If you’ve ever watched Nigella Lawson cooking up a storm in the kitchen, you might already be aware of the link between cooking and sexuality. She certainly knows how to make baking look sexy! But there is another way to think about cooking and sexual intimacy, and it might help to uncover how you view sexual intimacy in your relationship.

To help with this discussion, I want you to consider the following cooking (and eating!) analogies, and ask yourself whether your lovemaking is like –

1. The cherry on top – is everything in your relationship pretty good – there is nothing particularly bad about it. It might be sweet, sometimes a bit dry but otherwise, something you enjoy. Is lovemaking the cherry on top, that makes everything else seem better?
2. The main ingredient – is your relationship based on your lovemaking? Do you sometimes feel like the relationship could fall apart if you were to stop being sexually intimate with each other?
3. Eating chocolate – is lovemaking like doing something you enjoy but it comes with guilt and perhaps shame? Do you enjoy sexual intimacy while you are in the middle of it, but it feels like a guilty pleasure, and you don’t like to flaunt it about too much.
4. Baking sourdough – is your lovemaking like a slow ferment? Do you like to let your partner grow in desire for a few days before finally relenting? Does it leave a sour taste in your mouth?
5. Fine dining – do you feel like your lovemaking has to be perfect? You and your partner need to look and smell your best, with nothing out of its place? Is it something you can only afford once in a while? Maybe it leaves you feeling unsatisfied. OR
6. The nourishment of a family meal? – is your lovemaking considered an essential part of the relationship, like partaking in a family meal? There is comfort, and ritual, and certainty about its presence in your relationship, and you come together to participate because it is an important way that you connect? You feel satisfied, valued and included.

It is clear from this analogy which one we recommend for a healthy functioning relationship. Sexual intimacy is an important part of every couple relationship and needs to be treated as such. Lovemaking doesn’t need to be perfect, or shameful, or used as a bargaining chip. It is essential, like eating, and can form a powerful way of connecting with each other that develops the strong bonds required to make it for the long haul.

There is much research to show that sexual intimacy is not only fun and pleasurable, but also binds the couple to each other. For the woman, sexual pleasure releases oxytocin, also known as the love hormone. This is the same hormone released when she breastfeeds her baby, developing a strong bond to the child. For men, their hormones are a bit different. In the earlier years of a relationship the presence of dopamine and vasopressin are important in feelings of attraction and sexual arousal. As a relationship progresses, testosterone levels drop, allowing for more oxytocin, therefore allowing for the bonding nature of sexual intimacy to be present. It appears then, that long term sexual relationships give men the space to commit to their partner, and sexual intimacy becomes a bonding activity for him too, making him feel more loving and connected to his partner.

However, turning our sexual intimacy into something as ritualistic as a family meal can seem a bit… unsexy. However, to ignore its importance and not put it in our regular plans is almost certainly going to lead to it being put at the bottom of the to-do list. There was a great song in 2007 by Flight of the Concords that joked about a couple with small children that had been together for some time, having to plan their sexual encounters, or as it was called “business time.” The opening lines are:

“Girl, tonight we’re gonna make love
You know how I know?
Because its Wednesday
And Wednesday night is the night that we usually make love
Monday night is my night to cook
Tuesday night we go and visit your mother
But Wednesday, we make sweet, weekly love.

The Chorus went:

“It’s business
It’s business time
I know what you’re tryna say
You’re tryna say, “It’s time for business, it’s business time, ooh”
It’s business
Its business time!”

My husband and I always laughed at this song when it first came out, but that was before we had children. Now it makes prefect sense and gratefully, the song normalises this aspect of sexual relationships. As you move into a committed relationship and everything that is involved in running a busy family life, sexual intimacy can lose its spontaneity. But this shouldn’t be end of expressing your love sexually. You may not have the desire you did in the early part of the relationship. You might be too tired, or all touched out by small children, or just want some peace and quiet, but your relationship will stagnate if you do not prioritise your sexual intimacy. Like the nourishment of a family meal, you will feel more connected, more content, and more able to manage the difficulties of life together when you commit to participating.

If you need to work on this aspect of your relationship, start with communication. Talk about how important it is to you that you connect sexually as a couple. Talk about all the things that are getting in the way, and work together to decide how you will fit lovemaking into your weekly schedules. And when the time comes, know that desire comes when you make a start. Arousal does not have to precede sexual intimacy, and can develop as you participate in the activity. You may not feel like it beforehand, but you will not regret the impact prioritizing your sexual intimacy will have on your overall relationship satisfaction.

So throw away your preconceived ideas that lovemaking needs to be perfect, or that it is something to be ashamed of, or that you need to be in the mood. Treat it like a family meal, one that is certain, ritualised and comforting.