If you’re a very physically affectionate person, it might feel like more is better when it comes to touching your partner.
But speaking to The Guardian, Natasha Silverman, a sex and relationships therapist for Relate, said that an imbalance in desire can create a rift in your bedroom ― whether it’s for cuddling or dancing the horizontal tango.
While the “right” amount of cuddling is “completely subjective,” Silverman says, “The way we initiate affection is often replicated in the way we initiate sex.”
That includes cuddling and can be reflected in your sex life when one person “smothers” another with physical affection.
Silverman explained that just as one person desires cuddling more, the person who’s less affectionate often pulls further away ― also known as the intimacy-desire paradox, which shows up in some people’s sex life too.
“They end up on this merry-go-round of one person pulling back to try to widen the distance and the other trying to shrink the distance,” she shared.
Psychotherapist and writer Esther Perel says in her book Mating In Captivity: “It is too easily assumed that problems with sex are the result of a lack of closeness.”
“But… perhaps the way we construct closeness reduces the sense of freedom and autonomy needed for sexual pleasure. When intimacy collapses into fusion, it is not a lack of closeness but too much closeness that impedes desire,” she continues.
Maybe, as Silverman advises, you might want to back off a reluctant cuddler in order to kick your intimacy and possibly even sex life back into gear.
She advises us to ask “Is this OK? Do you like this?” when we cuddle them.
Silverman says that while the approach-retreat dynamic between couples can be “unhealthy” and “emotionally damaging for the person who needs more connection,” she adds that if you’ve noticed a similar pattern, “there’s nothing wrong, you’re not broken and the relationship is probably OK – you’re going through a very normal process.”
It’s common for couples to fall into a family-like dynamic that makes the idea of sex unappealing, she adds.
However, if you’re feeling literally and figuratively out of touch with your partner most or all of the time, going to couples or sex therapy or even discussing whether you two work together may be worthwhile.
