I read your situation and it just sounds like you are the HD guy and he is the LD women. It is just so backwards. I bet there are lots of LD women that would LOVE your husband. Its like he has read all the relationship books and follows the advice that us HD men are given, to ignore the sex and appeal to all those wonderful LD needs. You need to slap him around an tell him you are NOT a LD women. First, you must communicate what it is you need clearly to him many times (as you have said). But somwhere down the road, he has to learn to fly on his own. There is just no way that us HD's can be a never ending supply of "desire" for both parties to the marriage. I guess what I am saying is that expectations are wrong, initially in this process, but eventually, we must accept them. Eventually, the LD must learn to fly on their own. Eventually , THEY must decide to change, and they must do it on their own. Their is only so much guidance us HD's can give. If you tell someone 20 times how to do something, and they still don't do it right, it would seem that they don't care to learn.
As for the sex, there are a lot of ways to have sex that are not vaginal. Heck, I have given my wife orgasams without even touching her there. He has lots of options to entertain you, neither of you should give him a pass for you physical condition right now.
I'm struggling with the same thing right now. Mrs GGB is fairly religious and my faith has grown as well. The Catholic church teaches that any ejaculation outside of the women's vagina is sinful unless it was truely accidental. You can do oral, mb or whatever, as long as it ends with intercourse. Yes, MB is a sin. I am struggling really hard with this one because of the frustration level of having a naked and beautiful wife in bed next to you that says not tonight more often than not.
We're attempting NFP now, although I fear we might have screwed up: We ML last night for the first time in a while. I was tired but she was feeling a little randy (that should have set off warning bells). Now she hasn't had a cycle since the baby yet, so we've been tracking temps and mucous and trying to figure out how the NFP applies without a recent cycle history. Earlier this week she got a little bit of blood spotting with a small amount of mucus, prior there had been pretty much no mucus. Well, this morning her temperature stepped up, which if it stays that way tomorrow indicates that she may have ovulated and is her fertile window.....Yikes! i counted back on the calendar, and we are almost exactly the same number of days from delivery as we were when the last one was conceived.
GGB, holding his breath and wondering if he can get used to celibacy, since if MrsGGB is indeed fertile and it takes, she probably won't ever let me near her again.
Quote: GGB, holding his breath and wondering if he can get used to celibacy, since if MrsGGB is indeed fertile and it takes, she probably won't ever let me near her again.
My Dad was raised Catholic and his sister married a strict Catholic and had 8 kids in 12 years. Maybe your W could handle it the way she did with a very early cocktail hour and a series of foreign exchange student nannies and maiden aunt types in residence.
"Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?" - Mary Oliver
What I don't understand is in this day and time some religions do not allow birth control. Its so expensive to bring a child into the world and raise it. Would seem to me religions should change with the times in the world. I personally am not any ONE faith. I believe in a higher being, God, if thats what you want to call it, and I pray to God, but I stopped going to church years ago because of the Clicques and petty people in the church. I consider myself a spiritual person. Anyway, why do religions regard birth control as a sin? GGB and HP can you explain that one to me? thanks
Quote: Lillie, I do think it would be beneficial to me to do the work you are suggesting. I can think back to many times in my early days when I felt 'less than desirable' (not sexually, of course). My dad had several unflattering nicknames for me and was neither loving nor affectionate nor kind nor attentive to me, as a child. He basically neglected me (and the rest of my family) to the extent that we scarcely had food, clothing and shelter and frequently went without these. So I realize that a lot of my neediness with H is due to FOO issues. He has even pointed this out to me.
He is not responsible for "healing" these past issues (that I truthfully never even think about) but he IS responsible for his own personal growth. This is where the whole thing breaks down for me, I guess. I do need to work through some FOO issues but guess what? At the end of it, there will be my H..still professing that he's too shy and awkward to force himself to show his desire. That I will just have to trust that it's there.
Here's the thing: it's not your H's behavior that hurts, it's your feelings that hurt. IOW it's your response to his behavior that causes you pain. I know we've covered this before... but just a recap: it's because of who YOU are that his behavior triggers feelings of hurt, annoyance, irritation, futility, etc. As Cemar pointed out, there are probably plenty of women who would LOVE his behavior-- or at least claim to love it (Mrs. Hairdog springs to mind).
It occurs to me that one reason for resisting going through the exercise of connecting today's pain with a hurt from the distant past is that maybe you're apprehensive that after exploring your feelings, his behavior might actually NOT bother you any more. And THAT prospect is very unappealing. Seeing yourself as passionately desired by a man-- particularly an admittedly LD man-- is part of YOUR OWN identity. To be so attractive sexually that a deeply religious, ex-Marine cannot resist you-- that's powerful. In high school, I had a crush on Mr. Spock. I wanted to be the one who "got to" him. (Now I've got a guy I can't "get to.") If you got to the point where his hesitance to reveal his desire and act on it really didn't bother you, I think that would be a pretty scary prospect. It would mean letting go of a trait of yours that you have convinced yourself is absolutely essential to Being Honey. To become okay with his behavior means relaxing your standards and settling for less, and that's not a happy thought EVEN IF it makes the hurt go away.
Here's an analogy. Suppose growing up you always wanted to go to Harvard. You studied hard, got fab grades, decorated your bedroom with Harvard items, and told everyone that one day you would be a Harvard graduate. When you finally graduate from high school, money is tight and your dad suggests you go to the local junior college for a year or two and then transfer. You really don't want to do that. And when you search your feelings to figure out why you really don't want to, you're afraid that you'll LIKE the junior college and will abandon your Harvard dream. You've always thought of yourself as Harvard material. If you graduate from a local school, what happens to that part of your identity that was totally bound up with being a Harvard graduate? If it turns out you like the local school, how will you get okay inside yourself to having succumbed to lower standards?
Or an analogy closer to home: let's say that part of who you consider yourself to be is a woman whose house is always spotlessly clean. Your H is in the habit of throwing his dirty laundry on the bedroom floor. (I said this was fantasy. ) It makes you furious to see his stuff on the floor and you tell him over and over again that it's important to you for him to put his clothes in the hamper. Let's say you go through a process of some kind, and the possibility of you getting okay with his laundry on the floor presents itself as an option. I would guess that your first reaction might very well be: "But I'd have to get used to lower standards of housekeeping. If I do that... then what? I can no longer claim a spotlessly clean house as one of the things that identifies me as me."
These are gross (large and clumsy) examples, but you get the idea. Go through the process and see what happens. The prospect of change is unsettling-- not HIS change: that's a comfortable thought! But what about change in YOU? Change you didn't plan for and didn't ask for?
And no, it's not your H's job to heal you, but we are unconsciously drawn to individuals who present us with emotional situations that need healing. I didn't make that up. We encounter those childhood hurts in our primary romantic R's so we can heal them. This idea is central to UL, but didn't originate there, by any means.
Edited to add: I don't mean pretending to be okay with the junior college or the laundry on the floor. I mean going through a process where you really DO become okay with these examples or with H's behavior. The prospect of becoming okay with something that right now totally bugs the cr&p out of you is yucky and it feels like the ONLY way for that to happen is to relax your standards in some way or put your needs aside. But going through the process of connecting present with past pain is kind of magic-- ask cinemanymph-- she's living it. No one is suggesting you "talk yourself out of" being pissed at his behavior. This is not a rational, logical process; it's experiential.
This comment from me always stirs up such a sh*tstorm.
Lou, Yeah I never went along with the No MB thing for the very reason you cited--I'd be a lunatic. MrHP has accepted a portion of the responsibility of helping me to stay away from this temptation and has agreed to regular sex. Regular for us is 2-4 times per week, so while the urge still hits, it's managable. His stance might not be all that popular with the LD folks, I don't know, but it's his nonetheless.
Annette, Catholics believe that there are two purposes of ML to your spouse: Unitive and procreative. Unitive obviously is talking about uniting (in body and spirit) the two people. Closeness and intimacy, IOW. Procreative refers to the ability to create new life. Contraception places a barrier between the two people and therefore the sexual gift is incomplete. Again, this doesn't mean that you have to have 8 kids in 12 years; it merely means that if you want to space your children a certain way, that you abstain during fertile periods.
I have to say that I am not as up to date on the specific logic as, say, GGB may be since I am infertile. It doesn't apply to me, either way. I've taken the pill on and off throughout my life to regulate the unchecked estrogen that circulates in my system, but I don't know that I will ever take it again. I think I will look to other hormonal methods to regulate the estrogen that do not additionally contain elements that make the uterus inhospitable to a growing embryo. I would hate to think that I became pregnant, on my own!, and the pill ruined that experience for me, since I wouldn't be taking it to prevent a pregnancy anyway.
I hope that makes sense. I looked for a concise and clear article that explained it better than me, but you know religious documents..nothing concise about any of em, no matter what religion you are.
it is a sin because God intended for us to procreate, and sex is the gift of life. Using birth control is subrogating God's will, He is supposed to determine when life is created. As Catholics, we are called to be open to life (it is right there in the wedding vows too). Further, if you closely examine birth control methods, most of them other than the simple barriers or sterilization cause a spontaneous abortion after conception has occurred. We as Catholics believe life begins at conception, and that taking a life is a mortal sin.
IMHO, it is really really arrogant to tell the church to 'change with the times'. We are taught that the Church's rules are God's rules. Insisting on changing them is equivalent to telling God that you know better how to run things. God's law is God's law, we as humans are asked to follow it, not challenge it or pick and choose which parts we like and only follow those parts. One of the things that helped my faith grow is the recognition that despite all sorts of popular pressures, the Catholic teachings have remained substantially unchanged in 2000 years.
The church condones NFP as a birth control method since it does not interfere with God's intended function of the body. Numerous studies have shown that, when used properly (ie abstaining during the fertile periods), NFP is at least as effective as any other birth control method other than sterilization by removal of the testes or ovaries. It also does not have an on-going cost (pharmaceutical companies don't like it because they can't make a profit off of it), which makes it the ideal birth control. The caveat is that it is incumbent on the couple to develop self control to avoid sexual relations during their fertile time if they are not ready to accept a new life.
Annette, I'm sorry to hear that the behavior of people drove you from church. That is so not God's way.
Lillie, I think I just need to read the darn book, lol.
What bothers me the most about this dynamic with MrHP is not that he continues to "poke" this button, although that does bother me, but rather that I've asked him to do something, he has wholeheartedly agreed to do it and then he just....doesn't. His reason as to why he doesn't is "laziness".
Quote: To be so attractive sexually that a deeply religious, ex-Marine cannot resist you-- that's powerful.
That would indeed be powerful. I'll let you know if I ever fully experience this.
So here is a final question for you:
Why would I WANT to get to the point where I was okay with the fact that my husband was unresponsive to me?
I am following everything you say but I don't think I'm really 'getting it', kwim.
But what about change in YOU? Change you didn't plan for and didn't ask for?