Recommended Resources
For the parts of libido hormones don't address.
Libido is never just hormones — for anyone, ever. It's biology, mind, and connection working together, all the time.
50–70% of women going through perimenopause and menopause experience low libido. That's not a niche issue — it's most of us.
What changes in this transition is that the biological layer shifts dramatically. That often exposes how much the other layers matter — and how little most of us were ever taught about them.
Hormones do a lot. Restoring estrogen, progesterone, and testosterone changes the physical layer — energy, response, sensation, vaginal tissue, sleep, mood. For many women, that alone is transformative. It's the foundation everything else builds on.
But hormones don't reach every layer. The first half of this page explains the layers they don't reach and why those matter. The second half is the resources that work on them. Each is evidence-based. Each does something specific. None of this is your fault, and none of it is something you were ever taught.
Why it's complicated.
Spontaneous desire is rarely spontaneous.
Most women want what feels like spontaneous desire — the wanting that just shows up, like it used to. Research on female sexual response suggests that what we remember as spontaneous desire was usually responsive desire plus anticipation, happening so close together it felt like one thing.
Early in a relationship, anticipation is constant — the texts, planning the next time you'll see them, the buildup. Years in, anticipation has to be created on purpose, and most of us were never taught how. The reassuring part: responsive desire is a skill. It can be cultivated with practice, attention, and the right framework.
Most of us were never taught real sex education.
Most women never had real sex education. Neither did most men. A lot of what people now think sex should look like comes from porn — which is performance, not data. The expectations that follow from porn don't match how women's bodies actually work, and that mismatch causes a lot of unnecessary suffering on every side.
Filling that gap as adults — through clear, research-based information — is often the missing piece. It's not about needing to "try harder." It's about having the actual information no one ever gave you.
The orgasm gap is real — and it isn't biology.
What "typical" sex looks like for most heterosexual couples doesn't match how women's bodies actually work. The data:
- Median time to orgasm during partnered sex: ~5–6 minutes for men, ~13 minutes for women.
- Heterosexual women orgasm in about 65% of partnered encounters. Heterosexual men: ~95%. Lesbian women: ~86%.
- With clitoral stimulation included, women's orgasm rate roughly doubles — from ~21–30% to ~51–60%.
That gap isn't biological. It's an information and skill gap most of us inherited. Typical sex was designed around what works for men's bodies — and once you have the actual information about what works for yours, the gap closes faster than most women expect.
After pain, your brain protects you.
If you've ever had painful sex — even once, even years ago — your brain remembers and protects you. That's not a personal failing. It's a survival system doing its job.
The way out isn't pushing through. It's teaching your body, slowly, that sex is safe again. Sometimes that's therapy. Sometimes it's physical care. Often it's both, working together over time.
What helps.
Laurie Bonura, LMSW, MEd
For the layered work — when desire is tangled with relationship dynamics, past pain, body image, or trauma, the research consistently supports working with an actual human therapist. Bonura is trained in clinical sexology at Widener University and in AASECT supervision (the standard sex therapy credential pathway). Individual and couples sessions. Free 15-minute consultation to see if she's the right fit.
Best for Anyone whose situation is too layered for self-paced work alone — especially if pain, trauma history, or relationship dynamics are part of what's going on.
Ferly
For building responsive desire as a skill. Ferly is built on the same cognitive-behavioral and mindfulness research cited in the academic literature on female desire — packaged into daily exercises, guided audio, journaling, and partner practices. Developed with leading researchers in female sexual medicine. The app version of "responsive desire is a skill you can learn."
Best for When your body feels back online but the wanting hasn't come back. Especially good for the responsive-desire-and-anticipation work, in app form you can use daily.
Esther Perel — Bringing Back Desire
For the long-relationship "we love each other but the spark is gone" pattern. Perel's central insight: desire and security pull in opposite directions, and most long-term couples accidentally extinguish desire by trying to maximize closeness. The course teaches the dynamics that keep desire alive in long partnerships — anticipation, distance, mystery — the things most of us were never taught about how desire actually works inside a committed relationship.
Best for Couples doing this work together — especially when the relationship is genuinely good and the spark has still flattened over time.
OMGYES
For the orgasm gap and the technique gap. Built on the largest peer-reviewed studies of women's sexual pleasure, developed in collaboration with researchers from Indiana University and the Kinsey Institute. Video-based, focused on what actually works — concrete techniques most of us never learned because no one ever taught them.
Best for The practical, mechanical side. Especially good for women whose information about their own bodies has been incomplete, and who want clear, evidence-based answers about what works.