Remember back at the beginning of your relationship when things were hot and heavy? When you couldn’t wait to rip off each other’s clothes and get it on?
But then gradually something happens. The love taps stop flowing and start barely trickling. Real life takes over with its endless responsibilities.
Instead of doing each other, you are doing the dishes and neverending loads of laundry.
Or at least, ONE of you is.
Nights of passion turn into nights of desperately seeking some zzzs. Midnight booty-calls turn into midnight baby-calls. The “bump and grind” becomes the “bump and no grind courtesy of the daily grind.”
Because by the end of the day? You are touched out, tapped out, burnt out. And your sex life goes from sizzle to fizzle.
For one psychologist it is at this point that she hears from her female clients, “my husband wants more sex but I don’t.” And it has a lot more to do with what’s happening outside the bedroom than what’s happening between the sheets.
So husbands, listen up, this one’s for you.
Psychologist Dr. Lisa Vallejos took to Twitter with a PSA for all the husbands out there looking for more sex: if you want to do it more, DO MORE.
She starts her thread by saying:
Husbands, your friendly neighborhood psychologist checking in with some much needed advice—- I talk to your wives every day. They are tired. A thread:
Every single wife I work with comes in with some variation of the same complaint. He wants more sex, she doesn’t. When we dig in, it never fails that she is holding 80-90% of the household responsibilities.
Responsibilities which include: working, taking care of the kids, cooking, cleaning, teaching, meal planning, grocery shopping, scheduling appointments, picking up prescriptions, taking care of pets, and paying the bills…
It’s no wonder women are EXHAUSTED. (And yes, husbands do shit too, and some husbands do carry their fair share of the load, but typically the majority of household labor falls on the wife.)
We are the ones who carry the brunt of the physical, mental, and emotional load of our homes and families and we are drowning under the weight of it.
And what we want, what we really really want? It isn’t sex, baby, It’s HELP. Which leads to sex, so, you know, WIN-WIN.
Vallejos goes on to say that in all of the cases the wives report that their husbands have said, “If you tell me what needs to be done, I’ll do it”. Which, granted, on the surface seems helpful, but it’s not. Because it just adds one more thing to her already overflowing list of all.the.things.
So then she has spent all this time asking for help, not getting it & then finally does it herself.
By the time these women come to me, they’ve already been doing this for years.
They are so fed up that their question isn’t how to make it work, it’s whether or not to stay.
— lisa xochitl vallejos, ph.d (@realdocv) May 27, 2021
Women don’t want to have to repeatedly tell their husbands what needs to be done. We want them to SEE what needs to be done and just DO IT. We want them to be PARTNERS, not man-children.
We want you to apply the same critical thinking you do to other areas of your life to the home. We want you to see the needs, just like we do, and take care of it.
We don’t want to have to ask you to do chores—that’s what we do with our kids. We want you to be a partner.
— lisa xochitl vallejos, ph.d (@realdocv) May 27, 2021
And partners have benefits. Like, really GOOD benefits. There is a direct correlation between chores and sex. The more chores you do, the more sex you’ll get.
Choreplay is the new foreplay.
There is a direct relationship between household labor & interest in sex. If wives are burned out, they are not turned on.
You want sex, she needs help. The two are related. I’m not suggesting you do chores to get sex, but I am saying if you do more, you will get more.
And Vallejos is 100% right.
Recent studies back up her claims. One study out of Cornell University and published in the Journal of Marriage and Family found that couples who share the housework fairly reported “having sex significantly more often than couples where the woman (or the man) did 65 percent or more of the housework.”
The study’s lead author, Sharon Sassler stated:
“The evidence shows that when men do a greater share of housework, women’s perceptions of relationship fairness and satisfaction are greater. Sharing housework is now perceived as a sexual turn-on.”
Additionally, another study published by the Journal of Family Psychology came up with the same conclusion.
“Compared with men who reported making an unfair contribution to household chores, those who perceived a fair contribution to household chores engaged in more frequent sex with their partner, and both partners reported their sex being more satisfying.”
More sex AND more satisfying? Pass the mop.
However, women don’t need studies to prove what we already know: Men, if you want more sex, it starts in the kitchen. Or the bathroom, that’s good too.
Vallejos ends her Twitter thread with the following words of wisdom:
“Your wives are on the edge y’all and you may not even know it. If this thread sounds familiar, do something quick because I promise you she’s already thinking about life without you.”
It’s not just about the sex or the laundry. It’s about being partners, stepping up, and taking on your fair share of the load. It’s about mutual respect and admiration. It’s about navigating this crazy life together, as a team. As equals.
And you can start by doing the damn dishes.