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After 17 years, our sex life is better than ever.
My wife and I waited to make love until our wedding night. We were very romantic with each other in our dating life, but we believed it was God's best for us to wait to experience the fullness of sexual love until after we said our vows before our families and our friends.
The wedding night, and the honeymoon itself, was wonderful, full of passion and joy and the thrill of discovery. But then something happened... when we returned from the honeymoon, I began to realize our sexual desires were not in sync. I was craving sexual contact much more frequently than my wife, and she was feeling pressured to have more sex than she wanted, which meant she wanted it even less.
I started to feel frustrated. I had tried very hard to live a Godly life and kept myself sexually pure. But now that I was "allowed" to enjoy the gift of sex, I felt like I couldn't open it fully; that I couldn't satiate my desire.
I consulted close Christian friends for advice, and found that many of them had also struggled with the sexual component of their marriages. I read Christian books on marriage and sexuality, and tried lovingly and patiently to apply what I was learning. But somehow in all this, my wife felt like I was trying to change her, that I was critiquing her. Whenever we tried to talk about "it", we ended up in an argument.
It felt unfair: so many people seemed to be enjoying their sexuality to the fullest, while I felt starved. The struggle with my sex life became an obsession, and I began to feel like a failure spiritually: after all, a Godly man really wouldn't let such a thing get in the way, right?
In desperation (and with the best of intentions, really), I started checking out more overt sexual information which eventually lead to me privatizing my struggle. I would secretly read erotic books, or look at pornographic materials. And though these things would satisfy for the moment, they left me even more thirsty and unfulfilled. And I felt like I was a spiritual sham for even wrestling with these things.
There were good moments, of course, and even some exploration of desires. My wife could at times be very erotically playful, trying new positions and stimulation. And everytime it would happen, it would give me hope that we were finally clicking, finally on the same track. But then we'd fall right back to our old habits of me initiating, and her refusing.
9 years into our marriage, while my wife was pregnant with our third child, we decided to pursue professional help, and started counseling sessions with Joyce Penner. I had read her books, and thought they were excellent sources for marriage and sexuality. We were in counseling with her for a very brief period, but it was helpful in changing our communication about sex from the perception of blame to one of caring.
From that point on, our discussions of sex were much more constructive. A big part of that was my learning to let go of my expectations of who I wanted my wife to be in bed and learning to enjoy who she really was.
The good news is, the older she gets (now 40), the more sensual she's becoming. She seems more free to let go and enjoy the pleasure, and enjoy giving it as well. She is an amazingly passionate lover and gives herself to me without holding back. Yes, we still have our struggles now and again, but she is the lover I always hoped she would be... and I believe I have become the lover she needs.
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