Some studies have suggested that only about 3 percent of Americans wait until they’re married to have sex these days. It seems that practicing abstinence until marriage just isn’t as important as it used to be to most people.
After hearing that, you might be tempted to throw abstinence out the window and engage in sexual intercourse before you’re married. But you could be making a mistake if you do.
Everyone is free to make their own decision when it comes to remaining abstinent prior to marriage. But you should know that there are many benefits of waiting until marriage to have sex with someone. You should consider those benefits before deciding that you want to have sex with a person before you’re married.
Take a look at 5 benefits of practicing abstinence until marriage below.
Improves Communication for Couples
Ask anyone who has been married to their spouse for a significant amount of time what the secret to a good marriage is and they’ll likely respond with just one word: Communication. It’s so important for married people to be able to communicate with one another at all times.
But one of the problems that people run into long before they tie the knot is that they fail to learn how to communicate effectively with their partner. Sex isn’t the only reason this happens, but once two people start to have sex, it can change the way they communicate and lead to them developing bad communication habits.
When people start having sex, they’ll obviously be intimate with each other on a physical level. But that often leads to a lack of emotional intimacy, which is where issues with communication can start to set in. They won’t always spend as much time as they should talking about their feelings and their thoughts on life.
To be clear, not everyone who has sex with someone before marriage struggles to communicate effectively with them later on. But you can increase your chances of introducing good communication into your relationship by abstaining from sex at the start.
Builds Stronger Bonds Between People
When you first start having sex with someone, you’ll often feel a close physical connection with them, both when you’re being intimate and when you’re not together. But over time, that physical bond can wear down if there isn’t an emotional bond to support it.
Far too often, people rely on the physical bond when they’re in a relationship and don’t ever get around to developing the emotional one. By abstaining from sex, you can give yourself time to develop stronger emotional bonds with another person—bonds that will last once the fire in the bedroom starts to fizzle out.
Abstinence isn’t always easy. But it’ll give you time to build a friendship with a person prior to building a life with them. That friendship will serve as your bedrock as you move forward and get more serious with someone.
Encourages More Romance in Relationships
Think about all of the things that people do for one another when they’re first dating. They buy each other gifts, send each other cute text messages, and go above and beyond to let the other person know that they care about them.
Some people are able to continue doing these things after they’ve had sex with their significant other. But once sex is a part of the equation, it’s not uncommon for the romance in a relationship to die out. People think that having sex with someone is the only way to show their affection for them.
When you’re not having sex with someone, it almost forces you to find other ways to show your love, devotion, and affection for the person you’re dating. And when this happens, you’ll find that you and your partner will continue growing closer as time goes on.
Promotes More Generous Partnerships
Once two people start having sex, it’s not out of the ordinary for them to want to do it more and more (and more!) for the first few months. There is often a raw passion that exists between them that leads to them craving more sexual activity.
The problem with this is that, over time, that passion can lead to one or both parties becoming selfish. Suddenly, people start to feel like they deserve sex from their partner whenever they want it. That selfishness can destroy a good relationship if you’re not careful.
By practicing abstinence until marriage, you can take selfishness out of the mix and promote generosity within your relationship. You’ll still need to keep selfishness in mind once you’re married since it can still prove to be a problem. But it won’t be as big of a concern for you and your spouse.
Leads to More Happiness in the Future
There’s no way to guarantee that you and your partner are going to be happy when you get married one day. But studies have shown that those who practice abstinence until marriage are about 20 percent more satisfied with their marriages than those who have sex before getting hitched.
Additionally, they’ve shown that those who don’t have sex before marriage are 15 percent happier with sexual quality. You might think that some people would be disappointed or dissatisfied with sex after waiting for it, but that doesn’t appear to be the case at all.
And if you’re one of the people who thinks you might be unhappy with your sex life if you wait, you should know that there are solutions to this problem. Read more here about how sex therapy can help newly married couples get their sex lives on track.
Is Practicing Abstinence Until Marriage Right for You?
There are very few couples practicing abstinence until marriage in 2019. But that doesn’t mean that they don’t exist!
There are millions of people waiting until they’re married to have sex with their partners, and they’re enjoying all the benefits listed here. They’re finding it to be an enriching experience that makes their relationships stronger than they might be otherwise.
Think long and hard about whether or not abstinence is a good goal for you and your partner. And make sure you read our blog for tips on establishing other healthy goals for your relationship.
