#18 - Still working 2 years into Ring & Piecing

[BL42]

Steve85,

Steve85 - My question is what do you think caused the drop off in sex initially? Why do you think your sex life was "off the charts" while dating to "Almost immediately she started to lose her interest in sex"? Sometimes I wonder if my W acted so loving and sexually to "ensnare" me (for lack of a better word), and then to turn it off and act as she really wanted to once she was married. But...is it something you (and I) did to cause that, which I can improve upon for the future? I tend to think the lack of the sex life caused me to get frustrated and pull away, but maybe in her mind (and your W's) it was the opposite. In other words...what came first, the chicken or the egg? And how to I improve myself and/or see the red flags for next time?

BL, her and I had that discussion multiple times, the chicken and egg thing. Did get back of desire cause my bag behavior or vice versa. As with all things I think the truth is in the middle. She didn't want to keep up the pre marriage pace and then I started to act poorly. Which exasperated her lack of desire which exasperated my bad behavior. Kind of a self-fulfilling prophecy

However, I would also bring up things we used to do, and she admitted that she did those things because she wanted to be a cool girlfriend". Which brings me to Sage....

You're probably right that the truth is in the middle. I did broach the topic at times with W but we never really had a good, genuine conversation about it - it would get brushed under the table with a "don't analyze it" or whatever.

I also just want to stand up for women in the ‘ensnaring’ commentary.

Unless she is a sociopath, or on the spectrum of a serious personality disorder, most women do not approach M with the intent of ensnaring. That sounds to me like a cop-out for men who can’t own their contribution to the SSM or the M. And you don’t hear women suggesting that men ensnared them, so it also feels very sexist to me. Do women make certain choices based up on their perceived future stability? Absolutely. But I would argue men do the same thing and yet we don’t call it ensnaring.

I don't think you can say this in totality. There is plenty of anecdotal evidence of to suggest that there is a degree of "trying to get him to marry me" that goes on in many cases. It's like the old joke (the original version is crude so I'll clean it up a bit): Why do brides smile on their wedding day? Because they know they never have to give oral sex again.

Maybe ensnare is too harsh a word, but there is often an aspect of a GF being willing to do things, sexually or not, to get married. I know women that were very into their boyfriends hobbies..... Until the I does were done, and then it was "go do your own thing". So it certainly does happen.

Now you make a good point about men owning there side too. LH touched on it but we guys can get lazy in the marriage and stop trying. When the guy feels so comfortable that he'll just let loose with farts around her, maybe his dress and hygiene and grooming gets lax, and he stops romancing her I can see why a wife would not want to sleep with that! So it does go both ways.

But I can only speak for my case...I still dated her, groomed and dressed well, and kept my hygiene up (I'm a bit of a neat freak). But did I behave badly about her not having desire? Yes I did.

I agree there's something here. Again, I hesitated to sure the word ensnare because it had the potential to be controversial but whatever word there does seem to be a quick fall-off in many cases which makes it seem like a bit of bait-and-switch.