Myself and my partner have been together for nearly 10 years. We have a great relationship overall but struggle to have regular sex. My libido has lowered in recent years but I still find my partner extremely attractive. We always find holidays a great reset where we have much more frequent sex and then vow to bring this frequency back to our daily lives but can never maintain it – I find the mundanity of the everyday difficult when it comes to feeling aroused and sexy like we would on holidays. We sometimes argue about the frequency of sex and find ourselves wondering what is “normal” for couples our age. Do you have any advice to help address this lull in our sex life?
First, please abandon the whole idea of what is “normal” for couples. It’s not useful. Some couples have a lot of sex, some couples (many more than is acknowledged) happily live in sexless but loving companionship, and most long-term couples go through phases where sex is not the priority or the frequency of sex goes down. One thing for sure is that self-judgment, shame or comparison has literally never helped anyone’s sex life – it merely heightens the negative emotions and sense of pressure around sex, which is not exactly an aphrodisiac.
What I think could be helpful is paying attention to what you already know about your desire and what arouses it. You mention that universally acknowledged magical experience of “holiday sex”, so let’s dive in to what that actually means. Eroticism feeds on new experiences, embodied connection, connection to yourself, emotional connection with your partner and seeing your partner anew – seeing them in a new place, seeing them engage with the world differently, or getting the time to talk to them and hear insights, thoughts and ideas you hadn’t heard from them before.
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On holidays you’re away from work stress and having new experiences with your partner in a new place. Often, you’re staying in a hotel where someone else is making the beds, doing the laundry, making the dinners and cleaning up the dishes. You’re having novel daytime experiences with your partner and evening meals where you get to have conversations that aren’t just about logistics, but yourselves, your emotions, your connection. You’re often walking or sunbathing or swimming and also getting some rest and lie-ins, so you’re feeling connected to your body. Even if the details change, the overall impact of a good holiday is the same: genuine rest, a break in routine, new shared experiences, positive bodily connection, reconnection with yourself, and quality time to reconnect with your partner. These are the ingredients for connection, arousal and desire.
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You know this. You know that the mundanity of daily life sends your desire crashing, so it would be helpful for you to think very specifically about what about holidays makes you feel great and desirable and desire-filled; what particular parts of the daily grind are the most depleting and desire-killing right now; and how you can start to bring elements of one into the other.
Is the division of household responsibilities equal, and if you are shouldering the burden of more than your fair share, could this be recalibrated? If there’s too much on your plate and no room for rest, it’s no surprise that your sex drive is low. Look at your responsibilities and enlist your partner as a team member as you try to tackle any issue there.
It’s also important to consider how you are feeling connected to yourself these days: are you engaging in hobbies, activities, work, friendships, vocations that make you feel alive and inspired outside of your relationship? If not, how can you start to? This could mean reconnecting with a hobby or activity that brings you joy, or trying new things to break out of the numbness of repetitive routine. If there’s any activity that helps you feel connected with your body, or makes you feel sexy, even better. Eroticism isn’t only about experiencing sexual energy with a partner, it’s about feeling connected to and excited by yourself, so start there.
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New experiences are also vital to work into your relationship. Desire feeds on what is novel and surprising, which can mean seeing your partner in a different context or having new experiences together. This could be as simple as going somewhere new for lunch or going to a gallery or play or comedy show if that’s not your usual activity. Or you could be more adventurous and commit to taking a longer-term art or dance class together, or invest in more travel, whether that’s daytrips, city-breaks or a big adventure where you make a lot of new, exciting memories. In fact, thinking about life in terms of intention and “making memories” can be a really helpful mindset, as it encourages you to be present, to stretch outside your comfort zone, and to think about the life you are building with your partner every day. Not every day can or has to be special or noteworthy, of course, but bringing some more presence and attention to life and making the effort to try new things can be really meaningful.
Presence, attention and effort also need to become priorities within your relationship. If the above travel or shared activities is difficult due to kids, finances, and so on, you need to carve out time in your day for each other – 20 minutes before going to sleep or early in the morning. For now, take sex off the table. Focus on holding each other, cuddling, kissing, massages – but agree not to try escalate it. When a relationship has one person whose libido is low, there can often be a pressure to turn any physical intimacy into sex – which can make the partner with low libido withdraw from any physical affection to avoid any possible escalation. This can cause more distance and be really damaging. So focus on creating intimacy without sex. Intentionally show each other physical affection, and emotional attention. Ask each other questions you’ve never asked each other before (the app Agapé or card decks from The School of Life or Esther Perel are lovely for this). Express gratitude for each other, so you’re paying attention to all the small things that you do for each other throughout the day.
If you want to focus on sex, focus on yourself first. This might sound counterintuitive, but sometimes desire is spontaneous, and sometimes it is responsive, so it responds to stimuli. If you’re in a state of responsive desire, a lot of things can feel like brakes on your desire – stress, the house not being clean, work anxiety, not feeling attractive. In this state you can address the root of the brakes and try to eliminate them, but you can also focus on tapping into the accelerators. For example, you might not feel any desire initially, but if you start making out or masturbating or using a sex toy, sexual desire can be ignited because you’ve put your foot on the accelerator. Please note: this is not a reason for a partner to pressure to you into foreplay or sex because “you will get into it” – you need to be free to explore on your own terms. Try masturbation or anything that makes you feel erotic. In time, it may help jump-start your desire for partnered sex.
Above all, stop putting pressure on yourself. You’re in a period of low desire. It happens to everyone at some stage. Focus on building connection and presence into your life and relationship, and feel the benefit of it. Regular sex isn’t the singular verdict of a healthy life and relationship – but it can be a wonderful ripple effect of it. Build a life and relationship that excites you, and desire will probably follow.
