Tonight will be interesting. I've been cleaning out the bedroom, so it's in some disarray, but much less cluttered. Today is our wedding anniversary, and my wife usually feels some pressure to have what I think of as "special occasion sex." I try not to make it seem like I expect sex at these times, and sometimes it doesn't happen, but she has so many ideas of the way sex "should be" that I wouldn't be surprised if she decided we had to have sex tonight simply because it's our anniversary. I'm not going to initiate; we'll see what happens. "Special occasion sex" irritates me, which is irrational. It IS a special day, and I DO want to have sex with my wife, so it doesn't make any sense to sulk. But it feels like I'm lucking into it without actually being attractive enough for her to want to do it. If we'd gotten married on a different day, I'd be out of luck tonight. It's not a ringing endorsement.
Charlie, I think I've said most of this to her at one time or another, actually. I've been pretty open about what I think for the last couple of years. Certainly never all at once like this, though. I'll show her this, but she says she's going to read SSM, so I want to wait until she does that. If, at some point, I decide she's never going to read the book, then I might show her this thread. What could it hurt?
I know I should lose the weight, but it's hard to make it happen. And part of me says, hey, I don't demand that from her, why can she demand it from me? But I know that's not right. We're not the same person. Last time, I really did lose the weight for me. But back then, I was able to spend a lot of time on my bike, in jiu-jitsu class, and in the weightroom. That was before the baby. I've begun eating better, but I don't get the exercise I should and I know it. She said the other day that she wanted to walk in the early mornings, and I told her I would go with her. She wanted to know who would stay with the baby, and I told her I would get him dressed and we could put him in the stroller. Silence ensued. I don't know; maybe she wanted to walk alone and I intruded.
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Based on your posts, I don't think that this is the 'magic bullet' to solving your sex-starved marriage. As you've already indicated there are plenty of other contributing factors: the house, the bedroom, work exhaustion, body image, etc. I also don't think that your wife truly understands the vital connection between physical intimacy and emotional intimacy for a man (the Marriage Catch-22 mentioned in the SSM book).
I agree. I've actually said almost the words from the SSM book to her on more than one occasion, but I don't think it has sunk in. And I also agree that there's more than one problem here. It's a tangled mess. Anyway, I have said to her, more or less verbatim, "I feel like I'm stuck in an impossible situation. When we got married, I swore that I'd never have sex with any other woman, and I still don't want to, but now I can't have sex with you either. So the only options for me are 3 billion women I swore I'd never touch, or one woman who won't let me touch her." I don't think it made a dent.
Now a question for Low-Desire people--women or men--when your HD spouse told you about the Catch-22 for the first time, did it basically sound like s/he thought you engaged in some grand conspiracy to deny them sex? It feels like I'm being a whiny, self-centered punk here. But it's amazing to find a group of people who seem to think it's OK that I'm complaining about the pain in my marriage . . . even listening. And giving feedback. I just never get to do this. Thank you all.
