Do you want to have
a great love affair, a love affair that lasts a lifetime? Do you want to have a lifelong love with great sex, for as long
as you both shall live? Do you want a husband or wife who is faithful for life… for their whole life, before you even
met them? Do you want to marry your soul mate?
You CAN have a relationship like this.
Have you ever heard the phrase you always remember your first time?
Have you ever wondered why that is true? It’s the chemistry!! There are chemicals and hormones
that are released during sexual stimulation that cause bonding to occur, a kind of emotional super-glue. The hormone oxytocin
is known as the bonding hormone. It has been known for some time that this hormone is released during labor and delivery and
nursing, when a mother breast feeds her infant. It causes the mother to bond to her child. We now know
this hormone is also released during sexual arousal and causes a bond to form between the man and woman. The hormone is enhanced
by estrogen, so the emotional bond is often stronger in women, and breakups are commonly more difficult for women. There are
other brain chemicals like vasopressin and dopamine that also play a roll in bonding of men and women. Once there is sexual
arousal there is bonding. It doesn’t have to be intercourse. After just 20 seconds of touching oxytocin begins
to flow, a 20 second hug or kiss can get the bonding process started.
Teen relationships generally last a few weeks to a few months. In couples who have been sexually active the chemical
bonding has occurred. When they break up the emotional damage can be devastating and last a life time. If a bond is broken
repeatedly, from several relationships, pretty soon the ability to bond altogether may be lost. It's like trying to reuse
a piece of tape, it just doesn't stick. Unfortunately, this happens all too often. An oxytocin high can have an addictive
effect. When one relationship ends there is a search for another partner to repeat that bonded feeling, but the attachment
to the prior partner doesn’t go away. You may go from partner to partner trying to get that feeling again.
It doesn’t have to be that way. We can have lasting, bonded relationships.
How does a lifelong, bonded relationship form? An emotional and relational connectedness between two individuals must occur
before physical intimacy. If you want a soul mate you have to get to know the heart and soul. Talking, communication, getting
to know each other takes time. You can’t rush the emotional for the physical. Sex is more than just a physical act,
it effects the whole person, emotional, spiritual and physical.
There is a 12 step process,
described by Dr. Donald Joy, through which all human couple relationships must pass to achieve bonding. Bonding takes time.
If any steps are missed the bonding is weak and is at greater risk for breaking. If there is any physical intimacy before
stage seven the bond will be at greater risk for breaking. Step seven is also the last exit before intimacy. This means that
if the relationship is not a lifelong commitment it should not move beyond step seven. Any breakup after this step will cause
damage. It is especially difficult to break a relationship after step 10 has occurred. When a relationship ends, the tendency
is to begin the next relationship at the step where the last one ended. If you have been hooking up and don't understand
why your partner won't commit to a relationship it may be because you skipped the relationship building steps.
The 12 steps of Human
Pair Bonding are:
Love
Bonding
Eros
1. Eye to Body Infatuation
2.
Eye to Eye
3. Voice to Voice
Philia 4.
Hand to Hand Leave Parents
5. Arm to Shoulder
6. Arm to Waist
Storge
7.
Face to Face
Cling to each other
8. Hand to Head
9. Hand to Body
Agape 10.
Mouth to Breast
Naked & Unashamed
11. Hand to Genitals
12. Genital to Genital
There are four types of love that correspond to the steps of bonding.
The four types of love are:
Eros is infatuation; it is the mountain top feeling of new love,
the total obsession with the beloved. Infatuation doesn’t last but may lead to deeper love.
Philea is friendship
love. You get to know the other persons thoughts, dreams and goals in life. This is where you bare your heart and mind to
one another. Sometimes this is harder to do than bare your body.
Storge is familial love. It
is a deep caring and concern for the other person. This is the stage where you vow to be there for the other person, when
you promise to help each other.
Agape is the love that is past feeling. It is a commitment,
a decision, a matter of will, a promise to be kept for life.
In English there is only one word for love, but in Greek there are four. These are Greek words for love that are
taken from the Bible. The Bible is God’s word to us. God created mankind, God created marriage and God created sex.
God has a plan for relationships that is far better than the shallow, unfulfilling, physical relationships that are common
today. It’s called marriage. Sex is designed to be for oneness in marriage, two become one. Sex is meant to join a couple
together spiritually, emotionally as well as physically. God has a better plan; He is the provider and protector. His plan
provides the lifelong love and the best sex and protects from harmful effects of sex outside the boundaries of His protection.
If
you can say NO to sex now, you will be free to say YES to a future relationship that can be bonded for life.
This is why you should Wait for Sex.
Joy, Dr. Donald, Bonding, Relationships in the Image of God, Evangel Publishing House,1999
