I know that when we were dating and when we were first married that sex was something my wife seemed to enjoy. I also know that she use to enjoy a good orgasm in the not too distant past, like earlier this year and last year.
You read the SSM book, right? This was VERY important for my marriage. My wife, like a lot of women, thought that she should first be overwhelmed with desire, and THEN get stimulated. I didn't understand that at all. I loved the idea of being stimulated and brought to a state of arousal at a time when I hadn't been thinking of sex. But to her, that was pointless and weird. Several times she literally stopped me from touching her because "If you do that, you're going to make me want to have sex, and I don't feel like doing that tonight." I found that utterly baffling, of course, but it made some kind of sense to her. She could relent one night, have a great time, be brought to a literal screaming orgasm, and the next day nothing had changed. I would remind her of the last time we made love and ask her if she enjoyed it. The memory would flush her cheeks and she would gush about how great it was . . . . but she didn't want to do it again. Some of those nights I just wanted to hit myself in the head with a brick in frustration. It didn't even seem possible.
When she read the SSM book, she admitted that maybe she needed to give me more of a chance. One suggestion in the book is to set a time. Ask her to give you, say, five minutes and then decide if she wants to stop or go on. If she accepts this, it leads her to "act as if" and allow you to stimulate her . . . and then she finds that her desire is not gone after all.
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So, while there may be nothing wrong with "not wanting sex," I know that it is not a foreign concept to my wife. I also know that physical touching is something she currently says she enjoys, but is something she doesn't want to give me at the moment (probably for a good reason to my wife involving something I did or didn't do).
Did she say that? I mean, is that her phrasing, that physical touch is something she gives you, and she's withholding it from you? I ask because that's the way the HD partner usually perceives the issue, but the LD person usually doesn't see it that way. You can read my description above and see how I reasoned (logically) that there was no way she could be telling the truth both about how much she enjoyed sex when she was having it with me and how she never wanted to do it again. How could a person enjoy massive amounts of pleasure and love and then treat it like torture? But she did. Rather than taking her at face value and trying to figure out the difference in our thinking, I used logic from my point of view and decided that I was being punished for something.
This is a problem even if she's really doing it, though. You seem to be familiar with No More Mr. Nice Guy, so I'm sure you've at least read about the pitfalls of having a marriage where the wife feels like she has to lead all the time and make every decision--as if she's caring for her husband like one of the children. You and I might look at it as being "kind" or "sensitive," but women have their own set of rules.
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I am trying with my sexual sabbatical to avoid pushing my wife to have sex(my way of trying to "be kinder"). I didn't suggest sharing or talking about the books I was reading on relationships with her, that was her suggestion to me. I think I understand what you are trying to say about pushing, as I hated piano lessons as well.
You're doing the right thing, and it's great that she volunteered to read the books. But notice why she did that? You didn't push her or nag her, you set an example that she noticed and wanted to join. You led. That's the way to get things done. From your posts, I'm guessing you know what it feels like to be nagged and henpecked. I never attempted the long sabbatical Glover recommends. I did about a month more to clear the slate with my wife and stop the rejection/depression cycle than anything else. Just remember, you're not doing it as a favor to her! It's not something you do to be kind to someone, it's something you do to simplify the work you're doing by taking all the messy feelings that surround sex further out of the equation for awhile.
As hard as it is, you have to stop thinking of everything in terms of how it serves your wife. I struggle with this. The most important thing is that, no matter what, if you're committed to five months, you do five months. Don't let anyone, including your wife, talk you into compromising what you decided was the right thing to do. Honestly, my wife didn't even notice the sabbatical until it was almost over. My thread is here somewhere . . . here it is. You might find it interesting; there are some other posters like Bagheera and Strong & Alive who really helped me--although I didn't use everything they had to say.
