Women who don't want sex
The following discussion is based on some of the research I've done for a book I am writing on the subject of sexless or low-sex marriages. Specifically, in ongoing situations where the man wants regular sex, but the woman would rather miss it out altogether. Although I discuss what seem to me to be the reasons, I make little attempt to offer a solution. I do not cover every possible cause, just some of the main ones.
In particular, I do not cover medical reasons such as hysterectomy or low hormone levels; the reason being that I want to focus on things the complaining male could fix by himself. However, apart from the obvious like hysterectomy, and ovary removal, I think that medical causes are rarer than health professionals would have us believe.
The opposite situation - men who don't want sex in their relationship - is becoming increasingly common, but I have not covered it here because I am finding it very hard to get information directly from men in this situation. Women, on the other hand, are usually very happy to open up and share their reasons for withholding.
When I first started writing this book, I was going to call it something along the lines of 'How to get more sex from your wife', and it was going to be written very much from the perspective of how women withhold sex from their dear husbands, who may well spend all day working, only to come home to an emotional ice palace. It was going to then give men the strategies they needed to get their woman to see how much they were hurting their put-upon husbands in holding back that much-valued commodity called sex.
I conducted most of my interviews by email and also by participating in on-line forums. (TalkAboutMarriage has been a huge help). I was as interested in hearing from men as I was from women who were doing the withholding. What I found shocked me. It turned out that in almost all cases, that far from woman being the unilateral meany, there was usually a very good reason why they were not in a hurry to bed their men.
I say 'almost all cases', because there were two groups of women that were, to put it bluntly, impossible to be married to, or to obtain sex from, over any length of time on a regular basis. Quite often the husbands were reasonable, sensitive men, who tried their best to accommodate their wives.
The most difficult group was composed of women who had been sexually abused as youngsters. With them, the severity of the problem depended on how bad the abuse was, how religious their upbringing was, and whether they were willing to seek help in accepting sexuality as a normal part of marriage. In the most tragic case I came across the wife had not allowed the husband to have sex with her for over 20 years. The effect on his self-esteem was devastating.
The other group was composed of women with medium to severe mental illness. These woman would usually be quite happy to have sex and lots of it at the beginning of a relationship, but it would either dwindle, especially after marriage, or else as in the case of women who were manic depressive, the sexual availability would go up and down with mood.
I did not find a significant group of women who were withholding sex for the sheer hell of it. The worst I found was that some women did not want it all that much, but had no idea that their husbands were crawling the walls for lack of relief. They did not realize that a lot of men don't feel truly loved unless they are being demonstrably sexually desired by their wives. Often, women in this group become more giving sexually once they understand the importance of sex to their husband.
In view of the above, the purpose of this book mutated somewhat, and became a manual for men to see how they are the architects of their own sexual famine, and what they can do to restore balance.
Wrong diagnosis.
As men tend to be pragmatic, the first thing they do is to try to
analyse
the situation. This is where many a man makes his first mistake. It's a
mistake so huge that if it's not quickly seen through it will
set
him off on a path that will only cause more problems later. The mistake
is this: they believe that the woman's sex drive has declined. And it's
not just
made by married men. Agony aunts, doctors and therapists all seem to
make this wrong diagnosis. These experts then weigh in with advice
aimed at fixing the woman's malfunctioning
sex drive. So she is advised to have her hormone levels checked, and
told that anyway, it's quite normal for drives to slacken off with age
and motherhood.
Well, there is some truth in all the above, but if we look closely, we see that we are not sticking to the facts. And the facts are these: the woman is less interested in sex with her husband. She does not desire him. She does not find him as physically attractive as she once did. However, if a cute-looking guy crosses her field of view, she may well have quite a different response. Sometimes it can result in an affair starting. The husband is shocked because he thought she had gone off sex; why would she want sex with someone else? The answer is obvious if we get rid of the blinkered outlook that the wrong diagnosis creates - she has not gone off sex at all, she has simply gone of sex with her husband.
Often, things never get to the affair stage. Instead, even the wife herself believes she has gone off sex. She may even notice that she finds other guys hunky, but as it's just a passing thing, and her life is so taken up with being busy, it soon passes and is forgotten until the next time. Maybe she feels guilty because she's married and so quickly suppresses such passing frissons.
This is all good news to the smart husband. If it were her sex drive, he would have to get her to do something about it or there would be little chance of an improvement in their love life. But if he realizes it is just him she has lost interest in, he can do things all by himself to become more attractive in her eyes. If she fancied him in the past, there is every chance he can regain that position in her affections. All he needs are a few skills.
Is there really a mismatch of sex drives?
It is generally accepted by even quite liberated people that
on
average men have a higher sex drive than women. And while that might
seem to be borne out by what we see on the ground I believe that, if
anything, women have the stronger sex drive. However, what is almost
beyond question is that women, when they are totally in tune with their
bodies and their sexuality, can have far more earth-shattering orgasms
and sexual pleasure in general than men can even dream of. Perhaps this
is why society across many cultures has chosen to berate, control, and
in some countries, systematically abuse women in order to keep them
down. Even in the west to this day, a woman who has had more than a
certain number of partners is
called names like slut, whore, and "easy lay". There is little
chastisement of men who do the same thing. In fact, being known as "a bit of a lad" tends to
increase the social status of a man amongst his peer group.
So if women's sex drive is equal to or greater than that of men, why do most of the complaints about lack of sex come from men? Two separate factors appear to be coming into play. Firstly there is huge social pressure on women, especially women from a religious background, to be "pure". Most women do not want the label of "bad girl", so they play along with the perceived need to be demure. Secondly, it seems that a woman's level of desire is directly linked to her current state of mind. While men use sex in order to relax, women seem to like to be relaxed before they can have sex.
To illustrate this last point, imagine a man coming home from a grueling day at work. He wants a stress buster: maybe dinner, a shower and sex, in that order. For many men, satisfaction of the sexual appetite is the greatest stress buster. When women are stressed however, they don't necessarily feel sexy. They seem to want to satisfy other appetites in order to relieve their stress, and tend to go for food, hot bubble baths or long chats with friends. Men find it hard to understand why sex is low down on a woman's list of stress-relieving activities, especially as she is clearly relaxed and happy after good sex.
When it comes to women, it seems as if they have a huge sex drive, but there can be a series of dampeners waiting in the wings to ruin and suppress it. Work overload, lack of sleep and financial strain, to name a few. Men feel these same pressures too but are much happier to ignore them all in the pursuit of sex. And this is where the real difference is manifest. Men will regularly go out of their way to the point of taking stupid risks to satisfy their sex drives, whereas women tend not to indulge in such recklessness unless they feel really pushed by circumstances. Perhaps once or twice in a woman's lifetime the complex balance of hormones can get so concentrated towards arousal, that all repression and censorship are temporarily forgotten. If her cravings happen to land on a target outside the marriage, an affair can result. Although this state of affairs is generally short-lived, and life returns to normal, guilt and embarrassment can set in over what just happened, and her sexuality will take a further decline. In her mind, sex and chaos have become linked.
Why husbands become less sexually desirable
Resentment
When a previously amorous woman goes off sex with her husband,
there
is usually one main reason: resentment. It's not her workload or her
hormones. These may play a part, but it's the slow build up of
resentment that kills her passion.
Resentment is one of those things that builds up very, very slowly. If a man in a sexless relationship casts his mind back over the years to a point well before sex went downhill, he will probably remember that there were certain things that his wife complained about regularly. If these same themes cropped up year after year, it's almost a dead certainty that resentment built up over this time.
Women's sexuality is such that when they are confronted in bed with someone who they see as the main cause of their resentment, they just don't feel like sex. In fact, there is, unsurprisingly, a feeling of repulsion. The resentment might not be in the forefront of their minds at bedtime, but it is there in the background, working its evil magic, souring the moment, and giving her headaches.
Resentment 2: the controllerOne of the things that causes a slow build-up of resentment is the controlling behavior of a bossy husband. When such a couple first get together, the woman will overlook the controlling aspect of the man's behavior, because to some extent it can come over as sexy possessiveness. However, after the honeymoon days are perhaps 12-18 months behind them, this restrictive behavior is seen as just that - a restrictive strait jacket. Sometimes the expectations of such a husband are outrageous: she has to be home at a certain time, she can't spend too much time with friends, and male friends are absolutely out of the question. Such a husband always knows what's best for their marriage in general, and for her in particular. Amazingly, many wives go along with this attempt to cage their butterfly-like longings, but it comes at a price. She may still love and like her husband, but sex becomes less of an appetizing prospect. In the end, it's all she can do to grit her teeth and bear it as he humps away on top of her. Of course, as their sex life tumbles downhill, our micro-managing father figure knows exactly what is needed: she should get herself fixed. After all he does for her - and this sort of man is usually hard working - he expects and demands a little comfort in the evenings. Of course his attitude will just push any desires she had for him further away.
Resentment 3: lack of romance
Some
women, but by no means all, simply can't get into sex without the
background of romance. When the couple were courting,
everything seemed romantic, and of course, even the stiffest of men
buy flowers to start with. The marriage ceremony itself is one big
romance. Then after all this superhuman effort, some men breathe a huge sigh
of relief now that all the romancing is over and done with. They can now get on with the business of everyday married
life. All women notice this, but some can cope, especially
if they can see that their insensitive male makes up for it in other
ways. However, for some women it's a deal-breaker; they just don't feel
loved by being jumped on as soon as they get into bed. They need to be treated as if they are
special and sometimes men just can't see this one simple thing. When they do
begin to see it, (or perhaps they read somewhere that women need
romance), they often misunderstand. First of all they think that doing
something romantic should immediately lead to hot passionate sex. The
other mistake they make is to apply a "one size fits all" mentality to
romance. As covered in more detail here,
romance needs to be tuned to the woman concerned. There are a few
generic things that work, like flowers, and saying "I love you", but
beyond that, romance must be tailor-made. A man with the type of wife who likes romance
- and they seem to make up a high percentage - will soon be
finding that the hot sex seems to be cooling down. His every advance will come to
be viewed as an unwelcome assault. This is the sort of marriage where
the woman complains that "sex is all he thinks about". It does not mean
she is not interested in sex, it means that she feels that she is being
treated like an object. A woman in this situation is ripe for an affair
- and that always comes as a shock to the unromantic male, who assumes
she has a low libido!
An even stronger passion-killer than ordinary resentment occurs when a woman loses respect for her husband. In her head she uses words like "useless" when she thinks of him. If things have got to the point where she says this word out loud, sex is probably well on its way to being out of the window altogether. The ways in which this happens are many and varied. It may be that whenever she complains about random things, he always backs down and gives her what she wants in order to keep the peace. While this does indeed buy some peace at the time, she gradually builds up a picture of him in her mind as a pushover. Equally, if she sees other people walking all over him, she will come to despise him. One of the worst things a man can do, in his wife's eyes, is to allow his parents or in-laws to dictate to him.
It is as if at the start of marriage, the woman opens a sexual bank account for her man and puts a certain amount of sexual currency in there to get him started. Every time he acts despicably in her eyes, she makes sure to mark down his balance accordingly. At first, she will extend a small overdraft when he hits zero. But after a few years, the bank informs him that they no longer do overdrafts on this type of account. Once he hits zero, he can't expect sex very often.
Everybody slips up from time to time. So how come he could get an overdraft in the past, and not now? Simple. His credit is not good. This is what happens to a man who is resented and eventually despised. In the case of resentment, the wife feels that every time he was given the benefit of the doubt in the past, he let her down. Now he is not worthy. In the case of the man who is despised, it's even worse as not only is he not worthy, he is "the man of straw" - sexually sub-prime.
Too much
closeness.
In
"Mating In Captivity" by Esther Perel, the author deals with a
very strange phenomenon which applies equally to men and women
experiencing lack of interest in sex. It seems that when some people
experience
the closeness of marital love, it sends them back to their childhood.
If
they came from a household where there was little physical affection,
they tend to gravitate towards that state. "Show me how you were loved
as
a child, and I will show you how you will love as an adult". That's not
an exact quote from the book as I don't have it in
front of me, but it gives the general idea.
I found this book useful in that it covered material that is hard to find anywhere else. Her findings came mostly from therapy sessions with her own clients, and the case histories are certainly interesting to read. My own view is that closeness is a strain for some people because they see in the other person things that they can't stand in themselves. Demonising the other person makes it easier to bear, but unfortunately, it has the side-effect of making that person seem undesirable.
Under-performance.
Although it's not top of the list, women eventually tire of sex if it's
not fulfilling. Premature ejaculation is one area that is a common
cause and yet can be so easily got round. In most cases, the man can
easily train himself to last longer by using methods like the ones
mentioned here.
The other thing he can do, is to offer "afterplay" so that his wife gets to cum afterwards. The women who get maddest are the ones who are married to a "minute man" who just rolls over when he is done.
Another area that leads some women eventually to shut down is when sex is functional but not exciting enough or romantic enough. They will emit hints over the years that go unheeded. Eventually the woman might get fed up and withdraw sexually. This is a different to the typical male response to the same complaint - men who feel that sex with their wives is not exciting enough will put up with it almost indefinitely rather than have no sex at all - but they will be very unhappy about it and some will be on the lookout for an extramarital solution.The people pleaser makes a good doormat.
Due
to their gentle nature, some men fall into the trap of never saying
"no", as well always agreeing with the demands of everyone around them
however taxing or unreasonable. Part of the motivation of the
people-pleaser is to be liked, and up to a point it works. However,
over time
it has a depressing side-effect, making a man seem less sexually
desirable. If this situation occurs within the context of a marriage
where the man is also the house-husband, he soon becomes just
about as sexy as housework itself. If a man finds himself in the
situation of being the stay-at-home dad and house-husband, it is vital
that he finds other ways of displaying his masculinity, now that being
the chief breadwinner role is not an option.
My theory on why the pushover guy loses out is incomplete. However, I think something is going on behind the scenes at a very primal, caveman level. Women are generally physically weaker than men. Strange men are therefore a danger, but a lover takes on the role of a protector. If a woman finds that her man can't even stand up to her, she instinctively feels that he will be of no use in protecting her from the outside world.
Of course many men by definition are of only average strength, and could not defend their family from a physically powerful aggressor. These days however, in the west at any rate, we don't live in a society where physical prowess is as important as earning ability or assertiveness. Decisiveness and firmness have largely replaced the need to be physically strong in this situation.
The man that lacks these qualities is therefore in danger of committing a cardinal mistake: causing his wife to lose respect for him as a male. The appearance of Political Correctness on the scene in the last few decades has confused these types of men. They do not see that it is possible to be assertive without being a male chauvinist pig. Feminism has also added another hurdle: An increasing number of men find it hard to be sexually aggressive even when their wives tell them they would enjoy it. That is not to say they want it like that every time - they might like to switch roles from time to time - but they want to know it's there. Unfortunately most women who have this desire do not come clean about their fantasy. They often nurse a yearning to be "taken roughly", but never express it.They are hoping their husband will pick it up telepathically. If this unrequited desire for sexual dominance from their husband goes on long enough, it can lead to the woman to getting angry and resentful as well as shutting down sexually. Our passive male merely takes this as a signal that he is doing something wrong or has offended in some way and he tries even harder to make amends, thus making the situation worse.Conclusion
I believe the syndromes above are some of the main reasons that women shut down sexually. It is obvious that generally speaking they are probably not applicable to the reverse situation of men who don't want sex. This just goes to remind us that men and women are equal but... opposite, and in my opinion, with more animal instincts than our modern self view would allow.None of these errors or omissions lead to instant shutdown, they work like slow poison, causing a decline of desire over time. However, a sudden event can trigger steeper falls on the graph of sexuality. Things like childbirth, loss of a job, or bereavement will accelerate the process. But if above listed causes are not already at work, the situation has more chance of bouncing back once the crisis is over.
© MT
