The Family Fix: Are Kids Ruining Your Marriage?

April 26 -- Before they had kids, Kathi and Greg Scearce were not just husband and wife, but best friends, they say. They thought raising children would bring them even closer — but they foundthe opposite was true.

Now they rarely go out as a couple. They haven't spent a night away together in 12 years. In fact, they barely seem to interact at all, except when it's about the kids, Marie, 10 and Olivia, 4.

Mare and Joe Rivera tell a similar story to ABCNEWS' John Stossel. Before they had kids, they spent a lot of time writing songs together. But they haven't since they had 6-year-old Layla and 3-year-old Jesse, who want to be with their parents all the time. If Mare and Joe simply want to sit next to each other, the kids try to squeeze in between.

Like many couples, Joe and Mare miss the closeness, spontaneity and the sex they had before they became parents. The couple say they now have to make "appointments" for sex every few weeks. "Now it's a big, huge arrangement that's just so much work that it's not even worth it," said Mare.

According to William Doherty, a family therapist and author of Take Back Your Marriage: Sticking Together in a World That Pulls Us Apart, 70 percent of couples become less satisfied with their marriage and their sex lives after they become parents.

"After we have children for most of us our energy begins to drain out of the marriage relationship unless we put something back in," he said. "If we're married we simply must give some time and attention to the marriage if we want it to survive."

The Riveras and the Scearces grew so frustrated at how their kids were imposing on their relationships that they agreed to let 20/20 put cameras in their homes, in the hope that Doherty's advice would help them rekindle some of the passion and the romance they used to feel.

When Lovers Become Strangers

The footage showed that Joe and Mare had to practically beg their children to let them sit alone together. Getting a night out together involved a negotiation. At night, the children refused to sleep in their own beds, often falling asleep on the sofa, denying their parents any time alone.