Major Breakthrough-I am Freaking Out. HELP!

[MJontheMend]

You guys know that I've been bouncing a million theories around over the last 6 mos.. I now realize that the reason I kept having to come up with theories is that my H wasn't revealing enough.

Here is what he revealed to me in the conversation we just had. He told me several weeks ago that he was LD in his previous relationships. He didn't go into any detail but I was relieved/depressed to hear this for all the obvious reasons. He gave me some further detail today. He told me that one of the women he was involved with was experienced (and self-confident) enough to just tell him in a nice way that he obviously had a low libido. I said "Well, maybe you didn't really have a low libido. Maybe you just weren't very experienced.". Then I asked "Were you attracted to her?". He said "Well, I liked the attention.". I said "I mean were you physically attracted to her. For instance, did you want to see what her breasts looked like naked?". He said "No. That's what I'm trying to tell you. I just don't think that way.".

This conversation actually started out on the topic of why he did things that I regard as "cruel" to me over the years. Guess what? It all had to do with sex. He was "mean" to me because he was angry that I was overweight because this made his low libido even lower. Also, he avoided a lot of physical contact because he was afraid that it might lead to a request for sex.

This is all freaking me out because it's so much like what was said in the books and he hasn't read the books and I truly believe that there is no way I suggested these ideas to him because I was kind of shocked by these revelations.

I have no idea what to do with this information.

[honeypot]

Mo,
You are shocked at what? I'm not purposely being obtuse; I just don't understand what you are saying.

You are shocked that he is LD or what?

Help me out here..

And I was not following what you said about reading it in the books...what books and what were they saying that you did not believe to be true about your H?

Again, sorry for being daft, I just need more info!

[Julie33]

Mo,

I had the same reaction as Honeypot when I first read your post.

Correct me if I am wrong, but I think you have been working on the assumption (or the hope) that there is a REASON for your H's low libido, and that once that was unravelled...lo and behold, he would be HD. I think you have made SOME progress in that direction, but clearly not enough.

In your situation, your H complicated things because until recently, he never actually said that he was just LD by nature, and kept pointing to you and various other reasons for his LD behavior.

I'm not sure what to tell you. Maybe more info from you would be good because we can then help you.

J

[honeypot]

Julie,
I know that I had a hard time fully accepting that H's libido was just not that high. Or at least it wasn't as high as I fantasized it would become once the issues were worked out.
My H's reason for sexually abandoning me were religious. He had some very screwed up views as far as religion and sex and somehow had it in his mind that denying himself sex was giving greater glory to God--the less he bothered himself with earthly pleasures, the more he could concentrate on the REAL meaning of life. If this sounds completely whacko, it's because it was. He sees that now and we have moved past it.
However, I thought for a long time that ditching the religious hangups would cause him to be this red hot lover. When I discovered that this was, in large part, just HIM I was devastated but at least I knew then what I was working with. I also think that I was operating on a bit of a double standard. On one hand, I was saying to the world, Look at me..I'm an HD female and proud of it!
But at the same time, I was FULLY expecting my H to come to his senses and start acting like a "regular" guy. It took me a long time to wrap my mind around the fact that his mind and body just do not operate in the "regular" way. He doesn't think about sex during the day. He doesn't think about it when he sees me (or at least not very often). He DOES think about it when I physically touch his penis. He DOES think about it when I verbally say something to him.

Sooooo, Mo, I don't know if this is any consolation to you but at least you know what you are up against now. He has been hiding behind YOU for a while but now he is admitting to himself and to you that he's just LD. There isn't any magical cure for it but this is where the real relationship-building comes in, imo.
When the disclosure is complete, then you can make an informed decision as to where to go from here.

Hugs,
Honey

[MJontheMend]

I guess I am freaking out because I wanted to believe that the problems in our relationship were causing the HD/LD gap to some extent. I didn't want to believe that the HD/LD gap was what was causing the other problems in our relationship as was the case in many of the examples in PM. I know it seems kind of chicken or the egg but for some reason it makes a big difference to me.

I am upset about the fact that the reason he was mean to me was because I was overweight. I wasn't freakishly fat, just normal midwestern suburban mom overweight. I guess I really wanted to believe that my confidence was what was attracting him now, not my gym workouts. I guess this is what frightens me about our future. I know I won't always be as attractive as I am now or even as attractive as I was as an overweight mom in her 30s, but I suspect that I will continue to want to have sex. I am really "working it" to get the response that I'm getting from him now. I don't think there are many new "tricks" that I'm going to be able to come up with to get his interest when I'm 60. It seems like we're doomed to a future in which either I'm annoyed and frustrated with his low libido or he is annoyed and frustrated with my high libido.

I guess I have to decide if I can really be comfortable with the fact that he has a low drive and in order to meet my needs will be "just doing it" a lot. OTOH I feel like I should be mature enough to figure out how to make this work for me. OTOH I really don't like it because I want to be with a man who desires me SEXUALLY and it makes me feel very vulnerable to have to be sexually reliant on his goodwill rather than his libido. I'll always feel like if I do something to annoy him then I won't get laid and it's really hard to be nice all the time. I know I'm regressing here and I should realize that being nice all the time never got me anything, but where does that leave me? Do we spend the rest of our lives with him "just doing it" because otherwise I'll nag him about it or leave him? Also, how do I even begin to address the fact that my preference is actually for a very sexually aggressive approach?

AAAAAARRRGH!!!

[MJontheMend]

Correct me if I am wrong, but I think you have been working on the assumption (or the hope) that there is a REASON for your H's low libido, and that once that was unravelled...lo and behold, he would be HD. I think you have made SOME progress in that direction, but clearly not enough.

BINGO.

I don't want a LDH! I don't want a LDH! I don't want a LDH!
So I was looking for a magic cure. Actually I wasn't looking for a magic cure, I was willing to work my *ss off and do just about anything in order to make him HD.

[SolidMechanic]

Two things:
1) He has been trying to meet you on your turf sexually. His positive behavior (aside from the childish turning off of the cell phone) is much more important than the other things. Give him some credit for this.

2) His self disclosure is a really good thing. He is telling you what makes him tick. He might not have know this until recently, until your confrontations forced him to take a hard look at himself and explain his behavior.

Maybe now, he can take responsibility for his own sexuality, instead of putting it all on you.

Also, you say you're afraid to trust in his good will rather than his libido. But isn't this a way of moving toward a more adult relationship, where his desire is based more on appreciation for you as an individual, rather than relying on male hormonal response?

Isn't that what we all have to wrestle with as we age?

SM

[MadFrog]

and Mojo gets thrown right back into her crucible where she now has a two choice dilemma: life with a LD husband, or leaving.

[NotATLDave]

The thing about seeing our C is that we have become much more clear about who we are and what we want. The clarity of our differences creates "passion" because we now understand how we are different and thus, we understand how much of gift her compromises are. Look at his efforts as a gut-wrenching desire to love and be with you despite the fact that he falls short on the sexual desire scale.

Communication plays into this too. We are also at a point where we are learning to nicely communicate about our differences. For example, the other night, my W said she feels that massage and touch can be more intimate than sex. I said that I feel that the opposite is true. Instead of beating each other up, I said "hmmm...that's an interesting difference....what do we do about it?". It's all about living in the moment.

[MJontheMend]

Also, you say you're afraid to trust in his good will rather than his libido. But isn't this a way of moving toward a more adult relationship, where his desire is based more on appreciation for you as an individual, rather than relying on male hormonal response?

Isn't that what we all have to wrestle with as we age?

I am well aware that there is a certain amount of immaturity in my current mood/POV. I basically feel like throwing myself on the floor in a temper tantrum and chanting "It's not fair! It's not fair! It's not fair!".

Also, the thing about aging doesn't really help me. It's kind of like saying "You know you're going to need reading glasses, a bar on your bathtub and laxatives when you're older so why don't you start using them now?". Okay it's not really like that but I'm feeling bitter.