Mismatched desire in a coupleMy husband wants sex more than I do: why and what to do

Why does my husband want sex more than I do?

The difference is not that he has fewer problems, but that his problems have an end. He fixed the car, finished his shift, came home and exhaled. Your list never ends: you have cooked dinner and are already thinking about breakfast, you have started the washing and know there will be a new load tomorrow.

Women come to me with this question all the time, and it sounds almost the same every time: “We both have plenty on our plates, but he wants it every evening and I don’t. What is wrong with me?” My answer: nothing is wrong with you, you live in different modes. He finished his tasks three hours ago and switched over. All day you have been running a control room in your head: who to drop off where, what to buy, who is ill with what, what to hand in at school. That control room has no off switch, and at half past ten, when he says “so, sex?”, it is still running.

The difference is not in the number of problems at all, but in the fact that his problems have an end.

The psyche cannot change gear in a minute. If all day you have been thinking about everyone except yourself, you will not turn into a sultry woman on the strength of one sentence. There is no magic pill here, but there is an understanding of how your desire works, and it explains almost everything.

Is something wrong with me? What is it called when you don’t want sex

No, there is no diagnosis here. Reduced desire counts as a disorder in ICD-11 and DSM-5 only when it causes distress to you yourself, not when you want sex less often than your husband.

Neural networks and forums bring up “hypoactive sexual desire disorder” the moment a woman writes “I don’t want to”. But there is only one criterion there: distress. If you yourself are tormented by not wanting sex, and it has gone on for months, you have the right to help. If the only thing that bothers you is that your husband wants it more often, this is about a difference in desire within the couple, and that is a different story. I go through it in the section for couples and in my course “Sexual Compatibility in a Couple” (the course is in Russian and Ukrainian): there is a lesson “Who in the couple wants more” and a test for your sexual constitution, so you can stop fighting over how often you have sex.

A separate question that arrives in almost every second letter: at what age does a woman stop wanting sex? At no age. Desire changes its form after childbirth, with age and in menopause, but it has no off switch tied to your date of birth.

Spontaneous and responsive desire: the “bang” and appetite that comes with eating

There are two types of desire. Spontaneous is the “bang”: you were walking along and suddenly wanted it. Responsive switches on in response to touch, when intimacy has already begun, and it is the main one in long relationships.

Spontaneous desire is what the movies show us: the heroes save the planet, their eyes meet, and thirty seconds later they are together. In real life it lives at the start of a relationship, on holiday and on those rare days when the control room in your head is switched off. The longer you are together, the rarer the “bang” and the more often appetite comes with eating. This model was described by Rosemary Basson in 2000, and Bancroft and Janssen added the “accelerator and brake” to it the same year. Both models are explained in detail on the page about responsive desire.

In men the spontaneous type works more often: he saw a picture, had a thought, the body reacted. He has many times more testosterone, and it affects the frequency of spontaneous impulses. That does not mean men do not lose desire: they lose it too, from stress, burnout and resentment. In women the entry threshold is higher; the body needs conditions.

And here is the trap. Responsive desire will not switch on while the body is on high alert. Has the child woken up, are the dishes done, what needs handing in tomorrow. In that mode you cannot relax, and without relaxation there is no responsive desire. So “I don’t want to” most often means one thing: you haven’t had time to leave the mode, and he has.

What happens if I don’t have sex with my husband?

Nothing will happen to the body: abstinence does not cause illness, hormonal imbalance or “stagnation”. But something will happen to the couple if you stay silent about the difference in desire.

Google shows this question in every search result on the topic, and the answers there are frightening. Let me go through them point by point.

What the internet says	What is actually known
Abstinence gives a woman illnesses and hormonal imbalance	Abstinence has no medical consequences. Hormones follow the cycle, not the frequency of sex
A woman is “supposed to” have sex a certain number of times a week	There is no norm. Muise and colleagues (2016, 30,645 participants) found that well-being rises up to a frequency of about once a week and does not rise further
If you don’t give it to him, he will go to another woman	Cheating is a person’s choice, not an automatic consequence of infrequent sex. But the distance in a couple grows if the difference is not talked about
Long abstinence can be seen from signs: irritability, insomnia	There are no such signs. Irritability more often comes from lack of sleep and overload, that is, the same things that dampen desire

What really happens without sex: hugs, kisses and whispers in the ear disappear, and what is left is a shared household. That is the loss, not the number of sexual acts. If there is no sex right now but there is tenderness, the couple is fine. If there is no tenderness either, the conversation is needed today. I have written separately about how this gap opens up especially fast after childbirth.

How often does a woman need sex, and how often do couples have sex on average?

There is no norm: as often as you and he want, if both of you are satisfied. The population averages are around once a week, and they do not oblige you to anything.

Twenge, Sherman and Wells calculated in 2017 that American adults have sex a little over fifty times a year on average, and the frequency has been declining since the nineties. The British Natsal-3 shows the same trend. Neural networks turn this into “spouses should do it 54 times a year”, but the sample there is all adults, not couples, and the researchers never wrote the word “should”.

Far more useful than the numbers is one question: when was the last time it was good for both of us? If the answer comes easily, the frequency will catch up. If it is hard to remember, frequency is not the main problem.

Put up with it or say no: why forcing yourself through sex makes things worse

The third layer nobody talks about: if for years you put up with sex that is no fun, the body remembers it and answers in advance, “why do we need this circus”. An honest no is better than pretending.

Dry, unpleasant, you feel nothing, you fake pleasure, you wait for him to finish. Every time like that, the brain records: sex is work. Then you wonder why even responsive desire does not switch on, although your husband is gentle and does not rush you. I see this in consultations all the time, and it takes longer to repair than tiredness.

That is why “giving in so as not to hurt him” works against you both. How to say “not tonight” without a war and without guilt, I go through on the page how to tell your husband you don’t want sex. And if sex is sometimes painful or dry, that is a question for a gynaecologist and a sexologist, not for endurance: the causes are collected in a separate article about pain during sex.

What to do if your husband wants sex more often: seven steps

The repair has to happen on three levels at once: head, body, state. Candles and new lingerie help for an evening and then everything slides back, because they cover one level out of three.

You have already tried: taken baths, bought lingerie, gone to the spa. And everything went back to how it was, because only one thing changed. Here is what I do with women who come to me with this request.

1. Stop comparing your starting conditions. He is not an animal, and you are not cold. You are built differently and live in different modes. Every conversation starts from this thought.
2. Agree on touch without obligations. Hugs and kisses during the day do not automatically lead to sex. Without this agreement you will start avoiding hugs too.
3. Set aside time for yourself to leave the mode. Twenty minutes in the evening when nobody touches you and nobody asks you for anything. This is the condition without which responsive desire does not switch on.
4. Hand part of the control room over to him. Not “help me” but “this is yours”: dinner on Tuesdays, school, the doctor’s appointment. The head frees up when the task has left it completely.
5. Tell him about the two types of desire. Many husbands are convinced that foreplay begins with their erection. Explain that it begins in the morning, with tenderness that demands nothing.
6. Start from a neutral state if you want warmth, and listen to your body. If arousal comes, carry on. If it doesn’t, stop without guilt.
7. Don’t wait for the children to grow up and the chores to end. They will not end, and the mode will have time to become a habit of the body.

If explaining it yourself feels awkward, my intensive “An Honest Manual for Men and Women” (the intensive is in Russian and Ukrainian) has a separate lesson, “Don’t make her”: how not to fight over how often you have sex, three tips and one recommendation. You don’t say it directly, you simply play him the recording.

I have gone through this topic out loud: first why he wants it 24/7 and you don’t, then why nothing works when done separately. If listening suits you better than reading, start with the first one.

When mismatched desire is a reason to see a sexologist

If conversations have not helped for three months or longer, if his touch hurts or disgusts you, or if every refusal turns into a fight, it is time to see a specialist. Preferably together.

In a couples consultation I look not at the symptom “she doesn’t want it” but at the system: what is going on with her body, with her head, with her state, and what he is doing at the same time. A woman who comes alone often takes home an assignment for two, and that works as well. You can book on the page sexologist online. And if right now you would first like to understand what is going on with you, start with the page I don’t want my husband: why and what to do.