Sex advice with Suzi Godson: My husband never makes an effort to turn me on

My husband is continually surprised that I don’t feel like having sex very often, despite the fact that he does nothing to turn me on. If we try to talk about it, we end up in a blame game. How can I make it really clear that he needs to make an effort to have a good sex life?

It is so easy to turn the marital bed into a battleground. At first glance, the situation you describe sounds fairly straightforward: you feel aggrieved that your sexual needs are being ignored by your husband. Since he never makes an effort to turn you on, how could he possibly be surprised that you can’t be bothered engaging in sex? And since he never listens when you tell him how you feel, you ignore his pleas for intimacy. Frustratingly, he doesn’t seem to understand any of this, so you are searching for a more explicit way to make your feelings clear to him.