Staying in a sexless marriage

[StickStickStickStick]

I'd really love to hear from others who are managing to stay in a sexless relationship.

Advice on here is often to leave and that's not at all practical in our situation (low income, I've lost my career, etc etc.) We coparent fine and get on okay.

I'm really finding lack of intimacy hard. Tonight, after months, I tried to initiate and remembered why I don't bother. It's soul destroying .

I bumble along okay for a few months and then have a period of feeling so frustrated at the situation. It's so horrible. I assume he just has such a low drive it doesn't bother him if we "start something and it fizzles off and he goes back to doing what he was but leaves me feeling so frustrated. And then the bigger frustration that I even ended up in a marriage like this.

I know in can work if both partner have a low drive. But I really don't. I need to suppress it really. I have single friends who would love to be in a relationship and I do try to feel grateful for the fact I have a partner, and the kids.

But I was on so stupid getting into this in the first place.

Anyone else feeling the same? Is a rich fantasy solo fun the way forwards or does that just build resentment?

I'm so bloody envious of functional couples but I guess every relationship has it's story and every family it's difficulties.

There's variations of it, as we weren't doing it much at all we chose to have sex everyday for 28 days. Like I said we got as far as day 3 but it's a start!

Oh sh1t, I think you guys have given me some cajones. Today visited son who was doing some jobs at home. He did not phone his Dad to help. OH was out this morning so I suggested he was doing X, when OH came home of course it was all my fault he had not been there for son (like he ever takes or answers his mobile anyway). OH has gone off on one saying, how do you know I was doing X?

I replied, "Well I know you weren`t fucking anything"

OH has now gone to sons to help with DIY, I suspect I am in deep doo doo.

welshnist - hope you weren't in deep doo doo

Kikashi Fri 23-Feb-18 14:53:52
welshnist - hope you weren't in deep doo doo

Was the weirdest thing when he returned, it was as if I had not spoken of the elephant in the room. That is the nub of the problem, they complete block it out it would seem. Total denial...

"ostriching" as it's known in my house

I’d love to know how others actually cope and function in a sexless marriage. For me leaving isn’t an option. I’m almost 50, sex and affection have been missing for years with my DH. I try to keep fit and happy. I won’t even discuss it now with DH. I’ve tried and I’m the only one who ever gets upset. He is completely uninterested and if I’m honest hasn’t really been since we got together 20 yrs ago. It’s hard to talk to anyone/friends in RL as I feel I’m such a failure (although have sought help with GP and counselling and anti depressants which do help). What do others do?

I’ve been in the same situation for 8 years. My 40th Birthday was the last time he was interested. Again as is the same with you, it’s not so much the lack of sex itself but the lack of intimacy or affection, it does make you very lonely. I have tried many times to initiate but the rejection does wear you down. These days I’m entering the dreaded menopause and find I feel too knackered to even ask!! I’ve also recently discovered he’s having an affair and quite likely has been for sometime, so that explains a lot!

I think they try to muddle through as best they can and if it gets too much they leave.

I think I wrote upthread about someone I know who lives a parallel life - she is a committed christian so won't leave. She has made a separate life for herself with lots of volunteering and church activities. She goes on holiday with her female friends. She supports her husband and insists he give her hugs and cheek kisses morning and night to maintain affection.They have separate rooms as sharing a bed upset her too much. MH issues/severe depression led to the sex stopping in her marriage so she has to deal with his low moods as well. They communicate and have put strict boundaries in place.

I don`t know how much clearer I can be than the many posts on here. The men will not change they will never want you in a sexual way ever!! again. You just have to decide to stay or go.

I suspect Cosmopolitan when it came out put them on the spot, my Mother hid it back in the day, then had an affair because as she put it my Father had never been up to it in the sense of pleasing her.

How many men do you suppose are really appalled by FGM? If we went back to the day when you thought of England and looked at the ceiling compiling shopping lists without the slightest idea there was something better out there you would have looked forward to kicking him out of bed. Which means many women lived in ignorance of their partners failings later in life.

My partner hates that I have no sex drive. The idea of sex just isn't appealing to me. I'm on medication though, so probably to do with that. But, for me, sexual intimacy isn't an expression of love.

Just a reminder that sex isn't necessarily available on tap to the single, particularly post menopause. It took me 18 months to be ready for another relationship and find the right person. This in spite of no ties and a very active social life, where I meet a lot of women who have given up looking.
That said, I was happier on my own than being ignored.

alpineibex Tue 27-Feb-18 12:29:03
My partner hates that I have no sex drive. The idea of sex just isn't appealing to me. I'm on medication though, so probably to do with that. But, for me, sexual intimacy isn't an expression of love.

The irony is that a man would justify that as a reason for divorce/affair, sadly it does not happen in reverse.

Re: medication SSRI`s and others of that ilk can kill the sex drive.

Apologies if this has been covered already, OP, ( I haven’t read every single comment on the thread), but I did wonder if your husband has undiagnosed depression?
You say he is unenthusiastic about activities or outings, is very passive, describes himself as useless, as well as the lack of libido - these can all be depressive features.
I also think some gay men can be very deeply in denial, even in these more enlightened times, particularly if they’ve had any sort of fundamentalist religious upbringing.
They want a wife and kids to try and convince themselves they are not gay, but can’t maintain the fiction far enough to engage in regular straight sex.
There is also the old “Madonna v whore” chestnut - that once you become a mother, the chap can’t see you as a sex partner, as it seems disrespectful. Those kind of dinosaurs tend to have affairs instead.
I was a bit puzzled that one poster suggested autism as a reason for a lack of libido. My late husband and I ( and most of our relatives!) are on the spectrum, and we were at it like rabbits for our entire 16 years together! My in laws were complaining in their 80’s that FIL’s bp tablets were causing impotence, so being autistic certainly hadn’t limited them.
If you really want to stay married, and there is no prospect of things improving, then a discreet affair might be a reasonable option. And certainly look for a better paying job, so you have more options about leaving if your distress in your marriage becomes unbearable.
I’m so sorry you’re having to deal with this. I’ve been a widow for 26 years, so I know exactly how awful celibacy is. I hope you find a solution that works for you.

Interesting

"You say he is unenthusiastic about activities or outings, is very passive, describes himself as useless, as well as the lack of libido - these can all be depressive features. "

It could be low testosterone. Just because the NHS says his T levels are "normal", doesn't mean that they are. According to their guidelines, if your T level is 12 nmol/l or above, it counts as "normal", and you get refused treatment, despite 12 nmol/l only being about half the average level for normal, healthy adult men. They've just chosen a very low level as the cutoff to keep the number of patients they have to treat small.

I started a similar thread a few weeks ago and was directed to this one. My DH is brilliant in every way - he's a go-getter, earns fistfuls of dosh, treats me with care and generosity, pays all the bills, takes me on lovely holidays, which he plans and researches and books and pays for. DC all grown up now (youngest nearly adult), this should be our time.

Everything we do is more fun if he's there too. He's funny, clever, generous, great fun to be around.

We hug and peck/kiss hello and goodbye, and quite often hold hands in bed. Literally, how pathetic. We HOLD HANDS in bed.

I've always been the initiator, the main one wanting it. There have been long dry spells when DC were little, and pressures of work, illness, etc.

I think the main change has been me. I have lost confidence as I've got older and flabbier and not felt as happy to be always initiating and pushing for it. I've tried just touching and cuddling a bit without expecting more but my body does expect more and I end up frustrated and wide awake and upset.

Physically I think he has a problem - PIV has always been a problem for him, I think actually his foreskin is too tight - he has a close friend who married latish in life and went through a circumcision because of that.

He's not into porn at all. He might be gay or just asexual. His sister is, she's never had a lover.

I don't want anyone else. I want an intimate relationship with the man I love.

I talked to him the night I started the other thread - we were away together and had come back from the beach, I was expecting some kind of intimacy because it has happened before on holiday, but it's almost like he was scared of it, kind of leaped up saying "wow, is that the time, gosh, we better get on," kind of thing.

He was upset when I told him how I feel. (Despite having had it all out a few months before, when he apologised.) He was really upset and felt inadequate, and I was sorry I'd upset him, though relieved that he wanted to change. He even initiated it once, a few days afterwards. But not again. Last night I put my hand on him in bed and he put his hand on my hand - as if holding my hand affectionately but I suspect keeping it from caressing him.

I don't want him to feel inadequate. he's my man and I'm on his team and his upset is my upset. But I don't know how I feel to have him thinking everything is hunky dory when my life has a big empty hole in it where sex and intimacy should be. He's just not interested. I can walk past him naked or whatever and he won't even turn his head, I could be a chair for all the interest he has.

When we spoke about it he said maybe he should get counselling, and if things don't look up soon, he will. They have not looked up. He has had a few bouts of depression in the past, though, the last thing I want is to make him ill over it, or worse, have him discover he's gay or something, then I'll lose him completely.