I am a 23 year old male and have allways wondered if the concept of sexless marriage is just a matter of time untill it becomes a reality?

19 comments

  1. When sex becomes required or transactional. When it stops being an activity two people enjoy together and becomes something one partner does to keep the peace. Everyone is not on the mood sometimes. Having your partner pick a fight or pout when you say no just makes it less likely to want it in the future.

  2. Mine started pretty much after the honeymoon phase wore off. In our case we are just incompatible in that way. It sucks but sometimes it comes down to either accept it and stay or leave. There a lot of other reasons that can cause it, health issues, addiction, abuse, neglecting and/or constantly rejecting a spouse. You can spend months over at r/DeadBedrooms reading about everyones bedroom issues including mine lol. Nobody ever thinks they will end up in a sexless marriage.

  3. If my partner was unable/unwilling to make sex fun and fulfilling for both of us.

    If my partner behaved in a way that made me feel taken advantage of or uncared for.

    If my partner behaved in a way that severed our emotional connection.

    If my partner behaved in a manner that made me lose respect and admiration for them.

    These are all things that would make me lose interest in having sex with my partner. Luckily for me, none have occurred.

  4. As a woman divorcing a man who I did not want to have sex with for a very long time, here’s my list:
    1. Not enjoying the sex. If he doesn’t make the effort to make me orgasm and just jackhammers me or goes right for my dry vagina with zero foreplay, it makes me feel like I’m being used as a sex toy. Women’s anatomy is different from men’s and what you see in porn is not realistic.
    2. Feeling like I have to manage our entire lives and household. If the mental load isn’t being distributed equally, and my husband starts to feel like another child I have to parent, I’m not going to feel like having sex. Share the emotional labor and I’ll have no problem getting in the mood.
    3. If he never touches me except for when he wants to fuck, I’m not down. Again, it makes me feel like I’m being used as a sex toy.
    4. If I’m not feeling emotionally connected, I’m not down. Being expected to give freely in bed when he hasn’t even taken me on so much as a short coffee date in two years is really frustrating. Inject some romance and passion outside of the bedroom and I’ll be way more likely to want to have sex.
    5. Hormonal and physical changes. This gets dismissed so often. Unfortunately, a lot of women’s sex drives change after kids even if the relationship is great, because of hormones and post-birth complications. It was honestly extremely hurtful that my husband was more worried about our sex life than the fact that my bladder was prolapsed and my tear wasn’t healing, not to mention my severe postpartum depression. Show concern about the health issues first and foremost, and do everything you can to support her in healing before being worried about your penis. Menopause affects sex drive too, but I haven’t personally experienced that yet.
    6. Grumbling and complaining when you don’t get it. One time my husband literally stomped out of our room and slammed the door behind him because I wasn’t in the mood, even though I let him down gently and had a great reason to boot (had pulled a muscle BAD at the gym earlier and hadn’t gotten a chance to ice it all day or even really rest it). I understand that constant rejection hurts, but be solution-based, don’t just pout. It goes back to feeling like I have to parent my partner; that’s not conducive to a good sex life.

    Anyway, this is just what I can think of at the moment. For context we were married for over ten years (technically still are) and had two kids.

  5. It does not have to be.

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    I can’t help you with losing interest in sex, but I can say a few things that helped me and my wife were these. I can also tell you that being in a sexless marriage is no fun and increases stress in other aspects of the marriage exponentially. Most of these I made some mistakes in early on and we went from a dead bedroom to a healthy sex life.

    1. If there are medical problems, address these.
    2. Schedule time for each other. Yeah, having things on a scheduler doesn’t sound romantic, but trust me when I say, that carving out time for your spouse is worth it. It increases intimacy emotionally to spend that time together.
    3. Find out how your spouse feels loved. It very likely is not the same as you. Then do this, a lot.
    4. Learn how to argue. I say this in all seriousness. Find out if your spouse has trigger words or issues. Now that you have found these buttons, don’t ever push them. Don’t do it! Learn how to respectfully disagree, because you are not clones. You probably will hit the triggers a couple of times before you figure it out if they exist . But once you do find out, avoid.
    5. Talk about each others needs and expectations. This is relevant to sex, but also the laundry, emotional concerns, etc.
    6. Talk about sex. If you don’t know actual expectations and desires, well, chances are, you won’t randomly get everything right.

  6. I’m up for sex 90% of the time. If I’m not up for sex I’m either feeling sick, exhausted, on my period, or I’m mad at him about something.

  7. We’ve been together for 7 years and except for brief periods during pregnancy/postpartum haven’t gone more than a week without.

    It’s never transactional, we don’t use it to make up after arguments, we’re both allowed to say no or stop halfway through. We both have orgasms, we both enjoy ourselves. Even with the constant interruptions from a baby and toddler we’re finding the time. When I’m feeling touched out, he gives me space. He’s my port in a storm and I always feel like more of a person after our time together.

    I think there is an emotional reason people stop rather than a logistical one, though it makes for a convenient scapegoat.

  8. Not feeling like my orgasm was important. We would get started and as soon as I was even a little wet he would climb on top, and finish just as I started to really get into it. Then I’m left with a raw vag and sexually unsatisfied. Once he started making my orgasm a priority we started having great sex.

  9. In my prior relationship, I did everything. Breadwinner, cleaning, paying bills, figuring out basically every aspect of our life, child raising, arranging family gatherings (his and mine, including his mother and sibling’s birthdays) and basically it was hard to be attracted to a bump on a log. I grew up and he didn’t. He started to see me as boring and lame.. I saw him as a burden who didn’t give a crap about my feelings. I didn’t want to bust my ass all the time and then jump on a guy who just continued to make life harder and didn’t even appreciate anything.
    My current marriage doesn’t have this problem. We work together or at least can pick up each other’s slack, we work for each other and for our life together. Sometimes we are completely worn out and there can be 2-3 weeks between sex, but that’s certainly not the Normal. Otherwise we are affectionate, interested in each other and attracted to each other (and interested in being attractive for each other) and have great sex regularly.

  10. It’s not inevitable, but it does become easy to fall into. When you get older you just get so many damn obligations that the two of you have to carve out space and make sex a deliberate, considered thing rather than “Oops, I touched your arm and now we are a tangle of clothes and limbs.” I’ve been with my wife for 18 years and we’re still very happy and frisky.

  11. I’ve been married for 35+ years and in our 20s and early 30s without kids we were like rabbits. Then, kids came and split shifts came and school came and both working came and it tapered off. Then, in my situation, their was some damage to our relationship and we struggled through and we were more sexy times. Now in our 60s, my husband has some biological issues that come from age. We still partake but much more infrequently. Frankly, the conditions have to be good for both of us.

    I retire this year (he already is) and I’m betting we will be back to older times because without the restraints of an adult child at home the same hours I’m off work and me working we will have the freedom to relax and let it happen.

    But, I can also say that we know each other so well. So well that our family won’t let us play games on the same team (think charades, Pictionary) because we can almost get the right answers with no words or a barely there gesture. We are at the point that half way through a fight (same ones we have twice a year no matter what) we start laughing because it’s so stupid. So, what we lack in day to day sexy we make up for in all the other stuff. Sure, we have a lot to work on because we are transitioning to a new phase of life, but all in all one part of the relationship isn’t everything. Hope this helps.

  16. My husband just one day stopped having sex with me for 10 straight months. No explanation, no warning. It was frequent, decently good, then radio silence. It never recovered. Frequency was twice a year for 5 years. Unfortunately, sometimes we just don’t know or ever get to know why.

  18. Keep yourself clean, put some effort into being attractive (ie healthy), don’t be transactional, don’t expect it just cause you’re married, be spontaneous

  19. When I went through a normal low libido period (pregnancy and postpartum/breastfeeding) and he pouted, whined, threw fits, got angry, sulked, withdrew, and guilted/pressured/coerced me into sex I didn’t want. He also crossed a ton of boundaries (constant unwanted groping, etc) After I’d given birth and realized that me sacrificing my body to grow and nurture our child didn’t matter to him if his penis wasn’t being serviced, my respect for him plummeted. I’d have never been able to stomach sleeping with him again, so I left him.

    Had some similar issues with my current partner when we had our baby earlier this year, but we were able to talk about it until he understood that it’s normal and temporary and that all of the above would only permanently cement a lack of desire for sex (with him at least.)

    I don’t think enough men are prepared for the very real (and biologically normal) likelihood that they will need to take care of their own penis for awhile after they choose to bring a baby into the world with their spouse/partner. There really needs to be more education on this during pregnancy because I think that the horrific behavior that many non birthing partners display ends up making sex a negative for their partner permanently instead of it just being normal postpartum libido loss and coming back.

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