Chapter Excerpt

Has sex become a chore at home, just another task to complete before we go to sleep? We get so busy taking care of others—our kids, clients, bosses, friends, extended family, etc.—that at times we forget to take care of ourselves and our mate. Sometimes we do not exercise or eat right, let alone make sure we have a healthy dose of sexual interaction. We often are so busy with everything that our sexuality takes a backseat.

Do our sexual needs ever really go away? We are sometimes reminded of those urges when we read a romance novel, when that young trainer leans over to give us a spot in the gym, when the sexy grocery-store clerk smiles at us, or maybe when our coworker flirts with us. We fantasize and masturbate. We remember and imagine. We would like to have the ultimate fantasy: a passionate and intimate relationship—the happily ever after. Why then do we seem to have so little energy to put into our sex life with our mate?

We hear a lot about married women and lost libido. Books are dedicated to the subject of boosting the libido and finding the medical and emotional causes of loss of interest in sex. Of course, there are many situations in which a woman’s sex drive is low or nonexistent due to actual physical or emotional problems. These issues and their possible treatments are outside the scope of this book. The issue for many of us, however, is not lost libido but rather our own lack of focus on our sexual needs, or perhaps the misdirection of that focus. We rarely put much time or energy into our sexual relationship with our mate. We need to think about all the effort we devote to our children, our careers, and/or our communities, and then look at how much time we actually give to our sexual relationship. Often there is no comparison. Our sexual relationship is way, way down the list of priorities.

The issue is our own lack of focus on our sexual needs, or perhaps the misdirection of that focus.

Giving our sexual relationship such a low priority is really hurting us, much more than we care to admit. We are hurt because the intimacy we crave with our mate is lost. We are hurt because our innate sexual needs are being ignored. We are hurt because we are missing out on a lot of “that feels great” in our lives. We can work ourselves like machines, taking care of everyone and everything until we drop at night, then getting up and doing it again the next day. Or we can start paying a little attention to those inner desires again and start feeding them. The rewards will be huge. Those days of looking forward to intimate time alone with our mate will return, and sex will no longer be a chore. Our relationship can only improve when we start putting a little time and effort into seeking passionate encounters.

If we continue to place a low priority on sex, we are only hurting ourselves, and, in the long run, our neglect will have a detrimental effect on even the best of relationships. How does placing a low priority on our sex lives affect our husband or long-term mate? We all know how much the men in our lives value sex, and we need to realize that they value it for many of the same reasons we should value it—the intimacy and closeness it creates with our mate, not to mention the sheer pleasure.

The Seven Reasons to Seek Passion with Our Mate

(Advantages to Placing a High Priority on Our Sexual Relationship)

•  Increases intimacy

•  Feeds our innate sexual needs

•  Provides a lot of “that feels great” in our life

•  Improves the overall health of our relationship

•  Reduces the risk of becoming a statistic

•  Provides a great tension reliever and mood elevator

•  Provides a creative outlet and an avenue of great fun

When my friends and I got home from our first unofficial passion quest support meeting, every one of our mates got laid. Having spent some time confiding in our friends about sex, having shared some secrets, having made suggestions, we were suddenly energized to not only have sex but have it enthusiastically. Just that little bit of focus on our sex lives triggered the innate desire within us.

Right away, when we began exploring the paths to rediscover the passion, our relationships were dramatically affected—and I am not just talking about in the bedroom. This is because our sexual lives have a powerful and profound effect on our relationships as a whole. The depth of this impact will become crystal clear when we explore the real-life experiences of women who journeyed out, seeking to rediscover their sexual selves and the “passion pot of gold.”

One friend of mine told me about the dramatic change in her relationship with her mate when she simply eliminated thirty minutes of nighttime television and instead spent the time “messing around” with him in bed. She decided that she could accomplish a more complete state of relaxation by cuddling and sharing massages with him than she could by passively watching TV. The time together often led to sex, and even when it did not, the small effort on her part did not go unnoticed. Soon her husband was much more agreeable and much more attentive to her needs both in the bedroom and out.

I have made an impact on my own relationship with an effort as small as occasionally buying the latest book on sexual technique and trying something new every time I have sex. This usually results in my husband picking up the book, reading it, and sharing in the application of the “new” sexual approach. (Trust me, putting a book about sex on the nightstand all but guarantees our man will pick it up and look at it.) Some techniques or positions, because of their absurdness, result in fits of laughter, and others my husband and I agree we shall certainly use again. In any case, just that little bit of effort on my part results in a wonderful return in intimacy.

The purpose here is to share real-life sexual experiences—both minor and major—with the goal of helping us find renewed sexual passion in our life. Sometimes the path toward rediscovery is a long and difficult one. Sometimes minor efforts are not enough, and sometimes dramatic efforts have a major negative impact on our relationship. The journeys each of us take to reignite the passion are unique, but the resulting discoveries allow for some universal observations. By sharing experiences with each other, we learn what might work for our relationship and what might not. Learning about each other’s mistakes along the way may help us avoid pitfalls and seek more productive paths. Ultimately, we will realize the need and the benefit to actively seeking a more fulfilling and passionate sex life in our long-term relationship.

When I first approached women about their experiences with sex in their long-term relationships, many insisted that all they could contribute was “everything you would want to know about missionary style.” And, as an aside, they jokingly offered to share all their “secrets” about how to “get [sex] over with as soon as possible.” With this kind of frequent commentary from women in long-term committed relationships, I am not at all surprised by the number of people who are unhappy about their sex lives or, for that matter, having affairs and getting divorced.

My Passion Seeker friends and I conducted an unofficial count of all the women we knew who had an affair or were having an affair. We were shocked by the fact that each of us could think of at least two different women, and many of those women were now divorced or living with a strained relationship at home. Granted, some of these women had an affair in retaliation for their spouse’s indiscretions, but they were nevertheless cheating (or had cheated) on their mate.

According to the National Opinion Research Center’s Reports on Sexual Behavior, the number of wives cheating on their husbands in the United States is on the rise. Their findings show that in the last twelve to fifteen years, the percentage of previously or currently married women who have ever been involved in an extramarital affair has risen while the rate for men has remained about the same. This means that the “infidelity gap” has narrowed. (See “The Current Estimates for the United States” below.) An Internet search will bring up many Web sites geared toward women who are cheating—or wanting to cheat—or men who are looking for married women to cheat with. Reports vary widely as to the actual percentage of women in committed relationships who are cheating in the United States, but some experts put the number as high as 55 percent (see “The Current Estimates for the United States” below).

Letting the passion slip away from our relationship sounds like a quick way to become another statistic—one of the approximately 50 percent divorcing or the estimated 40 to 55 percent having affairs (see the list below). Of course, there are many other stresses on a marriage, but just as most marriage counselors will tell us, discontent in the bedroom is one of the biggest. What are we accomplishing by sticking our head in the sand and trying not to think about how much we miss the passionate newness of those early days?

The Current Estimates for the United States

(See the resources section at the back of this book for a comprehensive list of studies and additional citation detail.)

•  About 50 percent of first marriages end in divorce. (U.S. Census Bureau Current Population Reports, February 2002)

•  Forty-three percent of first marriages break up within the first fifteen years. (Centers for Disease Control, National Center for Health Statistics, May 2001)

•  Tom W. Smith, author of the National Opinion Research Center’s Reports on Sexual Behavior (April 2003), notes that “In the last twelve to fifteen years, the ‘infidelity gap’ has narrowed, as the percent of previously or currently married women ever involved in an affair has risen while the percent of previously or currently married men ever involved in an affair has remained stable.”

•  Forty-five to 55 percent of married women and 50 to 60 percent of married men engage in extramarital sex at some time during their marriage. (Joan D. Atwood and Limor Schwartz, “Cybersex: The New Affair Treatment Considerations,” Journal of Couple and Relationship Therapy, vol. 1, #3, 2002)

•  Approximately half of all married persons have at least one affair during the course of the relationship. (Mary Stuart, coauthor of The Divorce Recovery Journal, 1999)

•  Sixty percent of men and 40 percent of women will have an extramarital affair at some point. (Peggy Vaughan, therapist and author of The Monogamy Myth, 2003)

•  According to an online survey of 38,000 Internet users, respondents devote three hours each week to online sexual exploits, and one in ten respondents said they are addicted to sex and the Internet. (Survey by MSNBC.com and Dr. Alvin Cooper, director of the San Jose Marital Services and Sexuality Center in California; as printed on usatoday.com, Newsbytes News Network, 2001)

Maybe we are already one of these statistics. Maybe we had an affair or cybersex, and maybe we got away with it, but did it help at home? Has the passion improved? Or maybe we have just thought about having an affair. Maybe we are dancing on the edge of infidelity because it makes us feel sexy and desired again. Is whetting our appetite outside the home helping to spice things up with our mate or is it just muddying the waters?

When we think about it, many of us are already seeking passion. Sometimes we just complain about the problem, and sometimes we venture out, actively making poor choices to solve it. Do we even realize that we are already on the journey? Have we actually acknowledged to ourselves that we miss the sexual passion in our relationship? Maybe our instinct, our innate sexuality, is calling out to us to do something about it before it is too late. We may not be listening because of the kids and the job and the chores and what have you. We may not think there is anything that can be done about it. We may believe it is too late, takes too much effort, or is “just the way it is” in a long-term relationship. The passion slips away—end of story.

Well that is not the end of the story. We need to pay attention to that voice inside us, the one that is calling out to add some excitement, to find the passion, to add more “that feels great!” We need to take action, follow the path, and begin the journey toward a passionate renewal in our lives. This, in fact, is what many women are doing, some in healthy ways and some in not so healthy ways.

The Six Passion Quest Dead Ends

(Dead Ends to Seeking the Missing Passion in Our Relationship)

•  Passively letting the passion continue to slip away

•  Believing that this is “just the way it is” in a long-term relationship

•  Believing that it is too late to do something about the problem

•  Believing we do not have the time or energy to do something about it

•  Pursuing sexual passion behind our mate’s back (i.e., cheating)

•  Failing to recognize (and learn from) the dead-end paths we have already ventured down (e.g., ignoring the problem, or committing adultery or dancing on the edge of it)

After much complaining and crying into our beers about our sex lives, my friends and I decided we all needed a little kick in the butt, something to once again motivate us to really put some effort into making love. We would each try something new—something different—and then share the results. We would put our collective minds together to find a solution to the boredom that had become our long-term relationships. We would follow the path that was calling out to us. We would start our journey to rediscover the passion.

As we started off and began to share really personal tidbits with one another, I learned that many women were already “treating” the malaise that was their sex life at home. The “treatments” in some cases were questionable and often made the problem worse. Some were very creative, some involved ignoring the problem, and some were, well, unconventional. Each one of us was on a different journey, but all were seeking the same sexual “pot of gold.” We were hoping that we could rediscover that passion we had with our mate in those early heated encounters, that somehow we could re-create the excitement. We hoped that our journey would bring us to that place of many intimate moments of “that feels great” pleasure and joy.

Through the diapers and the night feedings, through the car trips with screaming children and the teenagers missing curfew, through it all, we have often had our sexual selves closeted, struggling to again be realized. Once I started questioning anyone who would talk about their sex life, intimate details began to surface. My research uncovered some intriguing and inspiring real-life dramas. Jessie, for instance, regularly reads romance novels, flirts with her trainer, and now desperately wishes to understand what the big deal is about sex. Nora is facing a soon-to-be-empty nest and a passionless marriage. Courtney, on the other hand, has been “experimenting” a lot. Lisa and her husband have tried nude beaches and are even considering a “wild exploration” (see glossary at the back of this book). And Carla thinks she wants to have an affair, flirts regularly with the men at work, and has frequent cybersex.

When we discussed these women and their stories at our Passion Seekers’ meetings, we started putting the focus back onto our sexual selves. We realized that, like these women, our sex drives never really vanished—we were just not paying close attention to the fact that we were already on a journey of sorts. We were all, in our own ways, seeking passion in our lives. We all wanted to be “Passion Seekers.”

The passion within us is not dead; it is sometimes dormant or hiding, but it is there, struggling to come out and be fully utilized again, or in some cases for the first time. We want to feel sexy and be noticed again, now that we are mature enough to handle it and know what to do with it (and, boy, do we). We have had children, careers, and many experiences. Most women over thirty-five (and especially those who have had children) will tell you that they are more orgasmic now than ever before. We are at our sexual prime.

The paths we take toward rediscovery are not always smooth ones; bumps and wrong turns are often inevitable. We hope to find the passion within ourselves and within our mate, but often we look the wrong way. We start down a path that heads somewhere else. Sometimes the path leads us to a pitfall and the end of our relationship, but sometimes it leads to exciting discoveries with our lifelong mate and takes us to new unexplored heights.

We learn a lot from our friends. The successes and failures of others can speak volumes. So I sought out the details of those who have already undertaken journeys to find the lost passion. Hearing the revelations of these women, I discovered the extent of the complications involved with exploration. Just where are our journeys taking us and what can we learn from the journeys of others?

Courtney is currently a stay-at-home mother of three. She is organized to a fault and is constantly planning something. She and her husband of nine years have experimented in the past. They are practically the poster couple for location sex, having tried just about all the imaginable spots to “do it.” You would never know this by looking at them. They are the picture-perfect conservative WASP family. They work hard to keep their sex life interesting. The problem now is, what should they try next? How do they crank it up a notch?

Nora has been married for about twenty years and has two children—one already off to college and one who just comes home to eat and sleep. Without the emotional focus on the children, she and her husband are facing an empty nest. Nora wonders what is left of the passionate and intimate relationship they once had. Can it be rediscovered? Are there paths yet to explore on their journey or have they covered the globe already? Or, worse, has the last passion ship already set sail?

Jessie is an executive and a mother of two. She has often been chided for being a “closet prude.” She makes flirtatious comments and sexual innuendos with the best of them, but beneath the surface she is really very embarrassed by the whole subject. She tolerates sex with her husband, feeling it is an obligation that she must bear. She will say that the thrill for her left after the first child was born. With her full-time career and two children, she professes to be too tired to care.

Jessie cannot even remember the last time she enjoyed sex with her husband. She says that when they do have sex, she does the “obligatory leg spread,” closes her eyes, and sometimes throws in a few moans for effect. She adds, “He usually gets it over with pretty quick, thank goodness.” Unfortunately, it sounds as if Jessie has given up or maybe never had it to begin with. It is true that Jessie has neither experimented nor tried anything “spicy” with her spouse. She was raised in a strict religious environment and claims this is the reason for her sexual inhibitions. To conclude that Jessie is a prude, however, is a superficial inference at best, for Jessie turns out to be a most enthusiastic participant in a quest for passion. Her sexual suppression eventually results in an explosion that rattles her moral and ethical beliefs to the core.

Carla, on the other hand, has had a lot of experience (and, yes, I mean sexually). She dated around, focused on her career, and waited until her forties to “settle down” and get married. For a time, she was actually referred to by her friends as the Midwest’s version of Samantha (after the promiscuous character on HBO’s Sex and the City). By my standards, Carla’s near three years of marriage qualify her as a newlywed, yet she is already feeling boredom in the bedroom. Carla is a corporate career professional who travels a lot for her job. She has been propositioned on just about every one of her road trips, usually by married men. Is Carla headed down infidelity lane?

Finally, there is Lisa. Lisa is a former executive, now a stay-at-home mom. She is very outgoing and an active community volunteer. Lisa talks a good game but has not participated in anything really wild—yet. During vacations, Lisa says, the sex is great, but once she and her mate are back home, making love becomes mediocre at best. Lisa has sought advice from every book she has gotten her hands on and has asked the advice of many a seemingly happy couple. A few times while she and her husband were on vacation, swingers (see “swinging” in the glossary at the back of this book) approached them. She is now very curious about the “lifestyle.” With the goal of spicing things up, is Lisa heading toward “wild explorations”?

The stories of Courtney, Nora, Jessie, Carla, and Lisa are compilations of real events that happened to people who were willing to confide in me. I do not pass judgment on the actions of any of these people. In fact, I greatly respect them for finding their own way and for providing details of their lives and experiences, from which we can all benefit.

Through these women’s journeys and the information and advice offered, we may get a glimpse of something we might want to try or something we wish to avoid. By sharing in these experiences, we may find our own way toward a more fulfilling and passionate sex life in our long-term relationship. Let the journey begin!

Copyright © 2006 by Helarie Hollenbeck