How To Deal With Low Libido Part 6
For men, intimacy is oxygen. Cut it off and you turn your partner into a sexual asthmatic—chronically coughing and wheezing in his attempt to breathe you in. He’ll experience a tightening of the chest and eventually his lips turn blue (among other organs).
Make no mistake, when you constantly reject your partner’s advances with some version of “I’VE GOT CLOTHES TO FOLD,” he hears it as “I don’t love you.” Or want you. So, go away.
For men, sex equals love
A lack of touch leads to emotional scurvy. When love, which used to flow freely, gets harder to come by, it’s hard not to turn the rejection against yourself. You believe you’re to blame, that you’re no longer attractive, that your manhood is useless, your desire pointless and your needs unworthy.
If your unwillingness to have sex continues long enough he’ll grow distant and angry which then really puts you off sex. But his negativity is an understandable reaction to having love withdrawn. His anger is a manifestation of the hurt that lies underneath. He feels punished for something he didn’t do. The effect of the punishment causes pain; the unjustness causes anger. It’s hard for you to see this, of course, because now you’re reacting to his self-defensive distance and anger, rather than his understandable hurt.
Rejecting his sexual advances makes him suspicious, insecure, inadequate, vulnerable, hurt, resentful, and unloved. And it’s especially easy for him to think you’re cheating on him.
A Proxy For Self-Esteem
It isn’t just that the most powerful expression of love got taken away from him. Sex is a proxy for a man’s self-esteem and masculinity. It’s a platform for confidence and virility. There’s not much room for masculinity and virility when you’re reduced to nagging and negotiating for sex, or being the only one initiating it or knowing your partner is merely tolerating it.
My point in bringing all this up isn’t to make you feel guilty; it’s to make you understand the consequences of your withdrawal. Reversing the damage will take some work and you need to be highly motivated, not by guilt but by love–for the man in your life and your own sense of who you are and what you’re capable of growing into. Nobody should take a vow of sexual poverty when they date or get into a relationship. Especially you.