Anyone who works on the internet already knows how I feel. On the computer before breakfast or even before a shower to check stats, emergency emails, freelancers who need feedback and any critical webmaster board posts. A quick shower, even quicker breakfast, feed the dogs, feed the chickens and then it’s back to the computer. Whatever happened to sex in the morning?? It’s a faded memory around here.

By the time you raise your head it’s past 1pm and you think, “Where did lunch go?” Where we live it’s now daylight savings time and that’s really wrecked the schedule. During the winter we knew when to stop for dinner because it got dark. Now we work til dark but that’s way after 8pm. Who wants to start cooking at 8:30? It’s gotten so bad around here that all I have to do is call and say, “I’d like to place an order for delivery please,” and I get, “oh, hi Maureen.”

It’s not that I’m earning heaps of money or that the work I’m doing is absolutely critical; I work because it’s there. There’s nobody around to say, “Quittin Time”, like the guy in Gone With the Wind. There’s always a link to check, a link to add, stats to follow up, new trends to check on, competition to watch, trademarks to defend… and I could go on at length.

At some point we all get up and decide we can’t hold our eyes open one more minute and decide to go to bed. Sex now? God, no, I’m too tired! All I want to do is sleep.

I’ve decided to change my ways. I’ll keep you informed if it works. I am convined that it doesn’t matter how much money we earn or how well the website does. If we’re too tired to have sex, we’re doing life wrong. No more working past 7pm even if I have to set an alarm. I will have enough energy for sex several times a week, even if I have to have a nap during the day. I’m going to increase my stamina and flexibility by using the gym we installed and I’m going to be happy about it.

It is possible that we’ve got this monogamy thing all wrong. Why is it when a relationship breaks down, society or your new love interest expect that the love for the old partner must die? To have more than one friend is certainly a good thing and we have enough affection to go around for as many friends as we can find. To have more than one child doesn’t mean that children #2, #3 or #4 have less love and nurturing. What is it about an ex that’s so different? It’s all about the sex and nothing about the love.

Personally I know it’s possible to love an ex because my husband does. Certainly the relationship is different than it used to be, but he wasn’t required to stop loving her in order to fully love me. It was with a glad heart that I found Josh Bagby’s blog Monogamy Drives Me Crazy and I thought it was terrific to find someone who agreed with me.

I’m all for sexual monogamy because that’s what I’m most comfortable with, but I think every human has the capacity to have intimate relationships with other men and women that don’t include sex OR me. The religious right would say I’m anti-family for putting ourselves at risk of falling for someone else. If traditional monogamy is all that’s holding our relationship together, I’d hope to fall in love with someone else!

In our business we have many thousands of married people looking for someone to share sexual intimacy only online. These are people locked into a monogamous relationship and they’re lonely. They don’t want to leave their spouse or partner, but they want to feel alive, important, validated, less lonley and a lot of other needs that aren’t being met right now. I think it’s a good thing. I wish the world wide web had been around in the 80s because I’d certainly have used it.

The reasons men and women want and need sex are different but each sex “wants” the same. The sex drive differs for both men and women, so the trick is finding someone who’s desire matches yours. A good sex life is crucial to any relationship, but the frequency I have sex with my partner may differ widely from what you consider enough.

What’s interesting is that men need physical contact before they’ll invest in an emotional relationship and women need to feel close in order to desire sex. So how do we ever get together? Most loving couples acknowledge the differences between men and women even if they aren’t consciously acting upon it. A woman will flirt with her partner, touching and fondling him - even giving him “the look”. In turn a man will do his best to listen while he’s being cuddled. That’s all it takes. She’s validated and he’s cuddled.