We’ve been together for about 2 years and we had a daughter a year ago. Overall sex was good and it never felt planned out even after our daughter. Lately though sex is becoming less frequent, I’ve been trying to make it interesting and spur of the moment make a move (ie. kissing with tongue, rubbing her legs/body) but she shuts it down immediately. Saying she feels gross or we probably smell. And she’s right it does feel cleaner after a shower but it feels planned. I feel our passion dying. It feels like she hasn’t made a move on me before or after a shower in 6 months. Not sure what to do.
Edit: wasnt expecting so many responses but i would just like to thank everyone giving helpful answers. Just some clarification, some people are saying I don’t shower enough or smell but I do shower twice a day. My wife even commented when we first met on it being “weird” that I have to shower twice a day everyday. So I would say mindset wise Im a cleaner person than her. She is a stay at home mom and spends all day most days with our 1 year old as my job has long hours I don’t get off until my child is asleep or she is getting ready for bed.
How often does she get to shower? And for how long? Does she have pelvic floor issues (like peeing when sneezing)? Is she breastfeeding?
It might be less about you showering, and more about her.
It could also be that she uses her shower time to transition from mom mode to wife mode, and being clean is just a bonus.
I’m a sahm and my bath/ shower time is my detach myself from mom mode and get into partner mode. It gives me a metal break to switch gears. Also. I love oral but can’t do it with smells so, with both of us clean, the fun can be different each time. He loves it when we change things up and showering now is part of our build up/anticipation. We talk about what we want to do to each other later in the night before showering.the break also gives me time to daydream about what i want to do to him and vice versa. It can be fun if you want it to be.
Kids make you feel dirty. If she feels better about herself after a shower, why complain? It’s really not a big deal.
There’s nothing wrong with people wanting to be clean before sex.
Maybe your wife just wants to feel clean and desirable so she can enjoy herself. If she’s home with your child all day, I’m sure she feels grimy and touched out by the time the baby is in bed. There’s nothing wrong with a little anticipation; buy your wife some expensive shower gel and lotion to help her feel loved and ready when the moment comes!
Your wife is touched out. She is exhausted. She finally gets some time to herself after looking after a small child ALL DAY LONG and you want to have sex.
The shower is either a way to say she’s not interested without hurting your feelings (or an excuse if you’re pressuring / coercing her) or she needs to have 10 minutes by herself. And that personal time is fulfilling basic cleanliness and then she has to share her body with you.
You get two showers a day. She gets one. Think about what you can do to make sure she gets more time to herself and she might be more interested in sex with you.
Buddy, she’s in need of a spa day or something. It’s her feeling less than desirable after having baby. I don’t think it’s anything you’ve done. I would ask her if she needs a day or two to herself, get a mani/Pedi, her hair done some new clothes etc. Being at home all the time can affect you and your self esteem
I’ll be honest. Children, especially young children, are not just exhausting but after a while you begin to forget the person you were and find yourself becoming a tired, overworked, anxious and unlovable person. If I can suggest something, you need to give her a whole day to herself every week and go out, just the two of you, once a month. You might think you’re doing a lot for her but you need to give her space. She needs to find herself again.
I don’t understand why this is a big deal
Don’t overanalyze it. She just wants to be sure she’s not sticky and smelly after caring for a 1 year old on her own the whole day long, it’s not about you. She is probably still insecure about her new, ” mom ” body too and it gets her to feel better about herself when she’s fresh from the shower. If it makes her feel better, why just not go with it for her sake. See if she’s open to showering together, maybe it would feel more spontaneous to you.
Rather than blaming your wife for not being spontaneous, why don’t you just accept her wishes and come up with more ways to make sex more interesting for you? Stop dwelling on what isn’t working and look for solutions
She doesn’t want to fuck you because she’s touched out from the kid all day. She’s overwhelmed with housework and probably loneliness.
Help more around the house FOR A LONG TIME then see how she feels about sex.
I have used this same excuse in my marriage (now divorced).
I don’t understand why so many guys are hooked on the planned aspect. Honestly as a woman I feel it makes me wanna have sex less. Idk why guys just don’t get these things.
Is the aspect of “yes take me here and now” more important to you than your wife being comfortable after having a sticky kid glued to her boobs all day?
While she’s in the shower, you can light some candles, put on some nice music. Make it nice, make it a well spent time.
I hate this type of task-oriented sex, I see many guys have the tendency to do this and it’s quite off-putting. Your mission is clear: to have unexpected sex, if it’s not unexpected then it’s not passionate. Well most women don’t work that way. Don’t take this the wrong way, it’s a piece of advice – why can’t sex be a bit planned? I’m not thinking put it in your Google cal, but just build the intimate connection with her instead of chasing a porn dream of sex anywhere and anytime man.
Sounds like a lack of emotional intimacy.
By the way, those kind of „moves“ to initiate sex can feel very pushy and pressuring and usually make things worse.
Ok but maybe she just doesn’t want sex after being with the kid and prefers resting. What you see as spontaneous, she could see as pressure. Also let’s be honest your sexual needs is the leastof her worries. She has other important priorities. Also, it takes a lot of time for a pregnant woman to fully recover physically. (i believe it’s 18 months). She could still very well be recovering
Also, 1-year-old babies are extremely clingy and demand a lot of attention. It often leaves parents exhausted to meet their child’s needs
A lot of pregnant woman also often feel gross… Mainly bc of the sweat, puke, and diapers they have to change.
Basically, I would suggest to be less pushy and maybe communicate on the matter
I am not a mom but my sister is a mom to 4. She also has ADHD and she gets overstimulated. When you have a child that constantly needs to be held, fed, cleaned, and all the gross that comes with that, and as they get older they get into exploring their world and bring more messy gross dirty things and they always want to show you or touch you and cuddle you…. At the end of the day, she is so sick of physical touch and even talking. It was to the point where she and her husband would lay in bed and text each other about their day. It took her a very long time to even realize that is what was happening and why. She always thought it was something external that was causing it, but it’s really not.
My guess is that it’s not you or even your wife. It could just be sensory overload. And this can happen no matter if they’re are SAHM or full time working. Hormones and mental health are strictly things.
Oooook she’s a stay at home mom and at home all day alone with the baby/toddler? How often does she get out? Even on the weekend? A sitter once or twice a week? Parent watching your daughter? Date nights?
How frequently do you shower? She might be trying to hint that you don’t shower enough. Also, have you tried just talking to her about this?
No kids here, but I prefer to be freshly showered if I’m going to be intimate with my boyfriend. It’s purely about cleanliness and wanting to smell my best. Your wife could be the same, especially if she doesn’t get to shower when/as often as she likes due to taking care of the baby.
So your wife spends 24 hours a day caring for a newborn. She is ***exhausted***.
Stop pestering her for sex. Declare it off the table for a long stretch of time. A month, six weeks, longer, whatever. And radically re-do your domestic arrangements. It is not acceptable for you to never see your own child. It is not acceptable for her to work 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, while you work far shorter hours than that. The two of you are a team, and you need to be working together to share the work of caring for one house and one child.
Also: you two have been together for two years and have a ~~new baby~~, 1-year-old, which means that she got pregnant 3 months after you started dating.
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~~less than 6 months after you started dating. Probably 3 months.~~
You have never actually had a dating relationship. Not really. You are now trying to survive on a terribly flimsy foundation that you didn’t have time to build. That, plus your current workload, is ripe for unhappiness. You can’t go back and fix that now, but you need to accept that it is going to be hard for a while. That’s why we don’t have kids with, or marry, people who’ve known for such a short time.
Then take more showers. There is nothing wrong with her wanting this.
From your edits: sounds like shes over worked, tired, but trying her best. Ask her what she needs?
i’m so sorry but i would have a hard time getting off if i felt dirty. does she ever get a chance to shower during the day?
Soooo here’s the thing, I’m the same way. Sometimes, I just ask my hubby to just simply wash his penis (when we’re short on time).
We used to have sex without him showering all day until one day I got one bad ass infection, the itchiness was eating my vagina… it was brutal. My gyno said it was most likely lack of hygiene before sex (sweat and urine accumulated in penis going into my vagina). Even if it’s 12hrs since the last time he showered, all of that accumulates.
Ever since then, I don’t let it in any part of my body without being freshly cleaned.
ETA: I also have to shower before sex and then again after or it gets itchy, very itchy.
Also, motherhood (post-birth) messes up with our hormones and libido. After I had my son, my libido was non-existent for years. When my husband found out, he was very patient thou, mainly because he saw me trying to get my libido back (doctors, sex therapy, toys, you name it) but it got so bad that even giving him oral would make me very, very nauseous.
The first couple years I went with “fake it till you make”, but one day I decided to be honest and told him that the last couple years I’ve been faking every single orgasm and I couldn’t do it anymore, I didn’t have it in me to fake it anymore so I needed to start looking for professional help. He first was shocked (obviously), but then was very understanding and supportive.
Have you talked to her about that? Maybe that’s one of her problems?
Dude, she had a baby a year ago. Her body is different now, but she’s also stressed. It sounds to me like either a) she has some birth trauma and it is impacting how she views herself or b) she can only relax enough to want to be intimate after a shower
Either way. Talk to her. You two are still new parents, and tbh, you’ve barely been together without parenting either being on the horizon, or being a parent. You just need to talk to her.
I make my bf do this for me because I get UTIs and Yeast Infections a lot but he is a night showerer anyways so it works out. Not sure why this is an issue for you?? A little soapy foreplay in the shower then rushing out of the shower to have sex? It’s great ..
Honestly sometimes lack of support with household choirs and never going out on special dates can have a lot to do with not feeling romantic and sensual. When was the last time the two of you had an interesting conversation and did something fun?
People are allowed to care about hygiene.
I scrolled down expecting to see this closer to the top. For any woman who has gotten a UTI, making sure there isn’t a bunch more bacteria getting smeared around is 100% non negotiable. Most guys wash their hands after they pee, but not before, so therefore cleanliness is questionable if they haven’t showered first, or at least thoroughly washed hands and important bits. For both parties!
The shower can also serve as a transition from mommy to wife roll. Lean in you fool.
Perhaps it could help if you shower with your partner, and then use that time to get intimate? It can make things much more romantic if you also spice things up by trying new things, such as spending a night out at a hotel or trying in different environments.
First, you should discuss this with her. Second, maybe her sense of smell heightened with pregnancy. Certain things that changed during my pregnancy that most people said would probably change back did not. One was my sense of smell. My sister now uses me as her personal bloodhound if she “thinks she smells something.” Yay me.
I can definitely see how she might feel smelly or dirty after a long day of childcare plus still being close to post partum.