His Needs, Her Needs: Building an Affair-Proof Marriage

by Willard F. Harley Jr.

Hug and kiss me every morning while we’re still in bed. Talk with me and tell me that you care about me while we’re having breakfast together. Hug and kiss me before you leave for work. Call me during the day to see how I’m doing and to tell me you care about me. After work, call me before you leave for home, so that I can know when to expect you. When you arrive home from work, give me a hug and kiss and spend a few minutes talking to me about how my day went (I’ll talk to you about how your day went too). Help me with the dishes after dinner. Hug and kiss me for at least five minutes when we go to bed at night and tell me that you care about me. Bring me flowers once in a while as a surprise (be sure to include a card that expresses your care for me). Remember my birthday, our anniversary, Christmas, Mother’s Day, and Valentine’s Day. Give me a card and gift that is sentimental, not practical. Learn how to shop for

Affection is the communication of care, while admiration is the communication of appreciation, value, and respect.

kissing her to the five-minute hug before they went to sleep at night,

knowing what your spouse needs does not meet the need. You must learn new habits that transform that knowledge into action. Then and only then is that need met.

To Consider Together

Sexual Drive

Sexual Awareness

man cannot achieve sexual fulfillment in his marriage unless his wife is sexually fulfilled as well. While I have maintained that men need sex more than women, unless a woman joins her husband in the sexual experience, his need for sex remains unmet. Therefore a woman does her husband no favors by sacrificing her body to his sexual advances. He can feel sexually satisfied only when she joins him in the experience of lovemaking.

Sexual Motivation

“Why should we make love?”

making love relieves his sexual craving. But

will say that sex helps her feel closer to her husband. For her, it is all about intim...

How to Achieve Sexual Compatibility Let’s review once more the three important differences between men and women when it comes to sex: Sexual drive. The abundance of the aphrodisiac hormone, testosterone, in men and relative lack of it in women gives men a much greater craving for sex. Sexual awareness. Boys tend to explore their sexuality earlier and more often than girls. By the time they marry, they usually have a better understanding of how to have a fulfilling sexual experience. Sexual motivation. With a much higher sex drive, the primary reason men have sex is to relieve their craving. For women, the primary reason is intimacy and emotional bonding.

The sexual experience divides into five stages: willingness, arousal, plateau,

climax, and recovery.

Willingness—How It All Starts

But women are willing to have sex when their husband offers it only if they feel emotionally close to him.

The reason most women are willing to have sex with their husband is that they want to express their love for him in this way. But they don’t like to call it sex. They consider it “making love.” They want to extend their affection, which is the expression of their care, into lovemaking. That’s the reason affection is the environment that makes the event of sex attractive to most

most cases, an environment of affection and anticipation of a mutually enjoyable sexual experience result in her willingness to make love to him whenever he has a sexual desire.

Arousal usually doesn’t take place unless there is a deliberate

decision to let it happen.

If a woman is willing to make love, she will encourage her husband to touch her ...

When intercourse begins, a woman needs to sustain strong stimulation to her clitoris and vaginal opening. A woman learns to create this more intensive stimulation by (1) contracting her pubococcygeus (PCG) muscle (it is the muscle used to stop urine flow), which tightens the vagina on the inserted penis; (2) thrusting her pelvis rapidly; (3) and assuming a position that increases pressure on the clitoris and resistance to the penis in the vaginal opening. The shorter the distance between a woman’s clitoris and the tip of her vaginal opening, the easier it is for her to be sexually stimulated by intercourse. A distance less than one-half inch generally makes stimulation almost effortless, while a distance of more than one inch can be challenging. But those with a clitoris-vagina distance greater than one inch can find intercourse to be a very satisfying sexual experience if they experiment with various positions until they find one that works for them.

It’s a bonding experience, especially for most women. So spouses should kiss each other, hug each other, and look at each other.

If the way you have sex prevents you from being affectionate, your wife is less

Plateau—the Best Stage of Lovemaking

foundational to a good marriage: affection for her and sex for him.

While probably more in touch with their own sexuality because it is such a basic male drive, many men lack skill in lovemaking because they fail to understand a woman’s need for affection as part of the sexual process. When a man learns to be affectionate, his lovemaking will become very different. The man interested only in satisfying his hunger for sex molests his wife more than anything else, because his technique is insensitive to her feelings. He uses his wife’s body for his own pleasure, while she gets more and more infuriated. Conversely, many women don’t understand their own sexuality well enough to know how to enjoy meeting a husband’s compelling need for sex. To satisfy her husband sexually, a wife must also feel satisfied. I try to encourage wives not only to make their bodies available to their husband on a more regular basis but also to commit themselves to learning to enjoy the sex relationship as much as their husband does.

Golden Rule For the wife to enjoy sex, she will need help from her husband. If he does not communicate his care for her often and effectively, she will feel that he is insensitive and uncaring. This principle of reciprocity is applied throughout this book. You can’t enjoy your end of a marriage if your spouse doesn’t enjoy his or her end. If you care about your spouse, you don’t use or deny your spouse out of selfishness or ignorance. Almost all cultures and ages

a woman is aroused by her husband’s affection, attentiveness, warmth, kindness, and tender sensitivity.

The Second Thing She Can’t Do Without—Intimate Conversation

It Takes Time to Talk

who maintained their love for each other scheduled time to be together almost every day.

set aside at least fifteen hours a week for undivided attention, where one of the primary purposes is to engage in intimate conversation.

wives have encouraged me to stick to my fifteen-hour minimum for undivided attention. They know it’s necessary for a healthy marriage.

The Importance of Conversation

But there are three that I believe are especially important.

First, conversation is an integral

part of how all of the other important emotional needs are met. As I’ve already mentioned, the expression of affection is generally verbal, and sexual adjustment requires deep and sensitive communication. But consider for a moment the other emotional needs we will be discussing: recreational companionship, honesty and openness, physical attractiveness, financial support, domestic support, family commitment, and admirat...

second reason conversation is important in marriage is that it’s necessary for ...

and conflict resolution. Marriage is a partnership that requires mutual agreement on a host of issues if it’s to be successful. Conflicts over friends and relatives, financial planning, time management, child discipline, and many other common problems can be resolved only if couples are skilled in talking to each other. The more enjoyable an...

the third reason that conversation

important in marriage isn’t understood as well by most men. We’ve already been discussing it in this chapter. Conversation itself is important

The first emotional need met in most affairs is intimate conversation.

The Enemies of Intimate Conversation

Making Demands

Being Disrespectful

Regardless of how you feel, don’t say anything that’s disrespectful.

Enemy #3: Expressing Anger

But expressions of anger are always intended to be hurtful. So when spouses are angry with each other, they should say absolutely nothing until they’ve had a chance to cool off, because whatever they say will be abusive—and insane. Yes, insane. Take it from me, a clinical psychologist, when people are angry, they are experiencing temporary insanity and should say nothing until their anger subsides.