The big question: is hot sex the key to happiness in your relationship?

Where you used to hang out every night, it now happens much more often that you have sex once a week. In a busy week, you sometimes even skip it. And suddenly you start to wonder: damn, do I have a normal relation?

Why does it seem like everyone is having a lot of sex? Is once a week little? Or are we all lying about the numbers? Shit, are we actually REALLY happy with each other if we don't go at it as often? Recognizable questions? You're not alone. A lot of people link the quality of their sex life to their happiness. And if there's one thing you shouldn't do, it's that, as research from Carnegie Mellon University shows. Long story short?

Even though you might think so, about four times a week steaming hot sex with your partner is according to them not the key to happiness at all.

So what then?

The couples in the study who reported being the happiest had sex on average once a week. More sexual encounters did not lead to an increase in satisfaction among couples. On the contrary: hundreds of couples took on the challenge to have sex at least two to three times a week and ended up feeling more stressed than relaxed. According to the researchers, happiness is determined by the intimacy in the relationship, but intimacy doesn't necessarily mean sex. Do you hear that? Totally normal then.

Should we stop comparing ourselves to those ‘other couples’, who are probably lying anyway, because it's not cool to say that you only have sex once a week? And so one in three Dutch people regularly lies a bit about their sexual encounters as well. Yes, that also turns out from research. Completely unnecessary then. Being intimate with each other in the broadest sense of the word: that’s what makes you happy. Capice?