"Should I Stay or Should I go?": How to Grieve the Relationship You Will Never Get

How many of us have the partnership or marriage we imagined when we daydreamed about our adult life as teenagers or as young adults? ... Hmmm... none of us, yup, right. (And if you said, "Yes, this is the marriage/relationship I always dreamed I would have," good for you! Your experience is not the norm, and I hope you cherish it.)

Basically, if you don't feel like windblown, blissful Nicholas Cage in the gif below, when you think about your relationship, you are a normal human being. So let's dive deep into why you're normal, why you have to grieve to get more of what you want, and how to move through this process to the other side of real, knowledgable love.

Today we're going to talk about how grief and long term relationships often go hand in hand. Interestingly, participation in this grieving process we call 'Relational Reckoning' in Relational Life Therapy, can free us from the falsehood that the perfect relationship will rescue us from disappointment, hurt, anxiety, stress, etc.

Relational reckoning is the quiet, often painful process of grieving the relationship you thought you would have and facing the reality of the one you really have. It is a slow, layered and intentional process, and it's not fun.

For many people, this process of relational grief begins after a rupture. Sometimes it follows betrayal. Sometimes it grows slowly after years of unmet needs. Or it emerges post immense loss, where both partners are changed in unexpected ways.

You may find yourself asking:

"Is this the relationship I hoped for? Can this become something different? Am I staying out of love or out of fear? How do I know whether to hold on or let go?"

What Is Relational Reckoning?

Relational reckoning is the process of coming to terms with the gap between the relationship you imagined and the one you are living in. It's learning to let go of the imaginary ideal partner you truly deserve (prince charming or princess charming) and recognizing and appreciating the partner you have in front of you, while you grieve that relationship that never was and never will be.

Most of us give up something in order to stay in a long term relationship, whether that be hobbies, certain relationships, unlimited freedom, lifestyle choices, etc. And that needs to be honored by grieving, truly feeling the loss and allowing yourself to move forward fully rooted in your decision to stay, despite what you will never get.

Most of us enter relationships with an internal blueprint. That blueprint is shaped by attachment history, family patterns, cultural messages, and personal longing. We imagine safety. Emotional attunement. Partnership. Endless Fun. Incredible awe-inspiring sex. Ridiculous gestures of romance. Shared growth.

When reality does not match that vision, grief surfaces.

This grief is often invisible, and is connected to disenfranchised grief. No one died. Nothing dramatic may have happened. Yet something important feels unobtainable, lost, even stolen from us.

We have to hold our unfulfilled desires with open hands, so we can recognize when we do get more of what we want in relationships. Grieve so you can get.

You may be mourning:

• The version of your partner you believed you married

• The ease you thought you would have in your life once you met 'The One'

• The emotional security you assumed would grow naturally

• That relationships are never 100% safe

• The feeling of being on the 'same page' as your partner and recognizing you may see things (politics, religion, child rearing practices, intimacy, etc.) very differently

• The fact that you may have to ask for what you need and want again and again

• What you haven't gotten in the past

• The imperfectness of repair

• The shared future you pictured

• The reality that repair cannot go back and change what has already happened

This process invites you to face that grief directly instead of minimizing it.

Grieving the Relationship You Thought You Deserved

There is a particular kind of sorrow that comes from realizing you may not receive the kind of love you longed for. This can activate attachment wounds from your past, both in childhood and previous romantic relationships.

If you have a history of emotional inconsistency, neglect, or abandonment, relational disappointment can feel familiar, painful and deeply personal. When you experience this letdown in love, you may initially behave in ways that get you even less of what you want.

While grappling with this grief, you might notice:

• Heightened sensitivity to rejection

• A strong urge to protest or pursue

• Emotional shutdown to protect yourself

• Thoughts like “Maybe I am too much” or “Maybe this is all I get”

  
  

Grieving the relationship you thought you deserved is honest and hard work. You will never get a perfect love story, and your partner cannot rescue the younger versions of you from the trials of your past. Grief acknowledges that love alone does not automatically create safety or mutual growth. It also allows you to separate fantasy from reality. That clarity allows you to 'choose' your partnership, with eyes wide open.

Cherishing the Relationship You Do Have

Relational reckoning is not only about loss, but also it is a discernment model. Sometimes, when we step back from the imagined relationship, we can see the real one more clearly.

Ask yourself:

• What is actually present here?

• Where do we show up well for each other?

• Can my partner and I take accountability 70-80% of the time when we mess up?

• Do we have fun together? Do we 'see' each other and still like each other at our core?

• Are there moments of genuine connection?

• Is there willingness to grow?

  
  

Cherishing the relationship you do have does not mean ignoring what hurts. It means seeing the full picture. Many couples get stuck because they are fighting the reality of their differences instead of learning how to work with them.

In attachment-focused couples therapy, like Relational Life Therapy, we often explore the idea that conflict is not the enemy. Conflict is a signal that you both are in it, for better or worse. It's how we do conflict that often needs refining. You cannot yell and scream and curse and get more connection. It's just not how it works. And you can't shut down and wall off, and get more peace and quiet and calme. It's just not how it works.

A partner who struggles with vulnerability may not lack love. They may, however, lack skills. A partner who protests loudly may not be controlling. They may be afraid of losing connection.

Relational reckoning asks: Is this a relationship that can expand? Or one that is unable to meet enough of what I need and want to justify the work I must do to let go of the things I cannot and never will get from my partnership?

How to Know If It Is Time to Repair

Not every relationship needs to end. Many need repair, which is the practice of meeting your partner's emotional hurt with humility and an eagerness to reconnect and soothe.

Here's an example for my tactile learners: When you forget to pick up the dry cleaning or call the lawn guy and your partner snaps at you, "Why can't you just be more responsible?," a repair might sound like, "I am sorry I forgot this, and I want to understand your frustration about it. Tell me more... Is there anything I can do right now to repair with you?"

Can you guess what repair doesn't sound like? Same scenario as above, but instead you snap back, "Well, fuck me, I guess. I'm such an irresponsible jerk, but you also are a mean, nagging shrew." Whew. That response may feel 'good' in the moment but it won't get you more of what you want: closeness, peace, happiness and connection.

You might consider working toward repair if:

• Both partners are willing to reflect and take responsibility

• There is emotional safety, even if it is inconsistent

• Harm is acknowledged and not minimized

• There is effort toward change, not just promises (and yes, 15% effort counts here!)

• You still feel moments of warmth, delight or care

Repair requires mutual engagement. It cannot be carried by one partner alone.

It also requires grieving the fantasy relationship. You cannot rebuild honestly while clinging to what you wish your partner would become.

Sometimes repair means redefining expectations, or renegotiating the contract you started with. Sometimes it means building new patterns of communication. Sometimes it means learning how to co-regulate, or contain yourself (yes, you must learn both protective and containing boundaries!), during conflict.

How to Know If It May Be Time to Let Go

Letting go is one of the hardest decisions in relational reckoning. Ending a relationship is not simply losing a partner. It is losing routines, shared history, and imagined futures.

You might consider whether letting go is necessary if:

• There is ongoing emotional or physical harm (if physical harm is present, I always recommend physical separation, with the help of domestic violence experts, before you make your decision to stay or to go)

• Your needs are consistently dismissed or mocked

• There is no accountability for repeated ruptures

• You aren't getting enough of what you want and need to make the grieving you'll have to do worth it

• You feel chronically unsafe being yourself

• Growth is lopsided

For individuals with attachment wounds, this decision can feel terrifying. Old fears of abandonment or unworthiness may surface. It can be difficult to separate current reality from past trauma. This is why relational reckoning benefits from therapeutic or emotional support.

A therapist can help you distinguish between:

• Trauma activation

• Fear of being alone

• Grief over the real letdowns in real partnerships

• Real relational incompatibility

• Situations that are truly unsafe

You don't have to make a decision in the dark of the night, alone. No decision made in the middle of a crisis was the best, most well-thought out one.

The Role of Attachment in Relational Reckoning

Attachment shapes how we respond to disappointment.

If you lean anxious, you may hold on tightly, hoping things will change. If you trend towards avoidance, you may detach quickly to avoid vulnerability and risk. If you carry unmitigated relational trauma, conflict can feel overwhelming, or you may spark arguments as it feels familiar and 'predictable' because you grew up with it. Your child parts are often running the show, and they can't run an adult relationship effectively, no matter how hard they may try.

What worked in childhood won't work today. It will protect you, at any cost, and at the end of it all, if you don't get your child parts under control, you will lose the very thing you said you wanted: a true, lasting love story.

Relational reckoning asks you to pause before reacting.

It invites questions like:

• Am I responding to this relationship right now, or to an older wound?

• What am I truly needing right now?

• Can this need be met here?

  
  

This kind of self-inquiry moves you from reactivity to agency and empowerment.

You Are Allowed to Want More

One of the most painful parts of relational reckoning is admitting that something is not enough. Many people minimize their dissatisfaction because their partner is “not that bad.” There may be no obvious crisis. No dramatic betrayal. No moment where you look out and realize you have to go Eat. Pray. Love. (and divorce your spouse, so you can chase your codependency with someone else, but I digress).

Just a quiet ache of unfulfilled desires, unrealized dreams, and unrecognized hopes.

You are allowed to want emotional presence. You are allowed to want depth. You are allowed to want partnership that feels mutual. And you can let go of the relationship with love and peace, especially when you've moved through the relational reckoning process with intentionality.

As Terry Real says, "I'm not in the business of making people stay together. I'm in the business of ending misery." This misery can shift with couples therapy, if you both want it. This misery can also end if you decide to let go. Neither choice is perfect, and neither choice guarantees complete happiness, or that you won't repeat similar patterns in a new partnership down the line.

Holding Both Grief and Gratitude

In many relationships, this process of grief isn't all or nothing, nor is it a one and done moment.

You may feel deep appreciation for certain qualities in your partner. You may also feel profound sadness about what is missing. Both can exist. Love can't pay the bills and it can't erase grief, but it can allow for growth towards a real knowing of you and the person you've chosen. Relational reckoning allows you to sit in that complexity without rushing toward immediate decisions. Sometimes the clarity you are seeking emerges slowly, as you watch patterns over time.

When to Seek Support

If you are navigating relational reckoning, you do not have to do it alone.

Couples therapy can help partners understand their attachment patterns and create safer (and more effective) ways to communicate. Individual therapy can help you explore your complex emotions, clarify your needs, and strengthen self-trust. Outside support can prevent old patterns from driving new decisions, especially if you carry attachment wounds or past relational trauma.

A Gentle Invitation

If you are in Edmond, Oklahoma or Vermont and navigating relational reckoning, whether after loss, betrayal, or years of quiet disappointment, therapy can offer a steady space to sort through what feels tangled.

Together, we can explore what you are grieving, what you are cherishing, and what your next step might be. You do not have to rush this decision, nor do you have to carry the weight of it alone. I'm here if you'd like to schedule a consultation to talk further about this.

Take Exquisite Care of Yourselves,

Megan

The Fear of Forgetting After Child Loss: Why Continuing Bonds in Grief Matter

The fear of forgetting after child loss is one of the quietest and most painful parts of grief. Many parents carry a persistent worry that, as time passes, memories will fade. You may wonder what will happen to the sound of your child’s voice, the way they laughed, or the small details only you remember. You may even fear that moments of joy mean you are leaving them behind.

This fear is not a sign that you are grieving incorrectly. It is a reflection of attachment. When you lose a child, the bond does not disappear. What changes is the form that connection takes.

Understanding continuing bonds in grief can ease the belief that remembering and living cannot coexist.

Why the Fear of Forgetting After Child Loss Is So Strong

Parents are biologically wired for connection. From pregnancy or adoption onward, your nervous system organizes around protecting, soothing, and responding to your child. Their needs become part of your rhythm. Their presence shapes your identity.

When a child dies, that attachment system does not simply turn off.

The fear of forgetting after child loss often emerges because the physical reminders are no longer there. You cannot hear their footsteps in the hallway. You cannot reach for them in the same way. Without daily physical reminders, it can feel as though memory is all you have left.

Parents often tell me:

• “What if I forget the way they smelled?”

• “What if their face becomes blurry in my mind?”

• "I can't remember the sound of their voice, and it's making me feel like a bad mother/father."

• “If I start living and having fun again, does that mean I’m moving on?”

• “If other people stop talking about them, will they no longer be remembered?"

  
  

These fears are deeply human, and reflect the deep love between parent and child.

The mind understands death. The attachment system within still longs for closeness.

Attachment Does Not End With Death

In attachment-informed grief work, I see the internal bonds with your child as everlasting, not just external and ending with death. Your child is not only someone you interacted with physically. They are intricately woven into your story, your body, and your sense of self.

Continuing bonds in grief refers to the ongoing inner relationship you maintain with someone who has died. Earlier models of grief suggested that “healthy” mourning required detachment or closure. We now understand that for many grieving parents, detachment is neither realistic nor necessary.

The goal of grief is not to erase attachment. It is to reshape it.

This is not a denial of reality, but an integration of what is true both then and now: that you deeply love your child and want to remain close to them, even if you aren't in the same time and space any longer.

Continuing Bonds and Growing Around Grief: Two Models That Change the Conversation

Two models help reframe this fear. The anxiety of forgetting one's child often softens when parents understand that connection can shift rather than disappear. You may no longer have physical closeness, but you can have internal closeness. You may no longer have shared experiences in the present, but you can carry shared meaning forward.

The Continuing Bonds model affirms that connection does not end with death. Parents may talk to their child internally, honor anniversaries, keep meaningful objects nearby, or carry their presence quietly throughout the day. This is not refusal to accept reality. It is an ongoing expression of love.

Dr. Lois Tonkin’s Growing Around Grief model adds another layer. Grief does not shrink over time. The pain of losing your child remains the same size. What expands is your life around it.

In the beginning, grief fills almost everything. Over time, new experiences and capacities develop alongside it. The loss remains. The love remains. But your world becomes larger.

Together, these models remind us:

You do not have to keep your grief acute to stay connected.

You do not have to let go of your child to live again.

Your grief can remain sacred without remaining all-consuming.

What Continuing Bonds in After Child Loss Really Means

Continuing bonds in grief does not mean staying stuck. It means allowing love to remain part of your life.

For some parents, this may look like:

• Speaking their child’s name

• Keeping meaningful objects visible

• Writing letters or journaling

• Honoring birthdays and anniversaries

• Talking to them during difficult moments

For others, it is quieter. A private ritual. A thought before bed.

There is no single correct way to maintain connection. The question is not whether you are holding on. It is whether the bond feels life-giving or immobilizing. If remembering brings warmth alongside pain, that is often healthy. If it feels fused with guilt or self-punishment, additional support may help.

Letting Go of the Future While Holding On to the Love

One of the most difficult aspects of child loss is not only losing who your child was, but who they were becoming.

Many grieving parents find that the fear of forgetting after child loss is intertwined with grief for the imagined future. You may grieve:

• The milestones you will not witness (going to school for the first time, getting their driver's license, going to prom, getting married, having children of their own, etc.)

• The relationship you expected to have as they grew

• The role you anticipated playing in their adult life

Letting go in grief often means releasing the future you envisioned, not releasing your memory of your child.

This distinction matters.

You are not being asked to stop loving. You are being asked to adapt to a reality you did not choose.

Holding on and letting go can exist at the same time.

When the Fear of Forgetting Feels Overwhelming

For some parents, the fear of forgetting after child loss can become consuming. You may find yourself replaying memories repeatedly to keep them vivid. You may avoid new experiences because they feel like betrayal. You may feel panic when details seem harder to recall.

This response often reflects trauma layered onto grief. Sudden or traumatic losses can intensify the nervous system’s need to hold tightly to memory.

If the fear of forgetting begins to limit your ability to function or connect with others, it may be helpful to work with a therapist who understands grief and attachment. Together, you can explore ways to preserve memory while also creating space for your own ongoing life.

Remembering does not require freezing.

You May Forget Small Things. That Is Not the Same as Forgetting Your Child.

Over time, certain details may soften. The exact pitch of a laugh. The way their hair fell across their forehead. This can feel terrifying.

But forgetting small details is not the same as forgetting your child.

The relationship you had shaped you. It altered your nervous system. It changed how you see the world. And for many mothers, it even changed your body at the cellular level.

Research on fetal microchimerism shows that during pregnancy, fetal cells cross the placenta and can remain in a mother’s body for decades. Long after birth, and even after loss, some mothers continue to carry their child’s cells within their own tissue. You can read more about fetal microchimerism here.

Emerging research also suggests that pregnancy may influence a parent’s brain in lasting ways. Some studies have found that neurogenesis rapidly forms in the brains of fathers, post birth of their children, meaning that a child's introduction into the world is a powerful one that forever changes the neurons in a parent's brain. Death doesn't erase these brain changes. An accessible overview of this research can be found here.

For some grieving parents, this knowledge offers a quiet steadiness. The bond was never limited to just an emotional one. It was biological. Physical. Cellular. Even if memories shift over time, the attachment is not dependent on perfect recall. It is woven into your body, your identity, and your story.

Grief evolves. Memory softens. Love remains.

Your love does not depend on flawless memory. It has already changed you in ways that cannot be undone.

Support for Perinatal Trauma and Child Loss

If you are carrying perinatal trauma, including miscarriage, stillbirth, infant loss, traumatic birth, or complicated grief, you are not alone.

I am honored to be presenting at an upcoming virtual retreat focused on birth trauma healing. This retreat is designed specifically for Christian women navigating perinatal trauma and child loss, while offering clinically grounded, compassionate support that honors the complexity of your story.

I will be speaking on child loss, grief, and continuing bonds, including the fear of forgetting and how attachment shapes healing after loss.

You can learn more and register here:https://www.birthtraumastories.com/home/bts-virtual-retreat-signup-form

If this space feels aligned for you, I would be honored for you to join us.

A Gentle Invitation

And if you are a grieving parent in Edmond, Oklahoma, or throughout the states of Oklahoma and Vermont, struggling with the fear of forgetting after child loss, you do not have to carry that fear alone. Therapy with me can provide a steady space to speak your child’s name, explore continuing bonds in grief, and sort through the complicated mix of love, longing, anger, and sorrow. If you'd like to work together in this capacity, schedule a consultation here.

With me, there is no timeline you must follow. In my office, there is no expectation that you will “get over” this. Together, we can honor the bond you have while helping you live in a way that feels grounded and supported.

Your child’s memory does not depend on constant vigilance. It lives in you, in a full and thriving life, even after you've survived the unimaginable.

Take Exquisite Care of Yourselves,

Megan

Love, Sex, and Power: A Relational Look at What It Takes to Have a Bangin' Bedroom Life ;)

When we think about love, sex, and power in relationships, we often separate them into different categories. But in truth, they’re deeply interconnected. As a couples therapist trained in Relational Life Therapy (RLT), I see how intimacy isn’t just about what happens in bed; it’s shaped by how we show up for each other every day. And in the month of love, there’s no better time to unpack what really fuels connection.

What RLT Teaches Us About Love, Sex, and Power

Relational Life Therapy, developed by Terry Real, focuses on helping couples build authentic connection through mutual respect, accountability, and vulnerability. RLT names the dynamics of power directly—something many couples avoid but deeply feel.

In intimacy, power shows up in small ways:

• Who initiates affection or sex

• How each partner’s needs are responded to

• Whether emotional labor is shared

• How consent and desire are navigated

  
  

When one partner holds more power, emotional, financial, or sexual, it can quietly corrode connection. RLT invites us to name and rebalance these dynamics so that intimacy can thrive in safety.

Sex Starts Outside the Bedroom

Foreplay isn’t just physical. It’s relational. How you speak to each other while making dinner, who takes on the mental load, whether your partner feels seen and valued throughout the day, these are the precursors to physical connection.

Reframing sex through an RLT lens means asking:

• Do both partners feel emotionally safe?

• Are power imbalances being addressed, not avoided?

• Do we share the responsibilities of life actively and with constant renegotiation as to fit, scheduling, and energy levels of each person?

• Is affection freely given or based on performance?

• Is what I'm doing or saying giving me more of what I want? If not, am I willing to change how or what I say or do?

Sex becomes less about what happens in a single moment and more about the relational field built over time.

Common Conversations in the Therapy Room

These are some of the concerns that often come up when couples explore intimacy together:

“I don’t feel desired anymore.”

Often, this points to emotional disconnection rather than physical disinterest. When daily interactions lack warmth or respect, desire fades. Couples that engaged in a six second kiss daily reported increased oxytocin, the 'love hormone,' and a decrease in cortisol, the 'stress hormone.' (Gottman Institute)

“We’re not on the same page sexually.”

RLT encourages couples to look beneath the mismatch. Is there a dynamic around control, fear, or unspoken resentment? Sexual conflict is rarely just about frequency. Mismatched sex drives are also common. Libido is driven by many factors including amount of sleep, division of household labor, hormones, emotional connection, physical health issues, amount of exercise one gets, medication side effects, age, pregnancy, and even one's cultural or religious beliefs around sex.

“They wants sex, but I feel invisible.”

This speaks to emotional neglect. When a partner feels unseen or dismissed outside of bed, sexual connection can feel more like obligation than intimacy. It also can mean that sex isn't currently meeting the needs of every party involved. If sex isn't enjoyable, then why would anyone crave it?

“The way he initiates just turns me off.”

Sometimes initiation is too abrupt, disconnected, or even silly in a way that doesn’t land well—like the stereotypical "boob honk" or grabbing a partner when they’re folding laundry. It can feel more objectifying than connecting.

The antidote is thinking about context and timing when you initiate. A passionate kiss before you leave for work, paired with a warm look and a playful, “I can’t wait to continue that with you later,” is more likely to build anticipation and emotional connection. Initiation doesn’t have to be perfect. It needs to be attuned to the moment and the temperature in the room.

“I want more sex, but I don’t want to beg for it.”

This concern often arises when one partner feels starved for physical connection but ashamed to ask. They may interpret rejection as a personal failure. RLT helps partners differentiate between rejection of an act and rejection of the person, and encourages couples to talk about what makes each feel safe and wanted.

Rainchecks can also be a way for one partner to decline sex for right now, with the expectation of "Let's do it tomorrow afternoon when the kids are napping." Rainchecks can only be done responsibly and relationally by saying something like, "I love you and I want to be intimate with you, and right now isn't a great time for me. I'd love to try for it tomorrow afternoon or tomorrow morning if you'd like. Is a raincheck okay?"

“It feels like we’re roommates.”

This is a red flag for emotional and sexual drift. Often, couples still love each other, but they’ve stopped showing up relationally. RLT brings attention to the micro-habits that build connection: turning toward each other, asking curious questions, intentional one-on-one time, kissing regularly, doing the small acts of love that you know make your partner feel loved (getting their coffee ready in the morning, rubbing their feet, getting them a diet coke at the store, etc.), and making space for small moments of play and flirtation.

“I say yes to sex, even when I don't want it, because they pout or throw a fit if I say no.”

This dynamic is more common than many people realize. When a partner responds to a “no” with sulking, passive-aggressive behavior, or emotional withdrawal, it creates pressure rather than desire. Over time, sex starts to feel like a duty, something one agrees to in order to avoid relational fallout, not because they truly want to connect.

The quickest way to kill someone’s desire is to make sex feel like a relational obligation, a toll that must be paid to keep the peace. RLT helps couples name this behavior without blame, while inviting the declining partner in the moment to set limits and advocate for emotional maturity, and giving the partner demanding alternate ways to invite intimacy.

Mutual desire can only thrive in a space where “no” is respected. Only then can “yes” actually mean yes, and if "no's" are allowed, that means the "yes's" are more enthusiastic and real.

Rethinking “Foreplay”

The word foreplay can feel limiting. It suggests that everything before penetration is just a warm-up. But what if every moment of connection, from a thoughtful text to doing the dishes without being asked, was part of the sexual landscape?

Through the RLT lens, intimacy isn’t a sequence of acts. It’s a relational posture. Affection, touch, attunement, humor, curiosity, all of it contributes to sexual safety and pleasure.

Power in Bed Mirrors Power Outside of It

Sexual dynamics don’t exist in a vacuum. If decisions outside the bedroom are made unilaterally or if one partner carries most of the emotional labor, it’s likely that the bedroom reflects those same imbalances.

RLT encourages couples to examine:

• Who initiates and who avoids?

• Are we able to role-switch in our initiation process or in our intimacy? Is there room for creativity in our bedroom?

• Are both partners free to express desire and set boundaries?

• Is consent a one-time event at the beginning of the act, or an ongoing 'checking in' process?

When both partners share power, emotionally and sexually, intimacy becomes a site of mutual joy, not quiet resentment.

Intimacy Isn’t Earned by Being “Good”

One common belief is that sex must be earned, by being helpful, doing chores, or behaving in a certain way. But this frames sex as a reward, not a relational exchange.

From a relational perspective, sex flourishes when partners feel emotionally connected, respected, and desired. Not because they checked off a list, but because there is real mutuality and generosity throughout the partnership.

Building Connection: Small Shifts with Big Impact

RLT offers practical steps for couples wanting to rebuild connection:

• Practice daily repair. Quick check-ins or brief apologies keep resentment from festering. Seriously. Say sorry with good intent, no matter what. If you want more intimacy and connection, and yes, sex, you need to be apologizing often.

• Pencil in time for sexual connection. You schedule everything else in your life that matters to you, why not your sex life? To be clear, you don't need to have sex everytime. Just knowing that the weekly time is there is often enough to help couples prioritize intimacy more.

• Widen your idea of sexual intimacy. What counts as sex? Whatever you and your partner want to count as sex. Get rid of the idea that sex always has to have a penetrative element in order for it to 'count.' Sex can look like being together naked, a sensual massage, mutual masturbation, etc. And often, it may end in sexual intercourse plus explosive orgasms, but it doesn't always to have to.

• Make sure both partners get enough rest and relaxation outside of the bedroom. Increasing both partners' access to rest makes for a partnership where you feel supported and rested, which leads to a removal of one potential drain on libido, which is exhaustion. In fact, women who get one extra hour of sleep per night led to a 14% increase in next-day sexual desire.

• Offer non-sexual affection regularly. Cuddling, the six-second kiss daily, or hand-holding without pressure for more builds safety.

• Share household chores for the good of your entire relationship. In heterosexual couples that split chores more evenly (it doesn't have to be 50/50), there was increase in sexual frequency. In fact, couples that shared housework more evenly had sex an average of 6.8 times per month, which was 0.5 times more than their counterparts in which one partner shouldered most of the housework burden.

• Talk about sex often. Remove the pressure of performance and invite curiosity. Find new ways to share about sexual desires and fantasies with your partner. One way I've recommended to many couples is to have them read a romance novel together or have one partner mark the pages with sexual activity that sounds appealing or interesting to them. It can be a way to spice things up or at least, bring up the subject in a less confrontational way.

• Go on dates or spend one on one time together with shared experiences. It gives you something else to talk about besides the humdrum day to day tasks of managing a household, raising children, or work. It's hard to feel sexual attraction with someone who you don't really know.

• Name the power dynamics in the room and in your relationship. If one person always calls the shots, it’s worth exploring how that affects trust and connection.

These shifts create a relational environment where sex is more likely to feel wanted, not expected.

Therapy Support in Edmond, OK or Throughout Oklahoma and Vermont (Virtually)

If you and your partner are navigating challenges related to love, sex, and power, therapy can offer a grounded, compassionate space to explore what’s really going on. I work with couples in Edmond, OK or throughout the states of Oklahoma and Vermont, who are ready to move beyond surface-level fixes and into deeper relational change. If you want to work together, feel free to email me at info@giftofgritcounseling.com or schedule a consultation here.

Together, we can create space for emotional and physical intimacy that feels safe, mutual, and real.

Take Exquisite Care of Yourselves,

Megan

References:

1. Kalmbach et al. (2015) — The impact of sleep on female sexual response and behaviorKalmbach, D. A., Arnedt, J. T., Pillai, V., & Ciesla, J. A. (2015). The impact of sleep on female sexual response and behavior: A pilot study. Journal of Sexual Medicine, 12(5), 1221–1232. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25772315/ 

2. Kornrich, Brines, & Leupp (2013) — Egalitarianism, housework, and sexual frequency in marriageKornrich, S., Brines, J., & Leupp, K. (2013). Egalitarianism, housework, and sexual frequency in marriage. American Sociological Review, 78(1), 26–50. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4273893/ 

3. Cornell Chronicle (2016) — Want more sex? Split the household choresCornell Chronicle. (2016, August 23). Want more sex? Split the household chores. Cornell University. https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2016/08/want-more-sex-split-household-chores 

4. The Gottman Institute (n.d.) — The Six Second KissThe Gottman Institute. (n.d.). The six second kiss. https://www.gottman.com/blog/the-six-second-kiss/