Has anyone successfully reversed a passionless marriage? How did you do it?

Seeking Advice

I (M43) and my wife (F46) have been married for 10 years, we have 2 kids between 5-10.

Over the last several years we've started living in parallel and more as roommates. My wife's energy is low and has virtually no libido. She's on anti-depression meds which definitely doesn't help but she's always had a baseline of low libido and never has initiated sex.

Her description of it is essentially responsive desire, she doesn't ever suddenly want sex, though she enjoys it once she gets going. In the last while we have had improvements in quantity - but it's all scheduled, not spontaneous - usually on a lunch hour when we're both WFH. Despite going from 1x a month maybe to now about 2x there's just no passion from her. Sex is fine, but I still physically initiate everything and I do the 'work' to get us both to the finish line. If I want something I have to ask for it and it just doesn't feel great - more like I'm taking what I want vs mutually giving and receiving.

I've gone to counseling recently to work on how to better communicate my needs and see if she can/will meet me in the middle. It feels like the more I look at our history and who we are now that we are fundamentally mismatched in this area, which seems unsolvable in any natural and lasting way.

Has anyone else in this situation successfully reversed a passionless or low libido sex life? What did you do?

Posted Jun 29, 2026, 11:29 PM UTC

38
Loading comments…