| Catz |
Posted
on 01-Jun-02 05:48 AM
Over lunch, you're chatting with a friend about your unsatisfying job, annoying in-laws and nosy neighbors. Then it happens. As you butter your bread the question slips from your mouth: "So, how often do you have sex with your husband?" OK, so maybe this hasn't happened to you, but do you think it could? After all, sex is the topic that many of us avoid yet at the same time are most curious about.
Luckily, a recent study by Durex condoms has some answers. Sixty percent of the study's participants claimed they have sex at least once a week, while 4 percent said they have sex every day. So what about marriages where sex plays less of a role? We asked marriage therapist Mark Goulston, M.D., to offer some insight into the sex lives of his midlife patients. Marriages who have less sex are usually unhealthy, because each partner usually feels differently about the frequency. One usually wants it more and feels deprived, if not downright cheated, of sex. The troubled couples have sex once per month to once per three months and almost never say they were making love. Usually the healthy couples have sex once per week to once per two weeks.
Dr. Bonnie Eaker Weil agrees on the importance of lovemaking to any marriage. "Touching, cuddling, stroking and sex are the glue that keeps a relationship together," she says. "These actions that you might take for granted actually release endorphins that create a special bond between you and your partner." To this end, Dr. Eaker Weil suggests that married couples make whoopee three to five times per week.
But before you reach for that aspirin and your 10-year-old negligee, keep in mind that intimacy doesn't always have to involve intercourse. As one puts it, "The intimate exchange of physical, emotional and spiritual bonding should be an every day occurrence in our lives. Intimacy is the goal, but to achieve it all facets of our mind, body and soul must be developed."
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