What happens if you are a woman with a high sex drive?
It seems like it should be a dream come true if you partner with men. Men are supposed to be ready to go all the time. Right?
Aren’t they?
Well, of course not. At least not most of them.
We are just taught that nonsense.
We are taught that men are lucky to have a willing partner. If a man isn’t interested in having sex as often as his partner then something must be wrong or he must not find her attractive. These beliefs can be very damaging to our self esteem and to our partnerships.
Men with sex drives that are lower than their partners can feel like something is wrong with them. The dynamic we see in the media for heterosexual couples is almost always the other way around with men begging for sex and women not as interested. Men’s sex drives are in reality all over the map just like women.
In most partnerships there is a mismatched sex drive and an equal percentage of women have higher sex drive than their partners. It’s just not something we talk about often in our culture and it is unfortunately a source of shame for many people.
If this is a challenge you are facing you are definitely not alone.
People have low sex drives for many reasons. Some people are just built that way. Sex has never been that big of a deal to them or they never spontaneously want sex and only under certain circumstances does their sex drive comes online.
Other people have adopted negative messaging about sexuality from culture, their families, religion or they have negative beliefs about or challenges regarding their own sexuality or body that turns their sex drive way down.
Many people are leading fast-paced, super busy, stressful lives which in my experience is a recipe for a suboptimal sex life. In fact my livelihood sort of depends on helping couples sort this out.
Often in long term relationships, partners become too familiar with one another and sex can become mundane or boring. For many intimacy has dropped way down on the list below other duties like work, raising kids, chores, family obligations, etc. Sometimes the relationship dynamic has become more like roommates, siblings or even parent-child and it makes perfect sense why sex drive would diminish.
When physical affection is our preferred love language, we can feel unloved if our partner is uninterested in sex.
For some people sex drive has shut down because of feeling pressured to have sex. This goes for people of all genders. If you perceive that a partner with a higher sex drive is pressuring you to have sex when you aren’t in the mood, if you habitually accommodate them when you don’t want to, or if you feel subtly or not so subtly shamed when you decline sex, then your sex drive can completely shut down.
Being tired, stressed or not in the mood are valid reasons for anyone to decline sex and pushy sexual behavior, no matter how subtle, and sexual shaming isn’t ok no matter your gender.
Many many years ago, before I understood this stuff, I heard a woman say to her now ex-boyfriend “either you aren’t interested in sex, you aren’t interested in women or you aren’t interested in me” when she was turned down for sex. (Ok, maybe it was me. Yuck!) At the time it felt very personal to be turned down when I believed that his sex drive was supposed to be higher than mine. I felt rejected and it negatively impacted my self esteem which was already suffering. So I definitely understand.
Everyone appears to be under a lot of stress these days. Stress affects people differently. If sex tends to relieve your stress, your sex drive might go up during stressful times. If sex is a source of stress for you, perhaps due to sexual challenges you or your partner are struggling with, sex drive may decline during times of stress. Someone at GQ came up with the new term ‘anxiousexual’ but this isn’t a new concept. Recent stressful world events have led to even greater mismatched sex drives in couples.
Some clients share with me that they feel starved for cuddling and physical closeness but they feel like sex is the only way to get that, or they feel like sex is expected of them by their partner whenever they engage in any kind of intimate physical contact.
This is super common.
We sort of expect a man is the higher drive partner, but it is quite common for women and it can feel shameful to admit it because of our cultural misconceptions about male and female sex drive. There is often also a belief that the higher sex drive partner should just deal with it.
It’s not shameful to want sex.
It’s also not shameful to not want sex.
It is definitely not shameful to want to create a deeply satisfying relationship with better intimacy.
Many people with higher sex drives wrongfully assume that they are stuck. They believe that they must continue to suffer feeling sexually unsatisfied. People often give up. Some believe that their only other option is to seek sex outside of their partnerships.
There is another option.
There are many ways that I help couples struggling with mismatched sex drives become more closely matched if that is what they desire. I help people identify and move past blocks they may not even be aware of that affect their libidos and create the best conditions in their partnerships for satisfying sex and deeper intimacy. I especially love helping people get out of their heads and into their bodies during sex so they will feel way more pleasure and want to do it more often.
This work is life changing for my clients. They often have gone through years of feeling like something is wrong with them, feeling shamed or pressured by their partners around sex, feeling rejected and disappointed, undesirable and unattractive or disconnected.
It is such a joy for me to see my clients get to a place of having satisfying and fulfilling intimate connections with their partners. I see them light back up and rekindle their passion for one another. That’s exactly why I love this work!
If that’s the type of partnership you want, feel free to
book a consultation with me. I’d love to help in any way I can because you deserve nothing less.
Much Love ❤️