Are you trapped in a sexless marriage?
Does your wife or partner withhold sex and affection from you on a regular basis?
Does your wife or partner use sex and affection as currency in a transactional relationship?
Are you feeling frustrated by the lack of physical and emotional intimacy in your sexless marriage or relationship?
Does your wife or partner make you feel like there’s something wrong with you for the very natural desire of wanting to be intimate with them?
Does your wife or partner frequently reject your affectionate and sexual overtures, yet expect you to “perform on demand” whenever they need an ego boost or want to feel desirable or want to reassure themselves of their control over you?
Does your wife or partner ration out sex in order to keep you in the relationship?
Has your wife’s or partner’s cold, abusive, volatile, and rejecting behavior extinguished your desire to be affectionate and intimate with them?
Does your wife or partner belittle you or accuse you of being gay or unfaithful because you’ve lost your desire to be intimate with them because of their consistently cold, angry or rejecting behavior?
Counseling with Dr. Tara J. Palmatier, PsyD
Dr. Tara J. Palmatier, PsyD helps individuals work through their relationship and codependency issues via telephone or Skype. She specializes in helping men and women trying to break free of an abusive relationship, cope with the stress of an abusive relationship or heal from an abusive relationship. Coaching individuals through high-conflict divorce and custody cases is also an area of expertise. She combines practical advice, emotional support and goal-oriented outcomes. Please visit the Schedule a Session page for more information.
Want to Say Goodbye to Crazy? Buy it HERE.
Transactional to the max. If I take her somewhere or buy her something her immediate response is “what is this going to cost me?”. Believe me the sex is lousy. No response or arousal on her part. But no amusing myself either. So the sooner its over the better. But I’m still married so I won’t look outside. Even when it’s final and I’m free I don’t think I could ever trust anyone enough to get that close again
Many seem to view kindness and compliments as currency, too. Trying to pry a kind word out of them or acknowledgment of a job well done, is like trying to pry a nickel out of the death grip of a miser.
“Has your wife’s or partner’s cold, abusive, volatile, and rejecting behavior extinguished your desire to be affectionate and intimate with them?”
—
Yep, pretty much. Not rejecting so much, she would be into it if I approached her but she’s so darn angry and critical to the point of abuse all the time I’ve lost any desire for her.
Contrary to what many an abusive, high-conflict woman thinks, contempt and criticism aren’t a turn-on.
My lovely wife is regularly critical and otherwise unpleasant (twisting words, game playing, etc.) during sex. Not always, of course. I’ve dealt with my share of transactional stuff too.
Lately she’s been blaming me for our infrequent sex. Because, you see, I’m not flirting enough with her and turning her on. Of course, if I try to flirt it’s unwanted. Or she turns me down because she doesn’t want me to think she’s “easy.”
…Believe me, I think she’s anything but easy.
I’m curious to know how often “normal” couples have sex, on average.
Depends on the age group, but a close estimate is 2 times a week.
LOL, sorry bad to laugh but it reminds me of a conversation I remember when I was with my NPD ex, and various couples we knew were complaining about being too tired to have sex because they had kids.
His outrage and sense of entitlement that not even tiredness would stop him having sex completely missed the point that there was the possibility his partner (i.e. me) might be too tired.
So when I got depressed and on medication and was commuting for a job, I was “frigid” because I wasn’t “putting out”.
What exactly are you too tired…to do? Seems to me that the male side of the sexual equation is the one who needs to be “Up” to the task and ready to swing from the rafters! Be honest…if your just not into it..say so. I think what most MEN are “tired” of, is the constant maneuvering for what should be a natural, free flowing biological function…..
Too tired to relax and enjoy things…and I am not exactly a passive partner – passive is not in my nature.
Hey Mr. E,
I got the exact same treatment. I called it the jumping through hoops to nowhere. If I had only done ___ we would have had sex, and since I didnt do ___ no sex.. So a few days later I do ____. Oh well you should have done ____, then we would have had sex.. So same thing few days later I do the new ___, and same excuse. Constant rule-changing, requirement-changing BS that could never be met.
Which was all my fault we didnt have sex because I could never meet the ever changing rules.
Good riddance! Ive been free for 2 years now and I absolutely LOVE IT.
Oh now that brings back horrid memories. I had that exact game many times and mine upped the ante over time to include things I may have said that offended her or phrased them incorrectly. “If only you hadn’t said ____ then I wouldn’t have lost the mood and we would have had sex.” It got to a point where I couldn’t speak because it didn’t even have to be something where I was talking about anything even remotely connected to her, it could just be something she decided to take offense of and claim it as the reason for no sex.
Mr. E mentions flirting, but I am curious if anyone had the “romance” play done to them where she claims she would be in the mood more if you simply showed her more romance or made it more of a “special event”.
So you buy flowers, arrange for a nice dinner, work you butt off to set the mood only to first have her complain that you probably paid too much for the flowers and she knows where to get them super cheap, followed by how the nice dinner was too expensive and you could have simply eaten something from the fridge and saved all that money, topped off by her many complaints of the candles being a fire hazzard and the rose petals leaving a big mess she will have to now inspect once YOU clean them up later. Of course at the end of all of this “fun”, assuming she hasn’t shut it down at an earlier stage, she develops some reason for why she is NOT in the mood, is too tired, has some medical issue, or is just too upset over the mess you made to be in the mood.
So after all your hard work and effort you still end up with NO SEX. Of course you swear to yourself that you will never be such a fool again and voila’ you are right back to hearing how if ONLY you were romantic she would be in the mood more and you would have sex more often.
It took me a long time, but I figured out eventually that this was one big maze she had built where I was the mouse and there was absolutely NO EXIT and definitely NO CHEESE for me to find. She could shift the walls of the maze at will and I was NOT allowed to hold her to the same standard as she held me.
Thats quite a coincidence Woody,
My now ex wife has the same tactics. If you hadnt said ___, YOU ruined the mood. Or she’d tell me to mention it early in the day so she’d have something to look forward to. Then she’d tell me she felt pressured and I should be spontaneous. So I’d be spontaneous and she’d get mad that I was trying to and tell me she felt like a recepticle.
Or like you said, If youd only be more romantic, so, I go to the trouble of trying to take her to a fav restaurant and end up in a huge fight because I had to stop at the gas station to get gas. ‘If you truly wanted it to be special YOU would have got gas before coming home and picking me up, and since you didnt, only shows how insignificant you think I am’ = no sex for you, try again 2 weeks.
Been free for almost 2 years now and not a single woman has ever complained that I went to the wrong gas station before taking them out to dinner.
Amen! Amen! Amen! I’ve been free for 1yr and also LOVE IT. Men seem to want sex more than women. IMHO that’s just the facts. I’ve debated this with female friends and I just think- yeah sure; what does your hubby/boyfriend tell me when you aren’t here? Lol. Sex is almost always transactional and anyone who thinks different is delusional. In an ideal world it wouldn’t be but…. look around- this is anything but ideal.
Set up to fail what a classic!
I remember the sex with my ex-wife before we were married was great: intense, non-transactional, mutually enjoyable; not the greatest I ever had but definitely fulfilling. But the the day after we got married, it turned into a chore, something I had to work for and treat as a reward, rather than the norm; we didn’t even have sex on our honeymoon!
When we were trying to get pregnant, the sex was so monotonous and mechanical that I felt like I was no more than a machine being rated on performance and results (we eventually got pregnant after a year of trying).
When I had trouble getting aroused because of her constant abuse, I was accused of being gay and not being a man — wow that’s a great way to arouse your man isn’t it? And of course I was a pervert for looking at porn to satisfy my sexual desires.
When people say that bad sex is better than no sex I would definitely disagree: physical arousal without emotional intimacy can still be fulfilling but not if your sexual partner is a monster!
I feel the same way about bad pizza, Funky Monk.
When I had trouble getting aroused because of her constant abuse, I was accused of being gay and not being a man — wow that’s a great way to arouse your man isn’t it? And of course I was a pervert for looking at porn to satisfy my sexual desires.
So many of the men I work with experience the same exact thing. It seems like this kind of individual views their partner as a service object. Earn money, Provide a home. Human vibrator. Other people are objects to be used.
I could write a book…
After we got married, she wouldn’t let me touch her with a ten foot pole except when we trying to conceive. After we started having kids, she put up the “No Trespassing” sign so to speak, and later had the audacity to accuse me of not having any interest in her.
She started sleeping on the couch when she was pregnant, saying she couldn’t get comfortable in bed. Ok, I can understand that. Our youngest is now 3 1/2, and she’s still on the couch. The story now is that she has too much anger toward me.
She’s pretty much extinguished any interest I had in her by treating me like crap, so I guess it goes both ways.
Sex is definitely a manipulation tool. Its not always transactional but she definitely decides to go all when she wants something. She wants it always while she is ovulating. We’ve both been sick and made to feel guilty I’m not giving it to her. Then any lack of sex because I’m on the couch or she hasn’t responded to me is projected onto me. Typical.
Oh, the stories I could tell about the drought.
Oh my gosh what a teaser to get us to tune in…. 😉
Ok, I just had to say it. Like everyone else here I had a transactional and cold wife, now EX Wife thank you very much.
I used to kick myself for allowing it to happen, but I was young and foolish. Before marriage she was always talking one heck of a good game about what I had to look forward to between us intimacy wise once I said “I do” and we were married. She told me she was just an old-fashioned girl and that I needed to understand. Than the very night I waited so long for when all the “teasing” would finally come to an end was the beginning of the real hell. First it was “I am not ready, you need to understand”. Then after months went by and I was ready to bolt she finally gave in, but then it turned into “what have you done for me lately to deserve anything”. And as the years went by the fee for such intimacy kept going up and up.
Funny thing about our transactional relationship, she kept having to do less and less while I kept having to do more and more. You will never see anything close to fair, so cutting your loses and getting out is the only fair thing to do.
I look forward to the show, this should be good….
That is unless it is all one big tease like the build-up above…. 😉
My marriage wasn’t sexless, it was passionless, though even that isn’t quite the right word. It was devoid of genuine physical AND emotional intimacy. We went through a stretch where she nearly completely shut me out of her life. Sex was horrible. I got so bad that I started having erectile dysfunction problems. She didn’t care.
The weird thing is that several times in our marriage she did let go and she was fun in bed. And as weird as it sounds, toward the end, we had great sex several times, but it wasn’t emotionally intimate and lacked a relaxed conviviality–it was just great fucking, which is very nice sometimes, but not what a truly intimate relationship is about.
Wow does that take me back. Id have to answer yes to all those questions.
One of my favorite memories though was one of the reasons she said why we dont have sex.
You never last long enough anyway so why bother.
AHEM, well, you wouldnt expect a pro baseball player to win the world series if you only let him practice once every 3 months? Yet *IM* supposed to be this sexual adonis after youve been starving me for the last 12 weeks.
Ive had more and better sex since our divorce than I did during the whole time I was married – AND not one single complant about the duration.
If the value of a currency is lowered or gone altogether, then a wad of bills becomes needed just as boat wants barnacles.
Strange analogy I know, but then so is the analogy that the parceling out of affection in a relationship is the same as a treasure house of happiness wrapped inside a marriage.
If someone peddles in this kind of misery, and you’re the consumer of it, then quite simply forget about trying to fix it and just get the hell out of there.
You can’t raise a souffle twice, walk on the sun in your socks, light a match under water to name a few. It’s really no stretch here to see this kind of marital blister on this list.
I’ve not experienced this sort of nasty behaviour, but I can tell you if I ever did I’d be wrapping up the relationship as speedily as Santa’s best helper does a present in December.
P.S.
Sorry anonnew2bp, the comment I made above is not a reply to you as such as it was meant as a general comment only. 🙂
Like all, I can relate to every single point.
Before the “change” 10 months into our marriage, my wife was a sexual dynamo. Often initiated and never refused. Up for any suggestion I had (which weren’t outrageous anyway) and she even proposed some things that clearly crossed the line to “kink”. Always monogamous, though.
Do you have any idea what it feels like when, in the dark, you reach out to your wife and audibly hear her teeth clench, and physically feel her cringe and pull away from you? As bad as that was, it was 100 times more horrific in the light, when I could see the sheer contempt on her face.
Or when I went to kiss her mouth, and she would tip her head for me to peck her forehead?
When I would get upset and say I wanted to be treated like a husband, not a rapist, I’d be accused of needing anger management.
When I said I was lonely, I was told that it was because of something missing inside me, not because of anything she was or wasn’t doing.
And when I left her after almost 4 years of this abuse, I was immediately accused of having an “exit strategy” – an affair.
My current wife got pregnant after about 4 months of dating. I married her because it seemed like the “Right” thing to do. After putting up with 5 years of her crap, homeschooling my stepdaughters and son and being made to feel like a useless piece of shit…. After having sex she always tells me that we had sex because it’s what I wanted and her needs are never met. I’m tired of never doing anything right, always feeling guilty when she whines about how something didn’t work out the way she wanted it to blah blah blah blah blah. She uses sex as a weapon and to make matters worse she’s recently accused me of being unfaithful.
My only wife I mean.
And she always initiates it. I never cease to be baffled….
$10 says she fakes orgasms.
I think you left one question out.
“Has your wife or partner completely let herself go to the point where you have trouble being attracted to her at all, then blames you for your lack of attraction?”
Okay, Dr. T.
I finally made it over here. I am using this topic to test my presence on your site. 🙂
You know I will be tuned in for the show, and congratulations for its much anticipated launch. You are a natural for radio…nerves be damned. lol
I’m afraid I may not be able to contribute to the upcoming show, but will definitely have a listen.
I have been celibate by choice, or an active participant sexually, when in a relationship. That gray area really sucks, so I don’t deal with it at all. If you no longer want to ‘be there’ get out. (Yup, it’s pretty much that ‘cut and dry’ for me) I do know some people that are in sexless marriages/relationships. But some are because of age, or health reasons, and they successfully remain partners and friends. Comfort, tends to come with age.
If you are lucky enough to have grown old with someone you love…love evolves beyond the sex.
My two cents.
Izzey
I may have missed it, but I don’t see anywhere here where anyone mentions the “Ritual of Sex” when those rare moments did happen and you actually did have “sex” of a sort.
What I mean by “ritual” is more or less the exact steps that you had to take leading up to the moment. For me it was more or less 40 steps of things that had to be done precisely and in precise order or else the mood would be lost and so wouldn’t the opportunity. I mean steps like locking the door, getting the old blanket for the bed to prevent soiling the bed, turning off the lights, making sure all the blinds were pulled tight, etc…. There were many, many more, but you get the idea.
If any step was missed or done incorrectly there had to be profuse apologizing and a fingers crossed hope that it wouldn’t be too much of a sin to cause the mood to be lost. In many ways this was like a video game in that you had to learn the moves, how to do them, and in what order so that you could have any hope of winning the prize. And in many ways the “ritual” was merely level 2 of this game.
Level 1 was what you had to do in order to get to level 2 and level 2 was what had to be done to finally get to level 3 where the complaints would then set in about a lack of ability and why wasn’t I aroused. After practically killing yourself to get to level 3 how could anyone be expected to have anything left to give.
So I was curious if anyone else had to deal with the “ritual” aspect of the whole mess?
Lock the door so kids are deterred or at least slowed down the kids. Do this. Do that. “You ruined the mood.”, and on and on and on. Everything is right and then…
“Are you done yet.”
“Hurry up.”
The flip side is performance on demand. This usually takes place when she KNOWS you are exhausted or just not willing to put up with the game. Then she can say
“well I tried you just weren’t interested.”
Variations on a theme.
Like after a 12-hour workday, or spending the evening listening to her gripe about Today’s rephrehensible unforgiveable behavior meant to hurt her…beat you down, then expect you to get it up…that might work in the military, but….
No ritual for me. I wish there was a list of things that could be done. My wife isn’t much for being consistent.
That just means that the same dirty talk is hot one day and insulting to her the next time around. Or whatever else she dreams up to make it difficult.
What’s really fun is when she realizes she’s being a pain in the ass, says something about not “being easy,” and then starts giggling (in the unsexy, immature-and-embarassed-by-sex way) anytime I touch her.
That’s so sad love x
Does your wife or partner withhold sex and affection from you on a regular basis? (weeks, months, years, “beg for it,” etc.)
Does your wife or partner make you feel like there’s something wrong with you for the very natural desire of wanting to be intimate with them? (“You just want to have sex all the time!…You’re a pig.” Don’t touch my hair or boobs or anything but ‘you know what’ – don’t get me sweaty.” Hurry up and get it over with.)
Does your wife or partner frequently reject your affectionate and sexual overtures, yet expect you to “perform on demand” whenever they need an ego boost or want to feel desirable or want to reassure themselves of their control over you? (cum for me [or else]!! Prove to me that you still love me – I owe YOU nothing. I don’t HAVE to prove to you that I love you – after all, I’m still here putting up with you [in between lovers], that ought to tell you).
Does your wife or partner ration out sex in order to keep you in the relationship? (“Every Tuesday at 8:00, rain or shine!—or else.”)
Has your wife’s or partner’s cold, abusive, volatile, and rejecting behavior extinguished your desire to be affectionate and intimate with them? (limp pickle)
Yeah, weird how being treated like an object / incompetent boob / errant child / lightswitch / body part / meal ticket / piece of cardboard to be bent and twisted, shaped to someone else’s will / normalcy prop…makes it impossible to get physically turned on. Go figure.
Our bodies will tell us what our minds cannot.
~anonymous
In both my marriages, my wives did many of these things: the changing rules, the jumping through hoops only to have the requirements changed,the transactional deal, the constant rejection and criticism and then anger that my desire had waned, etc.
It never ceases to amaze me at how I often felt that these situations must have been unique to me, yet other guys can describe, essentially, the exact same things.
My first wife feigned being spirtual and evolved, such that she required “connection” to have sex. She would use that vague term in denying me anyphysical intimacy despite the fact that I was atentive, did more than my share around the house and with the kids, while working full time. I would listen to her and try to empathize with whatever vague, weird feeling of emptiness she was experiencing. I wanted her to talk to me and was a good listener. Yet, nothing i did was ever enough to satisfy her “emotional needs” such that she felt “connection’.
Imagine my surprise when , in coming across her journal, I began to read how she was having sexual liasons with strangers she would meet inhotel bars on a regular basis. Guess they must have “connected’ with her on a spiritual level first.
In retrospect, i can look back and see just how my XW would do muchthe same during courtship. Once, she told me that she was really turned on byhaving someone talk dirty to her during sex. Despite feeling foolish, I tried to comply. She was enraged that I did it, claiming it was dirty and disgusting. It was her suggestion for God’s sake.
I should have run after that. Unfortunately, I just doubted whether I had heard her right when she made the request and assumed I had messed up.
This was the biggest issue for me out of all of the behaviours. He was never affectionate and as far from tactile and I am to it. In fact he actually used to flinch if I tried to kiss him etc. He used to kiss me like he’d kiss a hairy old auntie! I used to joke about it at first thinking it would change, guess what, it didn’t!
He was dreadfully cold. Even when we first got together we weren’t at it like rabbits, I had to initiate things. In fact even the first night we slept together I took the lead. Looking back I remember my inner goddess proding me and I ignored her!
He refused to sleep naked as he said it was uncomfortable, he wouldn’t even compromise and do one night every so often. Every kind of sexual contact had to be on his terms or it would stop.
This is so hard to write but, I used to be so desperate to please him that I would offer up the uncomfortable kind of sex (!) just to have some sort of contact. I’d hate myself after for being so desperate 🙁
The few times he did initiate sex, there was no foreplay it was just, well take your undercrackers off then. And he was usually on drugs. When he’d taken stimulants he’d be tearing at me, and I’d be so grateful (sad) that I would just go with it as I never knew when would be the next time.
Pathetic really especially due to how it ended with me finding willy shots on a bi contact site where he was looking for men! I have a feeling he’s actually bi but hasn’t ever felt able to act..
So so sad really. The last few years I’ve not even bothered with any sexual contact, what was the point? He slipped up once and said he thought he’d treat me to some sex, bloody really?!
Dawn:
I just had to reply – NPD ex was just the opposite. Only HE was allowed to initiate, and ONLY the way he wanted (i.e. no he would not start by kissing,backrub or romantic gesture, but had to get ‘right to it.’). If I initiated, he ignored me/ refused / did not physically respond.
Only when a fried explained to me th Madonna-Whore ideology that his behavior finallly made sense.
I too, had such a hard time feeling like he saw me as an adversary rather than as a partner.
Best of fortune to you…