Yes, Cyrena, she has had lots of individual therapy. But she hasn't told me much about that. It seems to have helped with a number of issues, but not our nonexistent sexual relationship.
But again, I keep in mind that getting rid of blockages does NOT guarantee that a woman will want sex. That's one of the constant assumptions I get from everyone giving me advice. If my wife is not sexual with me, it's BECAUSE of abuse, some huge blockage, my issues, etc. Nobody has every directly suggested to me that it might NOT be an issue that's causing it, and that not being interested in sex is not necessaril pathological.
SillyOldBear, the "acting if" suggestion is one I like. I used to do that quite a bit. Maybe it's time to try it again. Though it drove her nuts a while back when I was last doing it.
DanceQueen, I know what you mean about being an athlete. Both my wife and I are still very active with hiking and long-distance running and bicycling.
I think I know what you mean about sexual fulfillment, at least from memories when I was young and I had notions about a deep erotic emotional connection with my future wife. But I have to say that years of dealing with my SSM, perhaps, has me now thinking of orgasmic pleasure as being very much separate from any emotional relationship. And getting back to a more emotionally-based erotic/pleasure connection is going to take a lot of practice and real experience with someone who is capable of accepting me fully as a sexual person. I can see that that feeling isn't accessible to me right now -- it's hard even to picture it. I mean, for a long time I've only experienced sex as powerful adrenaline rush that can be had with someone in secret, so to speak.
As for trying to reach a mind-blowing orgasm -- I'm not trying. I'm succeeding quite nicely on that front with no effort at all. Which has also been a problem perhaps, in contrast to my wife, who's never had an orgasm. The contrast couldn't be greater, and made for such a lopsided and asymmetric sexual relationship even when it was "working".
Though I talk a lot about sex, I certainly want more than that, though maybe I'm not thinking of it in the richer light you are. For one thing, I like sex to last a long time -- fast buildups to climax are for the birds. Slow buildups and then hanging on the brink of orgasm for a long time lead to explosive orgasms. Was always perplexed to hear that women typically want their guy to last longer. In my marriage, all I ever heard was, "You can finish up now" during intercourse. And she never wanted any extra stimulation of any kind. Was never allowed to touch in key places either. And she was never big on foreplay either. So everything I heard and read in advice columns made ABSOLUTELY NO SENSE to my experience.
"As for trying to reach a mind-blowing orgasm -- I'm not trying. I'm succeeding quite nicely on that front with no effort at all. Which has also been a problem perhaps, in contrast to my wife, who's never had an orgasm. The contrast couldn't be greater, and made for such a lopsided and asymmetric sexual relationship even when it was "working"."
I know this seems important to you, so I'll address it...
The fact is, your wife never having had an orgasm is not actually a roadblock for you OR for her. Nor does it mean that you are having better sex than anyone else just because you are having mind-blowing O's and they are not. The O's are not the goal, even though it does seem that way to you right now.
Here is the main roadblock to your wife's sexual life: YOU.
You are her husband and you haven't yet told her in a direct way that you will no longer accept the way things are. She is relying on you to stay complacent, and THAT is the roadblock to her sexual life. She is comfy with the way things are (even though in reality, she isn't, but she is pretending just as you are). She is counting on the fact that she has backed you off from her and you no longer expect her to change. Voila! The perfect conditions for her to never change, and YOU are 50% responsible for this.
Yes, we all hear you, she doesn't want to explore, she doesn't want to be touched, she doesn't want to do the experimental types of playing that will help her find out how to have an O. We get it. Many people here have gone through similar. It doesn't mean anything though! I know you think that your experience is your reality and there is no other way to think about it...but there IS another way.
Did you read my post to you where I suggested what you could say to your wife to let her know you will no longer accept the way things are? You didn't respond to it, but I would like to know what you thought.
You will likely just figure "what's the point", but by reacting that way you will absolutely condemn your sex life to exactly what it is right now, and even worse because the future is going to get worse and worse for you (and her), not better.
The only way for you to possibly change around your situation is for YOU to stand up and make a concrete decision that you will not accept things the way they are anymore.
She will likely squirm, cry, maybe yell, maybe withdraw from you, argue your point, ask why its so important and on and on and on....
So what? This is what everyone will ultimately have to face with their LD spouse. You must keep remembering that she did not create this mess herself, as much as you would seem to like to blame it all on her. Who cares if she spouts off and cries and runs away? Will that actually physically hurt you? No way. What it will do is open the door to further talks, where you can continue to insist that you will not live like this forever.
When I was married before, I had the same type of list you had. In my mind, my marriage was sexless because he didn't do x, y, and z, and because he wasn't good at a, b, and c....and for my part, all I accepted in the blame was that I had some childhood sex abuse issues. So it was all his fault, my childhood's fault, and none my fault.
Guess what I found out when I finally divorced and sorted through all the research? IT WAS MY FAULT.
How?
Because I never stood up for what I wanted and needed in a clear and direct way that my husband understood I really meant. I was too afraid to "hurt him" by telling him the truth. I was afraid he would feel bad about himself. I was afraid he would not be able to ever do the things I'd like him to do, nor be good at them (and I don't mean sex acts entirely, but some of that too, yes). I thought that even if I demanded what I wanted, he wouldn't be able to deliver.
What I realize now is that I never gave him that chance, but that if I would have, he would have surprised me.
The reason he never stepped up to surprise me is MY OWN DAMN FAULT for not making it clear to him.
Don't get me wrong, there were many many talks where I believed I was telling him what I needed. There were tears and fights and on and on over the years. I'm sure you believe you have already said everything that needs to be said, too.
But you haven't, because so far you haven't said "I will NOT accept this any more and I WILL have the sex life I want to have". I never said that either, not like that. And now in retrospect, I know that even if it had hurt him initially, it would have been the kindest conversation I could have ever had with him. Because without that full on direct approach and fully knowing what was at stake, he could have never found within himself the tools needed to meet me halfway.
So...I blew it, we are divorced, and I know now I can no longer believe the old fairy tales I told myself about how our ssm was all his fault anymore. It was a lie I told myself because I did not have the courage to be directly honest.
DanceQueen, you make good sense, but I have to explain a little more. I don't think in terms of who's at fault, or to blame. The only thing that matters for this discussion is what can I do in this relationship. And some of the things you suggest sound good. I have already discussed divorce with my wife, I have already suggested taking a lover and having an open relationship, I have discussed that I want to date other women, but that was all a few years back at this point. At the time, she said she needed more time, and that she would "consider" what I had suggested. But nothing has changed in this regard, though she has certainly made a lot of personal progress in her other career and avocation goals, not to mention family projects and other efforts which mean a lot to her personally, to her credit. So this might be a good time to bring it up again.
But what's difficult is that there is little that I have not already said before. Except that she called my bluff on divorce, for example. So I have to suggest divorce again, and this time really mean it. And explain why. And my difficulty is I absolutely hate that kind of conversation with someone I love, sex or no sex. She ends up feeling like she's being taken to the woodshed, and so on. There is no good way to have that discussion, and it's ended with nothing but bad feelings all around.
If my wife were someone I could talk openly and frankly with about these issues, I think I would have resolved these problems one way or the other long ago.
When I continually brought these issues up before, she got to the point where she said she feels she "can't be safe with me". Something having to do with past abuse, perhaps. And at that point she would immediately leave the room on the first few words where she could sense I was going to talk about this. I couldn't follow her and demand a discussion, because then she'd get hysterical, and sometimes just leave in the car and stay out until late at night. That was some years ago, but I think her response would still be the same now if I pressed it. It was a shocking stonewalling that left me no options other than to just make my own decisions without her consent, disagreement, approval, or anything simply because the would refuse to talk about it, no matter how much pressure I put on her to do so. And dressing it up and sneaking it into a discussion didn't work either -- it just made her even more on guard to avoid situations where she would even spend time with me doing other things, lest I bring it up.
But at this point, and maybe for the first time, we have a pretty good buffer of time since any of those incidents. She certainly feels safer around me now. But I think part of that is because I haven't brought up these issues.
Having to explain all this makes me realize how "out of the norm" my marriage is. When I read suggestions like yours, I learn more about what other women are like in the sense that I have to assume the suggestions would work for other women. Kind of reminds me of a time when a friend suggested that my problem was that I needed to give my wife more foreplay and clitoral stimulation. OK, I said, there's just one problem with that -- she doesn't want any of that and furthermore, won't even let me. "Huh? Really? Wow, you have a problem." So, sad to say, from his comment I learned more about what other women need, not my wife.
When I was first trying to deal with all this, it was really deflating to realize that things were so out of kilter that normal advice for normal problems didn't even apply in my marriage. My god, man, if lack of foreplay and clitoral stimulation was my only problem, I'd be on those right away and the problem would be fixed tonight!!!
ssmguy...Hopefully silly will chime in. He knows all about the waterworks when the discussion begins.
I am a woman and I am here to say: DON'T BUY HER MANIPULATION OF YOU.
I can't disagree that she does feel unsafe. Of course she does, she is being confronted with her own marital negligence.
She can tell herself that her fears are based on her childhood, but you don't have to believe it, you know that right? She can believe it, but you don't have to. You can be kind toward her while she is believing that her past demons are the reason she doesn't feel safe with you, but you still don't have to believe it yourself.
Now, given this understanding, that her crying and feeling unsafe and fleeing the scene is NOT about YOU, can you feel safer yourself in delivering the message once again? Her fears and tantrums are something you do not have to take on the burden of. You can expect reasonable, loving communication in a marriage, man. C'mon! Think about this, ok? Is it reasonable for her to hold your entire sex life under emotional hostage like that?? Even given her history? No. How do I know this? Because once you make sure she truly understands that her reaction will not sway your decision to stand up for your own sex life, she will quickly begin changing her tune. It may take a day or two for it to sink into her head that you are serious this time. But if you really ARE serious, she WILL know this and it will sink in. You'll have to take a leap of faith and trust in us, ssmguy....but seriously, wait til you hear more from silly about the subject of crying and leaving the room, and how much different that tune sounded once he made it CLEAR to her that he would TRULY move toward divorce!
I'm still sorting all that out for myself, actually. I've learned a few things, but I still don't really understand how it works in the sense of why a woman works so hard to manipulate a man, but demands that he be immune to her manipulations or she'll lose respect for him. It still seems to me that it would be simpler to choose a good man and then not try to manipulate him or "test" him, but I accept that it's not the way things are done. I'm cursed with a need to know why things happen, and I can't let them rest.
But I know a few things now that I didn't know a couple of years ago:
1. I cry when I've reached my breaking point. If I'm crying, someone is probably dead or a bone is broken, or (especially since my youngest son was born) I'm looking at something that deeply touches me emotionally. She cries a LONG time before her breaking point. If someone managed to make me cry by saying something to me, one of us would probably be about to get hurt. But if she cries because I said something to her, I can't assume that she's badly hurt at all. She might just be mad. Or worried. Or feeling guilty.
2. She's perfectly capable of feeling real remorse and terrible guilt over our problems while we discuss them. This feels deep and permanent to her at the time. But if I relent because she feels that way, she will take that as my acceptance. We'll fall back into the same rut in no time.
3. My wife is a child of divorce--an ugly divorce. Her parents can't stand each other; her mother particularly despises her father. She always lived in fear of the end of our marriage, when I would get fed up and leave. She would lose control and cry wildly because she was sure that every time I told her about something that bothered me, I was leading up to telling her that the marriage was over. As long as I didn't do that, she would cry tears and promise whatever to keep the marriage going, but it was always hanging over her head.
4. I am the child of a long, happy marriage. That's my ideal--that you choose someone great and then you make it work, whatever it takes. When we got married, I couldn't imagine any good reason we would divorce. I thought that if we ever divorced, it would be over a failure of the will to stay together and make each other happy. Because I have a bad Nice Guy problem, that mostly meant that I gave up a lot of things that made me happy and tried everything I could think of to make her happy. But I can't *make* her happy, and that's a bitter pill, believe me, but it's true. I told her that I would never leave, no matter what. That I wanted her to help me and work with me, but that no matter what happened, I would never leave. Like you, I thought I was being kind. I thought I would take away her fear of divorce and then we would be free to deal with our problems honestly. What I managed, as I'm sure you've figured out, was to show her by word and deed that I didn't really care what she did, since there was nothing she could do that would drive me away and no degradation I would not accept in order to be with her (for sufficient values of "be with.")
5. I'm a Nice Guy, White Knight, and whatever other pop-psych jargon there is for a man who puts women on a pedestal and keeps them there. I can't stand to see a woman cry. I couldn't stand to see her cry. I feel sick at the sight, and my first thought is that I'm causing this by not putting a stop to this. I sincerely believed that if she started to cry, I had gone too far. The truth is that she was crying because were beginning to get at the truth.
6. I have not mastered any of this by any means, but I do this much right now: if she cries, she cries. If my problem is not serious enough to warrant a few tears, then I shouldn't have brought it up in the first place. I just have to bull on through and keep going. And here's the magic part: you don't have to proceed past the tears many times before she catches on that tears don't stop the discussion anymore. I don't know how much of this involves conscious thought or ploys, but I can't deny that the waterworks dried up considerably after I told her a few times that I'd get her a kleenex but we still had a lot to talk about.
Now, only once or twice did she actually get up and leave. She never left the house, just went to another room to collect herself, and I usually let her go. But I waited for her, and when she came back it was clear that she understood we were picking up where we had left off.
If she has found out that she can end the conversation by crying, you don't have a chance--except that you don't have to keep letting her do that. You don't have to be mean, you just hand her a tissue and keep going. She may actually be shocked enough by that to tell you that she's crying and you should stop, and that's when you tell her that what you're talking about is too important. Obviously it's important that you choose an appropriate place and time when you both have time for a discussion, partly because that's just common sense and partly because if she has an excuse to avoid the conversation, she will--as DanceQueen said, this conversation is painful for her the way the first mile is painful for an out-of-shape smoker. It hurts to change your habits and demand more from yourself, even if they were bad habits.
If she leaves, my completely unprofessional and untested advice would be to resolve that when she comes back, the conversation picks up where it left off. I have no idea whether that will work, but it can't hurt.
You have less to fear than you think you do. If the rest of your marriage is as good as you think it is, or even pretty close, then you have to know that she has a lot to lose if the marriage ends, too. The classic Nice Guy thinks his wife is his superior in most ways and that she's a fool to stay with him. He's glad she stays, but he doesn't understand it. He thinks he has to tread lightly all the time because he never knows when she might get fed up and leave for good. But that's all in his head.
That's a long post, but two more important observations before I toddle off to bed:
1. You already know this, but the more you write, the more important your wife's history of abuse seems to move to the fore. That's something my wife didn't deal with, although she had some horrible boyfriends (And I rescued her from those awful brutes! Isn't that great?) I realize you say she's had therapy dealing with that issue, but do you believe she's made any progress toward resolving it so she can really live with it? It doesn't sound that way.
2. You said this:
Quote:
I don't think in terms of who's at fault, or to blame.
You wouldn't be human if you didn't, but it's clear when I read your posts that most of them come around to all the ways she has wronged you. That's normal. I'd be shocked if you weren't furious deep down. Nothing changed for me until I got so furious that I couldn't stop thinking about it and I had to do something about it. But you'll have an easier time if you acknowledge openly that you're mad about the way you've been treated. People like me think a woman will respect us for our wisdom and calm kindness, but they just wonder why we don't respect ourselves enough to get mad when someone walks on us.
And don't ask me why they don't just stop walking on us and avoid the whole issue; these are the mysteries. (This is the part where DanceQueen informs us that men do the same thing and I'm a sexist.)
This is an interesting discussion. I don't see a "Sex Starved Wife" board. Is it ok to talk about women with HD here?
When you talk about ultimatum that you no longer accept things as they are, what outcome are you looking to achieve? It seems it is not only about having sex more, it is more about the attitude, the difference in outlook on sex life as a whole.
DQ, you are happy with the way things are, but you wish it was more often. Is that right?
I'd like to read about those stages of intimacy. I've been thinking about it forever. Of course there's a book about it. I'll look up previous posts for the name. Are there any other good reads on the subject?
I sometimes make a conscious effort to reverse the pronouns just so people will realize I'm not just talking about women, but some of the specific issues we're talking about are usually not seen the same by a man and a woman, even if they're both the LD or HD partner in their relationships. But yes, the book on SSM talks quite a bit about the special problems a HD woman has because the social expectation is that men are horny (and pigs) while women are overworked, saintly mothers who have to fight their husbands off. And I think there's a "Sex-Starved Wife" book by Michelle Weiner-Davis now, too . . . here it is, in an excerpt NBC put up on the web. Here it is on Amazon-- The Sex-Starved Wife: What do Do When He's Lost Desire I've written here a few times now about the irony of our Sex-Starved Marriage, that my wife's best friend was (is) having the same problem except that she's the HD one and her husband is the LD guy.
Well, as SSMGuy found out (and I did, too, if you go read my original thread) if you bring up divorce without the resolve to do it, then you haven't really given an ultimatum. You only reinforce that you're weak and you'll put up with anything.
If you genuinely will not divorce under any circumstances, it would be better not to bluff. Speaking only for myself, I got to a point where I understood that my wife and I were ruining our marriage and I couldn't live with it. I still hated the thought of divorce just as much; I knew it would be a humiliating, painful process that would never really end because we have children together, and I knew that even if I took the step of leaving and filing, I would have to deal with the fact that I deeply loved my wife. It seemed crazy to contemplate divorcing a woman you love!
I didn't set a date or a deadline; I simply said to her that I hated the thought of divorcing her, I honestly didn't know what I would do with my life after we divorced, but that if she wasn't willing to work and make our marriage work I was willing to do it. I told her that I was asking her to make a real effort with me to save the marriage, and that if she wouldn't wake up and try to turn things around, we were headed inevitably for divorce because I would be the one to file eventually, when I was sure she'd given up.
DanceQueen has probably long forgotten (I had) but she posted this in one of my first threads about my own situation:
Quote:
The number one thing my ex-husband could have done that would have prompted me into changing and fixing my LD problem was if he took a stand on it and refused FOR HIMSELF to be married in a sexless marriage. . . . I am hoping you see a point here - it makes me ANGRY that he would have stayed married to me forever, even though he was unhappy and didn't love me anymore. For all my mistakes, I always loved him and always wanted things to improve with him and I kept trying and trying. But he valued committment much higher than he valued me as his wife, or even his own happiness.
This is skewed! His happiness should have been his own first priority, as it should be to everyone. What he wanted was simple love and physical love from me, but he didnt have the skills and tools necessary to deal with all of my emotional baggage. OK - that is totally understandable - no one is born a mental health professional and can just "fix" a person like me with love. But what happened? Well, as he became more and more unhappy and finally fell out of love with me, suddenly I was now to blame for all of his unhappiness. It was MY FAULT because I didn't want to have sex with him.
Where was his own responsibility to himself for his own happiness? Why was it all on my shoulders? Why would he have put us both through misery for the rest of our lives, by remaining married to me in a loveless, sexless marriage? Why was that "ok" with him?
That's where the road leads when you decide that you'll never leave, you'll just accept misery . . . and if she finally gets tired of it and takes the initiative to leave because you won't, it probably feels like the end of the world.
I'll look up previous posts for the name. Are there any other good reads on the subject?