It’s been a while since I had a guest poster on here, but this one is well worth it! Dr. Corey Allan is a marriage and family therapist who’s worked with couples and addressed godly sex for a long time. You may recognize him from the Sexy Marriage Radio show/podcast where he’s been cohost for 16 years! Feel free to check my episodes with Corey on higher desire wives here and here later, but first here’s his wonderful post aimed at wives about how going along to get along may not be your best choice.

Take it way, Dr. Allan!

I want to talk to the woman who said “it’s fine” last night when it wasn’t.

Maybe it was about sex. Maybe it was about something else entirely — the plans he made without asking, the comment that landed wrong, the way he scrolled through his phone while you were mid-sentence. Whatever it was, you felt something rise in your chest. A flash of hurt. A flicker of anger. And then, almost instantly, you made a decision.

Let it go. Don’t make it a thing. Keep the peace.

You’ve made that decision a hundred times. Maybe a thousand. And every time, something small inside you goes quiet. Not peaceful. Just… quiet.

I’m a licensed marriage and family therapist. I’ve been counseling couples for over two decades. And I need to tell you something that might be hard to hear: that silence is costing you far more than the argument ever would.*

*Quick note from J that I know Corey would agree with: if you fear that you’ll experience abuse if you speak up, please get help. That isn’t the situation for most of you reading, but for those few, it’s important to mention.

The Deal You Didn’t Know You Made

In my practice, I see a pattern so common it could be its own diagnosis. I call it mutual toleration — the unspoken agreement between two spouses to tolerate what they don’t respect in each other so neither one has to confront what they don’t respect in themselves.

It looks like peace. It feels like maturity. From the outside, people might even say you have a great marriage because you never seem to fight.

But underneath the calm surface, something is slowly dying. Your vitality. Your desire. Your sense of self.

Mutual toleration is a trade: I won’t bring up how you hurt me if you don’t bring up how I hurt you. I’ll manage your weaknesses if you manage mine. We’ll both pretend this is working.

The result? Low conflict, low connection, and a bedroom that feels more like a business arrangement than an intimate space. Therapist Terry Real calls this “stable misery.” I’ve seen it in hundreds of marriages, and it almost always starts the same way — with a woman (or a man, but in my experience it’s often the wife) deciding that the cost of speaking up is higher than the cost of staying silent.

It’s not. The math just feels that way.

Why You Keep Quiet (And Why It’s Not What You Think)

Most of us don’t swallow our truth because we’re doormats. We do it because we’re scared.

Here’s what’s actually happening: when something occurs in your marriage that feels like a criticism, a dismissal, or a threat — even a small one — your nervous system kicks into gear. You get a surge of anxiety, and you have about three seconds to choose: stay present and deal with it, or find an exit.

Most of us take the exit. And we’ve gotten remarkably creative about it.

Maybe you smooth things over with a cheerful tone that doesn’t match what you’re feeling. Maybe you redirect the conversation so you don’t have to sit in the discomfort. Maybe you tell yourself you’re “choosing your battles wisely” when the truth is you’re just afraid of what happens if you actually engage.

These aren’t character flaws. They’re protection strategies. Your brain learned a long time ago — maybe in childhood, maybe in a previous relationship, maybe in the early years of your marriage — that certain emotions aren’t safe to express. So you developed ways to manage the people around you instead of managing yourself.

The problem is, every time you take that exit, you teach your spouse (and yourself) that your real feelings don’t have a place in this relationship. Over time, you stop feeling safe enough to want what you want, say what you mean, or show up as who you actually are.

And if you can’t show up as who you actually are, desire — the real, embodied, I-want-you kind — doesn’t stand a chance.

The Mirror You Don’t Want to Look In

Here’s where it gets uncomfortable. I want you to try something.

Read the following paraphrase of 1 Corinthians 13:4–8 slowly. I’ve broken it into single lines for a reason.

Love is patient.
Love is kind.
Love does not envy.
Love does not boast.
Love is not proud.
Love does not dishonor others.
Love is not self-seeking.
Love is not easily angered.
Love keeps no record of wrongs.
Love does not delight in evil. Love rejoices with the truth.
Love always protects.
Love always trusts.
Love always hopes.
Love always perseveres.
Love never fails.

Now replace “love” with your first name. Read it again.

How’d you score?

I take this test periodically. I land between six and ten out of sixteen, which tells me I’ve still got work to do. And I’m a professional who teaches this material for a living.

The point isn’t to shame you. The point is to show you what you already know: nobody aces this test but Jesus. And without him, the kind of love described here — the honest, enduring, truth-rejoicing kind — is beyond what we can manufacture on our own.

But here’s what matters for your marriage right now: several of those descriptors are impossible to live out if you’re keeping the peace instead of telling the truth. Love “rejoices with the truth.” Love “always protects” — including protecting your own integrity. Love “is not self-seeking” — but neither is it self-erasing.

Keeping the peace at the expense of your honesty isn’t love. It’s fear wearing love’s clothes.

What Courage Looks Like at 9 PM on a Tuesday

So what do you do instead? You go first.

Not first as in you escalate, attack, or deliver a lecture. First as in you tell one true thing. One honest sentence, said with warmth, that represents what you’re actually experiencing.

“I felt dismissed when you picked up your phone while I was talking.”

“I’m saying yes to you tonight, but I want you to know I need to feel pursued, not just available.”

“When you made that joke in front of our friends, it landed on something tender.”

“I’m not fine. I don’t know exactly what I need yet, but I wanted you to know that.”

That’s it. One sentence.

You don’t need to have the whole conversation figured out. You don’t need to present a case. You just need to stop pretending you don’t feel what you feel.

Will it be comfortable? No.

Your nervous system will scream at you to take it back, soften it, laugh it off. That scream is not the voice of wisdom. It’s the voice of a protection strategy that has outlived its usefulness.

Will your husband respond perfectly? Probably not.

He might get defensive. He might go quiet. He might not know what to do with what you just said. That’s okay. His reaction is his to manage. Yours is yours.

The goal isn’t a perfect conversation. The goal is staying real. Because every time you choose honesty over silence, you build a muscle — the muscle of showing up as your full self in your most important relationship. And that muscle is the foundation of everything: deeper trust, real connection, and the kind of desire that doesn’t have to be manufactured because it grows naturally in the presence of two honest people.

The Peace That’s Actually Worth Having

There’s a difference between the peace that comes from avoiding conflict and the peace that comes from resolving it. The first one feels easier. The second one costs more.

But the second one is the only kind that leads somewhere worth going.

Your marriage doesn’t need you to be quieter. It needs you to be braver. Not the dramatic, blow-up-the-relationship kind of brave. The Tuesday-night, one-honest-sentence, I’m-going-to-trust-that-this-marriage-can-hold-my-truth kind of brave.

Go first. It will cost you the comfort of silence.

It’s worth it.

Dr. Corey Allan is a licensed marriage and family therapist, the host of Sexy Marriage Radio, and the author of the forthcoming book Go First: It Will Cost You. It’s Worth It.

For a free Healthy Marriage Mini-Course, visit tinyurl.com/smrcoursehhh.

The post What “Keeping the Peace” Is Actually Costing You appeared first on Hot, Holy & Humorous.

Today I am launching a series of guest posts from the male perspective with Corey Allan of Simple Marriage. I’ve followed Corey’s blog for several months and listened to his Sexy Marriage podcast with another marriage and sexuality blogger, Gina Parris. Here is Corey’s take on sexual desire differences.

Are you the high desire or the low desire spouse when it comes to sex?

Have desire differences created problems in your marriage?

Sooner or later, most couples experience problems in this area. Desire problems are the most common sexual complaint for couples.

But what about (cue the dramatic music) if you’re the wife who has higher desire for sex than your husband?!?

It’s natural to feel bad about having sexual desire differences, especially if you believe that sex is a natural function. Most people believe that love automatically creates sexual desire in healthy people. And at first glance, this makes a lot of sense.

But if you buy into the belief that sexual desire comes “naturally,” you’re in for a load of problems. You’ll feel pressured to create something that just isn’t there. You’ll get defensive and despondent when problems surface in your sex life. You may even begin to feel defective or screwed up. In turn, it’s less likely that you’ll address these sexual desire problems and even less likely you’ll succeed if you do. Add to this the seemingly taboo-ness of a man with low sexual desire (not as uncommon as you’d think).

When you believe that sex is a natural function, it sucks to be the low desire spouse. You may see yourself as the one with the problem . . . plus it’s likely that your spouse (the high desire spouse) sees you that way too.

The other big problem with approaching sexual desire as a natural biological function is it actually helps create low sexual desire because it makes sexual desire impersonal. It’s hard to desire sex when it feels like your spouse just wants to relieve their physical or emotional needs.

Know this: There’s always a low desire spouse and there’s always a high desire spouse — and there’s one of each in every marriage.

There’s a low desire spouse and a high desire spouse on virtually every issue and decision in marriage. One of you wants to do something the other doesn’t, or wants to less than you. And even if you both want the same thing, one of you will want it more than the other. Plus, no one is the low desire, or high desire on everything. Positions shift on different issues throughout the marriage.

Desire differences are going to happen. And the positions you take (low or high desire) are simply points on a continuum.

The most freeing point of this view, neither the high desire position or the low desire position is right or wrong. They’re simply differences.

Let’s say you want to have sex every day, you’d likely think that would make you the high desire spouse. But if you’re married to a person that wants sex two times per day, you’re the low desire spouse. Desire isn’t either high or low due to biological drive, past history, or even how much you like sex — it results from some standard of comparison, usually this is your spouse.

If you buy into this idea it will help you stop the arguments over how much sexual desire is normal or healthy.

Let me state it this way — I really like sex.

I also really like chocolate — but not every day.

When my wife and I have attempted to have sex every day for a certain number of days in a row, it becomes burdensome and impersonal. But does that mean the couples who have sex more often than us are better or healthier than us? Nope.

Same for those that are less frequent. This is that comparison devil rearing its head again.

Differences are going to happen in marriage.

Especially when it comes to sexual desire.

Why?

Because this is how relationships are designed to operate. There’s more going on than “happily ever after.”

When it comes to marriage, the relationship is driven by more than just feelings, and it helps to realize that feelings aren’t always accurate. Feelings are open to interpretations. And our feelings can lead us to believe that when your spouse isn’t interested in sex like you are there must be something wrong.

Well, things going wrong and things not going the way you want are two different things.

And, if you can see that there’s actually nothing going wrong, it’s more likely you can turn things around and make them more to your liking.

The beauty of seeing desire differences (regardless of gender) as points on a continuum is it reframes the “problem.” Couples have often sought ways around this problem. Or more aptly stated, high desire spouses have sought ways to increase their spouse’s desire.

But, inevitably, the low desire spouse will control sex.

Here’s how this works:

The high desire spouse makes most, if not all, of the overtures and initiations for sex.

The low desire spouse decides which of the sexual overtures he or she will respond to.

Which determines when sex happens. Giving the low desire spouse de facto control of sex — whether he or she wants it or not.

When you look at it this way it seems simple.

The key is — how you experience this, and handle this, will say a lot about you regardless whether you’re the high or the low desire spouse.

The fact that you experience desire differences doesn’t necessarily mean there is something going wrong — and shifting your perspective could change everything.

It could open the door to you both using your sexual desire differences more productively. Desire problems can be useful to people and relationships — they push you to become more solid within yourself.

Being in a committed relationship brings two life forces front and center. The drive for togetherness and the drive for separateness. The desire to connect and share experiences with another person and the refusal to submit to another person’s tyranny.

When it comes to sexual desire, the low desire spouse understands tyranny. He or she feels oppressed, pressured to want sex and have sex, thanks to the badgering by their spouse’s higher desire. BUT, the high desire spouse understands tyranny too. He or she will feel the pressure to have sex when and how it’s available since opportunities may be few and far between. They must settle for “getting lucky” rather than feeling wanted. And on top of all this, they usually must act grateful for mediocre sex.

Sex is a common gridlock issue. And gridlock in marriage is inevitable . . . but also resolvable.

When it comes to sex, sure, the low desire spouse can stop having it, but there’s usually a limit to how far you can play that card if you want to stay married — particularly happily married.

So what can you do?

You must realize that what we’re talking about here is not just sex. There’s a whole lot more going on.

Most of the time, sex is approached from an other-validation stance (also called a reflected sense of self).

Take intimacy for example. Other-validated intimacy involves one spouse disclosing feelings, perceptions, doubts, fears, and inner truths and the other spouse 1)accepting, validating, and empathizing, and/or 2) disclosing in kind.

Other-validation hinges on reciprocity.

In sex this plays out as I’ll do you then you do me.

What this actually does is boosts or shores up your reflected sense of self.

Here’s something you must get straight in your mind: Being intimate with your spouse doesn’t mean you get the response you want.

Marriage is an interdependent relationship — its resilience lies in both spouse’s ability to function independently.

The balance between your reflected sense of self and your solid flexible self has a dramatic effect on your level of sexual desire and passion — and whether or not you miss it when they’re non-existent.

You may be a good person with fine values and good intent, but if your anxieties drive you to avoid things or act impulsively, you’ll do things that violate your integrity, ideals and goals, and diminish your self-worth. You’ll react harshly to other family members when your anxiety is high, which may go against your ideal of being a good solid parent, which then makes you feel guilty, thus your self-worth takes another hit.

When it comes to sex, like I stated before, there’s more going on than just sex.

Look at it this way — I’m the high desire spouse in my marriage and I’ve learned there are many things I can do to get my wife to have sex with me. I can woo her, set up a romantic date, get her several drinks, manipulate, beg, persuade, plus many other things that may work. But, none of these tactics make her want me.

That’s something I can’t control.

When it comes to being wanted . . . all I can do is present something worth wanting.

And something worth wanting develops best when you confront yourself, challenge yourself to do what’s right, and earn your own self respect.

A scary proposition, yes. But it’s the way a marriage fully alive really works.

Source: Schnarch, D. (2009) Intimacy and desire. Beaufort Books: New York

Dr. Corey Allan is a really smart guy who writes at Simple Marriage and counsels people on how to have better relationships. He’ll teach you how to get along with others, play nice, get more of what you want and enjoy giving back. He might even help you get more sex out of the deal, too!

Thanks so much to Corey for enlightening us on sexual desire differences!

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