Sorry, KEB, I'm going to have to hijack this thread and get some info to help myself out. Again, we may have been separated at birth because your situation is so similar to mine....
I also took up the “hobby” about six months into our marriage. Mostly, I think we both came home from work tired, and I didn’t have the energy to put a good effort into pleasing her.
I found it was easier to just spend five minutes by myself.
Over time, I’ve just become sort of lazy. Pre-bomb, when we did ML, it was about once a month and was fairly perfunctory. Since the bomb, we have ML once. More on that later.
After the bomb, I tried, unsuccessfully several times to initiate ML. Perhaps my tactic was wrong because I was just asking “Do you want to fool around tonight?” several hours before bed.
I bought SSM because I thought she was LD. Before we were married, she couldn’t get enough, and things were hot. They went downhill fairly quickly after we were married. As I read through the book, I began wondering if I was the LD. Perhaps more accurately, I was the Lazy D spouse. We discussed what had happened, and she agreed, that we need to have a more passionate love life.
She has also had the hobby for some time now. I didn’t know this until a post-bomb discussion, where we discussed that our sex life had become so boring to her, and so much about me coming, that she just wasn’t interested in sex with me any more. I have found I think about having sex with her constantly now that I don’t have the release of the hobby.
I can’t for the life of me explain why I preferred myself to her. She’s beautiful and great in bed (when adequately warmed up). Mostly, my actions, or lack thereof, during our marriage have defied explanation. She says she doesn’t believe that I have loved her for a long time now because of the way I’ve acted towards her. I know that I have loved her, but it makes sense to me that she would see things the way she does. In a way, I’m exactly where I deserve to be, but I’d still like a second chance, now that I’ve learned so much about myself
We ML once, about a month ago, and I tried too hard to create and exciting scene for her. Trying to re-do some of the kinky stuff from the dating days. It wasn’t executed perfectly, and I think she ended up disappointed with the event. She has adamantly refused any offers of sex since then. Not maybe. No.
I have stopped the hobby since the bomb. She has not. She also becomes agitated when I give specifically sexual compliments. She did not like when I told her she had a great butt. She told me it’s been so long since I complimented her that it makes her cringe when I do it now. I can compliment her outfits and makeup. I can also compliment her mothering skills and non-sexual abilities.
She said that since she felt that I didn’t care about her appearance any more, she stopped caring what I thought about her appearance.
My question: would a more persistent and spontaneous “I want you so bad” in bed be something that might work, in light of the fact she’s said she doesn’t want sex from me at all?
My fear is that I feel like I need to strengthen our friendship more before I try for sex. Since she is so convinced that there is no hope for her to ever start to love me again, she doesn’t want to be subjected to boring and perfunctory sex. But I think if we could get back into the habit, it could be passionate again. Kind of a chicken-and-the-egg thing.
Is begging for sex pursuing behavior? Or is it a 180? In the past several years, I never asked more than once or twice a month. And always well in advance of the proposed time of the act. But it seems that if she knows I’m horney for her, it might make her feel sexy again...
Not to mention, my sex drive has gone into overdrive.
