Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Relationships

Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

Dh doesn't fancy me anymore and I am so angry with him it's making me grouchy and shouty - vicious cycle thing going on. Help.

133 replies

gleegeekgleek · 23/05/2010 15:42

Dh doesn't find me that attractive anymore. We haven't had sex for about two years .

I am really angry with him for not fancying me. I am 36, in decent nick (have hair done, exercise although could lose a few pounds but not many, make up, etc so please no suggestions on that front as I already do that) The problem is I am not super skinny, toned and tanned. I am probably reasonably pretty and not overweight (a 10-12).

He has said this about the tanned and toned thing in a roundabout way and that 36 year olds can't compete with younger women and he admits his standards and expectations might have been messed up by media imagery. He thinks this is just the way of the world.

I am feeling really bitter about all this and disappointed, angry sometimes and resentful. It is making me grouchy with him and sometimes with ds.

I do like him generally. The above makes him sound misogynistic which he isn't - and he does loads with ds and his fair share at home.

He just doesn't seem to fancy me anymore. No OW I think. He has a low sex drive and always has had and it seems the hurdle for him is higher than I, a mere normal woman rather than model don't meet it anymore.

Help!

OP posts:
gleegeekgleek · 24/05/2010 19:48

sincity - what happened then with you and your dh? What was he like?

OP posts:
SolidGoldBrass · 24/05/2010 21:09

Drloves: I don't do couple-relationships so have never been in the position of swinging-to-liven-up-a-relationship. But because I spend a lot of time on the swinging scene and write about sex and relationships, I know a lot of people who have made it work for them.
ANd you are right that if one partner is already belittling the other (as opposed to one or two thoughtless remarks) swinging won't help - swinging will not fix a seriously messed up relationship, but nor will it wreck a good healthy one.

MagalyZz · 24/05/2010 21:34

So if you had a hot sexual relationship with a decent guy who totally got you SGB, would you risk it by swinging? when you're happy with somebody you don't need a third party.

I can imagine swinging only if I no longer gave a fuck whether I lost my partner or not!

SolidGoldBrass · 24/05/2010 22:52

Magalyzz - I am not monogamous, end of. I would be (and have been, when I tried monogamous relationships) bored, trapped and miserable if obliged to refuse sex with anyone other than my 'owner'.
I'm quite aware that this doesn't apply to everyone, but a lot of needless misery is caused by the cult of compulsory monogamy.

MagalyZz · 24/05/2010 22:58

but for so long as it's good what's the point having a policy of not being monogamous!? I thnk that society is FAR too couple-centric and that really nauseates me at times, but imo the issue for women rather than for society, is staying in crappy relationships long after you get anything out of them. But relationships can be great, occasionally, sometimes, people get it right.

sincitylover · 25/05/2010 13:10

GGG

in a nutshell - met exh - we were colleagues but unequal ones - and had previously been a lecturer on a u/g degree I did as a mature student.

Not my usual type at all. He appeared gauche but think that's an act and quite unemotional. Had a facade of caring. Sex OK at the beginning but never set the world on fire.

Got married quite quickly within two years and things OK really until we moved to our own place. Had ds1 and really after that everything went downhill in many ways including sex. I was very up for it and he wasn't basically. Also very unaffectionate.

Often made little digs about women's bodies and often came out with some quite misogynistic things (imo) about women in general.

I could never agree with his intellecualising and rationalising of life and we often argued about it - I used to say it's as much a belief system as fact and I saw it as his way of distancing himself against feelings or it could be that he has aspoergers (one of his female friends suggested he did)

We had ds2 (miraculously) and then between his birth and us splitting up (ds2 was just 5) had sex once.

Had suspicions of OW (plural) but didn't find any solid evidence. Quite a ladies man though.

He wouldn't address any of the issues, wouldn't go to relate yet said we couldn't split because 'he would end up living in a bedsit'. Basically put me through hell and I must say my attitude to him because of this was not great but I was exceptionally miserable.

Was never really loving to me or not my idea of how a partner should act towards their OH.

Eventually all imploded when he didn't pay the mortgage for six months and I forced the sale of the house.

By the end I didn't actually want to have sex with him and would have had an affair if the opportunity had presented itself.

he found a new victim partner within four months of our split. And has gone on to have dcs with her. The power imbalance there is different because she has money. Tho I found out he witholds info about his finaces from her - he told me in fact.

All very quickly which has been hard for my
dcs.

I would say it was a viscious(sp) circle - sex goes, intimacy goes, resentment builds. We were very angry with each other but on my part it was often sexual frustration combined with tiredness combined with deep hurt at the rejection I felt.

By taking no action to address it he was actually speaking volumes. Though he went round telling people we had grown apart. If I met a man with small dcs who said the same I would be very suspicious that there was not some other back story tbh.

Hope that helps.

sincitylover · 25/05/2010 13:13

Sorry couple more things - when he was with me it was as though he was trying to squash all the joie de vivre out of me (he certainly didn't have much when at home)

He is also very manipulative and I see that in his dealings with the dcs. They crave his attention btw - he is very sparing with it.

gleegeekgleek · 25/05/2010 13:54

He sounds quite similar apart from the finances thing and the bit in your second post.

I've been thinking and I think the backstory is low libido and possibly a bit of erectile dysfunction.

OP posts:
New posts on this thread. Refresh page