Why Lack of Intimacy in Marriage Happens and How to Address It
Trigger Warning: This article is about marital intimacy and addresses sensitive topics in a generalized manner, or by brief mention. Please read at your discretion.
The battle to save your marriage can begin quietly. Subtle shifts. Ones you can feel, but that may be hard to pinpoint. It didn’t used to be this way. You used to feel that closeness with your partner. Now, the private struggle of intimacy issues bothers you deeply, but no one teaches us how to handle a battle like this—in the bedroom. In our safest spaces. In our most vulnerable places. No one warns us about how painful this can be.
Intimacy issues can expose the weaknesses in our relationship, or create new fissures that lead to further emotional and physical distance between you and your partner. Cracks appear in the foundation, in the seams of unity where intimacy once sealed the bond with your partner. Walls go up. Armour comes on. Someone mentions divorce.
So, let’s talk about it.
How Common Are Marital Intimacy Problems?
Sexual activity among married couples is overall on the decline. 2020 reporting by the JAMA Network Open, National Survey of Family Growth estimates a decline in weekly-or-more sexual activity among married partners by double-digit percentages. Some couples have sex more often, others less, and both can be healthy and “normal.” However, intimacy issues can develop—declines in physical closeness, sexual satisfaction, or emotional intimacy, etc.
The keyword here is a decline, or an erosion of, the intimacy of a marriage. And how we address this common marital struggle is what matters.
Intimacy Defined
From a broader perspective, what is intimacy? Merely a sign of evolutionary fitness, a tool to ensure reproduction and survival by cooperation? Or is it something more, something we humans must have in order to live productive lives? Do we really need intimacy to be happy?
In short, it depends on who you ask. The biologists would answer confidently, “Yes, intimacy is important to feel safe, connect for reproduction, and ensure species-protective family units.” The therapists would say, “Yes, we all want to feel known, safe, loved.” John Donne said, “No man is an island”; the Bible in Genesis 2:18 says, "It is not good that man should be alone," and Aristotle posited that humans are social animals by our very nature.
So what is intimacy? It’s connection.
What Is Marital Intimacy Defined?
The basic human need for intimacy inspires partnership, threading a bond between two people that is defined by closeness and sharing with one another, and a deep sense of trust. Marital intimacy is a particular type of intimacy between two people committed as partners; their bonds are often defined and deepened with physical intimacy and sex.
But marital intimacy is more than sexual acts that repeat with predictable regularity. Marital intimacy also involves (and physical, sexual connection is fed by):
Emotional closeness
Non-sexual physical affection
Sexual attraction
Trust and vulnerability
Shared values and meaning
Everyday partnership
If even one aspect of marital intimacy declines, one or both partners may feel they are drifting apart. Maintaining an ongoing intimacy connection takes work, just like any other aspect of marriage.
Esther Perel, a Belgian psychotherapist and author of Mating in Captivity, illuminates the complexities of marital intimacy. The very things that provide a desired marital stability can also flatten desire. As we learn our partners more deeply, this familiarity can also create boredom or disinterest, creating a paradox of competing needs. Perel reminds us that shared eroticism can be playful, livening up the dull routines we can become trapped in.
Reasons for Sexual Intimacy Problems
Marital and partner intimacy can break down in a variety of ways and for a variety of reasons that can overlap or conflict (as Perel explained). This is why improving marital intimacy or having more sex in your marriage can require more than one approach.
Stress and life changes
Chronic stress
Work overload and burnout
Parenting demands
Sleep deprivation
Major life transitions
Pregnancy and postpartum changes
Aging
Poor communication
Health and sexual functioning
Chronic illness
Chronic pain
Hormonal changes
Medication side effects
Erectile dysfunction
Painful intercourse
Low arousal
Performance anxiety
Mental health and personal history
Depression and anxiety
Body image insecurity
Past sexual trauma
Sexual shame
Religious or cultural taboos
Differing attachment styles
Desire and connection
Mismatched desire
Differing sexual preferences
Differing expectations
Lack of post-sexual affection
Routine and boredom
Little quality time
Partner phubbing (choosing digital device time over your partner)
Conflict, communication, and trust
Unresolved conflict
Lingering resentment
Punitive withholding
Poor communication
Broken trust
Infidelity
Sexual behavior and substance use
Pornography use (associated with reduced sexual satisfaction)
Overdependence on masturbation
Secret sexual behavior, attractions, or fetishes
Alcohol and substance use
Partner abuse
Competing Frameworks & Ideas Around Sex and Intimacy
Each partner brings their own religious and cultural expectations about sex to the table. Sex is deeply rooted in our personality, our body image, and our understanding of how relationships work. More broadly, societal, cultural, and religious influences also shape how we feel and talk about sex.
Since we feel differently about the problem, we may disagree on how to solve it, or on how important solving the problem even is. For example, let’s say that you have always believed that sex serves a purpose—producing children. And once that’s done, you really have little interest in maintaining a sexual connection with your partner. But what if your partner views sex as a lifelong expression of love shared between partners, one that is necessary for closeness? These two views collide, producing a lack of intimacy for one, and unwanted sexual pressure for the other.
Studies suggest men and women often differ in how they value sex in marriage. One PubMed study on sexual desire examined “desire discrepancy,” finding that “Men were significantly more likely to endorse desire for sexual release, orgasm, and pleasing their partner than were women. Women were significantly more likely to endorse desire for intimacy, emotional closeness, love, and feeling sexually desirable than men.”
Intimacy resources that may interest you:
TED talks:
Books:
Come As You Are: Revised and Updated: The Surprising New Science That Will Transform Your Sex Life
Come Together: The Science and Art of Creating Lasting Sexual Connections
Wanting Sex Again: How to Rediscover Your Desire and Heal a Sexless Marriage
Articles:
Science-Baked Ways to Build Deeper Emotional Intimacy in Couples
75 Questions to Discuss Intimacy with Your Partner (Or, to journal on while you examine your own needs.)
How Do You Know if There Is an Intimacy Problem in Your Relationship?
An intimacy problem means that one or both parties are no longer happy or fulfilled with the current expressions of emotional, physical, and sexual connection. Sometimes these issues can be easily addressed. Honest communication. Talking to your partner about how you feel and getting things out into the open. Making more time for each other. Reducing workload, burnout, or stress. Engaging the erotic senses. Stoking passion.
Other times, medical or psychological support may be needed to address physical or mental barriers to desire and sexual performance.
What to Do if You Want to Fix Broken Marital Intimacy
Sexual intimacy issues are often faultless. These things can happen between partners because life is complex, and we can deprioritize sex to save energy for other things. Still, in matters of intimacy and physical need, emotions can run high. Consider couples therapy, medical checkups, or consulting with other trusted professionals who can help.
The work begins with a safe space for conversation. Honest feelings. And a willingness to try, together. And isn’t that what marriage is all about?
Christina M. Ward