How Stress Is Hijacking Our Sex Lives

Tools for rebalancing our nervous systems and enhancing our erotic potential.

• Hormonal imbalances caused by elevated cortisol can disrupt sexual desire, arousal, and functioning.

• Shame around sexual struggles creates a vicious stress cycle further impairing sexual functioning.

• Regulating stress and prioritizing pleasure can help rebuild your capacity for joy and connection.

Let’s talk about something that's been happening in bedrooms (or not happening, more accurately) around the world: People are having less sex. This isn’t just anecdotal. A growing body of research shows that sexual frequency is declining across age groups, even among people in long-term partnerships. I wrote about this in my book, and it’s only getting worse. Beyond the challenges posed by our growing attachments to our devices instead of each other, our busy schedules, or the distractions of modern life, the biggest, baddest, most toxic culprit is stress.

As a neuroscientist, sex therapist, and someone who’s devoted her life to understanding the science of pleasure, I can tell you: Stress is a libido killer. It disrupts our hormonal balance, hijacks the brain’s pleasure circuits, and makes it hard—sometimes impossible—to connect with our sexual selves. It plays a big role in how many people are currently feeling sexually dissatisfied, if they even want sex at all.

Let’s break it down.

The Body’s Stress Response: A Double-Edged Sword

When we face a perceived threat—a lion on the savannah or an overflowing inbox—our bodies activate the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis, releasing stress hormones like cortisol and adrenaline. In the short term, this is a good thing. It helps us survive.

But chronic stress? That’s a whole other story. When the stress response stays switched on, cortisol levels remain elevated, and that’s where the trouble starts, especially in the realm of sexual health.

Cortisol vs. Sex Hormones: An Unfair Fight

High cortisol levels interfere with the production and function of our key sex hormones: testosterone, estrogen, and progesterone. For men and people with testes, cortisol competes with testosterone, leading to lower libido, erectile difficulties, and reduced sperm production. For women and people with ovaries, elevated cortisol can disrupt the menstrual cycle, dampen arousal, decrease sexual desire, and contribute to painful intercourse or vaginal dryness.

Essentially, when your body thinks you’re in danger, it puts reproduction and pleasure on the back burner.

The Brain in Love (and Lust) Needs Safety

Sex isn’t just about hormones. It’s deeply rooted in the brain’s emotional and reward systems. One of the most important players here is the limbic system, especially the amygdala, which processes fear and safety cues, and the nucleus accumbens, which processes pleasure and reward.

Under chronic stress, the amygdala becomes hyperactive, which makes the brain more vigilant and reactive. This state is antithetical to the conditions needed for sexual arousal. Remember: Pleasure requires presence. If you're stuck in fight-or-flight mode, your body isn’t going to prioritize getting turned on.

Stress Disrupts the “Pleasure Circuitry”

The mesolimbic dopamine pathway—the brain’s pleasure or reward circuit—gets disrupted under prolonged stress. This system (a.k.a. the seeking system) includes the ventral tegmental area and the nucleus accumbens, and is responsible for generating feelings of motivation, anticipation, and reward. If you want to learn more about our core wired-in emotional systems and the role they play in sex and pleasure, you can read about them here.

When this system gets dysregulated, we don’t just lose interest in sex—we lose interest in everything. This blunted reward response is part of what we see in depression and anhedonia, and it’s no surprise that stress, sexual dysfunction, and mood disorders often go hand in hand.

The Vicious Cycle: Stress, Sex, and Shame

Here’s the kicker: Not being able to have sex (or enjoy it) can create more stress. I see this all the time in my clinical practice. People come in feeling broken or ashamed because their desire has flatlined or sex has become a source of anxiety rather than joy.

And shame, my friends, is a huge driver of stress.

When we internalize sexual struggles as personal failures rather than physiological responses to stress and trauma, we reinforce the very stress that’s driving the problem. It becomes a feedback loop: Stress leads to sexual difficulties, which lead to more stress and shame, which further impair sexual functioning.

Everyday Trauma and the “Death by a Thousand Cuts” of Modern Life

In our fast-paced, high-pressure society, we’re navigating what I call “everyday trauma.” It’s not always the big-T traumas that wreak havoc—it’s the chronic, low-grade stress of being constantly plugged in, overextended, and emotionally undernourished. These small stressors accumulate, overwork our HPA axis, and erode our capacity for pleasure and connection.

Sex, especially partnered sex, requires attunement, trust, and vulnerability—all of which are hard to access when we're just trying to keep our heads above water

What Can We Do?

The good news is that our brains and bodies are plastic—they can change. We can restore our capacity for pleasure and intimacy, but it requires intention.

Here are a few things I recommend (also see this link for recharging your sex life):

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• Regulate your stress: Practices like mindfulness, breathwork, yoga, and time in nature help calm the HPA axis and create the conditions for sexual arousal. Even short daily practices can make a difference.

• Reconnect with the body: Mindful self-touch, sensual movement, and embodied meditation can help you bring attention back to your body and reawaken desire. You don’t have to jump into sex—start with feeling.

• Challenge the shame: Talk about it. Name it. Shame thrives in silence. Whether it's with a therapist, a partner, or a trusted friend, giving voice to your sexual struggles is the first step toward healing. Here are some tips for talking about sex with your partner.

• Get curious instead of judgmental: When things aren’t working sexually, approach it with curiosity, not criticism. Your body is trying to tell you something. What would it mean to listen?

• Build safety: Whether through therapy, relational healing, or nervous system work, building a felt sense of safety in your body and relationships is key to restoring your sexual vitality.

Prioritizing Pleasure Is Not a Luxury

I want to leave you with this: There is nothing wrong with you if stress is impacting your sex life. You’re not broken. You’re human. In a world that’s often hostile to rest, connection, and pleasure, reclaiming your right to sexual joy is a radical act of self-love. This is an opportunity to focus on enhancing your erotic potential.

So take a breath. Get curious. And remember: Your pleasure matters—not just as a luxury, but as a vital part of your emotional, physical, and relational well-being.

Nan Wise, Ph.D., - Website -Blog -

References

Wise, N. (2020). Why Good Sex Matters: Understanding the Neuroscience of Pleasure for a Smarter, Happier, and More Purpose-Filled Life. Harvest.

Twenge, J. M., Sherman, R. A., & Wells, B. E. (2017). Declines in sexual frequency among American adults, 1989–2014. Archives of Sexual Behavior, 46(8), 2389–2401.

McEwen, B. S. (2007). Physiology and neurobiology of stress and adaptation: central role of the brain. Physiological Reviews, 87(3), 873–904