Husband says I do not show enough affection and support

[Op80]

My DH and I have been together for 10 years, married for 7.

Recently I feel like nothing I do is good enough for him. Not in the sense that he's negative or angry but more in a needy sense.

For example, I don't hug him enough, I don't want to cuddle in bed enough, I don't tell him I love him enough, I don't say nice things to him enough, I don't randomly ask him if he's ok enough and so on ...

Now I appreciate this could just be seen as someone wanting to feel more loved but I don't think I am that terribly unloving.

We have a young child, I'm often touched out. I do practically everything in the home. I feel like everything I do is for other people and now someone wants even more of me.

I don't cuddle to sleep, that is just not me. It never has been. I like to have a little scroll on my phone as it feels like the only alone time I get to just sit and do something a bit mind numbing, but that's not good enough.

I'm more than happy to cuddle on the sofa when watching TV and I do feel like I actually initiate hugs a lot of the time. However it ALWAYS ends up sexual. I've brought this up with H a few times now and he doesn't get it. "At least he wants me" is the type of answer I'll get. Whereas I end up feeling like it's all he wants me for. 90% of the time I can't hug him without it turning into a bum / boob squeeze or some comment about sex.

When he said I don't ask if he's ok enough I pointed out to him that I literally, THAT DAY, had asked him if he was alright and gave him a hug because he seemed a little stressed but apparently that's not good enough because I should ask more just generally.

He thinks he says nice things to me all the time but I never do but again it's ALL sexually charged. It's always about me being "fit" or looking good (with the face or hint about wanting something). It's never about me being beautiful or how he appreciates what I do for our family or anything that I feel is actually meaningful to me.

A perfect example on my part is that I have a hobby that I enjoy. It's the only real thing aside from work, family and friends that I enjoy. He never asks me about it, he never asks how it's going, he never wants to watch, he never encourages it or feels supportive. In fact sometimes he feels cooler when I get home, probably because we aren't having tea until later that one night a fortnight I do it. Things like that make me think we'll hang on, you don't actually care about me as a person. You're not interested in things that make me happy. It's about you, it's about sex and it's about what I can do for you.

I feel like I spend my whole life basically doing things for other people and it's still not enough. It's not good enough because I spend half an hour scrolling on my phone to wind down, it's still not enough because I don't want to cuddle to sleep, it's not enough because I don't ask if he's ok enough.

Whenever I bring this up I "don't get it" or I'm "not understanding what he's saying".

Basically he doesn't feel loved apparently. But I don't think I have much else to give right now.

He treats you like his support animal. Free childcare, cooking, cleaning, ironing, sex.

AND you pay towards the bills.

But it still isn't enough for him.

Been there. Divorced it, don't miss it.

He needs to start pulling HIS weight in the cleaning/cooking/ironing dept. But he earns more than you, so he won't.

Start making plans to LTB, but stop doing his ironing with immediate effect.

Hi op it’s no wonder you feel this way. Why do men expect to go out to work then not do anything else in the home. Next time your on your period just say no to the bj he has hands he can do himself just like the way you have to crack on every month also tell him your too tired for him as you work just as hard and it seems to be one sided honestly op you deserve better.

It was the entitlement that was so breathtaking with my crappy ex - as if because he had married me, he had a right to sex with me whenever he wanted.

Thank god the law has changed now around sexual coercion. When I look back, nearly all of the sex that I ever had with him was not wanted by me. He knew I didn't want to, but he didn't care.

It's no way to live, OP, and you don't have to continue with your DH.

thought I’d written a post I didn’t know about!

Can I be honest as a couples therapist? Aside the practical issues you could guys work on (such as sharing the chores better), this seems to me as an issue that's much simpler: you both have different love languages. He needs affection/sex to feel loved, you need perhaps real quality compliments. So you are not able to meet each others needs for feeling loved cause you're touched out (so cant give him quality affection) and he thinks you need a boob squeeze (so doesn't give you appreciating compliments). You could both read up on love languages and then see how you could find small ways to do that for each other as it is different to what you think each other needs.

Behold posters - a man has entered the chat 🙄

I would be so checked out of this marriage OP 💐

I think you should leave this nasty, manipulative, selfish bell end now, rather than put up with any more of his BS. It's not you, it's him!

Nope. You both work full time, starting position is that chores/childcare are divided 50 percent - obviously to vary if one person has longer hours or a big commute.
Very clearly this is the problem here - if you weren’t worn out you wouldn’t mind your husband wanting sex. I remember seeing a Latin American TV advert aimed at new parents that spelt exactly this out to new fathers!

Why isn't he grateful for a partner that's gjven him the gift of his children? Your views are disgusting🤮

He’s manipulating and coercing you into more sex than you want to have. He sulks if he doesn’t get what he wants. He accuses you of not loving him, caring for him etc. so you have to work to prove him wrong. Win for him.

It’s hugely manipulative.

He needs to stop treating her as a household appliance or a piece of meat. That’s got fuck all to do with love languages. He’s bullying her and you’re justifying it. Go you 👏👏👏

The love languages is a very rigid framework based on religious fundamentalism, specifically Southern Baptist Christianity, that says here I am and I can't change. It's rooted deeply in patriarchy. Physical touch as a love laguage when used by men most often means sex.

He's a sex pest who wants her to service him at will. He wants blow jobs when she's uncomfortable on her period. He does nothing around the home. He's not her partner in marriage or parenting, he thinks he's the boss. There's no solution to his treating her like a sex doll by reading a load of patriarchal bullshit that doesn't even hold up when studied.

You're entitled to your opinion although i don't agree with it. Things aren't black and white to me and I do like to see marriages work and improve.

Intimacy isn't just sex?!

Why so nasty?

I disagree and I think we are allowed to offer differing opinions on here. You can move on if you don't agree with mine, OP can ignore it too.

It’s make or break OP… and I think you’ve got the upper hand. You are just teetering on getting the ick. He sounds like a boy, not a man. Give it to him straight and suggest counselling if he doesn’t believe you. Basically you sound so much more mature/pragmatic and he comes across as an absolute tit.

Yes, my god. That this so called therapist turns up here spouting the love languages shit ugh.

That therapist should do some reading into how the love language shit has been used to coerce millions of women into unwanted fucking with their shitty bad husbands.

Any therapist basing their counseling on this debunked coercive rape apologist crap should be prevented from counselling anyone.

Are you trying to say the love languages aren't based on the book by a Southern Baptist minister whose degree in adult education came from a Christian religious school? Oh, he also has a degree in anthropology. That after 30 years of this, there's still a paucity of studies showing its effectiveness? (Unlike modalities like CBT and so on).

This. Just show him this.

Could you add in that he might start doing some housework? Or is it only sex, love language and him getting his end off enough to live comfortably in the marriage that matters?

Once thete is a child in the relationship the balance of chores has to be a huge factor in how a married couple negotiate their lives?

Sorry OP he sounds insufferable and you are not unreasonable at all in being frustrated. I don’t think people like this can change.

You can’t make someone feel the way you want them to feel and your words have fallen on deaf ears.

I couldn’t put up with this and would be looking for an exit but easier said than done I know.

Yes there's other issues to work on too, but they could also work on how they show each other love as currently they both aren't happy about that. Im not doing a treatment plan for her just quick advice for something they might want to consider. The moment I mentioned couples therapist everyone is responding with their crap projections. I mentioned it cause we are trained to be more balanced in views and more neutral given we know that there's never only one to blame - or almost never (abuse for instance excluded).

Most men aren’t that bothered about kids
they have them because it initially means more sex 😂 and most of the time they aren’t really that inconvenienced by having kids

Until they have to compete with the baby for attention