The Key To a Happy Relationship - a podcast by Dr. Jessica OReilly

For many couples, the biggest buzzkill involves spending too much time together! In this episode of Sex With Dr. Jess, Sexologist and Relationship Expert Jessica O'Reilly recounts what it was like to start traveling for work and missing her husband. Being able to balance your time with your lover is an important part of a relationship; dates with your friends, personal time, and traveling for work are important not just for you, but your relationship.

Rough Transcript:This is a computer-generated rough transcript, so please excuse any typos. This podcast is an informational conversation and is not a substitute for medical, health or other professional advice, diagnosis or treatment. Always seek the services of an appropriate professional should you have individual questions or concerns.

The Key To a Happy RelationshipParticipant #1:
Hello. My name is Jessica O'Reilly, and I am a sex and relationship expert, and my focus is sexual compatibility. Because sexual compatibility is essential essential to a lasting, happy relationship. I am here to help you become sexually compatible because compatibility is something you cultivate. It's not something you find. You have to work for it. Today I want to talk about a common relationship habit that is ultimately destroying relationships. And I'm seeing this more and more with younger couples, but it's a pattern that can be sustained for years, for decades and really chip away at the relationship. And this pattern, this bad habit involves spending too much time together because it will ruin your relationship. You need to spend more time apart if you want a lasting, happy, fulfilling relationship. The research shows that happy couples are able to strike a balance between quality time together and quality time apart and the couples that I work with who have been together for 25 or more years. The couples who actually still like each other even still want to have sex with each other after 25 years. They know that time apart matters. They know that scheduling so called date nights with friends with family on their own separately is just as important, maybe even more important. I think more important than scheduling date nights as a couple. Now, I could tell a lot of stories about clients who found their way back to one another or started having more sex after months of dry spells without sex. Once they finally started spending time apart, once they started engaging in separate hobbies, hanging out with different friends and ultimately having their own lives in addition to their couple's lives. So I could tell you all of their stories. But today I think I'm going to talk about me, me and my marriage. I've been with my husband for 15 years, and it's a good relationship. It has its ups and downs in and out of the bedroom. We laugh a lot, but we fight enough, too. We like each other and we irritate each other. We definitely admire each other, and then we want to run away from each other sometimes and just get away. I think it's a balanced relationship with the good and the bad. And yes, this has been going on for about 15 years, but four years ago, something changed. Well, I changed. My job changed and I started traveling for work. At first it was just once a month or so, but then it became more frequent and it just forced us to spend time apart. Now I travel, say, three to four times a month. Sometimes I'm only away for a couple of days and then sometimes I'm away for a number of weeks, even a month. And I miss him. I don't know if he misses me, but the time apart for us apart, the time we spent apart was so good for our relationship in so many ways. Number one, we started to miss each other when I'm away. I miss his warm body in bed, not just because I'm always cold, but I miss him. I miss the way this sound so silly, but I miss the way his breath smells so bad in the morning. I miss the way he sets his alarm too early and then hits the sleep button.

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