Dismal sex life

[boredbean]

Will preface this by saying despite this issue, I love my dh a lot. We have a young child and I'm not willing to break up the family over it so please no 'leave him' comments as it's not an option. But I need some advice about how to come to terms with it.

Sex life started off fine but after the honeymoon phase it rapidly dwindled. He claimed to have low testosterone/libido. About a year in I discovered Viagra in his stuff which he'd never told me about. He clearly has some ED issues but didn't want to tell me. I got the feeling he was quite embarrassed.

We have sex 1-2 times a month and it's always the same thing (not at all experimental). It also has to be pre planned (fair enough as we have a mix of toddlers and tweens roaming around. Plus he has to pop a pill). But I feel sometimes it's more out of a sense of duty than because he really wants to. He doesn't communicate about sex at all. After 8 years together he still seems closed off and almost embarrassed about talking about it which I find weird as I'm very open.

He is ten years older than me but he says he's always been this way. I don't have a massively high sex drive but at 40 I'm quite gutted at the prospect of this being it for my sex life. Mostly I can live with it but around ovulation I find myself getting really upset and frustrated about it all. And I can't talk to him about it as he just gets all weird and defensive. Sex has never felt natural or spontaneous, it's just going through the motions.

He did a favour for me and said jokingly that I'd have to pay him back somehow. I alluded to sex and he showed no enthusiasm but said he'd love a day at golf ffs. I listen to my friends talking about their active sex lives and feel pretty depressed and ashamed about mine.

I've accepted that things probably won't change but I do feel like I need to find a way of letting him know how it makes me feel (frustrated, disappointed, disillusioned and unattractive) and how to come to terms with the slow and premature demise of my sex life too. When we do it I enjoy it and he always finishes so I presume he does too. But it just feels like he could take it or leave it. I would love for him to initiate or just surprise me one day.

He probably can take it or leave it. That’s what a low sex drive is really. Never really have that huge urge to have sex that people with higher sex drives do.

Feel for you both here.

not an unreasonable expectation to have sex more than every 30 days, and equally not unreasonable to only want it every 30 days.

if you love him very much I’d be tempted to try and ride it out because there is a very strong chance you might be less interested in sex post menopause. Like night and day for me and I also had that age gap ovulation madness at your age.

has he ever had a completely rampant sex lid do you know or has it always been a bit of an afterthought?

Sex *drive not lid ;)

Ps please never, never allude to sex as a favour: it’s really grim even if in jest and … yeah, just the biggest turn off. It makes sex transactional which is awful.

I think the key here will be communication - you really need to learn to talk to each other about how you feel. It sounds like that's really difficult for him (possibly also you), but it's going to be the way to get to a happier place in the end I think - even if it doesn't result in more frequent sex!

If you cannot discuss it and get to a point where a you are misaligned, and you won’t leave, then there is much that can be done.

I stayed in such a relationship too long. If I had a Time Machine, I would tell my younger self to be brave and leave. It is too important to settle for something that you will later resent

Would he prepared to go to counselling op?

Can you explain to him very gently how you are feeling using "I" statements?

If he is not feeling it that's one thing, but to completely shut you out and not speak about it, is not on in a committed relationship. It's 2025 ffs, there's nothing to be embarrassed about. And you have a right to know if his ED is due to a health issue or not.

I'd get a babysitter for the weekend and try and spend some time alone with your DH and go for walks, and drives, and have some private dinners and really try and talk to him properly.

Sounds tough op. I had to guide DH quite a bit when we first got together as he was a 27 year old lightly prudish virgin. I wasn’t- A virgin that is or prudish

I do have a higher sex drive and at the moment with other issues we have sex about one a week which is fine and we both enjoy it. The main thing is to keep talking to him. DH certainly got better and he said a lot of it was performance anxiety that I was comparing him to other men.

also just a general thing

Why is this always reported that men want sex all the time and women quite often don’t. I have seen so many threads on this saying the husband doesn’t want sex but the wife does.

He is very loving and tactile in other ways. He's just never seemed especially interested in sex, except maybe for the first month or so we were together. With ex partners it was spontaneous and seemed to happen naturally. With him it feels like it requires so much forward planning and like he isn't that bothered anyway.

If I've brought it up in the past and said I don't feel like he's really interested in me he will say 'of course I am' but actions speak louder than words.

OP your partner isn't very sexual. There could be any number of reasons such as trauma, asexuality, low testosterone (or other medical reasons) or even being gay.

You can't change him and I certainly wouldn't be interested in having perfunctory sex with an indifferent partner.

I would buy yourself a range of decent sex toys and some lube.

Anti depressants suppress libido or ask if he will allow you to get sex elsewhere. There are good sex toys as well.

Well if you won't leave and he won't change there really doesn't seem to be a solution. And I suppose a fling/affair wouldn't be a great idea.

I have lived through this for 28 years, sex dwindled to nothing for the last 8 years, a couple of times a year prior to that, and it was mostly unsatisfactory. I felt like a surrogate, used to produce three healthy children then my job was done.

I became a husk of my previous self. I felt unattractive, I did everything I could to make him want me. He had ED issues, had prescription after prescription, which would literally be left unopened until they were years out of date. I was convinced that I was the most unattractive woman on earth. This has seriously affected my self esteem, actually my whole life.
Then I woke up and realised this was not how I could live anymore. It was far too late, I now face an older age in, if not poverty, then certainly poorer than it could have been. Probably unable to fund a car or go on holidays, despite working hard my whole life.
If it it’s important to you now, do something about it. Don’t be me.

@DoNotAdjustYourSex really sorry to hear that. Thankfully we are not there yet, once a month is the minimum and mostly I'm ok with that compromise. It's just the lack of communication or spontaneity that gets me.

My youngest dc is only a toddler and it's not important enough to me to break up her family at this time over this one issue. But equally I don't want things to decline further or it's going to become very depressing.

I’m sorry to be blunt but there is no compromise. Being made to have sex out of duty is a relationship killer and if someone doesn’t feel it, they don’t feel it. It doesn’t matter how you jazz it up with therapy and pills.

You say you don’t want to leave but this is it. Either accept that this is the position and you’ll have to sort yourself out when you’re frustrated or don’t. A third option is to go outside the marriage but that’s a minefield.

This is a bit random but there are natural substances that really can increase a man's sex drive and erections. Maca is one of them and is found in some energy supplements. Holland and Barrett used to sell a product called Horney goat weed (seriously). Why not suggest trying something like this as an energy booster or as a last resort..make him a smoothie with it he wont even know its in there 😀

Similar situation here so just offering my solidarity with you. There’s no point initiating anything as there’s only a 1 in 30 chance of success, so it’s soul-destroying. I noted to myself the other day that there was only a 6 month window in my life (now 49) where I ever had sex with anyone other than my partner, it was before we met. Just twice. So it feels a bit sad that this is “it”.

Better the devil you know.
It's a horrible world out there. They might be a man who can shag you senseless but will he be a nice person too and someone you can get on with and trust too.

I doubt you will find everything you want in one man, hardly anyone does.
I'd stick with him if everything else is OK.
Sex isn't everything.
A kind and caring man who treats you well and dosent have any horrible vices is worth his weight in gold.