No, I am not running out of topics. Believe me, there is PLENTY left to discuss about marriage and sexual intimacy. There are a myriad of challenges and ways to attend to this particular aspect of the marital relationship. The secular world continues to toss out their wrong ideas about intimacy which need to be addressed. Plus, my readers continue to challenge me with new questions and subjects I have yet to touch on.
However, I wanted to take today and simply thank those readers who have taken the time to share their story, give quality advice, or offer encouragement and prayers to others in the comments section. Quite often, I throw up a post, receive comments, and find some amazing gem (or two or three or more) among the readers’ thoughts. You often do better than I at answering questions — especially if you have been through a similar situation and worked through a challenge.
One more time:
Thank you!
And now, I’m simply going to open up my comments to see what wisdom remains out there. Here’s the question at hand that I want you to answer for me and the readers:
What one piece of advice have you received that has made a positive difference in the sex life of your marriage?
It can be something gleaned from the Bible, from a good friend or family member, from a book or blog, from your doctor or counselor, or any other resource. It can speak to the whole of marriage or some specific technique (but don’t get too graphic so that we’re all wincing and spitting here).
I will be gathering up your advice and sharing it in other ways as well. Blessings and thanks to all of YOU. Because I really do have the BEST readers!
PRAY TOGETHER!!!
As far as I’m concerned, the whole of your marital intimacy is wrapped up in this one thing! Once you get past the initial “weirdness” of baring your heart, mind & soul to God WITH your spouse, then the baring of your bodies becomes EASY.
Genesis 2:25 says “And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.”
Want to have GREAT sex in your marriage? Start by getting naked with your heart. The body will follow.
How is the best way to start praying together? My husband and I used to pray every night before we went to sleep (when we were still newlyweds), but that drifted away long ago. Like you said, it’s a little weird baring your heart, mind & soul!
Just start again! Gotta get over that weirdness again, but it’s well worth it.
Heather, last year I wrote a post on our blog called “Do You Pray With Your Wife?” It details the struggles, the hows and the whys as to how we got started praying together.
But the simple answer is (like Jay Dee said…) take each others’ hands before bed or in the morning if that’s easier, and just start to pray simple prayers of thanksgiving. Over time you will begin to open up more deeply, and the words just flow. Seriously… just start basic, and it will grow.
I’ve only been married six months so far, but my husband was given really really great advice before our wedding night. His brothers are quite a bit older than him and had some marriage wisdom when we got married and they told him to be REALLY over-the-top verbally encouraging for our wedding night. My husband has a lot of Spock-like qualities, so this wasn’t totally natural for him, but he took the advice and made our wedding night (which I was equally excited and terrified about) really sweet and wonderful.
So the advice is to be encouraging and to verbalize it. Especially when body insecurities are being faced. Sex should be safe. 🙂
Even if you don’t feel like making love, just do it! I have found that if I just get going, my feelings follow.
Just do it.
Mostly for women, but for some men, the desire for sex isn’t readily accessible. Whether low libido, lack of intimacy, marital discord, etc., fall at the center of the issue, my advice is just do it. When your spouse makes a move, accept it. Better yet, you make a move — even if doing so feels out of your comfort zone.
The best thing we can do most times in marriage is to step out of our cozy boxes and give to the other person. Believe me, having done so, the rewards are unimaginably terrific.
Just do it.
Mostly for women, but for some men, the desire for sex isn’t readily accessible. Whether low libido, lack of intimacy, marital discord, etc., fall at the center of the issue, my advice is just do it. When your spouse makes a move, accept it. Better yet, you make a move — even if doing so feels out of your comfort zone.
The best thing we can do most times in marriage is to step out of our cozy boxes and give to the other person. Believe me, having done so, the rewards are unimaginably terrific.
This one one hit home for us both 2 and 3 years ago. We were diagnosed with both having fertility issues then a year later told without drastic reproductive therapy that we would never have biological children. There is something about finding out that your body does not do what it is supposed to therefore sex will not result in procreation that can ruin sex. Things happen that don’t always put you in the mood. Sometimes you just have to do it. It may involve tears and you may not feel like it but you have to make that first step.
Best advice I received before marrying 9 years ago…”Be his lover, not his mother!”
This isn’t so much relational advice, but practical. Often when we make love, I end up ejaculating so much that it would soak the sheet and mattress pad to the point that we were changing our bedding rather than basking in the afterglow of our love.
I finally figured out a solution… I make the bed in layers. I went and bought a couple flat waterproof crib-size pads. When I make up our bed for the week, I put on a fitted sheet, then lay one of waterproof pads in the general vicinity of where our LM usually takes place. Then I put on another fitted sheet over that (the one to match the top sheet). Then if needed, after lovemaking we simply remove the top fitted sheet and waterproof pad and are left with a nice dry bed to enjoy our restful night’s sleep on.
I know they sell regular size waterproof pads, but I like the felted crib ones as they don’t make a rusting sound when you lay on them. It seems that the full size bed ones they sell are plastic and you can hear them when you move around. Make sense?
Anyway, there is my odd little piece of marital intimacy advice for the day 😉
We did that with the cribs when our kids were babies (to deal with middle of the night blow-outs, leaks, vomit, etc). I think it was the best new parent advice I was ever given. It humors me to see it applied to the marital bed. Glad you found something that works!
I love this!! Most of the time I cant even enjoy myself for worrying about (1)locking the door, (2)grabbing a towel to put under me, (3) worrying about making too big a yucky mess (4)getting the mess up so I or my hubby actually cuddle (which we never do)(5) running to bathroom to clean myself up(get infections easily was told to pee afterward).How could anyboy relax with all that to think about- I hate going through so much laundry! I think I’m going to invent a sturdy shower table for LM!
What works well for messy sex is a Liberator love throe that you can purchase from romance between the lines for about $80. This is a water proof throe that will slurp up the results of juicy lovemaking and in the morning you can throw it in the washer. No changing of bedding needed! Love away.
Note to readers: I get a little nervous when someone promotes a specific product on the blog! I’m not really here for that. But I did look up the Liberator thing here. Seemed okay. So there you go.
My husband and I like to joke (kind of) that a good marriage boils down to three things: the Lord, Communication, and Sex and really, I think it is about that simple most of the time.
Two pieces of advice that hit the same note and have been very helpful to me are 1) Study your spouse and 2) communicate, communicate, communicate! I spent so much time trying to seduce and please my husband according to the magazines, books, friends and even, marriage bloggers. Most of what I came across didn’t work for us or him. If I had just observed, studied, and listened, I would have spent a lot of time less frustrated. Most men or women may like something, but it doesn’t mean your spouse will. Learn to please them and teach them to please you.
There is one bit of advice I remembered from before I got married. It took me a decade or more to finally do it:
Never expect anything from your spouse.
It’s OK to have desires (even encouraged), but as soon as your desire become an expectation, you make your spouse responsible for your happiness, and that’s a recipe for disaster.
Interesting piece of advice I was given, that stayed kind of well ever since- a wife must be her husband’s mother in the morning, maid by day and prostitute by night. All sarcasm aside, it’s really about serving each other and learning to please one another.
Found this quote long ago on a blog that helped align my thinking in our very busy, very hectic lives – “Daily, I make the determination to treat him like a romatic partner more often than I treat him like a business partner.”
Ooo…that one hits home! Thank you for sharing! 🙂
A Few come to mind:
– Marriage is not a 50-50 proposition, it is a 100-100 proposition. You need to give yourself completely to one another and for one another.
– The 5 Love Languages, learn theirs and learn how to communicate in it.
– The importance of the following:
– Communication – make sure you are clear about what you are saying and clear about what you are hearing.
– Trust – Once you loose it it is hard to every get back.
– Praying Together – obviously a big one, many are saying it.
sleep in the nude, we got that advice 25 years ago in premarital counseling. I wonder how many times in those 25 years that we made love when it wouldn’t have happened if we had to take off clothes.
The Two main things we are learning that more married couples need to know about are…
No. 1 Enjoy the journey toward arousal but for-go the orgasm and space them at least 2-4 weeks apart or longer. You will be shocked how much sexual energy you store up that will center on your spouse. Most Americans (especially men but also many women) are hooked on dopamine and do not know how bonding sex can be if the hottest orgasm is not the goal and the big O oxytocin is pursued instead of orgasm. Orgasm lasts maybe 30 seconds but the kind of utopian sex that we are experiencing lasts for hours and you will find yourself in an always on position which is beyond delicious. You will experience more lubrication that you can imagine and this helps reduce the friction form longer lovemaking sessions. Rough hot sex militates against deep bonding and pushes you to 30 second of pleasure that stops hours of a deep soul satisfaction. We have gone from sex two to three times a week to sex twice a day lasting as long as we have time for.
No 2. He second way to bond deeply is to learn how to enjoy breast play. Gently sucking the breast can be very satisfying for both the giver and receiver. (This is also very healthy for the breast and studies have shown that regular breast massage and sucking can drastically reduce cancer rates.) Many times all we need to bond deeply and be satiated is 30 minutes of good breast time and caressing each other while we do that. These two thing we are learning complement each other well and have greatly improved our lovemaking. Oxytocin is very key, to a long and deeply satisfying marriage. If erections for him or lack of orgasms for her are an issue these two tips are especially helpful. Please listen up and try something out of you comfort zone instead of that buzzing new toy!
These two ideas have improved everything for us. We have gone from sex two to three times a week to sex twice a day lasting as long as we have time for. Sleeping in the nude is just a given with the honeymoon we are on that will not be over. We are married over 30 years and more in tune than ever.
Some good advice here. I like the breast play idea.
But honestly? 2-4 weeks between orgasms? My brain is turning with fudge just at the thought of that. I know the theory behind it, but I have to respectfully disagree on that one. Glad you and your mate are having a marvelous intimate experience even after 30 years! Go you.
My brain would have turned to mush too at one point but I must say I am blown away by how much better the sex is if orgasm is not a part of it. Try it before you knock it. You kinda learn after bit when to call it quits but truly it is lovemaking not just having sex. All I cam say is you try it and you will find without the orgasm you will be on the “always on position” and that in itself is really special. The bonding that happens will cause much of the stuff between you to go away. There is way to much pressure to have that big o and it is not sustainable for most on the long term. Nor is it the best for your relationship. About time between orgasms. That is not a one size fits all and you can always go back to the old method and you will often at first because sex takes longer when you do not rush it you lubricate better and you will get mighty turned on. I still crave orgasms but find that when i do its shuts off my desire and God intended for that to happen as most men and some women would destroy themselves and there marriages with the type of sex that is always trying to up the ante a notch to a hotter orgasm. This is not wise as the restraint is the secret of all great art and i say all great sex. Think about it.
I have only been married for 2 months so don’t feel like I have a lot of advice but there’s one thing that changed my sex life compared to others I would like to share. I was a virgin before I got married and had heard a few horror stories of a lot of pain the first time and the honeymoon being ruined as a result. I decided to do something about this and got my husband to be to buy a little plastic cone that was generally the size of his penis. I used it to stretch myself and when we made love for the first time, there was absolutely no pain. Not even discomfort. It made our honeymoon so beautiful to both be able to fully enjoy sex and I want to tell all young girls who are about to get married this great secret to no pain the first time!
Great advice given to me before our wedding night: Shower together after the first few times. I was warned that I might feel an overwhelming sense of vulnerability after something like that so even after it was over (and we needed to clean up a bit) we needed to constantly stay in each other’s presence. No alone time to think, “Did I do it right? Was he really pleased?” To take my husband’s hand as I was leaving the bed, and tell him “let’s have some more fun!” was a huge boost to our intimacy. We showered together our whole honeymoon and have continued the practice when circumstances allow. 15+ years and 6 kids later, I think it’s working. 😉