Coping with attraction outside one’s relationship is not easy and can be very stressful. You’re into your partner – maybe even really into them. You enjoy your time together. To the outside world, you seem like the perfect couple. Yet, a hidden quirk throws you off a bit: You fancy having a fling with someone else.
It might be a colleague or your partner’s best buddy. The snag is you can’t shake them from your thoughts. You daydream about them and then feel a twinge of guilt when finding it tough to muster excitement for your partner. Doubts creep in about whether you should stick around: Does this mean you and your partner aren’t a good fit? Is there a lack of sexual chemistry? Or do you tend to get bored with intimacy after a while?
As a therapist with experience helping couples and individuals with their relationships, I regularly hear tales like this. Clearly, folks are struggling, even feeling torn, over this predicament. “I want to desire my partner!” is a common plea. It’s a challenge because we can’t dictate what or who to desire for our bodies. Our sexual selves march to their own beat and aren’t particularly keen on input from our conscious minds. Judging and critiquing our sexual fantasies and yearnings is way easier than changing them.
Indeed, having a sexual hankering for someone other than your partner is intricate.
There could be various factors at play that you may want to grasp. Maybe there are issues in your relationship dampening your interest in sex with your partner. Maybe you’ve lost some of the attraction. Perhaps there’s something special about your fantasy partner that you can’t quite replicate with anyone else. Then again, maybe not. In reality, longing for another partner might mean absolutely nothing.
How can such intense feelings mean nothing?
You’re a primate, a product of hundreds of thousands of years of evolution. Your sexual tendencies have been shaped by your ancestors. Behaviours leading to successful reproduction get passed down, influencing your sexual instincts. The desire for novel partners is an example—it aided reproduction and gene transmission.
Conversely, behaviours not resulting in offspring didn’t get passed on. It’s as simple as that. So, your craving for a new partner likely means just that: You’re human.
It’s intriguing how seldom we talk about the impact of our evolutionary past on our sexual behaviour. The more ancient parts of our brains affecting our sexual instincts remain untouched by cultural ideals. Porn can be alluring because it gratifies our primal sexual instincts, even as guilt or shame may tag along. Guilt and shame arise when our more evolved, conscious minds clash with what the primal brain finds attractive. Likewise, loving and desiring only one partner for a lifetime is a modern construct not rooted in our evolutionary biology.
What should you do if you find yourself desiring someone outside your committed relationship?
There are various potential reasons for these feelings and many paths to consider. Your fixation on someone else signals a drift in your relationship with your partner. Relationships sometimes end, even when deep care exists. Couples therapy might be beneficial in such situations. However, if this extracurricular longing isn’t significant, you want to maintain your current relationship. It could be just your evolutionary biology doing its thing, urging you to seek new partners!
In such cases, you might experience these feelings again once your crush is no longer novel. Some couples discuss the idea of opening their relationship. More commonly, though, sexual experimentation comes into play—injecting more energy and creativity into your love life.
For instance, engaging in something with your partner that makes you feel sexually exposed can boost passion. We often feel closer and more attracted after being open and vulnerable in intimate situations. The challenge is that feeling vulnerable can be tougher after being together for a while because you’ve likely shared a lot already. But there’s always a creative way to experiment and push your boundaries. Express a desire you’ve been holding back. Share a longing you’ve kept to yourself. Discuss ways to inject more excitement into your shared experiences with your partner. Tackling your intimate life as a team will likely produce better outcomes than keeping your worries to yourself.
Contact Dr Gabe at Act Right Now Counselling for personalized guidance and support.
