What to Do if You Have a Lower Sex Drive Than Your Partner

It doesn’t have to lead to guilt and frustration

There are a lot of things pumping the brakes on my sex drive, and it hasn’t been easy to deal with.

Thanks to chronic illnesses, I need medical assistance to manage my hormone levels. Figuring out the right dosage is a long process and I’m still not quite there.

That means a lot of things, but mainly a lot of brain fog, fatigue, anxiety, and low sexual desire.

Then on top of that, I’ve got PMDD.

That means for about two weeks out of the month, I’m optimistic, productive, creative, and hella horny.

The other two weeks feel like a crash. During that time, I’d rather spend my leisure hours lying under a weighted blanket and just chilling.

For the most part, my libido feels like the fifteen-year-old minivan I drive. It doesn’t accelerate as fast as it should. The brakes are sticky. Sometimes, it struggles to even get started.

My husband’s the exact opposite.

He wakes up in the mood to have sex. He feels peaks of arousal through the day — when he’s working, cooking, cleaning, walking, or doing just about anything. And when he settles in the for the night, he’s definitely down to clown around.

He loves our frequent cuddle sessions, but I have a feeling he’d prefer them as sexual aftercare.

Most couples have mismatched libidos — at least, after the honeymoon phase is over and the hormonal surges die down. We just happen to be at two extremes.

In a way, it might seem like I’ve got it easy. Being the one with the low libido gives me the trump card.

Whenever I’m feeling some sexual arousal, I get to act on it because my high libido husband is always down to fuck. Whatever desire I have, he’s there to fulfill it.

And when I don’t feel up to it, that’s the end of the discussion. We’ll do something else instead — he’ll give me a massage, we’ll just hang out and talk, or he’ll cuddle me while we watch episodes of New Girl until we get too tired to stay up.

I basically get the exact amount of sex my body desires.

That sounds great in theory, but it actually kind of sucks.

I wish I felt more sexual desire and felt it more often. Being horny feels really fucking good. As far as states of mind go, it’s hard to beat.

It also has so many emotional and cognitive benefits. When my sex drive is active, I’ve got enough creativity to fill page after page with fresh ideas, I feel so good about myself that I take nude selfies instead of hating my body, and I actually feel like getting stuff done.

And I love sex. When I can’t get in the mood for it, I know I’m missing out.

The breathless excitement that comes from being teased and seduced, the unmatched pleasure that comes from a tongue slowly lapping my pussy, the deep and powerful sensation of being penetrated — I wish I could have all of it, even when I’m not really in the mood.

But one of the hardest things to cope with is the guilt.

Missing out on the sex and the vibrant feelings that come with it is bad enough. Feeling like you’re inadequate as a partner is even worse.

Knowing my husband has lots of intense sexual desires sometimes makes me feel like a burden. Like I’m the person who’s standing in the way of him finding sexual fulfillment.

In my darker moments, I feel like he deserves better than me — that he should be married to someone who could satisfy his horny appetites. Someone who could actually be on the receiving end of all that sexual affection and pleasure he wants to dish out.

A lot of discussions about mismatched sex drives are about the partner who wants more sex. We hear about their frustrations, we give them advice on helping their partners get turned on, we help them cope with the situation they found themselves in.

That’s great, helpful, and absolutely necessary. I’m completely sympathetic to my horny husband. I don’t want him feeling frustrated and pent up, I don’t want him to feel disappointed and rejected, and I want him to know he’s attractive and appreciated.

But I also know it’s not easy for the other partner. Having a low libido is really challenging, too — sometimes even more.

These are the things I do to help me be the lower libido partner without feeling too much guilt and shame.

Make It a Point to Show Your Love in Other Ways

When I’m not in the mood for sex, I try to find other ways to show my love for my husband.

Because I do love him. I’m profoundly fond of him. I’m grateful to have him in my life and I love spending time with him.

It just doesn’t always translate to wanting to have sex with him.

And that can cause some problems.

In some cases, sex is one of the ways your higher libido partner might express those things. I know that when my husband feels love for me, it turns to desire, to passion, and to wanting his hands and mouth all over my body.

When your desire just isn’t that strong, they might assume that it’s because the love you feel for them isn’t strong, either.

On top of that, being the low libido partner means you’ll be the one repeatedly turning down sex. And all that rejection can make your partner feel unloved.

That’s why it helps to make it a point to show your love in other ways.

Find non-sexual ways to be physically affectionate. Touch them sweetly, get close when you spend time together, and cuddle the fuck out of them.

Doing thoughtful things and doing them spontaneously helps a lot, too. It’s hard to feel unloved when you know your partner is thinking about you.

Plan and set up date nights so you can have lots of intimacy even when you’re not up to doing anything dirty.

And just remind them — a lot and often. Thank them for the things they do for you. Tell them you love and appreciate them. Have long, deep conversations where you just pour your heart out to them.

If you can do that, they can feel reassured and you don’t have to feel inadequate as a partner.

Stomp Out the Sexpectations

One of the things I hated the most about being the low-desire partner was feeling this constant expectation to have sex.

I’m sure my husband hated being continually and routinely turned down when he put the moves on me. But I hated having to turn him down, too. It didn’t feel good.

It got to a point where I tried to avoid anything that would create any sexpectations.

I turned down massages because I didn’t want him to think it might lead to sex.

I didn’t go out of my way to plan romantic date nights because I didn’t want him to put the moves on me.

I stopped flirting with him because I knew it might escalate and shutting it down would bum me out.

And that kind of sapped the energy out of our relationship. There was less touch, less affection, and less spark between us.

There was only one way to deal with it. I opened up to him about it.

I told him how I felt when there were sexpectations and all the lengths I went to in order to avoid them.

That gave us the language we both needed so I could be more comfortable with him.

Now, when he offers me a massage, he’ll specify that he’s offering it with no sexpectations. It doesn’t have to be treated as foreplay or lead to sex. It can just be a massage.

And I can relax and let him rub oil into my skin, knowing that it won’t lead to more. Even if touching my naked body makes him ragingly horny, it will still end up with him toweling me dry and me getting dressed.

I can also flirt more often now because he’s aware that it doesn’t mean I’m horny or want to take things further.

Be clear about your frustrations. Tell your partner all about the sexpectations you feel and how they put you in a tough position. Communicating openly about it will help them manage their expectations with your sex life. It will also give you a way to preemptively turn things down without having to do it when things are further along and rejection gets a little more awkward.

Don’t Beat Yourself Up When You Can’t Get There

When you’re the partner with the lower libido, you spend a lot of time trying.

You schedule sex to see if you can get yourself worked up enough for a fuck every Wednesday (even though it doesn’t always work as planned).

You spend all day watching porn to try to get yourself all horned up by evening.

You do everything you can to relax and protect your mood. You spend the entire afternoon in a bubble bath with scented candles lit and a playlist of your favorite music so you can be so chill you’re open to just about anything.

You masturbate and edge yourself to see if you can frustrate yourself into wanting a good fuck.

When you do all that and still end up feeling meh about sex, it can be crushing. That’s when you can really feel broken.

It’s completely understandable if you feel that way, but it’s also the wrong attitude to have about it.

First, remind yourself that none of it is your fault. It’s just the way your body, your hormones, and your brain chemistry work. It’s not always something you can fight — and even when you can, it’s never clear what the best way to deal with it is.

The amount of mental energy low libido people can pour into trying to get horny is frankly impressive and can be exhausting. Be proud of yourself for doing your best and putting in all that work.

Then, focus on what you did achieve.

Even if it doesn’t lead to boning down, you still spent the day reading smut or giggling through some parody porn.

Your scheduled sex night might have just turned into a regular date night, which isn’t that bad of an outcome.

You got to enjoy some non-sexual intimacy with your partner, even if it never actually turned to foreplay.

And if things got started but went nowhere, you still got to see your partner naked — which can still be hot even if it doesn’t actually turn you on enough to fuck them.

If it helps, you can also do all of your libido-raising activities privately. I found that really helped me with the guilt. If I told my husband I was trying to get in the mood, I would feel terrible when I couldn’t get there. I didn’t just feel disappointed — I felt like I had let him down.

But when I watched some porn without telling him or made a mental note to fuck him on a given night without putting it on the calendar, I didn’t have to feel bad when all I wanted to do was cuddle instead.

Use the Horny Scale to Masturbate Without Guilt

The weird thing about having a low sex drive is that you still enjoy some sexual stuff.

You might still fantasize, watch porn, and stare at thirst traps in your timeline.

You might wish you could have sex, even if you can’t actually get yourself in the mood for it.

And there’s a good chance you still masturbate.

There’s nothing weird about any of that, but it can put you in a weird place emotionally.

When you don’t want sex, there are a lot of great reasons to still want sexual pleasure.

Vibrators feel amazing. The orgasms they give feel even better. And the hormonal rush you get from coming is a really good way to relieve stress, balance out your mood, and it’s a lot more satisfying than zoning out in front of a bad movie.

But I struggled with that when my sex drive was at its lowest point.

Getting myself off always felt wrong. If I had even a shred of horniness, I felt like I should save it for my husband. I convinced myself that masturbating was just wasting it.

Except, it never worked out that way. Having the urge to masturbate didn’t mean I’d have a desire to fuck. So, in the end all I did was cheat myself out of coming.

I gave that up and fell into a pattern of masturbating secretly. When I could, I would sneak off, watch some dirty porn on my phone, and make myself come quickly with my favorite vibrator. I got it down to a science — I was in and out in under five minutes.

The rest of the time, I made good use of my massaging showerhead.

I kept that up until I came across something that changed everything. It was a viral Reddit post that gave a number system for horniness.

Basically, you rank your sexual desire on a scale from one to five. One is having absolutely no desire whatsoever. Five is ragingly horny and very down to fuck. At a three, you can be swayed one way or the other.

Mr. Austin and I made jokes about it at first, but we quickly started using it as a communication tool. When he would say something suggestive, I would reply with “Nice try, but I’m at a one.”

When I wanted the odds in my favor, I could say “I’m at a three, by the way. So if you want to try your best moves on me, you’ve got a shot.”

But it also helped me get rid of the masturbation guilt.

Because I need to be at a four to want sex and I need to be at a three for my husband to have a shot. But I only need to be at a two, or even a 1.5, to want to jill off.

That put everything in perspective. I don’t have to feel like I’m wasting my horniness by masturbating because there’s no way I’ll use it for anything else if I’m not at a three. And he knows that there are plenty of times that I desire a little bit of sexual self-care without having enough mood for sex.

You don’t have to actually use the five-point horny scale to communicate this. But being open about the fact that sex just takes a lot more arousal than masturbation is a great way to feel less guilty about doing yourself instead of your partner.

Embrace Your Partner’s High Sex Drive

When my sexual desires became rare and slight, I developed a weird relationship with my husband’s high sex drive.

The lower my sex drive got, the more his made me feel insecure and inadequate. It got to a point where I wished he would just lose it. I wanted him to stop wanting sex so that I wouldn’t have to feel terrible when I couldn’t give it to him.

Needless to say, that wasn’t great. He couldn’t lower his libido any more than I could increase mine. And being resentful of your partner’s sexual desires isn’t a good look.

Somewhere along the way, though, I flipped the script on myself.

I guess I realized it was just part of who he was and there was no reason for me to be upset about that. So instead of wishing he would change, I started embracing his constant horniness.

I encouraged him to jerk off regularly and really enjoy it — even if that meant doing it in bed with me.

I urged him to get sex toys to make it really fun and pleasurable. Last year, I even bought him strokers and sleeves for our Sexmas celebration so he could really go nuts.

We made a little room in our budget so he could subscribe to porn sites that really turn him on.

That changed everything. Knowing he was having a good time helped me get rid of the guilt — most of it, anyway. And it made both of us a lot happier.

If you can’t match your partner’s high sex drive, you can at least embrace it. Give them the space and time they need to masturbate. Let them blow a bit of money on OnlyFans subscriptions.

They’ll feel understood, less pent up and frustrated, and a hell of a lot more satisfied.

And without the guilt, you can enjoy the benefits of their high sex drive. Like the fact that they’re almost always down to fuck when you’re ready to have sex.

Their frequent horniness also means they spend a lot of time desiring you, checking you out, and fantasizing about you. Those are all good things, even when you can’t reciprocate in the same way.

I’m still working on increasing my sex drive and I’ve made a lot of progress in the last year.

It’s a combination of things.

I started writing about sex, so I spent even more time thinking about it.

I got a lot more open with my husband and let him know which of his little habits turned me off and what things turned me on.

I explored some of my kinks and it made sex so much fucking hotter, which made me a lot more excited to have it.

Now, it’s mostly a matter of making progress with my health issues. It’s slow, but I’m getting there.

Even when I do, though, I’m pretty sure Mr. Austin and I will still have mismatched sex drives. I don’t think there’s any way I’ll ever catch up to his.

That doesn’t bother me at all. Because he can take care of his own business when he has to and I have other ways of showing him love and affection.

And when I can’t quite get there, I can still enjoy my showerhead without feeling bad about it. That’s all a girl really needs.

If you liked this post, check out Pillow Talk With Emma Austin, the dirty and intimate sex podcast I host with my husband!

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