Say you’re married to a man who sings to thousands of swooning fans on a regular basis. A man who was just named the “most stylish” by British GQ. A man who fathered your two beautiful children… Even then, you won’t always be in the mood for sex, says Chrissy Teigen from the personal experience of being married to John Legend.

“It doesn’t matter who you are—even if you’re a sexy R&B crooner or an ex-swimsuit model, you’re just tired,” says the always candid model in a new interview with Women’s Health . “We still have that passion for each other, but are we doing it randomly in a dressing room? No!”

That kind of honesty is par for the course from Teigen, but still so refreshing to hear: Researchers have found both mothers and fathers experience dips to their sex drives after the birth of a baby , largely because of factors like stress and fatigue.

For Teigen, it helps to see Legend in his element. As she says, “If he performs somewhere, and I go, I’m like, ‘Oh, he’s sexy.’ We’ll probably have sex that night.”

If watching your partner perform to thousands of people isn’t an option, life coach Kate Mason says the reality is that getting back between the sheets after kids will probably involve a bit more preparation than in the past—at least initially.

“If you know that both of you will be too tired to move by the time dinner is done, the kid is bathed and soundly asleep, try for a morning bout instead,” Mason previously wrote for Motherly .

 

 

Adding to the list of factors that can complicate postpartum intimacy is the fact that most new mothers’ bodies have changed. Even Teigen, a former Sports Illustrated swimsuit model, says she needed time to feel confident after earning some new stretch marks and boobs that don’t feel like her own. (“I look at my boobs and I’m like, What the heck happened? They face outwards now,” says Teigen.)

With time, perspectives from other moms, and a renewed focus on mental health, Teigen says she’s rediscovered her self-confidence. “Since I was 20 years old, I had this weight in my mind that I am, or that I’m supposed to be,” she says. “I’ve been so used to that number for 10 years now. And then I started realizing it was a swimsuit-model weight. There’s a very big difference between wanting to be that kind of fit and wanting to be happy-fit.”

That’s one unexpected benefit of kids: They have a way of helping us realize what matters.

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