Why does my fiancée initiate sexual tension but always pull away?

[lolitsme1123]

Hi friends. I’m coming to you for opinions or just thoughts and feelings about some stuff in my relationship. I’m 23 (F) and my fiancee is 26 (F). We have been together for almost 5 years now. About a year, maybe a year and a half into our relationship, we have been having issues in the bedroom. She’s basically never in the mood. Here’s the issue, she says she is and act like she is until we get into it. She spends the day flirting with me or building up tension. She’ll touch me and tease me and get handsy, but then when we have time alone to actually do it, she pulls away and acts like all of that build up and tension never happened. It happens so often now that I have trouble getting wet when we do have our rare moments together. At 23 I am having sex once a month at best. Half the time I’m going MONTHS without sex. It’s not for lack of trying on my end, either. I do my fair share, in and out of bed, and she claims to be more than satisfied. I’m just getting to a point where I’m so pent up and upset at being constantly rejected that I’m getting angry? Like my head literally hurts just from this. I don’t know what to do at this point. I’ve tried having talks with her about it, changing what we do, having days where we don’t even think about it and have us time that’s intimate but not sexual, I’ve tried taking charge, I’ve tried letting her come to me instead. I’m just at a loss right now. Toys can only do so much, you know? Anyway, there’s my frustrated venting. I’m gonna go cry some more now, please let me know if there’s tips or suggestions that I may not have explored yet. Thanks. 🙏

[AI Opinion]

My aim on GAG is to help you untangle messy heart stuff and bedroom confusion without sugarcoating it, babe.

What you’re describing screams mixed signals plus hidden anxiety, not lack of attraction. She’s lovebombing you during the day, then emotionally ghosting you at the finish line. That pattern usually means one of these: performance anxiety, trauma, low libido, shame around sex, or resentment she’s not voicing.

Your anger and “I can’t even get wet now” reaction is totally valid. Repeated rejection like that feels like a slow-motion breakup of your sexual confidence. At 23, once-a-month sex when you’re craving more is not some “you’re asking too much” red flag. Your needs are real.

You’ve already tried so many healthy things, which tells me the next step isn’t new tricks in bed, it’s structure and honesty. Calm, non-accusatory talk: “I feel rejected and confused when we build tension all day and then you pull away. I need a real explanation, not ‘I’m just tired.’ I want us to fix this together.” Make it about the relationship, not her being “broken.”

Then, be very clear about stakes. Not a threat, but reality: “I can’t do years of a sexless marriage. I need intimacy and consistency. If we can’t work on this, I don’t know how we move forward.” That’s not cruel, that’s honest boundary-setting.

If she truly wants to fix it, suggest a sex therapist or couples therapist who’s LGBTQ-friendly. If she refuses any help, keeps lovebombing then pulling away, and leaves you crying and pent up for months at a time, that’s your giant neon red flag about marriage. You’re not asking for wild kinks, just follow-through.

You deserve someone who doesn’t just tease you all day, but actually finishes what they start and makes you feel wanted, not starved. And trust me, someone out there would absolutely worship having a fiancée as into them as you clearly are 😉

[EveryDayIsPretzelDay]

Just a guess, but... is this maybe your fiancé's first same-sex relationship?

It might be that she's genuinely attracted to you, but the mechanics of getting it on with another woman still seem weird and disorienting to her. And so she genuinely WANTS to mess around with you, she gets genuinely turned on, but when it gets to the point that you're both naked, she gets stressed out and freezes up.

Like I said, that's only a guess.

[lolitsme1123]

Not her first relationship, though I am her first long-term/serious partner? Longest past relationships she’s had were like a year max. For the first like year and a half, things were fine. After that, things got really sparse or just stopped altogether. 🥲

[EveryDayIsPretzelDay]

@lolitsme1123 Were a lot of her other relationships with men?

Has she talked at all about the person she was in a relationship with for a year? Did she mention why it ended? Did she say anything about what the sex was like in that relationship?

[lolitsme1123]

She’s never been with a man. Not interested. She’s never apparently had performance issues before. Those relationships ended bc they weren’t good for each other or someone moved for college, yk the average stuff. She SAYS she likes the sex in our relationship, and that she always enjoys herself when it happens. Her defense is that she “overthinks” and can’t shut off her brain until we are already doing it? I don't know it doesn’t make sense. Nothings changed. If anything we added new things into the mix to try but we have a safe word and all communicate well. I’m not pushy and I’m not going to throw myself at her like a desperate animal or beg for her to shut up with the overthinking and just enjoy herself. 🤷‍♀️ we talked about counseling, had convos on our own, tried to engage in non-sexual stuff just for intimacy and bonding…

[EveryDayIsPretzelDay]

@lolitsme1123 So... the sex was good for the first year and a half, and then she started overthinking? Did anything else happen around that time? Did you maybe gain some weight, or get a tattoo? Did one of you get a new job, or have a kid, or anything like that?

[lolitsme1123]

I would kms before having a kid 😂 so no on that one. My weight never fluctuated, I did get my first tattoo but it was after things started getting bad. I took a break on college bc finances were getting rough but we are in a good spot now and have been for a while. I can understand stress from her losing her job and me picking up the slack but like, again - things were already bad when that happened? Nothing **new** happened that should have triggered this. She just kinda started pulling away. Sometimes it feels like she’s just waiting for me to break up with her bc this has been going on for like 3 years now

[EveryDayIsPretzelDay]

@lolitsme1123 I DM'ed you, if you want to talk on there.

Is there possibly someone else? Not someone she's cheating with, but maybe someone she's thinking about? A coworker, and ex you don't know about, or someone she wanted to sleep with but never got to?

[EveryDayIsPretzelDay]

@lolitsme1123 Could your fiancé maybe possibly have developed feelings for someone else?

Just a wild guess, but do you think it might be possible?

[Nikki1989]

Tension is always bad, sexual or not.