Yeah like I’ve been with hubs for years even before making it legally binding and at a certain point 90% of your communication / negotiation is nonverbal with a 10% verbal clarification for when it’s insufficient. Like we’ll mutually get pushy / use the other if we’re horny enough just because we’ve been together long enough that we recognize that sometimes the other person just really needs it at that time to feel loved or they need physical release or they’re just too damn horny even if you’re not feeling it right that second.

There’s still space to say no if you’re really just sick / hurt / tired / overstimulated but at this point the default setting for both of us is “yeah go ahead just use lube” / understanding that it’s on the initiator to put in the effort to receive an adequate physiological response. And you accidentally overstep sometimes but it’s pretty minor and non traumatic when it’s rare and you’re both able to look at it from the perspective of an honest mistake. Sometimes your partner steps on your toes or runs into you around a corner too and it’s not a problem unless you’re in a shitty relationship with an ongoing unidirectional lack of effort towards preventing hurtful events.

I think this is what a lot of older couples are describing who are in what would otherwise be considered a healthy and living relationship by modern standards but where (usually the woman) states that she considers satisfying her husband’s appetites to be an obligation of their marriage. I take issue with it being unidirectional (historical perspectives on women’s sex drive is a whole other convo) and think they’re lacking the emotional intelligence / language to describe the level of communication they’re actually doing, but I think what they’re actually describing is just that they’ve been together so damn long that that communication has become largely nonverbal and following loose but long-standing emotional relationship contracts.

TLDR; after enough years you don’t need verbal yes/no as frequently.