Among couples that come in to counseling with relationship problems, the most common complaint about intimacy is: “We're just too busy for sex.” This is especially true when the husband and wife are both working full time jobs. Add to that schedule a family of children to take care of, and it is quite understandable that their lives are very busy to include regular intimacy. But is a busy schedule the real reasons why these couples are lacking intimacy?

In dealing with couples for years now, I have talked with hundreds of men and women who will spend everyday planning their dinner or their wardrobe, get in their television shows each night, get to the gym three times per week, etc. but thinking nothing of putting a priority on planning and engaging intimacy with their partners. In terms of priorities, sex seems to usually come last, far behind all of the above typical schedule. These couples have literally schedule intimacy right out of their lives. Are you one of them?

For most of us, being “too busy” in our lives is simply another subtle way we avoid sex, another way we turn ourselves off without honestly confronting what it is we are doing. We say, “Can't you see all of the things that I have to do everyday? I have PTA meetings, work, grocery shopping, house cleaning, and errands to run.” By missing the time for intimacy, we never have to face the anxieties or the resentments which are actually the real reasons why we haven't made love for weeks or even months on end.

There was one middle-aged women who was literally in tears at her counseling session when she said to me, “Each night we I go to bed and see my husband's back lying there next to me, all that I can think about is: It's been over 8 weeks since we made love!” But as our conversation went much further, she admitted that she went to yoga classes up to four times per week and jogged for an hour at an additional three days per week, all the while her husband was at home, alone. Soon enough she was admitting to me (and to herself) that she was ashamed of weight that she had put on her body and that she wasn't going to feel sexual until her body was in the shape that she wanted it to be.

As you can see, the problem was not totally the fault of her husband. In fact, she was creating her own reality of not making love, because she was insecure about herself. And while this wasn't easy for her to admit the whole time, she was able to feel safe by blaming her husband for the lack of intimacy. The sooner that we truly become honest with ourselves and work outward from the inside, the sooner that our intimacy problems can be addressed.


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