Perhaps it’s always been the case, but only now you are getting bothered by it.
Or perhaps it’s a new situation you are dealing with.
It’s common for couples to have different levels of desire and arousal.
In any case, and your and your partner’s gender doesn’t matter, the situation can be tricky.
In this article, I will not try to explain the reasons why your partner wants less sex than you do. Instead, I will look at three issues that you’re dealing with. They are all interconnected, but I’ll inquire into them separately:
Sexual urges.
We all have sexual needs and most of us want to have sex. But the frequency we feel these urges could be completely different. Some people feel like having sex once every few months, others feel like having sex once a week, and some want to have sex twice a day. It’s all normal and all healthy.
Before we continue on this point, I want to make sure that you understand that desire, for many people, does not arise all by itself. A big proportion of the population seems to have what is described as responsive desire, which arises only after the sex session started. So if your partner doesn’t want to have sex but then changes their mind once “the party has started”, then there’s a good chance you’re not mismatched on the frequency all that much. Just be aware that their pattern of arousal is different from yours, and work around that. I wrote a little about this issue here.
If your partner truly does not want to have sex and they won’t get in the mood even when you do your thing just to turn them on — then keep on reading.
It might seem impossible to bridge the gap if one partner thinks sex once every three months is ideal, and the other wants to have it a few times a day. What I want you to recognize here is that your partner is not your sex doll. They do not owe you anything simply because you are partnered. And understanding that you can’t expect them to like something that they don’t like will make it easier for you.
In order to satisfy your sexual needs, you can enjoy amazing solo sex sessions. True, it’s much nicer to practice with your loved one, but if they’re not available, solo sex can be truly fulfilling when you do it the right way.
Solo sex cannot compensate for the lack of human intimacy, though. Which brings me to the second thing that might be bothering you:
Physical affection.
We often come across the importance of touch to our wellbeing. Yet for many of us, sex is one of the only times we touch each other. We learn to associate sex with affection. And when we don’t have sex, we’re missing that human touch as well.
If you’re frustrated because you want to have sex more often, try touching your partner without sex. Regularly. Many times, if your partner is not interested in having sex, they would still appreciate a long cuddle and an affectionate kiss. If they still push you away, let them know you are not after sex. Tell them you only want to feel their closeness. And make sure you respect the no-sex boundary 100%.
If your partner repeatedly declines your advances for intimacy, you might feel less and less inclined to seek for it again.
This is the third issue I’ll address:
Being rejected.
It is understandable that your partner will reject you every now and then. And vice versa.
But if this has been going on for a while, you might want to look at it. Intellectually, you know that you can’t blame them for not wanting to have sex every time that you do. They have their reasons, even if you or they are not totally clear on them. But let us assume that you’re completely on board with their reason/s: you might still end up resenting them for rejecting you over and over again.
Feeling rejected can bring up lots of other emotions within you. Resentment is only one of them. You might feel anger, loneliness, disconnection, betrayed, depressed. There are many emotional reactions you could be experiencing, plus any combination of these. These emotions are a natural response to rejection. And this is where I would like to share with you my favorite way of dealing with emotions: The Sedona Method.
It’s a very brief overview of how to deal with emotions (any emotion, BTW), Sedona Method style. And if you like to dive deeper you can always jump on their website and learn more.
The Sedona Method — a brief overview:
- Allow yourself to feel everything that is associated with the specific emotion: bodily sensations, thought patterns, memories, counter emotions, etc.
- Ask yourself: am I capable of releasing this emotion?
- Invite yourself to release it. Just see if you even want to release it, or perhaps you’d rather keep on holding onto it. Whatever it is, it’s completely fine.
- Ask yourself when the release will happen. Again, even saying “never” is a totally legitimate answer.
Repeat this process until you don’t feel that emotion any longer. And repeat the entire method every time an emotion pops up again.
One exception to the rule.
Basically, there’s not much you can do to make your partner want to have sex more often. The exception is if they actually want to have sex, but don’t like to have sex with you, specifically. This is not just a frequency mismatch. This could be because you enjoy different things in bed. Or they might be an underlying, non-sex-related issue that affects their attraction to you.
If you suspect that’s the case, then there is definitely something you can do to make the frequency more to your liking. Go and see a sex and/or a couples therapist that can help resolve whatever it is that is clouding your relationship. You’ll end up having a much better relationship and enjoy a frequency of sex that suits you both.
