Sexual incompatibility may be another cause for divorce. In a number of states, another intimacy related matter—impotency—can also function as grounds for divorce. If a spouse is unable to perform the act of sex with his or her companion, the other member of the couple is within his or her rights to file for divorce. To serve as valid grounds, the partner's inability to perform intercourse must have been present at the outset of the marriage, and had to have lasted through the start of the divorce proceedings; i.e. the couple must not have consummated the relationship in order to use impotency as a justification for divorce.