Quote: I told him that I think our underlying issue has been lack of an intimate relationship. I believe that men pride themselves on their ability to please their wifes sexually.
I know you may not have phrased this exactly the way you did to him but I have to assume it was something like this. I see one problem, and the one that probably cause him to feel like you were lecturing him like a mother is that you put yourself in a position to KNOW what is wrong and you were basically TELLING him about it. He probably resented being told something he either already knew or doesn't agree with.
In any event, my C keeps telling me that I make this mistake all the time. She is trying to get me to only make "I" statements when talking about these things. So with that advice in mind, that convo would have gone something like "Honey, I feel like I was missing the intimacy in our relationship. I needed more from you, and wanted to give more to you but after the kids were born and I put on weight, I didn't know if you still wanted me. I was afraid of rejection by you, and so I just stopped initiating. I also started rejecting you because as the intimacy level went down, I started getting more self conscious and I felt uncomfortable with sex. If we can work back to a point where we are going to be intimate again, I just want you to know that I really love sex with you and I am working on understanding myself so I can ensure I enjoy what we do together." or something like that. Of course, now may not be the time to have that convo, but hell, there may never really be the RIGHT time for that. As OT often suggests though, these kinds of talks with someone that we are NOT in an intimate R with can have unexpected, and sometimes negative results.
I just think that most of us need to understand how we sound to our spouses. While we think we are merely sharing, much like we do here every day, a great new revelation about our R with our spouse, it may come off as controlling and condescending. We get so wrapped up in being the "one" to fix all this that we forget that they have their own set of beliefs, feelings and yes, believe it or not, ideas about what went wrong. Hell, they may even have an idea or two about how to make things work.
Mama, you know I struggle as much as you do with this. I feel for you. Actually, I just realized something more I wanted to journal on my thread relating to my struggle with when/how to talk to W. Maybe it will be relevant to you.
Overall, I am glad that the convo seemed to end on a positive note. I really hope he goes to therapy and by all means, YOU KEEP GOING to yours.
