Is this normal?

[tropicthunders]

Hi All,

Worried about my marriage. DH and I have been married for five years and have two young children of nursery age.

Life is busy. I work full time. He is self employed and can manage time a bit better, but looks after one of the kids twice a week(his choice).

I understand that it's normal at this time to get a bit disconnected and life being about routine and children. But recently, I have been really looking with in myself and asking if I feel attracted to my husband physically or if I feel love for him. I love him, in that he's a wonderful person and father. Great supportive husband. But I feel like I don't feel the desire of intimacy or the physical attraction.

To add to that I don't feel like he's attracted to me either in the way we used to.

Is this normal phase marriages go through when children are young?

I get really envious when I see people cuddling and kissing in that obviously attracted to each other and loved up way.

It's definitely pretty common yes. But I don't think you should accept it as 'okay'. There are things you can do about it if you want to.

How much time do you get for dates, or time when the kids are in bed and you are on the sofa/eating dinner/drinking tea and actually communicating (not each scrolling on your phones)?

I think it's definitely normal, yes. It's hard to feel sexy and attracted to anyone when you're exhausted and just ploughing through life to keep your head above water. Ours are school age now, so we are well away from the nursery age, and I'd say it's not that I'm not physically attracted to dh (I am) and I'm sure he's physically attracted to me, but life can easily get so focused on tasks and keeping everyone alive, that you don't have time for that. It takes actual effort to prioritise that - finding time in the day for each other, setting aside time for date nights, etc.

It was actually easier for us to find time for each other when our dc were younger. We could get a babysitter and put them to bed and go out for dinner. Now they're older and they don't go to bed until 10pm, so getting a babysitter is a different experience - she'd have to actually supervise bath time and bedtime, which I'm less comfortable with (older one could do herself, younger one still needs help and reminding). We don't have any family help - last time MIL watched them (with assistance from an auntie), my eldest stayed up til 11pm and the youngest was pretty much ignored and fell asleep on the floor in his sister's room, while MIL sat downstairs drinking wine.🙄 Now we don't get much time alone because when the kids are finally asleep around 10pm, we want to go to bed too, because we need sleep to function.

But yes, it's hard to feel sexy and attracted to anyone when you are tired and burnout. You can get it back, of course, but I think in any long-term relationship, things change over time and the intimacy is not going to be the same as when you were young and childfree and in the honeymoon phase, even though it can still be good. I think dh looks at BIL and his partner and feels like they have so much more sexual attraction and physically intimacy that us, but BIL and his partner have only been together 2 years, have no dc, very low stress jobs, only just moved in together a few months ago. It's a very different kind of relationship.

Can you set aside time together? If you can't go out, just spending time with each other is nice when you are otherwise ships passing in the night.