Whether it’s frequency, fetish, fantasy, or partners, “normal” is a myth. Let’s talk about what sex looks like in a healthy relationship and get past taboo.
“I have to be up early tomorrow, let’s just forget about it for tonight.”
“I thought we had a great relationship but after a few years, we just stopped having sex”.
Sound familiar?
Some couples experience ease with regularly engaging in fulfilling sexual activity. For others, this topic evokes panic, shame, feelings of inadequacy, or even anger.
How do we approach the notion of the importance of sex in a healthy relationship?
Weirdly, sex is still taboo.
People don’t really talk about sex in our culture—but you wouldn’t know it from Miley Cyrus or Katy Perry music videos.
The media is full of explicit images, pornography, movies, and messages that make us believe sex is an open topic; yet, many people do not feel comfortable approaching their sexuality or talking about sex openly with their friends or partners.
There is STILL no such thing as normal.
Statistics can give us averages, but there is often no contextualizing this data. Each partner comes to the sexual relationship with different expectations, assumptions, experiences, family message, and identities.
Cheri Huber, psychotherapist and author of Sex and Money…are Dirty, Aren’t They? talks about the many different ideas about sexuality we are exposed to while growing up.
One must be attractive and alluring, sex is dirty, not having sex means missing out, and good people are not interested in sex, are ideas we are all exposed to at one point or another in modern culture.
And what do we mean by sex anyway?
Sexuality has many definitions. Sex is penetration of a penis into a vagina or anus. Sex is the presence of an orgasm. Sex is pressing bodies against each other under the covers.
Straight sex, queer sex, phone sex, masturbation, cybersex, group sex; all of the terms connote different things depending on who you are and what you like.
If you happen to rub up against (pun intended) a different definition of sex compared to that of your partner(s), difficulty is imminent.
You want me to do…what?
We sometimes have different needs than our partners do.
Judith Martin cheekily touches on this issue in her book, A Guide to Excruciatingly Correct Behavior, noting
“a situation where one marriage partner is feeling playfully amorous and the other is taking the bar examination in the morning is an etiquette problem of dangerous proportions.”
Most couples have ebb and flow in their sexuality in the level of energy/sex drive, and in their connection with each other.
Respecting your partner is about understanding and acknowledging their personal preferences and it is integral to being able to have openness, safety, and comfort. Safety and comfort is where eroticism can grow.
Sometimes less is more.
Sexuality can take a back seat at times in relationships.
Sometimes sex is not possible or healthy in a relationship—especially in instances when there has been violence between partners, when one or both partners is struggling with a physical health issue, or when there has been sexual trauma experienced by one or both partners.
In other scenarios, partners make an intentional choice to abstain from sexual intimacy for religious or spiritual reasons. A healthy partnership is one in which one or both partners are able to reconnect and reestablish sexual intimacy.
There are a few warning signs to take note of:
- The possibility that you’ll encounter non-consensual sex
- Your partner feels unsafe when approaching the topic of sexual intimacy
It is not helpful to force your partner into something they are unwilling to do, feel unsafe or triggered doing, or is painful or harmful to them. Blaming and shaming your partner has the opposite effect of helping you to get what you need.