There are key factors in a relationship that mark the end and one of those is when the sex stops.
In my twenties, I was a lifestyle columnist and mental health worker. I also had a string of terrible relationships and became very aware of the signs of incompatibility and ultimately when a relationship had reached its expiration date.
When you study human behavior and work in the field of psychology for many years, you start to understand why we do what we do. In a relationship there are often many signs that plain out show that your not meant to be or nearing the end. However, most people on average, tend to ignore these signs until the very end. When we care for someone else, we don't really want to see the things that show us that the other person doesn't feel that way towards us. So we turn a blind eye, hoping that one day it will be better. But in these types of relationships, it usually just goes downhill more and more until one or both of you implode.
When I was in my twenties, I was with a guy who was a little younger than me. I guess coming out of my divorce and having two young children, I was ultimately just tired of feeling alone. There were many signs from the get go that told me this wasn't for me, but I just chose to look past those again and again. One early sign was that he didn't want to have sex with me almost from the very beginning. Then after only a month together, he wanted to get married. Even though we barely had anything in common. My house soon turned into a party pad for his friends and himself, and I would often work 12 hour or longer shifts, and come home to them drinking and partying every night. Our first Valentine's together, he even planned a poker night with his friends instead of anything with me. To say the signs were there in spades, would be an understatement.
I had two young children, and he constantly was very irritable with my kids and myself. We could never have a good moment together because everything about us seemed to make him angry and before long he would be yelling. As years went by, we drifted more and more apart, yet I still tried to make it work. I often told him what he did and how it made me feel. In the ten years we were together, we might have had sex a handful of times. And it often made me feel like something was wrong with me and that I must be unattractive. It took a great toll on my self esteem and led to me being sad all the time. I tried to hide it to those around me, putting on a fake smile or goofing off.
Not long after he moved in with me, his friends were once again partying all the time at my home after I got off work. He had told them to come on over and he would be off work at 11 PM. While I was sleeping that night, they got so drunk they were trying to wave down women off the road next to the house. I was later woke up from my sleep by cops asking me if I was the home owner and that I was going to be arrested for an "open house party" even if I was not aware of everything that was going on. As I lay in jail that night, the man I was with didn't try to call, bond me out or anything. Instead, as his close childhood friend told me after I got home, he was instead having sex with one of the females that they had invited over to the party.
Of course, for years, he denied this. Yet, even though he pleaded for his innocence, he ended up cutting his life long friends out of his life after that. Which I take to this day as a guilty conscience. But for years that was in my head, day in, day out. Wandering if the person I was with would be that horrible. And that takes a toll on you. As the years went by, he never made be feel like he even had any interest in me. It was almost like we were just roommates. I would often ask him why he never touched me, kissed me or wanted to have sex. He would then exclaim, "relationships aren't all about sex." Yet, he would often set upstairs on his computer and Xbox talking to younger girls, playing games with them and masturbating. When I would clean house, and see all his dried jizz over the black futon that was in his game room, he said "I do it so I can sleep." This hurt even more, that he was obviously wanting to have sex, just not with me.
Eventually we drifted completely apart, he would go off for all kinds of events and get Airbnbs with other women. And as I laid every night crying myself to sleep, I realized I could no longer do this. He had beat me down until I was nothing and all my self-esteem was gone. I never saw him, because he made sure to make everything else a priority (work, his friends, gaming). For the entire 10 years together, he never did anything special for me besides buy me some gifts, so it look like he cared. Every Valentine's Day, I received the same set of flowers with a bear, every single year. My daughter noticed on his social media, the 22 year old he is with now, he buys her the exact same gift for Valentine's Day. What a jerk?!
I have noticed in a lot of relationships like this, even though he ignored every need I had, and didn't even care to be around me. He still, just wanted me to set alone, every day and cry to myself. He didn't care how much he hurt me, over and over again. He was getting all his needs met elsewhere, and I didn't matter. But of course, that isn't the story he went off to tell his coworkers, family, etc. In his mind, he bought me things, so he had been a good partner.
As you can see, all the signs were bright red here, but I chose for years to ignore it. In the end, if you are no longer having any kind of sexual relations with your partner, then your relationship is over. For some reason, you are holding on. Maybe you don't like change, you are scared to be alone or so forth. There are many reasons we do this. But if your partner, even for one day, takes you for granted and does things that make you think they don't care--then believe their actions and walk out that door! You are wasting time that could be spent with someone who might actually treat you right. I contributed a lot of his behavior for years to him being younger than me, but in the end, he just never really cared about me. It wasn't just the no sex part but everything he did. He didn't want spend time with me, he rather play games when not at work or go hang with his friends. He didn't put any thought into the gifts he got me -- they were always generic, store bought gifts. He was always irritable around me. And lastly, he never showed me any kind of affection. He didn't want to hold hands, kiss or even comfort me when I was sad. If you are in this kind of relationship, then get out!
When you are with someone like that, they destroy everything about you. When your self-esteem plummets, then you no longer can be in healthy relationship, because you don't believe in yourself enough to do what’s right for you. Also, with someone like this, you lose trust in people. And eventually find it hard to trust anyone again. Don't waste years of your life in a dead-end relationship, get out before you have lost the best years of your life to someone who never cared to start with.