Can we measure the health of a relationship by our sexual connection?

Intimate relationships have evolved through several phases in the past one hundred years. At the turn of the twentieth century, it was still common for marriages to be arranged for practical rather than romantic reasons. Marriage was an economic and social necessity for a woman who had no marketable skills, as well as for a man who worked the land or one who lived by the social conventions of the time, which dictated that he needed a wife to manage his home and family.

A new phase in relationships evolved as Hollywood began projecting romantic images of love and marriage onto the consciousness of the country. Romance became a priority in people's committed relationships.

Next, the awakening of feminist consciousness brought with it a desire for equality in the home, in the workplace - and in bed. The Victorian attitude that a woman was sexually fragile and did not truly enjoy sex was replaced by women and men's knowledge of women's capacity for pleasure; and that for her, sexual pleasure takes time to cultivate. Women and men have begun to understand that a woman's first orgasm is often the beginning stage of an orgasmic plateau that can continue for long periods and include many kinds and intensities of orgasm. The experience of deeply fulfilled states of sensual aliveness gives men and women a new respect for sensuality and gender, which are important facets of the current phase in relationships--one where consciousness is central...