Like a lot of people who are single and dating, my sex life is full of peaks and valleys: When I’m dating someone whom I feel a strong connection to, we have sex consistently—pretty much every time we see each other, at least once or twice a week. And when I’m totally single or having a bunch of meh first dates in a row, I’m temporarily celibate. But the thing is, my sense of desire adjusts to the situation: When I’m having sex consistently, my libido is high. And when I’m not, it’s basically nonexistent.

My sex education included zero information about libido or desire. I went to public school, but it was the 2000s, and abstinence-only sex education was the norm. I think my high school sex ed classes briefly mentioned the existence of condoms, but I don’t recall any discussion of concepts like desire or pleasure. My perception of what a healthy sex life looks like mostly came from my friends and the pop culture around me. Some of this was good—I learned better info from YA books like Meg Cabot’s “Ready or Not” than I did from sex ed at school—and some less so.

My Libido Was Inconsistent, And I Thought That Was Weird

Compared to a lot of my friends, I was a late bloomer—I started having sex in my early 20s rather than in my teens. Part of this was intentional: I was raised Catholic and spent my high school years involved in my church community. As a church youth group member, I even signed a purity pledge. But part of this was simply because I was shy and unpopular, and no one really showed romantic or sexual interest in me until I was out of my teens. (Or if they did, I didn’t pick up on it).

When I did finally start having sex, I found that I wanted to have sex all the time. My first sexual partner had a high libido, and we’d usually have sex at least twice (and often more) whenever I spent time with him. When our situationship ended, I was emotionally devastated—but although my friends expected me to be sexually frustrated, given what our sex life had been like, I wasn’t.  

As I got older and more sexually experienced, this pattern continued. When I was dating someone, my libido was sky-high. And when I wasn’t, my libido all but disappeared. Some of my friends thought it was weird how I could go for months without sex and hardly notice or care. “If I were you, I’d have found a Tinder hookup months ago,” one said.

It wasn’t that I didn’t like having sex—when I was with the right partner, I definitely liked it a lot. It was more that if I wasn’t spending time with a partner I was attracted to and who showed interest in me in return, I didn’t mind going without sex. In my early 20s, I tried out a few casual hookups, but they were rarely enjoyable. The times that I did enjoy felt like exceptions—for example, one time was with a man I’d crushed on from a distance for ages before we finally hooked up, and another time was with a vacationing Australian who I had a brief but intense flirtation with before he left the city.

A few friends suggested I might be demisexual—someone who only feels attraction after forming an emotional bond with someone—but that label didn’t feel right to me. I felt plenty of attraction to people I didn’t know well (the cutie who worked in the office across the hall, the hot barista, the man I always noticed on my morning commute, as well as plenty of strangers I only saw once). Plus, my sex dreams frequently starred celebrities I’d never met.

Until “Come As You Are” Taught Me Differently 

In my late 20s, I read the book, “Come as You Are: The Surprising New Science that Will Transform Your Sex Life” by Emily Nagoski, PhD. I’d heard of it, and when I found a used copy on sale for $2, I picked it up. Nagoski’s explanation of the concept of responsive desire described my sex life perfectly: “A woman can be perfectly normal and healthy and never experience spontaneous sexual desire. Instead, she may experience ‘responsive’ desire, in which her desire only emerges in a highly erotic context.”

In her book, Nagoski explains that there are two types of desire:

• Spontaneous desire, in which your libido spikes spontaneously, without apparent cause, and
• Responsive desire, in which you experience desire in response to various contexts—cuddling with your partner, reading erotica, watching porn, recalling a hot memory.

I sometimes, but very rarely, experience spontaneous desire (and thanks to tracking my periods, I’ve learned that it’s usually when I’m ovulating). The vast majority of the time, I experience responsive desire.

“Responsive desire is context led—and involves the building of arousal and an exploration of pleasure or what feels good. For example, someone who experiences responsive desire might like to experience flirting in the days or hours before, eye contact, taking time to feel relaxed or to groom themselves, sensual touch or massage … in order to also experience sexual pleasure,” Shae Harmon, COSRT-registered psychosexual and relationship therapist, tells Verywell Mind.

(How) Does Spontaneous Desire Happen?

After I started taking an SSRI for anxiety and depression, spontaneous desire became even more rare for me—so rare that I began to wonder if my medication had permanently tanked my libido. But when I started dating someone new, someone whom I was very attracted to, I was happy to find that my responsive desire was stronger than ever. In the right context and with the right partner, I could experience just as much desire and pleasure as before. 

Donna Oriowo, LICSW, CST, PhD, owner of AnnodRight and author of “Drink Water and Mind Your Business: A Black Woman’s Guide to Unlearning the BS and Healing Your Self-Esteem,” says that even though you might think you’re experiencing spontaneous desire, it’s probably responsive if you really examine what caused it. “I think that this culture puts a lot of emphasis on spontaneous desire, but it doesn’t really exist in nature. Every single time that you desire, it’s probably because you are actually responding to stimuli, internal or external,” she says.

“Are you spontaneously hungry, or did you progressively get hungrier throughout your day? Did you see reminders of food throughout your day? There were stimuli, internal and external things are happening, and there is a moment where you recognize it.” With spontaneous desire, she explains, “I think that really what we’re saying is that you don’t recognize the stimulus that made it so that you wanted to have sex, which is very different from saying that there was no stimulus.”

So, What Is a Healthy Sex Life? 

A healthy sex life looks different for everyone. Plus, what a healthy sex life looks like can change for a person throughout their life in response to different circumstances and partners. If you primarily experience spontaneous desire, responsive desire, or a mix of the two, that’s healthy and normal.

“It is easy to use language that normalizes spontaneous desire as the more accepted way of relating to sex, and responsive desire as something lacking, when that’s just not true,” Harmon says. “Both are normal and natural, and people can experience both of these depending on context. I like to think we all have a spectrum of desire, with a predisposition for relating to our desires in one of these categories, because it’s easier for people to relate to. But in essence, there is not one definitive ‘right way’ to experience desire.”

How to Know If You Have a Healthy Sex Life 

The best way to know if you have a healthy sex life is to do some self-reflection. “Exploring what works for you, what is pleasurable (not just sexually) and how you experience the build up to having sex is a good starting point for anyone with any desire type,” Harmon explains. “Think about your ‘conditions for good sex‘—the things you like to have in place psychologically and environmentally before you have sex (and this goes for solo and partnered sex).”

Kari Harrison, LCPC, CST, a sex therapist with the Expansive Group, explains that whether you experience primarily responsive or spontaneous desire, nurturing your sex life can be helpful. “For both folks with spontaneous and responsive desire, so much of having a fulfilling relationship with one’s sexuality starts with the sexual relationship we have with ourselves,” she tells Verywell Mind.

“If someone experiences mostly spontaneous desire, they can manage their experience of spontaneous desire by nurturing a sexual relationship with themselves through a fulfilling solo sex practice—and a reframing of masturbation as not settling, but rather something that can be intentional and fun. For responsive desire, they can nurture their sex life by learning about the erotic contexts that turn them on as well as contexts that turn them off, and communicating those with their partner.”

Takeaways

Whether you experience primarily responsive desire like I do, primarily spontaneous desire, or a mix of both types, good news—you’re normal! There’s a lot of variety when it comes to the ways humans experience desire, and unless your experience is causing you distress, there’s probably nothing to worry about.

If your sex life is causing you distress, whether because you and your partner have different experiences of desire or because you don’t understand the way you’re experiencing desire, then there are a few things you can do. You can self-reflect on what you need to have good sex, communicate your needs with your partner, cultivate your relationship with self-pleasure, see a sex therapist—or all of the above.