Answer
Wa `alaykum As-Salamu wa Rahmatullahi wa Barakatuh
In the Name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful.
All praise and thanks are due to Allah, and peace and blessings be upon His Messenger.
In this fatwa:
If a husband and wife abstain from sexual relations for one reason or another, that by itself does not constitute divorce. Divorce, in order to be valid, must be pronounced or written down.
Focusing more on your question, Sheikh Ahmad Kutty, a senior lecturer and Islamic scholar at the Islamic Institute of Toronto, Ontario, Canada, states:
Marriage is not just a financial and physical arrangement of living together but a sacred contract, a gift of Allah, to lead a happy, enjoyable life and procreate.
The main goal of marriage in Islam is the realization of tranquility and compassion between the spouses. For the attainment of this supreme goal, Islam has defined certain duties and rights for the husband and wife.
If a husband and wife abstain from sexual relations for one reason or another, that by itself does not constitute divorce. Divorce, in order to be valid, must be pronounced or written down.
Since, as I can understand, nothing of the above has happened in your case, your marriage shall be deemed as valid.
However, if one of the parties wishes to seek a divorce on grounds of utter sexual dissatisfaction, that is another matter; for definitely, this can be considered a valid ground for divorce in Islam.
Almighty Allah knows best.
Editor’s note: This fatwa is from Ask the Scholar’s archive and was originally published at an earlier date.