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I Love my wife but she is very "cold"


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We have been married for 10 years and have 2 adorable children. From the outset, there were "difficulties". Romance has never ventured in our marriage! And what kept us united are the kids. My wife is a most wonderful mother and she is a very nice human being. In the last couple of years our sex life has become strained. She does not seem to want sex whilst I would love to make love as often as possible. When together, I have no inhibitions whilst she is anxious and completely inhibited, the lights have to be off, one or two positions only and oral sex out of question. Lately, things got so bad sex lost its joy and we were only having it once a month at the most. I am so very frustrated. I do love my wife but she seems to be so cold. We have discussed this issue many times and she always says that nothing is wrong and we are back to the same problem. Admittedly, we have very busy lives with me having a high profile full-time occupation and my wife being in-charge of the kids and housework. We both are healthy.

We do not believe in divorce for the sake of the kids and I want us to be loving and living harmoniously together. I do not believe in marriage chancellors either, as I think this is such a delicate personal matter one ought to try and resolve it "in house", but sadly I have reached desperation. What should I do??

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First, Geswaldo, welcome. Believe me, you are not alone with your troubles...

 

I have a couple of questions for you. You said that there were difficulties from the "outset" but then you also said that out of 10 years, the sexual difficulties have been mostly in the last couple of years. What I am gathering from that is that the difficulties were always there, but that they have become an increasingly important issue to you in the last years. Is that correct? Wasn't sure if your wife's inhibitions are recent or just tiresome lately...

 

Also wondering about how this issue has come up and been presented...you say you have talked many times and your wife says it is no problem. Are you frustrated when you bring it up? Do you speak with love and compassion or blame and threats. Just curious about the nature of the interaction when the topic is addressed...

 

Last, what else is going on in your relationship? Is it possible that your wife has issues with you that affect her willingness/ability to be openly sexual with you, or do you think that she "doesn't believe in" certain acts, or do you think she is just self-conscious/shy/embarrassed?

 

Here is my two cents worth. I had the same problem with my H. Still do to an extent though things are light years better and I think we are on the right track and have to accept that not everything can happen overnight.

 

I did not get anywhere until I threatened to leave over it. I did not cast it out as a threat but said that I could not live the rest of my life that way and did not want him to do anything he didn't want to do but that I could not deny my own needs either.

 

Since I first had that talk, it has been nearly a year and two counselors later. The first counselor did not help. The second one seems to have saved our marriage. But you say that you do not believe in counseling. Do you believe in books? There is one called "The New Rules of Marriage" that helped us a lot. But, honestly, I do not think it would have been enough without the counselor. What a counselor can do is look at your interactions OBJECTIVELY. My H had HUGE anger issues that he was very self-righteous about and refused to acknowledge. Somehow, this counselor showed him the light on this. I don't think my H would EVER have believed it coming from me. God knows I tried.

 

The first problem you have is that your wife says there is no problem. Um, if this is bothering YOU and is about your relationship, then THERE IS A PROBLEM and her refusing to admit that is a red flag that she somehow does not validate your needs or feelings as she should. So I would say something to her along the lines of, if it is a problem for me, then it is a problem for us, don't you think? The first thing you need to do is get her on the bandwagon to own this as a mutual problem...otherwise, you'll never get anywhere. My H tried to tell me that it was my problem, emotional neediness, shallowness, oversexedness, whatever, and I never got ANYWHERE until he realized it was an "us" issue.

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Luvstarved...Thank you for your kind and sympathetic reply. Her inhibitions were always there and were even worse at the beginning. I have never been allowed oral sex since day one for instance!

What brought this issue now is my perception that she does not love me...although deep inside me I hope that I'm wrong.

You have pointed out a very important issue which (I must admit) I did not realise in the past...yes... I do peak with blame and threats rather than with love and compassion, as you neatly put it...I put my hand up here, I am wrong. However, it is so hard to be compassionate when frustration sets in but I ought to discipline myself.

Also, yes, there are other issues in our relationship..mostly cultural. That's to say that I have had several pre-marital relationships, whilst she emanates from a culture whereby pre-marital sex is strictly forbidden. so, she finds certain acts "dirty", whilst I like to be adventurous.

Thank you very much once again for sharing your personal experiences...and you are so right about your remarks and conclusions. I will obtain the book you recommended for a starter. Best wishes.

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...I think this is such a delicate personal matter one ought to try and resolve it "in house"... What should I do??

 

It's clearly beyond the two of you to recconcile this. Time for some professional help.

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Luvstarved...Her inhibitions were always there and were even worse at the beginning. I have never been allowed oral sex since day one for instance!

 

May I ask why you wanted to marry her if this was the case from the very beginning and she was always the way she is with you?

 

What brought this issue now is my perception that she does not love me...although deep inside me I hope that I'm wrong.
It's funny...men don't equate sex with love until they after they love a woman (it's just sex, as we hear so often). But in a committed relationship like marriage, they start to see sex as an expression of love, and when that intimacy isn't there, men don't feel loved. It's common, if you read some of the 'my wife doesn't want to have sex with me' threads.

 

Does your wife feel loved? A lot of women need to feel loved in order to want sex...especially after years of marriage when they might start to feel taken for granted or their emotional needs aren't being met.

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Your situation is not at all unique. On the "thread view" of this forum, click on the column header labeled Replies and you will see the threads sorted by # of replies. The sexless marriage threads are easy to spot, and if you take an hour (more like 3 or 4 hrs) to read some of those prior threads, you will find tons of helpful advice.

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Your story sounds very similar to mine. Got married pretty young (23) and been married about 12 years. Had our share of problems over the years and for most of the marriage we had very little sex. Maybe once every month or two. Well we finally had some stuff come up that really caused us to look at our relationship and talk and argue and get everything out in the open. I finally realized that we weren't having much sex because we were not really communicating much and that is what my wife needed to feel closer to me. So we have been really been working on our marriage and let me just say we have had more sex in the last month than probably the last 2 years combined!! It has been great. But we have also really improved other aspects of our marriage like communicating and spending more time together. That is really what has led to things. Its give and take. I needed to communicate more and in turn she has opened up and is in the mood much more often. So try sitting down and talking about what is going on, it can get better.

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