|
|
Post by Apocrypha on May 24, 2017 14:35:35 GMT -5
She says she wants to get back to normal and will just push those thoughts and memories away during sex if it happens so we can be happy again. She has even offered scheduled sex twice a week. This doesn't seem like a good idea to me and I think it will make her resent me (more) in the end. She does seem to be trying, but I think professional help is needed, but I don't want to force her, she has to want to get help. Am I being unreasonable? Do I accept the bone she is trying to throw me as an olive branch in the meantime, while she tries to work through this? I want to be supportive and not ice her out, if she really wants to change. How do I know when she is really committed to self improvement? Thoughts? Suggestions? I dealt with an identical issue with Mrs Apocrypha, right down to the scheduling. I took her up on it, and made a point to ensure she was satisfied even if I was not. She ended up having dissociative episodes during it, and trying to blank me out otherwise - sometimes (often) by putting an arm across her eyes, and later on a pillow on her head (that was too much when it became obvious and I stopped altogether seeking her as a sexual partner). In therapy, despite HER offer and occasional acquiescence or initiating a pity fuck, she resented me and became disgusted with me for not rejecting such offers when she internally did not wish to have sex. She said I "used her like a meatbag" and that I "raped" her. Linger on that language a bit - it came out at therapy. Try to imagine the lengths one goes to to try to ensure sex is satisfying, positive, gentle (if needed), exciting, and fulfilling - how important it is when it gets this fraught to get it right - and to then have such a loving act and intention characterized in such a manner. You think you don't have anything to lose by saying "yes" but you do. Don't fuck someone who doesn't want you. |
|
|
|
Post by csl on May 24, 2017 15:01:31 GMT -5
Thanks for the replies and support. We had a bit of a blow up last night. She offered reset sex and I said no. She actually made an effort, took a bath invited me to join, I said no, then made another advance, I said no. She was pissed. She said she was trying to throw me a bone. I found that comment very revealing. She even used the word "reset", saying she wanted to reset things back to the way they were. One of the things she mentioned in a previous conversation was childhood sex abuse and flashbacks. She doesn't want to bring that history up in counseling and for now is refusing to attend. I have scheduled a session for myself next week. Ive known about the abuse since we were dating but thought she a handle on it, but recently found out about the frequent flashbacks she has during intercourse. I don't like the idea of triggering that pain for her during sex and it is part of the reason I don't want to do it any more. She says she wants to get back to normal and will just push those thoughts and memories away during sex if it happens so we can be happy again. She has even offered scheduled sex twice a week. This doesn't seem like a good idea to me and I think it will make her resent me (more) in the end. She does seem to be trying, but I think professional help is needed, but I don't want to force her, she has to want to get help. Am I being unreasonable? Do I accept the bone she is trying to throw me as an olive branch in the meantime, while she tries to work through this? I want to be supportive and not ice her out, if she really wants to change. How do I know when she is really committed to self improvement? Thoughts? Suggestions? No suggestions, but a thought that you can use to spur yourself on. In a big discussion, a couple of years ago on my blog, the Forgiven Wife blogger made an excellent observation that guys in your situation can take to the bank. She wrote: It's a husband's obligation to help his wife in her healing,
but not in her complacency. |
|
|
|
Post by orangepeel on May 24, 2017 16:28:24 GMT -5
Almost five years ago, I decided to say no to the constant refusals which were punctuated by sex that I would describe not as if the pity/guilt variety, but grudging. So I stopped initiating. My solution, rather than having an AP, was to bolster my self esteem by not putting myself in the position in which I'd have the humiliation of being refused. And my self esteem remains high - my pride's intact - but its counterbalanced by other, growing frustrations, not least of which is the growing distance between me and her.
I suppose the moral is, do what's right for you, whether it's outsourcing or not, but there will always remain the irreducible core of our need to have sex being denied: we were born for holistic closennes, all of us. Take away the sex and the very best you can hope for is a successful coping strategy. But that's it.
|
|
|
|
Post by unmatched on May 24, 2017 18:54:55 GMT -5
Thanks for the replies and support. We had a bit of a blow up last night. She offered reset sex and I said no. She actually made an effort, took a bath invited me to join, I said no, then made another advance, I said no. She was pissed. She said she was trying to throw me a bone. I found that comment very revealing. She even used the word "reset", saying she wanted to reset things back to the way they were. One of the things she mentioned in a previous conversation was childhood sex abuse and flashbacks. She doesn't want to bring that history up in counseling and for now is refusing to attend. I have scheduled a session for myself next week. Ive known about the abuse since we were dating but thought she a handle on it, but recently found out about the frequent flashbacks she has during intercourse. I don't like the idea of triggering that pain for her during sex and it is part of the reason I don't want to do it any more. She says she wants to get back to normal and will just push those thoughts and memories away during sex if it happens so we can be happy again. She has even offered scheduled sex twice a week. This doesn't seem like a good idea to me and I think it will make her resent me (more) in the end. She does seem to be trying, but I think professional help is needed, but I don't want to force her, she has to want to get help. Am I being unreasonable? Do I accept the bone she is trying to throw me as an olive branch in the meantime, while she tries to work through this? I want to be supportive and not ice her out, if she really wants to change. How do I know when she is really committed to self improvement? Thoughts? Suggestions? It sounds like we are in quite a similar situation. My wife also has some trauma in her background that has made intimate sex something very challenging for her and she doesn't want to face it. She doesn't want to be in a SM, she wants to want to have her libido back, but she doesn't really want the actual sex. So when it does happen, unless there are lots of drinks involved, it is a bit like Apocrypha described - she avoids eye contact, prefers the lights off and as many clothes on as possible and tries to shrink her whole world down to the size of her clitoris and block everything else out. She still comes, but it is a very dissociated experience and it rarely makes her feel good afterwards. She also talks about 'just wanting it to go back to the way it was', and I think she was hoping she could just get back on the horse and sooner or later it would all come good again. But it isn't working. Maybe you could talk to her and tell her what your concerns are, and if she still wants to go for it then give her a chance to try. In a way this is a growth process for her too. But you both need to be very sensitive to what is happening in your relationship. Because if she is having those kind of flashbacks she is very likely to make the trauma worse for herself. And sometimes if you go too far down a road you find you can't get back. |
|
|
|
Post by baza on May 25, 2017 1:37:11 GMT -5
If your missus did suffer sexual abuse but is unable / unwilling to address it, then you have an insoluble and untenable position in front of you.
If your missus has handled the truth a bit carelessly here, and there was no such incident, then there is nothing to address, and you still have an insoluble and untenable position in front of you.
Under one position the matter cannot be fixed.
Under the other, there is nothing to fix.
What would bring this to a head is you being prepared to put the marriage on the line.
If you are not prepared to do that - and it would be perfectly understandable if you weren't - then this situation just rolls on indefinitely.
Were you to say - "I respect your choice to place your need to not address this issue ahead of the needs of *us* as a couple and *me* as your husband, but your choice now compels me to make my own choice about whether I stay in such a situation or not. Think on it. Take a week. Then get back to me".
However, be aware that these situations have no place for brinkmanship, bluff, or bullshit threats.
You have to be prepared to deliver on what you say.
Under NO circumstances say anything that you are not prepared to deliver on.
All that achieves is to shred your cred.
|
|
|
|
Post by Apocrypha on May 25, 2017 9:55:15 GMT -5
Maybe you could talk to her and tell her what your concerns are, and if she still wants to go for it then give her a chance to try. In a way this is a growth process for her too. But you both need to be very sensitive to what is happening in your relationship. Because if she is having those kind of flashbacks she is very likely to make the trauma worse for herself. And sometimes if you go too far down a road you find you can't get back. I think it's important to note that I did just what you are saying at the top of your paragraph. We talked, for years. I listened, got a handle on her issues - empathy for them. She said she wanted to "go for it" and we got to scheduling sex and "try". It was intended as a growth process. I was incredibly sensitive to what was happening in our relationship and what was at stake. I was also pretty hopeful that her having positive experiences in sex would set her on a different track from whereever she had gotten to. The problem was that she really wasn't authentic with me about what she was doing or what was happening during sex. For the longest time, I thought her throwing her arm over her eyes was just her "thing". It's been noted by my lovers before and since that I'm extremely in tune with my partners in sex, reading them very carefully - and I still got this one wrong - she was able to fool me. It never occurred to me that she was totally dissociating, and she downplayed it when I finally objected to the pillow on her face. For a while, I thought it was just a strange "thing" she did, and that she was just an unenthusiastic lover (which she was, in addition to that, when she was unenthusiastic about the lovemaking). I'm not an insensitive, selfish, or self-centered oaf in the sack - and yet, this one slipped past. Nor is it the case that she is like this with everyone all the time. When she was chasing me, she was certainly an enthusiastic partner, and she has been, since, with other men. This response is triggered by having sex she doesn't want to have. It doesn't matter that it's agreed, or consensual, or a good idea, or an alternative to something worse. You can both go with the best intentions, but if you two decide to have a root - if SHE even initiates when she doesn't want to (like a chore), it's going to be read as a violation that wears YOUR face. |
|
|
|
Post by rdp62 on May 27, 2017 7:51:32 GMT -5
Don't do it, cut her off. Treat her like she treats you. Get a lawyer and a decent girl in that order. Going to take my own advice
|
|
