Sex is the one activity that differentiates marriage from every other relationship. You can have a great conversation with a friend. You can have lunch with a co-worker. You can go on vacation with a neighbor. But if you’re following God’s design for relationships, sex is only rightly expressed through marriage.
Milan and Kay Yerkovich say that dynamic is hugely consequential when a couple can’t negotiate their sex life in healthy ways.
They say each of us identifies in some way with one of the following love styles:
- Avoiders are emotionally distant and detached.
- Pleasers can be excessively nice and always want harmony. They don’t like conflict and don’t want to do anything that demands too much of them emotionally.
- Vacillators are committed to achieving a relational ideal. When they face disappointment, they protest – often through destructive choices – to get back to their perceived ideal. They see people as all good or all bad with very little middle ground.
- Controllers and victims usually come from difficult homes where there was abuse or neglect. Aggressive personalities tend to become controllers, and compliant spouses usually have a hard time asserting themselves as adults.
Negative love styles can prevent you and your spouse from achieving deepening levels of vulnerability, trust, and connection with one another. Healing comes when you can identify your broken love style and move through a process of sanctification and healing toward the “secure connector” style.
How does it all work? Milan and Kay Yerkovich are with us on our Focus on the Family Broadcast “How to Have a Better Sex Life by Understanding Your Love Styles” to explain.
This program was one of our most popular broadcasts of 2020. Our discussion isn’t graphic, but it’s probably not suitable for younger children, so please use your discretion and occupy your kids elsewhere. Or listen later online, on Apple Podcasts, via Google Podcasts, or take us with you on our free phone app.
I’d also like to extend an invitation for you to partner with us for a gift of any amount. When you do, I’ll send you our How We Love bundle, which features Milan and Kay’s book, a CD of the broadcast, and an extra CD containing an audio message from Milan and Kay about the five top things you need to have a healthier sex life. For more information, visit our website or call 1-800-A-FAMILY (232-6459).
If you can help Focus on the Family with a gift, know that your donation will be doubled for twice the impact in helping others through this ministry. Our thanks to generous donors who’ve made that possible.
Milan and Kay have a passion for helping husbands and wives experience stronger, healthier marriages. Milan is an ordained minister and pastoral counselor. And Kay is a licensed marriage and family therapist.
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