The Agony of A Sexless Marriage is Real

Has your marriage become stale? Are you just going through domestic routines but looking like a happy couple to everyone else? Have you become more like friends than lovers? Are you wondering where your happy ever after went?

There’s no easy way to bring it up, so I’ll just come out and say it aloud. A sexless marriage sucks.

Yearning for skin-to-skin contact but receiving rejection each time we try to get some is soul-sucking. It’s crushing. And then there’s the guilt and self-loathing that follows… of pushing too much… of not pushing hard enough… of being stuck in a no-win cycle and having no way out, no way to fix it.

Some of us claim we were tricked into a sexless life after romps whittle away to a ‘No thanks’ or ‘Why do you pressure me all the time?’ A relationship can change slowly enough that neither partner names what is happening, until one day the distance feels permanent. Other couples seem to go from an active sex life to almost nothing in a short time. I’ve written about one such six-month relationship that turned sexless.

Let’s be fair to our partners. Health issues explain some sexual declines. An illness, any illness, could excuse a couple’s sex life to falter. Pain, medication, stress, exhaustion, ageing and changes in confidence can all affect desire. These things deserve care and honest conversation, not blame. But there are also those couples who have no illness at all. One day, the sex is gone. Vanished. There’s no real reason to explain it.

Searches on the Internet reveal such stories. Most fall into one of two categories.

1. A Clinical Approach To Sex and Sexual Desire
2. One Partner’s Viewpoint of A Disappointing Sex Life With An Unwilling Spouse

Professionals provide clinical statistics on sex. Counsellors, Doctors, and the like will quote numbers on sexual frequency and how intimacy fluctuates. Numbers turn to words when describing how to improve a couple’s lovemaking. Communication, patience, and understanding are said to help things return to normal again.

The second half of the search list returns a more sombre message. It comes from the hidden corners of the Internet, written by those feeling anguish and disappointment. It’s raw emotion, coated with pessimism. Authors aren’t looking for answers anymore—they just want to vent their frustration. There are also couples who say a marriage without sex can be happy, because both partners genuinely feel the same way about it. Their experience is real, too. It simply isn’t everyone’s experience. I’ve gathered some real stories about marriages lacking intimacy that show how differently people live through it.

Despite all the advice available, few articles answer the hardest question so many of us want to know: Why? Why did the marriage turn sexless in the first place?

The very next question we want answered is: How can I get back what was lost?

Sometimes the answer is that both people want to rebuild intimacy and need help finding a way back to each other. Sometimes one partner is willing to talk while the other refuses to acknowledge the problem. And sometimes the painful truth is that one person cannot repair a marriage alone. Being told to communicate better can sound almost insulting when you have tried to talk about it for years.

That doesn’t mean every marriage without sex is doomed, or that anyone owes their partner sex. It means that the hurt and frustration of the higher-desire partner are real, too. A person can love their spouse and still feel lonely, rejected and unsure how long they can continue. The question of whether someone should stay is personal; forcing a spouse to remain in a sexless marriage is unjust. There is no one tidy answer that fits every couple.

If you are living this now, perhaps start with what you actually need to know: can you both speak honestly about what has changed, and are you both willing to do something about it? If the answer is yes, that gives you somewhere to begin. If it is no, you may need to consider what staying is costing you. I’ve written more about what to do if you find yourself in a sexless marriage, and the wider discussion continues in my When the Bedroom Goes Quiet pillar.

Due to my interest in this area, I’ve collected the latest sexless marriage content being posted to the internet and stored it in a Flipboard Magazine called Sexless Marriages.

Flipboard is an app for phones. (Computers use it, too, but it’s more of a phone thing!) You can store content in Flipboard, discover stuff, create magazines, and share them with like-minded friends. Browse my magazine or read my novel today.

May your sexless existence end soon.

-M (Author of Dark Fiction, one novel with a sexless marriage)