I Feel Like a Roommate in My Marriage

• Use “I” statements to express how you feel without assigning blame. As an example, Needle suggests saying, “I feel lonely and disconnected when we don’t talk about our intimacy,” instead of “You never care about how I feel.”
• Start a conversation about all the good sex you’ve had. “If you do have a history of things having been good once, that can be a valuable talking point,” says Stella Harris, a sexuality educator and mediator.

Harris says to ask each other: “What did we do then that we don’t do now?” and “Is there anything that can be brought into the present in a way that’s a fit for our current bodies and desires and needs?”

• Try a “sandwich” approach. Needle suggests beginning with something positive or affirming, then gently sharing your concern, and ending with a hopeful or loving statement.

Here’s an example: “I love the life we’ve built together. Lately I’ve been feeling more like a roommate than a partner, and I miss our closeness. I want us to find a way back to that connection. I enjoy feeling connected to you.”

• Ask open-ended questions. Needle says to be curious, asking your husband questions like, “How have you been feeling about our relationship lately?” or “What does intimacy mean to you at this stage in our lives?”

Harris also suggests scheduling a conversation so that you both can emotionally prepare for it in a balanced way. 

• Ease into the conversation. Approaching the topic with care is a good way to start. Harris says you can say something like: “I know this is a sensitive topic, but it’s important to me to talk about our sex life. Can we set up a time on the calendar when we can do that?”

Issues to explore that could impact libido. What triggered this change in your husband? Licensed clinical social worker Allison Kent wonders: Has retirement dampened his libido? Have either of you experienced any changes in your health that could impact sexual desire? Is he struggling with sexual dysfunction?

“If your husband is no longer interested in ensuring that you have an orgasm or experience pleasure, but he used to, perhaps he is having trouble with stamina or arousal,” Kent says.

Certified sex therapist Sari Cooper, founder and director of Center for Love and Sex in New York City, says it’s common for men in their 60s to experience changes in their erectile or ejaculatory functions. 

Sometimes, Cooper says, men rush through the sexual experience to protect themselves from the shame, anguish and embarrassment of not being able to keep an erection for as long as they did when they were younger. 

Cooper says your husband’s defensiveness may be a way of “saving face” and protecting his ego. That doesn’t excuse his belittling you or causing you to feel ignored, she adds, but it is a first step in trying to understand why he’s less interested in partnered sex.

Ask for what you want. Do you want more foreplay, more intimacy? If so, tell him.

“Maybe he’s just doing what he knows how to do, and like many people, she may not be comfortable talking about sex,” Harris says. “Maybe he doesn’t know that she’s not having fun and that it’s not creating pleasure. Maybe he needs to know what she wants; at least give him a chance.”

Introduce a pleasure game. To keep things light, Cooper suggests playing a game in which you take turns giving and receiving pleasure so that the sexual experience itself becomes less pressured.  

For example, she says, offer to give your husband oral sex, and on the next occasion, ask him to use a sex toy on you while you relax and enjoy the stimulation. Some other time, tell him you’d like a full-body massage — that you’re not interested in having penetrative sex, but rather in feeling the warmth of his touch on your skin.

As Kent frames it: “Sometimes, taking pressure off of sex can be the very thing that helps us have more sex.”

Consult a professional. If repeated efforts to communicate are met with defensiveness, dismissiveness or emotional shutdown, Needle recommends seeing a couples therapist or certified sex therapist.

A therapist, she says, can create a space where both of you feel safe enough to explore deeper issues. Therapy, she adds, can help uncover what’s underneath the defensiveness, address any physical or psychological changes impacting intimacy, and reestablish the emotional closeness that helps sexual connection thrive.