Sexless marriage - my fault - AIBU

[Namechangebirdy]

Name changed for this. I am a 52 year old woman who has been married for 24 years with two DS’s - one an adult and one nearly an adult. I have not had sex with my husband for 5 years and have stopped being intimate with my husband for over two years. I used to ‘sort him out’ to use a phrase but now he gets nothing.

I know he finds this very difficult but frankly I am just not interested anymore in sex. I’m knackered and yes I am on HRT but quite frankly at the end of the day I just want to go to sleep.

Is anyone else in the same situation? To be honest part of me thinks my DH will leave or have an affair when the kids leave and tbh I don’t know how I feel about this. I realise that I am the one who has withdrawn this part of our relationship and I am aware that I perhaps cannot expect him to be happy with this. We have had all the talks but I just don’t feel it anymore.

Birdy

Snap! DH used to say he didn't want to live a celibate life. But due to medical issues that's what we've got. Can't even be called a FWB relationship. But here we are toddling on towards our 50th.

I would have thought he's probably having an affair or two already, but if you love each other and it's kept compartmentalised and you are a good team, I wouldn't rock the boat! Perhaps you can try to hint that you wouldn't mind if he did have a discreet friend who could be with him for that stuff. So he feels less guilty and is more likely to keep the lines of communication open with you.

And if you would mind...then the work to do is on yourself. You don't have to have sex to have a marriage, but you probably have to give up some assumptions about what you think marriage is.

I am rarely interested in sex anyone tbh (I am 35 years old) I think I could happily never have sex again! Haha but I do have sex with my husband approx once a week as I know he wants it and needs it. Some people may think that is wrong of me but each to their own x

Can I ask whether this extends to all intimacy, or just sex? I'm in a similar position and have zero physical or emotional contact these days. We are just co-parents.

Thanks for the replies. Part of me thinks that I just need to accept that I should ‘sort him out’ every few weeks, but my heart sinks every time I think about it.

He is not a bad man, a good father and provider. I can’t say I still fancy him, but after being together so long this should not be a massive surprise - I am sure he found the younger me more desirable too.

Hi keepithidden - to be honest there is no intimacy I.e. kissing etc. I worry that I would give him the wrong impression and he would expect more if I started this.

Yes you are totally BU. you’ve unilaterally withdrawn a very important part of a marriage to most people. What steps have you taken to see if you can get help with this? Therapy, reading books, anything.

You sound so dismissive of the poor man. No wonder he’s not calling on your beautifully euphemistic “sorting him out”. Such contempt.

hopefully he is on Ashley Madison or similar having some great sex.

I left my marriage in part over my exH imposing a sexless marriage on us. What hurt was just not his not wanting to have sex, but his utter failure to even try to get us help for it.

And now - I’m in a relationship with a brilliant loving frequent healthy sex life. And he’s utterly miserable and his life is a car crash

I can understand not wanting sex anymore but is there any affection at all?

my DH has decided our marriage should be sexless and it’s soul destroying. You are utterly selfish to not even take steps towards fixing it.

Really? This sounds like a bad idea for both of you.

You don’t want to and he probably wants you to want too. Reluctantly “sorting him out” doesn’t sound like a great idea.

Wow some harsh comments on here. My sex drive nose dived two years ago. HRT didn't help at all and still have no desire. Even in Brad Pitt walked in, it isn't worth shaving my legs for 🤣 but on serious point, you need to talk to your husband, explain how you feel. Seek counselling or therapy and try some intimacy at least. Otherwise it's just cohabiting as friends.

Poor bloke.

Have you tried testosterone as part of your HRT regime?

Was sex with him ever really enjoyable for you?

You say you don't fancy him any more.
Do you think it's him specifically you don't want to have sex with or a more general feeling?
We can go off a specific person for all sorts of reasons, which might be fixable.

But was your intimate life satisfying before?
Was he a giver as well as receiver of pleasure? (Yes Im projecting and as it got better it improved/increased my “need”)

For many (perhaps most) monogamous couples where there are not health-based reasons for a lack of sexual intimacy, being sexually intimate is the thing that most clearly differentiates the couple relationship from all other relationships and it helps maintain their connection with their partner.

No-one should have sex they don't want to have but it is not reasonable to unilaterally withdraw it long-term and just expect your partner to suck it up - which seems to be your position given you are not interested in addressing your loss of interest. A partner who still regards sexual intimacy as important is entitled to decide that celibacy is not something they are willing to live with long-term.

So I think @BillionaireTea has put it really well when they talk about you possibly needing to reassess what being married means. It may mean you accepting that your partner seeks sexual intimacy elsewhere. And be aware that your partner may develop feelings for the other woman. In fact, I would say it's degrading to him and the OW (if one appears) to suggest that they can and should only have "meaningless" sex. Your partner might only want emotionally connected sex and the OW may feel the same. There was a post on here from a middle-aged woman several months ago who had - like you - unilaterally withdrawn sexual intimacy from her husband long-term because she had lost all interest in sex and had, as I recall, agreed that he could sleep with another woman and was then deeply distressed when he fell in love with that other woman. Overall, her attitude to her husband was fairly dehumanising.

You may be able to accommodate your DH developing feelings for and having sexual intimacy with someone else and still remaining with you. That is what happens in polyamorous relationships and they can work very well if everyone is on board and communicating properly. But yes - as BT says, you may need to reassess what marriage looks like to you.

You can't manufacture desire though. So if it's not there/gone is there any real hope of it returning?

I guess this is also part of the better/worse part of marriage too. Only you can know whether this is a part you want your partner to deal with, and only they can know if they can.

No answers I'm afraid OP.

Some very unpleasant comments on here. Way to go at tearing someone down, there are ways of putting things that don't sound so downright nasty.

To Birdy,
I was in the same position, but it was my husband who wanted a celibate marriage, alcohol was the other woman and I came an extremely poor 2nd, it destroyed my self esteem and wasted a lot of time. My marriage lasted 10 years before I left him. I now live on my own, my choice.
What you need to think about, is that this will be having an effect on your husband, I don't mean to sound nasty, but I think you need to have a really good talk with each other and decide what you're both happy with, and what you want. It's always better to have things out in the open.
I hope you get things sorted.

OP doesn't seem especially bothered about the situation and barely musters a shrug at the idea of her husband having an affair so I'm not sure what she actually wants out of either this thread or her marriage. You sometimes see threads from posters who've lost their libido but actively want it back, and this doesn't sound like that.

I'm always a bit confused by the whole "I'd rather go to sleep" trope you often see. Sex and sleep are not mutually exclusive in life?

Same, why does sex always have to be at nighttime for everyone who's gone off sex?

Sex is a really important thing for me. If my husband took that away from me, it would be a dealbreaker. Obviously not counting medical / life issues. Of course it fluctuates. But if there was no reason apart from 'not wanting it anymore and not trying to get it back' I would end the marriage. I say that with DC included.

Rejection, over and over, will kill anyones self esteem.

Exactly which is why, even though no one owes their partner sex that they don't want to have, they do owe their partner communication about it. If your libido drops for whatever reason you owe your partner an "it's not you, it's me" conversation and at least an intention to work through it.

You don't get to unilaterally remove sex from a relationship without at least a conversation.

You seem ok about turning a blind eye to any flings he may have which seems reasonable and fair given you’ve withdrawn intimacy. But what if he falls in love with someone and wants to make a life with her? You should be prepared emotionally and financially for a divorce, just in case.

I sometimes wonder if the women who want a sexless marriage ever really physically wanted their husbands in the first place? Did they ever want to f*CK him into the ground? Or was it just that they wanted kids? And after that he could get lost? Are these are the same dopey women who are very hurt and angry when their husbands look somewhere else for sex?