Recurring Problem

[OK Jeff]

So another update.
I went in to the bedroom last night. Had to all but pick a fight to get her to talk about what's going on with her right now. She started talking and the flood gates opened. Very little of what's bothering her has anything at all to do with me, or her directly. Some is her sister screwing up her life again. It's feeling overwhelmed by many responsibilities that aren't hers. I quietly laid and let her talk and talk and talk. I caressed her and listened offering only one piece of advice (because I read women don't want us to fix it for them). I told her she needs to let got of what responsibilities aren't hers to carry. I kissed her and drifted off to sleep with her in my arms.
Only thing I can't understand is why it's so difficult to get her to talk.

 

[Endeavourer]

The fact that SHE is 100% unwilling to have any sort of conversation about any of this .....

Here's something to consider.

A lot of women don't like to be directly asked for a physical connection; they like for an expression of affection to organically grow into it. If a question is posed earlier on, it feels like water being thrown on a fire. It has nothing to do with their husband or the love they feel towards their husband and is not a feeling of rejecting their husband whatsoever, but it might have something to do with women not having testosterone.

Also, a lot of women prefer multiple expressions of affection (perhaps 20+ incidents), and very importantly, some of those expressions should organically become sensual but not progress further, between the times of the mutual physical expression of love.

We women are creatures that naturally tend toward of negative self talk about ourselves so our husbands have the very important role of cementing his affirmations of us constantly. These expressions do that and warm our hearts towards the desire of a physical connection. We don't have testosterone to drive us to that; our hearts are the only thing we have to drive us to physically connect.

You too, indulge in negative self talk - but she likely has magnitudes more. Imagine if she told you 20x about how she loved and desired you between the 1x she wasn't in the mood for sex. The 1x wouldn't bite as much. You are doing similar for her so she has an overwhelming assurance of your love, affection and attraction to her. This will usually increase a woman's appetite for sexual frequency.

The topic of sex has not improved. The only real change is my response. It still feels like rejection, and my initiating only increases this feeling. I've made strides in the quality time front, in fact we're on a week long getaway as I type this.

It's really important to keep at the forefront of your mind when you have these feelings is that she has never said her lack of mood for sex has anything to do with a personal rejection of you, so it's very important to purposefully reject this type of self talk. If she is initiating 2x per month on average, it is EXTREMELY unlikely that she feels any of that towards you. Women who do generally can't initiate sex.

There could be 100 reasons for her not feeling ready for the physical activity required of the connection ranging from a digestive event that is in the works, to needing a shower but feeling too lazy to take one (remember, she doesn't have testosterone driving her), having something else bothering her that is distracting her focus and the list can go on and on.

I'm good with giving her quiet time alone, but it's hard not to feel rejected. (To the man haters, I don't mean sex).

An area of self discipline you could work on is to not ascribe thoughts or motives to her that are not expressed.

Here is an article about what happens in marriages when the ascriptions are expressed (which you are not doing), but they are just as harmful when they are thought and the other person is mentally blamed without the other person knowing anything what they are being blamed for. They still erode the love in the marriage.

I can double-dee-guarantee you that anytime my husband thought he knew what I was thinking he was FAR afield of what I was actually thinking. I've experienced this many times so I know to never assume what he is thinking either. To do so is an unspoken disrespectful judgement which harms my love for him even if he isn't aware of what I'm thinking.

Disrespectful Judgments

I'm very scrupulous about disciplining my thoughts to not think any negativity about my husband's thoughts, motives or intentions unless he specifically expresses such. This is a technique that has been proven to prevent problems in marriages.

 

[Endeavourer]

To run hard all day, then fall asleep on the couch alone is not what I expected. I'm just disappointed.

Give the 15 hours per week of undivided attention and the frequent expressions of affection and affirmation about 3 months.

If after 3 months she is not any more receptive than before, then connect with me and I'll refer you to a resource which is very experienced in guiding how to broach next steps. It's a community of volunteers on a (free) forum which is overseen by one of the most successful marriage recover experts in the country.

You definitely do NOT want to open the conversation with her without some seasoned guidance because this is a sensitive area for both of you and a conversation that goes sideways could do more harm than good. You two have already had a few memorable conversations on the topic that still sting today, and you don't want to add to that pile.

 

[Endeavourer]

Also, when you have some down time, read this article and the further description of each of the lovebusters:

Love Busters

Carefully examine your behavior as to whether you are perpetrating any of these - and during your three month trial period be very careful to excise them from your behavior.

If she engages in any, don't respond accordingly or the situation will just escalate to both of you harming your marriage at the same time.

If you don't believe you are engaging in any of these, I can give you a questionnaire you could ask her to complete so you can ascertain if she thinks you are.

 

[Tropical Wilds]

So another update.
I went in to the bedroom last night. Had to all but pick a fight to get her to talk about what's going on with her right now. She started talking and the flood gates opened. Very little of what's bothering her has anything at all to do with me, or her directly. Some is her sister screwing up her life again. It's feeling overwhelmed by many responsibilities that aren't hers. I quietly laid and let her talk and talk and talk. I caressed her and listened offering only one piece of advice (because I read women don't want us to fix it for them). I told her she needs to let got of what responsibilities aren't hers to carry. I kissed her and drifted off to sleep with her in my arms.
Only thing I can't understand is why it's so difficult to get her to talk.

Now that is awesome and, I suspect, if you keep up that level of intimacy then the other expressions of intimacy will start to fix too. May take a few months, but I bet it’ll really help.

Why is it difficult to get her to talk? Probably several reasons. Maybe she thinks she can handle it privately. Maybe she thinks because it’s her family, she can/should handle it privately. Maybe she thinks telling you will bother/frustrate you. Maybe she’s so burned out thinking about it she doesn’t want to talk about it and would rather talk about ANYTHING else. Maybe she finds it hard to talk about her feelings. Maybe other more pressing things need to be discussed first. Maybe she feels, as a man, women issues aren’t something that you care to deal with/know how to deal with/want do deal with. Maybe she didn’t feel like it. Maybe talking about it winds her up and she’s trying to let it go.

Instead of turning the positive step into a negative by being critical of her, which undoes the good of the moment, put a check in thebein column and keep plugging forward.

 

[Endeavourer]

So another update.
I went in to the bedroom last night. Had to all but pick a fight to get her to talk about what's going on with her right now. She started talking and the flood gates opened. Very little of what's bothering her has anything at all to do with me, or her directly. Some is her sister screwing up her life again. It's feeling overwhelmed by many responsibilities that aren't hers. I quietly laid and let her talk and talk and talk. I caressed her and listened offering only one piece of advice (because I read women don't want us to fix it for them). I told her she needs to let got of what responsibilities aren't hers to carry. I kissed her and drifted off to sleep with her in my arms.
Only thing I can't understand is why it's so difficult to get her to talk.

Winner, winner, chicken dinner!!!!!

Great job at connecting with her.

See how easy it is to let self talk convince you to feel rejected when it was just something else bothering and distracting her so much?

What beautiful loving and affectionate support you provided her!

 

[OK Jeff]

Thank you for the help.

 

[OK Jeff]

I read and reread this. It's the most helpful post yet. I'm not sure if it's your words themselves, my eyes beginning to open, or it's likely a combination of the two. I guess that's God's timing huh? Thank you for that. And feel free to keep expressing what comes to mind.

Here's something to consider.

A lot of women don't like to be directly asked for a physical connection; they like for an expression of affection to organically grow into it. If a question is posed earlier on, it feels like water being thrown on a fire. It has nothing to do with their husband or the love they feel towards their husband and is not a feeling of rejecting their husband whatsoever, but it might have something to do with women not having testosterone.

Also, a lot of women prefer multiple expressions of affection (perhaps 20+ incidents), and very importantly, some of those expressions should organically become sensual but not progress further, between the times of the mutual physical expression of love.

We women are creatures that naturally tend toward of negative self talk about ourselves so our husbands have the very important role of cementing his affirmations of us constantly. These expressions do that and warm our hearts towards the desire of a physical connection. We don't have testosterone to drive us to that; our hearts are the only thing we have to drive us to physically connect.

You too, indulge in negative self talk - but she likely has magnitudes more. Imagine if she told you 20x about how she loved and desired you between the 1x she wasn't in the mood for sex. The 1x wouldn't bite as much. You are doing similar for her so she has an overwhelming assurance of your love, affection and attraction to her. This will usually increase a woman's appetite for sexual frequency.



It's really important to keep at the forefront of your mind when you have these feelings is that she has never said her lack of mood for sex has anything to do with a personal rejection of you, so it's very important to purposefully reject this type of self talk. If she is initiating 2x per month on average, it is EXTREMELY unlikely that she feels any of that towards you. Women who do generally can't initiate sex.

There could be 100 reasons for her not feeling ready for the physical activity required of the connection ranging from a digestive event that is in the works, to needing a shower but feeling too lazy to take one (remember, she doesn't have testosterone driving her), having something else bothering her that is distracting her focus and the list can go on and on.



An area of self discipline you could work on is to not ascribe thoughts or motives to her that are not expressed.

Here is an article about what happens in marriages when the ascriptions are expressed (which you are not doing), but they are just as harmful when they are thought and the other person is mentally blamed without the other person knowing anything what they are being blamed for. They still erode the love in the marriage.

I can double-dee-guarantee you that anytime my husband thought he knew what I was thinking he was FAR afield of what I was actually thinking. I've experienced this many times so I know to never assume what he is thinking either. To do so is an unspoken disrespectful judgement which harms my love for him even if he isn't aware of what I'm thinking.

Disrespectful Judgments

I'm very scrupulous about disciplining my thoughts to not think any negativity about my husband's thoughts, motives or intentions unless he specifically expresses such. This is a technique that has been proven to prevent problems in marriages.

 

[tall73]

So another update.
I went in to the bedroom last night. Had to all but pick a fight to get her to talk about what's going on with her right now. She started talking and the flood gates opened. Very little of what's bothering her has anything at all to do with me, or her directly. Some is her sister screwing up her life again. It's feeling overwhelmed by many responsibilities that aren't hers. I quietly laid and let her talk and talk and talk. I caressed her and listened offering only one piece of advice (because I read women don't want us to fix it for them). I told her she needs to let got of what responsibilities aren't hers to carry. I kissed her and drifted off to sleep with her in my arms.
Only thing I can't understand is why it's so difficult to get her to talk.

Great to hear! That is why it didn't seem to make much sense to speculate about how she was upset over whatever perceived slights, rather than just asking her about the situation.

I hope things improve in the communication.

Also, to clarify another poster's statement earlier, no one asserted a three week period. What was asserted is a normal cycle. While the poster didn't read the whole thread, the study posted backs up the notion that there are times during the cycle where hormones make arousal more likely. Again, we are not slaves to hormones, but they do play a role.

Ultimately the issue is a lack of communication, and Endeavourer's take on that sounds helpful.

 

[Dave-W]

it’s that men don’t get that women need sex too,

No they don't.

Maybe they SHOULD, and maybe they are designed to; but this culture has so much abuse of girls and young women that many just turn it off and are fine with nothing ever.

or that men don’t get that intimacy primarily through sex isn’t conductive to an emotionally functional marriage

Especially if they have been abused.

If we are TRULY men, we can take it. Forever. And we should be supportive of that decision.

Psalm 15:1
O Lord, who may abide in Your tent? Who may dwell on Your holy hill?
2 He who walks with integrity, and works righteousness, And speaks truth in his heart.
3 He does not slander with his tongue, Nor does evil to his neighbor, Nor takes up a reproach against his friend;
4 In whose eyes a reprobate is despised, But who honors those who fear the Lord; He swears to his own hurt and does not change;​

 

[Tropical Wilds]

No they don't.

Maybe they SHOULD, and maybe they are designed to; but this culture has so much abuse of girls and young women that many just turn it off and are fine with nothing ever.

While I don’t disagree that sexual abuse of women is rampant in our society, I suspect if we were to do an anonymous poll of women on here, an overwhelming majority of women would say they need sex/enjoy sex just like men do and dislike the stereotype that says women don’t like sex or don’t desire, even crave it.

When you read on here or anywhere, it seems near universal that women say and indicate they enjoy sex, it’s just they don’t enjoy it or feel inspired to do it in certain situations. The disconnect comes that when a woman says as much, if a man takes the rejection personally and/or keeps repeating the situation she says she doesn’t respond to, he says “she hates sex,” not “she hates how I’m approaching having sex.”

It’s like chips. I love chips, but if somebody said “let’s have Doritos for breakfast at 6am” or wanted only offered it to me at midnight, or served me chips for dinner, I’d say no. For some reason, it’s easier to evaluate the situation and say “she likes chips, just not for breakfast” than it is to self-examine why sex is rejected and arrive at a conclusion deeper than “she/women doesn’t/don’t like sex.”

Especially

if they have been abused.

If we are TRULY men, we can take it. Forever. And we should be supportive of that decision.

Psalm 15:1
O Lord, who may abide in Your tent? Who may dwell on Your holy hill?
2 He who walks with integrity, and works righteousness, And speaks truth in his heart.
3 He does not slander with his tongue, Nor does evil to his neighbor, Nor takes up a reproach against his friend;
4 In whose eyes a reprobate is despised, But who honors those who fear the Lord; He swears to his own hurt and does not change;​

Abused or sick or working out other issues of trust and intimacy. Take it forever? Maybe, if intimate and physical needs are met in other ways and both parties are willing to accept a new shared expression, but it won’t be easy for either party. And if there’s a struggle there, I don’t think it connects to somebody not being a real man, but somebody who’s simply struggling with the new parameters of the relationship... Really big, daunting parameters.

 

[Dave-W]

Take it forever? Maybe, if intimate and physical needs are met in other ways and both parties are willing to accept a new shared expression, but it won’t be easy for either party. And if there’s a struggle there, I don’t think it connects to somebody not being a real man, but somebody who’s simply struggling with the new parameters of the relationship... Really big, daunting parameters.

After being married 40 years, these are not "new parameters."

 

[Paidiske]

No, they aren't.

But I also think, Dave, your situation is exceptional; and can't be generalised even to most women.

 

[Tropical Wilds]

I meant “new parameters” in the context of the OP or anybody experiencing a change in sexual frequency.

 

[OK Jeff]

Great to hear! That is why it didn't seem to make much sense to speculate about how she was upset over whatever perceived slights, rather than just asking her about the situation.

I hope things improve in the communication.

Also, to clarify another poster's statement earlier, no one asserted a three week period. What was asserted is a normal cycle. While the poster didn't read the whole thread, the study posted backs up the notion that there are times during the cycle where hormones make arousal more likely. Again, we are not slaves to hormones, but they do play a role.

Ultimately the issue is a lack of communication, and Endeavourer's take on that sounds helpful.

It's so difficult to get her to talk. I have to almost pick a fight to get her started talking. It's often left me with nothing but speculation. Perhaps enough times like the other night, she'll talk more freely.

Your comment to the other poster is exactly why I dismissed her. She cherry picked comments, many out of context, and was another of the "get over it" crowd. That horse has been dead awhile now. And it's not a reasonable response for any sane person.

 

[Tropical Wilds]

You can insult me, you can dismiss me, and you can exhibit all the behaviors of passive aggressive sniping you want towards me. The simple fact is that does more to support what I was saying far more than anything you’ve been saying. It’s both childish and petty, solves nothing, and makes abundantly clear that you want a specific answer that gets you sex and pity, not a solution that gets you intimacy and a more balanced marriage.

By the way, you probably should go back and re-read the post if you think that poster was putting me in my place for what I said.

 

[mkgal1]

This may be a helpful series for you, Jeff:

 

[mkgal1]

It's so difficult to get her to talk. I have to almost pick a fight to get her started talking. It's often left me with nothing but speculation.

It's a natural response for people to close off parts of themselves when they don't feel those parts are going to be met with acceptance. Sometimes that fear is irrational insecurity....and other times it's completely justified based on past history. You've admitted to angry outbursts (and we've all seen a bit of that even in this thread). When conflicts like this go on unresolved for years....each spouse develops their own "prickly" defenses. You can't change her defense until she knows there's an ongoing change in you that she can trust. Unfortunately it's a whole lot more difficult to restore trust once it's been shattered than it was to originally gain it. Patience is probably the most valuable virtue in all this.

That's actually what TW is trying to advise you in (the way I see it). If you wish for your wife to talk to you.....share what's going on in her head....then what you're truly seeking is a balanced and healthy marriage. If the only thing that were to change was that the sex between you increased.....I'd be willing to promise you'd feel just as disconnected and rejected as you do now. IOW....that's not the answer to your problem.

makes abundantly clear that you want a specific answer that gets you sex and pity, not a solution that gets you intimacy and a more balanced marriage.

 

[mkgal1]

This may be a helpful series for you, Jeff:

These are pretty short video clips. After watching one for yourself.....do you think that maybe you can approach your wife and say something along the lines of...."I'm realizing we didn't get off to the healthiest beginning....and I'd really like to work towards changing that. Are you up for trying to improve our marriage with me?" And maybe the two of you can begin by just watching these (and if she feels up to sharing any thoughts after.....listen just as you did the other night).

 

[mkgal1]

Perhaps enough times like the other night, she'll talk more freely.

I think so. As long as there's not circumstances that negate it in the meantime.