Advice | Pandemic stress isn't sexy. Simple ways to reconnect with your partner in trying times - Toronto Star

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For many, pandemic living hasn’t exactly set the stage for romance.

Sure, some may be enjoying more time together because they’ve subtracted things like commuting and business travel from their days.

But being together, within the same four walls, around the clock for the better part of a year — quite possibly in the same sweatpants — doesn’t give couples much of a chance to miss each other.

What it can do is pile up petty annoyances over talking too loudly while the other has a Zoom call, whose turn it is to help Madison find the right Google classroom link and why the place is such a mess.

And those are just the surface level stressors. All this day-to-day stuff is happening while we wrestle with the ever-present strain of the biggest threat to our collective well-being that humanity has faced in more than a century.

For lots of us, there’s less capacity left for trying to figure out ways to make another night at home with Netflix feel like a date.

Tanya Lee, a certified life skills coach who focuses on romantic relationships, said couples with kids seem to be having the most difficulty finding energy for each other as the pandemic months wear on.

“They are really, really stressed and they’re tired. They’re very tired because they have to do their job. Then they have to home-school. And then by the time the evening rolls around, they’re like, ‘OK, let’s go to bed.’”

Tanya Lee, a certified life skills coach who focuses on romantic relationships, says the key to making a bit of room for romantic love at this stressful time is to start with little things that bring a bit of respite and light-heartedness.

Of course, it’s a privilege to have the problem of too much time together safe at home while others do jobs that don’t allow for this kind of physical distancing. Or struggle to make ends meet, or endure the isolation of living alone.

Still, it’s worth noting that it hasn’t been all roses for couples sheltering at home.

Lee said the key to making a bit of room for romantic love at this stressful time is to start with little things that bring a bit of respite and lightheartedness to your household.

“People think that it has to be these great, big grand gestures, but they don’t have to be. It’s the small kind acts that count the most.”

That could mean drawing your partner a bath and keeping little kids quietly occupied in another room while they’re in there, or taking five or 10 minutes to start the day listening to a song that lifts both your spirits, she said.

Same goes for the small kindness of making your partner’s coffee, tea or morning smoothie.

Those who like the practice of gratitude journaling could put a twist on that by writing a quick note to their partner mentioning something they appreciated that day. “Then the next morning, give it to the person to start their day off really well,” said Lee, who hosted virtual writing workshops for couples in the lead-up to Valentine’s Day and beyond.

She also points out that the internet offers plenty of options for trying something new as a couple, like virtual cooking classes or taking in a concert online.

Too often, couples lose a sense of playfulness in their relationship — and not in the bedroom sense of the word alone, said Lee. In fact, she calls her coaching business Mistress of Play, which she said denotes the importance of reclaiming play for adults, and all the levity and creativity it encourages. An improvised game of minigolf you set up in the living room could do just as much for your romantic connection as a material gift you buy on Valentine’s Day, she said.

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If you can bring some laughter to your time together, that too can help bring you closer. Lee suggests combating pandemic blues with a silly theme night such as a ’70s-style party that’s easy to pull off with disco music and a few accessories from the back of the closet or a dollar store.

“Or have a lip sync battle between your partner and yourself and get your kids to judge.”

Eva Bloom, a queer sexuality educator and sex science communicator, said it’s normal for sex drive to take a hit at a time like this, and that people shouldn’t assume it means there’s something wrong in their relationship.

“We’re living under a constant stressor; maybe you’re home with your partner 24/7. It totally makes sense if you don’t want to jump their bones as much as you usually would in pre-pandemic times,” said Bloom.

She points to research by Lori Brotto, director of the University of British Columbia’s Sexual Health Laboratory, on the negative impact that stress has on sex drive.

A stressful event like the pandemic puts the body in “constant fight or flight” mode, said Bloom. “And when you’re operating in that part of your nervous system, it’s very difficult to come down to a place of safety and sexiness because your body’s like, ‘No man, where’s the bear we’ve got to fight?’ It’s been anticipating a bear fight for like 12 months.”

In addition to being on high alert, said Bloom, “there’s a huge part of your brain that’s, like, dealing with trying to do risk assessment all the time.”

Will the grocery store be crowded if I go now? Should I take the subway or call an Uber? These questions were never so fraught as they’ve been over the past year. Likewise, said Bloom, couples with kids have been trying to figure out how to integrate home-schooling with their other responsibilities.

“And you don’t have these different outlets that you would be having usually to go see friends and get out of your normal routine to replenish some of that energy. So, yeah, being exhausted also doesn’t get you in a very sexy headspace.”

Getting into a sexier headspace is often more successful when approached incrementally in “low stakes” ways, said Bloom, that don’t set up big expectations for going from, say, unloading the dishwasher to fireworks in a few hot minutes.

These can include things like a massage, a dance around the kitchen, the scent of a nice-smelling candle, changing into a favourite piece of clothing from the before times — all things that Bloom said help a person feel more present in their own body instead of their list of worries.

“The first thing that I say to people is have self-compassion around all this stuff, because if you start from a place of ‘I’m not meeting this expectation; I’m failing’ — starting from there is not going to lead to a successful happy sexual encounter.”

And though she notes that it may be a cliche, she said planning a date night can help you get into the right frame of mind for connecting with your partner, and maybe even inspire you to go through the ritual of getting dressed in something other than those well-worn sweatpants.

Brandie Weikle is a freelance contributing columnist for the Star's Life section, writing about parenting issues. She is the host of The New Family Podcast and editor of thenewfamily.com. Follow her on Twitter: @bweikle

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