You know, SSMGuy, your wife is not lying to her doctors and friends and family because she approves of your sexless marriage. You get that right? She knows something is wrong here. She realizes you aren't a happily married couple.
Indeed, that much is clear.
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... I can see you right now ticking off the things in this post that your wife would *never* do, from talking honestly about her sexual hang-ups to allowing herself to be pulled back into the room to having passionate sex with her husband. But 18 months ago I was where you are now, right down to arguing with DanceQueen and the regulars here about how they didn't really understand my situation and they all wanted me to get divorced.
That's a nice story. And you're right, I find it impossible to see how my marriage will ever get to the stage you're describing in your marriage now.
Even trying to imagine it is humorously impossible. If I picture my wife suddenly wanting to make love to me, I would wonder if she was drunk, or had taken a wrong pill, or had a brain stroke. Or I would seriously wonder what other shoe was going to drop, as if she were trying to soften me up for some really bad news she hadn't told me yet, like she just totalled the new car or something.
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One more note on what you call the "divorce-threat." If you are threatening divorce, that is, purely using it as a threat to get your wife to knuckle under, you're right, it probably won't work. The idea is not so much to say to her "you have to do X or the marriage gets it!" The point is to take that big leap for yourself and be able to say, and really mean it, that you are not going to accept your lot anymore and you are going to do whatever is necessary. You are right that this puts divorce on the table, but it's there with some other options. The point is to control what you control and let go of what you don't. You don't control your wife's actions, but you control yours.
For quite a while, it's been dawning on me that the only palatable potential solution is where I withdraw from my relationship with my wife to the point where it's acceptable for me to date other women. Now, for those on this forum who are hung up on the divorce thing, assume that means divorce. But my point is that I'd still be very much involved with my kids, and might even spend a lot of time in the same house with my wife doing things with my kids and my wife (or ex-wife, for you divorce sticklers out there). I'd be gone only when I'm dating other women, and I might have a separate place to bring them. But it's possible I'd still date my wife, so to speak. As I don't see how we'd be on bad terms, as we're really almost already in that type of situation.
But of course, for you divorce sticklers out there, we can file separate tax returns as singles, as if that made any real difference to the situation. And if I file the paperwork with the government, there won't be a marriage to call a sham, and nobody can call me an adulterer. The kids might not agree, of course, but who cares what they think? It's the legal definition that counts.
