# Marriage without sex is not really a marriage.



## hubby59 (Nov 22, 2013)

My wife and I waited until marriage for sexual intercourse because we believe sex is best expressed in the context of marriage.

That said, there have been times where my wife is not so interested in sex and points out all the other "wifely" things she does around the house.

I told her that based on our beliefs, the only thing I had to marry her to get is sex. Every other service, though appreciated I tell her, did not require me to marry her. So for a woman to deny sex or be cranky about it is darn close to denying the marriage.

So make love ladies. Most hubbies will love you more deeply if you are frequently intimate with him.


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## As'laDain (Nov 27, 2011)

sex is marriage?

WTF?
i thought that marriage was mutually exclusive support...
sex is like the icing on the cake.

dont forget that intimacy is usually felt by different means between men and women. so, what is intimacy to her may not be intimacy to you. 

hmm... what do you do then, when she is showing so much intimacy and your just not feeling it???

crap, now your in the realm of marriage....


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## hubby59 (Nov 22, 2013)

As'laDain said:


> sex is marriage?
> 
> WTF?
> i thought that marriage was mutually exclusive support...
> ...


Mutually exclusive support is not marriage. Without sex, there is not a marriage in the truest sense. And I'm not talking about couples who can't have sex for some physical reason.


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## As'laDain (Nov 27, 2011)

hubby59 said:


> Mutually exclusive support is not marriage. Without sex, there is not a marriage in the truest sense. And I'm not talking about couples who can't have sex for some physical reason.


when i was unable to have sex for a couple years due to chronic cluster headaches and taking over a gram of verapamil a day, i still had a marriage. even in the truest sense of the word. 

what definition are you talking about? biblical? where one man and one women cleave together and become one flesh?

as far as i can tell, that only needed to be done once for the marriage to be considered legitimate. a hell of a lot more was said about a marriage than was mentioned about sex...

what is this definition with which we base our assumptions?


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## questar1 (Aug 4, 2011)

Sex is among the contracts included in a marriage but is not the sine qua non for everybody. 

That said, I left my ex primarily because I considered a celibate marriage a form of abuse. You can't occupy that exclusive space and then refuse to discharge the duties of that space. 

But if your wife is less interested than you, there are LOTS of things you can do. Lots of fun, fun, fun ways to get things going. 

I used to dream of having a H with a higher sex drive than me, of having to put up with his annoying insistence and begging, and having to refuse, to push him away, because I had enough and .... Wait, that's why I married my current H. For the sex. No matter what else is going on between us, it's there. Like, "What, again? Are you serious? but I'm still mad at you!" Yup. He's serious. 

So, as you see, I kind of agree with you. 

But not everybody sees it that way.


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## As'laDain (Nov 27, 2011)

questar1 said:


> Sex is among the contracts included in a marriage but is not the sine qua non for everybody.
> 
> That said, I left my ex primarily because I considered a celibate marriage a form of abuse. You can't occupy that exclusive space and then refuse to discharge the duties of that space.
> 
> ...


i guess it all comes down to the person. im pretty high drive lately, i want it all the time. but, there was a time when i could go months and not even notice.


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## askari (Jun 21, 2012)

I too used to be high drive, but my LD wife has more or less extinguished my flame.
I hope that either my wife or someone else (at the appropriate time) can reignite it before it goes out and my todger falls off!

Sex with your spouse is, as a previous poster says, part of the marriage 'contract'. 
Both man and woman agree to 'with my body I thee honour'. 

We men need to understand the female language of love more....but a hell of a lot of women out there need to understand the male language of love more.
We don't want flowers or coffee in bed to show you love us...we want you to share your bodies with us (WILLINGLY)...forget the coffee, I can make that...wake me up with a BJ and I'l be speaking your language of love all the time!


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## Holland (Aug 20, 2012)

hubby59 said:


> My wife and I waited until marriage for sexual intercourse because we believe sex is best expressed in the context of marriage.
> 
> That said, there have been times where my wife is not so interested in sex and points out all the other "wifely" things she does around the house.
> 
> ...


No doubt your intentions are good with this post but the number of women in sexless marriages where it is not their choice is pretty much the same as men. Have you been around here long? If so you will have seen that there are as many women here suffering in a sexless marriage as men.
You are preaching to the converted.


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## Sabariel (Jun 14, 2011)

Women enjoy sex just as much as men. Well, good sex, anyway. No one enjoys bad sex. Well, no one who knows better.

Ok, for men, sex is like pizza: when it's bad, it's still pretty good. But for women, there IS such thing as bad sex, and it's incredibly awful. You start thinking about your to-do list, hoping he'll finish soon so you can get up and mop the floor. Because that's what you'd rather be doing.

When people "deny" sex, it's usually because their emotional needs are not being met. Maybe she feels overwhelmed around the house (especially likely if that's the first thing she mentions when you bring up sex). Maybe she needs more gratitude for what she does and how she takes care of your other needs. Maybe she needs more expression of your love for her, more romance, passion, compassion, and support.

Or, maybe _you_ don't satisfy _her_ sexually. Maybe you "ask for sex" and she says "yes" and then you just climb on top of her, thrust in and out a couple times, ejaculate, roll over, and go to sleep. If my husband did that, you can bet the farm he wouldn't be getting laid either.

Some people, like myself, are asexual. That means we don't have a sex drive to speak of. We're still capable of having very satisfying relationships, some of us are even able to have and enjoy sex... it's just that if we don't have sex, it doesn't bother us. Our relationship was not built on a sexual foundation, we relate to each other in other ways. We find more intimacy and pleasure from cuddling. For my husband, sex is a very raw, animalistic activity, and he doesn't feel especially romantic and intimate when he's doing it. We do have sex, but it's very infrequent. This used to bother me because "people" (who are "people"?) said that there's some average amount of sex that most married people have, and we were no where near that frequency, and I thought that meant we had a "bad marriage." Then I read more about asexuality and how lots of couples have completely satisfying relationships, passionate and compassionate relationships, but without sex. And then I realized, that's what we'd had all along, and all that was wrong was my attempt to fit our marriage into some box based on what "people" said it should be.


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## As'laDain (Nov 27, 2011)

Sabariel said:


> Women enjoy sex just as much as men. Well, good sex, anyway. No one enjoys bad sex. Well, no one who knows better.
> 
> Ok, for men, sex is like pizza: when it's bad, it's still pretty good. But for women, there IS such thing as bad sex, and it's incredibly awful. You start thinking about your to-do list, hoping he'll finish soon so you can get up and mop the floor. Because that's what you'd rather be doing.
> 
> ...


+1 for everything except for the part about men. when sex is bad for us, it can be absolutely horrible and demoralizing, especially if the part we like the most about sex is being able to satisfy our partners. 

for instance, most men have no desire to have sex with a spouse who responds to a sense of duty instead of an actual desire. when we have really bad sex, we know it. and it feels absolutely horrible. usually, men are better at thinking about something else, however. in other words, we usually don't dwell on it much, sometimes to our detriment.


in my own experience, my wife had a low self esteem when we first got married, and that was why we rarely had sex. she didn't feel sexy, so she couldn't help but fear that i thought the same. she preferred to not have sex rather than be disappointed by disappointing me, or, rather than seeing my disappointment.

i still have the feeling that just about anyone can be pushed to a higher drive though. just gotta learn how to press their buttons. 
and that takes time and work...


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## hubby59 (Nov 22, 2013)

Yes, no doubt other factors are involved in a good marriage besides sex. Obviously love comes to mind. But sex is fundamental. It's the glue. This is why in the days of old, a marriage wasn't considered valid until consummated, i.e. until the couple had sex.

I'm not talking frequency or any of that. Just saying it's key. It puts the couple in communion with one another.


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## trey69 (Dec 29, 2010)

Sex starts outside of the bedroom. If all other things in the marriage that lead up to sex is being ignored or not nurtured then its likely why sex is lacking.

Its not good for people to walk around saying, if you give me sex then you will get what you want...its usually the other way around. It starts outside of the bedroom.


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## usmarriedguy (Dec 9, 2013)

It is glue for a high drive person but two low drive people could be married and live happily just fine. 

So no I can't in general define a marriage as sex. It is important to you and your wife has every right to have her own view about what is important. 

Trying to make here feel like she has some biblical obligation to service you is probably not a good strategy and will probably result in her feeling really bad about herself.

We have both sides here -men married to LD women and women married to LD men but in general most active participants are HD because LD people are not interested in talking about sex.


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## CallaLily (Jan 13, 2011)

There are many many things that makes a marriage NOT a marriage. Sex is a just a part of it.

You would be surprised at the partners who shout out they are not getting any sex and they likely play a part in why that is. However, if you are spouse thats HD and a partner thats LD or vice versa, well thats just likely a case of mismatched sex drives. Perhaps MC could help, perhaps not.


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## hubby59 (Nov 22, 2013)

I don't disagree on the whole with any of you, but if one feels that sex is best placed in the context of marriage, then it is almost by definition fundamental to marriage. Why? Because everything else in the relationship can exist without marriage. I'm not really saying anything else. I say it because it seems that some undervalue sex's importance to a healthy marriage. If a spouse ONLY feels it's necessary to be life partners but without the sexual intimacy, then it wasn't really necessary to marry in the first place.


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## Aerith (May 17, 2013)

hubby59 said:


> My wife and I waited until marriage for sexual intercourse because we believe sex is best expressed in the context of marriage.
> 
> That said, there have been times where my wife is not so interested in sex and points out all the other "wifely" things she does around the house.
> 
> ...


Not very common beliefs nowadays that you have to get married to have sex. 

I read somewhere that previously people married to have sex and now they have sex to get married :lol:

My belief is marriage is not equal sex. Sex is just a part of marriage. 

I am wondering - according your beliefs - if sex stopped in marriage - should you automatically get divorced? Or divorce is not an option?


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## CallaLily (Jan 13, 2011)

hubby59 said:


> I told her that based on our beliefs, the only thing I had to marry her to get is sex. Every other service, though appreciated I tell her, did not require me to marry her. So for a woman to deny sex or be cranky about it is darn close to denying the marriage.


And what was her response after you told her this?


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## trey69 (Dec 29, 2010)

hubby59 said:


> So for a woman to deny sex or be cranky about it is darn close to denying the marriage.


I think the same could be said for those who deny their spouse, things such as, emotional connections, lack of empathy and support, nurturing and healthy care taking of the relationship, etc etc. If thats being denied then its denying the marriage as well.


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## WorkingOnMe (Mar 17, 2012)

Sex is not the icing in the cake. Sorry, it's the cake. It's integral to marriage and the absence of sex makes the marriage less valid.


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## Starstarfish (Apr 19, 2012)

> I told her that based on our beliefs, the only thing I had to marry her to get is sex.


- 5 for the most unromantic thing ever said. "I basically just married you to get sex, because God said so, so - let's do it."


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## Jellybeans (Mar 8, 2011)

hubby59 said:


> That said, there have been times where my wife is not so interested in sex and points out all the other "wifely" things she does around the house.


Having sex isn't the same as cleaning a bathroom or making dinner.

Sheesh. I feel for some of you guys (and married ladies who's husbands won't boff you).


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## sh987 (Oct 10, 2013)

Sex is as important to the marriage as it is to either one of the people in the marriage. If it's not that important to you, but it is to your spouse, guess what? Sex is important to your marriage, and you need to recognize how important it is to your partner. My take, anyway.

The same goes, by the way, for things like emotional connection, talking, quality time, etc, etc, etc. If your spouse has a need for it, you'd best do what you can to help them with it.


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