Reply to If your spouse lost all interest in sex, could you stay married?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Ignoring "declare open marriage guy" if we can, I wonder what responsibility others might think a low desire spouse has to address the situation if sex frequency drops below, say, once a month without any obvious medical reason.

The higher desire spouse is supposed to communicate, and that's fine, but is the lower desire spouse justified in ignoring the situation or assuming nothing is wrong?[/quote]

Sometimes, the problem really isn't solvable.

If the problem is a desire gap - she wants it 1x a week, he wants it 3x a week, then there can be a 2x a week compromise or some activity in between 1x a week.  But if she (or he) doesn't want it at all, the idea of 1x a week turns into resentment.  I have BTDT for coming on a decade.  Multiple conversations, efforts, toys, mid-day, end of day, morning, role-play, quickies, longer - it doesn't matter.  The core issue is a total lack of desire (or desire for me) and there is no amount she wants.

If you have ever had to choose between having sex with a partner that clearly prefers not to - even if she (or he) is doing it out of love/charity - it eventually becomes pointless.  And the marriage will whither, you can only hide a total lack of desire for so long.  It will always end in cheating, divorce or resentment.  Always.[/quote]

So what you’re saying is that as soon as you know there’s a gap in drive, just divorce since effort from lower drive spouse isn’t worth it.  I’m wondering what % of relationships have a gap in drive.  [/quote]
I think this and the previous responses are good answers.

I'll just add that once a spouse has respectfully communicated, in some cases multiple times, that sex is essential to them then it seems reasonable that the LD spouse remains mindful of that need. Expecting the HD spouse to provide regular reminders of this need feels unfair. From personal experience, those are not always easy conversations to broach. So to address your question head-on, if the LD spouse knows the frequency has dropped due to their actions/inaction, they are responsible for going to their spouse to address the issue. Please do not misinterpret the HD spouse's silence around the lack of frequency as a signal that they are ok with the change. They're not.

Compromising and sacrifice is essential. An LD spouse may not want to engage for a number of good reasons - maybe they've simply lost interest, or there are natural and medical changes going on. But shouldn't mean the HD spouse is left completely wanting. Ideally, the two will compromise - which means both [b]must[/b] sacrifice.

If a LD/HD relationship cannot compromise, for whatever reason, another difficult conversation about sacrifice has to take place. Is the HD partner willing to go without sex for the sake of the relationship? Can the relationship survive without this kind of intimacy? What other options are available? I generally disagree with the hypothesis that the end-goal for most HD spouses in dead bedrooms is to cheat. For some? Sure. But we should think twice about dropping such a large group in one box. That's lazy. A lot of these people are still very much attracted to their partners. They are frustrated and that is certainly partly the cause for why this issue has wrecked our bedrooms. [/quote]

So I'm the pp you responded to.  The one thing I find interesting in your post is that sacrifice is mainly mentioned with respect to LD spouse.  As per your earlier post, effort from LD spouse if pointless.  This means that there's nothing that LD spouse can do that will be satisfactory for HD spouse...meaning there's no compromise from HD end.  Again, what I understand from your poist is that once a HD spouse mentions they are not happy, it's better to divorce because there's no satisfactory solution for HD spouse.

Also, you didn't mention what % of relationships have a difference in drive levels.   Any difference in drive level could be unsatisfactory and so curious.

BTW, cheating should never be an option.  We can discuss other things but cheating is just wrong.  [/quote]

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