upanddown,

this post has not completely kept to your question exactly, i thought i would put my 2 cents in.

If i understand this right, your wife told you, just over a year ago, that is christmas of 2002, that she did not want to have sex anymore and then during the summer of 2003, she tells you that she doubts she ever loved you. but that she wants to stay married. did i get that right? did she say why she wants to stay married? does she like you as a friend just not a lover?

is any of this acceptable to you??? I am guessing that if you have been reading at this site for a year, you must have some concerns about your marriage.

do you have kids? how long have you been married?
have you ever done any counsoling?

to me, having sex or not is extremely secondary to her statement that she doubts she loves you. what is the rest of your relationship like? and don't come back and tell me that everything else is just fine, because then you must be in some sort of fog.

regarding if she is having an affair or not, if she is not, great, BUT, if you two don't start actively getting to the bottom of what is going on, one of you may very well end up in an affair. but even if neither of you have an affair, i can't see how either of you can be very happy of feel very fufilled in the relationship.

to me it sounds like you have just accepted her decision to skip out of a sex life with you, that you are going to adjust, and "get better" at dealing with it. although that is admirable, i can't see how you will not eventually end up resenting it all.

it is right to accept her needs to not have sex, but in my humble opinion, it is not ok to accept that there is no plan to work out whatever is going on between you two. Plus I think there is much danger in waiting, if you wait so long that you lose your ability to give her the time she is asking for, then neither of you will be in an open mindset to work things out.

my advice to you... GET TO WORK!!! Marriage is work and your marriage needs a lot of work right now. as always, take what you want, leave the rest.

fyi: i speak from some experience, my husband withdrew from me emotionally and physically, we almost ended up divorcing and i did end up having the affair (although that is due to MY personality flaw and not to be blamed on the state of the marriage) bottom line, we needed help getting our relationship back, we did MC and we also attended a very helpful weekend sponsered by an organization called Retrouvaille.

good luck!!

Me - FWS, 40 (affairs undisclosed)
H - 43
married 17yrs
two kids 9yo boy, 14yo girl

hpk,
I would be very interested in the materials Smart Marriage would use in dealing with the woman porn issue. Where is the conference? Do they have a website?
www.smartmarriages.com.
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I also thought that she could be gay or bisexual.

That would explain a whole lot don't you think?

Didn't really know if she loves you at any point.

Feels that you are always pressureing her for sex she doesn't want to have.

Wants to stay in the relationship- security, love from you, but no sex - safe -

Let's be realistic about this.. Isn't there a tendency for men to fantasize about 2 women together, but NOT a tendency for a woman to fantasize about two men together..and even there's the growing trend of "bi" women being glorified in the media.

It just a more "acceptable" fantasy. FANTASY being the main focus here. It doesn't have to be acted on.I think that's why there wasn't a big over reaction to the wife dowloads porn.

We just need to figure out why she doesn't want to be with you. Did you ever have a fulfilling life in that area?

So any new developments with your wife?
Have you discussed this with her?
Better, worse????....

bi sexual women are very glorified in the media>

look at that kiss between madonna and britney spears?

i find women in porn way more attractive then men.....and much easier to find.
unless you go to a gay site.
and i am not a lesbian.

so, unless he has more clue that she might be gay, i wouldn't worry about it.

but, i really would worry about the communication and why she isn't interested in sex w/ you.

FinallyLearning,

My wife says she wants to stay married, but at the moment she loves me as a friend. We also have three kids. She says she knows she should be in love and that something is missing, but that she can't wave a magic wand and make it come back. We have had counselling but she thinks any more counselling would just be saying the same things over again. She says she needs time and space to work thinks out, she thinks about it a lot and wants things to get better.

I am working hard at giving her space, and at the same time trying to create a "nurturing" environment. Everything else is maybe not OK, but getting better. We don't fight much, we get on well and still do things with the kids. She is definitely trying not to be tense and be considerate and happy.

I don't accept this state of affairs as a permanent solution, but temporary until hopefully my wife comes out of the fog, and hopefully realise that she does love me after all. I am not fulfilled at the moment and have a hole in my life, but I can only wait until it gets better.

But I can't do anything more. Anything else, talking too much etc. is pressure for her. I read a post from someone else the other day saying the same thing. Things didn't really start to improve until he took the pressure off his wife.

As for her being gay - I really don't think so.

I thought our sex life was fulfilling (nelly, she used to really like oral), but it seems a lot of the time she was giving into my pressuring her for sex out of guilt. I thinks she has too many negative feelings associated with sex with me at the moment. Looking back I see now that often she just let me get on with it. I think 10 yrs of being pressured for sex twice a week is one mega LB.

I spoke to her about the porn last night - she was on the internet for ages, so that gave me an opening. She didn't deny it, and we had a bit of a joke about it. But she clearly didn't want to be too open about it, so I just left it there.

We'll see what happens ...

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