Being woken at 5am in a sexless marriage

[5ammadness]

My DH regularly falls asleep on the sofa after he's been drinking. It's not every night, or even every week, but last night was the 3rd time this week. He wakes up around 4am-5am, and then comes to bed, waking me up in the process.

I have to be up for work at 6.30am, usually 7 days a week (self employed). I have asked him not to do this. In the past he has promised to sleep in the spare room if it is past 1am, but he seems to have forgotten this.

Sometimes I can fall straight back to sleep, but sometimes I can't, and I lie awake until my alarm goes off at 6.30am. I am tired. Very tired.

Our other major problem, is that we don't have enough sex. This is his choice, not mine. The last time we had sex was in January. He knows this bothers me greatly, and would like to fix it.

However, last night, he came to bed at 515am again - and in an effort to be closer to me, he spooned me, which would be lovely, except

A) it woke me up and
B) it made me aroused as we were both naked, which meant that I was wide awake and incredibly frustrated.

Part of me was hoping that the closeness might turn him on too, but he just fell to sleep. So we are lying there, him asleep and me WIDE awake and very sexually frustrated, and I lost my cool. Can't remember exactly what I said, but I made it clear that this wasn't fair on me.

All he kept saying is "IT IS 5.30AM, I'M NOT TAKING ABOUT THIS NOW" - he repeated this about 20 times before storming off in to the spare room, where he is still asleep, and will remain so until he decides to get up, whereas I am up for work as usual.

AIBU here? I just want a normal sex life and to be able to sleep until 6.30am. I don't feel like I am asking for the moon on a stick here. I am so sad about it all.

Thanks for reading.

“Stop emailing someone you are starting to have an emotional affair with or I will leave is an ultimatum.”

Who on earth would say ‘our relationship isn’t working right now? How do you feel about a counselling session?’

Of course ultimatums have a place in relationships.

”Start helping around the house otherwise I’m going to ask you to pay half towards a cleaner”.

Ultimatums normally follow multiple reasonable discussions that have failed, or even counselling sessions that haven’t worked. Likely, most people will rarely need to resort to issuing an ultimatum as those discussions will indeed work, but that doesn’t mean ultimatums aren’t a last reasonable resort.

Everything else is great, if only we could fix this!

Only he can fix it. He’s an alcoholic and only he can deal with that. You might find Al Anon helpful if only to get support from other women married to alcoholics, you’ll be astonished at how similar their experiences are to yours. My bloke’s in recovery now and it’s like having the man I married back.

If you don’t think alcoholic is the problem then you just have very different sex drives. It may be miserable for you but it’s just as miserable for the person with the lower sex drive feeling pressurised and derided for not wanting it. My sex drive really diminished over the years and the anxiety attached to the pressure of having to do it (to keep the peace) is the main reason I no longer have relationships.

YANBU to want sex in your marriage.

YABU to be annoyed that he wouldn't discuss this at 5:30am.

There's a lot more going on here than a 5:30am shag.

Is he showing any signs of depression or is her very stressed? Could be that both the drinking and lack of sex drive are because of this.

Ultimately you need to decide if his good points loyalty, works hard etc outweigh his bad points drinks way too much, Wales you up so steals your sleep, no sex, no intimacy. No marriage is perfect but most would be more comparable that yours. No sex is grounds for divorce. If you filed for divorce would you be happier on your own or in new relationship?

Garbage. A wife has the same degrees of entitlement to intimacy, affection and sex in a marriage as a husband. That doesn't trump the right to say 'no'. Posters like you have invented a narrative of alcohol dependency with no evidence of that.

YANBU for wanting to feel close to him.

I bet it's erectile dysfunction

Wow so much going on here. I find myself intrigued as o how the finances work. I appreciate today is Saturday, but it seems mighty unfair that one of you can sleep as late as they like and the other is up at 6:30 several times a week. Falling asleep on the sofa after midnight is something that happens to most people maybe a few times a year, not every week. Leaving the alcohol issues on one side you appear to be incompatible on many levels. You state he is not your DCs father- time to cut your losses ? Do you own property together? Hence my finances question.

What's his reasoning for not wanting intimacy when you've spoken to him?

I think coming to bed at 5ami ish and waking you up, is utterly selfish.

Well she hasn’t successfully pestered him, but she definitely sounds like a sex pest. She has even “offered” to cheat on him if he doesn’t agree to her sex demands! Double standards on mumsnet again. I’d love to see the different responses if a woman posted that her husband said that to her.

Tbf, OP explicitly states it's not every week ...

Not every week but 3 times this week. That would piss me off regardless of the alcohol or sex TBH.

Me too! But let's not misrepresent it as being every week.

I was also thinking this about the poster who suggested op masturbate next to him. If a man did that next to his female partner he would be called all sorts

Sounds as if you are sexually incompatible. Have you ever told him that you would like to have sex three times a week? If so what was his response?
Have you also tried a vibrator?

That post was vile and I'm glad most of us have deliberately ignored it.

If a man wanked next to his partner without her consent it would be indecent exposure at best.

Why do you think he's an alcoholic?

Because he’s behaving like one. If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck …

So the OP has tried in the past to talk to her husband about what she would like in terms of intimacy, and then withdrew and made no approaches to him sexually once it became clear that he was not interested. How is that being a sex pest?

Posters who try to claim that 'MN' always says one thing to men in sexless relationships and an entirely opposite thing to women are being ridiculous or disingenuous. MN is not a hive mind. On any thread like this there are people who who prioritise the right to intimacy and those who err in favour of the right to say no.

That one poster has suggested masturbating next to the dh is only proof of what one random person on the internet thinks, not proof that MN at large is hypocritical and misandrist. And I've certainly seen the suggestion of seeking sex elsewhere made on multiple threads posted by men.

Quibbling about whether he qualifies aa an alcoholic or not is pretty pointless too. He is at the very least a problem drinker, and his drinking is affecting his relationship.

So you've got no evidence for your belief? You just like the narrative?

If he can lie next to you both naked & not get aroused there is something seriously wrong. It doesn't seem right to me. Life is too short spending time with someone who doesn't fulfil your needs & has no interest in doing so. You said you've discussed it multiple times & nothing changes, surely your best ending it & meeting someone who can happily meet your needs?

@Plbrookes

Why do you think he's an alcoholic?

He drinks enough that he routinely falls asleep on the sofa and doesn't come to bed. He drinks enough that he has a problem with sex. And he drinks enough that it upsets his wife (who by her own admission also drinks too much).

In what world is this not problem drinking?

I did read your post, and I know I understood it right as you have repeated in this one the objectionable points I was responding to. OP does not need to reflect on her contribution. No one should be told that need to reflect on their contribution to a marriage that is failing because their partner has an addiction. Nor do they need to reflect on their contribution when they raise problems in the marriage and their partner repeatedly makes reassuring words then nothing changes.

I will never shift from my position that people should never be told to reflect on their contribution to a failing marriage to someone with addictions. I will never see it as anything other than contemptible to tell them they should.