How to cope with an almost sexless marriage? Can counselling really help?

[LosingIt2022]

Hoping this is the most appropriate subforum.
I'm looking for some advice because the lack of sex life is putting a huge strain on our relationship.
I want to propose some form of couples therapy / counselling because this is the only way I can think of to make her understand how important this is to me; I do not expect miracles but I do not want to leave any stones unturned.
If nothing changes, I would at least like to understand if there are some coping strategies to help me not lose my sanity - I am banging my head against the wall while dying inside and she doesn't seem to take notice.

What are your experiences?
Is there really a solution for couples whose sex drives change so much over time?

The story:

I'm male, my wife and I are both mid 30s, we have 2 kids.

I have always had a higher sex drive but, while mine has remained constant, hers has been constantly plummeting.

It used to be about once a week, I imagined it would have become less frequent, but I never imagined once every 2-3 months.

When it happens, she gets really lost in the moment, which is amazing, but it has simply moved at the very bottom of her priority list: it will only happen if she's not too tired, if she has already finished her favourite TV series, if that night her best friend doesn't call her to rant about her new life as a divorcee, etc etc.

Any attempt at experimenting has been shot down mercilessly: new lingerie makes her feel under pressure, toys are not her thing.

I have tried to plan and set some time for ourselves in advance, but she says this makes her feel too much pressure.

Any attempt at communicating is very hard because she just does not want to talk about these things; she was brought up in a very conservative, not religious but Jane-Austen-like environment.

I asked if she would ever be willing to, well, tease me; there are times when she wants to cuddle and nothing more, is that really that different? Apparently for her yes, she was horrified at the idea.

I got really, really cross because a couple of weeks ago she told me in the morning that she would have actually wanted me but I was in the loft, working. Why didn't you call me? So I should just wait in bed for you to finish your TV series, on the off chance that once in a blue moon you might actually want me, but there can be no communication or planning?

I have lost count of the number of times I told her how I feel rejected and unimportant, and how I feel less important than a stupid TV series. It just doesn't register, it's as if I were speaking a different language.

There are lots of other things in the relationship which work really well, and they are a huge reason why I fancy her so much, but this remains a big problem.
I often wonder: had I known it would have ended up like this, would I have married this person and had 2 kids?

Do you think she fancies you? It’s hard for some women to have sex with someone they don’t fancy.

You literally haven’t said anything nice about your wife. At all. Are you like this in real life? Do you compliment her or do you just pester her for sex?

You say a lot about you and your needs. You also come across as one track minded and repetitive. Turn off.

Is she really getting ‘lost in the moment’ or just faking? (You wouldn’t know tbh to answer that). Just if she enjoyed it that much, surely she’d be wanting more? Food for thought.

The TV isn’t your rival IMO. She just needs a bit of uninterrupted time, without someone demanding something of her I expect!

Well yes, because some women work full time and take on the entire load of the house work and childcare work, that they’re so exhausted that they can’t even consider having sex. Therefore this is the most logical question to ask first, as well as contraception and medication queries. Not sure why you find that difficult to understand, but it’s a process of elimination.
It sounds as though OP does his fair share, therefore we can then consider other possibilities.

I think this too.

Your kids are 9 and 5 so not tiny.

It's easy to get into a state where you are very passive about your marriage rather than active.

For a marriage to work both partners have to look on it at something precious that needs care and attention.

You and your wife seem to be struggling around sex - it has become something where you're on one side and she is on the other.

If you're going to have a good marriage you're going to have to work through it together. She's going to have to make and effort and so are you. Waiting for the moment to be perfect is a pipe dream.

Do you both agree that sex is good for your marriage and makes you feel closer? If so then that's a good starting point. Presumably if this is the case you can both agree that more of this good thing would be a good thing, it's just a question of realising both have to make time for and value it.

If however she doesn't like sex with you and feels bad after it then it's time for her to make some difficult choices about whether the marriage is over.

Some people women especially cope with the massive emotional and psychological requirements of mothering by denying all their own needs to be loved and caressed and pleasured. So first thought is whether your wife has lost touch with the part of herself that wants you to pleasure her and give sexually to her. It sounds like she enjoys it when it happens. So I wonder whether she could get more in touch with that part of her that might have got lost.

On your side you will need to accept that here and now is different from when you first got together. Things are very different now and having two kids means she just is not the same person she was.

I also get hints in your posts of contempt for her - she's "useless" at admin, that kind of thing. It's normal to feel angry when you feel rejected and to turn that into contempt. But it has an impact in a marriage - your partner will feel it and be affected by it. Perhaps you look down on her more than either of your consciously are aware of and this causes a kind of black rot in your marriage. There seems to be an idea that if sex doesn't improve that you might leave her. The idea that she might have the ick and leave YOU doesn't feature - and I wonder if this doesn't really occur to you as you feel you hold the option.

Good luck - if at bottom you still like each other and enjoy sex when it happens then surely with some therapy things could improve.

I admit I too did wonder if she is faking it.

I also picked up she's bfing a five year old? Is that right? If so it does strike me that she is totally identified with her role as mother and her other identities- eg lover - are probably very drowned out by that.

OP I think you’re getting a hard time here. It’s not unreasonable to want sex as part of a partner relationship and you can’t on your own figure out why things have changed or why your wife won’t even talk about it. It’s not about pressuring the other to have sex, which is not ok, but understanding why she doesn’t want sex. If it’s that she’s carrying too much responsibility in the house, is spinning too many plates with the kids, feels undesirable or has got the “ick” you’re never going to know if she won’t tell you.

I think both partners have a duty to try and address issues in the relationship. The way you’ve gone about that (toys, dressing up etc) may not be great but I also hear your frustration with the situation.

For now I would get individual counselling for you - not to fix the sex situation because you can’t do that on your own - but to explore how you feel about yourself and to understand what you want.

Ultimately if your wife doesn’t want to address this your choices are fairly limited. It’s not ok to decide that someone else will live a celebrate life, which is what happens in a marriage where one person decides they don’t want sex and won’t talk about it or seek help. It does point to other issues in the relationship that you may be aware of or completely oblivious to (which may be an issue in itself), but getting some space to really unpick what’s going on with you will help because the only person you can control is you, the only change you can effect lies with you.

@LosingIt2022

She can talk openly about feelings but struggles to talk openly about sex, not just with me but with her friends and siblings and mother, too, she has admitted as much. I think it's to do with her ultra-conservative (not religious) upbringing. If it were me making her feel uneasy, she'd be able to talk about it with others. She's not.

I think this is very important - you and your wife have a sexual relationship in which the two of you cannot communicate about sex. It doesn't really matter why or wherefore.

Fact is your sex partner can't talk to you about sex. What does that say about your sexual relationship?

And it is unlikely that she is the one with all the "problems". I wonder how far you are able to talk to her about sex, your true feelings about it and make yourself vulnerable to her about it? You are very very angry because you feel she has something you need, and she controls access to it, and this makes you feel humiliated and small.

She feels in a total bind because you hate her for this, at the same time she can't "magic up" a wish to have sex more than chill in front of the TV. She feels powerless too and married to a man who is becoming increasingly angry and that she experiences as yet another demand on her.

You're very in touch with feeling humiliated, rejected and angry and deprived. But are you in touch with feeling warm, and loving towards her? Can you say to her "I really want to be close to you - I feel lonely, and I miss you?" Can you allow yourself to be vulnerable?

I see you had angry fighting parents and a load of brothers and I wonder if anger and resentment easily come and destroy your warm loving vulnerable feelings.

Then your wife feels like she needs to have sex with very angry resentful man. Its quite possible your wife has no idea WHY you want to make love to her. She probably thinks you have an itch to scratch and she is the vehicle for doing that. She probably has little idea that sex makes you feel close, and you miss her, and you need her. And you love her.

Is she actually attracted to you?

@NoSquirrels
"I would like us to go to counselling to see if I can learn how to communicate better and we can both learn more about the other person’s needs with the help of a trained therapist. "

Thank you, this is incredibly helpful

@VahineNuiWentHome
"Therapy might help but I wouldn’t go there with the intention of ‘making her realise she has to have sex with you more often’ "

No, of course. No one is entitled to sex. But what I think everyone should be entitled to in a relationship is honest communication. A relationship with little to no sex might be survivable (I'd like to think). One without honest communication, IMHO, is not.

@category12
on anger and fancying her: yes, of course I am incredibly angry and bitter. But this is not (only) about sex, it's about poor communication.
How would you feel if you had an issue, of whatever kind, with your partner, they didn't want to talk about it, and only after months of you trying x y and z did they tell you they actually don't like that?

@Nirvanarama
"What I'm trying to say is please don't assume TV is more important to your wife than you are, it's almost certainly more complicated than that."

Words are cheap, actions speak louder than words. If she prefers TV for 3 months in a row I am entitled to draw my own conclusions. If someone doesn't make the slightest effort to achieve something, it means they don't really want it that much.

@Butterfly44 do you say the same to the women who complain they are not getting enough sex?

Why do men always come onto MN with ‘lack of sex’ stories?

I feel bad for you OP ☹ some people are selfish.

My guess is that they are trying to get a female opinion on how to solve the situation...

They tend to get the same range of responses which usually include lots of insinuations about them being abusive.

The whole subconscious constant knowledge that your other half wants more sex is a huge sex drive killer. It's says very loud "I am not enough".

You still have young kids, you both work full time it's knackering.

We still had frequent sex but I'll be honest it was quick and the pressure of knowing DH wanted sex daily was a turn off however much I always enjoyed it.

I do seem to remember a thread from a few months ago where the OP was complaining about lack of sex from her DH - the answers were very different.

Men on here are invariably told to do more housework and that they are obsessed by sex because they would like to have it more than once every three months.

I do think therapy together would be helpful. It's interesting that when you do have sex, it's not a duty shag. Also interesting that you chose to use the word feminazi which does indicate there might be some deep rooted misogyny going on there.

Oh dear, 'feminazi?' I love sex but I can maybe see why OP's wife doesn't want it with him now...

OP have you also maybe not thought about something rather obvious: that she never was that keen/that bothered about regular sex and now that she has had her kids she doesn't really see the point of it? or that she is simply not that attracted to you anymore?

It might be linked to a religious upbringing that link sex to procreation rather than pleasure, or it might simply be that she does not really enjoy it with you, to be blunt, and therefore does not miss it.

Frankly if you have tried everything: suggesting counselling, making sure you don't put too much pressure, do as much as you can to be an equal, supportive partner so she is not exhausted by looking after your kids and you get no response then you might in the end need to ask yourself whether you are willing to stay in a sexless marriage for the rest of your life.

First of all, make sure you are doing your fair half of all kids and domestic stuff. Most men don't.

After that, honestly, if this is not working for you, you do need to leave. There are married people dating sites full of men in your position - mainly middle aged men - but still. Is that what you want? A lifetime of one lying, deceptive relationship after another? I personally know a guy who has been cheating for a decade on his partner. Its disgusting.
Honestly, if you need sex then this is a relationship not working for you. Its also not working as your wife is not talking with you about it, or hearing you when you do. You need to accept this is not working for you and find a full relationship with someone whom it will work with. The alternative is no sex or a half life with a half relationship with your wife and a half relationship with affair partners. And those are bloody rubbish alternatives. Sometimes you have to accept that thinking, ' If only this could be fixed, things would be great!' is lying to yourself. Because that thing is the way it is. And if that's no good for you, you have to accept this is no longer the relationship you need.

Well, to be blunt I think your own conclusions are wrong and getting angry with her is only going to make the situation worse. She is just as entitled to not want sex as you are to want it. As I said, I don't know the answer. Best of luck.

You sound very angry. You acknowledge that discussing sex is difficult for you wife and you want her to do so, but when she opens up you berate her for not having done so earlier? I don’t think the communication issues are just on her end…

Actually the thread I recall was where the DW didn't want to have sex, but the DH had suggested he seek out sex elsewhere. I wish I could find it as it might be pertinent to your situation.

I definitely think you need outside counselling, either to try and come up with some solution, or to end the marriage amicably if you can't. I do think you need to say to DW that the situation is impacting you to such a degree that you are considering the future of the marriage.

I obviously don't know the reasons behind your DWs lack of sexual need, but I do suspect it is a self fulfilling prophecy where the less of it you have, the less you want. I also suspect that sex seems to have to be some big swinging from chandeliers event for DW needs some discussion as well.

I don’t know about counselling Op but I have not had sex with my husband for 3 years. I don’t want to and he has stopped trying. I know it isn’t right but I don’t know how to address it. I’d be happy to never have sex ever again. If he did ask me for it, I’d want it even less! When he mentions it I don’t know what to say. I just don’t want to. I realise I may encourage an affair if the opportunity were to arise for him but it doesn’t make me want to do it any more.

Every man is abusive according to Mumsnet.

Their maybe built up resentments, I know we're having a sexless point in time ATM.
It started with me and now he's retreated.
It's like a vicious circle.

Oh and just to add, when he is sat on his arse and doesn’t help around the place as much as I’d like or I have to ask him to, I’m not inclined to put out even through “duty”. The other thing is if he doesn’t stand up for me with certain people but that’s another story.