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Post by Apocrypha on Nov 17, 2020 10:14:27 GMT -5
living in a sexless marriage for roughly the last 4 years, married for 8. My wife and I have known each other for 20 years, we dated for a year after we first met, but ended up breaking up after trying to make a long distance relationship work. It was amicable We got back together 10 years later as we were geographically closer. I would drive up to her place on weekends (2 hours) and then back to where I was in professional school on the weekdays. We had sex every weekend 1-2 times and it was always mutually satisfying. sex definitely seemed to drop in frequency after I proposed, We almost didn't have sex on the honeymoon Sex during pregnancy wasn't too frequent, Sex to conceive and sex in between conceptions was still reasonably frequent. Since the birth of our second daughter 5.5 years ago, the frequency has just fallen off a cliff to the point that 4-5.5 years ago, we had sex maybe once every 2-3 months, except the times that she wanted to try and have a 3rd child. When that didn't work, sex is now on average twice per year, and its a no-foreplay, 5 minutes missionary She clearly has no interest in it, and I do not want anything to do with duty sex. It makes me feel like I am sexually assaulting her. She says it frustrates her too if I bring it up I have edited your post, leaving the portions that really stuck out to me as familiar to my own situation. 1. You had a slow burn start, knowing each other for a long time in a situation in which sex was likely challenging to have. It appears for a lot of this you hovered in the friendzone, and that when you did have sex - a lot of this sex was infrequent due to the effort and geographical distance between you. 2. Sex dropped immediately after proposal. It took a hit on the honeymoon and both pregnancies, flatlining on the second. Question - think of any significant mutual investment the two of you might have made together. Like, maybe when you bought a house together, or if you moved far away to start over again together. Did sex also drop then as well? How was her reaction to your proposal for marriage? Was it immediate and enthusiastic? 3. The quality of sex that you have is begrudging and poor. It makes you feel like you are sexually assaulting her. 4. Rather than solving the problem, she views your attempts at communication to resolve it, as frustrating. Does she pose it as you being "sex obsessed"? What I eventually arrived at in my marriage after years of gaslighting on this problem, was that my wife did not wish to be married to me. She said "yes" to my proposal, when the basis of our relationship was never going to be that of a husband and wife. The absence of sex was not the cause of the end of our married life, but rather a symptom of her intensely internalized resistance to being married to me. If you've ever dated someone who you really weren't into all the way, or knew you were going to break up with, you likely know that sex becomes a thing to avoid, or to acquiesce to out of general horniness (though followed by guilt), rather than any unique mutual attraction. The long distance + friendly zoneBack then, and even today as a single man, I often see people who deliberately choose relationships in which there is a barrier to full investment with each other. It might be in choosing a relationship to someone who is quite distant, or in which there is a significant age gap, or to someone who is a workaholic. The reason to choose a relationship with such an impediment is that either they don't seek full romantic investment in general (or at that particular time), or with the person they are seeing. The relationship works best on slow smoulder, as long as the limiting condition leaves them lots of room to see themselves as single. Think of a couple who are having an affair. The married one becomes single, and suddenly the affair evaporates. Or, think of someone who is newly separated, somewhat shell-shocked and who doesn't have a lot of emotional bandwidth to jump all the way into something. These are romantic situations with known, baked-in limits. The fact that you were able to remain close or friends despite parting - while not a bad thing - suggests to me that perhaps you both felt intuitively more comfortable this way. Sex dropping off with each significant mutual investment, when compared to when your lives were separate.The proposal. The honeymoon. The pregnancies and kids. I'll bet a shiny nickel that buying a house or if you moved together to a new town both caused a drop. I think withholding sex becomes a language - the body's way of rebelling against a decision by not supporting a deepening of intimacy. It feels like she is unwillingIt's hard to hide when you are married and have known each other that way for 20 years. You do know what willing sex with that person feels like. This isn't it. It feels like that because she is most definitely unwilling to have sex with you. If she poses it as not having any fantasies, it's because at this point - she's sparing your feelings and avoiding a difficult conversation, or because she isn't allowing herself to fantasize. My own wife was the same way, until we simply made the decision to separate. Suddenly she had all kinds of fantasies - a very rich and imaginative sexual life. It's not hard to have sex - even if one is relatively indifferent. As a single man, I've had all kinds of "why not?" sex with women I've been not sure about. It's hard to have sex though, when you know you don't want it with someone. That's not indifference; it's when it's really important NOT to have sex with someone - likely because the sex makes a promise that you know cannot be kept. If you bring it up, it frustrates her.This is one of the most frustrating things, because every shred of popular relationship advice is about increasing communication. In my case, across years, it got to the point that I thought maybe she had some kind of embarrassing kink. The more I spoke about sex, the more she posed me as sex-obsessed. In hindsight, I realize the frustration came for a slightly different reason. I was thwarting her goal. I'll explain - Her goal was to preserve the household. So was mine. In my case, like yours, my criteria for a household worth preserving was that it be a marriage, which includes sexual expression between a couple who share a mutual unique attraction. In her case, she knew she had no unique attraction for me, and as a result was not in a position to offer what I saw as a marriage, but she (like me) wanted to preserve the household union. As a result her method was to filibuster and direct attention away from the attraction/sex issues, whereas mine was to focus directly on the absence as evidence of something missing upstream in the relationship. Once I realized this, I was able to reframe this problem from being some kind of medical affliction that had descended upon our marriage for us to face mutually. I was able to see it across the expanse of our entire association and really see it for what it really was. We never should have been married. Prior to my proposal, I'd had months and various experiences that helped me "come to Jesus" in the marriage and get onboard FULLY with that intention before I popped the question. Her actual yes/no decision point came in a fancy restaurant - and her immediate answer was "why not?" (that's not a "yes"). Overall, I think two quality people with a decent foundation can get pretty far into a marriage on a half-tank before it runs out. When it does, it gets to where you are now.
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Post by tesseract on Nov 19, 2020 9:10:19 GMT -5
I have edited your post, leaving the portions that really stuck out to me as familiar to my own situation. 1. You had a slow burn start, knowing each other for a long time in a situation in which sex was likely challenging to have. It appears for a lot of this you hovered in the friendzone, and that when you did have sex - a lot of this sex was infrequent due to the effort and geographical distance between you. 2. Sex dropped immediately after proposal. It took a hit on the honeymoon and both pregnancies, flatlining on the second. Question - think of any significant mutual investment the two of you might have made together. Like, maybe when you bought a house together, or if you moved far away to start over again together. Did sex also drop then as well? How was her reaction to your proposal for marriage? Was it immediate and enthusiastic? 3. The quality of sex that you have is begrudging and poor. It makes you feel like you are sexually assaulting her. 4. Rather than solving the problem, she views your attempts at communication to resolve it, as frustrating. Does she pose it as you being "sex obsessed"? What I eventually arrived at in my marriage after years of gaslighting on this problem, was that my wife did not wish to be married to me. She said "yes" to my proposal, when the basis of our relationship was never going to be that of a husband and wife. The absence of sex was not the cause of the end of our married life, but rather a symptom of her intensely internalized resistance to being married to me. If you've ever dated someone who you really weren't into all the way, or knew you were going to break up with, you likely know that sex becomes a thing to avoid, or to acquiesce to out of general horniness (though followed by guilt), rather than any unique mutual attraction. The long distance + friendly zoneBack then, and even today as a single man, I often see people who deliberately choose relationships in which there is a barrier to full investment with each other. It might be in choosing a relationship to someone who is quite distant, or in which there is a significant age gap, or to someone who is a workaholic. The reason to choose a relationship with such an impediment is that either they don't seek full romantic investment in general (or at that particular time), or with the person they are seeing. The relationship works best on slow smoulder, as long as the limiting condition leaves them lots of room to see themselves as single. Think of a couple who are having an affair. The married one becomes single, and suddenly the affair evaporates. Or, think of someone who is newly separated, somewhat shell-shocked and who doesn't have a lot of emotional bandwidth to jump all the way into something. These are romantic situations with known, baked-in limits. The fact that you were able to remain close or friends despite parting - while not a bad thing - suggests to me that perhaps you both felt intuitively more comfortable this way. Sex dropping off with each significant mutual investment, when compared to when your lives were separate.The proposal. The honeymoon. The pregnancies and kids. I'll bet a shiny nickel that buying a house or if you moved together to a new town both caused a drop. I think withholding sex becomes a language - the body's way of rebelling against a decision by not supporting a deepening of intimacy. It feels like she is unwillingIt's hard to hide when you are married and have known each other that way for 20 years. You do know what willing sex with that person feels like. This isn't it. It feels like that because she is most definitely unwilling to have sex with you. If she poses it as not having any fantasies, it's because at this point - she's sparing your feelings and avoiding a difficult conversation, or because she isn't allowing herself to fantasize. My own wife was the same way, until we simply made the decision to separate. Suddenly she had all kinds of fantasies - a very rich and imaginative sexual life. It's not hard to have sex - even if one is relatively indifferent. As a single man, I've had all kinds of "why not?" sex with women I've been not sure about. It's hard to have sex though, when you know you don't want it with someone. That's not indifference; it's when it's really important NOT to have sex with someone - likely because the sex makes a promise that you know cannot be kept. If you bring it up, it frustrates her.This is one of the most frustrating things, because every shred of popular relationship advice is about increasing communication. In my case, across years, it got to the point that I thought maybe she had some kind of embarrassing kink. The more I spoke about sex, the more she posed me as sex-obsessed. In hindsight, I realize the frustration came for a slightly different reason. I was thwarting her goal. I'll explain - Her goal was to preserve the household. So was mine. In my case, like yours, my criteria for a household worth preserving was that it be a marriage, which includes sexual expression between a couple who share a mutual unique attraction. In her case, she knew she had no unique attraction for me, and as a result was not in a position to offer what I saw as a marriage, but she (like me) wanted to preserve the household union. As a result her method was to filibuster and direct attention away from the attraction/sex issues, whereas mine was to focus directly on the absence as evidence of something missing upstream in the relationship. Once I realized this, I was able to reframe this problem from being some kind of medical affliction that had descended upon our marriage for us to face mutually. I was able to see it across the expanse of our entire association and really see it for what it really was. We never should have been married. Prior to my proposal, I'd had months and various experiences that helped me "come to Jesus" in the marriage and get onboard FULLY with that intention before I popped the question. Her actual yes/no decision point came in a fancy restaurant - and her immediate answer was "why not?" (that's not a "yes"). Overall, I think two quality people with a decent foundation can get pretty far into a marriage on a half-tank before it runs out. When it does, it gets to where you are now. #1 and 2) I would not characterize any aspect of our dating years or first few years of the marriage as being friendzoned. We saw each other 2 days / week and always had mutually satisfying sex, often initiated by her. She had no tendencies towards asexuality. It did taper off somewhat, but not drastically after we got engaged and after we bought our house, but I would say our sex life the first 3 years of marriage were generally satisfying. As we were a bit older (34 when we got married), we opted to have kids right away. She wasn't super sexual when she was pregnant, but that happens to many women, so its not something that concerns me. She enthusiastically said yes to the proposal. She had even given me a ring 1 year into dating so I would know her ring size when the time came. She cried quite hard when I asked her and says to this day that she has no recollection of the moment or saying yes. #3) Right now, cuddling with her feels like I am assaulting her, because I think she is afraid I will touch her boobs or elsewhere. She says she likes it when I cuddle with her, but is afraid of leading me on when her mind just doesn't seem to ever think about sex. When we do have sex, it is fairly quick and whereas she would have multiple orgasms before, she is done after 1 now. I can tell its for my benefit and it makes me feel bad afterwards, but I felt refusing would have a more negative impact on our sex life than going with it. Thats no longer the case for me though and I have told her that I will not accept the status quo and if we cannot get back to a point of mutually enthusiastic sex, then we need to discuss our path to divorce. #4) She has never accused me of being sex-obsessed. She is frustrated by the discussions because she has repeatedly said it is her fault and she doesn't know why she doesn't think of sex. She says she knows she is at fault for my unhappiness. She says she has talked with her OBGYN and Therapist about it many times but they haven't been able to offer her any advice other than "this is just a phase of your life." I told her that I didn't think phases that lasted years that were threatening the marriage could be allowed to be dealt with passively. She seems to agree and seems willing to be more proactive about this moving forward. Thats the only thing that gives me hope right now. I would say she is generally conflict-averse so she was probably hoping it would fix itself naturally without us having to discuss it. I told her that I thought we could discuss this in a more clinical way as a problem that we were both facing rather than adversarial thing between us and she seemed to be happy at that prospect. I have known her for 20 years, and asexual is never an adjective that I would have used to describe her. I think it is far more likely that she has some form of Hypoactive Sexual Desire Disorder since the birth of our second daughter and we have just been lazy in dealing with it. Its led to a lot of hurt/resentment building up in both of us, but its clear that it cannot go on. I have done everything I can to address the marriage aspect and if she is harboring some resentment or not being truthful with me about what she needs, then that is her problem. I will leave with a clear conscience if our situation doesn't improve. But I will focus on the HSDD route since that is what is open to me now and seems to line up with how she says she feels. Tomorrow is her next OBGYN appointment and I'm going to ask her to ask first about hormone testing for Estrogen, Testosterone, Oxytocin and whatever else the OBGYN recommends. I'm also trying to get her to set aside time with me to get some exercise together, whether its Yoga, using the Peloton, whatever. And we'll talk more tomorrow about the Maze Women's Sexual Health Center depending on what her OBGYN says. Thanks for your replies thus far.
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Post by Apocrypha on Nov 19, 2020 10:10:32 GMT -5
I have known her for 20 years, and asexual is never an adjective that I would have used to describe her. I think it is far more likely that she has some form of Hypoactive Sexual Desire Disorder since the birth of our second daughter and we have just been lazy in dealing with it. Its led to a lot of hurt/resentment building up in both of us, but its clear that it cannot go on. I have done everything I can to address the marriage aspect and if she is harboring some resentment or not being truthful with me about what she needs, then that is her problem. I will leave with a clear conscience if our situation doesn't improve. But I will focus on the HSDD route since that is what is open to me now and seems to line up with how she says she feels. Just noting - aesexuality came up in your clarification and elaboration about your situation and history to me. Aesexuality as a condition is really rare diagnostically. It seems like it's the first thing most people in this reach for, me included. I think, in most cases - nearly ALL of them - the most common situation isn't aesexuality but rather the final stages of disconnection, possibly even contempt. Anecdotally, I've seen this in my own marriage and I've seen it in the stories of the marriages of the separated women I've dated across the past 6 years or so. Separation and divorce has a remarkable cure rate for people who believe themselves to be aesexual, many of whom go on to have robust sexual lives in their next relationship. It seems more the norm than the exception to me. I know that in the singles world, ambivalence or resistance to a relationship ends up with aversion to sex with that person typically. At some point that aversion exceeds even the person's own natural libido, and the sex ends. In the singles world, that would generally result in ending the relationship - not seeing a path forward and having little invested. In a marriage though, with lots invested and many years of a life built around it, there is the question of what to do with the household, the mutual enterprise built together. This complicates matters very much. When I was facing this question and trying to figure out what I had or didn't have, I found it helpful to approach it with these questions: How did what we have differ from what I imagined as a best case amicable divorce? If we both agreed to end it, would she feel relief about never having to have sex with anyone again? How soon before she would be eager to try with someone new? If we were to pose our present day commitment to celibate living with each as part of our wedding vow (like a priest's oath), would she agree to marry? Would she even agree it was a marriage?
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Post by cagedadventurer on Nov 19, 2020 22:52:57 GMT -5
Half tank to empty in 4 years, that well sums it up. The Obgyn ..just stall tactics. This does not improve. If not for the kids, easy decision. You won't last like this though, it ( the rejection and SM) makes life and ambitions seem moot. Hint, they only respond to affairs and divorce papers...both anazing aphrodisiacs.
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Post by northstarmom on Nov 19, 2020 23:06:33 GMT -5
apocrypha said: "I know that in the singles world, ambivalence or resistance to a relationship ends up with aversion to sex with that person typically. At some point that aversion exceeds even the person's own natural libido, and the sex ends. In the singles world, that would generally result in ending the relationship - not seeing a path forward and having little invested."
This would be true unless, for example, the person who has completely lost or has little desire for their partner has reason to want the relationship to continue -- reasons such as being in the closet, wanting to be financially supported or wanting to have a SPOUSE so they can have kids before their biological clock runs out. This is why for some people, sex sharply decreases upon engagement or marriage. The denied partner thinks that sex in their early relationship was good. They don't realize that their partner was faking it while possibly using reasons such as physical distance as reasons not to engage that much.
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Post by tesseract on Nov 20, 2020 8:52:13 GMT -5
You guys are right in that the OBGYN could be a stall tactic. The thing that keeps me optimistic is that it should be pretty obvious to me if she is looking for a solution and working with me or if she is just trying to placate me while keeping the status quo. I have been very clear with her that our current dynamic leads only to divorce. I asked her again this morning to discuss hormone testing with her OBGYN and she said they had done that last year and found no abnormalities with Testosterone, Estrogen, etc... She had it done mainly because her periods were really messed up and I guess no abnormalities were found. I'll dig into this more with her later. So I just reiterated that she needed to ask about other options then. If she comes back saying again, the OBGYN just said its a phase of life, then we are going to have problems and will need to have a more direct conversation.
I'm only 42 years old. There is no way in hell that I am continuing like this even for another year. Oh, and if it takes divorce papers to get her to snap out of whatever this is, then its too late. If I serve divorce papers, I am done. I'm not interested in it taking that level of commitment to get her to rejoin this marriage.
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Post by tesseract on Nov 21, 2020 13:42:53 GMT -5
So she had her appointment yesterday. I asked her how it went and she said they talked about her lack of libido again and the doc asked if it was affecting her marriage and she said yes, so the doc is getting her Testosterone tested again, which she went and had done right after the appointment. They also talked about medications to boost sex drive, but the doctor is not a big fan of them given some of the side effects, so we are agreed we will try other stuff first, such as checking hormone levels, more frequent exercise for the endorphins and other energy boosting benefits. We may pursue a more specialized women's sexual health clinic as well. So no changes yet, but I don't expect it to be quick. I do feel like she is treating it with the importance I need so far. Only time will tell.
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Post by Handy on Nov 21, 2020 14:51:54 GMT -5
Tesseract, that is good progress, given that so many SM's never go past the "I'll try" stage.
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Post by saarinista on Nov 21, 2020 16:17:37 GMT -5
tesseract it seems like your wife is going to a lot of appointments. Has she tried simply "forcing herself" to have sex when she might not feel like it all that much? Sometimes people get in the mood after they get going. Women, in particular, can do this more easily than men. I think you said you don't want "duty sex." However, I don't think there's anything so wrong with "duty sex" in some cases. She has two young children. It sounds like you live busy, high stress lifestyles. Is it possible that you are asking her to have a level of spontaneity and passion that she simply doesn't have at this point? If the alternative to employing a bit of initiative and having "duty sex" is no sex at all, of divorce, maybe duty sex isn't so bad.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 21, 2020 23:27:29 GMT -5
I have been very clear with her that our current dynamic leads only to divorce.
Good for you tesseract for being so direct and forward - I wish I had your moxie. How did she take it when you mentioned divorce was the outcome if no resolution was reached? It sounds like she is trying so far, but what happens if the doctors say she is physically OK?
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Post by Deleted on Nov 21, 2020 23:36:23 GMT -5
Has she tried simply "forcing herself" to have sex when she might not feel like it all that much? Sometimes people get in the mood after they get going. Women, in particular, can do this more easily than men.
saarinista I have heard that before and it really baffles me. It seems the refuser gets complete and total amnesia regarding sex between sessions.
W: "Hey that was actually great. We should do that more often."
Me trying for sex a week later....
W: "What are you doing? Is that all you ever think about?"
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Post by saarinista on Nov 21, 2020 23:41:43 GMT -5
Women can have sex without being totally turned on. That's a fact. Now I'm not saying that's the BEST way to do or have sex, but all you have to do if you are a woman is be compliant.
Men have to be turned on to have sex. Don't they? Women can fake it.
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Post by worksforme2 on Nov 22, 2020 7:58:51 GMT -5
Women can have sex without being totally turned on. That's a fact. Now I'm not saying that's the BEST way to do or have sex, but all you have to do if you are a woman is be compliant. Men have to be turned on to have sex. Don't they? Women can fake it. Here's what I learned about your suggestion for women "just to go along until their interest is engaged". After a couple 3 or 4 "talks" with my then W I mentioned how she seemed to always enjoy the intimacy and to reach an orgasm. She conceded that she wasn't interested initially but after things were well on their way she began to enjoy the experience. "So why don't you mentally engage at the onset if you find the experience enjoyable? I asked. She didn't have an answer and her willingness to have sex never improved, avoiding intimacy as much as she could. Quarterly was the best she could do. You may actually have a relevant point, but if the woman is adamant that she doesn't want to allow things to even start, it's a mute point.
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Post by tesseract on Nov 22, 2020 8:22:13 GMT -5
tesseract it seems like your wife is going to a lot of appointments. Has she tried simply "forcing herself" to have sex when she might not feel like it all that much? Sometimes people get in the mood after they get going. Women, in particular, can do this more easily than men. I think you said you don't want "duty sex." However, I don't think there's anything so wrong with "duty sex" in some cases. She has two young children. It sounds like you live busy, high stress lifestyles. Is it possible that you are asking her to have a level of spontaneity and passion that she simply doesn't have at this point? If the alternative to employing a bit of initiative and having "duty sex" is no sex at all, of divorce, maybe duty sex isn't so bad. Its a thought. I have avoided proposing that up to this point, since I think that my wife is more of an "actions follow feelings" type of person. Even that Women's Sexual Health clinic (Maze) talks on their website about scheduling sex and just doing it, but they usually won't propose that until they have made other progress for a few months first whether that's with hormone therapy or other methods. If she is really committed to fixing this, I could see us putting in once a week duty sex just to try to get her body back to experiencing that release regularly. If she isn't committed, it will definitely blow up in my face, but I have nothing to lose. I really think regular exercise to increase her energy levels, endorphins, and circulation will pay dividends here as well. She is not overweight by any stretch of the imagination, but I think her functional strength and cardiovascular health are way lower than where they should be. Frankly, we could both stand to get more exercise and doing it together could be a good bonding experience. We had a nice evening together last night. Got the kids to bed and she lay between my legs with her back on my chest and I gave her a head/neck massage while we talked about all sorts of things (not sex related). I didn't try to start anything even though I wanted to. I want nights like that as well that we haven't had in awhile, not just the sex. Granted, we need to get to a point that we can have times like that without the spectre of sex looming over us. It should feel natural and care free.
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Post by tesseract on Nov 22, 2020 8:27:37 GMT -5
I have been very clear with her that our current dynamic leads only to divorce.
Good for you tesseract for being so direct and forward - I wish I had your moxie. How did she take it when you mentioned divorce was the outcome if no resolution was reached? It sounds like she is trying so far, but what happens if the doctors say she is physically OK? She took it fine since I tried not to approach it like a threat or ultimatum. I just said that the current situation was unacceptable to me because of how much I crave physical touch and I feel that physical intimacy is closely entwined with emotional intimacy. I said I knew it wouldn't be fixed immediately, but if we couldn't openly talk about it and start making progress, I saw no other outcome than divorce for my own sanity. She agreed it was a problem (again fully blaming herself) and said she wanted to work on the marriage. So here we are. If she is physically ok and this is more mental, then my next step is to ask her to go for consultation with a Sexual Health counselor at Maze or somewhere else specialized who can try behavioral therapy or something along those lines. There aren't a whole lot of options open to me, since the work really has to be hers. Thats where we will see how committed she is. If I have to suggest everything and make next steps, thats a red flag. Part of the healing process from this has to involve her taking initiative to heal it. I can't have her being a "stress ball" that only holds its shape while I apply active pressure. I have found myself perusing listings on zillow lately to get an idea of where I would move to if we did get divorced. Always nice to have a plan.
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