Why do Women Lose Their Sex Drive?

07Dec08

I have about a million theories on why women lose their sex drive, some more conventional than others.  Let’s start with the one that annoys me the most.

Birth Control and Female Sexual Arousal Disorder

Most of my female friends and I found that our sex drives plummeted when we started birth control (although a few said they didn’t notice anything).  Some of them put up with it anyway, and others stopped using it.  Despite the fact that often our doctors were mostly dismissive of our complaints, we now have science to back us up (look here).  For a while, it’s been reported that women on birth control have lowered libidos while they are actually taking the pill, but it was just assumed that once a woman went off it her sex drive would return.  However, now there is also evidence that it can reduce the amount of testosterone in a woman’s blood longer term possibly reducing her sex drive for years!  That sucks!

Female Sexual Arousal Disorder (FSAD) is a recently discovered/invented disorder where women basically don’t get as horny anymore (see here).  It’s a little controversial because some people think it’s basically made up because something like up to 43% of women show some degree of FSAD.  How can it be a disorder when nearly half our female population displays it?  Probably the doctors are mostly horny men who expect women to act like porn stars and if we were just more understanding of women’s needs everything would just work out- damn that patriarchy!

But wait, maybe there’s another expectation.  You see, more than 80% of American women have been on birth control at some point (again, see here).   Maybe the high rates of FSAD are related to the high rates of birth control usage.  Maybe our pregnancy paranoia has actually caused a substantial percentage of our female population to come down with FSAD.  Anyway, I don’t use birth control anymore and I would highly advise anyone thinking about birth control to look into all the potential side effects because your doctor probably won’t tell you about them.

Long Term Relationships

Many people I know have also often noticed that a woman’s sex drive also wanes when she’s in a long term relationship.  In fact, some german study found the same thing – that essentially a woman’s sex drive drops when she’s in a secure relationship (here).  

I have a few theories on why this is.  My original and most basic theory was that sex with a new partner was better from some study I read ages ago that cited evidence that rats enjoyed sex more with new partners.  However, now there’s some other study that rats actually often prefer partners that are “better” rather than newer (it’s complicated, read here).  Also, anecdotally among the humans I know, sex with a new partner doesn’t usually seem better.  But, among people who are bad in bed, newer partners are probably better if humans are like rats…? Whatever.  

Anyway, the “newer is better” theory is out.  I think the original finding, that women have lower sex drives in secure relationships may be significant.  Supposedly arguments and makeup sex and whatever make things hotter (I can’t verify this myself as I don’t usually have the patience to stay around too long after a big argument).  Many people in long term relationships will start caving in to their partner’s will and there will be more silent resentment and less argument and this leads to no sex.  

But I have friends who argue far more than they fuck, so clearly that’s not everything.  My final theory, which is totally flaky but corresponds with my personal experience, is that on some level people don’t want what they can easily have.  Usually women end up in this situation where whenever they are even slightly horny the guy they’re with is like “oh god, thank you thank you thank you” and instantly jumps them.  So, they never value sex because they know anytime they want it they can have it.  I was giving advice to a male friend of mine who is dating a not so horny girl, and I told him that sometimes he should be the one to cut the makeout sessions short (in a very nice non-offensive way like “I have work, I should really go now”).  Essentially, he wants to leave her wanting more rather than wishing it had finished sooner.  He groaned, and said that would be incredibly difficult to do.  But that’s why it works – all guys find it difficult to do!  Ideally, you never want to pressure a girl for sex because it makes you seem desperate and usually comes across as unattractive.  Conversely, guys who are very relaxed about getting laid seem more worldly – there’s almost a feeling of “why doesn’t he care?  am I not good enough?  is he getting laid somewhere else?” and they have more power.  A desperate guy essentially lets his girlfriend completely control his sex life, a guy who occasionally says “I’m not really in the mood tonight,” signals that he is equally in control. 

I suppose that was really two theories, not a million.  There must be some other aspect to this that I’m not fully understanding though because neither explains lesbian bed death (as lesbians are usually not on birth control and don’t deal with male-female dynamics.)  It’s possible that lesbian relationships often seem very secure, so the security issue is a bigger one with lesbians but I’m not sure.  I will have to ponder this.

Filed under: Relationships   |  6 Comments
Tags: birth control, female sexual arousal disorder, FSAD, lbd, lesbian bed death, libido, long term relationships, lost, lost libido