Post by catonapillow on Oct 19, 2016 2:13:10 GMT -5
Forgive the abrupt beginning. This is my first time posting here in the new forum. As it was, I hadn't posted in the old forum in QUITE some time anyway. Perhaps at some point, I will post my old story here, but it is quite long. For now, suffice to say, I separated from my ex refuser husband just over two years ago, and we've now been divorced about ten months. This is progress, yes? Well, as it turns out, not so much. After many sexless married years, I thought I was being very careful in selecting dating partners. I met a man who seemed to share, in equal measure, my sexual passion and curiosity. He, too, was from a recent sexless marriage. We explored many, many things together, and fell in love in the process. It's been almost two years, and we're living together with my 6 year old daughter. The little blended family we've made is quite lovely. I love him tremendously. We are incredibly compatible in so many ways, and I can't imagine my life without him. Things are not quite what they seemed in the beginning, however. Not at all. Around the six month mark, his passion and desire began to decline. I want to be perfectly clear here. I am not a sex maniac! 
I am a reasonable woman! Yes, I would LOVE to have sex multiple times a day, but I know that for most people that is just too much. I don't expect that, and I am still very happy with less. I am a 38 year old woman, he is 51. I understand there are going to be certain issues. I am not unrealistic.
Over a period of months, frequency declined from nearly every day, and sometimes multiple times a day, to a few times a week, to once a week, to once every couple weeks, and then finally, to a random frequency ranging from once every 2 to 5 weeks. Passion declined as well, and other sexual issues that I didn't notice early on, became apparent. He began kissing me less outside of the bedroom, not at all during sex, and foreplay became all but non-existent. I enjoy what we DO do together, but I need more than just P in the V. I try to talk to him about it, but he gets defensive, and bringing it up only seems to make things worse. We have been to see a couple different therapists, and the one we're seeing now is pretty good, and I do think we're making some progress. Right now our frequency is up to maybe once a week, generously rounding up, but my satisfaction is still way down. Part of the problem is that I am far more sexually experienced than he is. This is where our problem departs from the kinds of things you can read about in self-help books, and suddenly we're on our own, in no-man's-land. His sexual experiences are limited to his refuser ex wife, and "providers." That is it. He never learned how to have partner sex. While we were all bumbling around in our teens or 20s, figuring out what went where, and what we can and can't and should and shouldn't do, and what people like and don't like - he never got that! He had a wife who just laid there, and then a series of providers who gave him "experiences." When I try to show him how to go slowly, and to focus on different parts of my body, he gets impatient, like a little boy. I'm completely frustrated, and he thinks the kind of sex I want to have is "movie sex," and real people don't actually roll around and kiss and touch each other like that. I'm boggled. Is it possible to re-teach a man in his 50s how to have sex? Am I wasting my time?
I guess what I'm so frustrated by, and what I keep coming back to is this: I thought I did everything right this time! I thought I picked a good one! All the signs were there, but I feel like I was tricked! He turned out not to be who he seemed to be, or maybe even who he thought he was. Maybe he didn't see it coming either. What the heck happened? I still want him in every way possible, but it's hard to want someone who appears to feel lukewarm about you. It's painful to be so in love and lust with someone who just cannot return that passion. He claims to feel the same way about me as he always has, and that his waning desire is not for me specifically. He says that whenever he does feel desire, it's always for me, and he acts on it. I suppose that is a very small comfort, if I can truly trust and believe it.
So here I am again. In a relationship where I feel ashamed of my libido, and I'm afraid to ask for what I want. How much rejection is a person expected to endure in a lifetime? Why the hell am I here again?
I am a reasonable woman! Yes, I would LOVE to have sex multiple times a day, but I know that for most people that is just too much. I don't expect that, and I am still very happy with less. I am a 38 year old woman, he is 51. I understand there are going to be certain issues. I am not unrealistic. Over a period of months, frequency declined from nearly every day, and sometimes multiple times a day, to a few times a week, to once a week, to once every couple weeks, and then finally, to a random frequency ranging from once every 2 to 5 weeks. Passion declined as well, and other sexual issues that I didn't notice early on, became apparent. He began kissing me less outside of the bedroom, not at all during sex, and foreplay became all but non-existent. I enjoy what we DO do together, but I need more than just P in the V. I try to talk to him about it, but he gets defensive, and bringing it up only seems to make things worse. We have been to see a couple different therapists, and the one we're seeing now is pretty good, and I do think we're making some progress. Right now our frequency is up to maybe once a week, generously rounding up, but my satisfaction is still way down. Part of the problem is that I am far more sexually experienced than he is. This is where our problem departs from the kinds of things you can read about in self-help books, and suddenly we're on our own, in no-man's-land. His sexual experiences are limited to his refuser ex wife, and "providers." That is it. He never learned how to have partner sex. While we were all bumbling around in our teens or 20s, figuring out what went where, and what we can and can't and should and shouldn't do, and what people like and don't like - he never got that! He had a wife who just laid there, and then a series of providers who gave him "experiences." When I try to show him how to go slowly, and to focus on different parts of my body, he gets impatient, like a little boy. I'm completely frustrated, and he thinks the kind of sex I want to have is "movie sex," and real people don't actually roll around and kiss and touch each other like that. I'm boggled. Is it possible to re-teach a man in his 50s how to have sex? Am I wasting my time?
I guess what I'm so frustrated by, and what I keep coming back to is this: I thought I did everything right this time! I thought I picked a good one! All the signs were there, but I feel like I was tricked! He turned out not to be who he seemed to be, or maybe even who he thought he was. Maybe he didn't see it coming either. What the heck happened? I still want him in every way possible, but it's hard to want someone who appears to feel lukewarm about you. It's painful to be so in love and lust with someone who just cannot return that passion. He claims to feel the same way about me as he always has, and that his waning desire is not for me specifically. He says that whenever he does feel desire, it's always for me, and he acts on it. I suppose that is a very small comfort, if I can truly trust and believe it.
So here I am again. In a relationship where I feel ashamed of my libido, and I'm afraid to ask for what I want. How much rejection is a person expected to endure in a lifetime? Why the hell am I here again?
