Wonderful relationship with sticky persistent problems

[letsgetcoffee]

Basic background: I'm in a wonderful relationship where I mostly find myself incredibly happy with how things are going. She is crazy smart, outgoing, intelligent, an excellent communicator, and just about as compatible as anybody could be with me. We never run out of things to talk about or things to try. We're having some recurring logistical + sexual issues, and I'm hoping some creativity here from you all could help me see things in a different light and/or come up with new solutions.

 

I'm a male, 26, she's a female, 30. We have been dating for about two and a half years, live separately (we both want this and value our space), and are both poly. She ascribes more to the primary partnership model, I'm more on the solo poly end of the spectrum, but we go with the primary partnership model and I'm content with that. We have made two cross-country moves together, weathered poly conflicts well even though we didn't realize we were and/or practice poly much before each other, done long distance for 6 months at a time, and dealt with some other major relationship conflicts that would break many relationships. This is why I have so much faith in our ability to solve difficult relationship problems. If it's relevant to your analysis, we both have no intention of having kids.

 

We recently moved to a new city together (which we both wanted to move to) a month ago and some of these issues, which we more or less had reached stasis on, are rearing their heads. I could write pages on the nuances of both of these issues, but I'll just present as short of summary as I can, showing both our views on them as best I can. If there's a question you'd like so ask, I'm happy to oblige.

 

Problem 1: Lack of sexual interest

About a year into our relationship, I lost sexual interest in her. After some tough conversations, she was like "ok, well I really love you, and appreciate the other aspects of our relationship, so I'll give you some space and not push for anything". To her credit, she has done an amazing job at not pushing me on that. So amazing, that I thought this problem was basically done and buried for about 6 months. I have been in other relationships in girls where I lost sexual interest several years in and kept pushing myself to have sex with them even though I didn't want to, and it made me feel awful, and I think I still have some baggage from that, one relationship I lost for this pushing reason/lack of sex. Those weren't poly relationships. She can go have relationships (romantic and sexual) with other people and I'm a-ok with that, but it's understandably still a major source of frustration for her.

 

Every 4-6 months or so, she brings up this problem again. From my perspective, we have thoroughly debated every point, know where each other stand, and no new information is coming in. She asks me to to just try some things, very low-pressure, and her intent with that is genuine. But I don't want to try those things, I'm not attracted to her any more, and sincerely believe I shouldn't put myself in situations where I have sex with people I don't want to. So far, I have been accomplishing that goal. I do my best, though I could always do better, to make the other parts of our relationship awesome and great, and to encourage her to have sex with other people if she wants/go on dates/go to parties with her to scope out potential guys/etc. She sees me trying in the sexual arena as trying to do things in a relationship that make you uncomfortable in other ways, doing things just because they please your partner. I see sex as vastly different than those other things.

 

Another several month lull, and directly after I have a date with a new person (though I think the timing is more related to the move than the new date, but I have been pretty inactive dating-wise for the past six months), we're talking and she drops the bomb that it isn't working for her and that she wants us to see a couples therapist. The way it was phrased, I get the impression this is a "make it or break it" moment for our relationship. I don't know what to do. She seems to really value the non-sexual components of our relationship, so I don't know if this means "I'll break up with you if you don't" or "I'll just give up eventually on this goal but it will be a recurring problem we'll need to have conversations about".

 

Problem 2: Fear of dogs/weekend logistics

I have a deep-rooted fear of dogs. I was bitten by a few as a kid, so you can imagine. There are many dogs where I will merely accept their presence or appreciate it, mainly depending on whether they bark or growl, those are the main things that scare me. The hair goes up on my neck, and I get into fight or flight mode. I have made a number of efforts to stay at her house, each time was an awful experience for me, one time they barked all night because they weren't in bed with her and I had a breakdown in the morning like I had never before. I was crying, panting, I was such a broken person at that moment, I couldn't make complete sentences, and I could barely walk out of the house on my own volition. I haven't stayed at her house for more than 10 minutes since (that was about a year ago) .

 

She has two dogs (and three cats), her dogs are very sweet and loving, have never actually tried to harm me, nor any other person. They're both small, I could crush them if I stepped on them. No logical reason to be scared of them. One Schnauzer and one habanese. They bark more than most other dogs I've interacted with. It's not constant, I've seen worse, but it is frequent, more than a couple time an hour at which point she'll have to calm them down in some way. Dogs my friends/family have rarely bark aside from seeing other dogs on walks and when somebody rings the doorbell.

 

Her dogs, on the other hand, bark frequently during the following situations:

I don't give them attention they want

She goes to the bathroom and is in a different room

We are on the bed/couch together and they can't get up to be with us

We enter the house

Wrestling each other

Hearing dogs outside or hearing other things outside we don't hear. Maybe they're far-away dogs, I have no idea.

 

We generally hang out Friday night to Sunday night, she stays at her place Sunday night, Fri + Sat at my place. She feels like she's neglecting her dogs when she leaves them overnight, and obviously in-between those times they need to be taken out to walk 3 times a day so they can relieve themselves. As a way to make-up for her always having to be at my house, I drive her home (we live less than 5 minutes from each other) and back so we can walk the dogs. I don't love walking the dogs, it took a lot of convincing for me to do it, but I'm getting used to it.

 

She has done some training, from what I understand it's many hours of work, to get them to bark less, and they do, but even a few sessions of barking an hour makes her house a terrifying place to me. I moved to a house a few blocks from her so it would be less of a burden to go back to walk them, she now has a yard, which she won't leave the dogs in unattended even during warm months because she is worried about hawks, somebody stealing them, and the dogs digging under the fence. I've proposed ways I can help her setup nets to ward off hawks and reinforce the fence, she is interested in none of them. The theft one seems impossible, you can't see her fence from the street, so unless dog theives have drones or are one of her two neighbors, her dogs won't get stolen, which is pretty rare in the first place. I had her help plan my room layouts in my new place, agreed to get some furniture she wanted that I didn't, etc so she would feel as comfortable at my place as she could. I've suggested putting the dogs in the yard, bark collars, bringing squirt bottles on walks, putting the dogs in a different room, etc. Basically, if there was a thing I could do to alleviate this difference in where we spend the weekend, and/or make barking rare, I have proposed ideas I thought could help She did buy a bark collar, but several weeks in hasn't tried using it, she says it will make her feel awful to change her relationship with her dogs in that way for somebody else (she isn't a huge fan of negative reinforcement), because the barking doesn't bother her. I don't want to force her into that position.

 

She wants me to spend more time with her dogs as a form of "exposure therapy", so I can get more used to them. Generally, my fear of dogs is a low-level issue in my life. It doesn't come into play when I meet most dogs. To her credit, walking her dogs with her has made me less afraid of them, but there's dogs I'm never afraid of, because there's little to no barking. Nonetheless, being in a confined space with them, and having them bark often, is still an awful experience. I think with a few thousand more hours, I could maybe get to a place where I wasn't comfortable but wasn't in fight-or flight. I have tried various doses of a number of legal and still-legal recreational drugs to little effect (alcohol, weed, etc) in terms of tampering my fears while at her place. We do these drugs anyway, it's not an effort on my part to be a better boyfriend.

 

Question:

She sees our arrangement as incredibly unfair, and every few months, we have a big long stressful conversation about it where she asks if I can just spend a few hours a weekend at her house. I won't. In terms of hours spent at each other's houses, I can't fix that, but in terms of all the other measures I can take, I feel like I've done it. From my perspective, compared to normal parity (half the nights spent at her place, half the night spent at any potential boyfriend's house), I feel like I'm doing a reasonable amount to make up for the difference. I don't know what to do to resolve this issue. She'll feel awful leaving the dogs alone, and would vastly prefer to spend equal time at her house where she is more comfortable. I'm also worried that capitulating to more of her demands to move further down this path of interacting with her dogs will motivate her further to fight for more progress till she feels/there is equality on this issue. I would love to be able to stay at her house, but there doesn't seem to be any other way. Any ideas on how to resolve this?

 

Conclusion:

In conclusion, ask questions, I'll be happy to answer. I want to either resolve these issues or find ways around them so they aren't stressors in our relationship. I really love this girl, just dealing with some places where we're both on polar opposite views and they are pretty un-moveable.

 

Thank all of you for reading all this and taking the time to offer some sage advice!

[Thenicegirl]

Have you tried professional dog training and going to a therapist for the dog issue? You could possibly be desensitized to dog barking by someone who knows what they're doing. With you guys experimenting with that yourselves there's a greater chance she'll push for too much too soon and you'll regress. A good 1-on-1 dog trainer could probably help with this too. They will teach her how to have better control of her dogs and if you're there during some of the lessons it may help shift your relationship with her dogs as well.

 

It kind of sounds like you've decided what you're willing to try and won't genuinely consider other possibilities. Your post seems to belittle her needs and concerns a bit. Like whatever you consider a compromise should be good enough for her but she clearly doesn't agree with you on that. She told you she wants to go to couples therapy. I think you should listen to your partner and go.

[clia]

Another several month lull, and directly after I have a date with a new person (though I think the timing is more related to the move than the new date, but I have been pretty inactive dating-wise for the past six months), we're talking and she drops the bomb that it isn't working for her and that she wants us to see a couples therapist. The way it was phrased, I get the impression this is a "make it or break it" moment for our relationship. I don't know what to do. She seems to really value the non-sexual components of our relationship, so I don't know if this means "I'll break up with you if you don't" or "I'll just give up eventually on this goal but it will be a recurring problem we'll need to have conversations about".

 

No matter how much she values the non-sexual components of the relationship, you can't honestly expect her to remain indefinitely in a relationship with a guy who refuses to have sex with her. You're essentially just friends. I'm surprised she's lasted this long. And yes, I would expect this to be a continually recurring issue during your relationship, until she gets tired of it and dumps you. Does she actually go off and have sex with other men and date other men?

 

Why don't you want to have sex with her? If you want to try to fix that issue, go to therapy with her to try and work through it. If not, then don't.

 

She sees our arrangement as incredibly unfair, and every few months, we have a big long stressful conversation about it where she asks if I can just spend a few hours a weekend at her house. I won't. In terms of hours spent at each other's houses, I can't fix that, but in terms of all the other measures I can take, I feel like I've done it. From my perspective, compared to normal parity (half the nights spent at her place, half the night spent at any potential boyfriend's house), I feel like I'm doing a reasonable amount to make up for the difference. I don't know what to do to resolve this issue. She'll feel awful leaving the dogs alone, and would vastly prefer to spend equal time at her house where she is more comfortable. I'm also worried that capitulating to more of her demands to move further down this path of interacting with her dogs will motivate her further to fight for more progress till she feels/there is equality on this issue. I would love to be able to stay at her house, but there doesn't seem to be any other way. Any ideas on how to resolve this?

 

She thinks it's unfair because it is unfair that she always has to stay at your place. You really can't spend a few hours at her place each weekend? That just seems really selfish. Given that she owns and loves two dogs, I don't see how this can reasonably work out unless you get over your fear of dogs. Have you tried counseling?

[GemmaUK]

These problems are overwhelmingly coming from yourself.

What steps are you taking to improve things on your own behalf?

[BaileyB]

I'm very sorry, but I would not be willing to stay in a relationship with a man when it is not sexual and he refuses to come to my house. And I would be really, really hurt if a man told me after a few years that he was no longer attracted to me and didn't want to have sex anymore.

 

I would also ask, because these are both your own personal issues, are they things that you want to change and what are you doing to improve your situation?

 

Relationships are about compromise, both people have to work to meet each other's needs. Your inflexibility about both issues would be really difficult to accept.

Edited December 30, 2016 by BaileyB

[Gr8fuln2020]

This is crazy. If I were your gf, I would have walked. She is being entirely reasonable here. You are not IN this relationship to save it, you can't be by the nature of your post. Sex is very important and yet you have no interest or ability to change the sexual dynamics.

 

Like clia says, you're advocating for a platonic-in-nature friendship. Perhaps you should be clear and tell her that.

 

I do not fear dogs. I frankly do not like pets inside the house and do not gravitate towards them (or cats). My childhood and multiple attacks contribute to my lack of enthusiasm for domestic animals, but I do tolerate them when a partner (ex-wife) has one or two or.... I understand how you feel, but come on. This is clearly a life-compatibility issue.

 

"Wonderful relationship with sticky persistent problems"

 

You don't have a wonderful relationship and those sticky persistent problems are HUGELY important. I really feel you want out and redefine this relationship, but are afraid to do so. Tell her you just want to be 'friends.'

[Gaeta]

Like SimpleNfit said those are not sticky problems, they are major differences in your values and life style that makes you incompatible.

 

Sex is a big important component of a relationship and you are failing at it. You may think pets are just a sticky problem but it's important difference in your life style and set of values. As a dog owner I would never date a man that fears dogs or is annoyed by dogs. She should have had more common sense when she met you and not pursue with you.

 

Set this woman free so she can find someone better suited to her.

[VeveCakes]

No comment on the relationship but as for he dogs - get a bark collar. Put up a baby gate and keep them in another room. Bark collars only need to be used a few times. They work great.

[hippychick3]

I'm sorry, but your girlfriend deserves way better.

 

The only thing she's doing "wrong" is staying with a man who isn't attracted to her and putting up with selfish behavior.

 

You need to work on yourself so you can be a better partner.