex, money, food, pets, chores, vacations, confidences, fears, and hardships– the best and worst of ourselves–with another. We also share a respect for each other’s privacy.

Disclosure Expectations in Relationships

While one partner may be more disclosing than the other, we can’t expect to hear or share every thought, action, urge or memory of our partner. In a trusting relationship, we have neither the need to check each other’s phone, emails, mail or daily moves, nor the obligation to disclose all. If we enjoy such sharing, it is mutual sharing that fuels our connection.

When thinking about privacy in a relationship it is worth considering:

• A loving relationship …
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Perhaps even more difficult than the realization that a marriage is ending, is the realization that the children must be told.

Regardless of how different a couple’s views may be on what did or didn’t happen in their marriage, most agree that the children need to be spared as much disruption and distress as possible.

Accordingly, most will follow the recommendations of experts to tell the children together in words suitable to their comprehension level–that Mom and Dad will be separating; that they are loved by both Mom and Dad; that they are not to blame; that sometimes Moms and Dads realize that they are no longer happy together; that some things will change but lots of things will stay the same; that Mom and Dad will still be there for them; that everyone will try to talk about changes so that everyone can feel ok….

Since there are no perfect words to make the loss of the familiar family context sound great to a child, adolescent or young adult, it is worth recognizing that “ telling the children” is only the start of an ongoing parenting process that needs to keep unfolding after the first sit-down takes place.

As you take on this parenting process, here are some considerations to keep in mind:

It’s Not Just What You Say—It’s What You Do.

Be prepared to be ignored, rebuffed or heartbroken by your child’s initial response. Much like adults who are told about something that will change their lives–the initial reactions of children may well be their best attempt to cope.

• Some young ones will say nothing and simply go play.
• Some school age kids will burst into tears, or voice worry that everything in their life like school friends, sports, and the bus stop will now be lost.
• Some teens will begin blaming one or both parents.
• Some college age kids will validate the decision, “ It’s about time!”

Being patient, voicing understanding, allowing time, validating feelings, or just being a compassionate presence (to a little one who goes off to play alone or a teen who needs a …

We have once again been faced with a high profile marriage scandal. This time the lovers included the CIA director, a married and much decorated military officer and his biographer, a married women, herself an Army Reserve intelligence officer.

What is predictable is the media focus on the man. In this case the articles addressed the question of military code of conduct, possibility of security breaches, the explanation of male infidelity in terms of power and narcissism, and the apology and compassionate sentiments to the betrayed wife.

What is curious is how little focus was given to the married woman in this affair. Other than a redundant account of her school success and running time, she was rarely seen as more than the idealizing audience to the man. There seemed little interest in her motives and even less in addressing the broader question- Why do married women have affairs?

The Reality

Perhaps we don’t ask the question because culturally we prefer not to know the answer.  After all, with matters of infidelity, the stereotype is of the married man in an affair with an unmarried female. In the case of married women the presumption is that women are more monogamous then men. They are – but not as much as we may want to believe.

• In the largest most comprehensive poll of its kind in 1994, Edward Laumann and colleagues found that 20% of women and just over 31% of men in their 40’s and 50’s reported having sex with someone other than their spouses.
• Frances Cohen Praver, author of Daring Wives: Insight into Women’s Desires for Extramarital Affairs suggests that estimates of infidelity range from 30-60% of women and 50-70% of men.
• Young and Alexander in their 2012 book, The Chemistry Between Us: Love, Sex and the Science of Attraction accept a rough estimate of 30 to 40 percent infidelity in marriage for men and women.

The Reasons

Having worked for many years with men, women and couples trying to hold on to marriages, recovering from betrayal or caught up in the pain and passion of an affair, I suggest …

The war in Iraq has officially ended and the president promises to bring the troops home from Afghanistan by the end of next year. For all of our military and all of their families, finding the way home from war is a treasured event and a complex process.

For families, homecoming involves readjustment  in terms of time, space, roles, and expectations. For couples, homecoming means finding a way to integrate all that has happened to each partner and the relationship they share. Whether one or both have been to war, on many levels both partners have to “come home” together. For couples that means coming to know themselves and their partners in old and new ways.

How Does that Happen?

Couples do this in their own way, in their own time, knowing that they are not alone. They often find that even more complicated than the hours waiting to be rescued, the hours of driving in the dessert, the flight from Bagdad, and the applause and embrace of those waiting, is the journey home they will take in the many months that follow.

Considerations:

Listed below are some considerations gleaned from others who have traveled this path as well as from those who have worked with and guided them home.

The Excitement and Fear of Homecoming

• It comes as a surprise to realize that for as much as everyone is counting the moments to be re-connected with his or her partner, many are also very anxious about homecoming – “Will he still love me?” “Will I still love him?” “Will she expect me to be the same?” “How much will she have changed?”
• You are not alone if you are both excited and nervous. If you can, savor those first Kodak moments of connection. You will build upon them as you get to know each other again.
• If those first moments just don’t unfold as dreamed, give yourself time and trust your coping skills and support networks.

Emotional Time Warp

In some ways homecomings throw you into an emotional time warp.  One day you are military serving with dust, death, comrades and combat and then -You are …

If you are human, in a relationship and living on this planet there will be decisions to make and problems to solve. They may be intrinsic to your circumstances, imposed upon you by outside factors, or a function of your personal needs and goals.

For most couples issues related to jobs, residence, children, socializing, religion, sex, money, in-laws and more demand decisions but often invite dissent.

If you want a clear example of the type of behavior to avoid when problem solving as a couple you have only to take a look at the presidential hopefuls.

Recognizing that they are, of course, contenders and putting aside the specifics of their platforms or the campaign engines that drive their rhetoric, they nonetheless offer a glimpse of the type of the exclusionary thinking and reactivity that erodes collaboration, jeopardizes problem solving and risks relationship success.

Dynamics to Avoid:

Consider avoiding the following as you and your partner build the platform for your life together.

• Coming from an “all knowing position.” “ You know nothing about cars and have no experience buying them, I will choose.”
• Blaming the partner for things outside of their control. “ Why would I want to go on another family vacation when the kids always get sick?”
• Assuming the worst about your partner. “ I really want to socialize with the people from work but I know you will be uncomfortable.”
• Looking only at what the partner has done wrong with respect to an issue. “ When it comes to money, you are the last person who should have anything to say. You used to have a bad credit rating.”
• Negativity about the other in public. “ He has no idea of the kids’ schedules or what they need on a day to day basis.”
• Coming into the problem solving with a solution. “ So I have it all figured out – we will buy a two family house with my parents.”
• Refusing to see problem solving or decision making as a building process. “That won’t work, forget it.”
• Seeing each other as one-dimensional. “ You are a city person. Why would you …
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