I hear you. I just wonder if it makes me an odd ball because I really don't care much at all about sex. I wonder why we can't maintain our relationship on the other things.
It would seem to me that you have the most important part of the relationship intact. Clearly your W is either hurt,angry or confused in a way which made her choose to engage in an extramarital sexual liaison.
Since you have this fabulous emotional tie and since your W finally had the courage to tell you of her infidelity, it seems to be a question of figuring out what prompted it and whether it is something you both can work on together.
If she is not moving out and you want the marriage to work and if you have a reasonably intimate emotional tie still, there might still be hope.
The key I would think is to start listening very carefully.When she talks really try to understand and to reflect back to her what you understand her to say.
Forgive me if I am wrong but it seems that she was not able to easily come to the table with the news of the affair. She tried to provoke you into acting in a way which might either justify her or prompt her into revealing the ugly truth.
The choice to have an affair is a hard one to live with it would seem. Pinning it on a fault with you is the next easiest way to make the admission of guilt.
The next most important key would be to focus on yourself. Make yourself happy and attractive to be with. Create a life for yourself that she would want to share, drawn like a moth to a candle (with better results).
Don't make conversations about you. Let her talk. Draw her out. Make it safe for her to what she really needs to say.
You might consider a sex therapist after a while.
All is not lost. Sex is only one part of marriage. Often its the other stuff which is harder to come by.
With all the changes that have happened, have you physically changed a lot? Is your physical appearance less attractive to your W now - were you a snappy dresser and now you dress down? Were you physically toned before and well groomed but now you have let yourself go? Do you feel worthy of your W's respect? Do you feel worthy of your W?
I went through a depressed phase after losing my job where I kind of got sloppy. Also, having Crohn's Disease and not knowing it did affect my lifestyle. That's gotten better now that I've been diagnosed and am taking medication. I have more energy and I work out more often. I actually feel like dressing better and looking better.
Originally Posted By: saffie
You need to pinpoint what it is you have lost in that area, ( and my guess would be your 'masculine edge' and your self respect). It sounds like perhaps you have so much guilt from the drunken night incident and your job situation, that you are going round like a dog skulking and expecting to be, (and thinking it deserves to be), kicked.
I think you may be on to something with this. I am not the self confident, in control, powerful man I was when we married.
I come form a working class family. Those values of a man always having a job and supporting his family are deeply ingrained in me. Not having a job and being rejected by so many has really taken a toll on me.
I also feel terrible for my actions the night I lost control. I was a monster that night and I feel awful about it. I do feel like I deserve to be kicked. I was always my wife's protector and I turned into a threat. I regret that more than anything in my life.
Originally Posted By: saffie
Man up would be my suggestion.
How do I do that in this situation? Do I throw down an ultimatum? Do I leave if she doesn't comply? I just don't know what to do. I've never been more confused in my life.
I hear you. I just wonder if it makes me an odd ball because I really don't care much at all about sex. I wonder why we can't maintain our relationship on the other things.
It would seem to me that you have the most important part of the relationship intact. Clearly your W is either hurt,angry or confused in a way which made her choose to engage in an extramarital sexual liaison.
Since you have this fabulous emotional tie and since your W finally had the courage to tell you of her infidelity, it seems to be a question of figuring out what prompted it and whether it is something you both can work on together.
If she is not moving out and you want the marriage to work and if you have a reasonably intimate emotional tie still, there might still be hope.
The key I would think is to start listening very carefully.When she talks really try to understand and to reflect back to her what you understand her to say.
Forgive me if I am wrong but it seems that she was not able to easily come to the table with the news of the affair. She tried to provoke you into acting in a way which might either justify her or prompt her into revealing the ugly truth.
The choice to have an affair is a hard one to live with it would seem. Pinning it on a fault with you is the next easiest way to make the admission of guilt.
The next most important key would be to focus on yourself. Make yourself happy and attractive to be with. Create a life for yourself that she would want to share, drawn like a moth to a candle (with better results).
Don't make conversations about you. Let her talk. Draw her out. Make it safe for her to what she really needs to say.
You might consider a sex therapist after a while.
All is not lost. Sex is only one part of marriage. Often its the other stuff which is harder to come by.
"We kiss each other goodbye every morning and goodnight every night. But it is rarely the passionate kind of kiss."
Have you thought about taking the initiative and give her that passion? Maybe it's the excitement she's missing.
I thought about that and I tried last night. She seemed very disappointed and said she just didn't feel it. Maybe it is the timing because we were having a bad night last night still dealing with her revelation.
I come form a working class family. Those values of a man always having a job and supporting his family are deeply ingrained in me. Not having a job and being rejected by so many has really taken a toll on me.
Okay, now we are getting someplace. This says a lot to me. It also sounds as if you've endured rejection from other family members or friends? Take that and add to the depression and add to your disease and you have a lot of junk bogging your spirit down.
Have you talked openly to your doctor? Some men find it hard to admit depression, but your doctor needs to know about it. All of this stuff added together is enough to make anyone's self-confidence flush down the toliet. It has to have an affect on your sex drive, don't you think? I won't say you are an odd ball, but I'd say it's rare to see a man who is into all the emotional intimacy and a low sex drive. Maybe it's just rare to hear one admit it? IDK.
It is hard to get all the information into a few posts, so don't get discouraged and give up. It takes time for board members to say all that needs to be said, and time for you to read and digest it. Continue to read the threads here on the forum and you will start to grow. Just don't quit us, okay?
It is not about what you feel should work in your M. It is about doing the work that gets the right results. Do what works!
Originally Posted By: saffie Man up would be my suggestion.
How do I do that in this situation? Do I throw down an ultimatum? Do I leave if she doesn't comply? I just don't know what to do. I've never been more confused in my life.
Be the man you once were. Work on your self confidence. Work on your appearance. Find who it was she once fell in love with in the first place.
I wouldn't be throwing down ultimatums - well not unless you are willing to follow through. Never threaten something you won't follow through - you just end up looking like a complete tool if you do that.
Seems to me you W felt bad about what happened re the ONS - and she told you about it. It doesn't make it ok, but it sort of indicates to me that she is trying to be open and honest with you - which is a great start.
You can't change her but you can change YOU. I personally think you need to work on your self confidence. Start dressing smarter and act more confident - even if inside you don't feel it. Women want a man they can respect. I know that for most men their work is strongly attached to who they feel they are and how they judge their worth......but there is so much more to you than that.
My H will 'allow' me to pretty much go along as I like, but I know there are certain boundaries that I wouldn't cross - maybe it's quite different for me as I am a SAHM and I have a pretty good life, so I respect my H's decisions on some things even though I may disagree with them. I like it that he has this 'edge' to him though; I wouldn't respect him if he was a push over. When something BIG comes along though, we tackle it as a team.
In summary though I guess I am saying, become the man who your W is proud to have on her arm, the man she would want to 'ravish 'her, NOT the one that whimpers in the corner and begs forgiveness. You did what you did re the getting drunk etc. There were reasons. It's been and gone.
Get up and act like the man in your house.
There is a book called No More Mr Nice Guy - perhaps you need to read it. It can be a bit extreme, and you need only take from it what you need.
Saffie me 46 H 46 M in 1986 D20,D18,S16,D13 H's A 01/05 to 07/06 H recommitted to M 07/06 renewed vows 09/06 Going from strength to strength
"In summary though I guess I am saying, become the man who your W is proud to have on her arm, the man she would want to 'ravish 'her, ..."
rav·ish Spelled[rav-ish] –verb (used with object) 1. to fill with strong emotion, esp. joy. 2. to seize and carry off by force. 3. to carry off (a woman) by force. 4. to rape (a woman).
Assume we mean 1. on the above list ;-)
Some W's (even the privileged SAHMs) work themselves up into a very sorry state that's impossible to change no matter what in the world you do. So just in case this W is in that state it would be best to first use the little energy you have left to work yourself up into a state just for your OWN good, not hers. Her job as a W was to build you up when you lost your job and she failed miserably. So meanwhile she can use her old Guicci bag on her arm for all you care (i.e, focus on ravishing yourself ;-). And realistically you cannot be or look likelike the man she fell "in-love" with - that man's long gone and was probably not real in the first place - may well have been a figment of her imagination.
Has she actually told you WHY she doesn't find you attractive physically? Many times they are just reflecting their own insecurities onto the spouse.
Have you talked to her concerning transparency with the OM?
We talked about that last night. I think it was a good conversation because we started getting to the roots and causes of her feelings toward me. Some of them I don't agree with but I at least understand them. I'm hoping that through understanding we can find healing. As I said, I'm a very logical person...sometimes to a fault.
First thing that came up is that she hasn't forgiven me for losing control. I said and did some very nasty things some of them true, most of them not. I was a monster, I know. It only happened a few months ago and she's having a difficult time with it. She said that she never imagined in her worst nightmares that I could turn into that guy and now that's all she sees when she looks at me. How do I get her to let go of this?
The second thing was a bit more difficult for me to wrap my head around, but I sense sincerity in her words. She said that she was angry with me or that she resented me because I was present during the worst times of her life (when she lost her father in a car accident and battled depression for several years) and she associated me with those bad feelings. She said that I reminded her of those times that she desperately wants to forget. How do I get through to her that I was a good force during those times? How do I get her to stop associating me with those times and to start connecting me with her getting through them?
There's alot of anger in my wife's heart. She's angry at alot of things. She's angry that her career has stalled. She's angry that my career is off the rails. She's angry that we're struggling financially. She's angry because she's getting older and she feels she hasn't done anything with her life. She's chosen to focus all that anger at me, I suppose because I'm the only thing she can lash out at. What do I do about this?
