Lack of affection and intimacy

[NotSureHowToFixThis]

Hi MNers

My husband and I have had a super rough year with lots of very difficult challenges (bereavement early ‘19, infertility, ill pets). We’ve been married one year and together 4.5.

My husband is clearly very down but it is hard for me to help him with it because to be honest I’m more down!

He gives me so little physical affection of any sort and it is really weighing on me now. He will happily receive spooning from me, massages or gentle touches but won’t initiate anything back or respond to any efforts I make to get him to touch me. To be clear I’m not even talking about sex here.

TMI WARNING
Our sex life is virtually nil (once in the last six weeks when I initiated) and he has started to make jokes about being a “two pumps Peter”
I have obviously caused that in the past because I got upset that he had stopped wanting to be bothered with foreplay, then when I tried to get myself to orgasm he’d be unable to resist entry and end up orgasming before I could I got annoyed that he was showing such lack of concern for my enjoyment but even then he hardly wanted sex.

I just don’t have a clue what to do now really. Do I try to ignore it completely and stop bringing it up ever or even hinting? Do I have it out with him and demand that he shows me more care? Do I ask him gently about how he is and how I can help?

Thanks for reading

I'd just ask him how he thinks it's going, and wait for a response. Then tell him how you feel. Ask what he suggests you both do about it.

Do I have it out with him

Maybe not the best choice of words unless you really mean this.
I can't see that the answer is anything other than sitting down like a married couple and discussing things. Talk about what concerns you and listen to what concerns him. You both need to be open and honest and to be frank that really shouldn't be an issue for a married couple.

It's highly likely from what you've written that there is deep sexual anxiety on both sides, if he's struggling to control his orgasms and is otherwise pretty clueless about getting you off then it's likely that he blames himself and therefore withdraws but really it's not one partners fault, a fulfilling sex life is a mutual responsibility.

Talk to him, don't blame him as it's highly likely he is filled with shame over this, accept that it's a conversation that should have happened years ago but that now it's time to reset your sex life and learn how to be compatible. If it turns out that you are not compatible then that's another issue.

@SellmeyourMLMcrap

I suppose that’s a big part of my upset. We had an excellent and open sex life for the first year and then it’s like doing the stuff I need became more and more of a chore over time.
I started to think that my demands for foreplay (warming up done by him not me.) were too much and that was putting him off doing it so often.

I think around two years he’d have liked to go for fortnightly and declining from there.
I thought that if I compromised on the foreplay I could keep things at around once per week.

Now I seem to have compromised away all foreplay and only get a very short bit of action every four to six weeks.

I can see that there’s lots in our lives this year at least that would cause it but I just don’t know how to even stop it getting worse

thanks for reading guys x