Lust For The Long Haul

They began to realize, with Schnarch's guidance, that although they felt estranged from each other, they were in fact completely interdependent. Jack didn't know how to soothe himself when he was feeling anxious. He looked to Tammy, and to sex, for that. For her part, Tammy had no idea how to take care of her own feelings, or even what they were. Nor did she have the energy, because so much went to propping up Jack. In some unconscious way, by avoiding sex with him, she was saying no more.

For their relationship to survive, each needed to take a step back and change how they individually dealt with their own emotions, rather than leaning on—and resenting—the other. Jack had to learn to deal with his neediness on his own, and recognize that he couldn't expect his wife to do it for him. Tammy had to figure out who she was and what she wanted, or live her life without really ever knowing herself—much less getting to be known by anyone else. And she had to speak up when she disagreed, rather than keep quiet in order to not rock the boat.

A year later, Tammy and Jack are utterly honest with each other. No hiding. "Before we would just not talk about any of our problems because we didn't want to get each other upset," Tammy says. Now, she says, they always say what they are thinking or feeling, regardless of the reaction they anticipate. "It can be very uncomfortable," she admits. "And I'm still working on tact." But in their case, she says, it changed everything. Over the course of several months spent learning to be themselves together, Tammy's sex drive returned. They're happier than they've ever been, she says: "We just renewed our vows in Vegas."

How Sex Makes Grown-Ups

Schnarch's way of thinking about the interdependence of sex and intimacy is a big shift from the traditional focus on anxiety as a primary cause of sexual difficulty. Problems in the bedroom are too often seen as distinct from the emotional struggles of marriage and partnership. But Schnarch—and a few other therapists—have developed an alternative view, one that puts partnership at the heart of sexuality and puts both sexuality and intimacy at the center of human development. Sexual difficulties are a kind of emotional Rorschach test that offers a glimpse into not just the dynamics of the relationship, but the continuing agenda of growing into a fully autonomous human being.

Schnarch says that what happens with many troubled couples is analogous to what happens in children as they mature emotionally. A key developmental task of adolescence is to form separate and unique identities from our parents. (That's what the dismissive remarks and the skin piercings are all about.) We assume that by the time we're married, we're past all that. Not true, says Schnarch. We've merely switched our focus from our parents to our spouses. Temporarily, some of us adopt joined-at-the-hip intimacy as an archetype of marriage. But the rebelliousness, the need to separate ourselves, kicks in again. You know it, Schnarch says, when you begin to find yourself more at odds with your partner and less sexually attracted to each other than you used to be.

Or you know it when you engage in something he calls arguing about reality. That is, you both experience an event—a movie, or a remembered moment from your past together. But you see it in entirely different ways, and you can't stop arguing until one of you caves in. Schnarch describes one couple's memories of the birth of their first child. The wife thought it was the closest moment they'd ever shared—but her husband remembered being nauseated by the blood. Their contradictory views of this event became part of a bitter argument that surfaced again and again. Because neither of them would accept the other's point of view, they felt that they were drifting apart. In Schnarch's view, this difference of opinion was normal, not an indication that their relationship was falling apart. They are, after all, two different people.

Schnarch's treatment usually involves intense four-day sessions, and doesn't lend itself to quick tips. All the same, there are basic behavioral shifts that he finds can benefit many unhappy couples. They all involve the same process: Each partner takes responsibility for his or her own emotions and learns to tolerate the idea that his or her partner is not a spiritual twin. That means no longer expecting a partner to validate you—so that he or she can admit that sometimes your ideas are half-baked, rather than always reassuring you that you're right. You examine your own behavior and see what you expect others to do for you that you could be doing on your own—for example, learning to feel good about yourself without requiring someone else's praise and compliments.