Problems having sex - I think it's me. Any advice please?

[Oldnamenomore]

My dh and I have been together since we were teenagers, we are 31 now, married with 5 children. We have been pretty happy- life is ok we work together in our own business a couple I think we get on and rarely argue. Up until the last year or so we always had sex very regularly a few times a week, even when we have had small babies , but now it seems like it is far less (a few times a month) and tbh he doesn't seem to enjoy it when we do. He loses his erection half way through - and a lot of the time the only way to get it back is to do things which while I WILL do I don't really enjoy. When we do manage to get through to the end it's crappy because again he seems only to enjoy everything I dont.

He seems to imply that I am not doing a good enough job at whatever It is I am doing or other things which are just not in my control that I find very confusing! which is the reason this happens but tbh I don't see what more I can do. He has erections other times, there is no problem with this it seems only to be when I am with him that there is an issue, so clearly I am pretty sure it's my fault .i have only ever had sex with him so I have nothing to compare all of this too- maybe I AM just don't it wrong! I just don't know how to fix this, I really miss having proper sex it sounds selfish but I do - i am 31 and I feel like this is pretty much the end of our sexual relationship.

Tonight I gave him a massage and oral sex - the same thing . I have never been upset with him , I don't make a big thing about it and I do t ever show disappointment but tonight I just couldn't carry on and ended up just upset again he made me feel it was my fault.

I am sorry this is so confused! I find this all quite difficult to talk about - there is 0% chance of him talking to anyone about this. Do I prett mich need to just accept that I will never have decent sex again or is there anything I can do to improve?

Thanks ??

CheeseandPickledOnion

I understand where you are coming from with it.

But would any man really abuse his wife mentally and physically like that for the sake of a tighter hole?

Sorry to be crude and upfront... but that would be the crooks of it. :(

Cheese, that is so far off the point that I'm stunned. Please withdraw your post. The OP's h is coercing her into a sex act she hates. That is the issue here.

In Cheese defence - she is not saying that his behaviour is at all justified but just pointing out what the possible reason behind it might be..

Nope, still unacceptable, rockup.

Many women do not like anal sex and many men are not that keen either. DH for one and me for another! So you are not alone in finding what you are being asked to do painful and unpleasant.

It does seem to be the latest thing in sexual terms and is covered extensively in current pornography which never used to be the case and I think pornography is constantly pushing the barriers. Oral sex used to be risqué but now is quite acceptable to men and women but there are still women who won't do it. The point to understand is no one should coerce you into doing anything you don't like ever! You've tried it and made your choice. Your husband sounds bored with the type of sex you have had up til now which is why he loses interest half way through. I don't think it is a physical ED but an emotional one.

This is not a sexual problem but a relationship one. For some reason he doesn't find you sexually attractive anymore, or some part of your relationship has become stale and boring for him. You have 5 children so they take up a lot of time and energy and you are together all the time in your joint business and I think you have just become a piece of the furniture. The excitement and novelty of sex has worn very thin for him hence his need for the need to stimulate himself with porn and to push the boundaries with anal sex.

I'm sure he still loves you but he won't accept the reality he feels as it will be hurtful of him to say he finds sex with you boring because he doesn't want to hurt you. His frustration and lack of communication skills in this area he is taking out on you and making you feel guilty for his lack of attraction to you.

Being with someone 24/7 is not the greatest aphrodisiac in the world and absence may not make the heart grow fonder but it does increase libido.

If it sounds as though I am blaming you I am not. None of this is your responsibility and you have done everything you can to communicate honestly with him (I assume you have?) but you are focusing on one area as is he. I am not sure what the answer is but this is how I see the problem and if it strikes a cord with you and if he confirms this is the problem, together you maybe able to work out strategies that will restore a more satisfying sex life.

rockup

I understand cheese's comment, an understandable reason for him wanting to do certain things. But not the way he is doing it or the behaviour he is displaying out of no where like he is.

I think he's developed an unhealthy obsession. Hence him not caring about his partner's feelings when he gets his kicks, seems out of character.

DestinyCalls

I'm sure he still loves you but he won't accept the reality he feels as it will be hurtful of him to say he finds sex with you boring because he doesn't want to hurt you. His frustration and lack of communication skills in this area he is taking out on you and making you feel guilty for his lack of attraction to you

I agree with most of what you said but the above it bullshit. He loves her but doesn't want to hurt her by saying it is boring... but will happily do something she has made very clear she hates, doesn't want to do, and is making her worried about the thought of!?

He'd rather that than sit down with her an mutually try and put a bit of spice back into things?

Ffs Cheese! Anal sex is nothing to do with saggy vaginas.

Sex is 90% in the imagination and 10% in the actual genitals! Go read some bloody psychology!

"I don't think it is a physical ED but an emotional one. "

I agree with this, though not the rest of your post. It seems he now finds anal and/or the idea of you having a kind of sex you don't really want more erotic than the idea of consensual vaginal sex. I'd be stunned if this was anything to do with "grip" as he is persisting with anal rather than, say, oral or manual that you are happy with, or indeed with alternative positions.

Oldname - so many of the posters on MN in other threads have experienced what you are and have difficulty in calling it rape. Maybe because they have a stereotyped image in their heads of what "rape" looks like and your experience doesn't seem to match that image.

I'm a man so am nervous about claiming to be able to say anything very meaningful about this when so many posters on here have direct experience of it and I don't. But please please see that, whatever you call what he does, the fact that he is able to maintain an erection only during an act which he knows you dislike and hurts you (or at least maybe he thinks you "just" feel uncomfortable, and I'm being very very generous to him there), it's still just so, so wrong. In fact, what he is doing is passing into the realms of criminality.

Hermit. It think he still loves her because the first thing a man does when he doesn't love his wife and is bored sexually is cheat.

He hasn't done this and I think pressurising her do do something she doesn't like is just one facet of their life. He's doing it because he is putting his needs above hers and blanking out the affect on her. It's something people do when they don't want to look closely at behaviour that makes them feel guilty. That's when they shove the guilt onto the other person.

I'm not say he is mr wonderful and he clearly has flaws but life isn't black and white.

Not really sure what to say to any of this! I can't even begin to think about what to do to fix things if it is an issue with probably the one part of my body I have no control over! . If he finds me boring again I'm not really sure what I can do about that. I have tried suggesting or doing various things over the last year but he is just not interested . In fact he seems totally unconcerned with anything like that - not long ago we had a meeting with a client who did not know we were married who asked me out at the end and dh found this hilariously funny for some reason! I think he doesn't really see me like that anymore.

And the OP should refuse point blank ever to do this again!

Old name, please don't worry about your vagina, it won't be that.

Sometimes people just do fall out of attraction to one another, although it's just on his part at the moment.

Sometimes it's just the beginning of the falling out of love in other areas

Destiny, it is black and white that he is in the wrong here. And bollocks to the theory that he'd be having an affair if he didn't still love OP. Love is a verb and coercing her into sex she hates over and over again is not a loving act.

Frankly, if he gets off by coercing someone into anal sex, he has less chance of getting to that stage in an affair than in a long term relationship where his partner feels financially trapped.

OP - I appreciate this must feel like a complete bombardment. All I can say is that you don't have to say anything to all these responses and you don't have to feel anything - whatever you actually feel and actually say is completely fine.

If I were you I'd take some time just to think. Don't have sex with him for a bit until you feel that you have got your head straight.

But I think you really do need to talk to him about what you do and don't find acceptable when it comes to sex - and mean it when you say that something in unacceptable. That isn't you being unreasonable or demanding or whatever - it's part of a normal loving relationship for the vast majority of adults in relationships. His response to what you say to him will tell you a lot so listen carefully. Any blaming of you or sulking or trying to persuade you that you don't feel something that you know you do is not a good sign, though.

Good post, pompodd. Sorry if this is overwhelming OP.

He doesn't sound like a loving or in love partner. Sex for him is all about the act and not about being intimate with his wife and mother of his children. He sounds vile tbh OP and I strongly feel you should seek professional help to be able to air this abuse, and it is abuse, in a non threatening place where you will be heard. Right now you are nothing more than orifice to him.