Battle in the Bedroom: The 4 Stages of Intimacy and Marriage

By D. L. Crager and Shelly Crager

"He wants sex all the time, and she is rarely in the mood. This is the greatest clash between the sexes known to mankind!"

We've all heard the phrase "the honeymoon is over". Many marriages take a dramatic turn for the worse after having children, bringing an abrupt end to the honeymoon bliss. Feelings of confusion, disapp

• Language: English
• Publisher: Trilogy Christian Publishing
• Release date: May 25, 2023
• ISBN: 9798887385112

D. L. Crager

D.L. Crager is one of those few people that has vision to tell a story with memorable grandeur and excitement that will take you into another world. Living a lifetime in the magnificent Rocky Mountains, D.L. naturally writes from an extraordinary perspective. Having written many books, he is also a successful businessman and has been happily married for over thirty-five years.

Book preview

Chapter 1

Help!

Did the title of this book painfully catch your attention? Is sex the constant topic of your nightly conversations or, more accurately, arguments that have repeated themselves over and over for months, years, or possibly decades?

Maybe you’re newlyweds and your expectations were completely polar opposite of what would go on in the bedroom, and it has surprisingly blindsided you both, never thinking you would be fighting over sex.

Possibly, your sex life is great and you have never had a disagreement or fight over sex, and you’re curious about how and why couples do such a thing. If this is you, more than likely, you have not yet had children. Can we get an amen here people—you know we’re right!

Maybe your parents or church, in a skewed manner, tried to persuade you not to have sex when you were young, and talked about it as though sex is taboo and sinful. Subsequently, this mindset has carried into your marriage and you rarely have sex because it’s not supposed to be important, or enjoyable for that matter. But in turn, you feel like you’re living in a confined tunnel restricting your marriage as though you’re always trying to expand your lungs for air to have life in your relationship with your spouse. You know you’re missing something great that is a true blessed gift from God, meant to strengthen your marriage, but you just cannot make sense of this part of your relationship.

Perhaps you were coached in a healthy manner about sex (emotionally and physically) and have followed the instruction manual in detail. Good for you…but you need to keep reading, because we can almost guarantee a fight is coming. When it does, it’s not going to be pretty and you’re going to think the world has come to an end, and your marriage is over. Welcome to the real world of marital relationships and being human; imperfect, needy and selfish at heart.

We need to preface before going on that not every man, woman, or marriage is the exact same. We will be talking and explaining about things and how they are for the majority, per marriages and genders. There will obviously be variances within relationships and individuals. As you read, be flexible and make the appropriate adjustments. It doesn’t mean you’re broken; it means God created you perfectly and uniquely for who you are and He loves that in you.

Examples; The wife might be more interested in sex than her husband. The husband might watch the kids as the wife works outside the home. The husband might be more compassionate or nurturing than his wife, and so forth. For the majority, generally it’s the opposite in these scenarios as well as many others.

No matter where you are in life and with your spouse on the topic of sex, let’s first put your mind and heart at ease. God talks about sex all the time in the Bible (He even has a whole book Song of Songs, or Song of Solomon, about intimacy), because He created us purposely to have intimate relations. Not only to procreate, but for it to be a major factor that can continually bring two (spouses) together, forming a bonding oneness for a healthier and long-lasting marriage.

Don’t worry, this is not a dirty or inappropriate book. Our mission in writing this book is to help explain this beautiful and fantastic gift God gave us and the important roles each spouse has for a continuous growing pattern of oneness for a balanced, joyful, and content relationship.

"Without consistent intimacy,

two separate lives will be lived,

not a oneness in marriage!"

Unfortunately, a majority of marriages are weak, stagnant, unfulfilling, lacking key bonding and/or growing components, and sadly crumbling everywhere over what is meant to be an awesome blessing from God.

Because we live in a broken (imperfect) world, many times we end up:

Being selfish and hyper-focused on what our needs are (not theirs)

Having too high, unrealistic, or distorted expectations of each other

Believing what our twisted and perverse society tells us we need to be happy, instead of believing the Truth

He wants sex all the time, and she is rarely in the mood. This is the greatest clash between the sexes known to mankind!

In public and around family and friends, this conversation about men always want it and women are rarely in the mood is contagious and humorous because most couples in reality have, or are, personally experiencing it all the time. You know this is true, but what is not funny and is hidden behind the masks you and your friends wear to hide this embarrassing truth are very sad, hurting, and/or angry people.

There is nothing funny about this topic of arguing over sex because at the end of the day, it is probably the greatest, most painful reason for relational destruction and the high divorce rates, one way or another.

This topic is not to be taken lightly, because it’s real, too real! It’s killing marriages, causing addictions (pornography, drugs, alcohol), creating affairs, deeply scarring psychologically and emotionally for both men and women, as it is shattering the loving family portrait our children so desperately need for an example of a healthy marriage.

We also wrote this book because the hurdles of fighting over sex have been coming at us at lightning speed for years from friends, co-workers, employees and, sadly, with countless couples in churches. It’s an epic problem that has been historically in all cultures around the world and, as we look through the Bible, for thousands of years. It doesn’t matter who you are; young or old, male or female, rich or poor, employer or employee, Christian or non-Christian. It affects every culture, society, race, and nationality.

We briefly highlighted this topic in our other book, Is Your Life Out of Order?, in which we explain why it is so vital to prioritize the five relationships in our lives.

Sex has, is, and always will be, an issue because of the natural basic instinct, interest, and overwhelming and powerful drive, primarily in men, to be sexually fulfilled and satisfied constantly.

Sex is only one piece of the big puzzle of marriage but easily gets grossly inflated and out of shape to the point it overshadows all the other important pieces of life in a marriage: affection, compassion, companionship, communication, feelings, relationships, romance, time, love, and so forth. These are all natural basic instincts, interests, and overwhelming desires, primarily in women to be emotionally fulfilled and satisfied constantly.

These two different worlds of emotion and sex—the inside of a woman and the outside of a man—continually compete with one another, but at the same time are always trying to become one and play nice with each other and live in harmony.

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As a wife, you respond, "Come on Mr. and Mrs. Crager, we know this; you’re avoiding our problem! Why does my husband always want sex and is never satisfied? If he had it his way, he would get it every day. Then, he wants us to do all these wild things to spice up our sex life because to him it’s not exciting between us anymore. There is no way I can ever reach his expectations, and you’re right, I am rarely in the mood. I’m always tired at the end of the day and, frankly, sex is the furthest thing from my mind, and I just want to get some sleep. How come everything for him leads to sex? I wish we could go back to when we first fell in love. He was so romantic and cared for me as a woman. Now, I truly believe all he wants out of our marriage is my body. God sure played a big joke on us when it came to sex."

As a husband, you respond, Don’t start boring me with intellectual, emotional, and relational feelings stuff—let’s get down to what’s important, the physical issue. What do we need to do to get my wife in the mood? All I ever ask from her is just a few minutes out of the day so I can make love to her. But she always says she doesn’t feel like it, or puts me on a guilt trip as though she has to rearrange her whole day or night for me. She spends countless hours all day with our kids, other people and constantly goes through her social media on her phone. I’m just asking for a few minutes to be with her, my wife, that I love, that’s all. To be honest, I don’t believe she desires me anymore, even though she says she loves me. Perhaps I’m bad in bed for her and she’s got another man in her life? Maybe it’s finally time to make up my mind and end this marriage so I can find someone else who will accept that I’m a normal man with normal needs. This is how God made me, right?

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