9 Smart ways to keep your marriage healthy at any age

1. Watch your waistline
Wedded couples tend to have fatter waistlines, which can spell trouble in terms of sexual attraction and general health.

2. Have a financial plan
Money is the number-one reason couples fight, and relationships tend to suffer during poor economies. You should discuss and agree upon some hard financial ground rules, preferably before you tie the knot.

3. Figure out your family rules
You and your partner may have vastly different ideas about how a child should be cared for and what constitutes family together time. If one of you is working, should the other partner get up with the baby at night, or should you take turns? Is it important for you to sit down to dinner as a family every night? You need to figure out how you can live together happily while each maintaining your own sense of self.

4. Make sex a priority—but not a chore
While you should make sex a priority, you shouldn’t pencil it in on your planner. But it doesn’t matter whether you’re having sex five times a week or five times a year—as long as both of you are happy.

5. Be flexible
Couples are making some hard choices when it comes to both their careers and their checking accounts. Everyone has a role within the relationship and as long as there’s a greater good, it’s not a question about whether it’s his money or her money.

6. Stay active as you age
Try to find new ways to stay active as a couple, whether it’s hitting the tennis courts or hiking trails. Pick up a life sport that you can enjoy together for decades to come, like golf, tennis, or hiking.

7. Gab (a little) to your friend
While it’s tempting—and often prudent—to keep couple conversations behind closed doors, you may actually benefit from blabbing to a close friend.

8. Rediscover each other as a couple, sans kids
Forget empty nest syndrome—a 2008 study found that marital satisfaction actually improves once children leave home. Female participants reported spending equal amounts of time with their partners both while their children lived at home and after, but they noted that the quality of that together time was better once the kids were out of the picture.

9. Be a conscious caregiver
In the event of a serious illness, spouses who assume the role of caregiver often develop a sense of “caregiver burden” and may become ill themselves. So it’s vital that both spouses ask for help when they need it.