Glossary
Sexless marriage
The relationship where the sex slowly fell away, usually without anyone ever naming it.
What is a sexless marriage?
A sexless marriage (also called a dead bedroom) is a relationship where there has been little or no sex for a long time. Usually it is not one choice, but something that happened slowly and was rarely said out loud. It often goes together with a difference in desire between the partners.
| Also known as | a dead bedroom, the online peer-support term; a sexless relationship |
| In Dutch | seksloos huwelijk |
| Category | a pattern around libido and difference in desire |
| Often starts with | a slowly growing difference in desire that goes undiscussed |
| Common causes | busyness, stress, little attention, and starting to avoid the subject |
| Where the medical side belongs | with the GP, a sexologist, or couples therapist |
What a sexless marriage looks like
In practice it is rarely a fight and more often a silence. Take a couple who have been together for years. Once the sex was there on its own, then it grew less through work, children, and tiredness, and at some point it had been months without anyone naming it. They sleep side by side, on paper they are not unhappy, but the touch is gone and nobody brings it up, out of fear of hurting the other or being turned down themselves. That pattern, where the subject gets harder to raise the longer it lasts, is what makes a sexless marriage so stubborn.
Why the sex can disappear in a long relationship
That desire fades in a long relationship is normal and not inevitable. A systematic review by Kristen Mark and Julie Lasslo in The Journal of Sex Research from 2018 describes sexual desire as something that “ebbs and flows”, and lists the factors that keep it going: the individual, the relational, and the societal. Frequency is not everything there. Research by Amy Muise and colleagues in Social Psychological and Personality Science from 2016 found that more sex goes together with more well-being, but that this link does not keep rising above roughly weekly sex, and holds mostly for people in a relationship. The point, then, is not a magic number, but that the touch falls away completely.
What a sexless marriage does to you
The pain often sits not in the sex itself, but in what falls away underneath it: being seen, being wanted, being touched. According to Thuisarts.nl, a difference in desire usually plays a part, and a painful loop forms. When one wants more and shows it, the other only wants it less. The partner who wants more feels rejected. The partner who wants less feels pressured. So both get stuck. For a lot of women, the loneliness of lying next to someone and still not being touched weighs heavier than the missing sex. That is exactly why a sexless marriage is so often the first reason to look for help or attention somewhere.
What a sexless marriage is not
“No sex means a bad marriage.” Not necessarily. Some couples are content without sex. It only becomes a problem when one of the two suffers from it, so it is about what the two of you make of it, not about a number.
“There is something wrong with me.” Rarely. Less desire, according to Thuisarts.nl, often comes from busyness, stress, and little attention for each other, not from a flaw in you.
“If you bring it up, you make it worse.” The other way around. Not talking about it is exactly what keeps the pattern going. The silence is the problem, not the conversation.
What I see myself
For a lot of women, a sexless marriage is the reason they write to me for the first time. It is rarely only about sex. It is about years of not being wanted, about whether they are still attractive, about touch with nothing coming back anymore. I’m Victor, a gigolo, not a couples therapist, and your marriage is not mine to decide about. What I do see is how much it does when someone looks at you again with their full attention. Some women are after exactly that, an afternoon of really being seen. Others use it as a push to finally raise it at home. Both are fine.
What you can do about it
A sexless marriage rarely changes on its own, but a few steps help:
- Name it without blame. Say what you miss instead of what the other does wrong. “I miss touch” opens a conversation that “you never want it anymore” shuts down.
- Rule out a physical cause first. Less desire can come from medication, hormones, or tiredness. Discuss that with your GP.
- Consider a sexologist or couples therapist together. Thuisarts.nl points there for lasting complaints, and a joint approach works better than trying to solve it on your own.
- Separate the desire for sex from the desire for touch. Sometimes skin hunger is the first thing that needs attention, even before the sex.
More reading on a sexless marriage
- Dead bedroom is the English peer-support term for the same thing, with the emphasis on online recognition and support.
- Desire discrepancy explains the difference in desire that often sits underneath it.
- Thuisarts.nl on less desire for sex gives the practical steps and when to see the GP.
Where this fits on this site
I do not fix a sexless marriage, and I’m not a therapist either. What I do offer is attention and touch for anyone who has not felt seen in a long time, discreet and at your pace. Curious how a meeting goes? Take a look at intimate togetherness. A word first is always fine, without any obligation.
Sources
- Ik heb minder zin in seks. Thuisarts.nl. Gives that a difference in desire between partners usually plays a part, that more desire in one can leave the other with less, that busyness, stress, and little attention are common causes, and the advice to talk about it with the GP or a sexologist.
- Maintaining Sexual Desire in Long-Term Relationships. A Systematic Review and Conceptual Model. Kristen P. Mark & Julie Lasslo, The Journal of Sex Research, 2018. Gives that sexual desire “ebbs and flows” and that keeping it going depends on individual, relational, and societal factors.
- Sexual Frequency Predicts Greater Well-Being, But More is Not Always Better. Amy Muise, Ulrich Schimmack & Emily A. Impett, Social Psychological and Personality Science, 2016. Gives that sexual frequency goes together with well-being through a curved link that does not keep rising above about weekly sex, and that this holds mostly for people in a relationship.
Related terms
- Libido. The desire itself, which has gotten out of step in a sexless marriage.
- Dead bedroom. The English online term for exactly this, with its own angle of recognition and support.
- Desire discrepancy. The difference in desire that often sits under a sexless marriage.
- Skin hunger. The hunger for touch that in a relationship without sex often weighs just as heavily as the missing sex.
- Dual control model. Why one person is aroused or braked more easily than the other, which partly explains the difference in desire.
Frequently asked questions
Questions about this term
What is a sexless marriage?
A sexless marriage is a relationship where there has been little or no sex for a long time, usually without it ever being said out loud. It often goes together with a difference in desire between the partners.
What can you do about a sexless marriage?
Start by naming what you miss, without blame, because it is exactly the silence that keeps a sexless marriage going. Rule out a physical cause with your GP and consider a sexologist or couples therapist together. A joint approach works better than solving it on your own.
What is the difference between a sexless marriage and a dead bedroom?
They mean the same thing: a relationship with little or no sex. “Sexless marriage” is the general term and “dead bedroom” the name from online peer-support groups. The dead bedroom angle puts a bit more emphasis on recognition and support from others.
Who can you turn to with questions about a sexless marriage?
For the relational and medical side, a couples therapist, sexologist, or your GP is the right address. I’m Victor, a gigolo. If you miss attention and touch and want to know what I can mean in that, I’m glad to talk it through, with no obligation or through free chat.
Learn more
Still have questions about a sexless marriage?
I'm Victor, a gigolo, not a therapist. For a lot of women who have not felt seen in a long time, I'm an afternoon of attention and touch, discreet and at their own pace. Curious how that goes? Send me a message, and I'll text you back whenever suits you.