Sex After Kids: What to Pay Attention to When Your Sex Life Changes

By Amy Moran, LCPC, CST, PMH-C and Owner of Spark Chicago Therapy

Having a baby changes your sex life.

Groundbreaking, I know.

But while most people expect sex to change immediately after birth, we tend to be much less prepared for the fact that sex after kids can stay different for quite a while. Sometimes years after the baby is no longer actually a baby.

And different does not necessarily mean worse.

As a Chicago Sex Therapist specializing in perinatal mental health, I spend a lot of time helping individuals and couples figure out whether something is actually wrong with their sex life…or whether their sex life is responding pretty reasonably to the fact that their bodies, relationships, identities, and entire daily lives have changed.

So before you diagnose yourself with a “low libido,” decide your partner is no longer attracted to you, or panic that you've officially become roommates, here are a few things worth paying attention to.

Are You Tired—or Do You Actually Not Want Sex?

Sleep deprivation is not exactly an aphrodisiac.

Neither is working all day, making dinner, packing lunches, cleaning bottles, finding the missing stuffed animal, responding to seventeen questions about Bluey, and realizing at 9:14pm that tomorrow is apparently Pajama Day.

Sometimes “I don't want sex” actually means “I do not want one more person to need something from my body today.”

Those are different things.

Before focusing exclusively on desire, zoom out. Are you getting enough sleep? Do you have any time when you're not responsible for another human? Do you ever get to be alone? Does your body feel like it belongs to you?

Sexual desire doesn't exist in a vacuum. Pay attention to the environment you're asking it to survive in.

Are You Touched Out?

Especially for the parent doing more physical caregiving, your body can feel like public property by the end of the day.

Someone has been climbing on you, nursing, grabbing your shirt, asking to be held, sitting on your lap, wiping something mysterious onto your pants and possibly following you into the bathroom.

Then your partner reaches over and touches your butt.

NO THANK YOU.

Being touched out doesn't necessarily mean you don't want sexual touch. It may mean your nervous system needs a break from being available before touch can feel pleasurable again.

Try creating some space between caregiving touch and sexual touch. Take a shower alone. Go for a walk. Lie in bed without anyone touching you. Give your body a chance to become yours again before asking it to become relational.

How Are You Feeling About Your Partner?

This one matters. A lot.

Sometimes we talk about postpartum sexual desire as though it's entirely hormonal or physical. But resentment is remarkably effective birth control.

Who gets up with the baby? Who knows when the diapers are running low? Who schedules the pediatrician? Who remembers that daycare needs extra clothes? Who notices that you're almost out of milk?

And perhaps most importantly: who is responsible for noticing all of those things?

If one person is carrying significantly more of the mental, emotional, or physical labor of parenting, that dynamic often follows you into the bedroom.

It's hard to experience someone as an erotic partner when you also experience them as another person you have to manage.

This is also why conversations about sex after kids often become conversations about the relationship itself. At Spark Chicago Therapy, we frequently see sexual disconnection as one piece of a larger adjustment to parenthood—not necessarily evidence that attraction or love has disappeared.

If your sex life has changed, look at the relationship outside of sex too.

Does Sex Actually Feel Good?

Please don't skip this one.

Bodies change during pregnancy, birth, and postpartum. Hormonal changes, breastfeeding, scar tissue, pelvic-floor changes, vaginal dryness, and birth injuries can all change the way sexual activity feels.

Pain is not something you need to push through because you've been “cleared” for sex.

And being medically cleared at six weeks postpartum does not mean your body is ready—or that you are ready.

If penetration hurts, something feels different, or you're avoiding sex because you're anticipating discomfort, talk to a knowledgeable medical provider and consider seeing a pelvic-floor physical therapist. Working with a Chicago sex therapist can also be helpful, particularly when pain has started creating anxiety, avoidance, pressure, or tension between partners.

Sex is supposed to be something your body gets something from, not something it tolerates.

Are You Waiting to Feel Like Your Old Sexual Self?

You may be waiting awhile.

Parenthood changes identity. Pregnancy and birth can change your relationship with your body. Your breasts may have a completely different job now. Privacy may be laughable. Spontaneity may require three weeks' notice and a babysitter.

Trying to recreate your pre-kid sex life exactly as it was can sometimes make you miss the opportunity to discover what your sex life could look like now.

Maybe you need more time. More privacy. Different kinds of touch. More direct communication. More lube. Less penetration. A locked door. Sex at 2pm instead of 10pm. A hotel room. A vibrator. Twenty minutes instead of an entire production.

Get curious instead of grading yourself against your old sex life.

Is Sex Becoming an Obligation?

This is perhaps the biggest thing I want couples to pay attention to.

When sex becomes something one partner feels responsible for providing in order to keep the other partner happy, prevent conflict, or prove that the relationship is okay, desire usually doesn't flourish.

Pressure is remarkably good at killing the very thing it's trying to create.

You don't need to force yourself to have sex to “get back on track.” In fact, repeatedly having sex you don't really want can make your body increasingly resistant to sexual contact.

Instead, start smaller.

Touch without an expectation that it leads anywhere. Make out. Cuddle. Give each other massages. Flirt. Masturbate. Talk about sex. Talk about what you miss. Talk about what feels different. Talk about what you might actually want now.

Sex After Kids Doesn't Have to Look Like Sex Before Kids

The goal isn't to return to some imaginary version of “normal.”

It's to build a sexual relationship that works for the people—and the bodies—you are now.

If you're struggling to figure out whether the changes you're experiencing are physical, relational, sexual, or some combination of all three, sex therapy or couples therapy can help you sort through it without treating desire discrepancy as evidence that your relationship is broken.

And if you've found yourself Googling things like “best Chicago sex therapist,” “Chicago couples therapy,” or “is it normal to not want sex after kids?” at midnight while the rest of your house is finally asleep: yes, these are incredibly common concerns.

Sex after kids may look different.

Different can still be really, really good.