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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]One thing that is important to consider:  when a young, healthy spouse no longer wants sex, I'd always keep in mind the possibility of a past sexual trauma that the spouse is not telling you about, male or female.  And yes, that spouse has a responsibility to address the issue but just know, this can take years.  Years.  A supportive, kind, patient, loving spouse can help the survivor heal.  [/quote]

The question would arise: why did this trauma not affect them during the courtship and early marriage, but suddenly is a show-stopping problem at some point years into the marriage?

Frankly this makes the "trauma" sound like a contrived excuse. The real problem is they have stopped being attracted to you for some reason. From what I can tell from DCUM, the track record of a spouse (especially a woman) becoming re-attracted once they have lost attraction is not very good at all.[/quote]

There are strong psychological reasons for trauma issues not showing up early on in a relationship.  Sometimes people are so in love, that overrides the traumatic reactions.  Sometimes people are successful in pushing trauma away for a long time.  Often the birth of children brings up a lot of issues for people.  And sometimes it takes the security and stability of a loving marriage for people to allow their walls to come down.  
For me, I was sexually abused as a kid.  I was aware of some of the ways this affected me, but not all.  It took 5 years into our marriage for things to hit really hard.  Put it this way, I had trouble changing my own kids' diapers because even though I knew it was necessary and caretaking to do so, I could not stop the feeling that I was somehow violating them by changing diapers.  I know it might sound crazy, but that's how I felt.  It was awful.  Sex is iffy for me.  I work really hard at being a good sport and focusing on loving my spouse during sex.  But he's had to also work hard at understanding my issues.  There are some things I just can't do.  And my whole "wiring" is kind of off.  We've had to be really patient and kind to eachother.  It has helped that no matter what, I have committed to once a week sex at minimum.  And if I'm able, I'll offer a BJ or something similar where I can.  I try to be enthusiastic even if I'm not.

I guess I just wanted to throw that out there because men have trauma histories too.  Something like 20-30% of all men have been sexually abused/assaulted/raped and something like 30%+ of all women have been abused or assaulted/raped.  It really is not just people making excuses.  There are lifelong consequences to this stuff.[/quote]

Great explanation. My personal experience with buried psychological issues is non-sexual but shows how life events can trigger buried feelings: My dad left our family (affair then divorce then married the AP) when I was very young. I grew up thinking it didn't bother me very much. However, when my son reached the age I had been when my dad left, I realized I was *very* angry about the whole thing. I think I minimized the issue when it was mistreatment of me, but for some reason when I had a kid and then I thought about my dad leaving us, somehow it felt like he was mistreating my son rather than mistreating me, and I experienced the anger that had probably been buried there all along. [/quote]

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