I don’t give advice to people I haven’t met, but the general advice in these situations is to discuss it. It sounds like the reason you are not feeling sexual is that you are tired with the pregnancy, a perfectly normal thing especially since it sounds like your job is demanding and has long hours. And there was an issue in sexual disparity even before. Most couples have differences in how often they desire sex, and they work it out. Life is not perfect, and compromise is part of any healthy marriage. There are always other options, such as masturbation. By the way, factually, sex 2 or 3 times a week is actually above the national average for married couples, and way above the average for couples with children.

I also like to remind partners who are trying to get their partners to have more sex that seduction doesn’t involve guilt induction or comparisons to other people. Effective seduction makes your partner’s life easier and better–John Gottman always has said that men who help with housework more get more sex. And Oprah once said that foreplay begins in the morning when the man unloads the dishwasher!

The general guidelines are to talk without accusations, and if that fails, see someone who can help you talk calmly and compromise.

Now that I’m five months pregnant I’ve felt a great drop in my sex drive. I’m always exhausted after I get home from work (late at night) and I simply just don’t seem to have the energy to make love as often as he wants to. Before I got pregnant I was content at two or three times a week but lately we’re lucky if we have sex once a week.

He has a very high sex drive and wants to have sex every day and has been extremely frustrated with me because of it. He keeps reminding me that his ex wife had sex with him any time he wanted to all the time and that that is “normal” and that I am “not normal”. He also insists that women are supposed to have increased sex drives during pregnancy- and the fact that my sex drive isn’t getting revved up is also “not normal”.

He sent me this article to read and none of these reasons really seem to explain what our problem is…

Hi,

It’s quite normal for sexual frequency to drop after a couple has been together for a while, and real life usually gets in the way of having sex multiple times a day, or even once a day. But if you’ve dropped off to having sex less than once a week or so, then something is going on. It’s usually a good idea to just have a frank conversation about it–to identify possible causes. In general, these can include physical changes, weight changes, illness, depression, conflict, or emotional distance. The general question is : Why aren’t we having regular sex? Sometimes couples can reboot their sex life just by having a weekly date/sex night. Enjoy New South Wales, I’m a great fan of Australia!