My boyfriend and I have been together for a year, and we always had a great sex life, but recently during the coronavirus pandemic, in which we have been together 24/7 for three months, he has stopped wanting to have sex with me altogether. We first developed problems a few months ago, a time when we were having sex several times a week, sometimes twice a day, when he said he was feeling rejected, and accused me of making up excuses not to have sex with him. I get that he was trying to bring up a genuine feeling, and I reacted badly and made it all about me, I could not believe he was complaining, and accusing me of lying to get out of it, and felt I wasn't good enough or he was accusing me of being frigid, at a time when we were having loads of sex and I didn't think there was any problem.
After a few arguments about this, I realised part of the problem was that he felt I never initiated it, which is true. I just never saw it. I kind of felt him reaching for me and me reacting immediately made it more of a dual effort. 99% of the time I am ready to go and super into it, but especially because we were having so much sex, if a few days passed and we didn't, I never minded, I just assumed if he wanted it he would initiate, and he began feeling I wasn't interested and became insecure.
So by the time I understood I needed to try to initiate more, which is not easy for me, as I usually don't feel spontaneous desire, we had been arguing over a myriad other things in our relationship during lockdown, and he suddenly showed no interest. It has been almost three weeks now and no sex.
I understand we need to reduce a bit of the conflict and pressure, and I tried saying, let's focus on other acts of intimacy, like kissing or massage, and he agreed, but he will only walk up and kiss me in quite a chaste manner, and I have tried in so many ways to say I miss long kisses, and how I think it is really nice when couples kiss outside of sex and not only as a way into sex. But he just doesn't seem into trying to find a solution and day by day I grow more panicked and anxious about it.
Maybe it is the situation, the stress from the virus, and some communication problems, but I am panicking he has lost his desire for me completely (he insists he has not but there is no evidence of it). Any advice much appreciated.
Oh dear. This feels to me like there’s lots of ‘should’ and oughts’ going on here. No wonder things seem to have become stuck.
I can see why you might have felt peeved by him saying he felt rejected. Given that there was loads of sex going on, I’m sure everything seemed fine, so hearing he’s not happy must have been very disappointing and baffling, to say the least. I can also imagine that you might have asked the ‘what more could I possibly do’ question, so it’s just as well he’s been able to say he’d like you initiate sometimes. Well, nothing wrong with that request. But what about your request? You’ve asked for ‘intimacy’ rather than ‘just’ sex sometimes and it seems that he’s finding that suggestion rather difficult to take on board, so let’s think through what all this might be about…
There are so many myths ‘out there’ about sex. They’re everywhere. Sometimes they can be very influential to the point that people start doubting whether what they do together actually meets the required ‘standard’. By this, I mean that people compare themselves, their bodies and goodness knows what else with what they read, hear and watch and sometimes end up with feeling things aren’t right when in fact, they’re probably absolutely fine. Whether it's stuff about multi orgasms, ‘staying power’, how much sex you 'should' be having etc, etc, etc. All these things deflect from focusing on what’s right for us as individuals and as couples. For some, sex half a dozen times a year feels totally fulfilling in the same way that sexual experience several times a day meets the needs of others. Really – good sex is all about working out what’s right for each of you together, regardless of what the rest of the world might be up to.
Lots of people don’t give sex a second thought from one day to the next. But when they’re approached by a partner they feel attracted to and safe with, they respond easily and really enjoy it. Other people though, spend most of every waking moment thinking about sex and finding or initiating opportunities to engage sexually with their partner. Both of these are entirely normal – as is everything in between. It sounds like both of you felt able and willing to engage sexually so that’s a positive thing because often, problems with sex are to do with miss-matched levels of need. However in your case, it sounds like you were both getting as much as you wanted, providing he always initiated – which is what he’s complaining about now.
I think the basic problem is that you’re both working on assumptions. He assumes that you should sometimes take the lead, but never bothered to share this thought with you previously - and you assumed he was happy with you not doing so, because you always responded when he made the first move - but didn’t check this out with him. And of course, now that the conversation has become tricky, he’s decided to find it difficult to hear that you perhaps need to not always focus on just the intercourse. This is a common problem for some relationships, where the unacknowledged but powerful message between the partners is that it’s not ‘proper’ sex unless it involves some sort of penetration or specific ‘routine’. Now, when you’ve tried to make some suggestions about a softer version, it seems he’s wanting to make the point that - whilst he’s heard what you say - he’s still blaming things on the lack of initiation. So somewhere in all this, each of you needs to do something different…
First off, he needs to stop calling you frigid. This is an old, abusive and very stupid criticism that is often applied to women and implies that unless you want to have sex exactly as a partner dictates, then there’s something wrong with you, when there so obviously isn’t. Second, he need to properly hear that you would like to focus on other sexual pleasures sometimes. Perhaps, as many couples do, what happens between you always follows a similar pattern, again, often as a result of each partner making assumptions. So being prepared to make some changes and play differently might really help. Third, you tell me that you don’t experience spontaneous sexual desire. Well, as I’ve said, lots of people would identify with this. But curiously, that doesn’t mean you can’t let him know you want him sexually by making a move. Some people do find it difficult to be the first to initiate and that’s sometimes because of the messages they’ve grown up with. There are hundreds of very negative messages such as ‘I’ll be rejected', 'I’ll look silly', 'I don’t know what to do', and 'nice people don’t’ and so on. Sometimes though, just having a go at initiating and seeing what it feels like, can help us to change thoughts and feelings we may have previously had about doing this. And by practicing this initiating, it can start to help you think more about initiating in general, and perhaps becoming more comfortable with it.
But of course, there's the whole lockdown issue. Lockdown has impacted on so many relationships. Not being able to create a natural space to 'cool down and calm down' can be really difficult. If you think about it, getting out, meeting friends or just drifting round a supermarket are all ways that any of us might use to recalibrate before going home. All of this is likely to have brought everything in your relationship to a head, so the rows and anxiety you describe are really not surprising.
Hopefully, as lockdown eases, we’ll all have the chance to work out what the new normal looks like. That might mean some difficult conversations as well as acknowledging how well we’ve coped. It’s just possible that had you not been living under lockdown conditions, the problems with sex might never have emerged and you’d both have continued working on assumptions. Now you both know what you know, there's a real chance to start a better conversation about sex. I think you both have to stand back, sit down together and talk. I don’t think he’s lost desire for you. I think what happened is that each of you is trying to get the other to see how important your respective distress feels. So on transmit, rather than listening. There's a load of self-help resources out there about how to talk together differently, resolve rows and move forward – have a look online.
The key thing is the recognition that you each need to do something different. That’s always the major hurdle. Once over that, so much else is possible.
Ammanda Major is a sex and relationship therapist and our Head of Service Quality and Clinical Practice
If you have a relationship worry you would like some help with send a message to Ammanda.
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