You do realise the need for SF can be met without actual touch? Short term, that is.

Just like the need for FS can be met by someone who is penniless.

A woman with a high FS need is capable of falling in love with a penniless law student. So long as he is capable of providing for her in the LONG term.

Men fall in love with women they haven't bedded all the time. If they foresee a satisfying sexual future.

We have all advised you to back off from pressing your wife into SF (which I think you had avoided doing anyway) because having sex when you don't want to creates an aversion that is hard to cure.

Immediate SF isn't a need, it's a want. What you need from your wife is a WILLINGNESS to acknowledge your need and work towards the goal of being enthusiastic about SF.

If she were doing this, and engaging in intimate conversation with you about how to reach this goal, during your UA time, she'd meet that SF need for you. She'd qualify for more love on the promise of a future of SF.

So Dr H isn't a stickler on all four needs being IMMEDIATELY met during a couples UA time, but simply worked towards.

This is what we want to see in your recovery. All four needs being met (if not immediately) in the right time portions. This is not an art, but a science.

The right type of medicine in the correct doses. Shortcuts simply will not do.

When Dr H interviews and surveys couples getting say, 14 hours - they almost universally are not in love.

Now we know you are not in a recovery situation. Your wife is unwilling to meet your needs. So you are having to Plan A her somewhat, and we will get to that.

However unlike most Plan A'd wives she is giving you an opportunity to woo her into bed with her love of dates. DotNetDave would kill for your situation. His wife turns down every date he proposes.

For now, the most PRESSING concern is UA time. So we MUST keep brainstorming how to get you two alone together more.

For one thing, more time with her is fairly likely to get you more SF, in spite of what she thinks.

Are you up for more brainstorming?

Here are a couple of ideas:

Ask for money to pay babysitters and/or for your parents, brothers, sisters, etc to babysit for you as a substitute for whatever they normally get you for Christmas or birthday presents. To me this is more important than any other tangible thing you could receive. So tell them you need date money!! And then do NOT spend it on anything else that you think you "need."

Thanks for the post. You've helped me break some things down in my head. I haven't pressed my wife to engage in SF even once since D-day. However, you're spot on when you say that her willingness to engage in conversation IS a need. It's what gives me hope of a satisfying future of SF. We can only talk about it for so long, usually a few minutes, before she shuts down. She blames me for all the problems we have in regards to SF. I'm trying to express my perspective on the matter so she knows my thoughts and feelings and she shuts off from conversation and says lets not even talk about it. I'm not being disrespectful, I'm not being judgmental, and I don't show anger towards her. I was simply trying to communicate my honest thoughts and feelings to her because in the past, I usually just withdraw myself and don't share my thoughts and feelings with her. I still do it, temporarily, sometimes, but I realize she needs me to open up.


This is it on so many levels. However, How do you define 'short-term'? 6 months, 1 year, 3 years?

I guess that's what's got me depressed. I don't foresee it. I don't see how it's ever going to reach that point. She's said some pretty rotten things to me since d-day, that I'm having a hard

Plan A is always short term because it's so hard on us.

Plus WSs get too comfy having things exactly the way they like it. There will be no change if they feel they can have that.

That's why Plan A is six months for men, three weeks for women until Plan B is ushered in.

Usually, you can't get a full complement of UA time in Plan A because the WS won't allow it.

But you should implement as much MB as possible and insist your needs are eventually met throughout Plan A.

The spouse is put into Plan B until they agree to full recovery conditions, a willingness to meet all needs and a commitment to proper UA time.

Because recovery won't work without it, the BS is better off in Plan B until all recovery conditions are met - with UA time seen as the most critical.

So you need to get that sorted out on your end as a priority. You can hardly insist on it if you can't provide it.

Plus the fact she's somewhat willing to be courted is excellent news and if it can be done you might leapfrog this Plan A into a full recovery.

Sorry, I hadn't gotten to it sooner, but I just listened to it. I get that. I agree with it. I'm curious what your motives were in posting it for my situation?

Do you think I don't want 'relationship stuff' or see the need for it? I feel like i'm doing that and that I have done it fairly well throughout our marriage. If you're referencing the 'in love' feeling that incentivizes the meeting of needs, I agree with that. It's my desire. But my counter is, if that were the ONLY criteria to meet needs, every marriage would end in divorce at some point through the life of the marriage. Dr. Harley said something in yesterday's show that stood out to me.

He said, "Use your intelligence, don't let your emotions be your guide". At some point there comes a conscious choice to meet the other person's needs whether or not you 'feel' like doing it. That's where I am. I'm meeting my wife's need because I make the conscious choice to do so each day. I made that promise to her when we married, and even though some days I might fall short, I always strive to do that, I'm quick to apologize and remedy mistakes. And I give more effort and energy towards the problem once I know what it is.

Where i'm at though is just that, mere inteligence. it's that CHOICE that keeps me going, not a feeling of being twitter patted. I don't have that. In fact, I have mostly sentiments of resentment, anger and neglect. However, I choose to channel those things more productively, I bite my tongue and try to follow the LB principles. I've gotten pretty good at it, but it eats me up inside.

Yesterday some random jerk left a note on my wife's car in the parking lot "complimenting" her and saying something along the lines of 'your husband shoud know he's lucky" and then at the end said, "I'm not hitting on you, just paying you a ocmpliment"

She showed it to me and she didn't know who did, but had an idea, and she thought it was 'sweet'. I told her I felt it was creepy. I mean, Who does that? If I were a single guy, I'd NEVER do that sort of thing to a married woman. As a married man, I'd NEVER do that to ANY other woman! I told her I was upset about it honestly for those reasons. She didn't fully understand why I felt the way I did.

When I've left her notes in the past, she takes them and reads them. But she told me she doesn't think they're genuine. She blows them off. So I stopped doing it, because obviously it's not effective.

Couple general questions that I'm curious on that I would prefer to be answered generally and not specifically oriented to my situation...

First, anyone have ideas on enjoyable board games, card games, other types of recreational diversions of a similar ilk that are great for 2 players? My wife and I love to play games, but most of the ones we LOVE are 3-4 players. We haven't found a lot of 'great' 2 player games. Scrabble's ok, but not my wife's favorite. Any ideas would be helpful for some of the weekly RC activities when we can't go out.

Second, does anyone want to take a stab at my original question. I don't feel it was ever directly answered. What would some of you say to a spouse that disagrees with Dr. Harley that SF is NOT an emotional need at all and I want this applied generally, not to me or my wife. Thanks.

I think the quote from that clip, the quote I posted with the clip, answers the issue you have been posting over and over again on this thread:


Her beliefs and feelings on the subject will change after she is in love with you, and that will come after you can get 15 hours of undivided attention.

We can get 15. The issue on upwards to 2-3 pages has been getting 20-25 hours. We're getting about 15 hours a week and improving as we 'get the hang of it'.

My problem is, I feel her love bank increasing, but find my own depleting. If I'm honest with myself, I'm not 'in love' myself, I LOVE my wife, my choice, through actions. I care for her, but the 'in-love' feeling is definitely not there. It's mostly filled with frustrations, resentments and betrayals.

According to Dr. Harley, our beliefs are typically defined by our feelings and behavior. i.e., a woman in love will feel sexually oriented and sexually motivated towards her husband. Such a woman is much more likely to rate sex in marriage as being essential. While a woman not in love is likely to feel less of a desire for sex, and her beliefs are likely to line up to match. Dr. Harley calls it "cognitive dissonance."

Sorry, I must have missed that. I thought you said 12.

I don't disagree with that phenomena, however, those are perceptions not truths. Perceptions are reality's for individuals(what may appear as a truth based on your own perspective), but your reality(perspective) may not be founded in truth either. I believe that phenomena above is something that happens, but that doesn't make SF not an emotional need.

I think indiegirl posted a good answer to your question:


I'd say what you want is for your wife to give this plan a try, and see if it turns things around. The plan works even if people do not believe it will work, as long as they actually do the right things.

I'm sorry, I can't understand that and am not sure it would benefit either of us if I did.

I strongly encourage you to go on the radio show and get Dr. Harley's help directly with your issue. Please consider this.

Basucally what I am saying is for most women, they need to feel emotionally bonded to a man before SF becomes desirable, or becomes a prominent need for them. Emotional bonding translates into SF or the expression of their love. However, for men, me in particular, I feel the need for sex, not just for physiological reasons, but to feel emotionally bonded to my wife. The reason I'm struggling so much is I feel absolutely isolated. I feel like my wife is still 'cheating' on me each passing day, at least emotionally. I feel wounded and hurt and to me the SF is a way to bring the reciprocation of those things together. For me, it heals, it bonds me to her, I feel attached to her, I feel integrated, whole and connected. That's why I feel so offended by her disregard of it as an emotional need. That it's only a vehicle to the destination of a need and not a real destination in and of itself. She wants me to be emotionally vulnerable with her, in regards to being open and honest, but for me the SF is the same thing for me. I need that before I feel able to be comfortable being completely open and honest(with my feelings). That's the cycle I was referencing earlier in the thread. I'm trying to break it through my actions, but I'm just so discouraged. How? When does this end? I know it's a process, but ultimately I believe it comes down to a decision to build a romantic relationship, not to wait for it to just happen.

On a bad week, with twins, there WILL be bad weeks.

marcos - he has started the online programme, so he has a way of asking these questions directly of Dr Harley. He can post them on the private forum, and he can write to his coach, who will consult with Dr Harley to provide answers. Dr Harley will communicate directly and in private with him if necessary, as he has done with me.

This thread has become pointless. There is nothing we can say that will answer the question that this poster has raised. The thread is just going round in circles the way this poster's other thread did. Eventually interest will die out and he will start a new thread with the same question, burying the facts of the affair and the recent contacts.

This poster needs to ask Dr Harley directly, and he has already paid for, and has a means of, doing this.

I've yet to see how to do this? We didn't purchase the coaching, because this is out of the budget right now. We got the HNHN and LB's online courses.

Needs_Meeter,

If your wife is unwilling to acknowledge this need then I don't know how you can convince her. If she is in recent contact with OM (and yes even a month is still very recent), if UA time is not being met on a consistent basis (I understand that twins are hard but at the same time, you cannot use this as a continual excuse when your marriage is on the brink - you are not the only person here with 3,4,6+ kids), then you will at a minimum either need to get her HERE so people can talk to her directly (because a withdrawn wife isn't going to take 3rd hand advice from her husband) or have her speak directly with the Harleys.

Your question was basically, how to get her to recognize SF as a real need for you - while doing shortcuts such as UA time. The answer is, you can't. You need to work the program and if that isn't working, then get in touch with the professionals. This is not an MB 101 question, it is a very real and serious consequence of the affair.