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So I'm only sexually attracted to someone during the "honeymoon" phase


westoftroy

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Hellooo, I apologize in advance if this is a bit long. 

I am a 24 year old female who has dated men and women happily. The fault in these relationships always lies with me, however. 

 

Prior to the relationship I will have sexual fantasies about someone who I believe I could have intimate emotional connections with, and I will be advantageous about a sexual relationship in the beginning of a new relationship. But once I reach emotional comfort and safety I literally feel no need for sex. I am still attracted to my partner in that I find him or her beautiful physically. But my sudden disinterest in sex (in every relationship I have ever been in) often drives people away because I don't know how to warn them about this initially. Especially because it doesn't occur for several weeks into the relationship. And I also think that I'm hoping one day I will find a person with whom this disinterest doesn't occur. 

 

In the beginning I do crave and enjoy sex and I will initiate intimacy with no hesitancy. But somewhere along the way I just stop caring about sex and prefer partnership. But I cannot make myself value the partnership enough to subject myself to more sexual encounters. 

 

Has anyone else ever felt something like this?

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I apologise for such a long response, and for my inevitable spelling mistakes....

 

I have had this issue for ever. (Save my first few relationships that were not sexual, and my longest relationship which was 15 second car sex ten times a day... that sucked.) With my partners I am sexuality interested at first, then we become a thing, and then my sexual drive goes our the window. Lately I have been more open about it, and my partner now is fully aware that I have no desires to be sexual. They are hypersexual and horny all the time, (they say this themself.) They are OK with me being on the asexual spectrum, but as of late this has been putting much undue stress on both of us. Stress for them because they need that sexual intimacy from me, for myself the feeling of not being a good partner because I cannot preform. I cannot force myself to just do it and get it over with because I do not want it. I would rather be cuddly, or watching a movie/ playing video games. Sex feels like an anxiety inducing chore that I dread almost every day, along with the occasional gross factor. When I finally can do the deed I am relived that I get at most about a week of relief from "I'm feeling horny, just letting you know." 

 

Now my partner is awesome, they are extremely sympathetic, and empathetic towards my lack of sexual drive. They are getting better at not being aggressive with their sexual requirements. This does nothing for the anxiety I feel over knowing that they will be horny again, very soon, and they need that from me. I am trying not to fall into the hole of depression this inevitably leads to but I am having trouble. 

 

I am open to polyamory for this reason, I know for a fact that I cannot do this so if it is that bad please go find it. But they need that intimacy from me to feel loved in that way? (I may be an assumeing ass hole here) I know sex is important to most relationships, I have done my reaserch. And I still struggle with it. I have less than zero answers and I apologise for that. But your not alone with this.

 

 

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I have been able to tolerate being sexual with some exes during the first few weeks. I think it may be the novelty of it being someone new, along with the hope that this time it might actually be different (this time I might actually feel aroused by them and feel pleasure in sex). It's always followed with disappointment and the guy feeling rejected and resentment towards me.

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I kinda understand. The honeymoon period is the most exciting time. I'm asexual and that's the only time I could bring myself have sex. You sound similar to a fraysexual.

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The fault in these relationships always lies with me, however

I know what you mean by this and I also want to say that you are not at fault. It's who you are. I'm not minimizing how awful it feels to be in your position, but it isn't your fault anymore than it is your partner's fault for feeling the way they do. Nobody is at fault. They are just being who they are. I say this with much kindness.

 

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They are hypersexual and horny all the time, (they say this themself.) They are OK with me being on the asexual spectrum, but as of late this has been putting much undue stress on both of us. Stress for them because they need that sexual intimacy from me, for myself the feeling of not being a good partner because I cannot preform. I cannot force myself to just do it and get it over with because I do not want it. I would rather be cuddly, or watching a movie/ playing video games. Sex feels like an anxiety inducing chore that I dread almost every day, along with the occasional gross factor. When I finally can do the deed I am relived that I get at most about a week of relief from "I'm feeling horny, just letting you know." 

 

Now my partner is awesome, they are extremely sympathetic, and empathetic towards my lack of sexual drive. They are getting better at not being aggressive with their sexual requirements. This does nothing for the anxiety I feel over knowing that they will be horny again, very soon, and they need that from me. I am trying not to fall into the hole of depression this inevitably leads to but I am having trouble. 

 

I am open to polyamory for this reason, I know for a fact that I cannot do this so if it is that bad please go find it. But they need that intimacy from me to feel loved in that way? (I may be an assumeing ass hole here) I know sex is important to most relationships, I have done my reaserch. And I still struggle with it.

 

 

I am exactly the same way as you two are and have been this way for 30 years. I like the excitement and novelty of a new partner but then it all fizzles out. I don't feel sexually attracted to the new partner, but definitely not sex repulsed. The desire to have sex is more from an excitement factor though, rather than an arousal or need. It's also an expectation ingrained in my head by society so I have a hard time discerning whether I am really having sex because I want to or because that's what I'm supposed to do. 

 

When I first started having relationships, there was no AVEN. Basically, something was wrong with you if you didn't want to have sex with the person you loved. I also thought I was super picky and that felt selfish. Why couldn't I be into someone (even romantically) long term like most others were? My partners always fell head over heels in love with me (not because I'm great, but rather because they experienced the packaged romantic/sexual attraction to its full potential) and I just felt content or good enough with them.

 

I tried over an over to make a relationship work. I worked on myself. I kept thinking that next time would be different if I just did this or looked for someone with these qualities. It always ended up the same for me. I just couldn't get revved up like they could. I was ok with that, but my partners never were. They didn't feel loved or desired. 

 

In my experience, it has never worked for me to be in a long-term relationship with a very sexual person. Apparently, some people can make this work. I feel I need to warn people to not do what I did though. I compromised myself and suffered for it. If you feel very anxious or depressed a lot of the time because of your relationship, my advice is to do something different. I don't know what that would be for you as everyone is different, but I do know that staying in a relationship where you can't be the real you has some sad effects on a person. 

 

 

 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

It is a relief to hear other people describe the honeymoon period. For me, it feels like it is all tied up in the romantic part and when romance is new and exciting, I am sex favorable. But once the newness wears off, I am sex indifferent again. I never can that much about the sex but can truly love and care for the person romantically.

 

My partner and I have been together almost 11 years now. It lasted longer, but eventually faded. I thought something was wrong with me and we fought about it often. I only recently discovered the ace community and found others who experience things similarly.

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FinneganCatch

I'm glad to see I'm not the only one who experiences something like this. It's not that I'm sexually attracted so much that I am more willing do what I can to please the other person. Mostly I feel like during the honeymoon period sex is a way to experience that closeness you get from emotional closeness later in the relationship. Once I have that emotional closeness I crave I find it hard to go back to including sex into the equation when its something I don't really want to do. I'm not sex repulsed later in the relationship but indifferent might be the best way to describe it. I find it hard to factor it into my time when there are so many better things I could be doing with it. Even in the beginning of a relationship its a lot of curiosity about what its like to be close to this new and exciting person in my life and sex just seems to automatically become a part of that since its "normal". I've spent a lot of my life doing the "normal" thing and wondering why I'm so unhappy with it.

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On 11/16/2017 at 12:38 AM, Ash19 said:

am open to polyamory for this reason, I know for a fact that I cannot do this so if it is that bad please go find

I feel the same way. I am open to polyamory for myself and my partners so that we can both enjoy sex. Because I only find sex appealing when it is involved with discovering new people. And I don't want my long term partner to go without because I cannot perform for her. But how do you even begin to bring that up to someone, you know?

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On 12/6/2017 at 8:53 PM, FinneganCatch said:

Mostly I feel like during the honeymoon period sex is a way to experience that closeness you get from emotional closeness later in the relationship. Once I have that emotional closeness I crave I find it hard to go back to including sex into the equation when its something I don't really want to do. I'm not sex repulsed later in the relationship but indifferent might be the best way to describe it.

Right. I'm not repulsed, it's just that I feel like sex is a relationship milestone. Once you get there and achieve it, you just move onto looking forward to the next milestone. I'm not sure if that makes a lot of sense. 

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  • 3 weeks later...
On 12/6/2017 at 5:53 PM, FinneganCatch said:

It's not that I'm sexually attracted so much that I am more willing do what I can to please the other person.

Yeah, I hear that. I see a parallel between the gray/fray/demi side of this that folks on here are talking about, and submissive sexuals in the kink scene. Service bottoms in particular are awesome folks who aim to please their partners, not always in overt sexual ways, and it gives them satisfaction. Maybe the similarity here is enjoying watching someone you are squishing hard for, enjoy what you do for them. Sexual or otherwise. 

 

On 12/6/2017 at 5:53 PM, FinneganCatch said:

Mostly I feel like during the honeymoon period sex is a way to experience that closeness you get from emotional closeness later in the relationship. Once I have that emotional closeness I crave I find it hard to go back to including sex into the equation when its something I don't really want to do. ... Even in the beginning of a relationship its a lot of curiosity about what its like to be close to this new and exciting person in my life and sex just seems to automatically become a part of that since its "normal". I've spent a lot of my life doing the "normal" thing and wondering why I'm so unhappy with it.

This very dynamic has me feeling like a sheeple. I wanted to know what all the fuss was about, and was disappointed over and over wondering what I was doing wrong. Or choosing the wrong people? Something. Except when I found long term partnerships that didn't revolve around sex, I was much happier. The magic of poly is they get their sexy times elsewhere. I feel really fortunate to have such good relationships with my metamours too.

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Sounds like fraysexual. I'm like this a lot of the time.

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So awesome this thread! Thank you for starting. I too feel way more sexually inclined at the beginning of a relationship but not because of desire or a need but out of extreme curiosity and excitement to get to know that person in every way possible.  I'm passionate about people and I wish I could feel that desire and passion for sex and sometimes hope it will be different with a new person each time but also for me I'm sensual and it's nice and exciting to get to be physically close to someone new which also happens with sex and as I said get to know them in all the ways that I know are possible even if I don't get to experience sex in the same desirable and passionate way as them, I still get to try it and get to know them on that level and share that experience with them in whatever way I can and it feels nice in the moment and can be fun or exciting but then yeah later on once I've explored that with them I just don't want sex in general. It's much more preferable not to have it later on in the relationship since I never had real desire in the first place and I have an almost non-existent libido. I should get first place for the biggest run on sentence of all time.

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I should get first place for the biggest run on sentence of all time.

 

lol

 

 

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So glad to see this thread is here! 

 

This has been exactly how I've felt through each of my relationships, an initial surge of sexual interest and desire but then after a few weeks it just falls off a cliff..

 

All i want to do after this initial phase is cuddle up watching movies, playing games, spending time with friends and going outdoors.

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I've realized this is an aspect of my overall-fluid sexuality: when the new relationship energy is going strong, I'm excited about sex. Once that's faded I most often fall in the "meh" to "nope" range. I suspect for me it's simply a chemical thing. The hormones, dopamine, etc that get kicked up when I'm excited about someone new also bring my sex drive on board for a little while.

 

I've had it last anywhere from a few dates to several months. The stronger the emotional connection I feel with the person, the longer the sex drive boost tends to hang on (which is why I don't think fraysexual works for me, since from what I understand that's when the sex drive cuts off once there's an emotional connection.) But it always fades to at least being sex-neutral, and with most partners to being mildly averse a lot of the time.

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  • 4 months later...

Omg!!   I had no idea this was a thing!   I always just thought there was something wrong with my sex drive.  I knew I wasn’t exactly asexual because I have sexual desires.  At first when I meet someone, I tend to have sex often.  But once I start to have feelings for them I no longer have sexual desires.  I love the person and I want to cuddle and be close and kiss and all that. But I’m fine without any sex.  And then once they start to notice my lack of sex drive and try to push it I start getting very serious sexual anxiety.  

I’ve forced myself to have sex to appease my partner for a time.  But I have to mentally prepare myself and talk myself into it. And most of the time when it’s over I’m relieved.  I tell myself that it was easy and that I shouldn’t be so axious about it.  But then I start counting down the days till I know I will have to preform again. It is the main reason all of my relationships have failed.  And the reason I can’t hold onto a relationship for more 8 months on average.  I’m not the jealous type either. I would gladly let my partner be with other ppl sexually if I knew that they would still come home to me and love me. 

 

Thank you you for saying something.  It’s the first time I've ever heard anyone else describe it. Especially the sexual performance anxiety and depression. 

 

Its nice to know im not alone. 

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