The Silence Between the Sheets

By Derek Colvin, LPC-S, CGT - The Giant Therapist

Real. Raw. Unfiltered Reflections on Desire and Disconnection.

There’s a certain kind of quiet that creeps into long-term relationships. It doesn’t happen all at once. Life gets full — work, kids, exhaustion, routine — and before you know it, the space that used to feel charged between you now just feels…still. It’s not that the love is gone. It’s that desire has gone quiet. And when desire goes quiet, couples often start fighting about everything else. The dishes. The tone. The distance. But underneath all of it is something more tender — a longing to feel wanted again. We don’t always talk about how lonely it can feel to love someone deeply and still ache for that spark you used to have. It’s not about sex as performance. It’s about sex as connection — as the emotional pulse of “us.”

The silence between you isn’t always about avoidance. Sometimes it’s grief for what you can’t name anymore.

The Arguments That Aren’t Really About Dishes

Most couples who find themselves here aren’t fighting about chores or logistics. They’re fighting about closeness. When sex starts to fade or feel mechanical, it’s rarely just physical distance — it’s emotional distance that’s grown roots. The fights about who does what become safer than the truth: I feel unseen. I feel unwanted. I miss how we used to reach for each other without thinking. But desire doesn’t disappear because something’s wrong with you or your partner. It disappears because real life is loud. Because stress numbs the parts of us that used to be spontaneous. Because tenderness feels risky when we’ve been quietly keeping score. Desire needs air to breathe, but most couples don’t know how to talk about it without shame or defensiveness. So instead, they argue about the laundry.

The Weight of Unspoken Needs

The longer intimacy goes unspoken, the heavier it gets. Not just sexually — emotionally. The silence starts to shape the relationship. We start protecting each other from disappointment instead of reaching for each other in it. That protection feels like safety at first. But eventually, it feels like loneliness. I’ve sat with countless couples who love each other deeply but have stopped being honest about what they need. They don’t realize they’re both waiting for the other to go first. And in that waiting, resentment grows roots — not because they’ve fallen out of love, but because they’ve forgotten how to risk closeness again.

Desire can’t grow where we’re pretending not to need anything.

When the Body Remembers What the Heart Forgot

For some, this silence starts after kids. For others, after loss or major change. Sometimes it’s medication or health. Sometimes it’s the slow erosion of curiosity. But every version comes back to the same question: Do you still want me? That question isn’t always literal — it’s emotional. It’s about being seen, chosen, known. In therapy, I tell couples that healing this part of their relationship isn’t about “fixing” sex; it’s about making space for vulnerability again. That might start with an honest conversation, or even small gestures of affection that say, “I see you.” Desire doesn’t need fireworks to return. Sometimes it just needs safety.

Finding the Way Back

The path back to each other doesn’t start with a grand gesture. It starts with the smallest risk — reaching for your partner’s hand again, saying something honest without bracing for rejection, making eye contact long enough to remember who you’re looking at. When couples slow down enough to reconnect emotionally, the physical intimacy tends to follow. But when we try to fix the physical without addressing the emotional, it feels forced — another task to complete instead of something to feel. It’s not about performance. It’s about presence. And presence can’t exist without honesty.

You can’t rekindle desire through obligation. You rekindle it through courage — the courage to be seen again.

The Invitation

If you’re in that quiet space right now — the one that feels like you’re doing everything right but still missing something — you’re not alone. The silence doesn’t mean the end. It’s just a signal that something inside the relationship wants attention again. Talk about it, even if your voice shakes. Start small. Reach for each other, even awkwardly. And remember that love doesn’t just live in what’s easy. It grows in the moments when you choose to turn toward each other, even when it feels risky. Because sometimes, the sex isn’t gone. It’s just waiting for the honesty to return.

If this hit home—Share it with your person.

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