H and I have been doing really well lately; we have a LOT of stress in our lives right now but we are handling it like champs. He is still reliant on me, it seems, to keep things sexually on track but I am doing my best to just go with it and not make every damn thing a crucible issue, kwim.
I have been asking him lately to help me shave. I can't see my own parts and need his help. He agreed and I braced myself for another "this is not sexy, why would you think it is?" moment. I didn't know if I could hold on to myself properly at that moment so I decided to just do it myself, by feel. Wellll, it worked okay, I suppose. Lots of razor burn and missed spots but it feels better than it did.
We had had sex Fri nite and Sat morning and I shaved on Sat night. I knew that he would be too worn out to enjoy it on that night, but one can still hope. Nope he was not interested. No biggie.
Fast forward to last night. I really pulled out all the stops, without coming out and stating "I want sex now"...he was folding clothes and I stood naked in front of him and applied oil on my dry skinned body. No reaction. I got in bed and was a little discouraged but still had a firm grip on myself.
He gets in bed and we snuggle and talk about all the stuff we have going on (buying a new vehicle, H has a job interview tomorrow, home remodeling, new baby on way, etc!!).
During this time, he refuses to touch my parts entirely which is not like him. I realized that he was intentionally avoiding it but again held on to myself and tried to recapture the EC, which was fading due to so much "business talk" (job interview, calling on cars, etc).
Then he asks me if I want to ML. I said "You know, I would really prefer it if you would stop asking me every time what my preference is. If you want to ML to me, I would LOVE IT if you would say that. I feel as if you are always feeling me out and then will make your decision based on whatever I say." He agreed that that was precisely what he was doing. I pressed and said, So you are not horny when you ask me if I want to ML?! (I don't know why, folks, but I always thought that he WAS and was being polite..sounds silly now, even to me) He said not really but that he could get horny really quickly if I was. I replied that basically he was making an offering to me, out of love, that he would ML to me if I wanted it. He said, Yes! I thanked him for that and snuggled up to him and squeezed his hand and said that it was a very nice and generous thing to do.
And it soooooooooooooooo is. I know that you HD men would kill or die for a spouse like that.
It rankled in my mind for about 3 minutes when I finally blurted out (forgetting to run it thru the schnarch a tron), "You know, there are many nights that I don't really want sex but I have to be honest...I never want YOU to feel that way!" We both laughed a little and dropped it. I also pointed out to him a little later that he always SAYS he wants me to shave and how excited he is going to be (he originally told me to do this because he was going to try Tim's Big Kahana Move of him standing and me kneeling on the bed, with the twist that he was going to kneel on the floor and bury his face in bare skin first). THEN when the time comes, it is at least 4 days before he will even touch me to check out the shaving job or to fulfill HIS fantasy about it. Bizarre! He said, I have no idea why I do that. But he still wouldn't touch it.
Now, I know my husband well enough to know that it is because touching leads to arousal leads to sex .
So if you don't want anything to do with sex, then STAY AWAY from the goodies!, is his thinking.
I eventually gathered my wits enough to request ML tonight and he agreed. And then we went to sleep. I have to tell you guys honestly that I think it is bullCHIT that I have to request it, after trying to make myself as appealing as possible...the shaving, the oil, etc, and basically putting myself as far on the line as I can without saying the accompanying words "I want to ML tonight". But I will really try to ditch this potentially resentful situation and just go with the fact that he is under a lot of stress and despite the fact that I am a source of RELIEF for this stress, he would rather wallow in it and really get the most out of his own adrenaline.
Finally, the title of the post....hatin it when it happens. It refers specifically to the moment when he told me that when he asks if I want to ML, it is because he is offering it in case I might want it. I swear to you good people that I thought he was being polite and that he still wanted it for himself. Now that I know it is mostly mercy sex (although VERY loving and generous mercy sex) I am afraid that I will have a hard time accepting this offer without overanalyzing. Now, you gents will have an impossible time understanding this but I think that the HD wives will understand where I am coming from.
At any rate, I was better off not knowing that his question of whether I wanted to ML was preceding a mercy offering. I need to learn to keep my big mouth SHUT!
Honeypot, who will prolly get sex tonight but is not overly enthused about it right now.
Honey, as an HDH, I know EXACTLY what you are saying. While I would LOVE to have a W that offered, it would still take something away from the experience to know that it was offered mostly out of mercy sex. But try to look at the good side. Though the offer to ML may be looking out for you rther than desire couched in politeness, at least he IS thinking of you and your needs. How much better is that than a H/W who simply doesn't care if you're left wanting or not? It may not be perfect, but it's way better than it could be.
Hi Honey, I think you are really handling yourself well. It's not easy to put yourself out there and stay positive in the face of a potentially rejecting situation. The reward is that you and H are sharing intimate moments, having dialogue, and are connected. I know it's not exactly what you would like...you'd like to be ravaged by him rather than be told he is doing this for you...but what you have is a committed man who is being honest and trying to please you. This whole low desire thing is so hard to accept and so hard on our sense of attractiveness as a woman. Your H is stepping up to the plate...perhaps this is all he can do right now with his mind so preoccupied, but it wouldn't hurt to let him know that as you head in the final stages of pregnancy a little reassurance/compliments/energy from him goes a long way. J
Yes I do realize, every day, how lucky I am to have an H who loves me so much that he will try to meet my needs, even when he is preoccupied and uninterested for himself. It was just a BIG shock to find out just how often he is uninterested for himself and makes the "do you wanna" offer. I would say this is at least half of the time. I really, really, truly thought that he was on board with it and just wanted to make sure that I was too. To find out that he is offering for my benefit only has been a shock to my ego, as silly as that sounds.
It is just hard for me to continue to be sexually confident (which he likes and wants me to be) when I get only intermittant positive reinforcement. I FEEL sexy and attractive, even in my pg state, and I know that he desires me. I even caught glimpses of his desire yesterday and it was clearly desire and not just affection. Where I have a hard time understanding it is when this obvious desire does not carry over to actual sex.
Also, I am having a hard time with the fact that he does these repeated bizarre behavior without any seeming attempt to get past them. Such as, the "no touchie touchie" on the shaved parts for a good 3 days or more after the fact. He LOVES me shaved so it is not anything like that. He wants me to do it and then when I do, there is no reinforcement there for me at all. This may be a crucible issue one of these days, but not now. Too much other stuff going on.
So today my mission is going to be to continue to hold on to myself and NOT let those resentful thoughts get the best of me.
I bet you were suprised when he told you how often he was doing that for you. My LDH would constantly tell me that he "never" thought about sex at all...I could have fallen out of my chair when our therapist asked him about that in one of our sessions...and he said he did, but that he never told me so. I was sooo SHOCKED to hear that, up until that moment I had been operating under the information that I just didn't turn him on at all...what a relief it was to learn that he just had a problem communicating to me that he did think about it...but that other things were getting in the way. I've explained since to him that simply telling me that he thought about it earlier in the day...even though we may not actually have sex, would really help me out in many ways...my self-esteem wouldn't quite feel so beaten with that info. He's trying to do better about that. And you are very lucky to have a man who is trying to meet your needs, you are indeed a very fortunate woman...as am I as my LDH has committed to getting our problem worked out. He's told me he knows a good thing when he's got it and he's not going to lose it...which gives me hope and makes me feel good at the same time :-) Good luck!!!
Sex can take a lot of energy and with some men this energy can take a few days to restore.
Now, every man is different and the same man can be different at various times of his live.
Some spiritual people have lectured on the creative energy within a man's seed and how this seed must be conserved if you want to, ah, be creative.
So perhaps your H just can't keep up with you and still maintain his other responsibilities.
There's a book called Taoist Secrets of Love where he describes a way to have sex without having the man spill himself into his woman. Done right it can be satisfying for both.
It may be that he very much wants to please you. It's just that he wants to have some energy left over to do something else with his life.
You offer things to your husband that I can only DREAM of. And his response is just unbelieveable. I would KILL to shvae my wife, but of course it will never happen, she would consider that GROSS. And him offering MERCY sex, I really don't understand this. Are you sure his testosterone is in the proper levels? I was reading where there are 3 forms of testosterone in the male body, some is free and others are not. All of the forms of testosterone must be at the proper level. I have probably said this before, get him checked out. If I were confronted with my wife naked asking to be shaved, I think I would be dead before I hit the floor, my heart just would not be able to take that.
Mercy sex, it sucks for both men and women. It is just as important to men to be seen as attractive as it is for women. What I don't understand is why LD people truly do not understand this concept. I don't understand why they get hung up on the frequency and when to do it, when they need to concentrate on the WHY to do it. These LD spouses seem to concentrate on the mechanics, which effectively ruins the moment.
Tom, I absolutely believe this to be true with H. I know for a fact (because he has told me) that it takes him several days to restore himself and feel sexual energy again.
But that is not usually what happens in reality. We usually have sex sometime before the so-called restorative period is completed. Turns out, he was doing this for me and I didn't know it!
I am so grateful that I have a spouse who will even think of doing it "for me" but as I said it surprised the heck outta me. I thought he was doing this out of horniness or...major blush here...that our previous night had turned him on so much that he wanted a repeat.
I DO appreciate his generosity and I hope I am not coming off as an ingrate here, I just learned something new that I think I could have lived without knowing. That's why I titled the thread "don't you hate when that happens"...meaning, I hate when I open my fat yap and find out things that were better left unknown.
It just shook me and I will need a while to re-frame my thinking..in regards to our frequency and what it's really about (desire to please me instead of plain ol desire). I am sure that I will still be able to be positive about it, after all he is doing a very positive and loving thing here..but I will just need a little while to readjust my thinking. I was operating on a mistaken premise, you know? And the TRUE premise does not make me feel quite as hot as I previously did. (oh I am so hot H has got to have me again the next night...yeah! As opposed to, H will gladly ML to me the next night because he knows that I have a higher sex drive than him and one night will leaving me hungering for more)
Oh well, I already am starting to feel myself coming around..it was just a shock to my sexual ego, that's all. Not the first and it certainly won't be the last, I betcha!
CeMar: It is worth a shot, I suppose. I know that his T checked out fine, many years ago, but I have no idea which kind of T that was.
As I have posted before, my doctor even called him "Rambo" in the office when reporting the numbers to us. I would be surprised if it were a hormonal problem (especially given that he wants to have sex twice a week ideally).
I am going to make a doctors appt for him anyway for a lump that is on the back of his head, so I think I will try to (tactfully) ask if he thinks this is something to test, also. I suspect that he would look at me as if I were loco.
I mean, we have sex approx 4x per week, in his mind to ask about LOW levels of T would be insane.
It is worth looking into though! Thanks for the idea..
