Well guys, I am feeling very stuck in a rut once again. Everytime I start pulling myself out of it, something seems to push me deeper into it. I've been contemplating what MrsNOP said about converstions having to lead to a resolution instead of just airing a complaint, and I think perhaps that is part of the problem. Thing is, I feel like I am beating a dead horse by repeatedly bring this up to Mrs GGB. When I do, she usually says she's trying as hard as she can. Invariably, the result of the conversation is we ML sometime in the next day or so, but then it falls back off. It seems the only time she's 'interested' is if we've had the convo once again, or if she feels I am getting mopey and concludes that it is because I'm not getting laid. Mind you, when it does happen, it is more IC and less ML because she insists on going right to the bits, and if I try to starther up slowly, she seems to want to get up and do something else. I've tried asking for a schedule. She doesn't want to put a schedule to it. I noticed last night that I was very reluctant to put my arms around her and start caressing her. THinking about it, I realized that I am fearing the rejection once again, and when I touch her nakedness, I can't help but to get turned on. When I finally did screw up the courage to just do it, she fell asleep on me. Now, this is after me going up to be with her at around 8:30. She took out her quilt, flipped on the TV and started saying how she needed to finish the quilt. I'd been asking for some alone time with her all weekend (she's got fertile mucus right now, so we've got to abstain from IC), but have been getting put off each time I ask for one reason or another. We seem to be at a point where she won't outright say no, instead she makes it impossible at the moment and puts it off. If I get particularly down, she'll ask me to come up for a little rubbing or a BJ, but it isn't fulfilling because she seems to be just doing what is necessary for me to ejaculate and that's it. There's little or no emotional connection being generated there. It is like she is just trying to fill the "GGB got off, so I'm off the hook" square. I shouldn't complain, as this is still much more than what it was last year. I've tried to bring it up, but she seems to immediately jump to an interpretation that I am impossible to satisfy and she's doing the best she can. I haven't had any chance since we dicussed it here last week to get her motor running...she's either too busy, too tired, has somewhere to go, has the baby to feed (Sat night she put the baby between us again and said she had to nurse him; he promptly fell asleep, but she wouldn't move him), yada yada yada.
So, it seems that I somehow have to change the conversations from an airing of my feelings to something that resembles a plan for resolution. I'm not sure how to do that, and my feeble attempts so far seem to be getting heard as more complaining rather than an attempt to fix things. Any thoughts on how to jumpt start a resolution process?
HP, I too am feeling myself growing resentful over her not ever coming to bed raring to go. As much as I try to fight it, I can't help but get into this pouty space again :-( For me, I guess it is not so much a dying to be pursued as it is a desire to know that my pursuit is appreciated and desired rather than being a constant source of irritation. Right now, all indications (although she denies it to her core) are that it is just one more thing that she has to do.
She doesn't want to commit a specific time, feels that it should 'just happen'. if I point out it isn't just happening, we'll end up going OK for a day or three, and then it is back to nothing again. She also very quickly steers the convo away from the subject, but then you knew that It has gotten to the point that I almost dread bringing it up once again.
I would keep bringing up the schedule, despite her resistance. She has no good reason for not wanting to do it. Why would a woman who feels little spontaneous desire for sex think that it should just "happen"?
Or, how about asking her to give it a trial run? Perhaps the NOPs could chime in as to how long the trial should be.
I thought about bringing our schedule up last night, but didn't. It is time to instate it. My pain has lessened enough that sex is now viable and I want to get it on before I start feeling bad again, lol. The pain is slowly creeping back so I know it's only a matter of time.
Quote: So, it seems that I somehow have to change the conversations from an airing of my feelings to something that resembles a plan for resolution.
Michele has a chapter in DR about "asking for what you want." It's also one of the tenets of Marshall Rosenberg's "Nonviolent Communication" that you never air any type of complaint without including a specific, doable, request for what you want. Besides his book, there is info at cnvc.org.
Here is my question: I aired a complaint last Sunday that included a request. Then I aired the same complaint last night, but not the request.
What would a person like myself do...air the complaint, make the request, give it a week, air the complaint, make the same request, rinse and repeat?
I kinda like this idea. My H is a big one for repetition. It truly takes him a lot of repetition to get an idea down pat.
I chided him last night for being able to remember entire conversations from elementary school (even comments his teachers wrote on his papers in high school) but totally unable to remember what we talked about one week ago. Even though it was the exact same thing that we were talking about, right then. So I asked him to do that lame-but-it-works communication tool, whereby you repeat back what the other person just said and, of course, he got all hyperbolic and exaggerative on me: You want me on a white horse and to sweep you off your feet with my unbridled passion.
Anyway, what would the author suggest about when you need to have the convo again?
Ah, the old I'll show you mine if you show me yours, eh? OK, Maybe I should treat it as a dare? OK, so I'll put on my kevlar vest and football pads and bring it up again if you do it too. Deal? Who goes first?
I know frequency is going to come up as an issue again too. Once every 10 days isn't gonna cut it for me,LOL.
Oh, BTW, I ordered Chris West's book from amazon last night. Thinking about it now, maybe I should have ordered it from a catholic site like catholicfreeshipping.com so that it might pique her interest more when it came in Oh well, too late now.
Well, we discussed schedule over lunch. Can you say lead balloon. Sure, I knew you could. In the course of the discussion I said something along the lines of it going 4,6,8 days or more between. She cut me off and said it hadn't been 4 days since last time. I pointed out that the last time was in fact 4 days ago, and it was just a quick bj, I didn't get to get her going at all, and we didn't have time to establish a connection. Well she got defensive with she hasn't been feeling well (we've all got colds), yada yada yada. I could have gotten the NFP charts where I've been marking coitus (per the instructions) to show her that we've averaged once every 8 days since we started up after the baby, but I didn't go there...I fear that would have been the end of the charting. Anyway, she pretty much said no, she's not putting her passion on a calendar, that it should be when we both feel the passion. *SIGH*. It isn't just the LM, it is any intimate talk (both sexual and non-sexual). And we talked a little about that too....she feels like she "isn't doing it right".
I think maybe I'll try again this evening but emphasize it as a schedule for us to spend time together not doing any projects, no email, no TV etc in the evening, maybe from 10 oclock on or something like that. Nothing specific about how we spend that time, just a way to pull the plug on the diversions. Whadaya guys think?
Oh yeah, forgot. She said once again that I am the "perfect husband", there's nothing she'd change or improve, or so she says. Feels bad that I'm "not happy" with her.
This is EXACTLY where my convos with my W go -- EVERY TIME. What is the best way to respond to this?
I usually say something like "I'm VERY happy with our M, in many areas, but this is the one area I'm not satisfied," and I'll usually point out one of MY flaws (or at least, in her eyes) where I let HER down, just so I'm not coming across as holier-than-thou. But INEVITABLY, when I try to bring it up, she'll turn it into "Sometimes I wonder if I can ever make you happy," or some such martyrdom statement that then makes it about HER and not about ME.
It has gotten to the point that I almost dread bringing it up once again. 