Corri, I am coming into this conversation late, how messed up this whole thing is.. but at the same time.. potentially close to home.. which is really making me wonder about a few things.
I know that my wife's life growing up was insanely messed up. I grew up in a religious home with 2 parents who loved each other and my sister was, quite honestly, one of my best friends.. still are (although she lives on the other side of the country). My wife on the other hand... well, all I hear about is disfunction, chaos and a big mess. I can't even begin and the few times that my wife actually opens up about some little thing, I have to pull my jaw off the floor for how messed up it is. I know she lived with her mom until she was 14 and finally left at that age, got sick of the crap and began foraging her own life on her own, been in contact with her mother only a few times since then... I have never met her or spoken to her. Same with her Dad, he was never around, has attempted to make contact with her now that she is older, but she will not have anything to do with him. I also know there was a step dad and 2 brothers, but she never talks about the step dad and both brothers are in prison. She has asked that I not talk about her past, inquire of her past, or try to delve into her past. She says it is in her past and so there is nothing she can do about it. And so she goes on, attempting to live her "regular, stable" life.
I have always assumed there has been some past abuse, but that is my opinion, as my wife is very strict in the whole "not bringing up the past". This also may be why she flat out refuses to have anything to do with counselors, or psychologists. Will not go, not under ANY reason. I have voiced the opinion on this board that a friend gave to me one time that there is something that happened to her in her past.. something so dark, that she will not go near it. It is easier to repress whatever that is and try to move on, then deal with whatever "it" is. I have read your story now and seen what "it" was for you, and "it" was very disturbing. Makes me wonder all the more what my dear wife has had to endure that she is just not ready to face.
I have also noticed that as I have endured some of my trials, many times you respond to me very much like my wife does... you seem to think through things much like she does, again, making me wonder all the more if you have similar pasts.
I have mentioned before that I am seeing some success in my whole scheduled sex experiment. We are at least doing things on a regular basis. But even with this schedule, I know she does not get into it. I know she is giving the go ahead for me, as she wants me to be happy and satisfied, but I do want her to enjoy it more as well. She says she is enjoying it as much as she can right now (which she'll admit is not much at all) , but that's all she can do right now, and I can't expect more than she can give. And so, I have done just that, I am trying to accept that by simply letting it happen once a week, she is doing all that she can do, and doing it because she loves me.. The ideal sex may not be there, but it's a start and its leaps and bounds beyond where we have been for years!
About 3 weeks back, we were doing things (and you'll see just how ignorant I really am of sex). For the first time in 7 years, she actually allowed me to manually stimulate her. That has been an "off limits" place for, like I said.. 7 years. I was totally excited that she would actually allow this. I had no idea what I was doing, but since she was allowing it, I went for it. After a few minutes of this stimulation, suddenly she JERKED forward, breathed hard, lurched around rather uncontrollably for a second or too and then fell back onto the bed. I was in shock. I assumed that she may have just O'd, but in our entire marriage, this had only happened once before, when we were newlyweds. It was right after this had happened that she cut of all contact "down there". So it happened again 3 weeks ago, and I was totally excited. I hoped that if she really had had an O, that it would somehow "Awaken her sexuality".. you can see how little I know here... And I eagerly looked forward to the next Thursday where I could try that again. But the next Thursday when I tried.. once again there area was totally off limits. She said that what I did to her, she didn't like. She didn't like the sensation, she didn't like the rush of feeling.... she said it took her to a bad place.. that she didn't want to go to again. So she asked me not to do that again, and to not try in other ways to give her the same reaction. She says she doesn't like sex, and despises the O (all 2 now, that she has had in 8 years), but she allows me to do it because she knows it is important to me to express myself on a regular basis.
My questions to you Corri, are (and I hope under the circumstances it is not too personal, but being that this is the SSM board, I can get your take)
1. What kind of person was your Ex? A nice person that tried to do things right, that for whatever reason just didn't click with you, or understand your past and how to deal with it, or was he an abusive jerk?
2. When there was intimacy, were you able to O, and if so.. was it an enjoyable thing, or did it somehow take you back to your experiences as a teenager? Did you avoid sexual types of situations due to the memories, or did your past play a part in how things turned out for the marriage?
I have a lot of questions about my wife's past and how it affects her now, and since I don't know what that past was, I am just left to speculate.. to try to figure out what may have happened and what not to do to accidently set her off. After reading your story and knowing what little I do, I really know wonder how similar your journey's are.
