Will You Take a Long-Term View on Overcoming Sexual Struggles?

We are a bit spoiled in the way technology gives us instant results.

With a  powerful computer in the palm of our hands at all times, not to mention similar technology sitting on our desks and in our cars, we can have insight, information and often resolution to a host of problems or questions in a matter of seconds or minutes.

It’s hard to even remember what it was like to not know something and not be able to immediately find the answer. 

Hey, who sang that song that was so popular our senior year of high school?

What’s the capital of Saskatchewan?

How long will it take me to drive from here to Ocala, Florida?

Who was John Lennon’s first wife?

What time is it in London?

Is that taco restaurant down on Pacific Street open right now?

Where can I get a throttle cable for my 2008 Briggs and Stratton lawnmower?

You get the idea. If you wanted to know the answers to any of the above, you could find out in mere seconds. It’s kind of mindblowing if you think about it.

I’m old enough to recall an era when if you didn’t know who sang a particular song, you actually called the radio station to find out. I. Kid. You. Not.

Sure, it’s fabulous in so many regards that we have so much quick access to information and answers. But the downside is it has created this unrealistic expectation we can resolve everything quickly. We are conditioned to know something now, and we get antsy and irritated when we perceive something is “taking too long.”

We are, after all, people who get annoyed if the little indicator bar on our software update tells us there are a whole 18 minutes left. 18 minutes. We feel like we’re going to go mad in that time!

The reality, though, is some problems—especially big problems—can’t be solved in seconds or minutes. Sometimes they can’t even be solved in days or weeks.

I hear from so many individuals and couples whose marriages are a tattered mess of loose ends, unresolved conflicts, and longstanding poor communication. If a couple has sexual struggles, rarely did such struggles show up on the scene overnight. Those struggles brewed and intensified and laid down roots for quite some time. They often became more convoluted as time went by, leaving in their wake a wide chasm of distrust, discontent and discouragement.

And there’s no way to fix all of that by opening up an app or attending a few counseling sessions or reading one book together or going to a weekend retreat.

If you have sexual struggles in your marriage, are you taking a long-term view on overcoming them?

Are the two of you in it for the long haul?

Are you willing to give it more than a few weeks to heal the pain and struggle?

Are you willing to devote months and maybe even years to finding your way back to each other sexually?

These are hard things. I know. But if you really want your marriage sexually whole again, don’t shy away from the truth that it’s probably going to take the two of you awhile to get there. And it’s likely going to take a tremendous amount of heart effort.

You’ll have to resist the urge to look for the easy fix or the instant gratification. It’s going to be a lot of two steps forward, one step back. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat.

Restoring sexual oneness in your marriage—or maybe building it for the first time—after longstanding sexual struggles can’t be done instantly. But it can be done if the two of you will commit to a long-term view and the necessary effort to restore what is broken.

Will you make that commitment?

Copyright 2020, Julie Sibert. Intimacy in Marriage Blog. Links may be monetized.

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