Hey, everybody. This is my first post, sorry it's so long! Thanks to Michelle and everyone who posts such great advice on this board. It's good to know I'm not alone!
My story in a nutshell: I'm a HD, my W is LD. We were so in love when we first got together 11 years ago. We were always embarassing our friends with our "PDA". We couldn't keep our hands off each other. We laid around the house on each other's laps, kissed, caressed, played, made love 5 times a week.
I honestly don't remember when her LD started to become apparent, but it became a big problem when she got pregnant the first time 6 years ago. She said she didn't enjoy sex, couldn't get comfortable, etc. Sex decreased to a "dog biscuit" she threw me twice a month, wholly unsatisfying for either of us.
Once the baby came, she became SuperMom and our love life took a permanent position at the bottom of her list of priorities. 2 years later came pregnancy number 2 and we went into a complete sexual freeze-out for 9 months. "What's the point? It's not enjoyable when I'm pregnant anyway," she would say. What I didn't realize at the time was that I desperately needed that sensual touch, and the connection that lovemaking gives us. And I couldn't understand how she didn't feel that need. It was all she could do to take care of a toddler and deal with her pregnancy aches. I was just another annoyance. All my loving touches were taken as sexual advances, and all my advances were flatly rejected.
I began to think about how great it would be to have a woman who desired me again. But I couldn't talk to my wife about those selfish feelings, after all, she was carrying our baby. My resentment got so deep I actually "forgot" to get her a birthday present. I deeply regretted it and had a million excuses, but I suppose I was subconsciously "checking out" of our relationship. I felt like we were brother and sister. The worst part was that it seemed like she liked it that way. To her, nothing was wrong! Except for the conspicuous lack of a birthday present.
That incident aside, I'm not really a bad guy. I do a lot around the house, and devote all my non-working hours to my family. I love my beautiful wife and I love my precious children. But to me, when the kids go to bed, it's time to take the Mommy and Daddy hats off and be a couple again. Be LOVERS again.
Well, I tried to grin and bear it through the second infancy. Sex became a once-a-week ritual beginning with phrases like, "Let's get this show on the road, I need to be up in 7 hours" or "We're running out of time, [TV SHOW] starts in 12 minutes!" Strangely, she said that sex was more pleasureable since giving birth, but she still had little interest in it.
About 6 months ago we went on vacation. Immediately prior to that was one of her 8-day menstrual periods during which time all sensual contact is forbidden. We were staying in a crowded house with family, so I didn't push the sex issue, waiting for a time that would be comfortable for her. After more than 2 weeks with no sex, I was bursting at the seams. I found the perfect window of opportunity when the whole crowd went down to the beach and we were left alone in the house with the baby sleeping in our room. I laid down a blanket in the hidden upstairs loft and led her up to see our "love nest". "No way, are you crazy?" she said. I was so hurt I angrily yelled that we hadn't had sex in 2 1/2 weeks and I couldn't believe she didn't want it. She didn't want ME! She apologized and we went up and had lame, forced, disconnected sex. I tried to tell her how sad I was afterward but she didn't want to talk about it. She essentially pitied me for having these juvenile urges.
After several more months of the status quo and no luck getting her to talk about the issue, I decided to look for help. I found an online article in Redbook that I printed out for her. It suggested, among other things, that reading erotica can be stimulating to LDs. Taking a chance, I got her a copy of The Best American Erotica 2003. And she loved it! She began reading a few stories and then initiating sex with me. She asked for more sexy books for Christmas. I was happy to oblige, and also gave her her first vibrator, which went over like a lead balloon. Oh well, you never know unless you try, right? Then one night I was watching "Real Sex" on HBO and she told me she thought I was becoming obsessed with sex. She said the vibrator really weirded her out and that she thought of it as something only "S&M people" use. So my campaign to unlock her sexual dynamo within kind of fell flat.
So she agreed that it's important for us to make love 2x a week, which is progress. It actually ends up being 5 or 6 times a month, not nearly enough for me, but it could be worse. The sex itself is really good, though 1 minute each of foreplay and afterplay is about all she can tolerate. I always have a bittersweet feeling afterwards because I know it will be a while before we're that close again. I have lobbied for more kissing and "making out", but she says that always leads to sex, so she doesn't want to kiss passionately unless it's a "sex night". Most nights she just wants to watch TV and go to sleep.
Then I started reading TSSM. It said so many things I have thought or said a million times, but wondered if I was just weird or hypersexed or something. Nice to know that we HDs aren't alone. And it's good to know that my W isn't alone as an LD. I think we've both been thinking that something is wrong with the other one, when the fact is that we're very DIFFERENT, but neither one is wrong. Hopefully she will read it, too.
This lady is the love of my life, the mother of my children, and I don't want to feel "trapped" with her, though I often do. I don't want to ever be unfaithful, as I know it would ruin our marriage and hurt our children. Does anybody have advice on things I can do to improve my situation and/or keep it from getting worse? Thanks!
