Hi SBH, Thanks for your insights. I agree that in feeling wanted, rather than controlled, he was able to move closer to me. In general, he has seemed suspicious of my desire to be intimate with him...he doesn't know what to make of it after all this time, especially what I expect of him. We had both gotten very used to distance.
In going along with our concept of a healthy marriage, both of us have tried to keep alive individual interests and activities. He enjoys going out with friends, would ideally like to go out every week, but because of "life" it ends up more like once or twice a month. Unfortunately, the activities became a way to escape each other rather than providing a healthy balance in a good marriage.
It hurt to see how "nice" and "energized" he was with other people and not with me, until I realized I did the same thing. We seemed better at treating the world nicely than treating each other this way, although we both are nice people. That was the other reason for making a date night...just to have a consistent time to go out and do something fun and reconnect, apart from what happens sexually.
We ML last nite for the third time this week-- even he joked it wasn't on date nite. I would have been content with cuddling, but he moved it in that direction, and it was enjoyable. I'm finding that now that we some degree of closeness and affection, I am less interested in sex, which really shocks me. Last nite it took a while to get my head ( and body) into sex; I hope I'm not going LD. J
