I don’t want to have sex

[zaaaaara]

Is this normal? Bit of background, 26, 2 young kids (2y9mo and 7mo)

married to a man I love and I do find him attractive but I just don’t want to have sec. And it’s not him I don’t have desire really in general( sometimes short bursts but not enough for me to want to do the deed

I feel quite repulsed by myself and just don’t feel sexual. My body is so different and I don’t have any confidence I don’t like my new body and ironically it’s not that I’ve gained weight, I’ve lost weight after my kids I have no boobs because of breastfeeding and lost the ass I have and I’m kind of tall so jus look awful and ‘lanky’

im also exhausted which probably doesn’t help. Our youngest hasn’t been the best sleeper

is this normal? I haven’t had sex with my husband in a year and we got married this year. I just don’t want to someone gave me free time away from my kids (I.e my parents babysitting) I’d just want to nap or catch up on jobs as sad as that sounds😭

Not a single person has said that

So if she doesn’t have sex he’ll cheat lovely so isn’t that lying back and thinking of England to stop the cheating cos that isn’t enthusiastic consent.

not all men cheat

talk to your husband about your issues cos I’ll bet he won’t see what you see. @zaaaaara a Frank talk.

What kind of guy wants to fuck his wife despite knowing that she'd rather not?

What you're experiencing is completely normal. Dont be ashamed or push yourself to have sex you dont want or are uncomfortable with. It will only enhance your negative feelings towards yourself and may cause underlying resentment between the both of you.

I had similar after a traumatic birth and recovery with dc1. We had sex twice in just over 2 years.

Once, I felt comfortable enough to speak to him about how exhausted I was and how much I hated my body. He spent that evening just holding me and reaffirming that he loved me and found me sexy because I'm me, and that was all he needed.

He was hands-on but similar to your H. He began giving me lie ins and time for a long soak in the bath once or twice a week and would take the baby out to do shopping or whatever so I could have time to myself. In no time at all, I was ready and feeling secure enough to have sex again.

Second baby and right from the off, he was making sure I had time to myself, and I didn't ever pressured into having sex. 8 wks pp, and we were having sex again. It's nowhere near as frequent as we now have a toddler who still wakes in the night, but at the very least, we have sex 3 x plus a month. Which is nowhere near our normal, but it's what we can manage, and for now, we're both content with that.

Try having a conversation with him when you're ready to.

I hope you feel more yourself soon. I won't patronise you and tell what amazing thing your body has done by having kids. Amd to embrace it. It's OK to feel let down by the whole pregnancy and birth aspect.

Maybe that stance makes you feel more comfortable, but, while there is a difference, I'd put them on a sliding scale.

If you're doing something/allowing something to happen to you when you really don't want it because of pressure or fear of the consequences of not doing so, you aren't really "consenting" are you? You're yielding/submitting, at best. Doesn't meet my standards for consent...

A hell of a lot, evidently. And therein lies the uncomfortable truth about the reality of many men and heterosexual relationships...

Not in so many words, no. But that's the general idea.

It's perfectly normal not to want to have sex after giving birth. Everyone is different true, but from my own personal point of view I was Mum, homework tutor and clubs courier, cleaner, cook, maid, family organiser, skivvy. My then DH went to work, came home played with the kids if they were still up but often they were in bed before he got home from work, so he had dinner, relaxed while I caught up on the cleaning etc and wanted sex. Now I dunno about anyone else but after caring for 3 children from 7 - 7 and temper tantrums, tears, nappies, pees n poos, school runs, homework, and all else the last thing I wanted was sex. Not his fault, not my fault either to be fair, and then he got handsy and resentful and pressured me, which meant I withdrew even further. It got to a point I would even avoid a hug or a kiss as I knew it started him off, we ended up divorcing a few years later without ever having resolved the issue. I do feels mums need time and space to be mums, its very hard to be all things to all people at once. For men a lot of things stay the same when kids come along, but for mums there is so much change in their lives. Maybe we need to have the kids and enter a female only commune for 5 years lol

It's normal, my kids 2.4 years old and we've only really just started having sex again, it's gonna take time for you to feel that way again xxx

I think it’s normal. It’s a combination of tiredness and having little hands pulling at you all day. It’s understandable to not want further physical contact on top of that even if it is a different kind. However, me personally and fully accept others may think I’m wrong but I make the effort albeit nowhere near as much as dh would like because I do love him and find him attractive. I also think men’s emotional needs are tied up with sex so I ask myself how I would feel if I asked dh for a hug and he said no. It’s the same kind of thing. Plus I do find that when we do have sex I do enjoy it even if I didn’t feel much like it initially

It's so so normal! I am BF my one year old and it totally suppresses my sex drive but also parenting is just exhausting when they're small. For us, I often do 'other stuff' for my DH, instead, though he never asks me to. But it makes me feel better about rarely fancying sex at the moment. I don't care that much, it's such a short time while I'll be breastfeeding in the grand scheme of things, and my DH is very chilled about it.

...after a year if you value your relationship you should work on intimacy,...

Well pop into his office when he's WFH and give him a handy. He'd love that.

I don't crave it or want it, just gets to the stage where I think oh it's been a while we better get it done. Like a chore around the house. There is nothing adventurous about it. Same missionary, him on top, over quite quickly. To my relief.

...there is an element of lying there for a bit til your reaction kicks in. [About as close as you could get to saying "lie back and think of England" without actually saying it.]

Where most married couples I know admit it's a bit of a chore and infrequent! (Probably more so the wives ,granted )

Yikes and yuck.😨The amount of women describing sex as a "chore", i.e., something one does not like/want but has to do is YIKES.

Sex shouldn't be a chore or something a man does to a (unwilling) woman. It should be something two people do together because they both want to.

This does correlate with a study I posted on here recently which found that 50% of a sample of young men admitted to having ever had sex with a woman they knew was unwilling, and 25% in the last year: www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3262661/

Tbh this is normal for some people especially with young children

I also think men’s emotional needs are tied up with sex so I ask myself how I would feel if I asked dh for a hug and he said no. It’s the same kind of thing

I'm sorry but that is nonsense, and sounds like the kind of thing a manipulative man would say to pressure a woman to have sex with him!

Hugging someone and letting someone penetrate a vulnerable part of your body are in no way equivalent.

Not all men. I’m at man, been without sex for a year in the past, and it has been very irregular (months in between) for years, and I’ve never cheated.

I’m definitely not a man. Promise! I get what you mean but men do seem to get really wounded over this kind of thing. It’s difficult for both parties though.

I Read a great phrase on here recently along the lines of
‘Lots of chores equal dropped drawers’

men who pull their weight are sexy. As their wives have a bit of space to feel like people again.

also I bet you are gorgeous, spent time on yourself to get yourself comfortable in your own skin again, for you .

this is not a you problem, it’s a time and husband problem.

You’ve gone though a lot, 2 babies in 2.5 years, it’s worth getting your bloods done, iron, b and thyroid.
Your husband maybe being shit and could do better, and it does just take time to physically and mentally get over pregnant and childbirth, but it’s also worth checking that there isn’t something else going on - it’s really quite common to have some sort of imbalance pp.
My thyroid went and I felt awful and everyone (including the GP) just said you've got a baby, of course you feel tired and awful 🙄

I felt like this for YEARS, until the NHS ran out of my pill contraceptive and I had no choice but to come off the pill...and fuck, turns out I'm not asexual as I thought all my life.

I think have an open discussion with him about how you feel. I doubt he feels that way at all about your body. Sounds like your self esteem has taken a knock, which is normal for the stage of life you're in. Some things just take more of a back seat for a while.

Maybe you need him to regularly start doing more or schedule some time for yourself to do something you enjoy at least once per week. I think you need to take care of yourself a bit first so that your headspace is a bit better, and then maybe things will slowly get back on track when you're ready.

Your body is probably so exhausted that it's putting you off sex deliberately as it knows it wouldn't be able to carry another pregnancy quite yet as it's doing enough already!

There's no rush.

By the way, men don't see our bodies the way we do. We see bumps, stretch marks, floppy bits, loss of muscle tone, a saggy arse.......and they don't see ANY of that.
It's weird.
It's like they genuinely don't notice.
Like they see an airbrushed version of us!

They are just happy to be loved by us. They don't care that one boob is bigger than the other or that we fart in our sleep....

Ah we're allowed to generalise about heterosexuals then I see ?

I'm really noticing this theme emerge now, upping of "men" generalising (and hatred quite frankly ) and now ok to sling negative assumption to the group of "heterosexuals".

I said "many heterosexual relationships", and I stand by what I said completely. There's plenty of evidence in this thread alone.

Would you feel comfortable coming out with a statement like "many gay men are promiscuous" and "there in lies the uncomfortable truth about gay relationships?"