Sex Life in Long Term Relationship

You’re here with your wife. You’ve been married, you have the career, you have the kids, you have everything you’re supposed to have. It looks good.

But you barely have sex anymore. That good sex life is not a part of your lives anymore. You’re faithful, you don’t cheat, you’re not hooked on porn—but what happened? How do you get that back?

You don’t fight. You don’t feel disconnected. But that sexual attraction where you used to really be into each other? It’s almost like now you have sex just to say you did, because that’s what married couples do.

So what the fuck? Is it over?

No, It’s Not Over

There are two directions we want to approach this from—and of course they’re interrelated.

The first is attachment. Can we make it safe for you guys emotionally to show up and talk to each other? If we can make your relationship a safe emotional container where you can really tell each other what your feelings are and what your experiences are—and understand the ways in which that’s difficult for both of you—we might create the environment that makes it more likely you’re going to be able to be sexually intimate with each other.

The second is this: Almost all relationships are going to have to make the transition from sexual intimacy that’s inspired by simultaneous excitement—like, “Ooh, I’m so excited. I came home from work today and you looked hot!” And you’re like, “Well the way you were looking at me, I feel like going upstairs too.”

Waiting for those moments to be what inspires you to have sex? That’s ridiculous. Because it’s going to happen less and less.

Sex Has to Be Approached Differently

There’s this awesome couple that specializes in this kind of work up in Petaluma—Jim and Felicia Mateo Shepherd. Their work is all about helping couples move towards what they call “heart-centered sexuality.”

There are a few main steps to that:

First, we have to give up this notion that we’re going to be sexually intimate out of inspiration. Like something’s just going to take over our bodies and we’re just going to want to do it. We’re going to have to actually work at it, plan it, and schedule times to be intimate with each other.

I know. This is really hard for people to imagine doing.

Second, the people that actually have sex with each other are probably going to have to change.

Here’s what I mean by that. When I met my wife Teal at Esalen, my sexy self—Sexy Figs, hello—met my wife’s sexy self. We were both like, “Oh, hello. Ooh.” It was love at first sight.

Those aren’t the people that have sex with each other now.

All these years later, my “Oh shit, am I going to be a disappointment tonight? Do I not want it as much as I should right now?”—that vulnerable, snivelly, Shrek-looking character—has to go and have sex with my wife, who is also like, “Oh my God, am I not as desirable as I once was? Do you not really want me as much as you did before?”

These two vulnerable people now have to come together and be sexually intimate with each other.

If we don’t make space for our vulnerable selves to be the ones having sexual intimacy, we’re probably going to end up spending more and more time not being intimate with each other.

Making the Implicit Explicit

We’ve got to take what’s implicitly happening and make it explicit. Sex has become a vulnerable thing. It’s already implicitly vulnerable.

There’s this innate need inside us as human beings to be emotionally bonded with another. It’s there because without it, we will not survive. Babies will die without being emotionally bonded to another person. Our whole physiology is built to freak out if there isn’t someone there for us who loves us and will care for us—and that we’re enough for them.

So that’s one physiological process ongoing throughout our life.

Now, there’s another physiological process ongoing over the course of our life: we want to mate, we want to have sex, we find people attractive. “Ooh, would you look at that?”

Obviously those two sync up perfectly sometimes. In the moment you meet your future spouse, they’re perfectly synced: “Whoa, you are hot AND I’m hoping you’ll become my primary attachment figure.” Brilliant.

But there are going to be moments in your life when those two things aren’t perfectly in sync. They may seem like they’re contradicting each other.

Life is not so simple.

The Monogamous Path Isn’t Easy—But Neither Is Any Other Path

Anyone that tells you the monogamous path is easy is having a laugh. It’s not easy. There are going to be moments where you’re challenged. You’re going to see things inside yourself you don’t like. You’re going to have longings that don’t fit inside the boundaries of your relationship.

But here’s the thing—anyone that tells you open relationships, being single and dating, polyamory is a piece of cake and an easy life? They’re having a laugh too. It’s going to be hard.

So can we take what’s implicitly happening, create a safe environment in our relationship so we can be explicit about it, and then really share and explore the feelings?

Creating a Safe Container

What’s most important to me in my own relationship—and what I primarily work on in helping people—is helping people create a safe container between two people in their relationship. So that both people can feel: You’re really there for me, and I’m enough for you.

That’s the most important thing.

Now, sex touches those things. Are you really there for me if you don’t desire me anymore? Maybe it’s going to bring up really vulnerable feelings. Am I really enough for you if I don’t desire you as much anymore and you’re really upset with me about it?

It’s really painful.

So let’s make it explicit. Let’s feel the feelings.

And here’s the crazy magical thing that can happen between people: Doing that—really showing up vulnerably with each other—can make people feel so close to each other, so understood by each other, that it becomes the perfect setting for people to actually feel safe to love each other and cuddle each other… and even get a little frisky.

Watch the full conversation above where I discuss these ideas with my colleague Ben Murphy.