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The great sexual divide
Feel like you and your beau are on different sexual levels? You're not alone!
By Louann Brizendine
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It seems harmless enough: "Honey, I'm exhausted. I haven't eaten, work was really tough today, I'd love to cuddle in bed for a while, but really, I just want to eat, watch TV, and go to sleep. Is that okay? He may say it is, but deep down, ancient wiring takes over. Remember, he's thinking about sex literally every minute. If she doesn't want to have sex, it can signal a waning of attraction or perhaps another man. In other words, the fading of love. Evan had insisted they come see me for some couple's counseling because he was convinced that Jane didn't love him anymore or, worse yet, that she was having an affair.
As we discussed the differences between male and female brains, Jane realized that Evan's brain's reality had an unexpected reaction to her not wanting sex. His brain interpreted her lack of physical desire for him as "She doesn't love me anymore." Jane started being more sympathetic to what sex meant to her husband.
It's just like what happens with a woman and verbal communication. If her partner stops talking to her or responding emotionally, she thinks that he disapproves of her, that she's done something wrong, or that he doesn't love her anymore. She'll panic that she's losing him. She may even think he's having an affair. Jane truly was just tired and didn't feel attractive, but the thought took over in Evan's mind that she was falling out of love with him. He began to appear jealous and possessive as his biological reality made him search for the other man. If she wasn't having sex with him, she had to be doing it with someone else. After all, he would be. Once Jane understood all this, she told
Evan what she had learned about sex being as important to a man as communication was to a woman, and she laughed when he said, "Great. Let's have more male communication."
Evan now understood that Jane needed more warm-up time, and Jane now understood Evan's need to be reassured that he was loved. And so they did have more "male communication." One thing led to another, and Jane became pregnant. Her reality was about to shift again, and sex sorry, Evan would move a little further down the list of things to do. The mommy brain was taking over.
 Excerpted from The Female Brain by Louann Brizendine, M.D. Copyright © 2006 by Louann Brizendine, M.D.. Excerpted by permission of Broadway, a division of Random House of Canada Limited. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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