[mezzy]

I have been with my partner for 4 months, it's been great and we love each other and get along, we don't fight and he makes me feel special. BUT he doesn't want sex as much as me. I'm a big woman and my ex always told me that 'i don't want you and I'm with you, so who else would". So I take it to heart when my partner doesn't want sex. I'm the same size now as I was when I met my partner. It hurts that he doesn't want to be intimate with me. I take it as personal rejection and wonder how he can say he loves me when he doesn't seem attracted to me. I enjoy sex, I love the high and the good feeling that come from it, and the intimacy that it brings to a relationship. I find myself pleasuring myself a lot when my partner is at work. He stays up late to watch tv/internet while I go to bed. It disturbs me that I feel he is emotionally shutting me out so early in the relationship. I take the intiative, but often he just says he is tired and I have a higher drive than him. What to do? I have low self esteem and confidence, I suffer from depression and anxiety. The constant rejection is taking it's toll on my mental and emotional health. I am seeing a clinical psychologist to try and get my life sorted out and gain my mental health back. But I feel like giving up on having sex with my partner and just self serving. I have tried to take to him about it, he realised how it was affecting me and made an effort for a couple weeks. He says he is tired and stressed at work. Personally I can think of no better way of relaxing than letting your partner help you unwind and feeling that closeness that everything is better together and that they are with you in every way.

[Synnen]

Okay, as the one with the lower sex drive in my relationship I have to tell you: BACK OFF!

You WILL drive him to not wanting sex with you if you keep pushing.

He's told you why he doesn't want sex as often as yeu: His drive is lower, and he's tired and stressed at work. Stress is a HUGE libido killer.

His lower drive isn't about you at all. You need to trust what he is telling you or you will seriously hurt your relationship.

Have you brought up the sex thing with your psychologist?

[JudyKayTee]

He says he is tired and stressed at work. Personally I can think of no better way of relaxing than letting your partner help you unwind and feeling that closeness that everything is better together and that they are with you in every way.

Do you work? I see a man who is tired after working, doesn't need/want sex every night, is avoiding the issue by staying up late in another room and watching TV.

YOU can think of no better way to unwind, etc. That doesn't mean HE can't think of a better way.

I think you are confusing sex and love and sex and intimacy. You can be very emotionally intimate without sex - sometimes it's due to circumstances, religious beliefs, physical issues. It happens.

[Cat1864]

Are you already living together?

mezzy, quite bluntly, you are making him carry the baggage you packed in your past relationship.

Your ex treated you very badly and did a lot of damage to your self-esteem and confidence. That relationship put unreal expectations into your head of a person can't love or find you attractive if he isn't having sex with you as often as you think it should be occurring. It may also have caused you to expect a lot from a relationship very early on. How quickly did you decide you were 'in love' and to start having sex? Have the two of you really spent any time building up other areas of the relationship such as communications and developing other forms of non-verbal (or sexual) ways of showing affection and intimacy?

It seems that you haven't taken time to heal and unpack the baggage that relationship left you with. You are still lugging it around and letting it affect your current relationship which is still extremely new. You are just now learning who each other is as a person.

This person is not your ex. He shouldn't be made responsible for dealing with your issues from your past. He has his own issues such as being tired and stressed. He should not have to deal with someone adding to that stress because they haven't dealt with their own problems.

To you sex equals intimacy and affection (probably because it was denied in the past). To him it is probably equaling work and having to satisfy yet another person's demands which is a huge turn-off and makes matters worse. Instead of looking for intimacy in intercourse look for it in cuddling and watching a movie. Find it in a shared smile or an inside joke. Give it by giving him a hug or a kiss on the cheek 'just because' and not as a prelude to sexual acts. Relax together and enjoy the feeling of being in the same room.

I am glad you are seeing a psychologist and I sincerely hope it is helping.