I’m 22m gf of 3.5 yrs is 24F.
Classic start of relationship she was all over me, couldn’t get enough of it.
Around the 2yr mark she experienced a prolonged period of low mood/light depression. Which has since improved.
Since then sex has been much less often, once a week to maybe once every 2/3 weeks.
I often initiate, and I’ll drop hints about what I want to do to her throughout the day. But often it doesn’t result in anything.
We’ve spoken about this. She says she still finds me attractive, now more that every as I’ve been hitting the gym. But she says she is never in the mood. It’s just not a thought she ever has.
Any tips for this, she wants to be in the mood, but just doesn’t without my direct help.
12 comments
I have the same issue! The first year and a half was several times a week, and sometimes a few times a day. Now I am lucky if it is once every couple weeks
Is your girlfriend taking an antidepressant? Those are notoriously hard on libido.
talk with her first, but polite, without pressing on here. maybe she don’t see this issue and she need to think about this. because it’s could be 2 options at least hormonal(low libido) and maybe need to check with doctor or she lost interest and not enjoy.
Schedule sex and make a date night of it. Sometimes you just need to know it’s coming and work your way to the right mood/headspace. It also helps as the higher sex drive persons feeling of rejection and fear of being too pushy.
Hormone imbalance could be some of it… takes a while for things to start working like normal again. Do you know each others love languages? Physical touch might be yours but maybe it’s not as high on her list. It brought a lot of context around needs and needing more and sometimes it’s going to take effort on her part to get in the mood. I started reading erotic romance books and phewwww say no more I was wanting to try everything I was reading haha (if she likes reading) and one last thing I will say, are you showing affection (hugging touching kisses holding hands- general physical touch) outside the bedroom? I realized I was only receiving it in the bedroom and it wasn’t a turn on. Just thoughts, wishing you the best!
Go read “Come As You Are” – it speaks to this.
Many people have psychological blocks that influence their arousal. If you can figure out if there are outside influences that may be impacting your gf you can work on eliminating them thus potentially increasing her interest in sex. Similarly, you can identify if certain behaviours or acts trigger or prompt sex and can try to replicate them in order to encourage the behaviour.
The mind works in weird ways.
Maybe some blockages. Communicate with her.
Antidepressants or some other medications takes a toll on the body.
Therapy and changing medications can help.
Maybe a medical issue. I’m BP2, ADHD and anxious as well as deficient on B12 and iron. Physical and mental health issues can take a huge toll on the body.
Asexuality is also a thing. People can be attracted emotionally but not see a need for sex.
Or she lost interest.
Reading Come As You Are by Emil Nagoski can give you a whole new view on types of desire, it sounds like the two of you have different kinds
*Learn to preheat the oven.* Nagoski’s book explains desire, but the key is not to try and initiate sex *before* she’s turned on. You wouldn’t put a frozen pizza in the oven at the same time as starting it, because its not going to cook correctly. Intimacy can be *fun* and playful. Kiss her, be playful, and be affectionate; but one of the best things is to just do it more in general, not just do it more *to start sex.* Kiss her, tease her, whatever, and then *walk away* or go back to what you were doing. If kissing/making out/cuddling/whatever *always* leads to aiming for sex, if she doesn’t immediately feel like having sex the moment you physically engage with her she may shut it down so she isn’t leading you on. For a lot of cis women (and other people, but the research here is more documented for cis men/women) desire is responsive. Randomly trying to initiate sex isn’t all that compatible with responsive desire, but initiating sex once you’ve been making out or teasing her playfully all day is entirely different than a cold approach because you’re giving her the time her body and mind actually need to get *interested* in sex
Also, if she is on a hormonal birth control that can flatline libido regardless of how much she likes or *wants to* want to have sex. In my experience, condoms and wanting to have sex daily/multiple times a week is a lot better than no condoms and feeling like sex was a chore and then feeling *bad* that I didn’t want to have sex with the partner I genuinely adored
No one so far has me too Ed that changes to things at work or elsewhere in life can do this. Once I was lucky enough to work from home (stated doing that in January after working onsite everyday since 2018) and my libido went up pretty much immediately.
Make a list of things that changed.
Also if you aren’t doing your fair share of chores (aka she seems tired a lot), then she isnt gonna be in the mood because her head is busy checking all of the chores in the house/apartment.
do you touch, tease her ? she might be one of those people who just dont think about sex but once stimulated, touched they get turned on.
Both my ex wife and current gf went through the same thing. It seems incredibly common.
This is very typical. If you aren’t happy then you may just have to stop seeing her. Because this is probably her natural level of libido.