That fear is something we all face - at least when we decide to embark on this path. I too am deathly afraid of saying these things to my W. I'm working around the edges of it, but I don't have a big enough pair to say what I really want to say.
What I’ve started to ask myself is just what it is that I’m so afraid of. My first response was exactly what you said - losing my best friend forever, a beautiful, wonderful person that I love more than anyone on the planet - but that was dishonest. I know that my W won't leave me just because I want greater intimacy and more frequent LM. No, what I'm really afraid of is finding out that she can't/won't change. Through twelve yeas of totally sexless M, followed by another sixteen of nearly sexless M, I’ve lived on the hope and the dream that it would get better, that my W would have some kind of breakthrough and discover the sensuous woman buried somewhere within her. My real fear is losing that hope and being forced to give up the dream. My real fear is learning that it will never get better.
Realizing that has helped a little. I’m still afraid. I still haven’t managed to really lay it on the line and disclose how I’ve felt for all of these years. But I have begun to see things differently. I have started bringing the subject up with her. I have a long way to go with myself, whether or not the sex and intimacy ever get any better, but realizing that my real fear was giving up something as illusory as a hope that things would change has helped me. My actions haven’t followed yet, but my mind is now much more focused on reality and on the here and now as opposed to the dream. It’s slow, but I’m getting there.
