Our Sex Life is a Disaster

None of the voices in this series are ongoing patients of Esther Perel. Each episode of Where Should We Begin is a one time counseling session. For the purposes of maintaining confidentiality, names and some identifiable characteristics have been removed, but their voices and their stories are real. Support for Where Should We Begin comes from Ali. It's tempting to feel that you need to improve yourself in the new year, but OLLI wants to offer you an alternative. Reconnection, not reinvention. They offer simple, science backed supplements to support women's wellness. OLLI has you covered. If you're stepping into 2026 with presence, not perfection, visit olly.com and explore their wellness lineup. These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Avoiding your unfinished home projects because you're not sure where to start? Thumbtack knows homes, so you don't have to. Don't know the difference between matte paint finish and satin, or what that clunking sound from your dryer is? With Thumbtack, you don't have to be a home pro. You just have to hire one. You can hire top rated pros, see price estimates, and read reviews all on the app. Download today. We've really been having trouble connecting sexually. It just ends in disaster, basically, like, anytime we try. I wrote my book, Mating in Captivity, because so often, people would come to see me, and their opening line would be, we love each other very much. We have no sex. And that begged the question, why does good intimacy so often fade in people who continue to love each other as much as ever? This couple, is two women. They are completely stuck in an erotic stalemate. The context of the moment is that one of them is eight months pregnant, and everybody has been warning them about the expected decline of their sexual activity. You are eight months pregnant, and you are feeling a time pressure and a fear of what sex will be like after you have a baby, and, you know, know, the crazy things people tell you when you're pregnant and what your sex life will be after that. But it doesn't seem like this is just a developmental and circumstantial reality between them. Basically, the dance is that one of them approaches, and the other one tries to do it right. But the word trying is what is complicated here. Because the moment she tries, her partner feels that she's not really into it. She then gets really upset. And then they stop everything, and then they launch a deep three hour conversation into the night that brings them back together into their closeness and intimacy, but also into a complete erotic dry spell. And this gets repeated and repeated, so they arrive eager to break free of this sexual impasse. So let's listen. We've been together six years, and we have this shared friend and …