Having a “bad sex life” means different things to different people. Couples who are fumbling in bed and do not communicate well, those who are matched with someone who has a much higher or lower sex drive, or those who do not have sex with their partner at all anymore are some examples.

What are the Causes of a Bad Sex Life?

Limited Knowledge

When you were taught about sex, if you were, it was likely the biological basics and you probably learned that in a sexual education class. No one asked questions in those classes because they were too embarrassed to. If your parents gave you the basics, chances are you were going to get away from the kitchen table as fast as you could.

Warped Perception

Movies, magazines, and books influenced your ideas about sex as you were growing up. Everything was portrayed as a perfect romantic encounter in the media you watched and read. Nothing was ever mentioned about the work it takes to keep you and your partner satisfied year after year. Everyone just assumed the magic would happen all by itself.

Limited knowledge and warped perception follows you into adulthood. If you are not open to intimate learning experiences, your sex life will not thrive. One issue is the lack of attention to physical needs. That is a two way street. You cannot expect your partner to know what you want if you do not communicate.

Something else that contributes is the level of comfort in your relationship. You settle into a routine during your day to day lives and your sex life often follows the same predictable pattern. The need to woo your partner is no longer felt because you are already with them. You also may not tell your partner how you feel about them. You have said it all before.

Lack of Emotional Intimacy

If you are in a relationship where sexual expectations are not met, it can drive a wedge between the two of you. A big part of sex is the intimacy it creates. The link between physical and emotional intimacy is undeniable. When your sexual needs do not match those of your partner, that closeness is lost. As a result, you become apathetic and may reach a point where you do not even have sex anymore.

Higher Stress Levels

If you have a bad sex life, your stress level is going to increase. High stress levels contribute to obesity, high blood pressure and depression, which are serious health issues. Higher stress levels mean you are likely to be easily overwhelmed or angered. That can affect your career and the amount of positive interaction you have with your family.

Health Implications

Lack of sexual intimacy has been found to affect health in a few different ways. Doctors doing clinical research have found that people who have had heart attacks indicated a high level of unhappiness with their sex life before the event.

Other clinical studies have found links between sexual fulfillment and the incidence and severity of migraines and premenstrual syndrome. The endorphins released during sex have also been shown to reduce pain in both men and women, even in cases of chronic arthritis.

Resentment

If you and your partner have very different sexual needs, it can be a difficult road. If you cannot meet in the middle and come up with a system of conscious give and take, resentment on one side or the other will build. You may even get to the point where you are not even communicating about it anymore. That lack of communication will seep into every other aspect of your lives together and impact your relationship in a very negative way.

Depression

If your sex life is bad or you and your partner are not having sex much at all, you can feel frustrated, neglected, and angry. These feelings can draw you straight into depression. You may start to ask yourself if the person you love is no longer attracted to you, if you are doing something wrong, or if you are bad in bed. The cycle of depression will further affect your sex life and then becomes a horrible cycle.

Decline of Non-Sexual Intimacy

People have to be touched in order to maintain a healthy psychological state. Once you are no longer touching in bed, it can move into other areas. You may find yourself unable to connect with your partner by touching his or her arm during conversation or have a difficult time communicating with any level of thoughtfulness and kindness.

Solutions

If your sex life is bad, it is time to light the spark again. That does not mean you should jump right into bed. Take the kids to grandma’s house for the night and spend time reconnecting with your lover. Have a relaxing dinner, curl up on the couch together, and watch a movie.

Let your guard down. If your sex life has been on a steady decline, you may be hurt, angry, or carry resentment. Start communicating with your partner, but do not do so in an accusatory tone. Just talk. Ask them what they need and talk about what you need as well. You should be assertive, but remain sensitive at the same time.

If you feel you cannot communicate effectively with your partner, consider seeing a sex therapist. They have seen and heard everything and can help you get back to a great sex life.

Couples that know all about each other’s finances tend to have a better marriage than those who do not talk about their finances. There are a few things that married couples should talk about frequently and they should certainly be on the same page before they get married. Those things that couples should discuss before they get married are: religion, sex, and money. If the couple is in agreement on those three things, then they will most likely have a successful and fruitful marriage.

Sit Down and Talk Honestly

When a married couple is not perfectly honest with each other, then their marriage will have problems. In order to make a marriage more successful, many people suggest having a sit down meeting to discuss finances and to do it once every other week. As most people are paid every other week, payday is a perfect time to have a discussion about what you will both do with those finances during the two weeks.

Have an Agenda for Each Meeting

That bi-weekly meeting can be as long or as short as you and your partner need to have. The meeting may simply be a review of the previous weeks or it might be planning for the next two weeks. Couples that have these meetings tend to discuss grocery shopping, medical expenses, entertainment expenses and other simple things.

Sharing Intimacy with Your Checkbooks

Many couples find that they enjoy sitting down and talking to each other with a purpose once every other week. These bi-weekly meetings are moments when couples get to share intimacy, even though these meetings are not sexual in nature. Because they are sharing something that no other people can share with them, these meetings are intimate times together. Talking about something personal and intimate like money, sex, and religion will certainly bring couples closer together because of the fact that these couples are sharing their most private feelings and thoughts about private ideas.

Discuss Money So You Can Relax Together

Understanding each other’s beliefs about money and how they share it with each other certainly do bring couples closer together. They partners can relax around each other when they know they are on the same page when it comes to finances. They do not have to keep secrets, so they know they can trust each other in any situation.

Involve Your Children When They Are Old Enough

When couples talk about their finances with each other, they can begin to involve their children when the time is right. It is a good idea to inform children about the best ways to talk about money. You and your partner can set a good example by talking about money in healthy ways with your children. You do not need to invite them to every single bi-weekly meetings, but maybe just one a month or one every other month. They do not necessarily need to know all of the details, but seeing their parents talk about money will help them learn that that is what healthy married couples do.

Find Discussion Points Online or In Books

If you are going to begin to have bi-weekly meetings about finances, you can find discussion points online. There are many websites that have topics of discussion that will get your talks flowing more freely. If you are uncomfortable talking about money and you do not know where to start, you can also find books that will help you begin an appropriate discussion with your spouse. It is important that you do not have your discussions in ways that end up attacking each other, but in ways that are supportive and positive. If you are accusatory or if you are angry about meetings, then your spouse will most likely shy away from discussions and they will not be very successful.

Have a Good Attitude and Keep Positivity

It is important to have a good attitude, even if things are not going your way. It is important to praise your spouse for the things he or she is doing well, especially if he or she is trying to make changes to spending and saving habits. If you say too many negative things, then your spouse will avoid talking about money because no one wants to hear constant negativity. If you are having problems staying positive, then you should write down the things you want to say positively so you will stay on task and not be insulting or negative.

Bring Your Marriage Closer

When you want to begin bi-weekly financial meetings with your spouse, you and your spouse will grow closer together. Talking about money is difficult for many people to do, so the fact that you are both caring enough to share feelings and ideas with each other will make your marriage stronger and longer lasting.

The importance of foreplay in your marriage has much to do with staying connected with your partner. The longer you are married the easier it is to get caught up in everything happening in the world around you. When you are dating, effort goes into sex and spending time together whereas you can easily begin to take each other for granted. The busier your life is, the easier it is to fall out of the habit of making the effort when it comes to sex and foreplay.

Keeping the Romance Alive

Foreplay is a big part of romance. When time is limited, couples often begin just rushing to sex and through sex. This makes the overall process less satisfying and can leave each party less and less willing to expend the time and energy having sex. If you work at foreplay you can build romance back into the sex process. This leaves both parties with a sense of longing and a more lasting loving feeling after the sex act is complete. This type of foreplay often results in having sex more often.

Making Sure Things Stay Interesting

Foreplay can be a way to spice up and otherwise mundane activity. While sex is not rally considered “mundane,” when you can have it any time you want with the same person it is not as much of a challenge. Foreplay adds the challenge back into the game of sex and brings the fun back to the sexual experience. You don’t have to be totally nutty, but you can bring a level of fun and joy to the sex act that keeps you thinking about new and interesting things. This provides you with constant variety in your marriage.

Helping to Make the Moments Special

Foreplay can really make moments special. Taking the time to really stimulate your partner before you begin makes sex memorable. Instead of just being the same as the million other times you have had sex, you will leave a lasting impression. Small tickling or teasing activities heighten the senses and make the overall experience more intense. This experience helps to build a sense of purpose to sex and makes it an complete satisfaction rather than just fulfilling the base animal need for sex.

Looking Forward to an Event

When you plan foreplay you can make sex more of an event. You can pair this with a night out or other romantic activity to give you something to look forward to. This can build a sense of anticipation in the marriage. The build up to the event allows an opportunity for both spouses to come up with ideas and thoughts of how to deepen the connection. Research can be done and it can be a fun couple activity even before you have any foreplay or sex. This makes the activity even more worth the effort as the overall pleasurable feeling lasts for days rather than just minutes.

Keeping the Intimacy Intact

Sex elevates your relationship beyond a partnership. Sex is a way to open your soul to one another and gives you a way to put the woes of the world out of your mind in order to really connect with one another. Foreplay is a big part of this intimacy. The lead in and the connection you feel helps you understand one another and be more forgiving when back in the real world. It can solidify your connection and commitment to one another so you work as a team when dealing with children or other trying circumstances.

Finding a Way to Connect

Foreplay can be a way to reconnect with your sexuality if you have reached a lull. Sometimes sexual appetite in a marriage will wane and instead of forcing just sex, building a foreplay scenario can help to encourage and entice the partners into sex. This way of connecting can help you rekindle the sex part of your marriage and build a stronger bond between you and your partner. Foreplay takes time, effort and energy. This helps to show how committed you are, something that is easy to forget when you have been married for a long time. As you fall into habits, the time for connecting gets lost and foreplay can help you get there again.

Staying Power for the Long Term

Sex is important for the long term health of your marriage. Temptations are all around you and if you are not fulfilled at home, it is easier to give in to such temptation. The more intimate you are with your spouse, the more guilt you would feel about doing anything you would later regret. Your mind immediately goes to all the negatives of giving in to such a whim and helps you stay on the right track. While you can never quell all sexual impulses you can definitely control them with real intimacy.

Overall foreplay really helps keep you interested in sex even when you may be getting bored. You have to know that sexual appetite will often change because of hormones, activities and other outside factors, but you can use foreplay to reignite the flame and keep your sex life alive and well. Keeping “in love” takes work, effort and commitment. Foreplay makes this commitment easier to accomplish and reminds you often why you are in love and why you are working together as a team in life.