Your resentment is entirely understandable, it’s pot luck whether you marry a wife whose sexual appetites remain strong post menopause and you can’t help feeling the rejection both physical and emotional- when your dw wont even talk about it or understand how it’s impacting you, naturally it makes you resent her.
For many women being affectionate builds up the nice feelings that lead to sex. So if she unconsciously makes that association she either doesnt want it now or worries if she are affectionate it will signal to her “sex pest” dh that he might get lucky later. And because her libido has vanished that’s not a welcome prospect.
But of course affection is important in most marriages. And to be frank so is sex. Both are fundamental to marriage, as opposed to living with someone who is a great friend or companion. She cannot simply decide for you that your marriage is now one of companionship only, without so much as a conversation!
And it’s hurtful that she hasn’t found a way to discuss it with you. I think that’s my first “alarm bell” - what’s going through her head to prevent her talking about it? Talking is the first step of many steps towards a solution. The solution may not be piv 3 times a week, of course. But there might be a middle way.
Most women would want a dh who was willing to discuss relationship issues . So that makes me think more is happening here. Assuming nothing else is fundamentally wrong in your relationship, I’d start here. With the talking problem. I’d consider if I’m the type of dh who likes to be a “solver” - ie, “Tell me your problem Wife, and I will bring my Man Skills to bear and Solve it for you.” That is not going to work here. You need to have this conversation a hundred times in tiny pieces and the solution will BE the conversation, building over time, creating a new structure for the relationship where your dw feels heard, wanted, safe, understood, and maybe even adored. Not just as a provider of sexual satisfaction but a much deeper connection.
I might raise the topic in conversation again, perhaps as you finish a nice coastal or woodland walk, so she knows she’s not being manoeuvred into a solution right now and also so there’s a natural ending to the conversation . I would not make this about finding solutions to your issues AT ALL. If you’re in this for the long haul you can give yourself a six month horizon to just talk.
Just tackle the first problem first - closing down conversations. You’ll get nowhere if she won’t even talk to you.
So you start with an apology and a plea for her to talk about the relationship, along the lines:
”I probably haven’t broached this the right way in the past, love. And I’m sorry for that because now it’s made things trickier. But please can you hear me out, because there is something i need to say to you. I really do want to understand what you’ve been going through the past few years, if I can. I know the menopause is a big storm to weather and at the same time you’ve been dealing with x,y,z but you don’t have to feel like you’re doing this all alone. Or maybe I’m so far out of the loop I don’t even know whats bothering you most nowadays. But I do know I miss feeling close to you, of course I do. And more than anything I want you to let me back in so I understand how you’re feeling about our relationship.”
And then see if she bites. Maybe she talks about physical symptoms, maybe she complains about your behaviour, maybe she raises issues you weren’t expecting - the fact you’ve got bad breath or the stress she’s under because of her elderly parents. Maybe she says very little or “I really don’t see the point” or “there’s nothing to say” which is an easy one to answer - “the point is I love you, and I want to understand why and how things have changed in the last x years. I’m appealing to you to explain because when you won’t talk to me I feel shut out of the marriage and I hate feeling like this and wondering if you can really be happy especially when I’m feeling so unhappy.” She’d be heartless to refuse to talk then - or she’d be effectively telling you she’s got one foot out of the marriage already.
So you can make it clear you realise your wife didn’t choose this. She didn’t choose for her body to go through this shocking hormonal change (with whatever symptoms accompany it), and come out the other side a somewhat different person. So it’s not a personal slight against you, but it does affect you because it affects the marriage.
Ask her at the end of the conversation if she feels better or worse for starting to talk about things, acknowledge it’s not easy to talk and that you’d like to keep talking even though it feels a bit awkward.
Once you’ve got her talking then over a period of months keep her talking. Pick a time when she’s not frazzled to check in. No pressure though. If it gets emotional or feels cathartic pick a moment to ask if she would like a hug. Take a really careful mental note of ALL the things she says. Sometimes a small thing mentioned might be a hint at something bigger, that she doesn’t yet really feel comfortable broaching. Make sure you let her know that whilst affection can make you feel sexy, it’s more than that - it’s about expressing love for her each other. And that’s what you want most of all.
And do not try to solve anything at all within the conversations. Don’t defend yourself too much or argue. Just listen.
Once she realises conversations aren’t all angled at you “getting some” then you might find she unfreezes. Once she knows she can touch and kiss you without fearing your need to initiate more, she will come to you more often. Once the affection and conversation is really secure you can move on to talking about sex. There ARE ways to address her lack of libido so that you can get some sexual satisfaction without her feeling the ick, but that’s a problem for much further down the line when she WANTS to solve it to please YOU. She’s not there yet. Baby steps.