Dr. Val FarmerDr.Val
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Rural Mental Health & Family Relationships

Reasons For Abstinence In Dating And Courtship

September 19, 2009

Many educated and well meaning people look at the numbers of teenagers and young adults engaging in high risk sexual behavior and throw up their hands in resignation. The best we can do, they say, is to encourage protected or safe sex in view of such powerful social forces and trends. Accordingly, to expect young people to be sexually abstinent is not realistic.

I disagree. I don't think the case for sexual abstinence has been made compelling enough. Check out these reasons for abstinence versus the "everybody is doing it" argument.

1. It can cost you your life. HIV and AIDS have life threatening consequences. Heterosexual transmission of AIDS is a reality. It is not just about needles and homosexuality.

2. You can acquire a sexually transmitted disease, i.e. herpes, gonorrhea, syphilis, genital warts and chlamydia. Many of these are asymptomatic in females and can cause cancer and sterility.

3. You face the devastating social, emotional and economic consequences of teen pregnancy such as:

- the emotional and moral impact of abortion.

- the emotional impact of giving up a child for adoption.

- the far reaching social and economic consequences of raising an out-of wedlock child, especially on the negative educational and life opportunities of the mother. This also has tremendous costs to society in terms of mental health and social/criminal problems of children raised in single parent, out-of wedlock homes.

- the emotional impact of mothering at an early age.

- the high risk birth and development complications for low birth weight infants born to teen mothers.

- the impetus for a teen marriage that has a high probability of divorce. Teens are not yet at a developmental point where they can put another person's interests and needs ahead of their own.

4. Premarital intercourse predicts higher rates of divorce. The myth of living to insure sexual compatibility is wrong. Forty percent of "living together" couples breakup and the remaining 60 percent who marry have a higher divorce rate than couples who never live together.

5. Premarital intercourse predicts higher rates of marital infidelity. The precedent for not being sexually exclusive has already been set. Abstinence enhances the quality of sex life after marriage. There are no ghosts in the bedroom.

6. Lowered feelings of self-worth. Premarital intercourse lowers feelings of self-worth when it violates deeply held personal, family and religious values. Feelings of guilt, depression and anxiety are common.

- Rejection is much more difficult after sexual intimacies have been shared. It is a direct challenge to self esteem and sexual adequacy. It makes emotional risks harder in subsequent relationships.

- When sex between dating partners is seen as a part of the process of building a long term relationship,

people have to make sexual decisions without a firm standard. A significant number of females engage in intercourse when they do not want to in order to be found appealing or in an effort to maintain a relationship that has already been established. Once a woman has engaged in intercourse, she may feel she has lost her right to say no to sexual pressure from her partner. Having sex without wanting to causes negative emotions.

7. Sexual relations without marriage commitment complicates a couple's ability to address and resolve meaningful relationship problems. Some problems can't be addressed because of insecurity and lack of trust. Sexual relations may precipitate a crisis in the relationship around commitment issues and leads to relationship breakups. The less committed lover becomes frightened and backs off.

8. Sexual relations with various partners destroys the connection between commitment and sexual relations and clouds judgment in courtship.

- For males: Males are less likely to commit to marriage and engage in meaningful psychological intimacy if sex is a part of the relationship. Males can and do engage in non-relational sex while applying a double standard to the women they date. They want their long term mate to be sexually exclusive.

Many men engage in sexual relations without meeting any requirements for emotional intimacy. They treat women as objects of sexual desire which are pursued to release sexual tension, to prove themselves and to feel adequate as a male.

Engaging in casual sex or sex without care and commitment is conditioning to divorce sex from feeling. This detachment limits their capacity to fully participate in and truly enjoy intimate sexual relationships. In an extreme form, this attitude lies at the basis of sexual addiction and sexual aggression against women and children.

- For females: Females engaging in casual sex give less of themselves in relationships, have more concurrent affairs, and receive less love and emotional intimacy from partners. They prefer partners based on physical attractiveness and disregard important factors in courtship such as agreeableness, emotional stability, kindness and consideration, willingness to give as well as receive in a relationship and willingness to share resources.

By engaging in sex without commitment, females disqualify themselves from being a candidate for marriage in the minds of males who are willing to engage in short term, sexually motivated relationships but reserve their commitment for someone who has a track record for being sexually exclusive.

9. For believers, add the violation of God's law to the list.

Is that enough reasons? Abstinence is a great message, not one to be sneered at.