It is estimated that more than 20 million marriages in the United States are suffering from a lack of physical intimacy.
Contrary to popular belief, and something rarely talked about, it's often the man who decides to stop being sexual in a committed relationship. wow!
As one 40-year-old woman told us: "You know, it was hard on my ego and self-esteem when he didn't want me sexually, because I didn't grow up knowing there were men out there like that." Of course she didn't. Men are supposed to want sex at the drop of a bra. Well, a lot of them don't.
My husband Bob Berkowitz and I are researching and writing a book about this topic. It's
called When Men Stop Having Sex. And What Women Are Doing About It. It will be published by William Morrow in 2007.
Last week, Bob wrote about why guys say they stopped having sex with their spouses. Now I'm going to tell you what women think the reasons are. (Please remember that our research is ongoing. We have hundreds of survey respondents, and will hopefully have hundreds more, so the statistics I give today may fluctuate a bit in the future.)
The majority of women, more than 60 per cent, believe that their husbands have stopped having sex with them because their husbands are depressed. Depression does lower the libido - and, with a cruelly ironic twist, so do many antidepressants, which can also cause erectile dysfunction. It is therefore not surprising that 40 per cent of our respondents claim that their husbands suffer from ED.
Men with erectile dysfunction, due to medication or for any other reason, will often shut down completely. They are ashamed, and see impotence as the equivalent of failure - of no longer being a whole man. In just a few short decades, men have stopped automatically being the boss at home or at work, something that used to happen just because they were born with a Y chromosome. And erectile dysfunction can be the last, limp, straw - the ultimate threat to an already shaky masculinity.
To most women, it seems extremely odd that with all of the drugs now on the market, 80 per cent of men with ED don't get a prescription. But the guys are so humiliated that they don't even want to tell their doctors.
We heard from one 53-year-old woman whose boyfriend is on medication that
lowered his libido and caused ED. She told us that he stopped having sex with her completely; they have not had sex in over a year. Because of this, he is suggesting that they end the relationship.
He feels that he can't possibly be someone whom she wants to share her life with. It broke my heart to read her comments:
"I feel that men allow their sexual problems to ruin a lot of really good relationships, MEN DO NOT HAVE A CLUE ABOUT WOMEN AND WHAT THEY WANT I want companionship, and if the sex comes naturally, that's great, but if it doesn't, then we can satisfy our needs in other ways. I believe that men think that if intercourse isn't achievable, then it is just no good for the
lady. I want him for the great guy that he is and all that he does for me otherwise."
The main reason men say that they stop having sex with their wives is anger, and women are aware of this. Close to 50 per cent of our female respondents say their husbands are angry, and that's why the men have stopped being intimate.
I got this in an email from a firend of mine. dont know how true the study is..but i am trying to find out now. interesting all the same
ANYCOMMENTS?
