The best thing about writing a dating and sex column (aside from the numerous free pleasure devices I get sent from companies) is that every day I get to wake up and explore my most favourite topic in the world. Whether it’s going on dates, reading a juicy sex survey or getting my friends to share their bedroom antics, barely a day goes by that I’m not fascinated in what I find out.
The benefit to this is that many of you slide into my social media DMs with your own trials and tribulations and I love seeing what’s got everyone hot under the collar.
Except for the one question that I get time and time again. We’re talking, at least five times a week. It’s grim but oh so common. The question is: Why won’t my partner have sex with me, and how can I fix it? I’ve never been able to answer the question with 100 per cent confidence, until now.
Now sure, there could be a million reasons why, and if I was a psychologist, I would suggest you book 10 sessions so we could really get to the bottom of it. But this one theory I heard last week, I reckon, could easily solve the mystery for 90 per cent of you facing this issue.
I was listening to my favourite podcast Diary of a CEO and host Steven Bartlett had philosopher Alain de Botton on for a chat about all things to do with love and sex. (Side note: Always hilarious listening to someone with a pompous posh accent talk about the naughtier things in life.)
Steven asked him “Why is it that sex is easier at the beginning than in a long-term relationship” and his reply was fascinating.
He said that one of the leading answers to this question is “anger”. And it’s anger that couples aren’t even aware they have towards each other. These aren’t the obvious things like anger because of infidelity or abuse. No no. He said these angers come from micro incidents of disappointment e.g. someone forgot to take out the bins, someone came home late. These small micro incidents add up and become a hidden rage within you. The result is that you don’t then want your partner to touch you because deep down your furious but you’re not even aware of it. Alain said “it’s not very easy to have sex or want sex with someone you’re angry with. In many relationships there is a lot of stored anger that neither party knows is there.”
I pondered on this for quite a while and realise I’ve been guilty of this. When I had a boyfriend a few years ago we were wild for each other. I don’t mean to brag, but if there was an Olympics for bedroom romps, we would have won gold. That was until we moved in together.
Suddenly date nights stopped because he figured I would be home when he wanted to hang out. He started expecting home cook dinners (I blame his mother) and constantly picking up his wet towels off the floor would drive me bonkers. Were these big scandalous acts? No. But by the time he got home from work, or his friends place, or golf I was so off him. A lazy prod of his ‘ol fella’ in my back when we went to bed was his new form of ‘you wanna’ and I genuinely didn’t.
Every time I went to rage at him about these small annoyances I would stop myself because they sounded so ridiculous out loud – but inside I was like a flaming inferno.
I don’t think I’m alone in saying many women will unintentionally use no sex as a passive aggressive tactic. Rather than communicate our anger, we withdraw sex.
So what’s the solution? Well, if you want to have more sex Alain says you have to ask your partner every week “How have we annoyed each other” and then have an open and honest discussion about each other’s annoyances. Get them all out on the table, address them and you will find the anger inside you extinguishes. Oh, and most importantly, your libido comes back.
So don’t waste your time on flowers, fancy dinners and sexy lingerie, just ask each other what your damn problems are. Maybe schedule in a quick 10 minute debrief before your Sunday night roast. Heck, if it gets you back in the sack it certainly can’t hurt.
Alain explained that EVERYONE does things that make them annoying. Umm … what! I find that hard to believe. All jokes aside, it’s true.
If my ex fella and I had spoken more openly about each other’s tiny annoying habits perhaps our love life wouldn’t have turned into the Sahara Desert.
Such a simple answer and solution. Oh Alain … any chance you’re single?
Jana Hocking is a columnist and collector of kind-of-boyfriends | @jana_hocking