The essential characteristic of marriage love is its condition of total delivery of life, to constitute a community of people who give each other security, pleasure, company, comfort, and support. That's why the kind of intimacy that this delivery establishes includes the free and joyful donation of our bodies through the intimacy sexual, but it is not confined only to her. What's more, the degree of complementarity and the benefits of sexuality has to do with the degree of intimacy that the couple has achieved in the different aspects of their life. That is, with the degree of communication, of trust, of respect, of delicate treatment and with solidarity and mutual support in their daily coexistence.

One can say that, except for the limitations that sometimes disease or a biological dysfunction can bring to the sex life, the vast majority of the problems faced by the couples in the bed, has to do with their intimacy in the daily life. For example, it is very difficult for the wife to feel attracted and willing to give all of herself at night, to a husband who during the day has done nothing but criticize or offend her, or who saw her tired and did not give her a hand in the chores of the house.

Most of the problems that couples face in bed have to do with their intimacy or treatment in everyday life

To improve the level of intimacy, a couple must, therefore, take into account, at least the following:

Intimacy implies acceptance: we accept our spouse when we make he she feel that, even knowing his her shortcomings and limitations, both of character and physical, she or he, is the most important person in our lives and therefore can always count on us. This we demonstrate through the attention with which we listen, through the words of consolation that we give, through the interest and concern we express to know how the other person feels, and by the way, even when we manifest our disagreements, we do it without judging the intentions of the other.

Intimacy implies trust: trust is not something that can be demanded but a reality that is born spontaneously between two who feel accepted. But trust can be cultivated. To do this, it is necessary to start from an act of fundamental faith: to believe that at no time the other has the explicit intention of offending or harming us. This attitude of trust in the good intentions of the other and its fundamental kindness is decisive for an open dialogue between the couples, both at the level of differences of opinion or modes of action and on the preferences that we have on an intimate level.

Lack of confidence can instead hinder all levels of communication both emotional and bodily. I know for example couples who feel very uncomfortable in intimacy because their spouse has bad breath and is sorry to tell them. This has led her to develop a great reluctance and annoyance for sexuality and her husband does not know what happens and thinks they do not want.

Thanks to the confidence couples should be able to say which caress they like more and which instead do not like or satisfy them. In short, trust creates the complicity and friendship that is required between two good lovers and makes them companions forever.

That confidence must be able to give the couple the freedom both to suggest having a relationship like being able to refuse it because it does not feel like doing it, without this leads the other to think that they are rejecting it or that they do not love it.

And when, over the years, sexual intimacy is not the one that prime, confidence can keep in the couple the degree of unity through which it is experienced that there are no secrets between the two; that with the spouse you can address even the most difficult issues as feelings about the relationship with your family, or the problems of work, even our dilemmas of conscience.

Intimacy means tenderness. Tenderness is composed of gestures or generous words with which a person cares not only the body but also the soul of the other person. I mean, it's those stares of admiration, that wink of an eye that raises our spouse's spirits; they are the flowers with which we want to tell someone: "today I thought especially of you"; it is the embrace of comfort or companionship with which we receive our partner after a day of work. They can also be the "compliments" or phrases of flattery that, although time passes and the mirror let us see the deterioration, make our partner feel that we continue admiring and loving. In short, the power of tenderness is such that we can say that it is the greatest and best aphrodisiac, not only because it motivates the caresses, but because it keeps the couple in love.

For all this, it is clear that "making love" is much more than going to bed. Is to develop in all aspects of the communication and coexistence the possibilities of delivery and intimacy of which God has made us capable, and that with his grace we can always improve.

More on this topic can be seen in Alba Liliana Jaramillo, The solutions you are looking for/in the sexual. Readings that can help: Zig Ziglar, How to make romance not die with marriage. Ed. Norma, 1991; Hendrix Harville Friends and Lovers: the ideal couple relationship. Editorial Norma 1991.