20 Reasons a Wife Doesn’t Want to Have Sex.

By: Jolene Engle

Many, many years ago I couldn’t wait to experience my honeymoon. The day when I could finally know my husband on a sexual level. But now the honeymoon is over and real life has begun. Yet, I can’t help but think back to that first night, as well as, the early months of our relationship. Oh how I longed to be with him! And the idea of not desiring to be intimate with my husband was never a thought that crossed my mind. But after 14 yeas of marriage, that newness that was once there has diminished, and life has crept into our relationship.

So this got me to thinking about wives in general. I often hear how many of them don’t have much of a desire to be sexually intimate with their man. And I have wondered what has changed for them. You see, I personally do not believe that any new bride had intentions of avoiding or depriving her man of sex when she said yes to his marriage proposal. But something has happened in their marriage. There is a break down of some sort that is causing her to turn away from him intimately.

This break down could be for a number of reasons:

Some are directly related to her man.
Some are related to the pressures and demands of family life.
Some could be related to body image issues, prior sexual sin or abuse.
Or some reasons could be the female body experiencing pain, limitations, hormonal imbalances, etc.

So, on this list are areas that we have control over and others areas, well… not so much. But nevertheless, sexual intimacy is ‘the thing’ that sets our relationship with our husbands apart from any other relationship. Regardless of our problems, this is not an area that we want to intentionally neglect because if we do, then that’ll bring a host of other issues into our marriage.

Issues Related to Her Man

Her husband is a jerk. Now, what woman in her right mind, would want to get naked and sleep with some rude, insensitive, self-centered, pig of a man? I know I wouldn’t! Quite frankly, I did not walk down the aisle to marry a man like that and I can reckon that most wives didn’t either.
He treats her more like a child rather than his wife.
She’s lost respect for him for a number of reasons. He could be a poor decision maker, father, money manager, lazy worker, doesn’t deal with conflict, is afraid to deal with extended family problems, etc.
She no longer trusts him. Maybe he’s gotten into pornography or had an affair.
He has poor hygiene and she’s turned off by him.
She’s no longer physically attracted to him.
He only has sex with her so he can physically satisfy himself, therefore, sex is not enjoyable to her.
Because of how he treats her or how she views him, she feels emotionally disconnected from him.

Outside of the man taking a shower and brushing his teeth, there are no quick fixes to the other issues. Lot’s of prayer, conversations with your husband, as well as some guidance are needed to help you deal with many of these problems. Unfortunately, I can’t go into the solutions here in this blog post. However, as time goes on I will cover them. So, if you can relate to some of these issues, make sure you sign up to receive my future posts.

She’s Focused on Her Family Life

She’s stressed and/or worried. Family and/or financial problems consume her mind so she’s not in the mood.
She’s mentally exhausted.
Sex is not on her to-do list and her list is already long enough as it is.
Her children sleep in her bed. To get them out and re-train them to sleep in their own beds would be like World War III, and it’s just not something that she wants to deal with. Keeping peace with the kids is more important than having sex with her husband. Who wants to deal with another temper-tantrum, right?
She’s pregnant and feels undesirable.
She’s nursing and she doesn’t want another human being on her. She needs her space so she can breathe.

After you marry it’s common for your focus to shift a bit. For some, you entered into the world of motherhood rather quickly. For other wives, you might be focusing on a career or perhaps raising teenagers, handling a blended family, aging parents, etc. You are now wearing more than the ‘wife’ hat. Perhaps you feel more like the cook, maid, taxi driver, etc. It’s hard to shift gears into feeling like a wife within minutes of an overwhelming and exhausting day. But the good thing about this list is you have the most control over it and it’s most likely the easiest one to fix. Knowing your roles and putting them in the proper biblical order is the key here. But if you’re not careful and you neglect your marriage, you can end up having to deal with additional problems that are related to your husband.

She’s Dealing with Her Own Inner Demons

If you have body image issues this is something you can work on yourself. You don’t have to wait for your man to change on this one! And if you’re dealing with guilt and shame from your past, you need to be in constant prayer and communion with the Lord. Through His redemptive blood He’ll heal you of your wounds.

Physical Issues

I’m going all vulnerable and open with you about this area of my life in hopes that what I’ve experienced will encourage you in your situation….

Sex is painful. When my babies entered into the world, let’s just say that natural childbirth jacked up my female body parts and made something that was once so physically pleasurable, now something excruciatingly painful. ”What the heck just happened and how do I fix it,” were my thoughts on my new found problem.
She’s physically exhausted. I lived with 10 years of chronic fatigue. Naps were scheduled into my daily routine because I couldn’t function without them. If this way of life describes you, then plan for naps and simplify your schedule. Yes, I realize that if you’re facing these issues you feel like your life as you once knew it, is now over.
She’s chronically sick. Yep, been here as well, my friend. If you really want to know more about me, then we’re going to get up close and personal on this one! In fact, I can’t believe I’m going to type this one out loud for the entire world to see. But hey, if it ministers to another sister in the Lord, then so be it. So here it goes…. I had a rectal and vaginal infection for well over a few years and let me just say that having sex with my husband when you have infections in those areas is not something on the top of my to do list! The doctors were of no help either. When they said, “I’ve never seen anything like this”, those words don’t bring a whole lot of comfort to the patient.
She has a low sex drive. Of course I can relate to this one as well being that I had rupturing ovarian cysts for over 5 years. Ya know, those things have a tendency to be related to imbalanced hormones! Of course all of my sexual/health-related issues made me feel like I wanted to slap someone, or better yet, kill someone, but that’s not something the Lord would’ve been too pleased with.

If you’re dealing with physical problems then be diligent to seek out medical guidance so your body can be fixed or somewhat restored. I say somewhat restored because sometimes fixing our bodies is just not a reality. However, avoiding sex altogether is not a solution to your problems either, it’ll just compound them. So you might need to get sexually creative on this one.

I know there are many things on this list that are so difficult to overcome, but with a willing heart, a teachable spirit, and a desire to please the Lord, you can, with Christ, overcome many of these obstacles.

Avoiding sex and telling your husband that you have a headache is not going to make your marriage any better, in fact, it’ll cause more problems to arise. One of the things that sex is designed for is to bring you and your man closer together. The marriage bed is a place to strengthen your one flesh union. There’s a reason why God said not to forsake the marriage bed….it’s for our benefit and our protection.

Do not deprive each other of sexual relations, unless you both agree to refrain from sexual intimacy for a limited time so you can give yourselves more completely to prayer. Afterward, you should come together again so that Satan won’t be able to tempt you because of your lack of self-control. (1 Corinthians 7:5 NLT)