I think you all need to really think about what LD is saying here. She's not calling her H a violent rapist. She's saying that he is having or trying to have sex with her against her will. I don't care what you call that... any way you look at it, it's a problem.
I understand what you are saying. I understand your anger, your hurt, and your utter shock that anyone would even think to suggest you climb back in bed with that man. When I was sexually molested, what you described is exactly how it happened with me. In my sleep. I'd awake, and there he'd be. In my case, because I had no power to fix the situation, as I was a child, the way I learned how to deal with it was not to sleep at night. I don't want to see you get to that point.
I think there are layers of problems here. But first and foremost, you just need to take some time to decide for yourself if you are going to stay in your marriage. If you decide you want to make your marriage work, then to have a successful one, you are going to have to get over your anger, and learn how to forgive your H.
There have been times in my past when my H would be doing his thing and I'd be laying beneath him with tears streaming down my face, and he never noticed. I thought the same way you did... how the hell could he not notice that? How could he go ahead and have sex with me when he KNEW I didn't want to.... how could he do that and claim to love me? That just did not, in any way, shape, or form, compute in my head.
I know exactly how you feel. Believe me, I do. All I can tell you is, if you want to, there is a way through all of this. I know there is, I made it through, and it was the damn hardest thing I've ever done in my life, and it was worth it.
But first, take all the time you need to decide if you want to be 'right in regard to your views and feelings on this matter,' or do you want to solve the problems you and your H are having and save your marriage. You can't have both.
This isn't about people agreeing with you on whether or not you were raped by your H. This is about you and your H finding it in yourselves to work together to save your marriage. You can forgive each other of anything, if you are willing to forgive. It's not a bartering operation -- "if you become a certain way, for a certain time, then I'll forgive you."
It doesn't work that way... it can't. You must first decide to forgive, then work everyday at being a forgiving person. Your feelings and resentments are not going to fade over night. You have to remind yourself daily that you are going to love your husband in spite of your feelings. Some days you'll be better at it than others. Some days he's going to piss you off so bad that you could give a hoot less if his pecker dried up to a shrivel and fell off his body.
In the meantime, continue to see your counselor so you can work through your feelings of anger, resentment and hurt. I think it is important that your H understand just how deeply he has hurt you, and how violated and betrayed you feel by that. But conversely, you also need to understand that in his own way, he feels exactly the same way you do. I'm not saying what he did to you is right, but try to see that what he was feeling drove him to make some very poor choices.
The two of you will get no where in your marriage if you can not set the resentment and power and control issues aside. That's a tough thing to do, because often times we are not even aware of the fact that we are doing that to each other. It takes practice... you know that saying 'a good marriage takes a lot of work?' That's what this is. This... this is the work part, and it is really, really f%#cking hard.
Do you see where I am coming from? I understand your feelings. I understand your anger. They all are completely valid. Now all you have to do is decide, do you want to be right, or do you want to solve the problem? Once you make that decision, then we can help you. Until that time, you just have to sit up there on the fence by yourself.
