AIBU to think DH is unreasonable for expecting intimacy when he can’t give me the basics?

[Gingerbreadhouse123]

DH and I are not intimate as often as DH would like. It’s clearly an issue for him as he always finds ways to twist conversations around to make the point of how I “always have excuses” to not be intimate.

For the past 12 years I still have to ask for the bare basics from DH - his time, his company, his attention towards me. I still feel like I’m bottom of his priority list. His business and work are priority.

AIBU to think that intimacy is a result/product of the bare essentials of a relationship being met? And if I’m consistently not afforded the basics, then naturally, intimacy with him is not going to feel like a priority to me?

no matter how many times I try to explain this to him and basically ask for the bare basics and for him to understand, he still just criticises me and implies that I am the problem because I won’t give him the intimacy he desires.

For additional context, we have 3 children, I work 34-50 hours a week in a highly pressurised, exhausting professional job - working 12.5 hour shifts. I do all of the running around for the kids - after school activities, appointments, carry the whole families mental load and do all of the planning and preparation for the family, working extra to pay for family holidays, Christmas, birthdays etc. He works 25-50% less hours than me, earns 3x as much as me, does do some tidying, laundry and cooking but isn’t around for any of the running around after the kids etc. and yet im still expected to do more - financially, intimately and in our relationship.

AIBU? I feel like I can’t take much more. I feel completely undervalued, under respected and feel like I’m just wanted as a sex object? He tells me he loves having sex with me because “it’s me”, but why won’t he understand that if he afforded me the basics of the relationship then I’d feel more motivated to be intimate? Is this a “me” problem?

What's his excuse for not doing the running around after the kids? Say you want parity on that before anything else is even up for discussion.

Also, why are you working extra hours to pay for holidays when he earns 3 times as much? Where is his money going?

I’d tell him his behaviour is off putting and so you don’t feel loved which makes it hard to want to be intimate.

Tell him you need his behaviour to show that he values you. You could contrast your care for his children and his home and him as evidence of your care for him, with his neglect of all those things. That your priorities are clear from your behaviour- him and the dc and your home- while his appear to be work and business.

Look up Abby Eckel on FB she speaks a lot about men expecting sex even though they have emotionally checked out of the marriage, and they leave their wife to burn out dealing with the mental load and the physical load of child rearing. And in your case a 50 hour week job !!

Isnt there a book about men, women, mars and venus? This sounds like a classic example of the fundamental differences between the male and female of the spieces.

I'm getting notes of self importance from the husband.
So many threads that his day ends when he leaves work,off to hobbies etc.
Whilst the little woman is at home and ran ragged.

If he works 25-50% less time than you and doesn’t help with the running around after school, what does he do with all his free time?

If you’re working up to 50 hours a week, then spending the rest of the time juggling the kids, home and holiday logistics, when do you have free time to spend with your H?

Basically what is he doing when you do get free time for him?

Your family sounds busy, but no more than the average family with young kids. From experience the only time for each other during this phase of your life is when you have sex. Intimacy will keep the relationship strong so that when your kids are older and much less demanding you still have each other and can breathe and begin enjoying each other’s company more than it just being sex. No sex will kill your marriage.

Men feel closer to their partner when they have sex, women feel more like having sex when they're feeling closer to their partner. I read that here years ago, and it's really stuck with me as something that is generally true, obviously not always. Of course either partner can be selfish, nasty or lazy, but even in a decent relationship, women tend to feel like sex when they're already feeling more connected because of other stuff, but for men, it's the sex that rekindles the connection. I found that spelling this out to my husband was helpful- if he wanted sex, he was more likely to find me receptive if he helped me or joined in with something I wanted to do first. If he wanted to spend all evening watching boring sports, fine, but it's not going to end up with sex afterwards!

working extra to pay for family holidays, Christmas, birthdays etc.

Do you think you're being financially abused?

something is amiss when you say his priorities are his work & business yet he works 25%-50% less than you.

surely being intimate is a way of spending time together and giving you both things that you need?

however, your division of labour by mumsnet standards is way off. Your ‘loads’ are not equal when you work more. Time to have a conversation. If you can’t work it out you need to stop flogging the donkey and accept you aren’t compatible

A relationship that is now operating based on resentment where both feel the other one is in the wrong and expect them to make the first change. That equals to a relationship that is slightly dying and is waiting for the trigger to end.

Why doesn’t he take the kids to their activities? Is he lazy and selfish? Or just useless?

Have a look at Alex Trippier on Facebook. You may be able to send him some of his content to help him understand. I think it helps that it is coming from another man rather than a woman.

If he won’t make you a priority, then make yourself a priority here!
what’s the financial situation? You working extra, him earning more? Is he financially abusive?? Thank goodness you have your own money!

It’s only a you problem in the fact you have put up with this shit so long. If he wants to pay less to the family that’s fine but he takes more of the physical load instead?

He is going to absolutely kill your desire stone dead if he carries on like this. It's how a lot of marriages/LTR end up.

• Husband starts whining about sex frequency but neglects wife in other respects, this in turn guilts her into having sex to keep him happy but kills off a little bit more desire in the process. He starts to whine again after a day or so, she initiates or gives in due to the whining and loses yet more desire for him. Vicious circle.

Amazes me how many men are happy to have sex with the woman they supposedly love when they've basically coerced her into it 🤮

YANBU OP, if he can't grasp that you need to feel more than a hole for him to regularly empty himself into, your sex life together is doomed. There's nothing wrong with you OP, he's treating you like an unpaid sex worker.

Time to pack the job in and take equal shares in his company and share his comfortable lifestyle perhaps

Hes doing nothing to make you want him so im not suprised you say no.

Your DH sounds lazy and selfish.

Absolutely OP. I once watched an interview where they were saying for women, forwplay has nothing to do with sex. For us to be in the mood, we need to feel loved, valued, heard etc and if we feel that way we are more likely to want to have sex. Tell your DH this.

Anyone who responds to not having as much sex as they want by whining, rather than trying to behave in a way that makes their partner want to have sex with them, is an arsehole who secretly believes they are entitled to a woman's body.

Maybe ask him outright if he wants to have sex with someone who doesn't want it? It's the position of a rapist.

Of course you don't want sex with someone who doesn't make you feel loved and valued.

I'm concerned that he says you 'make excuses' not to have sex. We make excuses not to do things we are obliged to do. He appears to feel that providing your body to him so that he can have sex with it is your obligation, and you are shirking your duty. What a dreary, stupid man he is.

He sounds like an absolute pig.

How have you put up with this for so long? No wonder you don't want to shag him.

Lazy twat.

If he works 25-50% less than you, why isn’t he around re domestic labour? Where is he?

If he earns thrice your salary, why are you ‘doing more’ financially? Why are you working extra to pay for holidays?

By ‘intimacy’, I assume you mean sex? Have you said words to the effect: ‘I don’t want to have sex with you because you treat me like shit?’ Or have you phrased it ‘delicately’ like you’ve attempted to do here? As, I promise you, the former is much harder for him to pretend not to understand.

What are you getting out of this relationship?

^ this

His ‘basics’ will be sex, yours for connection

Why are you not working equal hours & having equal leisure? Then you would both be better placed to meet the other one’s needs

Yes, but men are from Earth and women are from Earth.