As someone who pays attention to news and information about higher desire wives, I’ve noticed an increasing number of confessions and articles from wives who long for sex more than their husbands. But I rarely see features from husbands sharing their experience of being the lower desire spouse. Why don’t men admit when their sexual interest falls short of their wives’?

Let’s talk about some likely reasons why husband doesn’t confess his lower drive publicly.

He feels like a freak.

Higher drive wives (HDWs) have told me again and again that they feel like the odd one out—an anomaly. Given the messages they absorbed, from both secular and Christian sources, they presumed the natural state of things involved a rarin’-to-go husband and a lesser interested wife. Indeed, the conversations among women and men continue to support that scenario, as some husbands brag about all the sex they want and wives complain about all the sex their husbands want.

Why wouldn’t the husband feel like an anomaly as well? Surprised to discover he’s not as interested as she is. Questioning whether something’s wrong with him. Wondering if he’s the only one. After all, he’s heard all those messages too.

My first message to higher desire wives is always: You are not alone. And let me say the same to lower desire husbands (LDHs)! Not only are you not alone, you are 20–25% of husbands.

Does that seem high to you? It did to me too. But when I went digging into the research on this question, I very quickly discovered that 15% was a solid baseline, meaning LDH/HDW happened in at least 15% of marriages. However, the best studies I’ve seen place the likely range in that 20–25%, and some show up to 30%. This is also consistent with reports I’ve heard from marriage counselors and sex therapists.

Lower desire husbands are not freaks. They just have a different dynamic in their marriage. So if that’s you, remember that a bunch of those guys saying, “Oh yeah, I can’t wait to get my wife home!” are embellishing at best. Probably because they don’t want to feel like a freak either and don’t realize how frequent LDH/HDW occurs.

He feels like a failure.

Men don’t like to do things they aren’t good at.

You might say, “That describes women too!” and I agree that describes many women. But it seems especially true for men that they feel judged on their ability to accomplish things. This perspective begins way back in childhood, as noted by linguist Deborah Tannen:

For most women, the language of conversation is primarily a language of rapport: a way of establishing connections and negotiating relationships … For most men, talk is primarily a means to preserve independence and negotiate and maintain status in a hierarchical social order.

Deborah Tannen, You Just Don’t Understand: Women and Men in Conversation

Boys try to one-up each other, showing that they’re capable and confident, even if they secretly don’t feel as capable and confident as they sound. But they want to feel like they’ve got this. They know what they’re doing and can do it well.

So what happens for that kind of man when he enters marriage and feels that he doesn’t satisfy his wife sexually? She wants sex more than he does and/or more than he feels he can perform. In some cases, that sexual desire gap makes a husband shut down even more. If he can’t be good at something, why bother?

Mind you, HDWs don’t feel this way. Sure, they’re disappointed by rejection and lack of physical intimacy, but they don’t see their husbands as sex failures. In fact, they’d give their guy an A+ for effort. That is, if a husband works with his wife to figure out how to address the interest gap and prioritize lovemaking that meets both of their desires, a wife is usually pretty happy.

You only really fail when you don’t try. Working through the gap may involve confusion, setbacks, and negative feelings along the way, but success follows trial-and-error, learning, and remembering that you’re on each other’s team. And intimacy with your wife is worth the effort!

He fears the feedback.

What will his friends think? Actually, a lower desire husband probably knows what other men would think about his wife wanting sex more than he does. I’ve received pushback from certain men ever since I wrote my first higher desire wife post over 10 years ago. I have to believe LDHs see and hear all this stuff too.

These aren’t exact quotes, but I can definitely summarize the kind of things said:

• “If he doesn’t want sex more than she does, there’s something wrong with him.”
• “I don’t believe that many guys like this exist. I’ve never heard about it!”
• “Why would any red-blooded man not want to have sex with his wife?”
• “Maybe he’s gay.”
• “I can’t even understand that.”

Given such responses, can you see why a husband wouldn’t want to volunteer his lower sex drive? He risks losing the respect of his peers, and some men would even take away his “man-card.” My own husband noted that for many “one sign of male virility is the strength of his sexual desire.” But masculinity is not defined by being more sexually driven than your wife!

To all of you who have said discouraging things about lower desire husbands, please, please stop. You likely didn’t mean to hurt others, but statements like these keep LDHs from acknowledging, discussing, and resolving the sexual interest gap.

And to you lower desire husbands, you know what gets my respect and the respect of many others? Speaking up in spite of the risk and showing that real men can and do have lower sexual interest their wives. That requires courage. You may find the feedback isn’t as big a deal as you expected. Plus, there’s strength in numbers. Another husband may step forward, relieved to find someone else who gets it.

He doesn’t know the fix.

My husband and I also have a different dynamic in our marriage when it comes to asking for road directions: He will ask right away, and I will drive an hour out of my way trying to figure it out myself. I recognize this is not a good approach, but I relate to you men who don’t want to admit you’re lost and believe you really can get there on your own! Also, plenty of y’all would rather watch 30 hours of YouTube videos on how to repair something than call someone else to do it, and you listen to nearly from every complaint the people in your life with the hope that you can provide the right answer to fix the problem.

But what if the problem is that you don’t want sex as much as she does? Do you know the fix? Do you know where to look for the fix? Is the fix even something you want to do?

Instead of admitting you don’t know what to do, you’d rather ignore the problem, hoping it will go away, or wander around with the silent prayer that you’ll figure it out eventually.

But what if the fix isn’t that difficult? What if I could tell you what’s going on and how to deal with it? Okay, I can’t exactly diagnose your situation, but I’ve learned a LOT about navigating the sexual interest gap, and there are answers. Some are rather simple, and others require more effort. They range from talking through issue with your wife, to figuring out what sparks your arousal, to improving your health, to quitting porn, and beyond. (I’ll cover more of that in a later post.)

But if you don’t admit you’re lost and seek directions, you may well end up with your marriage in a place where you don’t want to be. You don’t need to know the fix right now, just that there are fixes—or rather ways to pursue satisfying sexual intimacy in your marriage.

What now?

Giving you a list of ideas to follow-up on requires another post, which I will write later. BUT in the meantime, I do have a resource to recommend. It’s really for your wife, but since this live event for higher desire wives will be fully recorded to be watched (or rewatched) later, you may want to encourage your beloved bride to sign up! What she learns, she can share with you, and you can talk out the issues together.

Also, this should convince you that you’re far from the only one. And that couples can navigate this challenge together! (Believe me, I’m pulling for you.) Click the banner below to learn more!

RELATED POST: A Letter to the Low Drive Husband

The post Why Don’t Men Fess Up About Having the Lower Drive? appeared first on Hot, Holy & Humorous.

Here’s his question for me:

I’ve been reading through all your posts about high-drive wives, trying to seriously take to heart any advice you have for husbands like myself. I am committed to trying to make things work ….

Your recommendations seem to be that the husband such as myself needs to see her needs and step up my game, and that the wife shouldn’t be ashamed of her desires and needs. Yes, I do see you talk about both spouses trying to meet the other where they are, and find a happy medium where both are satisfied, but that usually appears to be more in the context of significantly differing libidos like 4 times a year versus wanting sex every day. In our case, yes there’s a difference in drive, but it’s not that drastic, and we still have regular, not infrequent sex.

So I guess my question is this—from your perspective, am I in the wrong, or do we need to talk about the possibility of my wife lowering her expectations in regard to frequency? I just feel stuck.

Let’s start here with an important principle: Sex should be mutual in marriage. It should be mutually prioritized, mutually agreed upon, mutually pleasurable, and mutually satisfying. That’s how God designed it, and if any one of those is an issue, the couple should address it.

(If you want specific text proof, head over to 1 Corinthians 7:3-5, which I’ve cited numerous times. And that passage is less about rights than mutuality, by the way. Also, all of Song of Songs.)

But in practice, most marriages have one spouse who wants sex more than the other. Here, it’s a wife, which is more common than many think with 15-30% of marriages having a HD (higher drive) wife. Whoever is higher or lower, though, there will inevitably be times when one spouse wants sex and the other not as much. How do you negotiate that?

Let’s look at some commonly recommended options.

Never Say No?

This advice has been given to wives for I don’t know how long. But usually some well-meaning older lady tells a young fiancee or wife that to keep her husband happy, she should never say no to sex. Meaning whenever the HD spouse wants it—in this case, the man—they get it.

That could mean sex once a week. It could mean sex every day. But whatever the HD spouse desires, that’s what sets the pace of sexual frequency for the marriage.

This approach at least denies the legitimate reasons to say no to sex sometimes. If you don’t feel well, if you need to care for the children at that moment, if you simply can’t see straight because of how tired you are, it should be perfectly fine to take a rain check. Also, “I’d really rather try this tomorrow when I’m more refreshed” is a perfectly reasonable answer.

Saying otherwise makes it seem like one missed chance will sink the whole sex life. But our sexual intimacy is made up of numerous moments within marriage, and sometimes intimacy is even increased by a spouse understanding the other’s current reluctance and passing on a sexual encounter.

So yeah, you should be able to say no sometimes. That’s not depriving your spouse; it’s saying “not now.” Your feelings and desires matter too.

Only when you’re “in the mood”?

On the other hand, plenty say you should never be asked to participate in sex unless and until you are “in the mood.” If you don’t feel like it, you have carte blanche to wave it away without a worry. It’s your right to say no, and say no you will.

Take that viewpoint out of the sex arena for a moment and ask when this is ever a good idea. Your wife wants conversation, but you refuse to talk to her unless you feel the need yourself to discuss something. Your husband wants to save money for a trip, but you spend like a Kardashian until you suddenly feel like shoving a few dollars into the kitty. You both want to move to a house, but you don’t agree where, so you stay in your crappy apartment until one of you feels inspired to surrender. Does that sound like a good marriage?

Look, we do owe something to each other by virtue of saying “I do,” and that includes trying to meet one another’s emotional needs. Since sex is important not primarily as a physical release but as an emotional connection, it should be pursued regularly and generously.

Moreover, we should understand that “sex drive” sounds like your engine is revving before you put it into gear, but that’s not how libido works for many. Some have what has been phrased a “responsive” libido, meaning that you don’t get into it until you’re into it. That is, you can become aroused and enjoy lovemaking, but your desire begins with a decision to engage. Your sexual interest looks like this:

Which means you aren’t going to be “in the mood” until that second stage when your body awakens to arousal and begins to enjoy the experience. Once you know this about your desire, you might be willing to engage more than you originally thought.

Right Down the Middle?

Hopefully, we’ve established that it’s okay to say no, but it’s also good to say yes sometimes when you don’t think you’re in the mood, because you might get in the mood. But this husband asks specifically about frequency, and that’s an overall view of how much sex you should be having in your marriage.

Let’s say she wants sex four times a week, and he wants sex twice a week. Well, the obvious answer is to have sex three times a week, right? It’s a number right down the middle, so everyone should be reasonably happy. That’s a good solution, if you ask me (which you did).

But what if she wants sex four times a week, and he wants it once every three months? That’s a difference of 17 times versus 1, and the middle ground would be 9, or sex every 10 days. Do we think she’s going to feel satisfied with that? Do we even think sex every 10 days is enough in marriage?

Both the Bible and research would say no. To receive the intimacy and health benefits of sex, a couple should be engaging at least once a week.

To receive the intimacy and health benefits of sex, a couple should be engaging at least once a week. #marriage @hotholyhumorous
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Now in reality, if a spouse only wants sex once every three months, or even once a month, there’s an issue that needs to be addressed. That’s not typical or good for your marriage, and whatever obstacle is in the way of sexual desire or satisfaction needs to be tackled together.

But you can see how a strict middle-ground approach may not work for all couples either.

Who Gets to Decide?

Having covered some common advice on this topic, let’s get back to the question itself: “From your perspective, am I in the wrong, or do we need to talk about the possibility of my wife lowering her expectations in regard to frequency?” In this scenario, their difference is small, and they’re having regular sex, but she’s still pushing for more.

Should he come up to her expectations? Or should she lower them?

As the higher drive spouse in my marriage, I can honestly say that I’ve lowered my expectations. If I was completely in charge, we’d have sex more often than we do. But I’m not unsatisfied because we also have sex more than we would if my husband was entirely in charge.

Did we negotiate out a specific number of times? Nope. We just discussed what we each wanted, what saying yes or no means to us, and what challenges we had to engaging more frequently. It wasn’t a single conversation either, and I’m not going to pretend that each of those conversations was conflict-free. But we kept communicating, kept making love, kept working on our parts of the equation.

Indeed, our frequency went up a few months ago, and I mentioned to my husband that his sex drive had apparently increased. His response? “It hasn’t gone up. I’ve just been initiating more because I know what it means to you.” Swoon, right?

What Does Love Do?

When it comes to negotiating sex drive differences, ask this question: What does love do?

When it comes to negotiating sex drive differences, ask this question: What does love do? @hotholyhumorous
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And not love as in “ooh, I feel heat in my nether regions when you come near!” I’m talking about agape love as described in the Bible:

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

1 Corinthians 13:4-7

What does that look like in practice when it comes to mismatched drives? Well, the HD spouse isn’t self-seeking their own perfect number of times to have sex, easily angered by missed opportunities, or keeping record of all the times they didn’t get any. Instead, they’re patient, kind, protective, hopeful, persevering.

Likewise, the LD spouse isn’t self-seeking their own perfect number of times to have sex, easily angered by their spouse’s higher drive, or dishonoring of their beloved’s emotional need. Instead, they’re kind, joyful, trusting, and hopeful.

Honestly, a lot of advice I’ve given to HD and LD spouses pressuring for what they want in marriage could be summed up like this: HDs, back off. LDs, step up. And that’s really what I’d say to this couple. Yeah, she should lower her expectations a little, especially since he’s stepped up more. Though it’s probably a topic that will continue to be discussed and negotiated through various seasons of their life.

But ultimately, my answer is a question: What does love do? Once you define that, you can figure out how to address the mismatched drives in your marriage.

The post Q&A with J: Should A Higher Drive Spouse Lower Their Expectations? appeared first on Hot, Holy & Humorous.

Today it’s on my heart to write not to the high-drive wife (though I have done that and will continue to do so), but to the low-drive husband because that’s also a tough position to be in.

Dear Low-Drive Husband,

You live in a frustrating world. All around you, the message is that men want sex constantly, that their appetite for sex — particularly with the woman they love — is nearly unquenchable. It’s a message you grew up with, so much that it seems like masculinity itself is linked with a high sex drive.

And while you’ve got the equipment and it works, you’re just not that needy for sexual encounters with your wife. Sure, you like them. But on any given day, you’re not busting out of your pants zipper at the thought of sex, or even the thought of your sexy wife — as gorgeous as she is. And plenty of nights you long for sleep as much or more than you do sex.

Confessing this to other guys, however, might get your Man Card revoked. So you haven’t gone around asking how it’s going with others or seeking resources for your “issue.”

Even admitting it to your wife is difficult. Especially if your wife is high drive and wants sex more than you expected her to, or than you feel like. In fact, something about how much more she wants sex makes you feel like you don’t measure up.

As someone who has studied and written on married sexuality for almost seven years and hears from higher drives wives almost every week, let me see if I can explain a few things.

You’re all man.

Totally man. Completely, thoroughly M-A-N. A more passive sex drive doesn’t make you any less male. If you’ve got the package and you know how to use it, rest assured you’re good to go. God knows what He made, and he made you XY — man. In fact, this is a big factor in why your wife wants you so much. Because she’s very into you being different from her and how you fit together as male-female so perfectly.

Please don’t listen to the messages that equate masculinity with unbridled sex drive. They aren’t from God. Rather, principles of biblical manhood within marriage are controlling sinful appetites, providing for one’s family, and servant leadership.

Pay attention to these words from King David: “When the time drew near for David to die, he gave a charge to Solomon his son. ‘I am about to go the way of all the earth,’ he said. ‘So be strong, act like a man,…'” His next words were not, “And show off your sexual prowess, thus getting lots of high-fives in the men’s locker room.” Rather, David finished his instructions this way: “And observe what the Lord your God requires: Walk in obedience to him, and keep his decrees and commands, his laws and regulations, as written in the Law of Moses.”

Also, consider what the Apostle Paul said: “As for you, Titus, promote the kind of living that reflects wholesome teaching. Teach the older men to exercise self-control, to be worthy of respect, and to live wisely. They must have sound faith and be filled with love and patience” (Titus 2:1-2, NLT). These are pictures of biblical manhood.

You’re not alone.

You’re not the only one out there whose sex drive isn’t in high gear 24/7. You’re in the company of 15-30% of other husbands. Let me break that down for you. In terms of the U.S. population, that’s about 22 to 45 million men. If we’re talking world population, it’s 0.57 to 1.13 billion men. So while some may make you feel like a stranger in a strange land, you’re not.

While it seems risky, if not dangerous, to admit to another guy that you have a lagging sex drive, there are resources for you. Some have written about low-drive husbands, and you can also take many married sex articles, books, resources and just reverse things in your mind (if they say the wife is lower drive, but you are in your marriage, then pay more attention to the advice on that side).

That doesn’t always work, which is why I have a chapter in Hot, Holy, and Humorous: Sex in Marriage by God’s Design about higher-drive wives and the men who love them. And I’m also working on a whole book about higher-drive wives, mainly aimed at women but there will still be information for you.

You need to take action.

Dude, your wife is hurting. I hear from higher-drive wives all the time who question their desirability, their marriage relationship, and even their husband’s love, because they feel like the weird one whose husband doesn’t want them sexually. Even more importantly, God intended for you and your wife to have regular sexual intimacy in marriage.

You have a biblical obligation to engage in the marriage bed: “The husband should fulfill his wife’s sexual needs, and the wife should fulfill her husband’s needs” (1 Corinthians 3:5). Now that doesn’t mean that you should schlep to the bedroom with duty, duty, duty playing through your head. The second part of that verse, and so many other places in the Bible, show us sexual intimacy in marriage is for both spouses and should be pleasurable and connection-building.

Rather, this is a call to action. If you’re not currently fulfilling your wife’s sexual needs, you need to work on why and what to do about it. How can you create a situation in which you both desire sexual intimacy? I don’t know what your issues are, but I’ll throw out a few possibilities:

• Your body chemistry is off
• You had/have a porn habit
• You have sexual baggage
• You were taught that sex = sin
• You’re not attracted to your wife (see note below)
• You have self-doubts
• You’re super-stressed
• You’re just a passive guy

This is a really long letter now, playing right into the stereotype of the talkative female (which I totally am). So I’m going to hold off on explaining each of those issues and some fixes until next week. But it’s my prayer that you will find something here to take steps in the right direction. You might need to see a doctor, seek help to deal with your porn problem, study more about what the Bible says about sex, etc.

And if your wife shared this blog post with you, maybe it’s time to take a walk together hand-in-hand or sit across the kitchen table and have an honest conversation about sex in your marriage.

Because she wants you — all of you. And I suspect, once you work out a few things, you want her a great deal too.

Note on “not attracted to your wife”: High-drive wives will likely read that as physical appearance, but men tell me it’s almost always things like feeling disrespected or ignored that makes her less appealing to him. You, dear woman, are beautiful, but relationship issues can tense men to the point that they don’t feel as drawn to their wives. I’ll cover that more next week, but I really didn’t want to leave the wrong impression!

The post A Letter to the Low Drive Husband appeared first on Hot, Holy & Humorous.