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    Why Sex Is So Important to Us!

    ThinkstockThinkstockSex is fun, but did you know it has a higher purpose? Here's why it makes us happier, healthier and closer to our partners.

    Women can choose to have sex even when they're physiologically unable to produce offspring. So we know that sex must have some higher purpose and function than simply reproduction. We strongly desire the physical connection even after we can't bear children. Sex drive does not decrease with age!

    What's the higher purpose? Firstly, sex can serve as a nirvana moment between couples--a time when you feel complete happiness and intimacy, expressing love to your mate.

    Factoid

    There's a biological reason that humans are hornier in the summer. We all have a third eye (pineal gland) in the middle of the brain that secretes melatonin, a chemical that helps us sleep and blocks our sex hormones. The long, bright summer days decrease melatonin, so sex drive goes up. The biological upside? You may conceive a child due the following spring, allowing him or her to grow before having to endure the challenges of winter.

    QUIZ: Are You Satisfied With Your Sex Life?

    Sex is designed to make you feel good. Really, really good. To start, consider...

    • Men who have sex three times a week can decrease their heart attack and stroke risk by 50 percent.
    • Women who enjoy sex tend to live longer than those who don't. Great sex makes your body feel about two to eight years younger! This is the same for men who have 150 to 350 orgasms per year (compared to the average of once a week).
    • Orgasms appear to help decrease general pain.
    • When you increase sex from once a month to once a week, it's the happiness equivalent of adding $50,000 to your income for a typical American.

    It's also interesting to look at the gender-based evolutionary functions of sex. For thousands of years, women have felt the responsibility of growing the species and raising children. She has needed someone to protect her family. Her body responded more readily to intimacy (she provided the intimacy so a man could help her orgasm).

    MORE: Eat for Better Sex

    The man, on the other hand, had different intentions. When he saw threatening males approach, he'd get aroused by the threat to his family and mate (a sign that his sperm needed to beat out that of the other men). Under this scenario, the man would respond sexually to anxiety, risk and excitement-in stark contrast to the woman's desire for intimacy.

    This is one way of explaining potential differences that women and men have when it comes to arousal. It's one clue to figuring out how to better mesh sexual preferences. You need not go through the emotions when it comes to sex, but rather, experience the emotions.

    QUIZ: How Do You Act in Relationships?

    You may think the biggest sex organ is covered by your latest Victoria's Secret purchase. But really, your biggest sex organ is your brain. Some studies show that men think sexual thoughts every 52 seconds, but women only once a day.

    Even conservative researchers admit men have many more sexual thoughts than women do. Potential reasons for this? Men have 2.5 times the amount of brain space for sexual drive than women do (or is it that women just have more important things to think about?).

    - Dr. Oz & Dr. Roizen


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    69 comments

    • Michael  •  New York, New York  •  4 months ago
      Accurate and very true!
    • !  •  6 months ago
      sex is awesome! simply put.
    • Mike  •  6 months ago
      give me the money I would rather have sex with hookers then some dumb broad trying to hang around all day at least the hooker leaves and you don't have to be mean
    • Nichey  •  7 months ago
      I told my ex about the 50% greater chance of a man to have a heart attack if he don't get regular sex and she said if I ever to touch her again she'll accuse me of rape. Six month later I had the big one and died. Can my estate sue her for merder?
    • TTT  •  7 months ago
      "Orgasms appear to help decrease general pain."

      Masturbation would provide most of the same benefits to a man as sex with a woman would, according to the article.
    • anon  •  7 months ago
      causality. American public education FTL.
    • Adam  •  7 months ago
      36 yr old hetero male here. never have had much of a sex drive. Even when I was in early teens, sex concerned me a lot less than it seemed to for other guys my age. I've always been more intereted in mental/literary/non-physical pursuits more than anything else. I have zero interest in athletics of any kind and I read more than almost anyone I know ( multiple newspapers per day, 1 entire bedroom of my house dedicated to nothing but stacks and stacks of books).

      My mother told me sometime after I met my first girlfriend ( I was 23) that she and Dad often wondered if I was gay. I had a long conversation with her that boiled down to what I said in the paragraph above. She looked at me with a total lack of understanding, as if she couldn't conceive of a man who thought that way.

      I have ( out of my own curiousity) been tested for any sort of physical problems. Nothing; normal hormone levels, no erectile dysfunction. I don't fit into the category of an asexual person because I do infrequently cosndier sex, but only that: infrequently.

      I am personally acquainted with a psychotherapist and after laying all these facts before him and confirming that I had never been sexually abused in any way, he said that I was simply atypical, that nothing was wrong with me. He did say that my emotions seem to him to be muted in that I very rarely display strong emotion of any sort since he's known me. He explained that he noticed that I only mildly smile at jokes that others laugh out loud about, that I speak very precisely and to the point in conversations, and that I seem oblivious to nonverbal communication ( body language).

      Arousal, being an extreme emotion, is one that I don't feel often. i can see a barely-dressed, attractive woman and think " she's pretty" and yet the connection isn't made between that thought and arousal for me so easily. And yet, i am content with my life, my job, my chosen entertainments, and the house and land I own. So, to generalize that sex is needed/required or what have you, is incorrect. it's a form of entertainment, like many others.

      And yes, i'd rather have the 50k dollars.
    • BHO Sux  •  7 months ago
      I cum in my girl 3-times a day.....
    • BHO Sux  •  7 months ago
      I cum in my girl 3-times a day.....
    • BHO Sux  •  7 months ago
      I cum in my girl 3-times a day.....
    • BHO Sux  •  7 months ago
      I cum in my girl 3-times a day.....
    • Pancham  •  7 months ago
      sex karne sey body may tajgee aati hay
    • Bosoxinny  •  7 months ago
      Oh, I'd SO much rather have the fifty grand......besides, the only time I've EVER had an orgasm is on my own, and I'm 45 years old. Sex is seriously overrated.
    • QUEEN B  •  7 months ago
      i don't think good sex can be replace with money. money can't make you happy. there is something about it that can give u energy.. poor sex with 50 k, without 50 k, no money, i'll work hard and have sex and have fun and be happy for the rest of my life.
    • The Prisoner  •  7 months ago
      If a guy ain't getting any at home, there are hundreds of places to get it. If it doesn't bring you closer together with your mate, its time to get a new date. Sex is important because it just is. Now get busy.
    • Melissa  •  7 months ago
      I don't know why this article is even necessary. Duh
    • Rose  •  7 months ago
      This makes so much sense.
    • DJ Osiris  •  7 months ago
      Posted by Linda 1 hour 39 minutes ago

      "It is not a recreational activity."

      HUH??? Ummm.... Yes it is. I don't even know how you could think something so enjoyable to most people (maybe not you) isn't a form of recreation, whether you are single or attached in any way, shape, or form.

      You want proper perspective??? From thefreedictionary.com a recreational activity is defined as follows:

      rec·re·a·tion (rkr-shn)
      n.
      Refreshment of one's mind or body after work through activity that amuses or stimulates; play.

      recreation [ˌrɛkrɪˈeɪʃən]
      n
      1. refreshment of health or spirits by relaxation and enjoyment
      2. an activity or pastime that promotes this

      I don't know about the viewpoints of everyone else in here, but to me, sex certainly seems like it fits very well into these definitions as to what a recreation is.

      You want some more proper perspective? Maybe your inability to meet a decent man is your lack of enthusiasm and utter renouncement of anything and everything relating to sex, which is an ENORMOUS part of the lives of most NORMAL men. Maybe your views about sex make most decent men think you are frigid and can't attain any pleasure through the act. A decent man (or any man for that matter) don't want a woman who thinks of sex as solely "a biological function to serve the purpose of pro-creation". I don't mean to sound crude, but this sentence alone makes you sound very frigid.
    • Paris  •  7 months ago
      Before starting this or any other fitness routine, please consult your doctor. The advice in this article is meant only for healthy adults in monogamous relationships with opposite sex partners. Anyone who may have experienced side effects to birth control methods, abusive relationships, dysfunctional childhoods, emotional problems, or is currently taking medications of any kind may not achieve any benefits as claimed in this article.

      In other words, this article is utter hooey for the vast majority of people.
    • Judith  •  7 months ago
      Thankyou for establishing the fact that my Mama knew what she was talking about. She was born in l9l5 - and made no mistake that Sex was the glue that kept it all together. Thus, six kids, and a husband who smiled - a lot. Gotta love it.

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