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Original poster

dh very unhappy due to lack of sex.....

241 replies

americantrish · 12/03/2007 13:54

i'll try to keep this short... me and dh were separated from late september to late december last year. we have one child, ds is 3 in june. when i first moved back in, as to be expected, things were really good, sex included.

but now, i'm back a bit over 2 months and things are slowly feeling like they did before i left (on the sex front.)

(i should also say, we are in marriage counselling for about 6 weeks now and last week was the first week we touched on the topic of sex.)

dh has always had a higher sex drive then myself. and especially after having ds, my sex drive took a nosedive. and now, ds often doesnt nap during the day (he is today though! luckily!), wakes at 5.30am and by the time he's in bed at 7 or 7.30pm, i am knackered. and by the time i'm in bed at/around 10-10.30, sex is the last thing on my mind. dh tells me 'i'm tired all the time anyway' and that he does things he doesn't want to. (which i dont like how that implied i should have sex when i dont want to.)

a mistake i made in the past was having sex when i didn't want to. and as a result, i ended up in a state of self-loathing. one i wont allow myself to get back to.

i suggested to dh last night after he told me he was sick of being turned down for sex that we should sit down and have an open talk about sex and things associated with it. he assumes i know he wants to have sex when he rolls over and puts his leg over me! to me, that isn't a come-on!!
(i'm secretly afraid of having this talk! but there is SO much dh does sexually that i don't like.. i know i am hurting both of us (even if not openly) by NOT talking about these issues.)

i'm sick of feeling like this is only ME. (dh made a comment last night that "other couples go to bed and have sex".) sigh. he doesnt realise how badly those comments hurt. (to save having a row, i kept quiet about it.)

i need to have a backbone about this and tell him that if he just needs to get off, to go into the study, close the door and do this own thing. i'll leave him alone and not say a word about it afterwards. (porn used to be a very touchy subject for us, its not been brought up since we've reconciled.)

i guess i just needed to get this off my chest, it feels like its been suffocating me all morning. (sorry this was longer than i planned. thank you if you take the time to read it. or even skim it.)

OP posts:
Judy1234 · 20/03/2007 21:53

I think you should post that on all the mumsnet threads there have been from women not wanting sex and not being prepared to give it to their husbands.

lazyanna · 20/03/2007 22:56

thank you Xen - sex is - well, there is so much fuss about such a horrid thing

ENTP · 20/03/2007 23:20

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

Original poster
americantrish · 21/03/2007 09:06

lazyanna> i agree in a way, there is a LOT of fuss about sex!!

entp> i do love him. if it wasnt for ds, we wouldnt even be together now. we both know that.

OP posts:
Anna8888 · 21/03/2007 10:27

lazyanna - I cannot believe what you wrote... YOU DON'T LIKE SEX?????????

expatinscotland · 21/03/2007 10:30

'thank you Xen - sex is - well, there is so much fuss about such a horrid thing '

Huh?

Some of us actually like it.

Anna8888 · 21/03/2007 10:32

I just ADORE sex... just can't imagine life without it... and how anyone can get married to someone they don't really enjoy having sex with is quite beyond me...

expatinscotland · 21/03/2007 10:32

iftheyrenotgettingitathometheymayjustgogetitelsewhere

Anna8888 · 21/03/2007 10:40

And if women "are not prepared to give sex to their husbands" and aren't prepared to address the issue with counselling etc then they'd better not be surprised if their husbands have an affair / use porn / use prostitutes / leave them etc... You just cannot expect a man to go without sex - or a normal woman either - if my partner stopped wanting sex I'd have a MAJOR issue, and I really, really love him...

expatinscotland · 21/03/2007 10:48

I agree, Anna, be it the man or the woman in the relationship with issues.

I can see where sometimes people have serious medical issues, that's one thing, but another if they just go off sex and refuse to compromise on any of the matter.

As in my pal's case. She went for 3 years with no sex. Her husband just went off/ no drive and refused to compromise about it.

So she's seeing someone on the side who's in the same boat w/regards to his wife.

They love their spouses, but they're normal, sexual beings who have needs, too.

Original poster
americantrish · 21/03/2007 10:48

No, Expat. one thing dh isnt is a cheat. he is a very honest person. and before you may say well he could be or whatever, i trust him when it comes to this and he's never EVER given me reason to doubt. nor did he with his ex-partner whom i know. i'm not worried he is cheating. posting something like this is NOT helpful to me. it only further serves to make me feel even worse.

OP posts:
Original poster
americantrish · 21/03/2007 10:50

wow.. anna. i'd hope that last post wasnt a remark at me. we are in counselling. and trying to work thru it. i'm finding this thread less and less beneficial to me when it started off that way

MN is losing its rosy glow all of the sudden..

OP posts:
expatinscotland · 21/03/2007 10:51

Well, hey, this is a public board and it's just one take on things. The other thread is from a woman in the reverse situation, and one poster posted how she deals with it.

Whether it's particular to your situation or not, it's how some people handle it.

If you know you wouldn't be together with your partner except for your child then it's likely there are far greater issues than just sex between you both.

Best of luck and I hope you find some peace one day.

Original poster
americantrish · 21/03/2007 10:52

and in my case, i am married to someone i love, someone i have had a lot of problems with on many levels and the lack of emotional closeness is the reason why i am not wanting to feel physically close to him. had i thought our marriage wasnt worth saving, i wouldnt even try with the counselling. nor would he for that matter.

OP posts:
Anna8888 · 21/03/2007 10:52

No americantrish it was a response to Xenia's post below.

Original poster
americantrish · 21/03/2007 10:52

all im saying is, in this case, its NOT a helpful that on things. i am aware this is a public board.

OP posts:
expatinscotland · 21/03/2007 10:53

Mine was to lazyanna.

Xenia, I see where she is coming from, too, as she had a painful divorce after many years of marriage .

Original poster
americantrish · 21/03/2007 10:53

okay anna. sorry... am feeling very out of sorts today...

OP posts:
Anna8888 · 21/03/2007 10:54

No I'm sorry, the inverted commas weren't enough, I should have been clearer.

Counselling is a long slow and arduous process (we've all done loads in this family...) but worth it IF you find the right person to help you.

expatinscotland · 21/03/2007 10:55

And sometimes, if one counsellor isn't working, another might.

Original poster
americantrish · 21/03/2007 10:57

our counsellor is ideal for us, expat. or we wouldnt remain going to her. we both know how important for counselling to beneficial to have a counsellor you 'click' with.

OP posts:
Anna8888 · 21/03/2007 10:58

expat - I agree entirely. I found a fantastic NHS counsellor after years of expensive useless private ones who explained how counsellors are trained to rip off clients... he said, if you don't feel at least a tiny bit better after the second or third session, you should have second thoughts about the counsellor, and he thought that most people should have made major progress in 10 sessions. If not, they either needed serious psychiatry or their problems required "surgery" (eg divorce, change of job etc)

expatinscotland · 21/03/2007 11:03

We had similar experiences, Anna, the ex and I, when we went to explore why he didn't want children.

The best one told us, 'Yes, I think you need to divorce.'

We did, because basically he fundamentally did NOT want children - he's still happily childfree - and it wasn't fair for him to decide that for me or for me to decide the reverse for him.

Anna8888 · 21/03/2007 11:11

Expat - yes, that's interesting. My partner and his ex also had a therapist who told them "your divorce is inevitable". They didn't get on with it for a while, made everyone terribly miserable and ended up divorcing and everyone (children included) is much happier

Judy1234 · 21/03/2007 11:18

There aren't any rights or wrongs. Some people genuinely have a very low sex drive and when they marry people like that it's not a problem at all. Others would be disappointed if they didn't have it every day. I think most couples with children probably average about once or twice a week but I might be wrong. That's just a guess when you're busy and have children, and if you have a small baby then it's very different again.

I don't think a lot of married women however appreciate how important sex is to many men.