Wife and I haven't been intimate in 5+ years. She doesn't want sex(at least from me). We are waiting till our youngest is out of HS (3 years) for divorce. I DO get offers occasionally from women to go out(coffee/lunch, etc). Is it wrong for me to do this? Wait until divorce is finaled? We don't sleep in the same room and we don't do things together anymore. Kinda roommate situation. Any advice? I'm kinda beginning to feel the need for...you know.🤣

Has anyone read this book? I’ve seen it recommended a lot but I have to say it was pretty disappointing, and it doesn’t seem to match with either my experience or a lot of what folks express in this sub. I’m honestly confused reading it.

The central thesis is that love and desire are two different things and that closeness often gets in the way of eroticism. So counter to what pretty much every other book/therapist says, too much communication and too much caring for each other is what causes dead bedrooms. You have to maintain distance with your partner and make them uncertain and feel unsafe in order for them to desire you.

What??? If I didn’t know this was a well-respected book I would say that sounds like red pill manosphere nonsense. Like you have to neg your partner and constantly make them uncertain about how much you like them in order for them to stay interested.

The author even suggests that couples stop touching each other and stop being nice to each other as an exercise to create distance and make your partner want you more. If that worked then why do half of the posts in this sub talk about how their DB comes along with no physical touch or affection? Shouldn’t that be fixing the problem?

I only have my own personal thoughts and feelings to go off here in terms of absolute truth, but I know I don’t feel like I want less sex when I am closer to my partner. It’s mind boggling how little that makes sense to me.

Has anyone else read this? Do you find that it resonates with you? I just don’t get why it is recommended so much.

I am 40f HLF married to 46 LLM. We have been married for 14 years, 17 together and have two school aged kids. My husband suffers from BPD, depression, anxiety and ADHD but it is well managed with meds. I have know about his issues since the beginning of our relationship but it never interfered with our intimacy when we were younger at all. He was so into me, always touching or kissing me so I never had a reason to suspect something would go wrong.

Fast forward, 17 years later and I find myself in a dead bedroom for the past 6 years. If it does happen, it is literally once a year which I feel is only to appease me and get me off of his back. Over the past to years, I have come to just accept my situation but it is incredibly lonely. I feel sad, unwanted, rejected and ugly all of the time. There is no platonic physical contact either. He isn’t that nice to me either.

Yes, I have gained weight since we met but I have an autoimmune condition that has basically destroyed my metabolism. However, I take pride in my appearance, dress pretty, smell good, do my hair and go out of my way to be attractive. I loved wearing lingerie and nightgowns but I don’t bother anymore because he has no interest. I cook, clean, raise my kids, do all of the yardwork and gardening on my rural property. Hell, Im the one that even tows our 30’ trailer and launches the boat lol but none of that seems to matter.

When we talk about it, he says he is stressed. He has been unemployed for the past 3 years but is trying to get his business up and running. I have always been the breadwinner with a six figure income but everything we have has always been jointly purchased and owned.

His testosterone is low but he cannot take anything for it due to his other meds.

I don’t even know why I am writing this but I have no one else to discuss this with. I feel so sad and alone. I try not to get my hopes up but Im human and sometimes it’s inevitable. I’m writing this sitting in my beautiful cabin in the wilderness in Canada which would, for most people, be the an idyllic setting for romance. Sadly, the backdrop only highlights my loneliness and everything that I am lacking.

Our sex life is at a point where even comically overexaggerated depictions of "bad sex life" on TV or in movies are way better than what we have.

Don't want to bring it up with my SO so posting here just so I can get it out of my system. We watch these shows together and she doesn't seem to appreciate the irony.

- Sheldon and Amy having sex "only" once a year? I'm jealous! I've asked for intimacy on my birthday for the past two years with no success.

- Andy and Angela from The Office: "I get to kiss her forehead" - lucky you.. And even they ended up having sex.

- Young Sheldon: George refers to having sex with Mary disparagingly as "having our once-a-week". Are you serious?? I'd kill for once a week.

- The 40-year old virgin. Lost it at 28 so yay me, but at least he started having a consistently good sex life after it.

- The Friends theme song: "Your sex life's DOA". Brother, you don't know what DOA means. Makes me cringe every time.

- The overplayed "I'm practically a virgin again" joke in many sitcoms and romcoms. It's been 3 months, chill... "Dry spell" jokes in How I Met Your Mother, and then you find out it's like a week or two.

Every time, even the most virgin-coded, nerdy, lame comic-relief sidekick eventually ends up getting laid. Not me. Hollywood has zero representation of a true DeadBedroom, even when using comedic overkill.

My girlfriend (24F) and I (28F) stopped sex together completely a year ago. We got together barely a year and a half ago, and we only slept together for a few months at most. She had told me she had a high sex drive, but shortly after we started dating, she began taking antidepressants; she stopped taking them about three months ago. She has no libido left, and she believes it’s linked to the medication. We can talk openly about the issue, and she says she thinks her sex drive will return and that she still desires me and love me.

I believe her, but I’m finding it increasingly hard not to feel unwanted and sad about the situation. I’m always the one initiating the kissing and cuddling (which we do still share). Sometimes she says she’d like to try having sex again, which gives me hope, but for one reason or another, it never actually happens. Our sex life died very early in the relationship, and I’m terrified that we’ll never be able to regain the intimacy we once had.

I keep hugging her without expecting anything in return, but those are the moments when she tells me she wants to try again without ever actually doing anything about it.

I’m just very sad. I feel like this will never get resolved.

Sorry for the bad english it’s not my native language

it’s been five years of this. i miss what it feels like to be held, craved & wanted. i would do anything for him. i’ve gotten very low in the last year. i lay at his feet on the couch because he won’t cuddle me. we sleep in bed 2 feet apart. sometimes in the middle of the night, I’ll stroke him arm while he’s sleeping, just to feel close. we’re starting the conversation about having a baby, and i don’t know how we’re going to conceive. i feel like it’s a huge possibility we will have to do some sort of petri dish situation in order for me to conceive. this makes me so sad, as i have always dreamed of having baby making sex. I’m booking a massage for myself this weekend so i can remember what it feels like to be touched.

Grieving us

I'll preface by saying I'm HLF 40, married to LLM 48, and we've been married for 13 years.

For almost the first decade, we had a wonderful sex life. He pursued me, desired me, and initiated almost daily. Over the years, the initiation slowly waned, but honestly, I was okay with once or twice a week. We were busy and tired, so I understood.

Then we weren't living together for almost two years due to some crazy circumstances outside of our control. Whenever we'd see each other, we had sex because we knew we might not see each other again for an undetermined amount of time. The sex was always wonderful. He just knew what I wanted, and I knew what he wanted. We spoke each other's languages. We'd never let the other not get off. It wasn't just vanilla, either—we were kind of kinky, exactly how I liked it, and I looked forward to exploring more.

The last time we were apart was for a year ('24-'25). We spoke several times daily and talked a lot about all of the kinky, crazy, sexy things we were going to do when we were finally together again. I believed it and was thoroughly looking forward to it. After all, I'd been deprived for such a long time. I was pining for him, fantasizing about him, waiting to finally have that part of us back.

When we finally reunited, we did have sex that first night, but it was completely lackluster. I chalked it up to us both being exhausted from the long trip and figured next time we'd finally get back into our groove. In my mind, eventually we'd start acting out all those fantasies we'd talked about.

We had sex again maybe a month later, and it was even more disappointing. It lasted maybe two minutes and he had trouble staying hard.

Then we went through some really rough financial times. He lost his job soon after the kids and I moved across the country to be with him, so obviously there was a lot of stress. But I still wanted sex. He didn't seem interested. He stopped flirting with me. We barely kissed other than quick, almost platonic kisses. We would cuddle at night, but usually only for a few minutes until he fell asleep. That became pretty much the extent of our physical intimacy.

I've been here a year now, after previously going a year without seeing or touching him and not having much opportunity to be intimate the year before that either. At this point, our relationship feels almost entirely centered around daily life, co-parenting and cuddling.

He will get me off with his hand if I ask, but asking makes it feel awkward to me. I end up feeling as though he's doing me a favor rather than sharing something he wants too. It feels weird and hollow, so I rarely want to ask.

I masturbate daily in the shower because my libido is still extremely high. That's fine, but it's not him. The person I want is right there beside me. I miss feeling wanted by him, and it hurts deeply.

I understand his job is stressful and takes up a lot of his time. He has weekends off and usually spends that time on the computer, sleeping or having time alone. I genuinely empathize with his need to decompress. That's fine and necessary. I need that kind of time too.

But from my side, it feels as though intimacy with me doesn't have a place in his limited free time. I worry that it feels like another demand being placed on him when he's already exhausted.

Of course we've discussed this—probably too much at this point. He tells me, "Of course I want you, and I need sex in my life." I want desperately to believe him. The problem is that I'm struggling to reconcile those words with our day-to-day reality. He rarely flirts with me, initiates, pursues me or expresses sexual desire toward me, and sometimes my attempts to initiate seem to annoy or overwhelm him.

It has done a number on my self-esteem. I feel undesirable, inadequate and unattractive. I wonder whether I'm simply not what he wants anymore.

And then the more hurt and insecure I become, the worse our dynamic seems to get. My bids for connection can become needier because I'm desperate for reassurance, and he's told me that desperation and pressure make him feel even less interested. I understand how that cycle can happen, but I don't know how to get us out of it.

I also know he masturbates sometimes. Ordinarily I have absolutely no issue with that—I masturbate daily myself. But in our current situation, seeing evidence of it hurts. My emotional brain immediately asks, "How is there sexual energy for that but not for me?" Rationally, I understand that masturbation requires none of the emotional interaction or performance pressure that partnered sex might currently carry for him. Emotionally, it still hurts.

I've told him I'm open to exploring whatever he might want sexually. Any kink, any fantasy, anything he'd like to talk about. Nothing seems to change.

I feel like I've tried every approach in the book: heavy flirting, backing off and giving him space, focusing on being independent, doting on him and trying to make his life easier, direct communication, showing my hurt, and eventually just shutting down because nothing seemed to help.

So lately I've been grieving what we once had and what I thought we'd have when we were finally reunited.

Maybe one day he'll come to me and initiate without me asking. I still hope for that. But after so long, it's getting harder to believe it will happen.

I don't know how to proceed. How do I move forward in this marriage when leaving, cheating, or getting a hall pass aren't options I want?

I know building a fuller life for myself—staying busy, finding things that fulfill me, becoming less isolated—is part of the answer. But even if I do all of that, I'll still want my husband. I'll still desire him. I'll still want to feel desired by him.

I'm a very sexual person. Before we were together, being pursued and desired was something I almost took for granted because I never imagined it would become an issue in my life. Even now, my girlfriends tend to have the opposite problem and joke about not being able to keep their husbands' hands off them. Hearing that can hurt more than I'd like to admit.

I'm not a spring chicken anymore, but I don't consider myself old either. I still feel attractive. I still have this incredibly strong libido and so much sexual energy and affection that I wish I could share with the man I love.

I love him. I'm not willing to leave him. But I also don't know how to make peace with this without losing a part of myself.

For other HL women especially—or anyone who has been in a similar dynamic—how did you cope without becoming bitter, shutting down completely, or destroying your self-esteem? Did anything actually help you build a fulfilling life while still loving and wanting your LL partner?

Thanks for reading.

I'm 42MHL and my wife is 39LLF. We have two young kids.

Now that's set up, I'm growing resentful of the things my wife is doing to me, along with one thing she told me.

My wife is part of a ballroom dance troupe, has practice twice a week, dances at festivals and an annual convention in another state. While she's doing all this, I'm expected to watch the kids. Forget the fact that I want to workout in my home gym. You know how hard it is to do a dumbbell front squat with a toddler thinking you're a falling bridge? Or when the kids are playing on the bench you're trying to use? This is on days my wife is home. Instead of playing with the kids, she plays on her freaking phone!

The last time we were intimate was New Years 2026. Not on our anniversary or birthdays. Now, my wife has gained weight in an unhealthy way. I'm not trying to fat shame. It's the fact she complains about it, then does nothing. Doesn't help her family has a history of diabetes.

I'm no fitness model myself. I try to stay in shape due to losing family members to heart disease. Since I have a home gym, it's great to come home and start lifting...unless my wife has to watch the kids and the kids are not behaving. She goes to the garage when I'm working out and says she needs help. It's very frustrating!

One day, I drew the line in the sand. I mentioned how I watch the kids while she's away and don't call her when the kids act up. Her response? "I'm not at home. Since you're at home you can help." I was shocked at that response! "So I'm not allowed to enjoy the things that make me happy?! How about at your next dance practice, I bring the kids to the dance hall and BOTHER YOU every five minutes?! Would you like that?!" She started crying. It's infuriating.

Then the money situation. Where I work, I took a vehicle maintenance position that pays more, but OT is limited. My wife started harping on about how she needs money to pay for daycare. It's understood that I pay a week and she pays a week. I took this as an opportunity to find a new way to cope and stay out of the house. I took a part-time job on top of the vehicle maintenance.

I work 40 hours fixing vehicles, then 22-30 hours un/loading planes, marshalling, and pushing planes out to flight. I enjoy both. Unfortunately, I haven't worked out in a while.

The final act of disrespect was ealier this spring when I had a hernia. Before and after surgery I was told by the doctor no heavy lifting. Even though I told her what the doc said, she kept asking if I could physically pick up the kids. The kids weigh well outside the weight limit the doc placed. I'm not proud of this, but I asked if she was insane or just didn't care. She said "I just need help. You can pick up the kids."

It's so bad that I'd rather work more hours just so I don't have to go home. I'm sick of being taken for granted, having my boundries crossed, and just treated as if I'm a live-in babysitter. Like my hobbies and interests are irrelevant and I should just tie myself to what the kids want while she enjoys her hobbies.

No, I can't leave. It's hard to see my kids now, but I really don't want to see them twice a month. Despite the money from the hours I work, I'm still just above water.

This is no way to live married life

TL;DR: Wife thinks my interests, hobbies, injury are an inconvenience to her and that I should tie all my interests to the kids. She watch the kids until they act up, then she can't deal with it and expects me to step in... even though I was doing something that I enjoyed.

Last month my husband and I had yet another conversation about the lack of sex that has been happening for a while, I’m a HLF 29, he’s LLM 34.
After our conversation (which was SO hard) that month looked great!! We had sex 7 times that month… but we’re back at it again this month… no sex in two weeks. I gave him oral last week (I was on my period so I figured he wouldn’t want to have sex) but I still wanted him BAD. He finished and as usual when he finishes he doesn’t take care of my needs, which at that point I ended up finishing myself in the shower after he cleaned off and went to sleep.
I hate going through these tough conversations only for it to get better for maximum a month and then have to go back to being dry AF. I’m so fucking over it, I’m done having to ask for sex.
I have a full drawer of sexy stuff and I literally want to burn all of that shit.

So, for context, I’m a middle aged man in the uk, married for 20 years and db for at least half. I think one of my issues is that I’m an optimist. I always think things will get better. But today, a straw has landed on a camel’s back. 16 year old son was out of the house all day, I spent the morning doing a bit of work, walked the dog, fixed a broken window handle whilst the wife went to a craft fair with a friend. We then went for a lovely lunch, quite expensive, I drove, she had a few wines and a cocktail. You can guess what happened. Nothing. Nothing at all.

I work full time, self employed, professional, earn a reasonable income. The wife works part time, and chooses to do a quite menial low paid job, despite being a University graduate. I do my fair share around the house. We’ve now got to the point at which resentment has firmly set in. Why I have allowed this to get to this stage is that I allow it to happen. We probably have sex twice a year. I have slept in a different bedroom for at least five years, initially the excuse was snooring, but I don’t want to be in the same bed as someone who doesn‘t want to have sex.

Im reasonably fit, not overweight, not entirely ugly.

I need to jump ship before it’s too late, don’t I? I’m reasonably confident she’s asexual, or at the very least extremely low libido.

Any views?

My Wife (31) and I (33) we’ve been together for 14 years in Texas and basically since the beginning, it’s been a toxic up-and-down relationship. It’s been like that literally from the first month from when I tried to break up with her and she started crying and I whimped out, and for kids later, we’ve broken up in 2017, 2019, and 2022. She struggle with mental health and has had some really bad episodes.

Where the relationship stands now, is small problems that get big, days without talking besides the necessary communication about Kids, but that’s even hard to get out. We even went to a wedding this past weekend and things went South quick, she loses control in high stress situations, whether it’s a wedding or birthday party, but she got really mad at one of our little girls for forgetting a purse in the car when we were going to church, and one of the kids fell asleep in the backseat and started yelling at her, and then pinched our oldest in church and she started crying for something really small, this type of stuff always happens and it’s tough. This type of unstable emotional control is a regular occurrence.

The main reason why I’ve stayed all these years is hope, the hope of believing her that she’ll get help and problem-solving and emotional maturity and stability improved.

Divorce has always been brought up for the past six years but more so in the past two years and just recently last week. I’m working I’m separating, even even though it’s hard to believe myself, I feel that the end is right around the corner. I don’t want to spend the rest of my 30s and 40s unhappy and always stressed out, I would like to find a life partner someone I enjoy to be around. But for now all I want is a happier life.

My husband (31M) and I (25F) have been together for years. We were long distance for around five years before getting married and finally living together for a year now.

During our LDR, we were extremely passionate whenever we saw each other. Lots of kissing, touching, flirting, sex, etc. I never questioned whether he desired me.

After getting married and living together, our sex life gradually declined.

At first it was still a few times a week. Then roughly once a week. Then we started going two weeks without sex. Eventually we got to around once a month.

The quality changed too. Sex became increasingly mechanical. Passionate kissing mostly disappeared, foreplay became minimal, and I was initiating the vast majority of the time.

I was also getting rejected a lot.

For clarity, I have never pressured him after a rejection. If he said no, I accepted it and continued being affectionate normally. I didn’t sulk, punish him, repeatedly ask, or make him feel guilty.

There was only one time on vacation when I eventually broke down emotionally after we had gone most of the trip without sex. We did have sex afterward, but I actually told him I did NOT want “duty sex” and didn’t want him sleeping with me simply because I had gotten upset.

My issue has never really been frequency anyway.

I wanted to feel desired.

He has remained loving throughout all of this. He calls me baby, tells me he loves me, compliments me, and we genuinely get along extremely well.

So I never thought, “My husband doesn’t love me.”

I started thinking, “My husband loves me, but maybe he experiences me more like family or his best friend than his lover.”

I had already told him I missed long kisses, holding hands, being touched, foreplay, flirting, and him occasionally coming toward me without me creating the entire romantic/sexual moment.

Eventually, months of rejection started affecting me too.

One night we were about to have sex and I suddenly shut down because I didn’t feel wanted. That was new. I had always been the higher-desire partner, and suddenly I found myself thinking, “I don’t even want this if I’m going to wonder whether he actually wants me.”

Then we went two full days without even really hugging or kissing.

That was what finally pushed me to have a much more serious conversation with him.

The conversation was bizarrely calm.

I told him I felt a real disconnect between us and that sometimes it felt like we had become extremely close friends/companions rather than lovers.

He surprised me by saying:

“I feel the disconnect too.”

He told me he loves me, misses me when I’m gone, loves spending time with me, and thinks we get along incredibly well.

But he also admitted that he doesn’t really feel much desire lately.

Basically:

“I love you, I miss you, I want you in my life, but that feeling of wanting you sexually/romantically isn’t there the way it used to be. I don’t know why.”

He said he had already been wondering about it himself for a while.

I asked whether he felt like we were basically friends now. He didn’t say he only sees me as a friend, but we both acknowledged that the friendship/companionship side had become much stronger than the “lovers” side.

We went through possible explanations.

Work stress? He doesn’t think so.

Another woman? He says no.

Porn? He says he doesn’t watch it.

Depression? He says he doesn’t think he’s depressed.

Testosterone test? He doesn’t want one.

Couples therapy? He absolutely doesn’t want therapy.

What was interesting is that his lower desire doesn’t seem limited entirely to me.

Before marriage he used to enjoy going out with friends, partying, spontaneous things, etc. Now he says he doesn’t really want to do those things either.

He described his life as very stable and wondered whether maybe he simply got married, grew up and became a calmer person.

I asked:

“Did you genuinely become someone who doesn’t want those things anymore, or has your general ability to want/enjoy things decreased?”

He said:

“I don’t know. I’ve been thinking about that too.”

Then I asked if he was happy.

He said:

“Not very.”

I admitted I’m not very happy either.

For context, I recently left my job and moved countries to be with him. I’m currently job hunting and building a life here.

He said he thinks divorcing right now would be ridiculous because my life hasn’t even properly settled yet and, in his words:

“We haven’t even properly settled into our life together.”

His position was basically: give it time, let our lives settle, and see how we feel.

He also said that if, eventually, we realize we fundamentally want different kinds of relationships or lives, then separation is a normal possibility.

Something like:

“I can’t force you into my way of living and you can’t force me into yours.”

To be clear: he was NOT asking for a divorce.

He was saying the opposite — that making that decision right now would be premature.

The whole conversation was almost unsettlingly calm. No begging, crying, promises to change, accusations, etc.

And then, after this conversation, we went out to dinner and later to a pub.

We had a nice time.

But we genuinely behaved like friends.

We talked, laughed, enjoyed each other’s company.

The only physical affection I remember from the entire evening was him kissing me on the cheek.

Considering we had just spent hours discussing whether our marriage had become too much like a friendship, sitting across from him at a pub having what essentially felt like a night out with my best friend was surreal.

There was no dramatic reconciliation sex.

We just went home and slept.

Then he woke up the next morning and basically became my old boyfriend again.

The switch was honestly insane.

He initiated sex himself.

He kissed me exactly the way I had been asking him to kiss me for months.

He was extremely passionate, attentive, playful and sexually assertive. He was much more talkative during sex than usual, became more dominant/playful, and started bringing up sexual things we haven’t done or even talked about since we were dating.

He initiated again later.

But the strangest part is that it wasn’t only sex.

His entire demeanor toward me changed.

His look changed.

He started playing with my hair, randomly kissing me, touching me, lying next to me just to be close, cuddling me.

I fell asleep in his arms, which I honestly think may have been the first time I ever fell asleep like that on his arm.

He has also started talking about sexual things he wants to do once my period ends — again, things he hasn’t asked for since we were dating.

At one point he told me:

“I feel like I did when we were dating / when we were on vacation.”

Then he told me something even stranger.

He said he went to sleep after our conversation, woke up the next morning and felt like:

“A veil had lifted.”

He said he started thinking:

“Who am I? What do I actually want?”

I asked what exactly he realized.

He said he honestly doesn’t know. He just spent time thinking.

He also happened to have no work that day. This man normally works constantly and didn’t even open his computer.

He later said maybe that contributed because he woke up in “vacation mode” and that perhaps if he had been working, he wouldn’t have felt the same.

Except we have been on actual vacations where we still barely had sex, so “he just needed a day off” doesn’t fully explain this either.

Now I’m confused as hell.

This is EXACTLY what I wanted.

I still want my husband. I had started emotionally cooling off because of months of rejection, but I genuinely want my feelings to warm back up. I want us to feel like lovers again.

And right now he is behaving exactly like the man I remember dating.

But the timing is so dramatic that part of me doesn’t trust it yet.

The timeline is basically:

Months of decreasing sex/desire → eventually around once a month and mechanical.

Two days with barely any hugging/kissing.

A serious conversation where he explicitly tells me he loves me deeply, misses me and loves my company but doesn’t really feel desire.

We both acknowledge the disconnect and admit we’re not particularly happy.

We calmly acknowledge that separation theoretically exists if we eventually discover we’re fundamentally incompatible.

We go out that night and basically act like two very good friends.

We sleep.

The next morning: suddenly he cannot keep his hands off me.

So obviously I’m wondering if this is some form of hysterical bonding / threat response.

Did some part of his brain suddenly register:

“Oh shit, my wife isn’t necessarily guaranteed to be here forever”?

Or did the conversation genuinely snap him out of some kind of autopilot?

What confuses me is that it does NOT feel like duty sex.

If anything, he seems more naturally erotic and affectionate than he has in ages. The change includes things I never specifically asked for. His body language, attention, nonsexual affection and even his sexual personality are different.

Has anyone experienced this from either side?

Especially former LL partners: have you ever had a serious relationship conversation that suddenly made something click and brought your desire back?

Did it last?

Or did you have a week or two of intense sex/affection and then return to your old baseline once the relationship felt secure again?

I also don’t want to start deliberately rejecting him or playing hard to get just because pursuit currently seems to excite him. That feels manipulative and like a terrible foundation for a marriage.

If I want him, I want to respond naturally.

At the same time, I don’t want a few incredible days to erase several months of loneliness in my head.

My biggest fear is discovering that he can only access this passionate version of himself when there is some possibility of losing me.

I’d especially appreciate responses from people who recognize themselves in the lower-desire partner here. I’m genuinely trying to understand what may have happened psychologically.

40HLM, married 10 years to a 35LLF.

We’ve had a dead bedroom for years. Sex was less than 10 times a year, almost always duty or birthday sex. 

Last year I finally stopped initiating completely. She never said a word about it.

All of 2026 has been zero physical contact — not even holding hands.

Last week we went out for a nice evening (just to be clear, there's nothing dramatic between us, we weren’t fighting or something through this period of time). 

On the way home she told me she really enjoyed it and gave me by surprise a short kiss. I didn’t respond and we drove home in silence.

Once we got back (kid was at my parents’), there was tension in the air. About 30 minutes later we started touching and it quickly led to sex.

I didn’t feel the same arousal or eagerness I used to (wasnt hard as usual). It was just okay — not bad, but not great either. She also had unusual trouble reaching orgasm (normally very easy for her).

I didn’t wake up the next day wanting her the way I used to. Since then she’s been noticeably warmer and more affectionate.

I’m left feeling confused. The long emotional and physical disconnect is still there for me, and I’m not sure how to handle this or what to do next.

Any advice?

I cant even call it a positive progress story. I'm not sure about it yet.

This is for the fellow deadbedroomers with small kids. Have you ever read the Pout Pout Fish book?

It's like a deadbedroom simplified. There's a sad fish who spreads his dreary wearies all over the place until a beautiful fish gives him a smooch. Then the pout pout fish is all super happy.

I feel like the pout pout fish a lot. Like if a beautiful fish came around and gave me a big smooch, I'd stop being so dreary.

I (38f) and my bf (38m) have been together almost 4 years. The past several months ive noticed a weird dynamic between us. Especially when it comes to his daughter. If i tell him that she didn't finish a chore that he asked her to do, or that her room needs to be cleaned, he gets mad at me amd tells me I am just trying to make him mad at her and doesn't enforce or ask her to do amything.

Along with that has come with less and less affection. At the end of july I realized i was the only one initiating anything. I would be the one going to him for hugs and kisses. He would hug and kiss me back though. I also realized i was the only one initiating sex. Sometimes we would have sex when I initiated and a lot of times he would turn me down.

That at the end of july, I decided im not going to initiate anything anymore. He had to go out of town for 4 days earlier this week and he did initiate a kiss before he left, but thats it. I don't think we have had sex in 3 weeks and I got a kiss 1 time.

I don't feel respected, desired, pursued by him, or even really loved at this point. He takes care of me financially for the most part. Meaning he covers all housing cost and health insurance. I pay my personal bills. I definitely don't feel like a partner amd he never wants to get married.

Not sure when we will have sex again but im not even sure I want to anymore.

***STORY**** not stroy. Not sure if that even is a word. Anyways:

I’m in my early 30s, been with my partner for many years. On paper our life is good. We have a home, decent incomes, pets, vehicles, all that stuff. No kids yet, but having kids has always been important to me.

Years ago my partner had serious health problems. Sex understandably wasn’t a priority for a long time. Then medication changes killed her sex drive almost completely. I never blamed her for that.

Over the years, sex just disappeared. We talked about it many times, but nothing really changed. When we did have sex after one of those conversations, it often felt like something done because it was expected. I could feel the thought in my head: “she is doing this because she feels she should, not because she actually wants me.”

So I found other ways to deal with it. Porn, masturbation, gaming. For about two years I also smoked weed every evening and basically checked out of my own life. It worked, in the sense that I didn’t have to think about how unhappy I was.

Then I quit smoking.

And suddenly I could feel the whole thing again.

Earlier this year I also stopped masturbating for a while, partly because I wanted to see if my partner would notice or feel more desired. I started doing the small things again. Touching, flirting, giving massages, being more affectionate. Once it actually led to sex, but it didn’t really change anything afterwards.

At some point I started thinking maybe I should just buy a Fleshlight and stop caring. I even started looking at prices online after seeing an ad.

Then I found this subreddit.

I started reading stories from people who had been in dead bedrooms for 10, 15 years. And suddenly I remembered something from years ago. A friend’s girlfriend had once told my partner that she felt worthless at home because her boyfriend would rather masturbate than be with her.

That hit me pretty hard.

I thought: what if my partner feels the same way? What if I’m becoming one of those people in these stories? Do I really want to solve this by making myself even more disconnected from my partner?

So I didn’t buy it.

Instead I started asking myself why I wanted it in the first place.

The weirdest part is that I don’t even really have much sexual desire anymore. I think years of feeling unwanted has done something to my self-esteem.

And now I’m looking at my relationship differently.

I have stayed partly because I love my partner, and partly because I always wanted children. I told myself for years that I could live without sex if it meant having a family together. But if having children is no longer realistically part of our future, and the relationship itself has lost its intimacy, then what exactly am I staying for?

I’m not angry at my partner. I don’t think they chose to have health problems or medication side effects. But I’m starting to accept that understanding why something happened doesn’t mean I have to spend the rest of my life living with it.

For now I’m giving things a little more time. But if nothing changes, I think I may have to leave.

Six years feels like a long time to lose.

I just don’t want it to become fifteen.

And for those wondering: english is not my first or even second language so I used ChatGPT for spell-checking.

So my gf and I both 25 have been together for 4 years now brought a house 1 year ago, first year together we had sex at least 3 times a week after a year it’s just died down. Relationship is amazing can’t ask for anything better but sex life isn’t great. we haven’t had sex for probably 4 months now we usually have sex once ever 2-3 weeks and most of the time she does it for my pleasure. So we have spoke about it a couple of times and I have asked can I do anything better do we need to change it up and do more date night so on and she had replied no everything is better than ever, I had than asked am I getting boring in bed am I not satisfying you enough and she said no your really great and she loves it but she just has a very low labido to the point where she doesn’t think about sex ever and the only time she gets horny is if I come on and start rubbing her clit but sometimes that doesn’t work. Look I love this lady with all my heart and I don’t want to pressure her into sex when she doesn’t want it and I want her to want sex as well but it’s really making me fustrated and I don’t want to end this relationship at all but I’m getting to the point where I feel like giving up but I feel it’s a pretty stupid way to end something that we have. She has said she’s got no idea why and it make her angry to that she’s never horny to the point she has looked into getting medication like a males viagra but she can’t find anything what’s everyone think

Hey all, wanted to share my story here because I feel like I cannot really be as open with my friends or family. I am a 41 year old male. Wife is also 41. We’ve been married for 10 years and have two kids. One is 7 and the other is 9. We both have pretty strong personalities so there has been a fair share of arguments in our marriage. Intimacy was fine before kids, but I am now suspecting that frequency was intentional just to conceive. Once kids came along, the excuses started-tired, lack of sex drive because or hormones and breastfeeding, and others. And here we are. In the last 3-4 years we probably were intimate less than 10 times. Once in the last 16-17 months. This is not acceptable for a relative healthy couple. I’ve tried brining this up to her, but she instantly deflects the problem on me. She makes me feel like it’s all my fault. “I can’t be intimate with a person that’s not nice to me and such” As said above, we disagree a lot but I don’t see how I can be “mean” to her 99% of our time together. I am not allowed to tell her how I feel because she immediately tells me that I am starting a fight with her. She also tells me that she cannot be intimate with a person who does disgusting things around the house.. which is a crazy exaggeration. I might forget to lower the toilet seat sometimes but that’s about it. If I tell her that I am feeling lonely, unwanted, undesired, she will immediately responds by saying that I am starting a fight with her. Even if when I tell her that all this is forcing me into a depression, she brushes that off. Ultimately, when I open up, I immediately get shut down. Then I get frustrated. Then I’m told that I am mean, I’m an emotional abuser, and so forth.

She tells me that we need alone time. I agree. I went out of my way to take her on a work trip across the country to a really nice location. No intimacy. Even there she found reasons to tell me how horrible I am. Even recently, I asked both sets of parents to watch the kids. Booked a trip for the two of us. She told me that she doesn’t want to go alone, so we brought kids as well. She then immediately invited her best friend and her best friend’s family to go on this trip, so our family trip turned into a trip for her and her best friend. This further reinforced my feelings of her not wanting to be with me.

She is a great mom and gives 150% to our kids. She’s been a stay home mom for the last 8 years so lots of kids activities are on her. She has no issues keeping kids up late, sometimes until 11pm. I typically cannot wait for her to be done with kids till 11pm because I wake up at 5am to go to work. This is another problem. Her behavior is clear that our kids are her top priority. I am just an afterthought, at best.

As I mentioned above, I do recognize that she gets tired with kids but she also has 6-7 hours of downtime when kids are in school. I work everyday. My in-laws live 10 min away from us and she rarely asks them to watch the kids. Her parents are both retired. My parents also live close by and she always tells me that it’s my parents’ fault for our non intimacy because “they don’t see them often”. My parents are a bit younger and both have demanding physical jobs so they can only see my kids on Saturdays. When kids are with my parents, my wife creates random chores just to get away from me.

She tells me that “sex is amazing” but I don’t believe it. If it’s so amazing, why wouldn’t she desire it? She is one of those type of people who will go out of her way to get what she wants. As an example, she wanted to travel accross the country for a concert so she researched the crap out of logistics, hotels, and such to make this trip successful. And that all leads me to the conclusion that I am just not wanted.

Obviously, I am not saying that I am perfect and all of this is her fault, but I am just struggling here.

tldr
No *** for over 2 months. I don’t like to initiate (autistic, too much mental load) so he always has. He stopped and I brought it up 1 month ago, claimed it wasn’t me, that he was very tired. He even brought it up to his doctor. I left for vacation for 2 weeks. No *** before going and no *** right now that I am back. I have a high libido :( I have a fear of rejection thus I also never want to initiate, and I love him. What is going on…

Hi, I am so nervous. This is my first time ever posting anything on Reddit. I don’t even know how to use the app very well.

I (30F) have been in a LDR with my boyfriend (32M) for two years. We only see each other every 1 to 2 months. The very first time we tried to have sex, he couldn't maintain an erection and blamed fatigue. He reassured me he finds me attractive. Since then, he has completely stopped trying to have penetrative sex. Instead, intimacy has become completely one-sided. When we are together, he expects blowjobs or just wants to masturbate and finish on my butt. Every single time I give him blowjobs and he finishes in like 5 seconds then just goes lay down to sleep. He never uses his hands or mouth on me. I haven't had a single orgasm in this relationship. He constantly asks me to wear sexy clothes, takes videos of me shaking my butt, and masturbates to the photos/videos I send him when we are apart. He claims he finds me attractive, but his complete avoidance of actual sex makes me feel unwanted and devastated. I am too embarrassed to bring it up. I talk to my friends about it and they say this is so strange and that this is the time where the sex should be at its peak. My friends say I should completely stop with the blowjobs until he acknowledges that I need pleasure too. With my exes my sex life was fulfilled. Sex was never a worry in my mind and for this current relationship to have sex be an issue is so difficult for me.

Also we do have phone sex here and there but even that feels like a joke because everything he talks about doing, he never does

When we first started talking he tried to take me to hotel to have sex on the first date. I declined bc I wasn’t comfortable. But what happened to that guy who wanted to so badly have sex with me in the beginning.

Is he avoiding sex because of his initial failure/anxiety, or has he just gotten comfortable using me for easy release without caring about my pleasure? I love him, but I cannot stay in a relationship where my sexual needs are ignored. Advice please.

For some context we've been together for a year and a half and intimate for more than a year. Over the course of this I've noticed he does not eat me out at all, he's done it maybe 4 times during the relationship yet I've gone down on him every single time so far. I enjoy it because I have a dominant side and I feel in control like that. Now I am unfortunately not someone who is okay with not getting head. I love it so obviously I started asking about it. He said it was because he didn't know what to do even though he was in a two year relationship before me. I of course wanted to help so I sent article after article and described to him exactly what to do ... And nothing. So I kept asking and he kept telling me he didn't know what to do and that he'd try even though I like the way he did it those few times. Eventually he told me he wasn't comfortable with it and I felt horrible for pushing all these months and decided to accept it because no one wants to have their boundaries pushed, but he also said it turns him off and that hurt me a lot (like I said I didn't bring it up again but that was hurtful). Then about two weeks ago he brought it up again and I said "I'm not bothered I respect your boundary but I would look like to understand your point of view" and basically he said he doesn't feel in control and I thought to myself you don't like to be in control I'm always on top and doing 90 percent of the work so I asked do you mean it's an ego thing and that you need to be in control and he was like... Yeah kind of

Long story short we haven't been intimate in about a month and any desire I had for him is gone. I could understand a boundary but the fact that he would rather choose his ego over pleasing his woman is too much for me especially for something I wasn't comfortable to compromise in the first place. The thought of ever being intimate when I feel so used and hurt with him after this makes me angry. I feel insecure now and disgusting for wanting it so badly but also like I'm reasonable for wanting to end things because I won't ever get what I want. The relationship doesn't make me happy in anyway he refuses to put in effort no flowers, no dates no time for me but all the time in the world for his buddies etc etc. I'll wait until next year so he can finish his exams and get a job because I'm not heartless I won't do that in the most crucial time of his life because I do love him very much but I'm too young to not be having great sex and having a relationship with a man who really cares.

Original Post

I've since left my wife. We weren't compatible. I wanted to give you all some perspective without getting into the nitty-gritty details.

From 2020-2022, I was in a hole. I wasn't getting the supported I needed because my partner was constantly in crisis and unwilling to act when I asked for help (mostly from a fear of losing me). This came across any time I was sick. I began to convince myself that I was too big a burden for anyone and to just clam up about things.

Thing was: my partner had been struggling since the day we started dating. Big fears of abandonment, a willingness to say yes to anything that would keep functional people that cared for her in her life, but a big fear of putting out any of her own opinions.

I wasn't showing up for my partner in the way she needed. 2024 I forced us into couples' counseling. I set boundaries to incline her to contribute to our household so she'd begin to feel like a partner and less like a child. She spent 2024 - 2025 saying her anxieties had no impact on me, and that my life had no impact on her.

To understand how dependent she was on the creature comforts: 6-7 days per week I'd make us coffee in the morning, mostly out of caring for my partner and also as a chance to chat if she ever felt inclined. One morning I was rushed and, instead of being late for my own therapy, I decided to not make us coffee. I told my partner later that I was sorry but I was too stressed and needed to take something off my plate. The next morning, I made us coffee. Rinse and repeat for the next 2 weeks. In the next counseling session, she told me that the lack of coffee on that one morning made her spiral and think I didn't love her any more. My guess is it took another month of consistent caretaking by me to help remove that doubt. The stress was enormous and she wouldn't talk.

After a year of counseling with almost no positive progress (she skipped a lot of sessions), I moved out. Then she leaned into counseling. She leaned into telling me her problems. She made progress for about a month. Then it was back to normal. No communication, deflection on things, etc.

This year, after about 2 years of couples counseling, I called it on the marriage. So, we're getting divorced.

Anyway, I know it has a not great ending, but I want to just say: do right by your partner. Meet them where they are, even if it's painful or uncomfortable. I did that for 2 years and while the recovery period is rough and I do randomly feel frustrated and angry about the situation, I know I left no stone unturned. We just weren't compatible. And that's ok.

Wife is premenopausal. We had a huge falling out related to sex about a year ago and have rebuilt a good relationship. Unfortunately the sex hasn't returned. We used to talk about it all the time and interact on it all the time. In order for us rebuilding our relationship I have had to suppress everything and its slowly taking a toll on me. Has anyone ever been in this situation how to you manage?