Postpartum, Prolapse & Sex Pest DH

[Mischone]

I'm 8 weeks pp with our second child. My birth was a nightmare consisting of no pain relief, a second degree perennial tear and stitches, a severe postpartum hemmorage which required a blood transfusion and I developed sepsis from invasive group A strep which frankly could have killed me. and breath!

After a fortnight in the hospital I was allowed home but still not completely well, racked with anxiety, on antidepressants and it was then that I discovered the damn prolapse. Lucky me.

Said prolapse has left me feeling like I have constant cystitis so suffice to say I have little interest in sex plus I'm still pretty traumatised by whats gone on down there, which I think is reasonable given the circumstances?

I attempted to DTD at 5 weeks PP for DH's benefit more than my own as he'd gone about a month with no sexual contact (poor man - rolls eyes) but it was awful and only confirmed my suspicions that it was far too soon and I really wasn't ready, physically or mentally. I told him how I felt and he was sympathetic.. I thought.

A couple of days surpass and he's giving me the come on again, with various proposals and offers to do things to me like he's doing me a favour, when all I'd really like is a cuddle and a bit of TLC that doesn't involve his appendage or anything else.

We've had some other limited sexual contact since then (this has been me trying to keep him happy - I can't really be arsed with it and feel horrible down below) but it's never enough, or often enough, or for long enough. He doesn't sulk per say, but let's it be known how frustrated he is.

DH has an extremely high sex drive and doesn't seem to grasp the fact I'm just not interested in his penis at the moment, his tongue or anything else. If it's relevant he's on the autistic spectrum, high functioning and unless you know him well you'd never know that, but he's known for coming across as inconsiderate which may or may not be related to the ASD.

He keeps sending me dirty texts whilst he's at work thinking I'm going to succumb to his obvious irresistibility when he gets in. He's trying it on when he's at home every day, turning a loving kiss into a grope and then looks deflated when I (tentatively) reject his advances. He tries to 'tempt' me by flashing me when he's on his way to the bathroom or getting changed, and he's even resorted to sending bloody dick pics.

Last night when I went up to bed before him he sent a stupid text asking me not to use a sex toy because he wanted me to save myself for him today. I had no intention of using a flipping vibrator last night and have no intention of having relations with him tonight. My bits feel awful which he hears about every day.

What would you recommend I do in this situation, short of LTB?

Am I neglecting my husband because i should I be getting back to normal by now?

You can have ASD and independently of that, also be deeply and cruelly selfish. Which is what he sounds like.

Even things like being convinced you’re using a vibrator - that’s not because he thinks it’s likely given all you’ve been through. It’s more that he isn’t thinking at all about all you’ve been through, because he’s rather think of you as a receptacle for his fantasies right now. It’s like you’re a person unless he’s feeling horny, and then you become a function.

No, agreeing to have sex just because you've been pressured by an insensitive (at best) partner is not a sign of a good healthy consensual relationship.

Pressuring someone else into having sex with you because you feel you have the right to their body because you're married isn't healthy or loving, it's entitled and disgusting.

That shit destroyed my marriage.

Those things are different from "Well, I'm not hugely randy (who uses that word anymore??) at the moment but I love my partner and I am perfectly happy to offer sex at this time because on balance the relationship is really healthy." But that's not what the OP is portraying here, so it's not relevant! A partner who is so insensitive to the physical pain and emotional trauma that have put a temporary hold on sex is not upholding HIS end of the "healthy, consensual" bargain. FFS.

Just letting you know that we've deleted multiple posts by a previously banned poster, clearly intent on being deliberately inflammatory.

Thanks for all the reports. Hopefully we can get the thread back on track for the OP.

Thank goodness. I knew there was something not right with that one. Thank you.

for OP This time.

Lots of issues getting conflated here. Branleuse's post makes sense to me and seems to have been misinterpreted. People with autism can understand "no", be empathetic and mean well and still mentally run on train tracks and be awful at remembering not to talk about a particular subject they are very interested in. Of course the stakes are huge here and the potential for hurt massive, but that won't necessarily make it easier.

Maybe this is a minimising interpretation, but other more damning ones have been made at length and presented as fact. I think they are all just interpretations, and there may be less malice/abuse/manipulation there than our NT, big picture, brains tend to leap to.

OP you are, rightly, extremely upset. I've said before, I would set fast rules with dates and just take conversation about sex off the table completely. A simple rule he needs to remember and follow through on. You need to judge for yourself the inner meaning behind it if he doesn't.
At the end of the day, no one deserves to live with a sex pest and if you are not happy, safe and treated with respected in your own home then you need to take that very seriously.

WTF did I just miss? Oops, spent far too long typing.

Oh this is horrible. He needs to leave you alone. How would he feel if he was in pain because he broke his penis and you would not leave him alone, pestering him for sex? It's revolting.

In normal circumstances you should maintain sex in any relationship even if you don't necessarily feel like it, but these are extenuating circumstances that could effect your health.

Extenuating fucking circumstances? Lynnedwavis are you a member of some misogynist religious sect or something? Or just generally batshit?

No. No one is obliged to have sex for any reason, married or not. Having unwanted sex screws up relationships and can kill attraction stone dead.

And as for the PP who was talking about the "bitter" women on Mumsnet who try to break up happy marriages...

I'm a widow who was very happily married. Plus I'm very lucky to have come from one of those rare functional families. The older I get the more I appreciate that.

On our honeymoon DH asked me to promise him never to have sex out of duty or a sense of obligation. He said that led to sexual boredom and resentment. And we lived by our promise.

We were together 17 years, married 15. When the DC were tiny there were long dry patches. Sometimes, when we were both totally knackered, our sexual contact was no more than a shared glittering smile over the baby's head. But I found him seriously attractive right up to the day he died and our sex life was magnificent. No other word for it.

I know what a good marriage feels like. I sometimes hang out on the Relationships board and reassure women that what the man in their life is doing is unhealthy or even dangerous and that they really don't need to tolerate abuse. That's not because I'm bitter. It's because women deserve better and if they've never had a good relationship a lot of them don't recognize that.

"One of the things he said last night was that he just wanted me to know that he was still attracted to me and found me beautiful"

I agree that this is totally manipulative. It is clear he isn't at all interested in your self esteem. It's all about his dick but he's dressing it up as for your benefit.

"The restaurant incident a few years ago was him grabbing my bum or boobs, I don't remember which, whilst we were in a queue."

My abusive ex did this once, it is a demonstration of disrespect. Abusers commonly do this, it's designed to humiliate and embarrass you.

@Notashandyta

Wow, your comments are disturbing. You think it's OK for OP to be harrassed in her own home.

@BrigidSt I'm so sorry your friends haven't been supportive at all. That must have left you feeling so alone. I'm glad to hear you're getting out. All the best

I just want to say thank you to the so-called "angry" and "bitter" women on MN who use their own experiences, both positive and negative, to alert others in cases where their partner's behaviour is not healthy or acceptable. I could have done with a perspective like that when I was involved in an abusive relationship.

"There are some absolutely dense, misogynistic pigs on this thread, with vile outdated views. .

Ugh.

Christ this world needs feminism more than ever, on so many levels."

@Ninkaninus

You got that right

Oh dear what did I miss, I didn't see the banned PP's comments before MNHQ intervened. I hope it wasn't nothing spiteful.

Well it's been two days since I address the matter, so far he's stuck to his promise to rein it in. That's a drop in the ocean compared to the amount of time I'll actually need to be left alone in that sense, but I'm hoping what I told him has registered and he's taken notice. Time will tell I guess but if nothing changes then were going to have problems because I refuse to be objectified as a sex object at a point in my life where other needs are paramount.

He whistled at me today, something he does every day actually, except this time he stopped himself and said "Sorry, what I meant to say was that you look beautiful"

A good sign perhaps that something has clicked in his head? At least he's stopping and thinking.

Gah I dunno. I'm being hopeful aren't I. Its too early to know whether he'll sustain that.

I don't want it to go too far the other way and for him to feel the need to tread on egg shells, but if he will stop acting like a horny teenager I'll be happy.

He does have some great qualities, where the kids are concerned he's a very commited and loving father. He does alot for me practically too such as taking on all of the housework and cooking, doing the bulk of childcare in the early weeks after DD was born, so he's not useless or selfish.. until it comes to sex.

Sex is the one thing I wish I could change about him, well the way he sees sex at least. I know a healthy sex life is great but for a man in his forties he doesn't half crack on like a lad of 18.

It makes me cringe inwards the way he obsesses over it.

I refuse to be objectified as a sex object at a point in my life where other needs are paramount.

That sentence is twice as long as it needs to be. It's never ok.

And if he has to tread on eggshells for a bit, so that you don't, I think that is ok. You just putting up with it and cringing inwardly is no way to live.

OP I’m so glad he’s respecting your boundaries right now, but please do continue talking about this subject with him. Continued dialogue is the only way to work out if this change is likely to be temporary or long lasting. He needs to keep hearing how his behaviour makes you feel, and you need to keep talking to him about why he acts the way he does

@carla1983 so did mine - put his hand right down my jeans and knickers very obviously in a queue for a tourist site. Thinking about it now makes me feel sick.

Thanks, I get what you were saying and agree, just haven't checked back until now, embarrassed I'd poured it all out on someone's thread.

Bloody hell. I had foreceps and a handful of stitches and ex DP didn’t go near me for 8 months because I WAS NOT READY. That didn’t include the 2 months prior we hadn’t had sex because I WAS NOT WANTING TO.

ask him to push a watermelon out of his arsehole and then see if he feels up for it..

@motherofcats81 - how disgusting.

Mine grabbed my breast quite hard in front of his friend I had just met. I was totally mortified. Luckily the friend didn't notice as he was looking at his phone, his excuse was "he didn't see". I'm only a few months out of that relationship and I still feel the embarrassment and humiliation from the shit he would pull in public.

Thanks. Partly my own post partum state at the time, my perceptions of feeling isolated, mostly true. But I read on here lots and learnt, I take heart from everyone's wide experience. It helps. I'm doing well, happy, excited to move, scared but confident to find a way of living alone with my child. Grieving all the losses too. Husband not been sexually coercive, but everything else, same traits, not at all supportive or understanding of the invasion of my body during birth, damage, pain, fear, emergency section, hours of surgery etc, so ptsd and insomnia from night terrors, apparently I took too long to recover and was putting it all on for the attention. He mocked me. When bab was weeks.old.only. All that. So this thread and OP struck a chord. He is slowing her recovery, stopping her healing, by adding an extra stress to trauma. And its meant to be flattering, playful. Hes not oblivious to it, he was there. Oh but hes traumatised too...well yes, some, but it didnt happen to his body. We.all make choices in how we communicate, ASD or not, we choose. I have learning difficulties, I'm rude, annoying, impatient, inappropriate, all the time, but I try too. I am not abusive though. I choose to say no now. Thanks to reading on here, finding a group of mums locally and going to Women's Aid. OP I'm still in denial about it all, had some treatment, waiting for more, it gets better, easier, with or without him, but he is not helping you heal, mentally or physically. I was scared to check back after I posted, embarrassed, glad I did now, thank you.

BAH, no idea how to reply specifically, sorry.

Fantastic posts @mathanxiety

OP hes in his forties? My God.

I had similar with someone i dated at college re. the public humiliation thing. He suddenly stuck his hand up my top and started playing with the clasp on my bra while we were sat in the common room. So quick i couldnt stop him. Later a girl asked me why i let him put his hand up my top in front of everyone. LET him. FFS.

He would be in his forties now because this was in 1990.

He was only a year younger than me.

BrigidSt you are incredibly eloquent, and also incredibly brave.