Dear girls, A few weeks ago I started a conversation about the reasons women no longer want sex. Then, as woman-talk so often does, we got sidetracked. Off on the bunny trail of why I am still in love with my husband after thirty-five years and that secret key for stressed out mamas and other women who work too hard.
So today we circle back to those 3 Reasons I hear over and over again from women who finally admit that they’re really not all that enthusiastic about initiating and welcoming intimacy with their husbands.
And for those of you who are not yet married, please pay attention! These are obstacles every woman faces at some point in real life. Decide now that you’re going to overcome those glitches because you place imminent value on a healthy sexual relationship with that man who trusts you to meet his needs.
The first reason for no longer loving sex had to do with disappointment in your lover’s romantic efforts. I urged you to remember that he is not your Prince Charming.
Your husband cannot and will not fulfill that gaping hole of need every woman feels.
And gracefully loving him even when he falls short of your ideal is just the way Jesus loves us. It’s not too great a jump to conclude that…
Choosing to pour sexual love on your husband is an act of grateful, grace-filled response to your Redeemer’s tender love towards you.
The second reason we talked about has to do with circumstances. Overwhelming fatigue, pressure, the realities of too little sleep and not enough space to breath. Pregnancies and nursing babies and teenagers right down the hall who seem to have sonic ears— not exactly how blockbuster movies portray passion.
That’s when commitment comes in. A woman’s commitment to care about her husband and care for herself even when it’s not easy. The comments and ideas that came in for this post were filled with practical wisdom and delightful dashes of humor.
Today, I want to finish this conversation by talking about the third reason women don't want sex:
“Your body isn’t beautiful like the airbrushed, half starved, breast enhanced women in the movies. You’re so intent on hiding the parts you don’t want him to see that you fail to recognize your own inherent sensuality… You don’t want him to see you unclothed because you’ve lost the freedom your beauty brings. The naked and unashamed of the Garden is long gone.”
Beauty. It all comes back to this, doesn’t it?
In order to feel sexual, we need to feel beautiful.
We know that men respond to a woman’s beauty. But do we fully realize how much a woman responds to a man’s response?
As the wife of a pastor, I’ve had a front row seat to a lot of weddings. During the engagement the bride-to-be gets more and more beautiful. She stops biting her nails in order to show off her ring. Starts an intense exercise program in order to fit into her wedding gown. Goes and gets her make-up done and her hair-style updated. Everything for the Wedding Day.
And indeed, on that day, she is absolutely beautiful. Always.
But my favorite thing to watch is when she comes home from her honeymoon. That’s when her beauty blossoms. No amount of make-up or money can give anyone that slightly seductive swagger a newly married woman carries off. She wears a certain sort of grin just won’t go away. Kind of a cat-got-the-mouse look, and with a swish of her tail she let’s all the world know that she’s lovely. Beautiful.
Why? Because that young bride is responding to the response of her enthralled husband. He saw her as she is and he loved what he saw and she knows it! She feels beautiful because she sees her beauty in her husband’s eyes.
And that, my dear girls, is exactly what each of us needs to recapture if we’re going to fully respond to our husbands. We have got to see our beauty from his eyes.
Don’t judge your beauty by what you see in the mirror. The mirror is not the truth. In the mirror you see only your flaws, not your beauty.
Don’t judge your beauty by the magazines or movies. Those pictures are not the truth. They’re airbrushed and positioned and faking reality. No one looks like that in real life.
Don’t judge your beauty by others. You risk insulting the One who made you by wishing He’d done it different. Psalm 139 says He “formed you in your mother’s womb” and He likes the form He made.
But, you say, I’m not a beauty. I’m plain or plump or flat-chested. My skin is bad, my hair is limp, my eyes are droopy, my legs unshapely. You’re not being modest, you’re being honest. Shouldn’t you just settle for the truth as you see it and ignore beauty? After all, there’s more to being a woman than being beautiful, right?
Here’s the problem with that way of thinking: You and I need to feel beautiful in order to act sexual.
Ugliness and sensuality just don’t work for us. No amount of reasoning about how smart we are or how much we’ve accomplished is going to compel us to actively seduce our waiting husbands. That’s just not the way a woman is wired.
So what to do?
1. Decide in your mind that God made you beautiful. Elohim, the creator-God crafted you uniquely. He is not bound by time or culture. He is undeterred by what color hair or skin or shape of figure is currently in vogue. He is able to see the way He made you as a reflection of His own creativity. His beauty.
In order to think right, we have got to come to an intelligent agreement with God about how He made us. Our minds inform our emotions. When I decide with my mind that God made me beautiful, I begin to feel beautiful.
2. Uncover the beauty God made in you. Sometimes we have got to peel off layers of ugliness we have allowed to coat our real selves. Unhealthy lifestyles disguise our beauty under the consequences of overeating and under-exercising. Time to get out the Nike’s and breathe in fresh air.
Most often uncovering our own beauty just means we need to pay attention to our good parts. I once read an interview of make-up maven Bobbi Brown that fascinated me. She has made a fortune on women who don’t like the way they look. Her personal philosophy? Stop trying to cover the parts you don’t like and simply enhance your best features.
3. See yourself through your husband’s craving. Your husband needs to see you. He is not looking for perfection, hasn’t noticed those sunspots or saggy breasts. What he needs from you are glimpses of inviting beauty. Uncover just enough to give him what he needs, then allow yourself to respond to his response.
God made a point of the unashamed nakedness of the first married couple. He noted their ease with each other, their lack of hiding. Sin changed their perspective. Satan is the one who turned Eve’s eyes away from Adam’s response and onto her inadequacies.
It’s time we take back our beauty and own it, girls! It’s time we recapture that sensual swagger that somehow got lost by the lies we’ve come to believe.
It’s time to be beautiful.
From my heart,
Diane
PS: Can you tell us about your honeymoon? Did you see that delight in his eyes and feel more beautiful than you'd ever thought possible? Dare you show more of yourself now that your body no longer lives up to those pre-wedding-work-out expectations?
And for those of you whose husbands did not make you feel like the most alluring woman in the world , can I just say I am so sorry. There are men who inadvertently hurt their wives by what they don't say... it might be time to sit down and share your heart with him, letting him know how much you need to feel beautiful in order to respond beautifully.