What adverts don’t tell you

By ZAWADI LOMPISHA

Whenever you visit the classified pages of newspapers, there is always a column that, for all intents and purposes, is x-rated. The advertisements carried there have all sorts of gags and gimmicks that are meant to improve men’s or women’s sexual performance.

A certain pill will be geared to enhancing virility and libido, while another helps to tighten some muscles to improve performance. One balm provides just the right combination to get rid of cellulite and thus improve the looks department. Others will promise growth in size of whatever it is that you want to grow bigger, yet others will allege to work magic in the opposite.

The basic premise of these advertisements is the presumption that a small size, loose muscles, cellulite, big tummy, fat thighs and such body appendages and aberrations are deterrents to a good relationship. The converse is that the longer, tighter, muscular, smoother, flatter or thinner one is, the better improved the relationship is. There are even contraptions that one can buy to make up for where your partner lacks.

What, however, is becoming of concern to me is the number of married couples who seem to be getting convinced by these advertisements. Recently, a colleague informed me of a visit she made to her friend’s house and the “enhancements” that her friend had purchased to improve her life.

This being a family newspaper, I find it difficult to explain what these enhancements were. So suffice it to say that with these enhancements, the lady in question did not deem it any more necessary to seek sexual intimacy with her husband.

There is a problem

“Why would she do that?” I asked my friend.

“They seem to be going through a difficult patch in their marriage and have little points of contact between them,” she explained. “But since she still has needs, she has found a way out that seems to work for her.”

I find this very disturbing to say the least. 

When a husband and wife conclude that their marriage is not working because there is too much cellulite or that a certain body organ is too small, I think there is a problem. Of course, I do not dispute the fact that a spouse should not expect to look like a worn out sack of potatoes and still be attractive to their spouse.

And even as I say that, it is still true that sometimes it is possible to find one partner who looks like a cross between a worn out potato sack and a beat up shoe, and who will have a doting wife or husband who does not seem to have any problem at all with them. But I digress.

Wrong remedy

The point I am trying to put across is that an outward physical solution to an inward problem cannot mend a relationship. When a wife smears an ointment on her thighs either to shrink them or clear the cellulite in the hope that it will bring her husband home to her, she is dead wrong. The same is true for the husband who elongates himself and tones his muscles in the hope that by looking hunky and powerful his wife will have a new appreciation for him.

Can a pill heal a broken heart from a cheating spouse? Would a bigger body part win back a spouse who has moved on? How does a mechanical “enhancement” bring a husband and wife closer? Or when did increased libido help in assuring your partner that you are committed to them for life?

In my opinion, a couple must be very careful in allowing anything to enter their marriage that promises heaven, without the requisite repentance that must go with it. For instance, if your sex life is on the rocks because you lack emotional intimacy, it does not matter how good looking, toned or large you are. It just won’t help. The two of you need to sit down and talk through your problems. Pills, creams, toned muscles or such paraphernalia will not do it. Besides, allowing exterior things to gloss over matters as the easy way out is only bound to create bigger problems in future.

The husband and wife need to remember that their relationship is maintained because the two of them choose to remain committed to that institution. The glue that binds them rests deep within each of them. What the newspaper and other advertisements offer, should improve the relationship and not as a substitute for the hard work that they must put in to guarantee the health of the marriage.

For the lady who bought the “enhancement”, I can only hope that she will one day realise that substituting her husband for an inanimate object only serves to alienate them further. She must also look at a very possible physical separation happening as a matter of course. She might have done better for herself, if she had sought a marriage counsellor instead.