I seem to lose sexual attraction after 5 years and I don’t know why

[suchaclassic]

Since I’ve been having relationships I have had a very clear time limit on my sexual attraction to partners. It’s embarrassing to talk about but now I’ve reached the age of 40 I see the pattern. After about five years I start to not be able to find my partner sexually attractive and have to break up with them. I have been in relationships longer than five years (when I had DC) but post that 5 year mark the relationships have become very hard to maintain sexually and attraction-wise.

does anyone else have this?

I have been trying to think about why I am like this and I actually think it’s an attachment problem. I have co-dependent tendencies and at the beginning (first 1-2 years) of relationships I try and be the “perfect” partner, contorting myself into a pretzel and neglecting my own needs and desires. I unconsciously do this and somehow convince myself that I like the things they like and have lots in common with them. I am overly financially and emotionally supportive of my partners and completely lose my own identity. The sexual attraction on my side is strong because I have a strong need to be needed by them. As the years go by, something unconsciously inside me starts to resent neglecting my own needs (even though I’ve caused it myself) and I start losing attraction and resenting my partner. I then pull back and often leave my partner feeling blindsided. I don’t want to be like this but it feels like it is all happening unconsciously.

is this a familiar pattern for anyone else?

I know it’s toxic. I just don’t know how to not do it

Completely normal. If anything five years is quite long. Evolutionarily it makes sense, feeling "in love" keeps a couple together for about two years. Enough time to conceive, have a pregnancy and protect the baby through the newborn stage. After that, there's not much additional advantage to staying together.

We are great apes after all. Evolution doesn't really know or care that it's inconvenient to share custody or go on dating apps.

Not sure why many people don't know this. I always see threads on here of people that seem genuinely confused or think there is something unusual wrong with them - "why aren't I attracted to my partner of 20 years?". Errr you aren't supposed to be, are you?

Do you.'need' to be in an exclusive relationship?

I went into therapy after dh died and told her basically I needed her to hold my hand and stop me getting into another relationship too soon. Obviously that's not exactly how it worked but near enough! You have worked out the pattern but it would still be helpful to have an experienced therapist help you navigate and sanity-check your responses.

If you do want connection in some form, try some casual stuff or have a look on Feeld or similar for people interested in ethical non-monogamy. Or just be single for a while.