He does have self image issues, but I don't understand why. He has a great job that he loves, even though it can be very stressful. The problem is definately not the job or his level of satisfaction with it. He loves what he does and tells me so frequently.
Hobbies, he really does not have, but that is his choice.
Performance issues: he has never had a problem in that area with "coming to attention" and staying that way. He just has no drive, desire or need and avoids physical contact. I know that he is somewhat intimidated that I have had many lovers before we were married. I was very up front with him about that as I thought that he should know that. Maybve I should not have told him but I was being honest so he could make an informed decision before we married. I am his second lover.
Sounds like your wife and my husband suffer from similar difficulties. Wish that there was a magic pill or spell that would let them know that they are loved and appreciated so their self image would let them be more comforatablel with who they are. If we found this magic elixer, we could make a fortune! My H really is a dear, sweet, funny man. I do love him, but it is hard to continue loving when outward affection is lacking. Asking for affection is hell and feels forced. I would like easy spontinaity and passion and that is too much for him to give me. I wish he could be more secure with who he is, but I cannot change that, either. Let's hope that the counseling will help. He really is a closed nonverbal, and I am just the opposite. Last night we went to Match.com and took the personality test, which was my idea. He was very uncomforatable takinf the test, because mant of the choices were not completely accurate as far as what you would do or how you would react. He is so black and white, has to be the computer geek disease in him. ANyway, I was glad that he was willing to take the test. It is like going to a fortune teller, things as so general that you can interprete the results however you like. SOme of the results were quite accurate, though. Give it a whirl and see for yourself. My results were off base on some things asn pretty close for others. I used this personality test as a starting point for a discussion, so it was worth that at least.
Quote: Besides, fear should never be the reason for a spouse to stay faithful.
Fear of abandonment should never be the reason for a spouse to have sex, either.
Quote: But I do expect my wife to care about my well-being and happiness. I think any spouse in a healthy marriage cares about the other.
There's that dirty 'E' word again. What if she cares about your well-being and happiness, but doesn't feel responsible for it? What if she is acting in what she thinks is a caring, loving manner the best way she knows how? What if her definition of a healthy marriage is different than your own? Is she wrong? Are you? Could you both be right? Could you just be seeing the same thing in two different ways? What then?
Quote: And I am not going to go cheat on her if I don't get what I want.
Really? Haven't you already done so? Or have I misunderstood your posts, and you have only contemplated an affair?
Quote: After reading SSM, my wife told me that one of the biggest turn-offs for her are my unrealistic expectations, and my desire to analyze what is wrong. She felt she could never be the woman I wanted her to be.
I know that feeling very well. Before I read SSM, I thought I was trying as hard as I could, and it just wasn't enough. My H would still complain. I felt devastated. I felt like I was the biggest failure a woman could possibly be. That feeling got to be so profound that I literally just 'gave up.' I had never felt so worthless in all my life.
Quote: I really just wanted her to enjoy being sexual.
No, you wanted her to enjoy being sexual the way you enjoy being sexual...as you have defined it.
Did you ever know anyone when you were a kid that you maybe played a sport with, who had a parent that rode them so hard on everything from their performance to their technique, etc., that sport was no longer any fun for them? Even went so far as to quit and never play again? And the parent would say, "I'm just hard on him/her so he/she will be the best player they can be." Best player they can be for whom? The kid was probably out there originally having the time of his life, and probably was okay with his/her level of playing. But in the name of love, the parent rode them so hard that it wasn't fun anymore, it was a chore, and finally, feeling as though they would never achieve the level of performance expected of them, the kid just gave up....no matter how great his/her potential was for being a great player.
I'm not saying you ride your wife constantly, but there could be something you've said/done that makes her feel as though, no matter what she does, she will never achieve that level of expectation you have of her. Her dearest wish is probably that you could love her exactly the way she is...I'm willing to bet that there is a part of her that is convinced that you don't love her.
Quote: It is classic irony that my actions had the exact opposite of their intended effect.
It isn't irony. It is an expectation gone askew. You are not seeing the data. This is simple physics. For every action there is a reaction, yes? You continue to repeat the same action, yet are perplexed why you continue to get the same reaction. You get it because that is a law of physics. If you change your action(s), you will change the action that follows. It can happen no other way.
What the challenge here is, you may think you are changing your actions, but all you have to do is examine the reactions to gage the success of your experiment. If you continue to get the same reactions, you have not significantly altered your actions enough to warrant a changed reaction.
You and Johanna have both said that all you are expecting an affair to be is a gratification of physical needs. That's usually what it is for most people. It fulfills whatever is missing in the marriage, whether it's a physical lack or an emotional lack, or whatever. Just because you don't 'love' the other person doesn't make it any less damaging or hurtful, does not justify it, does not exhonerate it.
In my opinion, an affair is the easy way out. It keeps you from having to do the really hard work. An affair is a temporary treatment of a symptom. It is not the cure for the disease. If you continue to just treat the symptom, then eventually the disease is going to get you. I can promise you, treating the disease is a whole lot more difficult.
What I personally think goes on in a SSM, is that you have one person starving for emotional fulfillment, and the other is starving for physcial fulfillment. You have two battered, bloodied prize fighters laying dazed and confused, each in their own corner, each wondering if another round is really worth it. But no one ever asked why they started 'fighting' in the first place. No one can figure out why they are in the ring to begin with.
But what clicked for me in the book was I figured out that my H and I were speaking completely different languages. That's why the fighting started. I was laying, broken and bloodied, in a corner speaking greek. He was in the other corner, broken and bloodied, speaking french. And we wondered why the hell we couldn't communicate.
Period.
The reason I changed, the reason I could pick myself up and try again, is because I had something completely new to try. I started learning to speak french. I had never tried that before. Or, I hadn't tried hard enough and long enough to bumble my way through it. You HDers here are my french/greek dictionary.
I personally don't feel he is trying real hard to learn greek...and that really hurts...but that doesn't stop me from learning french. It doesn't stop me because I am doing it for me. It is an incredibly heady feeling to know you have the power of change. It becomes even headier when you start seeing results. It makes ME feel good. I am glad that the changes I am beginning to make to myself are making him feel good as well. It's a great side-effect. But it all stemmed from a decision to change myself. Not him. Not my marriage. Just me.
That statement "Well what about them? Why do I have to be the one try, yet again?" Hey, I've said it. Believe me.
And guess what? It's an anger statement. All it gets you is a stand-off. My shrink used to say to me, "do you want to be right, or do you want to solve the problem?"
And of course I would answer that I wanted to solve the problem. And then he would tell me that the only way I was going to solve my problem was to get rid of my anger, or move forward despite of it, and get busy trying. And keep on trying til I found something that worked. Until that time, he could do no more for me.
You, my friends, are pissed. Justifiably so. I understand it. I have been, too. I could get real pissed over the fact that I don't believe my husband seems willing to learn greek. But I can't control him, and I can't do it for him. But I can get real good at speaking french.
So. Do you want to be right and/or pissed, or do you want to solve the problem?
Quote: Sounds like your wife and my husband suffer from similar difficulties. Wish that there was a magic pill or spell that would let them know that they are loved and appreciated so their self image would let them be more comforatablel with who they are. If we found this magic elixer, we could make a fortune!
It may be closer than you think. Unconditional love from you just may be it. I know you write about how wonderful he is and you love him very much, but....you're just not happy with him because he needs to change x, y, and z about himself...his sex drive, his openness, his black and white thinking, etc. You believe he needs counseling and to change. He is the flawed one who is not meeting your expectations of how he should be. Not too surprising he doesn't feel loved and appreciated for who he is. I don't think you want him to feel he isn't good enough for you and you can't be happy with him if he is just himself, but you could very easily be communicating that message to him.
If you happen to be thinking right now "But HE makes me feel unloved! Why should I try to love him the way he is when he won't do what makes me feel loved?" then you're in a perfect position to understand your H. It isn't easy to step outside ourselves and say, "This is who I married and I'm going to love that person as they are." I've been in the same position as you, wanting my H to be different. You'll be surprised what happens within yourself when you make the choice to focus your attention on loving them with no strings attached.
Unfortunately, once you make that decision you have to stay vigilant. It is easy to slip back into "you need to change for me to love you as you are!" Don't I know! But it gets easier and easier when you realize how much better you feel when you decide to love without expectation of change. The first step is the hardest.
Quoting Corri:It isn't irony. It is an expectation gone askew. You are not seeing the data. This is simple physics. For every action there is a reaction, yes? You continue to repeat the same action, yet are perplexed why you continue to get the same reaction. You get it because that is a law of physics. If you change your action(s), you will change the action that follows. It can happen no other way.
One thing my wife really enjoys is shopping. Sounds pretty typical, right? And I find shopping to be tedious and painful. Also typical.
There is nothing my wife could do to make me enjoy or desire shopping. But I will go shopping with her once in a while just because I know she likes me to come along.
Sometimes I think my wife's attitude about sex is the same as my attitude toward shopping. So what is the action-reaction here? There is no action on her part will create a reaction on my part such that I suddenly desire to go shopping. I will go along to make her happy, but I will be hoping that it doesn't take too long. Just get in and get out with whatever it was you needed.
Maybe the big difference is that I am very supportive of her attempts to find other friends to shop with. Also, nobody will think me less of a husband because I have negative feelings about shopping.
Anyway, I've tried a lot of actions, and the reaction is more or less always the same. If she gave me a book called "The Shopping-Starved Marriage" which detailed her pain at the lack of shopping we do together, I would probably go shopping with her a lot more often. And so, that is why I think she's been more willing to have sex lately.
You know, once I get a few things in the shopping cart, it really isn't that bad after all.
I was looking for a joke I had posted or saved on my computer that you could relate to, but I couldn't find it, so here it goes from memory:
One morning (actually several mornings) everytime the husband tried to have sex with his wife, she would "clam up". She would say "you always want sex, you don't understand a woman's emotional needs, can't you just hold me?"
Later that day, the wife asked the frustrated husband if he would go shopping with her. So he thought if he he did something SHE liked, maybe she would do something HE liked, so he agreed.
She found an expensive dress she liked, and he said "OK, but I think you need some shoes to match" The wife was shocked and happy and found some shoes, when the husband said "I think this sweater would go good with that outfit also" Now the wife was estatic! She found a few more items, and each time the the husband agreed! The wife couldn't understand how nice her husband was being to her and by now felt she was in Heaven. When they got to the cash register, the wife said "OK Honey, give me your credit card" to which the husband responded "Oh no, I'm not going to BUY those things for you, I just want you to hold them, you just don't understand the financial needs of a man"
He will probably have to wait until the spring thaw now
Quote: One thing my wife really enjoys is shopping. Sounds pretty typical, right? And I find shopping to be tedious and painful. Also typical.
There is nothing my wife could do to make me enjoy or desire shopping. But I will go shopping with her once in a while just because I know she likes me to come along.
Sometimes I think my wife's attitude about sex is the same as my attitude toward shopping. So what is the action-reaction here?
I'm not saying you have to love shopping, or that you ever will. The action-reaction here is your wife asks you to go shopping (action), you die a slow painful death inside (reaction). That's all there is to it.
She does x, you do y. Action/Reaction. There's no "I do this and I want her to do that, but she doesn't." That's where I'm saying you are ignoring the data. You do x, she does y. Period. If you want the outcome to be different, don't tell her she didn't react the way you wanted her to, change your action.
If you do x, and you want her to do b, but she keeps doing g, stop doing x and try something else.
If you say, "but I want her to like sex," you are setting yourself and her up for failure. Her likes and dislikes are not in your realm of control, no more that your likes and dislikes are in hers.
What if she made it her mission in life to make you love shopping? You say, "nope, I hate it, don't like it, never will." But she persists. You should love shopping because, well, she's your wife, doggone it, and you should care about this thing that is very important to her well-being and happiness. Look at the thousands upon thousands of people who go shopping every day and love it? Why can't you be more like them?
Now think of all the things you've said and done over the years(?) to convince your wife she should not only have more sex, but like it more...and she is now doing those very same things to you to get you to go shopping more and like it more.
And let's say, for arguments sake, it is socially and spiritually unacceptable for her to go shopping with anyone but you, and if she does shop with someone else, then you will be devastated (I know I'm stretching it here, but just try it).
Can you not imagine yourself dreading the sound of car keys jingling?
She has to shop, and you have to go with her because you are the only who can. And what if, after a few years of having this argument over and over again, you started to feel like a failure as a man because you didn't like shopping as much as other people seem to?
Can you take five minutes and try to imagine that?
Now, let's say in the middle of a private crying spell in the bathroom -- the one you have every so often because you just can't figure out why the hell you are such a failure as a husband and man -- you hear your wife come in. And you just know those car keys are going to start jingling any minute...
What if in the middle of all that, she completely changes her tactics?
What if, instead of shopping at the mall, you shopped in sporting goods stores? What if she tried all the different kinds of shopping there are to see if any of them would be more enjoyable for you? Can you imagine any kind of shopping that you would enjoy, or at least wouldn't mind as much? What if she became more compassionate, more encouraging...oh no, what if she gave you a BJ before each time you went shopping?
I know this is getting a bit ridiculous here, but do you see my point?
You make some really good points and put it in a perspective that helps visualize the LD spouse’s position, it helped me understand some of my wife’s agony over having sex (although actually I don’t really mind shopping that much). Your example could be applied for each person substituting for something that they hate to do but their spouse like to help understand their LD spouse’s reactions, but not to accept the situation. The is a huge universal (although unrecognized or unaccepted) difference between the importance of sex and shopping or almost anything else. It would be closer to compare sex to eating. I know you’re thinking “wait! it’s not that way for low libbers!”, but hear me out...
What we have to remember is that humans are built to reproduce...and we are built to enjoy the act of procreation. It is a built-in mechanism so that the species will have more incentive to procreate. This is why phermones take over our ability to think "rationally" and we have sensitive areas on our bodies that when properly stimulated we are magnetically, uncontrollably compelled to engage in sexual behavior. The whole animal world is also structured around this drive.
Of course, with humans there are also additional more complex elements that make us want to copulate: social interaction, love, sense of closeness. We have moved from needing/wanting sex simply to satisfy an animalistic drive to reproduce to using it as one of the highest forms of love expression. (let’s not get into the love language thing here, as it is not really part of my point). We have progressed from using sex simply to make more of us to fill up this planet to simply enjoying one of the main benefits (pleasure). For us that are done making people the need, the drive is still there. Nature built us to keep making them for many years. Society (and our huge population) has taken away the possibility to let nature take her course and keep pumping out babies. But nature has gotten the last laugh because we still have the desire, the internal drive to keep humping away.
It is true that for many LDers the above paragraph is not applying but not because they are a different species or don’t need that physical love expression. It is not applying because there is a disfunction. Period. There is something not working. It may be physical, social, emotional or whatever but for some reason that person is unhealthy. Most likely it is not their fault, they simply need help. They may have had a bad experience, an abusive parent, out of balance diet, low self esteem, chemical interference, disease, emotional pain, the list of possibilities goes on forever. If, as a society, we were to treat this low libido condition for the disfunction that it really is instead of accepting it as a different lifestyle, and go after the problem like we go after other diseases there would be a lot more happy people out there, fewer broken marriages and families...
Having a healthy sex life is as important to everyone’s well-being as having a balanced diet. Sure our dietary needs change over our life span. The trick is figuring out which “vitamins” the each person needs to balance their sex health. In our modern world there are so many factors, so many dysfunctional elements to our lives that are messing us up; sex, like an abused child, is one of the victims of our troubles and the absence of it becomes a perpetrator of other problems...a vicious cycle.
The problem that most of us HDers here are having is getting our spouses to: 1) recognize that there is a problem, that healthy sex is part of a healthy individual 2) care enough about the relationship to seek solutions 3) have the willpower to work on it for the good of the relationship.
The LDers here (like yourself) are in a different position. As we’ve noticed there aren’t many and maybe no LD men posting here. This is interesting. The LDers that do post here are have made it to Stage 2 and are to be commended.
Honestly, Corri, I think your perspective as a non-horny wife that cares about her relationship and your ability to put your thoughts down have been some of the best advice around here. The rest of us horndogs whine and cry on each other’s shoulders a lot which is helpful for support but it is great to have cool-headed voices from the other side, like having a spy!
I have to return the compliment in thanking you for your support as well. You help me see things, that once expressed by someone other than my spouse, seems so obvious.
One thing I'd like to caution you on is assuming that there is something wrong with LDers. One of the biggest reliefs I experienced from the book was figuring out that, in fact, there was nothing wrong with me...I just happened to be a person that really didn't experience desire until things got going.
For a very long, long time, I thought there was something wrong with me because I didn't experience desire the same way my husband did, the same way that 99% of TV/radio/print portrays desire. Now that I know I'm "normal," my guilt has been relieved.
Now, please understand that I have been working years to understand my hang-ups and emotional tendencies...I was sexually abused...dysfunctional family, child survivor of multiple divorces, the whole nine yards. And while all that is very sad, and logically I could see it that way...I still didn't understand why I wasn't like other people. Until this book.
God, what an undescribable relief!!!!
Everything you point out about sex, the need for it, the healthiness of it...I agree with. At least now I do. Before I read the book, you and I would have been going to the mat over my belief that your desire, and those like you, had just run amok. I never would have rationally believed, either, that some women feel the same way you do, too.
One of the very critical differences here is that I am willing to face that I have a lot of hard work ahead of me. (Not that any of you aren't willing to face that. I just wasn't willing to face it before, I guess...or just didn't know what hard work I had to do...I had no direction....very frustrating). Sometimes I'll get it, sometimes I'll muck it up...but I was willing to change.
I think your spouses would be willing to change, too...they probably want to, but just don't know how. And they just won't get it until they get it.
But you all have to keep on keeping on. If they can't change, maybe you can enough to help them 'get it.' It's a huge scientific experiment...but unfortunately, I have no answer for you on how long you all have to keep at it. I guess you all have to decide that for yourselves.
If you have noticed your spouse making incrimental changes, grab on to that. Let them revel in the small changes they have made...let them experience the positiveness of their actions...and then help them set a tad bit higher goal. One they feel they can reach. I know that it will test your endurance...
But again, we all have the limitless power to change ourselves. Ourselves only. But I guarentee that if you changes yourselves enough, your spouse will change. They have no choice.
My shrink promised me that. Once I finally believed him, and actually tried it for myself...well...whew!!!!
Take care all. I'm off to spend a short vacation with my family.
Johanna - have you considered shock tactics? i.e. move out for a week or a month or whatever and make it clear what the price of your return is - just a thought!
Been thinking about letting him feel as alone as I do by staying with some very supportive friends for awhile. Not exactly a separation, I just need to know what his reaction will be when he is alone by himself. My prediction: He will "want me back" but nothing will change. I will like not having to face the internal emptyness by seeing him everyday so I actually might perk up a bit. This is hell. It's hard to explain to your friends that you have a celibate marriage. Most of them just cannot understand why our physical relationship is so bad when the rest of our life together is okay. Frankly, I don't have any answers, either.
Went to our first couples counseling sesion last week. Frankly, I was insulted by the therapist who asked my H to try this technique to "retrain" his behavior. The therapist asked my H to put reminder messages, such as sticky notes, all over to remind himself to pay attention to me and to treat me special. That pissed me off. If I mean so little to my H that he needs to "remind" himself to pay attention to me with a sticky note, that does not bode well for this relationship, in my estimation. BTW, have not seen any sticky notes, and little additional attentio either So the idea that the therapist has has been a bomb.
Time is ticking, life is passing him by and he does not even get it.
