Hi everyone. I thought I'd better start a new thread before getting locked out of the old one. Here are the links to my three previous threads in case anyone is up for some serious reading.
Needless to say, the Thread-O-Fun didn't turn out to be as much fun as I'd hoped considering that I'm still here and still looking for answers. At about 10 p.m. tonight (Saturday) after getting my girls to sleep I set aside my ever-growing fear of rejection and attempted to initiate with my wife. She had just gotten in bed after a fairly leisurely day around the house, a nice dinner, and a couple of glasses of wine. I crawled into bed and was turned down immediately due to my wife's impending heartburn from eating too late. While I think that's a perfectly good reason to not want to fool around, the problem is that my wife ALWAYS has a reason not to have sex, or to do anything even remotely romantic. After being rejected, I said something like "I'd really like to make love to you - how about later or in the morning?". And she replied "So that's why you came down here - to start an argument!" I'm telling this to point out how hard it is to talk to my wife about sex. Basically, if the word sex (or intimacy, romance, etc.) comes out of my mouth, I have started an argument. Therefore, in her mind I'm the bad spouse and it should be obvious to me why we never make any progress. After all of the great advice that I've gotten on here and everything that I've read in books, on the internet, etc., I'm at a complete loss - still. It's so frustrating!!!
After her comment about me starting an argument, which made me mad since it was fairly obvious that I had not intended to start an argument - quite the opposite in fact - we did get into an argument. It was relatively tame and short. I told her that I couldn't take this much more and that something had to change. I mentioned that our problem is not uncommon and that there's tons of information out there for someone in her situation that wants to regain their desire - yet she won't look at any of it. I asked her if she'd go to counseling with me and she said no. Finally I said I'm going out and I'm not coming home tonight - if you call me and tell me that you're willing to work on this problem I'll come home. So being the wild, unfaithful husband that I am, here I sit at my Mother's house on her computer since she's out of town for the weekend. For all my wife knows I'm out picking up some sex-crazed college girl. Actually, I hope she knows me better than that, but I'm curious what's going through her mind right now. I haven't gotten a call from her yet - and probably won't as she's way too stubborn for that.
I've got to solve this problem because I don't see divorce as an option. I probably make my wife sound like a complete witch on here, but that's actually not the case. With the exception of the sex/romance issue she is a wonderful wife and I can't imagine going through life without her. Plus, I've got two daughters that I couldn't bear to be separated from, nor could I stomach what a divorce would do to them. The only way I could ever end up divorced (at least by my own decision) would be if another woman was to catch me in a moment of weakness and convince me that being with her would be worth all of the problems that go along with divorce. And I don't see that happening. I absolutely love attractive women and probably tend to drool over them worse than most guys, however I honestly don't want someone else - I just want my wife.
This is getting long and I'm getting tired so I guess I'll wrap it up. I have to find some way to get through to my wife - and I really don't expect anyone to tell me anything that I haven't already heard. But if anyone has an idea, I'm listening. I know that I need to try something different, so I'll start by signing off with my real name.
