Intimacy in marriage

¶ … marriage and intimacy, and the different ways in which men and women approach these subjects. Styles of love within marriage will be outlined to give way to a more extensive discussion of emotional skills, marital intimacy, marriage stressors, and skills for opening communication, vulnerability, and finally, dealing with infidelity.

Intimacy, as defined by Baumeister and Bushman (2007), is usually thought to be the foundation of all love relationships, and is a feeling of closeness and mutual concern for one another. Robert Sternberg proposed the theory of love and its components in 1986, by using a triangle to map out the two different styles that people love each other (Baumeister, & Bushman, 2007). A relationship has three components: intimacy (a feeling of deep closeness), passion (intense attraction), and commitment (conscious decision to be together), according to Sternberg, relationship's are usually either high on intimacy and passion with low commitment, or high on intimacy and commitment while being low on passion (Baumeister, & Bushman, 2007). Although these three aspects may shift in weight over time in any given relationship, one thing is for certain is that a relationship with high intimacy and commitment will be a communal relationship that is responsive to one another's needs, emotions, and encourages a united marriage (Baumeister, & Bushman, 2007).

The needs of each person within a marriage differ, however everyone's relationship can benefit from effective communication, self-disclosure, appreciation, equality, and emotional skills (Lauer, & Lauer, 2009). Effective communication includes active listening and paying attentions to one's nonverbal communication as well (Lauer, & Lauer, 2009). Self-disclosure is extremely important (for both men and women), to be able to express their emotions, needs, fears, desires, and lifelong goals which serve to enhance intimacy and closeness (Lauer, & Lauer, 2009). Of course, appreciation and equality is very important in a marriage, where each partner can feel appreciated for what they give to the relationship and feel equal in all-important aspects of the marriage, such as decision-making.

Emotion Skills & Intimacy

Emotional skills can be defined in how a person "emotionally enacts" what they feel, i.e. If someone's feeling are hurt how do they express those emotions? (Mirgain, & Cordova, 2007) Some ways a person may express their enactments is by withdrawing, closing up, acting angry, or "self-disclosing." (Mirgain, & Cordova, 2007). Emotional skills are very important to intimacy because, depending on where each person's emotional skills are, the likelihood of getting hurt in a close and vulnerable intimate relationship is huge (Mirgain, & Cordova, 2007). According to Warren, Gee, and Cordova (2005), it is not the emotions one is having that effects the relationship, but the way in which one behaves that makes a healthy relationship. Indeed, Warren, Gee, and Cordova (2005) say, "that emotion skills, such as the ability to identify emotions, express emotions, empathize, and manage challenging emotions, are essential to the maintenance of healthy marriages." However, Mirgain and Cordova (2007) propose that correct empathetic emotion skills are not easy to come by, that one learns how to express emotions by watching other express theirs; so, a boy may learn to react outwardly angry when upset if the boy repeatedly sees his father do the same thing.

Another important skill for partners to learn is called "benign control in delivery," which essentially encompasses the way a partner might deliver a criticism or touchy subject with body language, tone of voice, and eye contract (Mirgain, & Cordova, 2007). In an example by Lauer and Lauer (2009), a married couple has two completely different approaches to conflict, where the husband is very aggressive, controlling, and outwardly emotional; his wife withdraws, shuts down, or even walks away from her husband's threatening stance, further frustrating him. This is important for marital happiness because as stated by Warren, Gee, and Cordova (2005) the more distressed a couple is the more likely they are to have disordered motions, occurrences of depression, and lower marital health compared to couples who are not distressed. Moreover, Warren, Gee, and Cordova (2005) found that negative emotions are most often perceived as more "intense" and "intimate," with a greater power of marital deterioration, compared to positive emotions, which are more often perceived as less intense and facilitates love and communication between partners.

Within marriage, the biggest obstacle that may be faced is the simple fact of gender differences. According to Warren, Gee, and Cordova (2005) and Mirgain and Cordova (2007), each of these studies showed that women have a higher capacity for showing emotion (such as happiness, sadness, love and anger) while also having an easier time recognizing emotions from others, whereas men had a more difficult time with expressing emotions but not recognizing them. Warren, Gee, and Cordova (2005) also found that marital satisfaction for men does not rely on the emotion skills the way it does for women, who usually have been raised to be emotionally superior to men in expression and recognition, and rely on this heavily when communicating. For men their wives' expression of emotion may be a disconcerting and even an alarming event that may make it hard for them to concentrate on the discussion at hand, possibly having unpleasant physiological responses to their wives' outward display (Mirgain, & Cordova, 2007).

For this reason, there is a myriad of books on communication and doing it properly, and some suggestions from Lauer and Lauer (2009) are helpful for couples trying to be more empathetic and better listeners when communicating. We have already established that emotion enactments can be either helpful or detrimental to martial happiness, depending on the type of emotions displayed. Lauer and Lauer (2009) suggest, "maintaining your perspective," which means don't pick fights or get overly emotional with issues that do not matter in the long-run. Also, do not hold resentments and keep everything bottled up, if something really is wrong it is time to speak up; it is healthier to not hold onto resentments and be open and honest, which is much less work! (Lauer, & Lauer, 2009) Another great tip is to use a technique called "de-escalating," which means that during an argument, discussion or fight where things may get heated and one partner expresses anger, the other partner "de-escalates" the event by "not becoming angry in return" and instead responds with calmness (Lauer, & Lauer, 2009). Arguments are not the only area in marriage where emotion skills are used, but also in general communication such as conversations, self-disclosure, and decision-making. Crooks and Baur (2008) has equally illuminating advice for couples seeking to improve their expressed emotions and communications styles, and some of those ways are: find some common ground to agree on, ask clarifying questions (good for arguments or making decisions), express feelings in words instead of emotional outbursts, and finally, focus on future changes that can be made the next time around.

Marriage, Stress & Intimacy

Sometimes marriage can be stressful and intimacy can get lost in the shuffles of day-to-day life. When this happens, marital satisfaction can go down, leaving each partner wondering what happened. In previous research it was thought that major stressors in life, such as moving, or a child dying, were the cause of marital satisfaction decline, but a study on daily stressors and marriage found that stress that occurs daily, or chronically, can have a much more negative impact (Harper, Schaalje, & Sandberg, 2000; Lauer, & Lauer, 2009). Also in this study, intimacy is conceptualized into five different categories of "closeness and sharing," which were emotional, social, sexual, intellectual, and recreational (Harper, Schaalje, & Sandberg, 2000). For women it seemed that daily life stressors were more of a predictor for marital happiness because, perhaps, most of the stressors the women listed were from the household and seemed closer to the marriage, whereas the men listed daily stressors that were outside the home, so perhaps seemed further from the marriage and less likely to effect it (Harper, Schaalje, & Sandberg, 2000).

There are many kinds of stressors that can affect marriage, and all marriages must face stressors and learn to deal with them in a united front. Some stressors can come from within the marriage, such as alcoholism, or deciding to apply for a promotion, whereas some stressors are external like weather events, or cultural attitudes (Lauer, & Lauer, 2009). The family cycle (birth, marriage, death) are considered expected stressors, while getting a divorce, winning a car, or being sent to war are nonnormative and unexpected stressors (Lauer, & Lauer, 2009). Daily stressors most likely would fall under chronic type events, where the stress is constantly occurring, for example a partner is constantly staying late at the office because of extra work, or the kids keep catching colds, or maybe there is always something wrong with the house that needs to be fixed (Lauer, & Lauer, 2009). These daily stresses can definitely take a toll on marriage because it seems like there is no end, and a couple can forget about being intimate or reconnecting, it becomes all about dealing with day-to-day life.

For minor stresses that are daily occurrences, a couple may want to seek a therapists help for some objective advice in what each partner feels is a stressful daily event (is it something small, like always having to drive the kids to school? Or something bigger like a partner is always staying late at work?), and once each partners' daily stresses are written out, the therapist can guide the couple in finding more intimate activities that can mediate the stresses (Harper, Schaalje, & Sandberg, 2000). This is a great way to deal with those daily hassles that can't be changed, and also a great way to see which hassles can be changed (such as, every week each partner has a turn in driving the kids to school).

For stressors that are a little more serious, there are effective ways of coping, and having a family dynamic high on intimacy, communication, hardiness and social support set up a family for success in weathering the storm (Lauer, & Lauer, 2009). If only one partner is dealing with stress (for example, a parent has just passed away), then the other partner can step in and increase their level of intimacy such as more physical attention like hugs, or small notes such as affirmations of love, or going out to do a favorite activity the couple enjoy together (Harper, Schaalje, & Sandberg, 2000). This is known as "intimacy-building interventions," and can greatly support couples who need help getting through any type of stress that may be hindering marital happiness (Harper, Schaalje, & Sandberg, 2000).

In addition to intimacy as a mediator, some other coping techniques for stress are taking responsibility for the problem as a couple or as a family, and find a new way to move past it, which means not being in denial that the stress is occurring and is having a negative impact, not avoiding the situation and acting like everything is fine, and certainly not trying to scapegoat and pass the responsibility to someone else (Lauer, & Lauer, 2009). Another technique is affirming your worth, and believe that there is something that can be done, that as a couple or family there is an ability and capacity to cope with the stress in an effective way (Lauer, & Lauer, 2009). Another great way of dealing with stress in marriage is to "reframe" the situation, and look at it from a different perspective (personally I like to call this "looking for the blessing in disguise"), the situation may seem hopeless, but hiding underneath there is some new way of looking at it and finding out where the lesson is (Lauer, & Lauer, 2009).

Vulnerability, Men & Intimacy

Intimacy is also so often a part of vulnerability, because it involves ever-increasing amounts of self-disclosure with your partner, which literally you are opening yourself up for anything. Indeed, men seem to equate a chore or task with expressing intimacy rather than showing emotions or using language the way that women do (Beckenbach, & Patrick, 2009). Due to the fact that men often avoid feeling overly feminine, or expressing their emotions in a feminine way (i.e. crying), it makes sense that men have very different views on what construes intimacy with their partner, which also helps to explain why some men may have a hard time with intimacy because it involves a certain level of vulnerability as well (Beckenbach, & Patrick, 2009; Livingston, 2004). A relationship with high intimacy is best served with one partner allowed to meet the needs of the other solely, and then having the roles changed to have their needs be taken care of next, so that neither feels "objectified" and allows a development of self within the marriage (Livingston, 2004). This is important for men, because most men equate being intimate with a specific action: sharing, where intimacy involves differing levels of sharing something, whether it be an activity, or a feeling of being safe together, or sexual activities (or a chore or task as previously noted) (Beckenbach, & Patrick, 2009). In this way, when a woman is feeling vulnerable and needs intimacy with her husband she can almost expect him to perform some action meant to convey intimacy, rather than provide deep outward emotions or conversation with her.

Another form that intimacy takes for me is the idea that they can be themselves with their partners in comparison to their friends, because with women their different "masks" they use are unnecessary, and they are able to "reveal parts of themselves that they were scared, uncertain, or ashamed of, without fear that they would be rejected for doing so." (Beckenbach, & Patrick, 2009). This point is very important for women who may be having a deep self-disclosing session with their husbands who may be revealing parts of themselves that might take them aback, and they may react badly, thus damaging the vulnerability that their husbands just shared. An example from Lauer and Lauer (2009), in the section about lack of daily communication between partners and why this may occur, talks about a couple where the husband reportedly learned to not talk about his ambitions of starting his own firm or changing careers because his self-disclosure (and goals, apparently), were met with derision from his wife. Of course, after a while of not making real conversation with each other the wife wondered what was wrong, and when prompted about her reactions to her husband's goals, she admitted that it scared him to hear her talk about their future this way (Lauer, & Lauer, 2009). Instead of being equally honest with her husband and telling him in a calm manner that the prospect of this made her nervous, she met his vulnerability with ridicule. To be sure, trust was rated as an extremely important factor to men for establishing a solid intimate relationship with their significant other, stating that this type of trust with their partners was unlike anything other kid of trust held with friends or family (Beckenbach, & Patrick, 2009). This suggests that allowing a man to be open, trusting, sincere, and vulnerable when talking about something of great consequence is crucial to the health and well-being of a marriage. Without this level of trust, men will have an even greater time trusting that they will not be rejected or ridiculed (Beckenbach, & Patrick, 2009). Men felt, in general, that a relationship with a woman was the only place where he could actually express feelings of doubt, vulnerability, intimacy, or fear because there is a significantly less chance that a woman would reject him, but a man would never allow himself to expose those feelings to a male friend because there is always a chance of rejection (Beckenbach, & Patrick, 2009). That is a huge amount of responsibility for woman to be the sole outlet of intimacy and closeness for their partner, where discretion and sincerity is paramount.

Nonverbal communication is a big part of intimacy as well, for both men and women, but men have more mixed feelings about sex as an intimate experience than women do (Beckenbach, & Patrick, 2009; Crooks, & Baur, 2008). Nonverbal communication can include facial expressions, physical closeness (being in each other's space bubble, in other words), touching, and making sounds (Crooks, & Baur, 2008). Basically men feel that "sex could occur without intimacy but intimacy could not occur without some expressions of physical expression." (Beckenbach, & Patrick, 2009).

Marital Satisfaction & Dealing with Infidelity

It has now been well established that the foundation for a great marriage is a high level of intimacy between partners, which can manifest itself in several ways, but most commonly are "behavioral interdependency, fulfillment of needs, and emotional attachment." (Greeff, & Malherbe, 2001). The highest and successful levels of intimacy involve a deep understanding of one's partner, meeting their needs, and seeing the "true self" of one's partner (Greeff, & Malherbe, 2001). Marital satisfaction does not just rely on intimacy alone, but also the ability to work out problems in a healthy way, communicate effectively with one another, and have high levels of self-disclosure between partners (a variant of intimacy) (Greeff, & Malherbe, 2001; Lauer, & Lauer, 2009).

Marital satisfaction relies on effective communication between partners, and some patterns of successful communication are outlined in Crooks and Baur (2008) where John Gottman's Constuctive Communication Tactics are discussed. Leveling and editing is one such tactic, where someone will edit saying something potentially harmful and instead use an "I" statement, and discussing topics that are only useful and relevant to the conversation at hand, not throwing everything in all at once (Crooks, & Baur, 2008). Validating is another tactic of effective communication, in which a partner will confirm that they can see their point-of-view on the matter, and understand why there might be (confusion, anger, resentment, etc.…) which helps to "facilitate constructive dialogue." (Crooks, & Baur, 2008). And lastly, another tactic for keeping the flame alive is…arguing! It may seem counter-intuitive, but according to Gottman couples who never argue are probably suppressing some serious things, whereas couples who argues sometimes have increased martial satisfaction overall (Crooks, & Baur, 2008).

Another important aspect of marital satisfaction and a facet of intimacy is sexual intimacy within marriage, which for both men and women attach value to being sexually intimate with one another and feel that it lends a great deal to the level or marital happiness and level of intimacy experienced by each (Greeff, & Malherbe, 2001).