One of my young co-workers was telling me one day at work that he couldn’t wait to someday get a girlfriend and or wife. This led me to comment, based upon my own experience of being married 13 and 1/2 years, the secret to a long lasting intimate relationship with a significant member of the opposite sex.
Don’t Build on Physical Intimacy
First off, a relationship should not be based foundationally on romance, physical intimacy or mushy hallmark feelings. These things feel great and look good in movies but their based on temporary fleeting feelings and emotions. Not to say that these things are not important or necessary to a marriage, because they are. They can help strengthen a bond that is already been made. My wife and I are not always romantic towards one another and were not always physically intimate.
My wife experiences physical pain which stops us from the ultimate form of physical intimacy married people have together on a regular basis. It still happens from time to time however. If a woman doesn’t want to have sex, you can’t force her, guilt her into it, or say something dumb like this comment I found on twitter.
Judah Lion@EricReflections (July 16, 2023 A Woman may not be in the mood to change a poopy diaper, but she does it anyway. Why can’t she apply the same resolve when it comes to her own husband?
Sweet Cold Reactions
Meg Wise@_nomadic_soul: Why did he compare it to something bad? Why not “my wife may not be in the mood for ice cream but she eats it anyways” and sex should be better than ice cream anyhow.
jhillky@jhillky2: I’m not sure if the best sex is better than the best ice cream. I’m absolutely certain that average ice cream is better than average sex, and the worst ice cream isn’t nearly as bad as the worst sex.
Meg Wise@_nomadic_soul: What ice cream are you eating because I definitely haven’t found the best ice cream?!
jhillky@jhillky2: Kroger’s Private Selection Amaretto Cherry Cordial is the best that’s easy to get. Their Black Raspberry Dark Chocolate Chunk is great, but I would prefer it without the chunks. A lady at church made a mango-zucchini sorbet that’s the best “healthy” treat I’ve had this decade.
By the way hot chocolate can be just as sweet as ice cream. Our first night as a married couple we got home from the wedding to a snowy driveway. My wife offered to make me hot chocolate. I never drank that hot chocolate and something else happened. Now If I ever ask her if she wants hot chocolate she’ll say, “Not that kind of Hot Chocolate”. Of course she’s on a Keto diet so she probably won’t have it anyway. But she did recently have some cake. So you never know.
Excuse For Lust
That poopy analogy really stinks. It’s at this point that a man has to learn self control, chastity, and has a chance to offer up his frustrations to God and become holy and loving to his wife. She isn’t there to be a outlit for your libedo and is not your sex toy to take out when your hormones are inflamed. The same people who are constantly talking about how wives should be open 24/7 for their husband are the same ones decrying how perverse the culture, LGBT +, and women wearing pants are. They think that by throwing the term ‘Martial Debt’ it makes their theology sound holy, especially if you say it was endorsed by St. Thomas Aquinas. It doesn’t change the fact it has become an excuse for your lust. A saintly pope weighs in on this thought.
Such a reduction does indeed make the person (in this case, the woman) become for the other person (for the man) above all the object of the potential satisfaction of one’s own sexual “need”. Thus this reciprocal “for” is distorted, which loses its character of communion of persons in favor of the utilitarian function. The man who “looks” in this way, as Mt 5:27-28 writes, “uses” the woman, her femininity, to satisfy his own “instinct”. Although he does not do it with an external act, he has already assumed this attitude inside, thus deciding internally regarding a certain woman. This is precisely what adultery “committed in the heart” consists of. This adultery “in the heart” can also be committed by a man in relation to his own wife if he treats her only as an object of instinct satisfaction.
8 October 1980 | John Paul II (vatican.va)
About Those Romantic Feelings.
You can’t always control when feelings come or go. Sometimes you can’t fan them into a passionate flame. They are unreliable as a foundation to build a relationship on as you can continue a relationship that you made a firm commitment to with a vow in front of God and family, despite the fact that you don’t feel like it sometimes. You can love and treat another person, especially your spouse, lovingly because love is a decision and a choice.
“My wife and I just don’t have the same feelings for each other we used to have. I guess I just don’t love her anymore and she doesn’t love me. What can i do?”
“The feeling isn’t there anymore?” I asked.
“That’s right,” he reaffirmed. “And we have three children we’re really concerned about. What do you suggest?”
“Love her,” I replied.
“I told you, the feeling just isn’t there anymore.”
“Love her.”
“You don’t understand. The feeling of love just isn’t there.”
“Then love her. If the feeling isn’t there, that’s a good reason to love her.”
“But how do you love when you don’t love?”
“My friend , love is a verb. Love – the feeling – is a fruit of love, the verb. So love her. Serve her. Sacrifice. Listen to her. Empathize. Appreciate. Affirm her. Are you willing to do that?”
― The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change
One of the best examples I’ve seen of this in action is when a spouse comes to visit their significant other in the memory care unit at the nursing home. Although their wife or husband has lost their memory and can no longer perform even the basic requirements of the marriage vows anymore, the faithful partner still loves and cares for their beloved in their sickness. That is love beyond feelings.
Religious Foundation
When I gave this advice to my young friends at my job, I had to tell them that the secret to a lifelong marriage was to get saved in Christ, repent of all your sinful ways and put him as the foundation for your romantic relationship.
But seriously…
As important as it is to have Christ as a firm foundation for your marriage, I didn’t emphasise it to those who don’t already believe in the truth, beauty, and goodness of the Christian faith. For me it was important to have my until death do us part life partner to be on the same page as me spiritually. It was the most important but not the only consideration for me marrying a certain person. But similar religious faith doesn’t always equal a lifelong marriage.
There are devout good Christian people I know who were married in Christ and in a church who are now divorced. My wife has relatives who have been married for years who don’t go to church. My mother was Methodist and my father was Catholic and they were married from 1959 until my father’s death in 2003. My mother never remarried and had my dad’s picture out where she and everyone else could see it. Being on the same page religiously doesn’t automatically equal marriage for life. But here is what I discovered that has worked for me and I trust it will work and has worked for others.
Marriage Foundation
In September 2023, it will mark 30 years since I first meet Kristin at Fitchburg State College. We dated in the beginning, and broke up so that she could be a nun. But that wasn’t meant to be. We did date on and off over the years. But one thing remained constant and consistent. We were always friends. If we were dating and kissing a lot we were friends who enjoyed being around one another, not just kissing. When we weren’t dating we still got together and did stuff together without kissing. I ‘ve detailed our road to marriage elsewhere.
Reflections on 11 Years of Marriage
Welcome 12 Years of Marriage in 2022
13 Years Married/30 Years Friends
Our relationship has lasted because we each picked..
- Someone we enjoyed being around.
- Someone we loved talking to.
- Someone we could laugh with.
- Someone who had the same goals.
- Someone we wanted to come home to.
- Someone we had built memories with over a period of time.
- Someone we wanted to keep making memories with.
- Someone we were dedicated to serving.
- Some we loved unconditionally.
When there are no romantic feelings you still have friendship.
When you can’t have sex or can’t be physically intimate you still have friendship.
When you don’t feel all gooey inside when you see your beloved, you still have friendship.
In marriage you have a committed on-fire friendship that is sealed with a commited vow.
From my experience that is what makes a good foundation for a marriage.
I call my Kris on my lunch break at work and on my 20 minute drive home.
I still look forward to seeing her at the end of the day.
Our friendship level has not changed.
Obey Your Husband
I think this is an important issue that should be addressed before you depart this article. No person I think has given a better explanation one of the most misunderstood and controversial biblical passages in Christendom. Fr. Mike Schmitz gives a reasonable, pastoral, biblically sound approach to this contested topic. There are some Christians who will automatically oppose his approach cause it doesn’t make the man the alpha domineering king he thinks God has appointed him to be. These guys like to emphasize that there the boss. For example one guy on Twitter said this about women critiquing men who critique men being the boss.
I tell you what if my Christian wife was on Twitter saying stuff like this I’d probably need to take her phone. Don’t give So and So a platform? What kind of anti-Christian agenda do you have going on here? (Tweet slightly modified)
But those who are a regular normal level headed type of Christians should recognize the sanity of what Fr. Mike says.
In Conclusion
When You Marry, Marry Your Best Friend.
They will be with you from beginning to end.
Ups and Downs and All-Arounds
Love knows no bounds.
You light up my life with a beautiful spark.
I love you forever
Want to leave you never.
-Kristin Wilson
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