Another sex one... can it be ok to stay? Has anyone ever found a way back?

[Baseballkitten]

DH and I are currently seeing Relate, we’ve not been operating as a couple for years and years - I have had the dc unilaterally and he’s carried on as if more or less single.
Three areas at Relate are: time as couple, communication and sex.

I am basically only here for the dc although I care about Dh. I can’t decide if I’d miss him or if it would be missing the family unit and the safety and familiarity. He used to be away for work for a couple of weeks at a time and I didn’t ever miss him but I suppose that’s not the same thing.

We’ve had a really poor sex life for a very long time and we were at six years and counting. However since we sort of hit crisis point and started seeing Relate DH is trying to initiate sex quite frequently - and I still don’t want to. I can’t imagine ever wanting to, but that seems a really awful thing to say. A few times I’ve just gone along with it because I know it must be hurtful to DH and also I can feel it makes him angry, which is reasonable as rejection is hurtful.
But when we do have sex I try and work out how few times I can get away with kissing him. How quickly I can make it be over. Afterwards i usually feel really upset.
I can only ever see me being in a place where I tolerate sex with DH, at best. It makes me feel dread - when he does the whole ‘let’s get the dc to bed early and have an early night’ I feel dread and resignation in equal parts.

But I want to keep my family together. I don’t know what to do about this. I genuinely can’t see it changing but I suppose I hope that it will. There’s never been much of a spark from my side I suppose and we’ve been together for nearly 20 years and married for 15. DH is a perfectly nice looking man - and yet, and yet, intimacy with him feels weird and uncomfortable to me. Kissing him makes me feel awful, I don’t decide it, my body just goes nope. The thought of oral sex with him is absolutely no, but luckily (I suppose) he’s never liked giving and so has never done that. I might possibly be able to make myself give but receiving would be an absolute no now. Years ago I would have liked him to but never really discussed it as I knew he didn’t like it, which again is fair enough.

Sorry, that was long.
Is there a possible way forwards? I am not asexual or anything, I just don’t fancy DH I suppose, but it is more than that.
I know logically the options are:
Stay and keep having sex I don’t want and hope it improves.
Stay and tell DH I can’t have sex with him again - he wouldn’t want to open the marriage and nor would I really. I think it could be messy. I appreciate if I don’t want sex with him he is entitled to leave to find someone else.
Or just accept the marriage is over and leave.

There are dc involved here too.

It sounds really awful for you. I don't see how there is a way back from it and I say as someone whose marriage went to a very bad place and crawled it's way back.

@Baseballkitten

I suppose he’s never put much effort in?! I remember the first time, we were at his and he just said ‘let’s go to bed then, it’s going to happen so we might as well get on with it.’ Or something to that effect, that was the gist. He’s never wanted to give oral sex, which is ok because if he doesn’t like it, he doesn’t like it. I’d only had one relationship before him and it was something I previously enjoyed, sex in there relationship wasn’t a chore. I used to give oral sex but then stopped because I don’t love it and I was only doing it for his sake. I cannot imagine EVER doing it again now with him. It would be too weird. It’s always been exactly the same, five minutes foreplay, into full sex.

Don't blame you for not wanting sex with him. It won't do anything for you and if you're already busy then I'm sure your rather spend your precious free time doing something enjoyable.

@Baseballkitten

No, we wouldn’t be able to discuss it and I think it would be a disaster. DH wouldn’t react well.

Then it's over. Best for both of you and far, far better for your children to accept that and aim for an amiable a divorce as possible .

The whole description of sex makes me wonder if he's gay or just has serious hand ups around it.

He certainly doesn't seem to want and enjoy sex with you and never has. No wonder you don't want it.

Is his image of wife and kids important to him/his job?

I've read all of your posts OP but not all of the others so sorry if this has already been suggested.

Just purely to discuss the sex side of things - it almost sounds like he's instigating the married version of a late night booty call. There's no build up or emotional connection, just an expectation that both of you are free and up for it. I never enjoyed one night stands way back when, and can imagine this sort of set up would leave me feeling similar. Especially the "dirty weekend away", without a pre-existing foundation. It has an air of any port in a storm to it.

Could you both carve out some time to actually date? Reconnect again, and remind each other why you like each other? Then maybe when you actually like him for him again (as a partner, rather than respecting him as a father etc) you might find him more sexually attractive?

Also, is there any way you could have some counseling sessions separately? They might be really helpful in giving you some strategies to address this without you feeling like you have to discuss all of your complicated emotions in front of him whilst you're still trying to untangle them yourself.

There's no shame to be had in calling time on your relationship if that's what you need to do, but I understand you wanting to try all other avenues first.

@Baseballkitten I feel like this is me typing this. It is all so similar.

DH and I are currently seeing Relate, we’ve not been operating as a couple for years and years - I have had the dc unilaterally and he’s carried on as if more or less single.
Three areas at Relate are: time as couple, communication and sex.

Same here - I am the mum, he is still the single bloke he is when I met him, still going to gigs and the cinema, leaving the everyday stuff to me.

I am basically only here for the dc although I care about Dh. I can’t decide if I’d miss him or if it would be missing the family unit and the safety and familiarity. He used to be away for work for a couple of weeks at a time and I didn’t ever miss him but I suppose that’s not the same thing.

I too am 'staying for the kids.' I care about DH in that I don't want to hurt him, and if we do separate I want him to have somewhere nice to live and find someone to make him happy. But when he was away at his mum's for a week recently, not only did I not miss him, I was relieved beyond belief just to not have him around, to be able to sleep, to be able to sit on the sofa, to not be bombarded with politics, and to just have a lovely time with the kids. (They didn't miss him either.)

We’ve had a really poor sex life for a very long time and we were at six years and counting. However since we sort of hit crisis point and started seeing Relate DH is trying to initiate sex quite frequently - and I still don’t want to. I can’t imagine ever wanting to, but that seems a really awful thing to say. A few times I’ve just gone along with it because I know it must be hurtful to DH and also I can feel it makes him angry, which is reasonable as rejection is hurtful.
But when we do have sex I try and work out how few times I can get away with kissing him. How quickly I can make it be over. Afterwards i usually feel really upset.
I can only ever see me being in a place where I tolerate sex with DH, at best. It makes me feel dread - when he does the whole ‘let’s get the dc to bed early and have an early night’ I feel dread and resignation in equal parts.

We haven't had sex for 10 years. I don't want to, and he doesn't seem to have any need, and so nothing ever happens. I desperately do want a normal adult life, but not with him. I've told him we will never have a physical relationship again as I don't feel that way about him. This was two years ago, and yet we rumble on. He's never given me oral either, and I don't think I've given it to him. Not that I can remember. No problems in this area with past partners, just the one I decided to spend the rest of my life with...

So, I think both you and me know what we need to do, but it is really REALLY hard to make it a reality when we have our kids to think of. It's overwhelming to the point where you just give up and carry on. I'm in counselling to help me find the strength to say let's call it a day, but I don't know if I'll ever get there.

(I did try to make your points in bold, but it mostly didnt work!)

19Bears it’s so unbelievably hard, isn’t it? I can look at your situation and know you should end your marriage, as you can look at mine and think the same.
But coming to terms with it myself is something very different.
Ending the family unit feels impossibly hard and I also don’t know if I will ever have the strength to do it.
The grass isn’t always greener, I may leave and make everyone unhappy and still not be any happier myself.
A lot of the time I feel nothing, just total disconnect. Empty. I don’t feel part of my own family.

@Baseballkitten. @19Bears. It’s so bloody difficult isn’t it— I sometimes read posts on here with people who really don’t get on, guys have been caught sexting or hookers or something and think in a way it’s an easier decision when there is something ‘totally unacceptable’ in the mix, rather than you just don’t really want sex and no longer feel 100% about stuff but dont want to upset other people or cause hardship for yourself or others.

I have had the dc unilaterally and he’s carried on as if more or less single.

I am basically only here for the dc although I care about Dh.

You do sound extremely cut off from your own emotions. It is as if your marriage is a series of roles that you and DH are playing and tasks you are doing and neither of you have any emotional engagement or intimacy with each other at all. You don't even seem to expect or want any emotional engagement or intimacy from marriage. I can't even fully blame your DH for treating you as a late-night booty call and fulltime nursemaid when you seem to have seen him all along as a sperm donor and wage earner, someone you can care about as long as you don't have to get too close. You wanted him to help out more with nursemaid duties and he wants sex with you, but neither of you seem to have expected or really wanted any closeness from your marriage. Or maybe you did want it once, but he has witheld it over the years and you have given up.

The only thing that links you to your own emotions now is your body and you physically not wanting to have sex with him. For you at least sex requires intimacy, and you and he don't have any intimacy. So do cling on to that feeling of physically rejecting him. It's the real you. That's your emotional core.

You might need some individual counselling to get back in contact with your own feelings.

I’d hate to think that the person I was having sex with/ initiated sex with was just praying for it to be over. Your husband clearly wants the marriage to include a good sex life with you, which of course is totally reasonable and could be fulfilling and a lot of fun if you both felt that way. But you don’t, and I think he needs to know that. The marriage between the two of you sounds broken, in name only, and I think an honest conversation needs having. Being in therapy but knowing deep down you have no real desire to follow through with the therapist’s suggestions is a waste of time and money and your husband has no idea you feel this way presumably. I think a kind but honest discussion is screaming to be heard here.
I feel very sorry for both of you. It’s really easy to get into the habit of your life becoming all about the DC, and when they’re little even more so. It’s hard to find the time and energy to do things as a couple too, so as the disconnect progresses both partners tailor their lives around the elephant in the room rather than address it.
Have the honest discussion, with the support of your therapist if that helps, and see whether an amicable split with good co-parenting makes everyone happier in the long run. Married sex should be part of a loving marriage and not a chore for one and a blind farce for the other.

Why is the sex so bad, you mentioned it’s always the same? Do you have any fantasies or suggestions for things you’d like to try that may help you enjoy it more. Could you include toys, or does the thought of doing anything with your DH leave you completely cold?

I couldn’t talk about the sex stuff with DH, it would be weird and uncomfortable and I don’t want to do any of it with him. But basically it would make me feel weird.
I suppose I have to talk to him and say to him sex it totally off the table and if he says that’s ok then at least he knows. I’d prefer not to have a sexless relationship but I can live with it.

It would be easier if DH were to have an affair or something and it wouldn’t upset me.
When we briefly broke up he was very upset and I felt terrible.

Your marriage sounds so incredibly depressing. I don't think your husband is reasonable to be angry with you for not wanting sex. Your description of your sex life sounds absolutely horrible and traumatising.

What do you get out of staying married? He's checked out of family life, your sex life is unbearably awful, you don't feel connected. You've tried therapy and it hasn't helped. I would just end it. It doesn't sound like he would be happy with a sexless marriage, and tbh, I think you wouldn't be happy either. It would remove one horrible element (if he agreed) but doesn't sound like it's going to make you happy.

This is exactly what holds me back so much @Baseballkitten the fact that I might cause massive upheaval trying to find my own happiness, make everyone else miserable, and end up feeling worse than when I started. I am convinced this will be the outcome, despite the fact that everybody I know who has gone through with it is so much happier now and doesn't regret splitting with their partner for one second. Half of married people split up and move on, it's nothing abnormal, but to me it feels like an overwhelming looming catastrophe. The trouble is, what's the alternative? Carry on this way forever and still be miserable??? I guess you have to make a decision one way or the other. You only get one life etc etc...

I think our marriage has been very transactional, with little emotional investment on both sides, but it’s definitely got worse since we had the children because I’ve not had the freedoms he has.

19Bears I agree - I decide to stay, but why does that never feel like a definite decision?!

@Baseballkitten

I couldn’t talk about the sex stuff with DH, it would be weird and uncomfortable and I don’t want to do any of it with him. But basically it would make me feel weird. I suppose I have to talk to him and say to him sex it totally off the table and if he says that’s ok then at least he knows. I’d prefer not to have a sexless relationship but I can live with it.

It would be easier if DH were to have an affair or something and it wouldn’t upset me.
When we briefly broke up he was very upset and I felt terrible.

I'm sorry, but dude, come on. It is over. It is so very very over. There is just nothing left other than both of you not really wanting to go through the upheaval of a split. Which, no one does, but you can't stay in this sham of a marriage because divorce sucks. It's like yanking out all your teeth so you never have to have a filling.

So much similarity with my marriage as yours sadly. Mine also didn't like giving oral and only did it the first time we had sex and twice after and that was twenty years ago. I told myself that I could live without it. I told myself that a solid partner was more important than a good sex life. He turned out to be a very chauvinistic father and husband. I have long standing AP, makes my life worth living apart from the kids😞

I try and tell myself the sex doesn’t matter as well.
It does a bit though, I think.

Having sex you don't really want to have is so, so, so damaging to your mental health. It gnaws away at your sense of self, self worth, self image, self confidence... makes you feel confused and anxious as physically you're doing something you intellectually and emotionally know you don't want to be doing. Please don't keep doing it

I too use to fear being a single parent. Like others have said I now feel empowered and look at some married women with sadness when they spend their whole time miserable and moaning about their husbands.

@Baseballkitten

19Bears I agree - I decide to stay, but why does that never feel like a definite decision?!

Because humans are not robots. We have feelings and emotions which change over time. If I was your H and eventually found out that you didn’t fancy sex with me I would leave.

@Baseballkitten

I try and tell myself the sex doesn’t matter as well. It does a bit though, I think.

Of course sex matters. It is fundamental to any relationship, a psychological and physical necessity for most people. But your DH obviously doesn't see it that way, and since things have gone on so long it might be difficult to get him to change now especially if you feel unable to talk to him about it. The truth is that a man who cannot satisfy his DP is not really complete (I say that as a man myself) - my ability to satisfy my DW is an affirmation of my masculinity.

I picked up on your remark about how you feel empty, nothing, and don’t feel a part of your own family. Do you think you could be clinically depressed? Have you talked to anyone about these feelings? Being depressed isn’t just being sad or down, the worst part is the emptiness, the inability sometimes to feel anything, and a perceived disconnect between you and the ‘real’ world. Feeling like you’re watching your life on a screen and in it but not really there, if you get what I mean. Having described your life events here, I can see that it would be unsurprising if you had become very depressed indeed. Humans can get used to all sorts of stuff which becomes ‘normal’ life after a while and not realise it isn’t normal life and the toll it takes on us. Take care.x