Sexless Marriage Effect on Husband

Marriages go through natural ebbs and flows when it comes to intimacy. But when sex starts to disappear for longer stretches—turning into weeks, months, or even years—it can take a serious toll on the relationship.

This sexless situation, typically defined as having sex 10 or fewer times per year, can leave husbands feeling lonely, insecure, unattractive, and unloved.

While the decline in intimacy impacts both partners, research indicates it may have an especially detrimental effect on husbands in heterosexual relationships due to influences of masculinity and gender norms around sex.

Understanding these impacts and learning how to cope with them is key for husbands hoping to sustain the health of their marriage.

In this blog article, we will share in-depth reasons for sexless couples, its impact on husbands and relationships, and tips and strategies to increase intimacy in couples.

What Defines a Sexless Marriage?

There’s no definitive timeframe that universally constitutes a sexless or low-sex relationship. Experts, however, typically describe couples as sexless or sexually inactive when they have intercourse 10 times or less per year. This translates to having sex less than once per month on average.

Of course, each couple differs in what they would consider a satisfying sexual frequency. But when sex starts happening very infrequently—just a few times annually—it often correlates with relationship problems.

Up to 20 percent of married couples in the U.S. are believed to be in a sexless relationship. These sexless marriages are more prevalent among older couples; however, sexless partnerships can affect couples across all age groups.

Reasons Why Sex Slows for Some Couples

There are diverse reasons long-term couples may start experiencing less frequent sex, including:

• Declining hormones: Age-related hormone changes often decrease sexual desire and arousal. Men produce lower testosterone as they get older while women generate less estrogen.
• Job stress and fatigue: Hectic work schedules leave partners constantly exhausted. This distraction hinders intimacy.
• Parenthood pressures: The demands of raising small children limit private couple time. Mothers touch from holding babies so much, they often feel “touched out.”
• Body image issues: Weight gain, pregnancy changes or health conditions may cause partners to feel less sexually confident.
• Emotional disconnect: Underlying anger, resentment or a breakdown in communication damages emotional intimacy between partners.
• Medical problems: Certain illnesses, disabilities, and medications cause sexual function or desire issues like erectile dysfunction or vaginal dryness.
• Mismatched libidos: Partners simply have differing levels of interest in sex that prove difficult to align.

Without consciously addressing the issues diminishing their physical intimacy, couples may find that sex continues to disappear from their relationship. They risk living in a loving partnership that exists without a sexual component.

Impacts on the Husband When Sex Vanishes

When sexual activity fades out in a committed relationship, both partners tend to feel equally as frustrated and disconnected. However, research indicates husbands often get hit especially hard emotionally by the absence of sex.

Male self-esteem frequently takes a harsh blow when a once-healthy sex life diminishes in a long-term relationship. Men even report higher levels of depression when sex declines markedly or ceases altogether.

Several theories help explain why the husband may bear the brunt of the despair when couples stop making love.

Masculinity Tied to Sexual Conquest Societal norms of masculinity still pressures men to view sexuality as a key component of their self-worth and social status.

Men learn to link their masculinity to sexual achievement and prowess. By contrast, women in heterosexual relationships aren’t socially conditioned to view sexuality in terms of validation.

When deprived of sex within marriage, men stand to take the biggest hit to their masculinity and question their ability to attract a mate. It leaves husbands feeling deficient since society tells men they should always crave sex.

Biological Sex Drives Tend Higher Among Men

Science suggests men biologically have higher overall sex drives than women. Testosterone, the predominant male sex hormone, is credited for playing a pivotal role in sexual desire and behavior. The majority of husbands simply think about and initiate sex more than their female partners.

Over time, this desire discrepancy can compound frustration for the man not having his physical needs met as frequently as he’d like. Mismatched libidos and expectations for sex may compound his feelings of rejection.

Women Often Control Frequency of Sex

Within the power dynamics of most heterosexual relationships, the woman tends to control sexual frequency and access to intercourse. This relates to historic gender norms in which men should pursue sex and women act as the gatekeepers.

When she stops being interested, he has no direct control over changing the situation to improve his access to intimacy. This lack of agency despite having an ongoing high sex drive amplifies feelings of powerlessness and resentment.

Differing Emotional Needs

Compared to men, women often have more complex requirements to feel emotionally connected before opening up to physical intimacy. When communication breaks down or partners disconnect, wives report losing sexual interest while husbands get even more sexually frustrated.

These contrasting needs surrounding emotional versus physical intimacy lead to competing feelings of confusion and rejection.

Impacts on Husbands in Sexless Marriages

1. Canceled masculinity – Men in sexless marriages describe feeling like “less of a man” due to the blow to their masculinity. Virility and sexual competence get tied subconsciously to perceptions of manhood.

2. Low self-esteem – Men often internalize sexual disinterest from their partner as a reflection on their shortcomings. It leaves them feeling undesirable, and defective and doubting their self-worth.

3. Mood issues – Research links sexless relationships to negative mental health impacts like depression, anxiety and irritability in men. Chemicals released during sex promote emotional well-being.

4. Anger about powerlessness – Lacking agency around changing the circumstances fosters immense frustration and bitterness in husbands who miss previous levels of physical intimacy.

5. Jealousy about mystique – Men may worry their partner directs her sexual energy outside the marriage or that there’s something wrong with them but no one else.

6. Fear and inadequacy – Husbands distressed about disappointing their spouse or performing poorly during infrequent sexual encounters after long dry spells. Sexual anxiety and impotence can result.

7. Resentment and withdrawal – When wives constantly rebuff advances, husbands feel rejected and unwanted. They may cope via retreat or acting out passive-aggressively.

8.  Infidelity worries – Feeling deprived physically sometimes causes husbands in sexless marriages to entertain thoughts of fulfilling needs elsewhere. Though most remain committed.

9. Exit considerations – Chronic sexual frustration makes some men consider divorce as the only path to finding an intimate partnership more aligned with their needs.

How Husbands Cope in a Sexless Marriage

Instead of productively addressing sexual issues, couples frequently ignore them entirely once sex starts to vanish. They adapt to affection-based bonding without physical intimacy. Overfocusing on other aspects of life like work or hobbies usually proves ineffective.

Men adopt various approaches to cope with the impacts of a sexless marriage:

1. Masturbation

Pleasuring oneself via masturbation eases physiological frustration. However, emotional and intimacy needs to go unfulfilled. Pornography dependence sometimes arises.

2. Emotional repression

Burying feelings over lack of sex shields short-term pain but builds resentment long-term when nothing changes. Passive aggression often manifests.

3. Verbal hints or pressure

Repeated attempts to verbally coax or guilt a spouse into intimacy leads to intense arguments. It usually backfires by worsening the recipient’s sexual aversion.

4. Outsourcing flirtation

Seeking ego boosts through flirting or emotional affairs online diverts sexual energy away from the marriage. Virtual outlets carry addiction risks.

5. Configuring ethical alternatives

Imagining some open relationship configuration sparks curiosity but rarely aligns with a spouse’s values or jealousy thresholds.

6. Resigned acceptance

Just surrendering to the chasm between sexual expectations elicits nihilistic sadness. Partners become disengaged roommates.

7. Planning exit strategies

Consulting secretly with divorce lawyers empowers the spouse to crave physical intimacy to leave an unfulfilling marriage.

Very few husbands report feeling content and fully adjusted to sexless marriages they once found enriching sexually. Most tend to struggle through phases of denial, anger, resentment, and sadness over the lack of intimacy.

But does the pain ever compel couples to reconnect physically? Unfortunately, the vast majority of sexless marriages stay sexless unless partners make concerted efforts to address the issues impeding intimacy.

Overcoming Sexless Marriage as a Husband

Coping mechanisms only help husbands survive without physical intimacy in the short term. They fail to restore feelings of sexual empowerment and confidence absent working directly on the loss of sex within the marriage.

While unilaterally trying to instigate more intercourse won’t likely improve the situation, couples can make concrete efforts together to move toward renewed intimacy:

1. Seek medical advice – Identify whether hormonal changes, health problems or medications impact libido or performance capacity that can get medically improved.

2. Address personal issues – Tackle sources of body image shame, anxiety, anger or pain during sex that may require professional counseling support.

3. Reconnect emotionally – Make concerted efforts to communicate openly, express affection and spend meaningful time together free of distractions.

4. Discuss needs objectively – Have honest, blame-free conversations about sexual expectations, mismatched desires, turn-offs, and hoped-for frequency targets.

5. Commit to relational intentions – Both partners must care enough about sustaining an intimate connection to invest time and compromise around meeting in the middle.

If both parties open up to constructive dialogue and reconnect in non-sexual ways first, this lays the groundwork to progressively reintroduce physical closeness later. Patience and compassion serve as key principles for improving sexual dynamics.

When Husbands Should Accept the Marriage Staying Sexless

Of course, everyone differs in their overall interest and desire for sex. For some couples, sleeping in separate bedrooms and pursuing companionship without physical intimacy works fine long-term.

They base their bonds on sharing mutual hobbies, social networks, family values or intellectual passions.

A husband shouldn’t have to coerce an unwilling wife to engage in unwanted sex for the sole sake of fulfilling his higher libido. Nor should husbands remain trapped for years in sexually unfulfilling marriages stirring negative emotions.

Each man has to determine his personal tolerance level for unmet sexual needs and emotional impacts. Then they face important decisions regarding choosing to pragmatically accept the disconnect or decide to leave the relationship. There are no absolute right or wrong answers.

Priorities, moral views and willingness to compromise get weighed against a desire for regular and mutually desired sexual connection. It often boils down to what constitutes a dealbreaker and what levels of sexual intimacy define partnership needs.

For husbands invested in giving their intimate relationship another chance, structured counseling offers guidance. Therapy equips partners to openly communicate their emotional worlds. Mending rifts creating distance influences whether couples reconnect sexually.

When nothing seems to move the needle positively over sufficient time, individual counseling empowers husbands to make self-affirming choices. It centers their needs in the equation of whether to sustain the marriage or not.

By assessing all options objectively, husbands decide which path aligns best with their goals for health and happiness.

In conclusion;

Sociological theories and research point to husbands bearing the heavier psychological burden when sexless dynamics develop within marriages. Failure to uphold masculine norms around sexuality delivers blows to the male ego. Men struggle uniquely when wives lose libidinal interest.

Myriad complex reasons explain why couples’ sex lives ebb, especially among middle-aged and older pairs. Interplay between medical, emotional and psychological factors often inhibits desire.

Rather than directly addressing subdued sexuality before it turns into long-term sexlessness, spouses tend to adapt their connections to alignment without physical intimacy.

But devoid of sex, husbands often battle lowered self-esteem, increased frustration, and bitterness over feeling helpless to change the circumstances. They resent the lack of feminine desire that once validated them. Coping mechanisms like masturbation or emotional repression create psychological distance. Resentment poisons rapport.

Restoring intimacy requires understanding and patience from both partners. Without mutual engagement, acceptance or compromises around meeting in the sexual middle, most sexless marriages stay barren.

Husbands shouldn’t settle for solely giving up though. Evaluating all considerations empowers men to make self-honoring decisions about their dealbreakers to feel fulfilled in marriage.