Issue #215: How to Keep Having ‘Good Sex’ in a Long-Term Relationship

From someone who lost and found it.

📚 Heart the Lover by Lily King: This book, out today (!), floored me. Similar to her previous novels Euphoria and Writers & Lovers (both subtly referenced), Heart the Lover bottles the singularity of a romantic relationship, where decades have passed but the heartbreak remains. Its tone reminded me of ‘Past Lives,’ but set largely in college, with a secret that held me captivated until the last word.

🎥 ‘Roofman’ in theaters: A fun heist movie, starring Channing Tatum and Kirsten Dunst, that doubles as a meditation on loneliness and connection. I’m also eager to see the new Daniel Day-Lewis movie, ‘Anemone,’ currently in theaters.

🍇 Linger by Hetty McKinnon:

Hetty Lui McKinnon

’s latest cookbook asks us to slow down, with nostalgic and plant-focused recipes inspired by people and places that shaped her. As with all of her cookbooks, my favorite part of this one is the unexpected and inventive combinations, in recipes that somehow remain unfussy and delicious.

Still from ‘Normal People’

If there was one relationship question that consumed me in my twenties, it was “How often are other people having sex?”

Like most women raised on Britney Spears, Cosmopolitan, and Carrie Bradshaw, I got the message that sex wasn’t just part of a relationship—it was the most important piece. Even Charlotte, who seemed to care about appearances and stability above all, divorced Trey largely over barriers in their sex life. Every time I polled girlfriends on the amount of sex they were having (particularly those who were in long partnerships, similar to mine), I added a data point to the proverbial yardstick I used to measure the health of my own relationship, especially as a year turned into five, then ten years together. As long as we fell within the bellcurve, I could believe that my relationship was okay. I was okay.

My question wasn’t entirely off base—for me, sex is important and the amount of sex I’m having within a relationship, often correlates with my satisfaction with my partnership. Still, my complete preoccupation with the amount of sex and other quantifiable measures (Did we both come?) tunneled my vision. And I expected this regular sex in addition to all the other roles my partner inhabits: trip-planner, dinner-maker, safe emotional haven, adventure buddy, financial partner (I can only imagine what happens when “co-parent” is thrown into this mix). In my marriage, sex became another chore to check off. I flattened it onto my to-do list, neutering sex from its full expression as the beautiful, messy push-pull of desire that occurs between two people, and within ourselves.

Comparison, and my efforts to maintain an arbitrary number that was constantly shifting, only told me whether I fit into the norm—not whether I was fulfilled by my own sex life. The question I’m more concerned with now, in the context of my current relationship, is not how much sex other people are having, but:

How can I maintain desire and eroticism within my relationship, even after the novelty fades?

Is it even possible to continue to crave my partner sexually, as life happens and the initial “magic” goes away? It turns out, it is.