When "Not in the Mood" Is Also "Exhausted From Doing Everything"

When someone mentions maintaining desire in long-term relationships, what comes to mind? Maybe it's something like more foreplay, arousal balms, or roleplaying.

Or maybe you thought, "It would honestly turn me on so much seeing my partner wash the dishes without being asked."

Adding spice to "accelerate" desire sounds intuitive, but its flipside doesn't get as much explicit airtime: managing turn-offs — what a sex therapist might call desire "brakes" — in a relationship.

Examples of common desire brakes include:

• Feeling stressed after work — and not having time to wind down before making dinner

• Anxiety about whether sex is going to hurt

• Losing sleep anticipating others' needs (maybe spouse, kids, or aging parents)

• Ongoing resentment when you're exhausted from caregiving and don't feel cared for in return

In other words, when one partner is the "project manager" of the household — maybe on top of working full-time — the mental load might be one of the big desire disruptors.

And unpacking expectations of labor in relationships might not sound sexy on the surface — but in the long run, foresight really can be foreplay.

Mental load is, in short, the project management of life: planning, organizing, and anticipating what needs to be done.

Consider, for example, a family trip to the beach. The physical tasks might include driving to the beach and setting up umbrellas and chairs, but the mental load might be in:

• Planning everything that needs to be packed

• Noticing how fast the kids are growing and whether their swimwear and footwear still fit

• Taking inventory of sunscreen — how much is needed for the whole family, timing when to reapply, and budgeting for replacing it when it runs out

• Considering picky eaters’ preferences and packing snacks and drinks accordingly

• Tracking temperatures, making sure the kids are staying hydrated, and calculating walk times to public restrooms when they're likely to need to go

Anticipation is the key word here — a caregiver who takes on the mental load manages needs before they're urgent. (Think sunburns or hangry meltdowns!)

When the mental load is managed well, it can feel like the household (or outing) is simply functioning as it should.

“Often, mental load tasks are overlooked by the partner who is engaging in less of this type of work," said sex therapist Heather Davidson, Ed.M., M.A.

Because the anticipation of keeping the household running smoothly is often invisible, others can take it for granted, leading to resentment.

And for a pair of parents, that resentment can show up as low desire.

A couple might initially report low or mismatched sexual desire, she said. “Usually, the lack of sexual intimacy gets them into couples therapy.”

As the sex therapy sessions continue, it's “common that couples may not align in believing their current setup works,” she added. "We focus on why the struggling partner does not believe the setup is working, and the negative impact on the relationship."

Redistributing the mental load more equitably starts with a baseline level of regard for both partners. If a couple doesn't have that, couples therapy can only go so far.

“Those resisting acknowledging this gap are often dismissive of their partner's concerns, devalue the mental load or household/child-related tasks as unimportant, and engage in blaming." Davidson named examples of such dismissal as, "'It's her anxiety,’… ‘She needs to relax,’… and 'It's not a big deal.'”

It's that disregard that can eat away at the connection.

"If you continue to highlight the negative impacts to the relationship and your partner refuses to acknowledge this or dismisses your concerns," Davidson said, that pattern of dismissal is worth taking seriously. Individual counseling might help more than couples therapy in deciding whether the dynamic can be worked with or needs to end.

For couples who are both acting in good faith, the work can start with clarity, communication, and prioritization.

First things first: Davidson emphasizes that “Couples need to find a system that works for them,” and “not what works for the TikTok couple.” In her practice, she found that “[Social media] fuels even more anger & frustration.”

Sometimes, a system for managing tasks involves lists, apps, or phone alarms. And sometimes, it might take talking to a therapist about where our expectations of labor in relationships came from, and how certain standards and priorities were modeled to us growing up.

“Nobody is a mind-reader … we are all different, with different strengths and weaknesses regarding these tasks.

Davidson also highly recommended the book, Fair Play by Eve Rodsky, and the accompanying deck to discuss the division of labor in explicit terms. “It helps them zoom out and really see who is doing what,” she said.

The Fair Play website features guides on 100 topics from aging parents and automotive maintenance to weekend plans and welcoming a child into the home. While a couple might not read every page together, they can zoom out, see who does what, and zoom back in to dive deeper into the topics that matter most.

Every card includes a section for planning, execution, and the minimum standard of care.

The card about postpartum life, for example, encourages:

• Asking for additional help from one’s partner guilt-free

• Having the non-birthing partner ask for help from others

• Taking a break from some tasks — not everything needs to get done when tending to an infant takes higher priority 

The mental load can feel exceptionally heavy when one partner is managing body changes, waking up to breastfeed/chestfeed, scheduling pelvic floor therapy visits, and pain flares — so it's critical to acknowledge the very real work that goes into recovery itself, and in learning how to be a parent.

Ideally, both partners would take ownership of the whole cycle, including planning and execution. “Just tell me what to do and make a list," for example, puts the mental load back on the overburdened partner.

Building the list together is useful once. However, if one partner is re-delegating, reminding, and checking again and again, they're still project-managing, which can be exhausting and make it harder to feel responsive desire.

“The minimum standard of care” section also raises another point Davidson made...

“Sometimes… we do have to let go of certain tasks or experiences for our own health/sanity,” Davidson said. Sometimes, prioritizing certain things means tolerating imperfection or lowering standards elsewhere.

Such compromises might include:

• Letting the house get a little dirtier to make time for the gym

• Throwing on a hat when you don’t have time to wash your hair

• Simplifying meal prep with sandwiches for lunch and slow-cooking dinner during the work day

When it comes to compromising when you’ve got kiddos, Davidson says, “Kids might be sad because things didn't go the way they wanted … but it is actually good for kids to learn to cope with disappointment.”

It might also be good for couples to assess together:

• What tasks can the kids do or take over

• Ways kids can build more independent experiences

• Setting older kids up with resources and letting them take it from there

• Which parts of child-rearing can be reassigned or taken care of by others in the community

Davidson added that the pressure on parents can “create unnecessary guilt and kids with little resilience,” and recommended reading The Anxious Generation by Jonathan Haidt.

Sometimes, parenting involves recalibrating the bar for what their kids can or can't handle as they grow and develop skills.

While we can't eliminate the mental load, a household (and community) can distribute it so that neither partner is the sole executive of the whole system.

Reassigning tasks is only the beginning, however.

We can't add more hours to a day, but we can rearrange priorities. Time should be set aside for pleasure, Davidson added. “As busy adults, if we don't make time for it, it won't happen."

Redistributing the mental load might not sound sexy on the surface.

But when you're used to doing it all, what's sexy about a partner doing the laundry without being asked is that they're showing that your time matters — that you matter. It's them saying, “Hey, I got this. See you after you take a bubble bath and read that delicious book, because you deserve both ‘me time’ and ‘we time.'”

That's foreplay that starts hours before the bedroom.