Boy, do I hear you! Things are essentially the same here, except that my wife has never suggested that I should go somewhere else. Of course, if I did you'd be liable to be reading a headline soon after something like "Man visciously slain by jealous wife..."
As for romantic feelings, the clue light came on a little while back. The fact that it took 18 years speaks to my level of density. Even before we were married, my wife would tell me that she didn't care about how I looked. Understand, I'm 5'9" and 120 lbs, not exactly Governor-elect Aahnold; we're not talking grooming & hygiene here. As you can imagine, after about 20 years of harrassment on the subject by every Tom, Dick & Harry and turn-downs for dates, that sounded pretty good. The point here is what I really heard her saying was "I don't mind" -- ie, my physique (or lack thereof) wasn't a turn-off.
Guess what! When she said "I don't care" she meant "I don't care!" In other words, there was no sexual attraction there. Wanting to be together, common interests, etc. were present, but not passion. Worse than that, though, is that there isn't anything I can do to spark any. I could drink protein powder and pump iron 8 hours every day until I did look like "a manly man" but it wouldn't matter. "I don't care" is the bottom line. In this case, my mistake was NOT believing what she said. So like you, I live on the scraps that fall from the master's table and try to stay sane the rest of the time.
Sorry about the vent. The real reason I wanted to post was to repeat something I posted on one of Sooner's threads. In reference to finding a counselor,I agree that poking your finger in the yellow pages doesn't seem to be an appropriate method. I do have two suggestions, however. The first is to go to the website of the American Association of Marriage and Family Therapists; there's a "Find a Therapist link" from that page. In fact, I'll jump out of this post momentarily and find it for you...
The other suggestion I would offer is to check to see if any Colleges or Universities near you offer graduate programs in counseling, marriage & family relations, etc. When we were looking for a counselor for our son, we were referred to such a program at a local college. They had a program where advanced students provide counseling services -- supervised by the professional staff (one-way glass, closed-circuit video, etc.). You get near-professional level services for a much reduced fee; I don't know what your finances are like, but it was a big driver for us. The staff also had a phone in the session room, so if there was something the student missed or was having difficulty with they could intervene or make suggestions in real time. It worked out well for us (not that we could move on to the marriage side of the equation, but that wasn't the student's fault). So you might want to think about going that route as well.
Anyway, good luck!!
HERE is Edward Bear, coming downstairs now, bump, bump, bump, on the back of his head, behind Christopher Robin...sometimes he feels that there really is another way [of coming downstairs], if only he could stop bumping for a moment and think of it.
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