Dec. 8, 2024, 4:42 p.m.

How to want sex more

Sub Missives

Ever find yourself avoiding something, and you’re not really sure why? Yeah, that’s me with sex sometimes.

After all these years of writing and thinking about sex – and about my own sex life and sexuality, specifically – you would think I’d have enough self-awareness that this wouldn’t happen anymore. But once in a while, I do realize, all of a sudden, that I’ve been avoiding sex or masturbation lately – and that I haven’t even given any conscious thought to why.

Sometimes it’s because I’ve been struggling through a chronic illness flare-up or a stressful life situation. Sometimes I just haven’t been in the mood. All of those are valid reasons to avoid sex (and, as a reminder, you don’t even need a reason to avoid sex – “no” is a complete sentence, and all that!).

But sometimes, if I dig a little deeper, I’ll find that there is a specific thing which has been draining my sexual desire. And often, that specific thing is entirely fixable, now that I’ve identified what it actually is.

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