AIBU - DH and my changing appearance

[Volley2014]

I've always tried to be as natural as possible. Kept my mousy brown hair colour, accepted I don't tan in the sun, don't wear make up etc.

I'm in third trimester with DC1 and have put on a bit of weight and everything's bigger. As a result of preg I'm getting a few stretch marks and my hair has gone rather dull. So, for the first time ever I decided to get my hair coloured and to put on a bit of fake tan to make myself feel better. I also have started experimenting with make-up a little.

Well it's worked a treat. I feel great and I think I look good. It's not how i want to be forever but to make the negatives of pregnancy a little brighter, it's worked.

But DH's reaction has been off the scale. He cannot stop speaking about it. He wants sex on the kitchen table, in the bathroom, in public, morning, noon and night. This is a man who I had trouble getting to want sex with me every two weeks before this, let alone all this sudden passion, variety and running commentary. He was not even like this when we first met.

I have reacted badly. I want him to want me the same all the time. I don't like that he is turned on by this "fake" new look. I thought he liked me natural. He insists that he does, but that he prefers this.

AIBU (and puritanical) to feel annoyed about this? Instead of boosting my confidence, the increased sexual attention has depleted it. As although it looks good I don't feel that it is ultimately "me" and I don't want to continue doing it after pregnancy.

It also makes me think this slightly more high maintenance look is something he has always preferred over my natural, low maintenance look which I was so proud of. He has started sending me dirty texts with his fantasies and he never did that before. The change is alarming me.

What was his fantasy world before I changed my hair colour and skin colour and put on make up? Where was it focused? Certainly not on our marriAge (as evidenced by the previously scant sexual attention.)

I have told him a this and he just laughs and says he doesn't know what it is, he just likes it.

Am I just being stupid?

Rebel robin - how on earth are the feminists on here going to bring her down?!??!!!

It's the people who like to think they're not who are essentially belittling and dismissing her experience by telling her she should just go with it and enjoy it and she's overthinking.

Woozlebear - you said what I was thinking again!

don't let the feminists on here bring you down.? What a load of crap.

I actually think its really awful that a few people replying are suggesting that it is anything more than the issue the OP spoke about. She looks great, she must do to get a reaction like that, she felt better, her husband loves the new look.
It's not about suggesting he was using porn before, it's not about calling him shallow. One thing I hate about these responses is how little posters realise they are only causing damage to the OP. Putting doubts in her mind or encouraging doubts that were already there. If somebody behaved this way in real life they would be dropped by their friends like a sack of shit for being a confidence dwindling killjoy who only seemed happy when they were pissing on somebody else's parade. How bitter. It is truly revolting to watch those type of posters rival for who has the most damaging thing to post.

RockinHippy I agree with you.

My other half grows a dodgy little goatee sometimes, he knows I hate it, I tell him I don't like it and we joke about it. I don't suddenly find him repulsive when he has it. I would never dream of telling him that he HAS to get rid of it. He knows I find him more attractive without it. I love him with or without the ugly beard. If I go through a dry spell it doesn't mean I've taken to watching porn or fantasizing about somebody else.

I've not read the lot but here's what I think. It's not about the "fake look". You are making an effort which men like and in doing so you are full of more confidence which is attractive. You also are carrying his baby. It's completely normal for him to find you attractive.
My dh finds me attractive with no make up and scruffy jeans but more so when I dress up -if you didn't look better why would anyone bother?Make Up enhances your natural features. Enjoy, be happy and have fun x

My DH loves me when I'm pregnant. I was so surprised at his reaction but his libido definitely increases each time (no matter how dreadful I look!) agree with PP that it could be this rather than your new look.

How is it the feminists bringing the OP down or making her feel bad?

We're the ones telling her that her feelings are valid, she is not crazy to feel this way.

I think all the posts telling her it's just her hormones and she should feel lucky to be pestered for sex all day are far more damaging.

Thank you for all the responses. I'm actually even more confused considering the responses are so many and so varied. I'm also not in the best mindset to know whether I am being rational or not because I am in the last weeks of pregnancy and feeling rather emotional about everything!

I am proud of my natural look because I think that I look okay with little effort and I feel good that I can focus my attention on other things and be ready in five minutes, rather than long drawn out beauty routines.

My skin and hair colour is now different. Both dyed. The fake tan covers the cellulite and stretch marks and veins and freckles. The blacker hair compliments the fake tan and gives me a more "exotic" foreign look. Yes, one of the "types" you see in porn.

I had assumed all this time that he just wasn't very sexual and had settled for sex twice a month and lots of physical affection in between. His sudden high sex drive bordering on sex addiction is a complete bolt from the blue.

I now look like a "type." With the big boobs and big belly, it probably appears even more explicit. I thought this "type" had no affect on him - we see plenty of women in the street who look like this - but obviously it does.

Did you ever talk about the lack of sex before all this? How did he explain that?

It seems like that's really the issue, in a way -- the huge discrepancy. I don't think you would be so bothered if he was just being a little bit more sexual.

Are you going to keep up this look? Did you ask him what will happen if you go back to your normal look?

I don't think his sudden attraction to you is strange. that's how sex works. It is playful. Fantasy is a normal part of that.

What would be strange is if he is making you feel uncomfortable and seems to have forgotten about the person inside the changing body.

He would need to address that. But if he is the same person just very very randy then I'm sure you will find your level again.

Is it possible that his new found sex drive is actually more about him, than you??

as in - your heavily pregnant self makes HIM feel more confident & manly than ever before, because he impregnated you & he gets a big confidence boosting buzz out of that & that has awakened his sexual self more??

If he's not usually a confident type, then this, coupled with your own new found confidence shining through, is more than a possibility too

Excuse typos - replying on the run x

He has started sending me dirty texts with his fantasies and he never did that before. The change is alarming me.

This would freak me out a lot, actually! No wonder you feel confused. I'd be wondering where it all came from - was he a sexter before we met, but chose not to do it with me? ... If so, why choose not to, and why start now? ... etc ...

As you're so close to D-Day, however, it might be wise just to relax and enjoy being a Pregnant Exotic Harlot or whatever. And see what happens next?

Unless you have had an extreme makeover and look radically different, this doesn't add up. You say you are making 'slightly more' effort and wearing 'a little' make-up so you can't have changed that much! Fake tan fades in a couple if days and you have dyed your hair a bit darker, that's all.

What is majorly different though is you are heavily pregnant with your first baby. It must be this which has altered his sex drive so drastically.

I think it's nice. I would enjoy. I also think it's more likely to do with your fuller figure, bigger boobs! And he's enjoying it. Why not? Let him.

I think you are being a bit paranoid. Dh loves it when I wear contact lenses, which I do about once a month! I could go and get them to wear all the time. I just enjoy the compliments. He likes it when I wear makeup and skirts. Probably because it's different. That's ok by me.

And get your sex quota in now, cos he ain't gonna be getting any for a long while after the baby!

I think the radical option of a conversation could help!

ABSOLUTELY!!

For all we know, the poor guy might have read, or heard that pregnancy knocks a woman's confidence & they need reassuring that they are still sexually attractive, not just baby carriers. That coupled with your extra effort to boost your own confidence may have made him feel he needs to make an extra effort you feel sexually desired

Talk to HIM!

"I have told him all this and he just laughs and says he doesn't know what it is, he just likes it." - has OP not tried having a conversation, then?

Obviously not enough though - if she's as deeply upset by it as she puts across here, she needs to tell him that's how it makes her feel & that she needs an answer from him.

He's a man, like it or not they think differently about sex & I've never met a man yet who would worry that they are being objectified by sexual attention, they would be just happy to be getting it, so he is never going to see it from her POV unless it's explained point by point in simple plain English that this is making her feel vulnerable, not desired for her core self, but something more superficial & she needs him to understand, be honest & explain.

But the OP needs to take on board somewheres very valid points too & accept that sex is at times playful too & that her DH may well be simply enjoying this along side all of the other things, no one version might be the answer, but a bit of everything, which makes it difficult for him to explain - & also the poor sod might be scared to own up to finding the changes attractive

So perhaps communicate rather than talk is a better way of putting it - let him know there us no right of wrong answer, you just need to know

I thought this "type" had no affect on him - we see plenty of women in the street who look like this - but obviously it does.

There is more than a faint sniff of disapproval about this sentence.

You know what? If this is upsetting you that much wash off the tan. There's not a whole lot you can do about the hair, or the figure.

But I wonder if you do find that its not so much the tan & hair BUT your new figure that he's really responding to, you'll still be disappointed in him.

And thats a real shame, as that figure is as a result of the baby the two of you made, and its a figure thats meant to be celebrated.

Post in relationships op, you might get some more sympathetic replies.

Fuck me people are hard work sometimes. Feminazis....and now apparently not wearing makeup makes you a clichéd earth mother 'type' and is 'worthy' and thus repels people.

And in any way affirming the ops feelings is bitchy and bitter and damaging....What's better? Going 'aww hun, you're being hormonal, you obv look sexy, you should be glad you're getting banged senseless'. Can you fucking imagine what hell would beak loose if a man posted along those lines???

Never mind the ridiculous assumption that the op MUST look sexier with a hair and skin colour different to her own. Wtf? I know dozens of people who dye their hair and use fake tan. Some look better, some don't. If the op thinks she looks good - and I'm sure she does - and feels happier because of it, then great, lovely, wonderful, but there's a really distasteful undercurrent on here that assumes that any artificial change to a woman's appearance is per se an 'effort', an improvement, an obvious seduction invite...Again, imagine a man saying the same things....

Oops this is relationships. From most of the answers I assumed I'd accidentally fallen into aibu.

I thought this "type" had no affect on him - we see plenty of women in the street who look like this - but obviously it does.

There is more than a faint sniff of disapproval about this sentence.

I see fake tanned, dark haired women all the time. Just look at Geordie Shore or Made In Chelsea. We (and I say we now!) are not all carbon copies of each other, because everybody looks different, but I'd hazard a guess a lot of these girls, like me, are mousy brown haired English girls with fair skin which doesn't tan THAT much in the sun, who - with the right products can make themselves look a little more exotic.

Are you telling me you don't think young women aspire to certain standard "looks" that they see in magazines or taken up by celebrities?

I made these changes for ME because it makes me feel better. When I look down, I see brown smooth skin and no longer big red stretch marks or bubbly cellulite.

He has told me he likes the brownness of the skin and the darkness of the hair.

But I don't plan to stay like this.

Whenever I talk to him about it, he laughs it off and says I love you with and without the fake tan/dyed hair. But the gap in sexual interest is huge! I have told him this and then he says he "just doesn't know." It goes unresolved, we part to go about our days, then I start getting this stream of filthy texts.

For those who say it's my pregnancy body he's after - I was white and mousy haired until last week, so he could have been all over me before, but he wasn't.

Also please don't mistake my lack of understanding of my own feelings about it for me somehow drip feeding information or not being genuine or being dismissive or snobby.

All I feel right now is that this vast sexual fantasy world of his has come completely out of the blue and slapped me round the face and I am grappling around for answers as to why it's suddenly appeared and where the hell it's been for the whole of our marriage.

I am trying to understand how I feel about it and it's taking me a while. Often the MN board is good at helping to tease it out.