Dear FoTW,
I was on an off term doing an internship in the fall while my girlfriend was on campus. We saw each other some over the summer, but then not over winterim or since I started my internship at the beginning of the fall. We’re now both back on campus again, and we haven’t had any sex since we got back to school. This is abnormal for us considering past patterns. Has something changed? I feel like everything else is normal, but I’m also afraid we may have lost our spark while I was off.
Sincerely,
Dry January
Dear Dry January,
Sex, death, money and taxes. All things people hate to talk about. Although you’ve probably heard this in Dartmouth’s Sexual Violence Prevention Program about 1,000 times already, sex is just like almost every other aspect of a relationship: the key is to communicate clearly.
First of all, most of this advice assumes that you have already explicitly asked your partner to engage in sexual activity, and she has verbally turned you down. If you haven’t asked or tried, your problem might be a simple lack of making your desires clear. The healthiest sexual encounters always begin with a clear, non-coerced verbal proposition and a clear “yes” or “no.”
Although it’s hard to say exactly what’s going on here, I have a couple guesses. One, there’s a real possibility that your partner might just not be that interested in sex with anyone right now. This is actually kind of common in the winter for some people – even mild cases of seasonal affective disorder can interfere with libido. It’s possible that your partner is grappling with the sudden movement to a dark, cold environment and it is affecting their mood. They might be in denial about this switch, or they may just not want to burden you with it. Libido also fluctuates naturally and randomly for some people.
Another possibility is that one of you has gone through changes that are turning your girlfriend off of continuing the relationship or engaging in intimacy. Although I don’t mean to catastrophize, it is possible that a lack of sex signals some trouble for the relationship.
In all of these circumstances, the best approach is simply to ask. Don’t be pushy or accusatory in any way. I might say something like, “Hey, I feel like our intimate/sex life has changed since coming back, and I’m still really attracted to you physically. Is there any reason for this?” Hopefully you get a clear answer from this approach, and whatever it is, I hope you can work through it with maintained and clear communication. Either way, it will be better to have this information than to keep wondering in the dark. Good luck!
- Eli
Dear Dry January,
I know none of us have time to read anything nowadays, so I’ll keep my response short: yes, you lost your spark. She hates you and wants to break up with you; she’s just trying to not hurt your feelings.
Kidding! Situations like this get pretty nuanced. Unfortunately, yours involves a street, and it’s not a one-way. Whatever happens in your relationship is a product of two people. Always ask how your own actions and feelings have contributed before you point the lens at your partner.
So, why haven’t you had sex since you both got to school? Maybe you could answer that yourself. Have you initiated it, and she hasn’t been receptive? Has she initiated? Have neither of you?
If everything else is normal, it’s unlikely that your relationship is in trouble. Relationships ebb and flow, and as you both got adjusted to your terms apart, you may just need a little more time to settle in before you go full throttle. If you truly “lost” your spark (which I think is an unhelpful way to look at things, since it assumes that the spark of a relationship simply goes away when it really morphs) you just need a little time to find it. Maybe go on a few dates, do something different. Go out of town. Go skiing or ice skating. The rest should follow!
But, if your girlfriend is apathetic in general, then that’s the time to see if the relationship itself may be in danger. But right now, I’d just assume that you’re both too busy at the start of the term to dedicate time to sex. And that’s okay! Good on both of you. Academics come first.
- Leila
Eli Moyse ’27 is an opinion editor and columnist for The Dartmouth. He studies government and creative writing. He publishes various personal work under a pen name on Substack (https://substack.com/@wesmercer), and you can find his other work in various publications.
