Having issues with my girlfriend of 5 years.

We’ve been dating now for a bit more than 5 years, and generally, everything is still as good as ever: we basically never fight, enjoy each other’s company, get on well with each other’s friends, enjoy similar things, have similar goal in life, and so on so forth. Marriage is definitely on the cards in the not too distant future.

That being said, for the last 6 months she’s had a medical condition which has significantly impacted physical contact. That in itself isn’t a problem; I’m sympathetic and we can work through it – hopefully it is only a temporary thing, with some treatment, I’m sure she’ll be back to normal sooner or later. The problem is that even before that, sexual contact was drifting towards being less and less. I’m worried that is going to continue to be an issue going forward. I feel like I’ve had to start “nagging” for sex, and she almost never initiates. It’s become quite clear that we both have very different ideas about how much sex is acceptable.

I have talked to her about this, making it clear that I have no expectations of her while she is unwell. She isn’t dismissive of me, and will engage me in conversation on this, but I don’t feel like I’ve gotten any resolution from the conversation. Most of the answers were “try being more patient”, “sometimes I just don’t feel like it”, and “I’m sorry” and “I don’t know what to say”. I still feel like she doesn’t really consider this to be much of a problem.

I’m honestly a bit lost. On one hand, I can’t imagine throwing away a relationship like this; on the other hand, it is a problem that I want to resolve, but despite talking about it with her, I don’t really have any clear idea of how to go about it.