Lesbian Bed Death

THE HOT LESBIAN COLUMN | ISSUE ELEVEN | MAHIMAHI / SEX Written by Bella den Boogert (they/them) | @belladbb | Contributing Lesbian

Illustrated by Tashi Donnelly (she/her) | @tashi_rd | Editor-in-Chief

“Lesbian Bed Death” is a term I’ve encountered many times throughout my years dating women, mostly through online forums or the occasional inside joke with a fellow sapphic about our personal relationships. 

When I first encountered the term, I pictured my partner and me lying asleep in my bed, holding hands like a tomb portrait, comfortable and forever encased in a sea of blankets and pillows around us. What’s so bad about that? Spending time in bed with my partner asleep is honestly one of my favourite parts of a relationship, feeling secure and removed from the outside world, existing only in each other’s arms. Unfortunately for me, my blissfully romanticised scene of an eternity in bed with my beloved was not what bed death was referring to…

To break down the term, it describes a phenomenon that occurs to lesbians in long-term relationships where sex becomes less frequent. The phrase became popularised after a 1983 study by sociologists Pepper Schwartz and Philip Blumstein in which they concluded that lesbians were having comparatively less sex in long-term relationships than heterosexual or gay male couples. The term then proliferated within the American cultural zeitgeist, taking on its own life after lesbians adopted it to describe frustrations within their own relationships. 

Even now, the main use of the term occurs within the lesbian community, as a joke or as a genuine concern that something out of their control is coming to ruin their otherwise fulfilled relationships. I would be lying if I said it didn’t float to the forefront of my mind in rough patches with my partners. In frustration, I have often caught myself thinking, “It's finally here; it caught up to us. I thought we were doing so well.” It’s convenient to have a term that specifically describes an element of sapphic relationships that can sometimes be difficult to talk about with our partners. However, it’s more important to note that this term is perpetuating a myth rather than an actual issue that affects just lesbians. 

To unpack this myth, we have to start by acknowledging the problems with the 1983 study that Schwartz and Blumstein conducted, the main issue being that the measures of sex recorded do not accurately reflect lesbian relationships. Notably, the study focused on the number of sexual encounters each couple was having as opposed to the quality or satisfaction experienced by either party. Another important issue was that the study primarily focused on penetrative sexual methods, greatly misrepresenting sapphic practices. 

Sexual frequency decreasing in long-term relationships is a phenomenon that affects couples of all genders and orientations. So why do we never hear the term “bed death” in relation to other genders or relationship types? Why is such a definitive and harsh word like death used to describe diminishing sexual frequency in lesbian relationships? Especially when statistically we know most other types of relationships are experiencing the same thing? Is it simply a historical tendency to reduce queer relationships between women to friendships? Maybe they were just good friends all along, and this sex thing was just a phase?

I believe one of the main factors in why “lesbian bed death” has become such a misunderstood cultural phenomenon is the ever-present enigma of women’s sex. Women’s sexual health and pleasure have been sidelined historically; therefore, a mysterious stigma still surrounds women’s sexual relationships with each other. As lesbians, we are faced with questions that demonstrate this in our everyday lives constantly, such as the classic: “So who’s the man in your relationship?” 

Unfortunately, it is still unfathomable for a lot of people that sexual satisfaction can occur without a male participant. That goes to say, for people that haven’t experienced a sapphic relationship, a lot can be left up to the imagination. Which is perhaps a factor in why bed death has been named in this spirit of fantastical dramatism, when in reality this problem affects most long-term couples regardless of gender or orientation for a multitude of reasons.

Now, all that being said, I don’t plan to stop using lesbian bed death as a term. For me, it will always exist in the space of queer humour, a funny inside joke I can use with fellow lesbians in the spirit of shared experience, such as the U-Haul stereotype. The most important thing to note about the fabled lesbian bed death is that not every couple has sex the same way, so sexual frequency simply cannot be used to measure the success or failure of a relationship. As a lesbian, it would be a disservice to my own experiences to analyse my relationships through the lens of heteronormativity. The most beautiful and intimate parts of a sapphic relationship cannot be accounted for or compared to the model of a straight one.