THE SEX QUESTION - My husband laments the frequency of our sexual relations, is he right?

How many times a month should couples who have been formed for a long time have sex?

In the program "Sans Rendez-vous", the sexologist and psychoanalyst Catherine Blanc answers Julie, a listener from Europe 1, and looks at this thorny question of the frequency of sexual relations among those who met there is several decades, and for whom the sexual desire has consumed a little.

Julie's question

"I'm 55 and married for 30 years. My husband complains that we don't have sex anymore. I think we do it once or twice a month. Is he right? "

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Catherine Blanc's response

"Before knowing if it's normal to have less libido, let's agree on the observation: do they make love or not? One says that they no longer do it, the other that they do it twice a month anyway.We are not talking about the number of times we make love, but we are talking about the feeling of frustration that is not shared by both of them in an equivalent way.

There is one who really has the feeling of making love, certainly less than other couples, when the other really has the feeling that it is total collapse and that there is no more sexuality. between them.

These two times are not enough to remind her that it's great that there is an erotic life and a sharing of emotions.

This may be because there are not the emotions or pleasures he would like to find there.

He wants to draw attention to a major frustration which is therefore in this sexual union, but which can be beyond sexuality, in their relations with each other.

Isn't it the quality of these reports that matters?

Exactly.

Twice a month is great.

After, indeed, one can find great to do it every day as it can be a hell to do it daily.

It is of course the quality that is interesting.

We don't care what we do if we don't have fun, taste, if we don't enhance the beauty of a relationship.

In this case, doing it every day is hell.

Is anyone "right" here?

I believe there is a communication problem. It's like she doesn't feel legitimate to argue that she only welcomes her twice a month, but puts her whole heart into it.

There are two people who make 'too much love' because they make love twice a month without speaking to each other, without communicating, without seeing the same story.

It is as if they are undergoing this relationship. 

Does libido weaken with age?

There is, in part, a misconception.

As long as we are alive, we are driven by desire in general and sexual desire in particular.

Sexuality is always an impetus that allows us to manifest our state of living, even if we can no longer make babies.

There is something alive that is always animated in us.

We think about sexuality, we dream about sexuality and, more or less easily, we act sexuality.

But all the time of our life, we don't have the same libido because we go through things that can sometimes put a stick in the wheels, like worry, fatigue, worry.

When you are very young, there is a major impetus which is the impulse to take one's place in a world of adults, in a world where one exists in particular through this sexual presence.

There are lots of things that are evolving.

There are, however, 'times' that must be recognized.

Aside from poor health, this is pretty constant in men.

In women, even though they are in very good health, the time of menopause is a complicated time that shakes things up a lot.

This doesn't mean that they're no longer sexually active, but there are a lot of things that need to be taken care of to keep the momentum going.

For example, the lubrication must always be there.

Nature, if we let her do it, still makes it a little less easy for women from that point on. "