sexless marriage, last schance saloon for kids. Any advice?

[lackofplaisirdamour]

Near the end of last year I posted a thread on here about my sexless,, but otherwise affectionate and loving marriage.

So after the 18 month posting where I was away, we got together again. It was and is lovely, very affectionate. Didn't pressure each other for sex, partly because I was ill with shingles and feeling rotten. Then went to visit our families for weeks over Christmas, and you can't really do anything about sex when one of you is in the parental guest room and the other is on the couch cushions on the floor in another room (yes our parents seem to think we are teenagers - and they would be terribly offended if we stayed elsewhere - easier not to argue to be honest, they are difficult enough as it is).

Then we got back home and have been doing lots of fell running, which has us out of the house at 7.30am on a weekend, and in bed sound asleep by 9pm. DH has been working manically during the week and when not out running on weekends - so he's up and off to work at 7am, home for dinner, works at the computer until 1am every night. He is working, not timewasting - the computer is in the lounge room, I can see what is on his screen.

So it's all affectionate, we spend time together doing things we love, but there has been no sex - i.e. we have had sex once since we got married, on our wedding night, 15 months ago. I'm not initiating it because he's either desperately working or in need of sleep, or asleep. He's not initiating it because he's too busy.

However, I now think he will always be too busy. We've had a discussion where we agreed we are in last chance saloon about having kids. We're both 38, nearly 39. We agreed that we needed to get the sex back on track whether or not kids happen. I tried to discuss the aspects of his work habits that mean i don't feel comfortable initiating it, i.e. it doesn't seem fair to prevent him from finishing something he's desperately trying to finish - but because he never says no to anything at work, this is how he works all the time. He agreed. And went back to the computer and worked until 2am.

I don't know if it complicates matters that I don't think he has a lot of respect for me, because my career has just ended and I am depressed and unemployed. He is very nice, tolerant, friendly, not judgemental to me - but I can see that he has much more fun talking to people who have stuff to say about their working life. I stay at home doing freelance work, reading and gardening. I never get to talk to anyone unless it's with the running people. He sees most of them at work through the week - they all have great careers, plenty of stuff to say, are self-motivated, etc.

Any advice?

I'm with Pinkfrocks.

You admitted in your last thread that neither of you like having sex with each other.

That is the reason for your problems, right there. Your husband wouldn't be too busy to have sex with you if he enjoyed it, and you wouldn't accept his bizarre excuses. You can't teach or force yourselves to enjoy sex together, though, so you've found a status quo that means neither of you has to make any hard decisions or start again, but neither of you has a sex life, either.

That is considerably easier going on your husband, because he can throw himself into academia, and focus on that. When that focus wears off, if it ever does, he'll probably struggle like you. Perhaps he has his sex drive under control himself, though.

For you, you are coming to the time when you need to decide if you want children, which makes this more pressing. You are underemployed, as you put it, so you can't reliably distract yourself.

If you assess this from a logical point of view, you are a married couple who have never enjoyed sex, and whom gave up on it very quickly. You are treating yourself with medication rather than sorting your life out, he is throwing himself into academia. You would probably both just live out your lives like this, if it weren't for the fact that you are aware that you will soon run out of time for children.

You can't save this. Not with him. There was never anything to save, there is nothing to repair it too. It isn't a crumbling relationship that can be restored to it's former glory, because there was never any glory in the first place. Your choices are to accept it, as it is, or to move on and find something better. It would seem that staying isn't much of an option, though, because your mind is already requiring antidepressants to get through the day.

Absolutely Infinity and Loving.

I've seen this type of situation time after time on MN where academics use their intelligence to post long and articulate threads ad infinitum but never actually do anything about the problem because they won't face up to the facts that are staring them- and us- in the face.

OP you need to stop kidding yourself. Deal with the emotions instead of ignoring the obvious and you won't need the crutch of medication to subdue your feelings.

You sound like you are over thinking and in doing so suppressing your emotions. You hardly mention your own feelings and dreams. Do you want to be a Mum? Do you want to work again? What is it you want to be happy?

I have a 2.5 yo DD (with a DS on the way in July) with a workaholic academic. I'm a couple of years older than you. I'm glad we did have kids, but it sure isn't easy. He's working all the time (I work full time too, since there is no part-time work in my field, plan to take about a year and a half off when DS is born).

The default is that I am watching DD all the time when she is not at daycare, because he's likely working. He often works at home, so we do see him, at least. I don't get to sleep past when DD wakes up on weekends. I don't go out on my own in the evenings (I never really did go out much, though). If I want to do something where I can't take DD along, it requires negotiation in advance. I'm also a former workaholic academic, so I feel guilty about asking him to put aside his work for anything I don't really need to do. If I have a dentist appointment or really need some sleep, that's different from just wanting to read a book. The time I get to do fun things for myself is after I get DD to sleep. She's a night person, much like DH and me, and she's not to the point where she will stay in bed quietly until she falls asleep yet, so that's usually 10pm or later. I get up at 6:30 for work, DD sometimes lets me sleep till 8:30 or 9 on weekends. We have landscapers and a once a week cleaner come in, and we're pretty tolerant of mess, so at least I'm not doing all the cleaning and yard work. I don't really have a career-type job, because I'm too exhausted to do more than 40 hours a week.

But it's not lack of time that is the issue- it's lack of desire for each other, and this has been the case throughout all their years together.

Really not quite sure how OP you think talking is going to change this- or being together 24/7 - when the desire is not there.

Hi OP. I am in a relationship where there is no chemistry and sex has gone from an effort to non existant. I always stayed because dp is wonderful and we get on brilliantly, but also low self esteem and thinking I should be grateful for what I had, then latterly wanting children became a factor in staying. We miraculously had dd last year (whose conception I can pinpoint to the minute). I realised after she was born that I had believed that once I was a mother I wouldn't care about sex any more, only about having a brilliant co-parent and dad for our dc. He is both of these things and more, but it hit me in wave of overwhelming regret when dd was 4 months that nothing had changed, that sex still mattered, and that I should have split up with him years ago. Things are such a mess and I wouldn't recommend being in my situation to anyone.

geeky why on earth are you putting up with that? Sorry but that's total bullshit, you deserve lie-ins and you shouldn't have to negotiate being able to do things, especially when you work FT too!

If I was single, I would be a workaholic academic myself. I still work a lot. But I cannot imagine doing the kinds of things these guy academics are doing to their partners, because I actually care about my DH and don't think my work is more important than his happiness. If it means a bit more stress on my part to get things done in less time, that's MY problem.

Sorry but I am so angry for you ladies

I work in academia too and many of my colleagues are married (or unmarried) with children. What you describe is not universal. No sex = no baby. It ain't gonna happen.

I was a workaholic academic myself at one time. You can take the tiger out of the jungle, but you can't take the jungle out of the tiger. I find it extremely difficult to ask someone to put aside work for things like sleeping in or having fun. I feel really guilty if I try. I don't blame my DH for this, I think it would be the same no matter who I was married to. It might be a little easier if I were with someone who didn't have a job where working all the time happens, but jobs like that are rarer and rarer (for professional jobs in the US, don't know if this is true in the UK). I didn't feel right taking time off to date when I was in college, anyway (plus I hated dating), so it's doubtful that I would have even met someone like that.

The career is a red herring.

Just to help you out here it is...

It's fairly obvious that the elephant in the room is that neither of us actually enjoys sex with the other, at all, and never really has. And we each feel very guilty about that, and can't really discuss it functionally.

I'm not qualified to comment on the relationship problems. I am, however, qualified to comment on what it might be like for an ex-academic to raise kids with a workaholic academic.

Yeah but in this case there are not going to be kids because they don't have sex