This is part one of a two-part interview. Sex and intimacy questions rarely feel simple to ask out loud, so Connect Couples’s Mercy Clark sat down with Brittany Bolden, LMFT, LCAS — a Connect Couples therapist and AASECT Certified Sex Therapist currently pursuing her Ph.D. in Clinical Sexology — and asked her the ten questions couples search for most. Below are six of the ten, condensed from the full interview. Part two — how to actively rebuild connection, communicate what you want, and navigate incompatibility — is coming soon.
Why don’t we have sex as often as we used to?
The question confuses a lot of couples, Brittany says, because it usually isn’t one problem — it’s several, stacked on top of each other depending on where a couple is in their relationship.
The first two years of most relationships run on what researchers call limerence: a flood of dopamine, serotonin, and oxytocin that makes desire feel automatic. “All of the chemicals are released… so people could procreate,” Brittany explains. Once that chemical rush fades, usually around the two-year mark, desire has to be built rather than assumed.
“Now you have to actually like your partner, and now you have to actually produce some of those chemicals within just the relationship.”
From there, Brittany looks at safety — emotional, physical, financial — as the real gatekeeper for a lot of women’s desire. If that box isn’t checked, the body treats sex as a threat rather than an option, regardless of how the relationship looks on paper.
She also points to a well-documented pattern: men are more likely to experience spontaneous desire (wanting sex out of nowhere), while women more often experience responsive desire (desire that builds once things are already underway). Brittany is clear this isn’t universal — “it doesn’t always have to be this way” — but it’s common enough in heterosexual couples to explain a lot of mismatched expectations around who initiates.
Add in the biological realities of postpartum recovery, breastfeeding, fertility treatment, and eventually perimenopause, and a pattern emerges: desire isn’t static. Desire often moves with a couple’s stage of life — and when men get discouraged by a partner’s lower desire and stop initiating, both partners can end up in a stalemate neither one chose.
Why does my partner want sex more or less often than I do?
Some of this comes down to biology. Brittany cites testosterone — the hormone most associated with sex drive — as a major factor. On average, men have 15 times more circulating testosterone than women.
But biology isn’t the whole story. Medications (particularly anti-anxiety and antidepressant prescriptions), performance anxiety, and where each partner is in their own hormonal life stage all shift the equation — and desire discrepancy can run in either direction, not just the stereotypical one.
Brittany’s first move with a couple navigating this: find out what medications everyone’s on, and what life stage each partner is actually in rather than just what a stereotype may predict.
Why does sex feel like a chore or an obligation?
This one, Brittany says, is where a lot of women get stuck with what she calls “duty sex” — having sex because they feel they should, whether that pressure comes from social messaging, guilt, or an unspoken sense of obligation.
The problem with duty sex is that it rarely lands the way either partner hopes. Men aren’t just looking for the physical act; they’re looking for connection and a sense that their partner wants to be there. Going through the motions doesn’t deliver that, even when the sex itself “gets done.”
Brittany’s reframe: stop thinking of it as an obligation and start thinking of it as your partner’s love language.
“This is how my partner receives love. This is what my partner really enjoys. This is how they connect with me.”
That shift — from “I should” to “this is how my partner and I connect” — doesn’t automatically fix a genuine mismatch in desire, but it does take some of the resentment out of showing up for your partner in a way that matters to them.
Why am I not attracted to my partner anymore?
Brittany treats attraction and desire as two separate, often-tangled issues. Desire is largely physical and hormonal — what’s happening with your body, your medications, your postpartum recovery. Attraction is different: it’s about whether you find your specific partner appealing, and it can be affected by anything from a change in body type to a partner’s behavior (the “ick” is real, clinically speaking) to how present they are as a co-parent.
The first step is untangling which one is the problem: attraction or desire. From there, Brittany recommends a simple weekly practice: each partner shares three things they found attractive about the other that week.
“You have no idea — like, men especially — women will find men attractive when they’re reading their three-year-old a book… whereas men could be like, ‘she walked past me on the way to the shower, that was attractive to me.'”
The exercise does two things at once: it surfaces what actually generates attraction for your specific partner (which is rarely what either of you would guess), and it starts rebuilding the pattern of noticing each other again.
Why can’t I orgasm, stay aroused, or enjoy sex the way I used to?
Brittany is candid that the field itself is behind here: female arousal and orgasm have historically been understudied, and most of what couples assume about sex is modeled on a male-typical, linear pattern — arousal, climax, done. Women’s arousal doesn’t reliably follow that pattern, and research on it is still catching up.
Her practical fix is a reframe she borrows from an unlikely source — a former supervisor’s sports metaphors:
“We don’t only focus on the three-point shot. We can still get a basket with a layup… focus on the progression of the night instead of whether or not you got that long three.”
Putting pressure on orgasm as the end goal tends to backfire, Brittany says, because it pulls people into their heads at exactly the moment their nervous system needs to be relaxed enough to respond. Shifting the goal to pleasure — rather than a specific outcome — takes the pressure off, and for many women, that’s what actually makes arousal possible in the first place.
What if intimacy could feel easier?
Optimal Intimacy™ is a private, research-based workshop designed to help couples better understand their emotional and sexual connection—without shame or pressure.
Is our sex life normal compared with other couples?
Brittany’s answer, consistently: there’s no universal normal. She’s had clients who hadn’t had sex in over a decade and clients who need it daily — and both can be a fine fit for that particular couple, as long as it’s something they’ve actually decided together rather than defaulted into.
What she does track with clients is trajectory: what did this couple’s sex life look like at each stage — early on, after kids, through any ruptures — and when, specifically, did something change? That’s more diagnostic than comparing to any national average.
Her broader point for anyone worried they’re falling short of some invisible standard: the couple gets to decide what they want their sex life to look like. Not society, not a friend’s relationship, and definitely not an average.
“Nobody gets to decide if you want to have sex once a year, once a day, ten times a day. Nobody gets to decide that but the couple.”
Expect your sex life to change over time
Desire moves with bodies, stress, and time, and rebuilding it starts with figuring out which piece is actually shifting — biology, safety, attraction, or just habit. None of that makes it a problem to fix in a weekend.
Part two picks up from here: what actually helps once you’re ready to act on it, how to say what you want without turning it into a whole ordeal, and what to do if it turns out you and your partner genuinely want different things.
FAQ: Sex, desire, and low libido in relationships
Is it normal for sex drive to change after having kids?
Yes. Postpartum hormones, breastfeeding, and sleep deprivation all lower sex drive, and for many women that dip lasts up to two years after a baby is born. It’s a physiological pattern, not a sign something is wrong with the relationship.
What is “duty sex,” and is it harmful?
Duty sex is having sex primarily out of a sense of obligation rather than desire. Occasional duty sex isn’t inherently harmful, but relying on it as the norm tends to leave both partners feeling disconnected — the partner going through the motions, and the partner who wanted genuine connection and didn’t get it.
Should we see a sex therapist if we’re not having problems, exactly — just changes?
A change in desire, frequency, or connection doesn’t have to reach “problem” status before it’s worth talking through with a professional. Many couples come in simply because they want to understand what’s shifting and rebuild intentionally, not because anything has gone wrong.