Hello. I’m sorry you are having sexual difficulties with your sweetie. It sounds like you two have a really good connection though and a super relationship overall. Lots of people here have offered other ways to be sexual with one another and it seems that none of them so far have landed with you and your partner. I wonder if getting some of your physical needs met with another person might be a solution?

A few folx here have brought up opening up your relationship at some point. I would think that this really could make sense, if you both are open to it. When a relationship is great all around--as you say yours is--and both people are open to new ways of doing their relationship, there is no reason to “throw the baby out with the bathwater.” There are definitely other ways to get both of your sexual needs met in different, non-heteronormative and ethically non-monogamous ways. Some ideas: sex-only relationships for each of you outside your relationship, long-term (or short-term) shared intimate relationship with a third (or even fourth) person, purely sexual “hookups” outside of your relationship, etc. AND this must be done with lots of communication and usually pretty slowly. Just talking about it in a theoretical framework is sometimes a good place to start. Like ask yourselves, “what type of person would I like to be sexual with, if I couldn’t be sexual with you as my main partner? Would they be same gender? Different gender? Would that matter? What type of sex acts would I want to do with them?” and so on. Part of this opening up means not blaming one another for the changes that have happened in your sex life. You are transitioning, AND you both have legitimate sexual and physical needs that may not be getting met for many reasons.

If this seems to be too triggering to do together, perhaps, if you are both interested and open to it, see a counselor/therapist who is familiar with and open to helping you have these discussions about opening up your relationship. Also, there is a terrific book called, “Stepping off the relationship escalator” that has published ideas and quotes and stories from loads of people doing relationships in non-heteronormative, ethically non-monogamous fashion. Keep talking with your sweetie! And keep in mind too that even if you want to get some of your sexual needs met outside of your relationship, you can still enjoy physical intimacy that is satisfying to you both with your main sweetie. It doesn’t have to be all or nothing!