sex and the WAW

[garyjlost]

Hi. Over the past four months, I've been writing about my situation in the walkaway wife forum. Now, my wife and I are working on restoring the marriage, and other concerns are emerging. Maybe it's time to discuss those concerns in another forum? Like here?

The WAW situation has a strange dynamic that is hard to describe to people who haven't experienced it. But it typically seems to involve a wife who has already separated herself emotionally from her husband. She is ready to move on. Maybe another man is already in the picture.

My wife and I were at the brink of divorce. I won't bore you with all the details (check out my story, if you're interested, by using the link in my signature), but we decided to work on the marriage again--mostly because we have a daughter. We had never really made a total effort at forging a satisfying marriage. We were both aware from the very start that our love lacked passion. Still, we loved each other, and thought what we had was good enough. As time wore on, though, the lack of passion became an obvious sign that something was amiss.

As we grew apart and considered divorce, we both had to consider the options: 1) start over again with new mates (sort of scary because of our 9-year-old daughter) or 2) attempt to restore the marriage and make it everything we wanted it to be. We chose the later. So it was time for us to stop being lazy about the marriage and to start making it a satisfying union.

I was disgusted with myself for the way I had wasted 16 years of my life without really trying to make the marriage satisfying. I was now going to do everything I could to make the marriage work.

One of the problems we had always faced was in the bedroom. My wife would almost never accept my sexual advances. She would deny this. She would say I always chose the wrong time to make advances.

But here are the rules -- She won't make love on weeknights: She's too tired. She won't make love on Friday nights: the week has worn her down. She won't make love on Sunday evenings: She's focused on the week to come. This leaves Saturday evening as the one-and-only day of the week we can make love. I'm not happy with that situation, but as long as I know the limitations, I can try to work within the limitations. So now I focus on putting together date nights on Saturdays. We now have a babysitter we can rely on. Glory hallelujah! (We didn't have one for the first nine years of our daughter's life.) Our daughter now sleeps in her own bed. Glory hallelujah! (She slept beside my wife for the first nine years.)

As my wife and I started working on the marriage, I started initiating lovemaking. She accepted and even initiated lovemaking herself. Around Thanksgiving, we even made love three times in one week. That's a record for us. (I know, I know, it sounds lame, but that's a huge step forward.) But since then, we've started to drift back to old patterns.

We had a nice date night this last Saturday. However, she was getting tired. It wasn't late, but she had mixed several types of alcohol and was reacting like someone had slipped her a Mickey. So I had to drive the babysitter home and then get back to my wife as fast as possible. It's like I'm playing Beat the Clock.

This wasn't an unusual Saturday night. This is par for the course. She won't accept my advances unless it's the very last thing that we do on a Saturday night before falling asleep. THAT is the window of opportunity. It's such a brief window. And it can close because she drank too much, because she's tired, because I have to take the babysitter home. (No, waking my wife for making love is totally out of the question. And making love during the daylight hours? She says that's absurd. The morning? You've gotta be kidding.)

So I've read SSM. I've tried some of its strategies. But it would help, I think, to just lay out my situation and hear what others have to say. (And no, going to a marriage counselor is out of the question. We tried that for a couple weeks. She didn't like it.)

I could give you lots more details, but you probably already feel like I'm writing a book.

I know I can't really change my wife. I know I'm the only person I can change. So I've worked hard at changing myself. The marriage is really the sole focus of my life right now. (I've eliminated many outside activities.) I have a new wardrobe. I have a new haircut. I take much better care of myself. I try to be attractive. I'm not an ugly man. But neither do I really inspire a lot of passion either. I'm a nice guy but ...

I'm doing my best to be a good father. I'm involved in my daughter's life. We play games and watch old movies together. We sing and joke.

But something isn't right with the marriage. I don't know if it's fixable. Don't misunderstand me--my wife isn't complaining that she is unhappy. But I can't believe she's really content either. She has had multiple affairs in the past. Yes, here's the real contradiction: she seems to have low-interest in sex; however, she is the one who has affairs, not me.

Maybe this is just the situation with a WAW. Maybe I just need to be patient. I know it takes a long time to bring back a wife who walks to the edge, like mine did. She isn't back emotionally all of a sudden. It can take a long time. That's what I've heard (over and over). I just need to be patient. I just need to be patient. I just need to be patient ...

And just the fact that she is making love with me once every couple weeks might be miraculous enough in it's own right. It can take months for intimacy to be re-established with a WAW.

Maybe I'm expecting too much. Maybe I should just consider myself lucky and continue working on the situation. Be patient. Be patient.

Still ... she rarely gives me her lips when we make love. She insists the lights are turned out. I can't see her eyes. And while this isn't totally satisfying ... maybe it's all I can really expect right now.

Your thoughts? I'd like to hear from you.