To understand how not to kill the mood, let’s first consider the more effective ways to kill it as witnessed through the lens of marriage counseling.
Being demanding—a spouse who is sullen and/or grouchy pressuring the other to have sex more often is probably the fastest and most effective way to kill the mood for the other spouse. If your goal is to have more enjoyable sex and more often, this approach will fail you. Even if you can initially convince your spouse to try harder to make you happy with this approach, expect powerful negative repercussions to cause damage to the intimacy you share in the longer term.
Being critical—negativity spoken about your spouse’s physique, technique, or personality during intimate times is also effective at killing the mood. These discussions truly may need to be had for the sake of a good marriage; however, better to be gentle and cautious in order to protect this sensitive and vulnerable connection you share. Also recommended is choosing a time and place separate from the marriage-bed for these discussions.
A quick word about sex addiction is appropriate for this post. It’s one thing if both spouses are agreeing that they want to engage in fantasies, role-playing, and/or porn viewing together. If they’re not hurting themselves, the marriage, or breaking any laws, then OK. It’s entirely different if one spouse is engaging in these things and the other doesn’t like it. This can be damaging to the marriage. Notice if the behavior is excessive or increasing in frequency or the need for more sensationalism to the point of interfering with the quality of that spouse’s life and/or the marriage. It’s at this point that seeking the services of a counselor specializing in sex addiction is recommended.
Even if you’re noticing problems in any of these areas, be encouraged to know that there is help for repairing the damage through marriage counseling. My approach is described on my website: www.BalancedLifeInfo.com on the Strategic Marriage Counseling page.
