A woman’s sex drive after marriage
So much is written about women who get married and then lose all desire for sex. I hear it day in and day out from men as the biggest reason they are looking for a new relationship or for a bit of sex on the side. Is it true? DO women lose all desire for sex the month after they say, “I do”?
I don’t think so.
I read a blog the other day that said “researchers say that womens’ libido plummets rapidly when they are in a secure relationship.” Hamburg-Eppendorf University interviewed 530 men and women in Germany. They say that mens’ libido “rarely flagged in over 40 years of marriage.”
I don’t believe it.
Every person’s sexuality and desire for sex waxes and wanes just like our appetite for everything else. We’re always changing. In my personal experience my partners have all gone through times when they could hump like rabbits without stopping to times when once or twice a week was fine.
They found that 1/2 of women over 30 who’d been married about 4 years didn’t want regular sex. Ok, if they’ve been married 4 years there’s a big likelihood that there are new babies involved. Who wants sex (or anything else that requires physical effort) when you’re totally exhausted?
You’re up half the night and can’t rest during the day. Your husband assumes since you’re home all day that you have plenty of time to do the shopping, cleaning, laundry, cooking, caring for the baby AND look like a million dollars full of sexual desire when he walks through the door after a day at work. If someone had asked me how much I liked sex during my first year as a mother I’d have said, “no thanks, I’d prefer a nap.”
Then you have the older woman who seems not to want sex. I say seems because that’s what I think it is. She’s probably got older kids and she’s got a full time job. She gets up in the morning, feeds the kids, cleans up the breakfast dishes, fixes the lunches, gets everyone to the school bus and she gets to her job without a minute to spare. She works all day, rushes to the market to get fixings for dinner and goes home. Rarely does her husband help. Not because he is lazy but he just never thinks of offering to help. His dad never helped.
After dinner she does the cleaning up while he watches the news. She helps the kids with homework while he surfs the net and then she puts in a load of washing and gets the kids bathed and in bed. Clothes into the dryer and then she sorts out what everyone will wear the next day. Finally she runs a quick vacuum over the carpet and heads to bed.
Does this woman feel sexy?
Probably not. She feels tired and taken for granted.
Do all women have this experience? Absolutely not. There are MANY men who realize that a marriage is a partnership and they work together to get everything done so they both have time for themselves. They also realize that caring for and about the children is their job too. Bathing, reading, kissing owies, changing diapers, walks in the park are things they do. They don’t consider it babysitting - it’s parenting. Men like this are most always adored by their wives. I’ve said it heaps of times but a man emptying the dishwasher is the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen. He validates me and says everything I do is as important as the work he does.
What’s your experience?
[…] Don Hazen, AlterNet wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptSo much is written about women who get married and then lose all desire for sex. I hear it day in and day out from men as the biggest reason they are looking for a new relationship or for a bit of sex on the side. Is it true? … […]
If you speak to most women nowadays, they are holding down stressful jobs, managing a household and possibly bringing up children, and by the time they have done all that they don’t have enough energy to do anything except slump in front of the TV for a couple of hours then fall into bed and go straight to sleep. Stress also has a knock-on effect on libido, which is probably a problem our mothers didn’t face in the 1950’s when there were fewer demands on their time.
I would love to feel sexier than I do now.
why are women who don’t desire sex as much as their male partners branded as “sexually dysfunctional”? We women are not automated, hormone-driven creatures, and find it difficult to feel affectionate towards our men if they neglect us and only expect us to fulfil practical purposes outside the bed, like taking the kids to school and cooking supper
[…] Rory Boland wrote an interesting post today!.Here’s a quick excerptSo much is written about women who get married and then lose all desire for sex. I hear it day in and day out from men as the biggest reason they are looking for a new relationship or for a bit of sex on the side. Is it true? … […]
If a man wants a better sex life all he has to do is wash a few dishes and do some laundry on a consistent basis. Watching a man clean the toilet is hella sexy.
This is pretty personal, but what the hell. This is a personal topic on this site.
My soon to be ex-husband didn’t like the way I did household things, like empty the dishwasher. I didn’t put the glasses in a correct order or whatever.
He insisted on doing them. I became like the men in your scenario wanting intimacy and he was the one exhausted, but not for lack of trying on my part mind you. I did more of the raising of our daughter and other things of course and all the bills…you know whatever.
He was frustrated that I didn’t fit the more “normal” female role better. Yeah, I can fix the car usually.
Our divorce is still pending (you have to wait 90 days), but will be final beginning of October…I think. I almost immediately went on the hunt, for some intimacy that I haven’t had in years. I am happier than I have been in quite awhile, but my house is a total wreck. LOL…
So, I get all messed up when people talk about traditional roles. There is so little about some not so traditional relationships that it makes people in those positions fell less normal. I am the confident version of this example. I think there are so many that hide their relationship roles when they are reversed or even tilted.
Most of my married friends says, that Mendelsohn’s wedding music is like requiem for quality sexual life…
You are missing the point…your comments are typicl of all the”ansers” that are always given. Now here is another perspective and I know a bit about this and addtionally have been married 25 years.
Men and women in marriage get tired of each other. There is no real excitement, adventure etc simply because the early passion, romance, newness has gone. That is simply nature and not unusual.Additionally, alas, Darwin might have added his: a wife, mother, has achieved Nature’s mandate-had a baby or a few, and thus less need to spread the gene pool. The woman has fulfilled her part of the darwinian bargain but the man still seeks to spread his seed except it will not be truly spread but expended. But the woman is loath to support his male need. So all the dishes, jobs etc don’t reallay deal with the issue but are a therapist’s notion of making things sork.Nature and Evolution make things work. Or not.
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Hi David,
I do agree with you on much of what you’ve said, however in my own experience and the experiences of other women like me, there are valid reasons why we don’t desire sex and it’s not always because we’ve had a baby or a few and don’t require sex any more.
Your 25 years of marriage does give you credit, that’s for sure, but so does my 59 years of living on the planet as a woman. I’m feeling more sexy and having more sex now than I did 25 years ago but I’m with a different man.
Thanks, David, for reminding us about the evolutionary argument. I’d forgotten that. It may be true to some extent but the real world may have other factors as well.
Sharing the work load and how that causes the woman to feel better is clearly a factor. But I’d like to ad that women don’t have the same inner compulsion as men. I mean men can get horny at the drop of a hat and don’t need an atmosphere. I think it’s hard for men to understand that women aren’t built that way, don’t feel the same way?
Well, maybe this is an old argument too.
Anyway, that’s the best I can come up with at the moment.
If I remember correctly, there was a report that said that sex never “ends”. Impotence and lack of interest in sex in women is a creation of their mind as they get caught up in the trials and stress of “living”. Marriage is not the end to sex. It’s the attitude. If you are still with the love of your life, be 80; you’d still be ready to go (not as much) but ready.
yeah! I agree with you…I think I just get lucky
I married a man like what you said on your last paragraph! yey!!
I’m not married yet however, i doubt my future wife sex life will diminish because i will do my best to keep things spicy and do it better each time we have sex. And not do it too often. You should always give a woman sometime after sex to develop a strong urge for you when she is turned on, that means when you are giving it to her, you both will enjoy every second of it and after.
Cash, I like your answer. I’m a woman and my problem is I only want/need sex about once per week. I don’t know if this is normal (?), but my partner definitely needs more than that, which is where the problems come. I am just not turned on every day or other day, and I hate giving in for him. It sucks. However, when he’s on a business trip, etc, and we haven’t done it in 5 days, I typically can’t wait to initiate it!
But here’s my question all… He adores me and I know it. But he is a man. Is it enough for him 1/week? Does he need more, will he secretly wish he could get it somewhere else? I want to keep him happy, but we have different libidos
http://www.beforeandaftermarriage.com
The naked truth about marriage
How refreshing, that’s right the women do all the work in every relationship. I don’t think so. I wash the clothes and put them away, cook dinner, get the food shopping, fill both cars with petrol, take the kids to the soccer training, work a full time job, keep fit, give my wife flowers 1/2 dozen red roses and do maintenance around the house; would I deny my wife making love because I feel sleepy no, why because I love my wife that’s why I have never, not once ever denied her any sex what so ever. I ask the questions is there anything that I’m doing wrong; I get told no. Why do I feel that I have to do the work, because she does night shift and looked after the kids when they did not go to school. Do I have a wife who comes home and feels like making love nooooooooooooooo. I’m the one who says how do you feel, how was your night, did you get enough sleep. I’m the one who makes the dinner plans to eat out; yes I do ask if she would like to go out to dinner and have the kids looked after. Why is it that you are so willing to white wash every male. There are some of us who are more than willing to do there fare share; and by the way boys, doing extra work around the house all time does not mean that you will get any more love making time, I believe that it’s an urban myth. Yes my wife does cleaning some times of which I’m very grateful of but I would prefer her to use her imagination in the bedroom. Why is it always what the male is not doing, do think that all we do is go out with our mates and drink beer watch football? Do think that we dont have any feelings. O it’s because your not doing this and that, get of your arse and realise that a marriage is about two people trying to do there best, both man and women. We asking for a little bit of spice in a marriage. Men told, your not in touch with your feelings. We told by our fathers not to show any, when we do show them to our wife we just get a blank stare, imagine if we did that you. Funny I just get a blank stare when I ask my wife to use a bit what she was born with. We are all not perfect, I don’t believe that we live in a etopea but give brake of the bleeding heart that you do all the work.
I’m willing and eager to agree that you probably help out all the time and it’s your wife that has the problem. I’m sure that there are some men who really put in half the effort.
But I will never agree that all men help out around the house. As you said, your father taught you not to show your feelings. Many fathers teach their sons that work around the house is women’s work. That might have been the case when only men went out to work, but it’s not the way it is now.
After marriage you can look forward to periods of time when your sex drive will just be out. If you got a lazy husband, your screwed.
After marriage you can count on your sex drive to be low. If you have a lazy husband, your screwed