Loss of Sexual Desire: Understanding Why the Drive Disappears and What to Do

There is a particular kind of silence in a couple when desire disappears. No one talks about it — because no one knows how to, because they're afraid of hurting the other, because they hope it will come back on its own. And in the meantime, distance settles in, and settles further. And the silence itself becomes a subject.

In the article that follows, I explore communication within the couple. If you recognise yourself in this theme, I designed a couple communication test that helps you take stock of your communication patterns as a couple. It comes with a guide to extend your reflection beyond the results.

A drop in sexual desire is one of the most common issues raised in couples therapy. It affects people of all genders and ages, in short and long relationships alike. And yet it remains surrounded by shame or a sense of failure — as if no longer wanting intimacy meant something had broken inside oneself, or in the relationship.

What a drop in desire is not

Before exploring the causes, it helps to unpack a few assumptions.

A drop in desire is not proof that love has gone. Desire and love are two distinct states. One can love someone deeply and not feel drawn to them sexually — just as one can desire someone without loving them. Conflating the two often leads to conclusions that are too quick.

A drop in desire is also not an indication that the partner is no longer right for you. It can be entirely linked to internal factors — fatigue, chronic stress, self-image, hormonal state — that have nothing to do with the other person.

And a drop in desire is not irreversible. It can be temporary, situational, or linked to a relational dynamic that can change.

The most common causes

Stress and chronic fatigue

One of the first enemies of desire is a lack of inner resources. Desire requires a form of inner availability — the ability to step out of one's head and into one's body. When someone is exhausted, anxious, or overwhelmed, that availability no longer exists. They are not unavailable to sexuality because they don't want it. They are unavailable because there is nothing left to offer after the daily demands have been met.

Fatigue is often the most mundane and most powerful reason behind a loss of desire — and the easiest not to notice, precisely because it is mundane.

Emotional distance

Sexual desire in a long-term relationship is often contingent on emotional connection. When that connection is distant — when the two people talk little, when conflicts accumulate without resolution, when life feels parallel rather than shared — desire can disappear not from absence of attraction but as a form of protection.

This contextual form of desire is particularly common, though it affects people of all genders. The body doesn't open easily to someone with whom one is in an unacknowledged state of tension.

Self-image and relationship to the body

Feeling undesirable — whether linked to body image, a period of self-doubt, or recent physical changes — can cut off access to desire. One doesn't feel like wanting intimacy because one doesn't feel in a state to want it.

Hormonal and medical factors

A drop in desire can have physical causes: hormonal changes (particularly around pregnancy, breastfeeding, menopause, or related to certain medications such as antidepressants or hormonal contraceptives). These causes deserve to be explored medically, without guilt.

What makes things worse

The most common dynamic: one person waits for desire to return, the other waits for an initiative, and neither talks. This absence of words creates a low-level tension — an absent subject that takes up more and more space precisely because it is avoided.

The other aggravating factor is implicit pressure. When one person feels an expectation (even unspoken) from the other, desire becomes even harder to access. Desire cannot be commanded. It resists obligation.

What can help

The first step is often speaking — not to resolve everything immediately, but to step out of silence. Something is happening, I don't know exactly what, but I'd like us to be able to talk about it. This opening creates a different space than silence.

Then: exploring the causes. Is this linked to current stress levels? To the quality of emotional connection? To something in self-image? To a medical factor? The answers point toward different paths.

Therapeutic support — from a sex therapist or a couples counsellor — can be valuable when the pattern persists, when attempts to talk about it get stuck, or when the situation is causing real suffering for one or both people.

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