Meet Karen and Peter. The alarm went and Karen dragged herself from bed. “Is it time to get up already? How can I sleep a whole night and still feel so tired?”

She looked across the bed to Peter. He still snored soundly. As he lay there exposed, she felt nothing. After 16 years of marriage, how things had changed! The years had been less kind to him, with an increasing waistline and receding hairline. Karen felt unaroused but, more disturbingly, she felt a distance. Somehow their lives seemed to be going different directions despite them sharing the same family, life and bed. How did it happen?

The children were all now at school but the busyness of life continued to escalate. Each day seemed like a list of responsibilities and chores that had to be accomplished and at night in the bedroom there was one more chore. It wasn’t that she didn’t enjoy making love, but the spontaneity, the passion, the fun, had gone. This, together with the competing demands on her, made her feel resentful.

Peter too, felt the change in their relationship. He loved her just as much as when they were first married, but life was so much more complicated now. Karen was always tired, but he didn’t understand why. The children weren’t babies anymore and Karen was rarely up during the night, yet the children had changed things. He loved them dearly but they distracted Karen’s attention from him.

Admittedly, he had responsibilities that kept him up late or caused him to fall asleep in the chair, but only occasionally. Now, even to suggest making love made him feel guilty and her increasingly negative response made him frustrated. Sex was beginning to cause tension between them.

The Post-Baby Blues: Does Karen and Peter’s situation seem all too familiar? For many couples, the stage after babies can pose new problems in the bedroom. Usually the sleepless nights, hormones and physical discomfort have passed but greater career, family and often church responsibilities make finding time for each other a constant battle.

So is this a problem, or just a part of life that Karen and Peter, and you for that mat­ter, may have to endure? The answer to this question will depend on how important you think sex is to a healthy marriage.

Mike Mason in his book The Mystery of Marriage says:

Sex is a powerful outward symbol of the inner temper of a marital relationship. It is an arresting and self-evi­dent truth that the quality of a marriage in all of its facets depends upon a wholesome and mutually satisfying sex life. And the corollary is also true, that the partners’ feel­ings about the marriage as a whole will almost always be reflected in the quality of their sexual relations.

You may find this hard to swallow and may wish to protest that there is much more to a good marriage than good sex. This is true, but a good marriage usually involves good sex because the intimacy a husband and wife share in sex unites and heals them like no other form of communication.

The act of making love between a man and woman committed to one another in marriage as God intended it to be, is the deepest, most powerful experience between two people. It is not just a physi­cal union but the emotional and spiritual act of becoming “one flesh”.

Breaking through the barriers: If this is the case, then we need to work hard at breaking through the boredom and barriers stopping our sexual relations and, thereby, the intimacy in our marriage deepening. Here are three suggestions:

Maintain your relationship. Sex in a Christian marriage is not an end in itself. It is an expression of the love a couple already feel toward each other. Nor does it take place in a vacuum. The relationship and the sex should encourage each other.

When we feel loved and happy we want to give ourselves passionately to one another and when we give ourselves passionately to one another, we catch a glimpse of how the rest of our relationship could be. As we recall the qualities that initially attracted us to each other, share together the experiences we both enjoy, laugh together and work hard at communicating beyond the superficial, we will want to go to bed earlier and vice versa.

Maintain the romance. Sex blossoms where it is nurtured with romance. We need to communicate our love through word and action. Even when someone knows you love them, it’s nice to be reminded. Even when you don’t have time for sex, it’s nice to have a cuddle with no strings attached. And when you feel tired and frumpy, it’s nice to hear that someone finds you attractive.

Maintain time together. Scheduling time for sex doesn’t make it second rate. At this stage in our busy lives, we need to plan time alone so we can ensure privacy and undi­vided attention. It may mean abandoning spontaneity for a time, but not necessarily abandoning enthusiasm. It may mean bal­ancing each other’s needs and responsibilities and making a time that suits both of you. It will definitely require communication and desire.

Scheduling extended time together without children can be harder but nothing enriches a marriage more than uninterrupt­ed conversation, relaxed enjoyment of one another and time to rediscover the joy of sex. Once a year even, arrange for the child­ren to have a weekend at grandparents or organise a swap with friends so you can enjoy your home alone or some other secluded spot. Take my word for it, it’s well worth the effort.

So where does that leave Karen and Peter? Is there hope for them that things can be different? Yes. Peter is not satisfied with a second-rate marriage and is deter­mined to keep pushing their relationship to be the best it can be. This rekindles in Karen a desire for Peter that she thought was lost. Both Karen and Peter commit themselves to making sex a priority in their marriage. For there, as they lie naked beside each other, acceptance is found, tensions are healed and intimacy is renewed.