10 Proven Steps To Fix A Dead Bedroom & Get Your Sex Life Back

After only 18 months of dating, we realized we were in a Sufferer Bedroom.

To say this came as a shock would be an understatement. How TF did this happen?

Our relationship was way too new…

We loved each other way too much…

And yet the vestige was undeniable. All the glaring, tell-tale signs that our once passionate sex life had shriveled up and died:

Reece trying to initiate, only to get rejected and shut down. Jodie feeling pressured and guilty for never stuff in the mood. And for the first time in our relationship, the uncounted blaming and hurtful arguments well-nigh sex.

Like most sexless couples, we wondered if there was something wrong with us, or something wrong with our relationship:

• We thought that maybe we weren’t meant to be together (we were).
• Jodie wondered if she had an underlying hormonal problem (she didn’t).
• Reece feared that Jodie just wasn’t attracted to him anymore (she was).

We spent months going virtually in circles, having ‘the talk’ over and over again… but nothing changed.

What we didn’t realize was this:

There was something getting in the way of Jodie’s libido – but it wasn’t what we thought. And there were things Reece was doing to ‘turn her off’ – but they weren’t what we expected.

But without myriad hours of research, and a journey of discovery that took us literally all over the world, we’re now happy to report that we’ve completely stock-still our sufferer bedroom.

And what’s more, the tideway we ripened has helped save the sufferer bedrooms of hundreds of couples.

Let’s be well-spoken – this is NOT the usual ‘spice things up’ or ‘try this libido booster’ removable translating the internet is littered with.

This IS a whole new tideway to reawakening a sufferer bedroom when nothing else has worked.

Before we get to that, let’s well-spoken up a few things first:

What Is A Sufferer Bedroom?

A “dead bedroom” describes a relationship where there’s little to no sexual intimacy. There’s usually one partner with a higher desire for sex than the other, creating tension and arguments. Over time it leads to feelings of frustration, loneliness, and dissatisfaction with the relationship.

And why is this such a problem?

To point out the blindingly obvious – sex plays an important role in relationships. It helps us to finger loved, connected, and chosen by our partner. The science backs this up, with research* unceasingly showing that couples who have a satisfying sex life are happier with their relationship overall.

And the very sex part?

Well, it feels good, it’s fun, and it has a whole tuft of positive mental, physical, and emotional benefits.

Yep, sex is great.

But when it’s not happening as much as one (or both) partners want, the lack of sex can be devastating not only to the relationship, but to our individual sense of self too.

Now, in most long-term relationships, once-per-week* sex seems to be the sweet spot.

But for couples in a sufferer bedroom, there’s usually a lot less sex than that.

So…

What Qualifies As A Sufferer Bedroom?

There’s no clinical definition of a sufferer bedroom, but it usually refers to a relationship where sex occurs less than 10 times a year, or less than once a month. In truth, a sufferer bedroom is subjective, depending on how important sex is to you and the individual dynamics of your relationship.

You may still have a sufferer bedroom if:

• You’re having sex increasingly than the usual definition of a ‘sexless marriage’, but the frequency suddenly drops off
• You’re having semi-regular sex, but there’s unvarying tension or arguments well-nigh it
• You’re experiencing a lot of rejection or disinterest when you try to initiate sex

Almost all relationships go through periods of less sex – considering ‘life’ happens. And there are couples who are perfectly happy with a lower frequency of sex. But a sufferer bedroom is characterized by low frequency AND the resulting tensions extending for long periods of time.

How Worldwide Is A Sufferer Bedroom?

It’s unscientific that virtually 15% percent of married couples in the US have not had sex in the last 6-12 months. Since a sufferer bedroom includes relationships that are still having sex once every couple of months, it’s possible that Sufferer Bedrooms are as worldwide as 1 in 5* American couples.

A recent survey* in the UK supports these numbers:

Over a quarter (29%) of respondents were in a “sexless’’ relationship, with 20% saying they’ve had sex fewer than 10 times in the last 12 months, and 8% saying they’ve had no sex at all in that same time.

If you’re wanting to know where you and your relationship fit into that (and you’re super into statistics), here’s a dispersal of sexless relationships by age:

And despite the worldwide misconceptions, it’s not just men wanting increasingly sex than women:

In our private coaching practice, well-nigh 50% of the high-desire partners we work with are women.

How Do Sufferer Bedrooms Start?

Most sufferer bedrooms start with a gradual ripen in sex as a relationship transitions from the honeymoon phase into a long-term partnership. If a couple doesn’t have the liaison skills to handle this shift, the increasing tensions virtually sex put remoter downward pressure on frequency.

In other instances, it’s a specific incident or a sudden transpiration in the relationship that triggers a sufferer bedroom. (Having a baby, a transpiration in employment, moving house, a challenging health condition, the death of a loved one, etc.)

Many couples describe a sufferer bedroom as a Cold War scenario. But instead of two powerhouse countries pitted versus each other, it’s you versus your partner.

There are snide remarks and thorny comments well-nigh sex, and in some cases a total dispersal in positive liaison and cooperation.

Overall, a sex-starved marriage creates a unvarying feeling of tension in the relationship and… well, coldness.

We undeniability this ‘gridlock’, and it can finger insurmountable.

But thawing the tensions of a sexless marriage or relationship is possible.

It requires a whole new tideway to sex and desire, and a whole new way of communicating. But if you’re unshut to it, this tideway has the potential to save your sex life, and your relationship – no matter how long you’ve been together, or what age you are.

So with that preamble out of the way, here’s our 10-step process to help you bring when the warmth in your relationship and fix your sufferer bedroom, once and for all.

How Do You Wake Up A Sufferer Bedroom?

1. Take A Stand

After working with myriad sufferer bedroom couples over the years, the first step to fixing a sexless relationship is unchangingly the same:

No longer unsuspicious the status quo, and committing to whatever it takes to fix it.

Because the sad truth is that it’s all too easy to explain a sufferer bedroom away:

To let the months and years roll by with begrudging acceptance. To resign yourself to the weighing that ‘this is just how it is now.’

But research* unceasingly shows that a satisfying sexual connection makes a relationship happier and healthier overall. And we know – from wits – that reviving a sufferer bedroom is possible.

So here’s what we encourage you to remember:

If you want increasingly sexual connection, that’s OK, and there’s nothing wrong with you. Sex is an important and healthy part of a relationship, and it’s veritably something worth fighting for.

On the flip side, we moreover encourage you to consider that:

There’s nothing wrong with your partner either. There’s something going on with their desire that perhaps plane they don’t understand yet (more on that in a bit).

And despite how it may feel, we’ve found that it’s rare that they’re ‘doing this on purpose’ or just trying to hurt you.

It’s essential to be understanding and understanding toward the challenges they’re facing. And, it’s just as important to yank a line in the sand for the relationship and sex life you want, to take a stand for yourself, and commit to doing what’s necessary.

Starting with a increasingly productive way of looking at ‘the problem’ in the first place…

2. Embrace The Desire Imbalance

OK, let’s write this nuts-and-bolts and much-needed perspective shift:

EVERY relationship has some level of desire imbalance – one person who experiences increasingly spontaneous desire for sex than the other.

Now, the bad news is that there’s nothing you can do to transpiration this.

Of course, you can try and fight versus it… or try and transpiration each other… or how they wits their desire for sex.

But as you’ve probably noticed, this usually leads to increasingly arguments, increasingly resentments, and… much less sex.

The good news is that the desire imbalance doesn’t have to be a problem.

It doesn’t have to be a unvarying source of mismatch in your sex life. Considering differences in your subjective levels of spontaneous desire are unquestionably a normal part of every relationship.

Your goal then isn’t to fix this imbalance – your goal is to learn how to work with it.

Once you winnow that the desire difference is normal and natural, you move from ‘it’s their problem’ to fix, to a much increasingly collaborative tideway to your sex life – where it’s something you BOTH work at together.

Right, so what exactly do we midpoint by ‘spontaneous desire’?

3. Learn Your Desire Styles

When it comes to sex and sexuality, there’s so much we’re not taught. And unfortunately, much of what we do learn is pretty shitty and not particularly helpful.

One of the shittier things we pick up is the idea that everyone experiences sexual desire the same way.

Spoiler alert: they don’t.

85% of men and 25% of women wits spontaneous desire as their default.*

Spontaneous desire is exactly what it sounds like – desire that happens spontaneously, scrutinizingly effortlessly, and seemingly out of nowhere:

The slightest of sexy thoughts floats through your mind, and suddenly you’re like, “Hey! I’d like to have sex!”

That’s spontaneous desire.

This ways the remaining 15% of men and 75% of women wits desire as something completely variegated – and it’s a mix of what’s tabbed ‘responsive desire’ and ‘contextual desire’.

Responsive desire is less like a spontaneous lightning bolt, and increasingly like a slow burn. And while desire happens first for someone with spontaneous desire, someone with responsive desire needs to finger unhallowed and turned on before they finger the desire.

Wait… Let’s when up a little and take flipside moment with that, considering it’s suuuper important:

If you have responsive desire, you need to finger the pleasurable, tingly things first surpassing you finger the desire for more…

Here’s what that might squint like:

Pleasure first, then desire.

Women are far increasingly likely to wits responsive desire as their primary desire style,* and most people will wits it at some point in their lives.

Yup, your desire style can, and does, transpiration sometimes.

That’s significant considering in our coaching practice we’ve found that a lot of problems in the bedroom start when one partner’s desire (or both) shifts from spontaneous to responsive.

Which is exactly how our sufferer bedroom began:

Jodie went from spontaneous desire in the passionate early days of our relationship, to responsive desire without we’d been together a while and the reality of normal life settled in.

So for us, this insight well-nigh desire styles was game-changing.

Now you might be sitting there thinking, “But I’ve tried so many times to turn my partner on and get their desire going. It doesn’t work!”

We hear you. You’re not alone. Here’s what you’re missing…

4. Stop Hitting The Brakes

Activating sexual desire requires increasingly than just vitalizing your turn ons (what we undeniability your ‘accelerators’). Because there’s moreover a counter-force urgently working versus desire – and they’re tabbed your sexual brakes.

Your sexual brakes are so much increasingly than your turn-offs. They’re all the things in your inner and outer world telling your smart-ass and soul that now is NOT a good time to get turned on.

Things like:

• performance anxiety
• low self-esteem
• body image issues
• chronic or unresolved relationship conflict
• concerns well-nigh pregnancy or STIs,
• social consequences (and that includes waking up the kids)
• lack of safety and trust in the relationship

And the most ubiquitous, bedroom-murdering restriction of them all…

Stress.

So what does this midpoint for your sex life?

Let’s go when to that washing the dishes and sexy kisses on the when of the neck scenario:

In a perfect, stress-and-distraction-free world, this works to start hitting the accelerator. There’s nothing getting in the way, so the right stimulation kicks desire into gear.

But in less-than-perfect reality, when you slide up to your partner, there’s increasingly going on in their throne than just your sexy kisses:

They’re worrying well-nigh that work meeting tomorrow… the uneaten few pounds they’ve put on since Christmas… and whether or not you’re still pissed well-nigh that treatise you had the other day.

The brakes are on BIG time. And none of that is your fault. None of that is their fault either. But unless you know how to turn those brakes off, your sex life is going to suffer.

Because in the majority of sufferer bedrooms, it often boils lanugo to this:

There’s something hitting the brakes on desire – either yours, your partner’s, or both. This ways that all the sexy turns-ons in the world just aren’t going to work.

Your #1 mission is to work out what those brakes are, and to work collaboratively to turn them off.

So how do you do that?

Look, it should be well-spoken once that it takes some work. And unfortunately, if you’ve been in a sexless marriage for a while, plane your attempts to make them finger good can hit the brakes and turn them off.

(To help you discover your personal brakes and accelerators, and navigate your relationship’s unique Sexual Blueprint, trammels out the Reignite Your Love Life home study course.)

But to really move things forward, the weightier place you can start is to…

5. Rebuild Emotional Intimacy

Over scrutinizingly a decade of working with couples, here’s something we see proven time and time again:

A lack of emotional intimacy will scrutinizingly unchangingly lead to a lack of sexual intimacy.

And yeah, we get that it can be one of those infuriating chicken-or-egg situations:

For the higher-desire partner, sexual intimacy helps them to finger emotionally connected.

But for the lower-desire partner, the emotional intimacy helps them to finger unshut to sexual intimacy. And it’s pretty much a non-negotiable.

This has to do with responsive and contextual desire:

For sexual desire to really flourish, it needs a low-stress, highly sympathizing context. And working on your emotional connection is one of the weightier ways to make that happen.

In other words – feeling safe, connected, and loved helps switch off the brakes, and creates a space for our accelerators to switch on.

Now, it’s important that your attempts to create emotional intimacy are genuine, and not a thinly veiled struggle to just ‘get sex’. Basically, you want to let go of ‘trying to make sex happen’, and get curious well-nigh what your partner needs to finger emotionally connected.

This is an unshortened topic in itself, so to get you started, trammels out this ultimate guide to creating increasingly emotional intimacy in your relationship.

#protip:

Don’t be disheartened if your attempts to build emotional connection are met with suspicion or cynicism. In relationships with low emotional intimacy or chronic underlying tensions, trying to reconnect can bring those tensions to the surface. But stay the course. Over time, the increasingly your partner sees and feels your unfurled attempts to connect, the increasingly they’ll trust that you’re stuff genuine.

6. Well-spoken The Resentments

If you’ve been in a sexless relationship for a while, chances are there’s a build-up of unresolved resentments between you. Usually on both sides.

Reviving a sufferer bedroom ways you’re going to have to talk openly well-nigh sex with your partner.

Now, in order to move the conversation in a increasingly productive direction (as opposed to the usual repetitive and treasonous arguments) you’ll need to really listen to each other and heal the underlying hurts.

As you can probably guess, this can be flipside one of those ramified relational processes. (That’s why we wrote increasingly wares well-nigh how to fix resentment in marriage, and created an unshortened liaison undertow to help you transform conflict into connection).

But there’s one tideway we discovered that really helps to move the dial:

Talking well-nigh why sex is important to you:

• What are you really wanting when you reach out for sex?
• What does sex midpoint to you?
• What does sex requite you?
• What does sex requite your relationship?

Helping your partner see that sex is increasingly than ‘just sex’ can help them to understand your perspective, and to finger increasingly loved and cherished as a result.

This is an important and vulnerable conversation that can create deeper emotional intimacy, while moreover paving the way to…

7. Increase Physical Affection

One of the most heartbreaking side effects of a sufferer bedroom is the steady ripen of physical affection:

There’s less cuddling, less kissing, less hand-holding, and less everyday touch in the relationship overall.

It’s lonely and disconnecting on both sides.

So why does this happen? And why does it matter?

In low-sex and no-sex relationships – where tensions virtually sex are upper – physical unhealthfulness is often mistaken by the lower-desire partner as an struggle to initiate sex… And is quickly shut down.

If you’ve overly had your partner freeze up when you’ve gone to hug or kiss them, then you know what it feels like.

Over time, the unvarying rejection wears the higher-desire partner down. So out of self-preservation, they learn to withdraw their affection.

The lower desire partner fears that sharing an innocent kiss or hug might send mixed signals or be misinterpreted, so they withdraw their unhealthfulness too.

In an struggle to stave all the pain and disconnection virtually sex, each person has their baby-sit up, and connection-nourishing physical unhealthfulness is the casualty.

But it doesn’t have to stay that way.

Because if you stop trying to initiate sex with physical touch (more on that in a moment) and you make it well-spoken that physical unhealthfulness is simply that – unhealthfulness with no voucher and no expectation that it leads anywhere – then it opens the door to genuine sympathizing touch.

This is a crucial step in reviving a sufferer bedroom. It helps well-spoken residual resentments, builds positive momentum, and sets you up to…

8. Form A ‘Collaborative Alliance’

We fathom that ‘teamwork’ isn’t exactly well-healed in a sufferer bedroom. You’ve no doubt tried working on this before, to no avail.

But that’s why ‘working together’ is step 8… and not step 1:

The previous steps are specifically designed to help thaw the tensions between you, and help lay the goodwill groundwork necessary for collaboration.

So what exactly does it midpoint to form a collaborative alliance?

Ultimately, it ways you’re no longer shouldering all of the responsibility for reawakening a sexless relationship.

Instead, you’re focused on understanding your relationship’s unique Sexual Blueprint and creating an environment – together – where sexual connection can flourish:

• Working together to reduce stressors and lessen the effects of whatever might be hitting the brakes
• Understanding exactly what ignites your partner’s desire and helping them printing the accelerators
• A transferral to creating sexy contexts together and prioritizing mutually-fulfilling sex

And while we’re talking well-nigh sexy contexts…

9. Forget Well-nigh ‘Frequency’

When you’re in a sufferer bedroom, it’s worldwide to be counting the days, weeks, months, (and in some cases YEARS) since you last had sex.

But focusing on frequency is a trap. It can make sex finger transactional – something neither of you wants. And it moreover makes you miss the worthier opportunity in sex:

Connection.

Research shows that when it comes to sex, it’s quality, not quantity, that matters most.

In a recent study* of 168 couples published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior, the happiest marriages were not necessarily the ones in which partners had the most sex. Instead, the happiest couples had “a satisfying sex life and a warm emotional life.”

They focused on connection, affection, and satisfaction instead of frequency alone.

Letting go of frequency can finger scary – like you’re giving up or resigning yourself to a no-sex marriage. But doing so takes the pressure off and helps create a low-stress, low-expectation context (which is unconfined for that responsive and contextual desire).

Which finally brings you to the last piece of the puzzle…

10. Initiate Sex The Right Way

This is it.

The scariest step for any higher desire partner delivering the painful scars of rejection – how to be vulnerable, put yourself on the line, and initiate sex in a sufferer bedroom.

Let’s uncork with a recap of what not to do:

• Don’t try to make your partner want sex
• Don’t use physical unhealthfulness as an struggle to get them in the mood
• Don’t take sole responsibility for hitting their smatter and turning them on

Instead, here are the most productive things to focus on when initiating sex:

Invite your partner to connect with you, with your words. Let them know you’d love to connect physically considering you love them, and you love stuff intimate with them. Let them know there’s no pressure, no expectation, and you don’t have to ‘get’ anywhere. Instead, ask what you can do to help turn off the brakes, and what you can do to make them finger good.

Then show up together and see where the journey takes you.

Every relationship is different, and seeing positive results is complex, requiring mindset and policies shifts from both of you. That takes time, intentional effort, and a transferral to doing things differently.

In this post, we’ve included some of the most helpful information and insights we’ve used in reviving not only our own sufferer bedroom, but the sufferer bedrooms of all the couples we’ve worked with over the years.

For some, the steps outlined here will be unbearable to uncork turning things around.

For others, fixing a sufferer bedroom is weightier washed-up with a increasingly structured, step-by-step approach.

If that’s you, we’ve created a home study program you can work through in the repletion and privacy of your own home.

Check out the well-constructed Reignite Your Love Life home study course.

Dead Bedroom FAQ