‘Our son sleeps with us’
Solaya Rowley, 44, is an actor and lives in Stoke-on-trent with her husband Chris, 44, a DJ, and their three children, Grace, 13, Ivy, five, and Harrison, three.
When I look back at our sex life when Chris and I first met 16 years ago,
I can’t believe how much has changed. But that’s what happens when you’ve got three kids in tow!
I still fancy him just as much as I did when we first met but the physical side of our relationship has definitely changed. When we met in 2006, Chris worked on the door at the same bar where I worked, and the connection was so strong that we were at it three times a day. I’ve always enjoyed sex, but with Chris, it was an attraction and intensity like no other.
BECOMING PARENTS
Fast forward two years, when we had our firstborn, Grace, in 2008. I struggled to feed her and had postnatal depression. Chris and I took two-hour shifts to get some sleep and suddenly, we went
from having sex three times a day to never.
We had no time together and any free time was spent catching up on sleep. After Grace turned one, my mum helped with childcare on weekends, giving Chris and me a chance to revive our relationship.
Then, when our second daughter Ivy was born in 2016, it was as if we’d taken two steps back, heightened by the fact I solely breastfed her for 18 months. Sex was the last thing on my mind.
But after a night out for a special occasion ended with Chris and I having sex, our youngest, Harrison, came along in 2018.
Now three, although he has his own room, he sleeps in our bed every night. Our chances are few and far between and on average, we’re doing it once
every six months.
We both miss sex a lot, as it makes us feel closer as a couple. We try to maintain intimacy in other ways, like holding hands, giving each other kisses and saying ‘I love you.’
It helps give me the reassurance I need that we still feel the same about each other as we always did.
Chris says: ‘I miss having sex with my wife, and find it quite stressful that we don’t have enough free time together for it. In the beginning of our relationship, it was just about the two of us, but even though things are different, we try to maintain intimacy. No kids in the bed is the rule I’d instil if I could!’