Hi Jessica!
Thanks for your email. I know this must be hard for you, I feel like I can hear the trepidation in your email. As you pointed out, it sounds like you've put your husband into the friend zone and that can be tough waters to navigate especially for a married couple.
The friend zone is a place where you get along with someone but there is no spark. Think about a sibling or parent whom you connect with emotionally but taking the jump to physical isn't at all enticing. There is no spark and no flutter as you noted. This guy is part of your support network but there is no arousal, no butterflies and no yearning for sexual contact or intimate touch. You may ask for a massage or backrub but it is always just that.
Are your displays of love and affection robotic? Do you say "I love you" out of habit? When he says he loves you, do you instinctively say that you love him back? Do you feel like you are taken for granted? Do you feel like you take him for granted or perhaps that he owes you something for sticking around and being his wife? Do you still flirt with each other? Perhaps you overshare and don't make an effort to be presentable for each other anymore. Do you cough, pass gas, blow your nose or even laugh about these things together without even the slightest attempt to hide them? The biggest one, do you use the restroom with the door open?
There, you said it. Could it be that your husband is truly not a good lover or do you simply thrive on the newness. Would you have married him initially if he wasn't a good lover? Does sex with the same partner get boring over time? Do women get bored with the same man over time? The fact is you can’t generalize the sexual boredom and preferences of all genders. Every one of us has predisposition to sexual boredom and both genders experience it but women are more predisposed to it.
Marta Meana of the University of Nevada at Las Vegas spelled it out by saying. “Long-term relationships are tough on desire, and particularly on female desire." To love is to have but desire is to want and even need something that you don't have. This is why desire fades in a long term relationship; because you already have it. Esther Perel says in her book Mating in Captivity "the qualities of a relationship that grow love – mutuality, protection, safety, predictability, protection, responsibility for the other – are the very things that will smother desire." and she is correct. These things all enhance love and reduce the uncertainty and novelty that drive desire.…
