Actually, there is a lot you could do. DQ and I along with countless other women have found that one's sexual partner has a hell of a lot to do with the sexual freedom one feels. And, this is not necessarily something that indicates some need for deep therapy. After all, we feel more/less free with our personal lives with a variety of people depending on exactly who that person is and exactly what our R is like with them. If for some reason I was zapped back into my XM (shudder), I think I would maintain my sexual identity as developed with my new H, but I would not feel and sexual freedom in the XM with my XH. Unless he changed radically from when I new him, I could not be sexual in any authentic/rewarding way in the context of that R because of HIM.
This is not to say that IC isn't a good idea for W -- I think its grand.
But if you want to make this all HER problem that she has to find a solution to without YOU participating in changing the dynamics of your sexual R so that she can find a robust sexual identity in the context of your M, I don't have much confidence that you or she will succeed in getting an M that works.
Quit hearing only what confirms your old ideas that get you nowhere. Consider that maybe women who have acted very much like your W when it comes to demonstrating repressed sexuality might have something worth HEARING rather than trying to shoot down with non-sequiturs and dogmatic insistence that you "know W" so well that you couldn't be mistaken. Drop both the defensiveness and arrogance if you want to really find new solutions that work rather than trace old patterns that hurt.
----
Oh, I promised you a story. In my XSSM, I desperately wanted hot sex. We had sex MAYBE twice a year. I flinched at XH's touch and tentative approaches. I insisted on MC. I bought sex books. Still, I could not tell XH how unfulfilling sex was with him, what I really wanted, etc... This was when I was really working hard to improve our sex life. One time in MC, the therapist pushed me ever so slightly on how I really felt about sex, I couldn't take it, I stood up and started literally running out of the room in a pure adrenaline fear/terror reaction. The MC backed off and stopped me. I just sat there numb yet sick. This was all way pre-bomb. In post-bomb MC, as horrible as it was, I never had a reaction like that. All this was when I was trying my damndest to get a hot sex life.
So, anyway, my guess is that it was HARD AS HELL for W to open up as much as she did in that email to you, baring her soul as much as she was able, doing really high risk stuff from her position hoping you would hear her a bit. And, she got nothing from you for it. Of course, it is easy to see why. You have to read between the lines to see what she is telling you, and it is things that you are already prone to be in denial about. Moreover, it would be almost impossible for you to understand just how emotionally wrenching it would be for W to hint at what DQ and I suggest she is hinting at. ---
Enough said. I'm blue in the face. Don't really think I can say anything helpful that you can hear, at least right now.
But, I certainly very very much wish you and W all the best. Though there is space for failure, there is also very clearly space for hope in what you have. And FWIW, I don't say that to everyone.
" She's rarely interested in sex, and she only seems to allow herself to open up and be intimate and close with me when faced with the reality of losing me. WHY IS THAT SO DIFFICULT TO UNDERSTAND???"
It isn't hard to understand. It makes perfect sense to me. I understand exactly why she would be like that. Review option 3. (and now I'll try to shut up again, lol)
Maybe that's it, Coach. Maybe I never have; maybe I can't.
Spiritually, I can forgive -- it's God's to forgive anyway, and not mine. But emotionally, it's very difficult for me to forgive someone who is unrepentant. And when they SAY they are repentant, but their actions and effort expended don't demonstrate that they really are, then I get to feeling resentful again.
You know I spend a lot of time on these forums. I see so many women (and men, too), who screwed up and had affairs, and who are willing to do ANYTHING to get their spouses back. My wife wasn't even willing to pay me ONE COMPLIMENT as our two-week assignment from our MC (we gave up on my LL#1 -- Physical Touch -- and MC decided to go for the less-lightning-rod LL #2 -- Words of Affirmation). But mostly, to be honest with you, it's the sex. After rejecting me for most of 20 years, she finally decides to get in touch with her sexual feelings again, and it's with someone else. Then, she lies to me about it, and it almost costs us our marriage (and it still might). To me, there should be some greater effort (hell, I'll take SOME effort!) expended -- sexually -- to try to re-build trust with me, and re-build love.
In two years, I've only seen three instances -- one, when our divorce was pending, two when our court date was pending, and three when we were about to tell our kids. Those, to me, were all about HER, and her own needs and guilt, and not at all to do with helping ME get past what she did to me.
"To me, there should be some greater effort (hell, I'll take SOME effort!) expended -- sexually -- to try to re-build trust with me, and re-build love.
In two years, I've only seen three instances -- one, when our divorce was pending, two when our court date was pending, and three when we were about to tell our kids. Those, to me, were all about HER, and her own needs and guilt, and not at all to do with helping ME get past what she did to me.
There. I said it."
Good -- so you'll be damned if you'll help her, huh. Thus the withholding and resistance.
Puppy, if you want to see effort on the part of your W to improve your sex life, look to that email she wrote. I'm telling you it took her enormous effort, and she did it for you and your M and your SL.
Puppy - when I was married, my ex-h eventually CLUNG to the idea that I was LD, because that meant it was entirely something to do with ME, a flaw within me ONLY, that caused me to not want sex with him. In his mind, it was all entirely about me being LD.
He also adopted a position of believing he was superior morally to me. He clung to this as well.
He also believed that he was open to anything, so if I had any sexuality bursting forth from within me, I only had to turn to him, and since I didn't that meant - yet again - that I was LD and that was all there was to the problem.
I found that with his assumptions that this was all my problem, it was easy to believe that myself...so I just followed this idea right out the door so that I could find myself and figure myself out.
Without his willingness to understand his half the dilemma, there was no way to fix it, was there? He watched me walk out the door and was glad to be rid of me, and I still do not blame him for that.
This might be you. You may be happy and relieved once she finally does leave.
But you know the rest of my story....I want it every day of the week and I initiate and try new things, have sex blogs on the SSM forum, and feel like a brand new person. Am I LD? No...I was a mother and wife and I had a husband who did not understand this conflict and who felt morally superior to me. THAT was my sexual problem.
Puppy, if you want to see effort on the part of your W to improve your sex life, look to that email she wrote. I'm telling you it took her enormous effort, and she did it for you and your M and your SL.
OT,
She wrote it because I wrote her first. All she had wanted to discuss was what we were going to tell the kids; it was me who opened up my heart (yet again) and laid it all out there, at WDID's and your encouraging.
And I'm sorry, I've re-read the e-mail five or six times, and I don't see ANYTHING in there that tells me she "did it for our SL". All I hear in there is "I'm scared, I'm restless, but I don't want to take the accountability for being the one to break up our family."
Can you tell me which part of her e-mail, you feel, she wrote to help our sex life?
Your own situation makes sense to me, and it strikes me as genuine. Let me ask you a simple question: why do you feel my wife is similar to you, other than her age and gender?
Good -- so you'll be damned if you'll help her, huh. Thus the withholding and resistance.
Oldtimer, that is SO unfair. "Help," yes -- I'm willing to help. I'm just not willing to DO IT ALL.
I told her last week that I would love "50/50" but that I would settle for even "90/10," but that I could no longer do "98/2."
I think we've pretty much beat this horse to death, and we're just going to have to agree to disagree. Until my wife can get some good individual counseling, and we can get some good MARRIAGE counseling, we're all just speculating here based on our own experiences and our own beliefs. I feel myself getting argumentative, and coming across like I'm not appreciating your help, which is the LAST thing I want to convey.
I think we best let this sleeping dog lie for now.
Puppy, I get it. The one thing you needed most from your W you couldn't get and then she shares it with someone else. I can taste that rejection. Then you want a little validation and affirmation for all the work you have and are doing. Plus you feel slighted from her not putting in the effort to re-build the M and solidify the love. All the women here are telling you to read between the lines and open your mind. That's tough to do when you are hurt and angry. You have every right to feel the way you do. I would let all those feelings out someplace safe, it is a lot to keep bottled up. When my W and I were seperated I used to wake up in the middle of the night sobbing violently. Then one night I felt a firm hand on my chest up by my throat and a loud, calm voice say over and over, "Enough, Enough, Enough...." until I stopped. I knew it was God telling me to let go of all my anger, bitterness and fears. I work and pray every day to kill those "snakes on a brain." The negative emotions were holding me back, the old hurts and injustices didn't have relevance to who I am trying to be. It was hurting me, my marriage, my family and career. Validate yourself, look at all the good you do here. No expectations, you aren't entitled to anything. Be your best for your sake. You can handle it. Strength and Honor Coach
M22,H45,W45 S21/18D12 Retain faith that you will prevail in the end, regardless of the difficulties and at the same time confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be.
Be your best for your sake. You can handle it.