Is it selfish that my husband never wants to have sex?

[thirtysomethingteen]

I have in the past lost weight but it didn't make a difference.

 

No one is saying losing weight alone will make him have sex with you more. It will, however, help raise your self esteem.

 

No one here is going to be able to give you advice on how to force him to change. So change yourself. As long as you continue to believe you can't support yourself or do any better than him he has no incentive to change right now because he knows you're not going anywhere.

[TigerCub]

I'm not dismissing then just giving more detail of what I go through. Is my relationship considered abusive? He never hits, calls me names, expects me to do anything for him. I can come and go as I please. That's not an excuse but I think it would be more neglect than abuse?

 

Hey Adrian77,

I'm sorry you're in such a bad relationship and that you actually feel that being with someone that acts like having sex with you is a chore - is better than being alone, or finding someone else.

 

Your question in bold - yes, your relationship is abusive.

He's destroying your self esteem and being emotionally abusive. He's neglecting your needs and making you feel like crap - that's abusive in my books (especially when it's coming from the person you swore to be with forever and make happy) - why can't he be bothered to do that for you?

 

I was with a guy that was a porn addict. He was sweet for most other aspects of our relationship - and in a way that actually makes it worse. I told him after I broke up with him (as we were breaking up) - I wish he would have slapped me sometime in that relationship because when it comes to something like physical abuse, there is no question, and I would have seen it, felt it and left.

However when it comes to emotional/sexual neglect and having that destroy your self esteem and mess with your idea of who you are and what you're worth (all the while that abuser is good for the most part) - that's worse in my opinion because it makes a person stay in the mess longer.

 

Leave before he completely destroys you.

 

Or just tell him "you're not man enough to cut it, stay here, drink, play computer games, **** yourself, and i'll go out and find a man to **** me'

 

what a loser.

He's selfish, abusive and useless.

 

If it were me, being alone would always be better than being with someone like that.

 

In time, I hope that you gain the courage to value yourself more and the strength to make a move so that you don't settle for this kind of treatement.

[adrian77]

It just feels like 40 is too old to start over. I wish I didn't feel the way but I do.

[DaisyLeigh1967]

Lose weight for YOU. Not him.

 

I would absolutely never touch him again. **** him and his ****.

[xxoo]

It just feels like 40 is too old to start over. I wish I didn't feel the way but I do.

 

This is something you could discuss with a counselor.

 

What do you mean by "starting over"? Financially? Romantically? You bring with you your 20 adult years of experience. It's more of a next chapter than starting from the beginning.

 

Is this a satisfying chapter of your life? If not, why not change what isn't working? Why not draw on the wisdom of your 40 years to write a great new chapter?

[bathtub-row]

It just feels like 40 is too old to start over. I wish I didn't feel the way but I do.

 

It's always hard to start over and even though you're not really old, I know you feel that way. I'm really sorry for what you're going through, and really sorry if you felt I was coming down too hard on you.

 

You are only 1 year out of your 30's. Does that sound better? lol. No one is really saying that you have to start over but you just seem really unhappy. Sometimes I try to think of other things that kind of keep things in perspective for me. Have you ever seen the page on facebook called Humans of New York (HONY)? It's nothing short of amazing. I recommend it to a lot of people. The reason I do that is because it helps us all understand that we're not the only ones with problems and sometimes it can even make me feel petty for whining about my problems. Not to say that my problems (or yours) aren't important. It's just a matter of perspective. The page isn't all gloom - there's happy and sad things on there that helps us remember that we are not all that dissimilar and that others share our same joys and sorrows.

 

What I have found to be true most of the time is perspective and attitude. You see, a person in their 60's would read your post and say 'if only I were 40 had her choices.' Someone who's 90 and stayed in a lousy marriage all their life may say 'dang, I wish I had left when I was in my 40's.'

 

Have you ever thought about the amazing people around us who are alive in our lifetime? I mean, the truly legendary ones like Oprah, Bill Gates, Stephen Hawking, J.K. Rowling, etc. The reason I bring them up is because it's good to look at people like that and ask yourself why they have what they have, why they're where they are. Granted, Bill is crazy smart. But so are a lot of people. Oprah had a lot of obstacles, and I'll guarantee that Hawking has had more obstacles than you or I could ever dream up. I'm not bringing this up because we should all aspire to be like these people. I bring it up because there's something to learn from these people. Do you think their lives have been charmed and that they're just lucky to have what they have? Do you think that they never had heartbreak, that they never fell on their faces over and over again? That they never had to start over? It's something to think about and it may help to keep things in perspective.

 

Is ending relationships tough? It absolutely is. On the stress level, it's up there with losing a spouse or parent to death. But sometimes in order to get to the rainbow, we have to jump a few hurdles. If you stop at the hurdle because you don't want to go through the pain of going over it, then that goal will never be reached.

 

But you have to be honest with yourself. If divorce just isn't an option, there's nothing wrong with that either. What will end up making you nuts is going back and forth about it in your head and never committing to a decision one way or another. So, if you stay with your husband, then really stay and find a way to be happy. Say to yourself, "this is what I've chosen, and this is why I've chosen it and I'm good with that." Then don't second guess yourself anymore about it. The same applies if you end up leaving him.

 

I've never walked away from a relationship and regretted it. The reason for that is because I gave it a LOT of thought before I ever did a thing. So by the time I left, there was no more doubt in my mind about what I was going to do and why I was doing it. I think that's where you will want to get with this -- either stay or leave and figure out why you choose either of those things. Then you'll be much more at peace with yourself and with your life.

Edited October 27, 2014 by bathtub-row

[TigerCub]

It just feels like 40 is too old to start over. I wish I didn't feel the way but I do.

 

What if you end up living to 90

then what?

I'm pretty sure at 50 you would have wished you did something at 40, and then 40 wouldn't have seemed so old.

 

Really imagine if you live to 80 or more. Do you want to spend the equivalent of your lifetime now with him?

Do you want to spend 40+ years being miserable.

I mean fine, people after a certain age may not care about sex as much as they did when they were younger, but this issue is beyond sex, it's your husband having absolutely no care in the world about how much he hurts you, it's your husband showing you over and over that you don't matter and your desires are garbage to him. It's all about him.

 

If the idea of being with that for 40 years is less scary than getting self reliant and taking a chance on your own, then by all means, stay.

 

I don't mean it in a mean way. But a person will only make a change when they have truly had enough. I can't make you see what I see and I acknowledge that it's so much easier for me to tell you to go when I'm not the one that's going to be doing all the work and go through all the uncertainty.

 

I wish you luck