Not that you needed another reason to make love, but having sex can actually tone your muscles, burn calories and heal what ails you

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1. Sex cures mild depression by releasing endorphins into the bloodstream, producing a sense of euphoria and a feeling of well-being.

2. Sex is a natural antihistamine. It can help combat asthma and hay fever. No one ever gets a stuffy nose during lovemaking.

3. Lovemaking can burn up those calories you piled on during that romantic dinner.

4. Sex tones up just about every muscle in the body, and it’s more fun than swimming twenty laps.

5. When women make love, they produce large amounts of estrogen, which makes hair shiny and skin smooth.

6. The more often you have sex, the more sex you will be offered. A sexually active body secretes large quantities of pheromones. These subtle sex perfumes drive the opposite sex crazy.

7. Sex is around ten times more effective as a tranquilizer than Valium.

8. Kissing encourages saliva to wash food from the teeth and lowers the level of the acid that causes decay and plaque buildup.

9. Sex relieves headaches by releasing the tension that restricts blood vessels in the brain.

10. Gentle, relaxed lovemaking reduces your chance of suffering dermatitis, rashes, and blemishes. The sweat produced cleanses the pores and makes the skin glow.

Excerpted from Why Men Want Sex and Women Need Love by Barbara and Allan Pease Copyright © 2010 by Barbara Pease. Excerpted by permission of Broadway. All rights reserved.

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