Sex File: My husband’s grief has affected our intimacy

Mon, 09 Dec, 2024 - 11:42

Suzi Godson

My husband is grieving after the loss of his mum nine months ago, and has lost all desire since.

I want to support him as best I can, but sex has always been an important part of our marriage and I feel a bit lost and cut out without that connection.

How can I stay close to him without pressuring him?

I can see why this feels confusing for you. At a time when you know that sex would be a comfort for your husband, he doesn't want it and as a result you feel shut out and cut off from him.

I know it won't be much consolation, but his response is very common. Sexual intimacy is about connection, and bereavement is about the loss of connection, and although nine months sounds like a long time, it's not.

My mum died 16 years ago and it took me at least two years to move on. Daily life goes back to normal pretty quickly, but the sucker punch of bereavement repeatedly assaults you.

Basically, when someone who was a huge part of your life suddenly disappears, they take a part of you with them, and it can take a long time to work out how to live with their absence.

When people feel sad and depressed, they lose interest in most things, including sex, but the relationship between bereavement and loss of sexual desire seems to be particularly nuanced.

Clinical psychologists and psychotherapists who specialise in grief therapy have described a number of different reasons why bereaved clients lost interest in sex.

Some stopped because they were emotionally fatigued, especially if they had been in a caring role. Others found the idea of sexual touching and experiencing pleasure when they were in emotional pain too distressing.

Some people had the opposite response and used sex as a way of numbing the pain.

In couples where a parent had died, some partners of the bereaved person reported experiencing feelings of jealousy - they felt that their spouse was idealising their dead parent, and that created an emotional distance between them.

The desire to have sex is fundamentally linked to your psychological state, and emotional pain tends to turn people in on themselves.

Because your husband is feeling vulnerable, I imagine that you have been reluctant to make any demands on him, but although he does not want to have sex, closeness and physical connection would be really beneficial for him.

Explain that you don't want him to do anything that he doesn't want to do, but that you think it would be helpful for you to try just lying together, preferably skin on skin, so that he can experience the immense therapeutic benefits of physical touch, which has been shown to suppress pain and negative emotion and boost the immune system.

Just holding each other is a vulnerable act that strengthens attachment and, when he feels safe, warm and loved, he may experience some form of arousal.

Let him lead the way, but if you can break down his initial resistance to physical contact, with luck, he will eventually recognise that physical connection and sexual intimacy is an emotionally restorative experience that helps to distract him from his grief.