Quote: OK...so, perhaps you're building up the "first time" way too much? If you think she wants to be pursued, then pursue, simply. Send her an email that says, Hey, I passed you in the kitchen this morning and I noticed XYZ...you looked sexy." Every day, find something - little, big, whatever - someTHING to make her stop and think. Tell her you had a dream about her...and let the unspoken hang there...
I do ALL of these things. This is the 180 that I did. I started the daily compliments, the little touches, the emails, ALL of it. I do that and still...nothing.
Quote: still also think that telling her what your NOT going to do will work in some ways. Not only will it say to her that she's not expected to "put out", it may incite her at the same time. Make any sense?
Yes it does. I don't do much of this because as OT constantly says, I am not trying necessarily to "desexualize" everything, just not have it lead directly to sex, right then and there.
Quote: There's a lot of power in saying the words "I want you" to someone.
Then again, I say that ALL the time too and I think it's lost it's power. Too much of ANYTHING is a bad thing. I have pulled back on this. I think it's almost the same as ILY to my W.
Quote: Or, you can be direct. Tell her. You can validate her feelings and still tell her how YOU are feeling. W - I know you're going through a rough time, however I am too. If we're in this together, then I need to tell you that your sexual rejection of me hurts. Can you tell me why you don't want to? Share your feelings about it with her. Ask her for her thoughts on the subject. SEnd it via email if you would rather...you do a great job of writing here, maybe you'd be able to tell her better in an email, and it may be easier for her to respond to you more honestly.
THIS is exactly what I mean to do, and what, much to the dismay of OT, I am waiting to do because I want her to be able to be focused on what I want to talk about, not this other stress, and as I said, I KNOW that stress will be gone VERY soon and no, I will not just allow that to be replaced by some other crisis. This NEEDS to be done, and OT, if you are looking for a boundary from me, here it is. I NEED W to tell open up to me as NM suggests, and I to her. If we can't do that, then i need to pull back and cease all my "actions" because until I know W is ready to participate, I am not going to do everything on my own for many more weeks/months.
Quote: I think there's a lot of confusion between sex and intimacy. Each of these means different things to different people. And to some, they are one and the same. I think to you, they are two different & distinct things, yet that does not mean they both can't be worked on at the same time. And I think games & toys are 2 different things. Toys, well, you USE them for a particular act. The game, is that - a game. The game wouldn't necessarily result in ML. As a matter of fact, it shouldn't be used for that purpose at all. It should be used to learn new things about each other. Perhaps leading to more intimacy.
NM, that's the problem in a nutshell. I never understood there was a difference, or even really thought much about intimacy. My W apparently did. I know sex was intimate to my W, but the way it became the only think I ever seemed to want from her physically, I think she started to see it as something devoid of passion/intimacy and just an act that was fun every once in awhile but a chore most of the time.
I blame myself for a lot of that and as I have said over and over, I now know the error of my ways and I KNOW how to behave in a way that shows W how much I want her, both in a daily, intimate way, and a sexual way, and that the two CAN be one in the same once again.
