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Why Great Sex Won’t Fix a Broken Relationship (and Vice Versa) · Doing Marriage Well

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  Doing Marriage Well for May 29, 2026 Why Great Sex Won't Fit a Broken Relationship
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  And Vice Versa I don't recall where I came across this quote.
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  You Mustn't Force Sex to Do the Work of Love or Love to Do the Work of Sex by
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  Mary McCarthy It's simple, brilliant, and oh so true.
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  And those who try to help married couples run into folks doing this wrong all the time.
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  Sex is great. I think God intended a married couple to have sex regularly.
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  And I know a healthy sex life helps a couple feel
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  closer and can smooth out some bumps in the marriage But
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  no amount of sex will solve relationship issues or make
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  them not matter You can possibly give a young man
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  so much sex he will give you a pass on relationship issues for a time But that
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  won't last forever The reverse is also true Your marriage can't be loving or
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  supportive enough to make sex unnecessary or make it okay that you're not having
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  it A person who has sublimated their sexuality might think that should be possible but it's not.
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  Very, very few men would be okay with a sexless marriage, and not a lot of women
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  would be okay with it either.
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  Good sex and a good relationship are related, but they are two different things
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  which are both needed for a healthy marriage.
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  When a couple has problems, each may focus on the aspect they see as most important,
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  one wanting to work on the relationship while the other wants to work on sex.
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  And that disagreement just makes things worse.
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  You can't have a truly good sex life with a poor relationship,
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  and you can't have a great relationship with a poor sex life. So what do you do?
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  In our experience, you find a way to have a functional sex life that might look
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  like intercourse once a week and something else when wanted by at least one spouse.
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  Nothing fancy, just basic sex. With that done, you dig into the relationship
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  and work hard to make it strong and healthy.
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  Often, making the relationship good will improve sex without any effort.
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  When this is not the case, you work on sex again after the relationship is solid.
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  If you and your wife are at cross-purposes on your relationship and sex life,
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  have a discussion about this way of dealing with both.
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  This is Paul, and doing both marriage and sex well can be a bit of a dance.
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  P.S. Widget does what the dog in the image is doing all the time.