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Post by crazyheart on Sept 15, 2019 2:23:49 GMT -5
Hi - Newbie here - I thought I was the only one with issues until I came across this forum recently. Seeing the great support here, wanted to share and vent I suppose.
Me - 52M HL and W is 49 LL I suppose. Married for 20 years. Generally good sex life for the first 10 years - nothing spectacular but I was content with 2x a week. Plain vanilla for most part except I enjoyed giving her Oral and that is the only thing she would allow apart from quick PIV. No other reciprocation nor much of foreplay (except a few times) - but I was Ok. I am very giving, enjoy pleasuring a woman very much but I married her and felt things would getter in due time.
Intimacy started dropping off about 10 years ago, I initially did not understand what was going on, blamed myself and worked harder to impress her - obviously nothing worked. Last four years we probably had it less than 6 times with 4 of them in last months (reset sex). I went through all the emotions you all are very familiar with including feeling rejected, wanting to kill myself a few times, lost, and jeez I dont even have the energy to type the negative feelings.
I voiced my discontent several times and her responses have been pretty much that all I think of is sex; she is not my puppet; we have great life -why cant I be happy without sex. There is no other intimacy as well at least for past 6 years - no touching her in bed, no cuddling, cant sit next to her on the couch, no other small gestures of affection that involved touching, no french kissing for 10 years - just short peck on the cheek.
We have two kids - one in college and the other going to college next year. She has been a great mother, does not spend much money on herself, forgives my shortcomings most of the time and I think she really does love me and wants to see me happy. She just cant seem to understand why I even give importance to intimacy.
Since January I have been much more serious in voicing my feelings about the lack of intimacy and brought up the idea that I would leave if there was no solution. She hit menopause a couple of years ago and did not even want to try HRT until her hotflashes became terrible a year ago. She pretty much said that I dont have any moral values since I am trying to rip apart the family just for stupid sex and that commitment means nothing to me. She works now but was a stay at home mom for a long time (her choice) and that I am rewarding her loyalty and dedication to the marriage by jump dumping her for sex.
She refused to go to couples counseling but In April We both agreed that we should give a shot at improving intimacy. I did explain to her that its not the physical act of sex but over all intimacy. I am not sure got anything but she did make an attempt (I did try to improve my communication skills as she requested) - she started to give a kiss on the lips morning and evening and allowed to touch her a few times while in the kitchen. In 3 months we have sex 2 times - both quickies (" I am ready - just do it cant wait") and even had difficult time geting hard that quick especially with no foreplay and no lights. End of 3 months we went on vacation and again quickies on 2 consecutive nights and I asked her why the need to rush and this is not what I had in mind when I asked for intimacy. Her response - well all you want is sex.
I was totally turned off and I told her that I am done trying and she needs to come back with a solution. Nothing from her for last few months and I bring it up and of course the same old story repeats that I am never happy and that am the worst person on the planet because I am giving importance to sex over everything else we have and I should act my age and not be immature like a teenager etc. I dont budge and she ultimately says that she will never ever have sex and that she cant and that we are better off divorcing. She calls and tells both our families that as well as kids.
We have draft separation agreement yesterday and a lawyer has the documents needed to file. But she has been very passive aggressive and emotionally blackmailing and making me feel guilty more than anything else.
Sorry - I did not intend this to be this long.
I know in my heart that staying in the marriage will leave me dissatisfied. I thought of this many many times over the past five years and I know that no matter how many times and ways I tell myself that I can try to be happy without intimacy - i know that I will want it and just be resentful and angry at my W and some day will just up and leave. But I also fell really lousy and sad that I am the one breaking up an other wise good marriage and create a split family for the kids and the unknown consequences and ways this might affect them. I just cant get myself to tell the lawyers to file the papers - it will be quick and done in six months as W agreed to equal split. I think she is just mad at me and does not want to live with me anymore as in her view I am not committed to marriage as in until death do us apart. I just keep replaying the same movie in my head - that I cant be happy if I stay but boy I am the worst dad and husband to break the family.
I am seeing a therapist myself tomorrow and hope I will have the strength to go through with my decision soon. Its wishful thinking at this point but - but if only I could have some intimacy and 1xweek sex that fulfilling, I would not be here.
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Post by isthisit on Sept 15, 2019 3:43:43 GMT -5
crazyheart Welcome, although I am sorry to hear about your situation. You are right so many of us have been there and experienced the feelings of desire to improve your quality of life versus the guilt of the effect on others you love. It is truly horrible and I send you my strength and understanding. You have acknowledged the legitimacy of your desire for a full life rather than a pretence of a marriage, which it seems that you have had, as have we all. I just want to state the obvious because it can’t hurt to say (and hear) this enough. You are perfectly normal to want and expect affection, kindness and intimacy with your spouse. That is a reasonable expectation of a marriage and the single factor which makes a marriage unique from any other relationship. As you describe it is not simply the bumping pelvises bit that is ultimately important (although fairly bloody important) it is the ongoing touches, kisses, lingering looks and knowledge that this person you chose and who chose you uniquely saves such intimacy just for you. No-one in the world but you. Without those factors it is not a marriage at all. Your W will recover. Your kids will adapt. You will likely have a shit time of it before you will embrace opportunities for the life you want and deserve. If you haven’t already read their stories some members here such as flashjohn and shamwow may provide some inspiration. My only other advice would have been to gather some support for your tricky journey. I am glad to see that you have arranged some counselling. It helped me a great deal. I wonder about your informal support network? Friends, siblings? It can be hard if not impossible to share the SM aspect of the demise of a marriage, so gaining the understanding of others can be a challenge. I wonder if there is someone with whom you could confide. I’m sorry you find yourself in these circumstances, but you are very welcome nevertheless.
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Post by michael on Sept 15, 2019 5:41:03 GMT -5
Hey crazyheart. It sounds like your story is plagiarized out of my life. Sorry to hear that. I thought I was the only one too until I found this site. For my situation, I’ve excepted that I’ll never be intimate with my wife again. I’m seriously considering getting a girlfriend, but it’s hard. I’m sure no one wants to be the other woman. Life sucks. I just want to cry everyday.
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Post by workingonit on Sept 15, 2019 7:07:07 GMT -5
Hi crazyheart ! Welcome!. I am sure you know this but you are not wrong or selfish to want to be a full human being. Her gaslighting is familiar to me. Particularly the guilt about what a great life you have. I have been given that guilt as well. But when you scratch beneath the surface it is NEVER just the sex. And really, if one person demands fidelity but refuses to share intimacy and affection with you, how is that a healthy relationship? It is controlling at best. Anyway, welcome. Share. Comment. Laugh and cry here. Coming to this group is a helpful part of internally reclaiming yourself.
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Post by crazyheart on Sept 15, 2019 7:17:33 GMT -5
crazyheart Welcome, although I am sorry to hear about your situation. You are right so many of us have been there and experienced the feelings of desire to improve your quality of life versus the guilt of the effect on others you love. It is truly horrible and I send you my strength and understanding. You have acknowledged the legitimacy of your desire for a full life rather than a pretence of a marriage, which it seems that you have had, as have we all. I just want to state the obvious because it can’t hurt to say (and hear) this enough. You are perfectly normal to want and expect affection, kindness and intimacy with your spouse. That is a reasonable expectation of a marriage and the single factor which makes a marriage unique from any other relationship. As you describe it is not simply the bumping pelvises bit that is ultimately important (although fairly bloody important) it is the ongoing touches, kisses, lingering looks and knowledge that this person you chose and who chose you uniquely saves such intimacy just for you. No-one in the world but you. Without those factors it is not a marriage at all. Your W will recover. Your kids will adapt. You will likely have a shit time of it before you will embrace opportunities for the life you want and deserve. If you haven’t already read their stories some members here such as flashjohn and shamwow may provide some inspiration. My only other advice would have been to gather some support for your tricky journey. I am glad to see that you have arranged some counselling. It helped me a great deal. I wonder about your informal support network? Friends, siblings? It can be hard if not impossible to share the SM aspect of the demise of a marriage, so gaining the understanding of others can be a challenge. I wonder if there is someone with whom you could confide. I’m sorry you find yourself in these circumstances, but you are very welcome nevertheless. Thanks isthisit - Thanks and yes I consider it fortunate that my parents and siblings are there to support me. I do have have small group of close friends to confide but I am not yet ready to discuss SM with them but in due course I will be ready I suppose.
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Post by crazyheart on Sept 15, 2019 7:21:49 GMT -5
Hey crazyheart. It sounds like your story is plagiarized out of my life. Sorry to hear that. I thought I was the only one too until I found this site. For my situation, I’ve excepted that I’ll never be intimate with my wife again. I’m seriously considering getting a girlfriend, but it’s hard. I’m sure no one wants to be the other woman. Life sucks. I just want to cry everyday. Yeah it sucks michael - glad to see that you have accepted - i am still in the process of accepting it. I really wish I could make do with an affair but its not for me.
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Post by crazyheart on Sept 15, 2019 7:26:02 GMT -5
Hi crazyheart ! Welcome!. I am sure you know this but you are not wrong or selfish to want to be a full human being. Her gaslighting is familiar to me. Particularly the guilt about what a great life you have. I have been given that guilt as well. But when you scratch beneath the surface it is NEVER just the sex. And really, if one person demands fidelity but refuses to share intimacy and affection with you, how is that a healthy relationship? It is controlling at best. Anyway, welcome. Share. Comment. Laugh and cry here. Coming to this group is a helpful part of internally reclaiming yourself. thanks workingonit - you are correct that it is controlling behavior. We have our blinders on in relationships and I am starting to see it for it is.
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Post by michael on Sept 15, 2019 9:09:16 GMT -5
Hey crazyheart. It sounds like your story is plagiarized out of my life. Sorry to hear that. I thought I was the only one too until I found this site. For my situation, I’ve excepted that I’ll never be intimate with my wife again. I’m seriously considering getting a girlfriend, but it’s hard. I’m sure no one wants to be the other woman. Life sucks. I just want to cry everyday. Yeah it sucks michael - glad to see that you have accepted - i am still in the process of accepting it. I really wish I could make do with an affair but its not for me. I think you get to that point. I can look at pretty much any woman now and wish I could make love to her. There was a time when that was unthinkable for me. I thought people who do that were losers and deserved no one. She has driven me to this point though.
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Post by worksforme2 on Sept 15, 2019 9:57:40 GMT -5
Hi crazyheart,...Welcome to the club. You seem to have selected the option of choosing to stay. In spite of how unhappy the relationship is you have made a perfectly valid decision that outsourcing your intimacy needs or divorcing her at this point are not the paths you want to walk. And that's OK. I encourage you to read the "Choosing to Stay" thread. Hopefully you will find some coping mechanisms that will be of help to you going forward.
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Post by baza on Sept 15, 2019 18:17:02 GMT -5
Marriages are in a continual state of evolving and devolving as life moves on Brother crazyheart . There are no kids, then there is one (or more) and the dynamic shifts. The kids eventually fly the coop, and the dynamic shifts. Deaths, births, illness, jobs, houses, friendships all happen and all shift the dynamic - as would a separation and/or divorce. Life events and our own choices continually alter the marital dynamic - albeit very slowly at times - for good or bad. Your situation presently is where one of the kids has flown the nest, and another is about to. There's no unringing that bell, the dynamic continues to shift (as it should) and your situation is going to be different in a years time whether you do something or whether you don't. So, do you figure that in 12 months time, when you'll effectively be 'empty nesters' is likely to be a happy environment for you to be in ? If your fully considered answer to that is "yes" then it would make no sense whatsoever to divorce. On the other hand, if your fully considered answer to that is 'no', then it would make no sense whatsoever to stay. Either way Brother crazyheart , it is incumbent on you to consciously and deliberately make a choice here, and own that choice, and live that choice, and accept the consequences of that choice. So the basis of your choice needs to be 'what is in your longer term best interests'.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 16, 2019 11:39:59 GMT -5
I would caution you not to put too much emphasis on the empty nest phase. I truly thought that the empty next would provide us (W and I) an opportunity to reconnect and rekindle our marriage. Nope. Once intimacy avoidant then always intimacy avoidant. Without the children as a viable reason to avoid having a real relationship then my W just came up with new reasons.
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Post by flashjohn on Sept 16, 2019 13:50:20 GMT -5
She pretty much said that I dont have any moral values since I am trying to rip apart the family just for stupid sex and that commitment means nothing to me. She works now but was a stay at home mom for a long time (her choice) and that I am rewarding her loyalty and dedication to the marriage by jump dumping her for sex
Wow, what a bitch. The fact that she says sex, which is important to you, is stupid, is saying that you are stupid. And saying that she has been "loyal" and "dedicated" to the marriage is a load of shit as well. If she had been loyal or dedicated to the marriage, she would have given you 20 years of sexual memories that would have bonded you to her.
However, the fact that she has been fucking you does mean that she may be trying. It sounds like she has forgotten how to be a sexual woman. She probably needs some coaching about how to be sexual and flirty. And most of all, she needs to understand that if she doesn't want to fuck you, there is no shortage of women who will. When I left my ExRefuser, I found that there were MANY women who were interested in a 51 year old man with an education and a career. But most of all, she needs to get on some hormones, probably estrogen & testosterone. This is the company who makes the hormones I use, you might see if there is a provider in your area. www.biotemedical.com/
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Post by deadzone75 on Sept 16, 2019 14:51:58 GMT -5
I voiced my discontent several times and her responses have been pretty much that all I think of is sex; she is not my puppet; we have great life -why cant I be happy without sex. There is no other intimacy as well at least for past 6 years - no touching her in bed, no cuddling, cant sit next to her on the couch, no other small gestures of affection that involved touching, no french kissing for 10 years - just short peck on the cheek.
Since January I have been much more serious in voicing my feelings about the lack of intimacy and brought up the idea that I would leave if there was no solution. She hit menopause a couple of years ago and did not even want to try HRT until her hotflashes became terrible a year ago. She pretty much said that I dont have any moral values since I am trying to rip apart the family just for stupid sex and that commitment means nothing to me.
Sorry you find yourself here, crazyheart, but welcome! Your W is not your puppet, but she is yours to have and to hold. She agreed to that when you exchanged vows, and by refusing your needs, she is the one not honoring commitment. I've said it myself: "..otherwise, it's a great marriage." Sure, it's possible to get along with your W, like I do, but the marriage is still shit if you are being refused. An "otherwise great marriage" equates to a friendship, or a roommate you can tolerate living with. Nothing more.
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Post by Apocrypha on Sept 16, 2019 15:36:53 GMT -5
This is a familiar story: "All you ever think about is sex." "I am breaking up my family over sex."
There are two issues happening simultaneously: 1. The nature of your relationship with your wife - likely from the start. 2. The management and prospects of your household.
Your relationship with your wife: The lack of sexual expression in your marriage, and the lack of participation on your wife's part from inception, is humiliating, lonely, and painful because it signals to you that whatever her feelings for you are, they do not include a mutual unique sexual attraction. Most people approach from the standpoint that their partner is committing an oversight that gives a mistaken and hurtful impression. What's more likely is that this is a true impression of their attraction or of their investment in a romantic future. It's possible to get by across several years of this - in much the same way that straight men engage in prison sex - because they are horny and that's what's available - but it's not the same as two people who are actually into each other. Usually when someone plays starfish like that, I get the feeling that they aren't committed to the what's happening, and may even be offering token resistance. You may be right in that she does indeed love you, as a family member. If she saw you as a sexual partner though, it's likely you'd be having sex.
"All you ever think about is sex" is probably not true, but it is reflective of the rising priority of the lack of intimate connection in your life that results in sex. It's an attempt to blame you for the symptom of the disconnection.
Your household and family enterprise: When you split, the household safety net and intuitive map of the future of your family - the holidays and vacations and birthdays and routines, your home, etc. are all blown to smithereens. There will still be a future or several futures for all of those things, but it isn't going to be what anyone anticipated. Let's acknowledge - as you do - that it's a powerful and emotional motivator to hang on. NOBODY wants to lose all of that.
But - and this is important - it likely is contingent on your mutual notion of what a marriage is. It sounds like, at this point, the bottom has fallen out of the market - that based on her behavior, you do not feel loved as a husband (perhaps as a father, and as a member of the family, but not as a husband).
If your wife doesn't love you as a husband (though she may love you as a person), and, as she indicates - isn't actually interested in a romantic/sexual connection with you, I like to step out of my frame and imagine if your present deal - as is - was a wedding vow, if you were to marry today. Would EITHER of you commit to celibacy for the rest of your lives, as a condition of marriage? Of course not. She wouldn't either. So she has to acknowledge that she is also unhappy and unsatisfied (likely nothing to do with your technique - it could simply be the situation of being married).
There are norms for separation - we all know them - but if you both truly value what's good and worth preserving about your household - then perhaps you have a chance - before the resentment intensifies - to work together and come to an amicable and cooperative arrangement. Sometimes, like an aunt or an uncle or an in-law, we inherit our family relations at later stages in life. Perhaps you two can come to see each other as "extended family" if it works out, and you can preserve some of what it sounds like you are both trying to hang on to.
When I was talking this through with my wife (now ex wife), I found that breaking this up into two things helped her see her part in the dissolution more clearly (she'd been seeing herself as the heroine, who'd been enduring sex with me to save the marriage). Hence ANY amount of sex was too much sex for her - and ANY attention prioritizing or trying to solve it was "my obsession". Her goal wasn't to have an attraction (how do you do that?); it was to deflect attention, and her hope was that I'd lose interest in her, so we'd be aligned on that lie. There is no way for you to win that game and still have anything resembling an intimate, invested relationship.
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Post by DryCreek on Sept 16, 2019 20:23:56 GMT -5
crazyheart, surely your wife realizes the duplicity of her own comments? “Sex is insignificant, and you’re being petty by letting the lack of it destroy our marriage.” Or... “Sex is insignificant, but I’m willing to destroy our marriage by withholding it.” She can’t have it both ways. Either it’s not significant and she shouldn’t be stubborn about withholding, or it is significant and she needs to treat intimacy with the intensity it deserves. It’s not about sex. It’s about her not honoring her commitment and expecting you to be the “better man” and ignore it. Life is full of milestones that give us pause to reflect on where we are, how we got there, and where we’re headed. You’re at one now - a double, really. An empty nest and recently crossing 50 years. You’ll have another when you approach retirement. With the empty nest, do you see that you’ll take advantage of all the opportunity it offers to be closer to your wife? Does life get better, or will it become a bigger effort to avoid each other? In 15 years when you retire, you’ll have even more time to spend at home together with someone. What will life look like then? At 52, you’ve got about 30 years of adult life behind you, and potentially another 30 years of being sexually active in front of you. The last 10 years are a pretty strong indicator of the direction things will trend by default - is that how you’re willing to spend them?
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