Anonymous wrote:I am the PP wit the 7 year denial. It does get better, but that kind of long term rejection changes the relationship permanently. You will never be what you hoped to be because of this issue even if she turned into a nympho overnight. It isn't the sex but the ego crushing rejection over years by the person you hold most dear that makes you change. If I would have known that mine would last 7 years, I would have cheated and felt fine about it. I had no idea I would suffer that long, and so I didn't, but I am not proud of that, and I would be guiltless now looking back if I had an affair. I hate that I carry this around with me. I hated reading your post and having the bitterness come back so vividly just from your story reminding me of mine. My wife has made vast improvements and I am comfortable where we are at, but I resent her from stealing a hugely important chunk of my life from me. I will never get those years back. Her selfishness stole from me something I will never get back.

Anonymous wrote:How could you not be bitter? I'm currently in the same situation with my husband. It's been five years already with no improvement. I'm barely 30 and feeling very bitter at going through this so young. You are a much better person than I am for not cheating.

Anonymous wrote:Things were very hot early on. Frequent and fun. She was 34 and wanted it all the time. I was 25 and happy to oblige. A dozen years later I don't think the age difference is helping so much. Although I know, partly from reading this forum, that there are plenty of women in their late 40s who are very much still into it.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's not only unfair to hold a grudge, it's bad for you and more destructive to the marriage than anything else. Men think that sex=love so they feel unloved when they don't get sex. For women it is entirely different. The fact that she didn't have sex does not mean that she doesn't love you or that she was trying to hurt you. You need to understand that and move on. She is trying to give you what you need and you need to put in the same effort to give her what she needs or you don't have a marriage. Let it go and start from here.

Above is the most ignorant post in this thread. You don't "just move on" from emotional abuse and neglect that spans 1/7th of your life. Is that what you'd tell a child who had been emotionally abused and neglected from 10-20? Just move on? You are obviously ignorant of the kind of suffering and problems this brings to a marriage. If a man only needed sex, we could get it from numerous sources and "feel loved". I married one particular woman and desired to have a full and complete relationship with her and yes- that also includes sex. You sound like my wife. After she royally screws up, she wants to "just move on".

The ignorance in your post seems to think that a guy wrongfully imprisoned for 10 years, when released after it is discovered he didn't do it, should "just move on". In fact, that is pretty damn close to what I imagine it feels like. The problem comes so often after a child is born, that to divorce means the guy will lose nearly everything, so in the context of today's legal system, rather than do the honest thing and divorce her so you can move on, anymore, I advocate an affair until she straightens herself out. It seems like this problem is as common for women as men (surprising to me, but OK). My wife has moved on, but wonders why I really don't burn with passion anymore for her. At some point, she will probably really want what she threw away but four years after the problem went away, I still resent the hell out of her. She now does everything and anything I ever wanted her to do back then. She desperately wants the passion back that I had for her 11 years ago, but all her efforts are failing. She now does oral, porn, and anything I would have wished for back then, and the feeling is just gone.

Sex and love are closely intertwined for men, but it isn't as simple as if you fuck me I will love you. If that was the case, this world would be a very bad and unstable place. Men can have sex with people they love, people they hate, people they could care less about, people who are physically repulsive and so on. Sex does not = love for men. Love = sex for men though.

Anonymous wrote:It's not only unfair to hold a grudge, it's bad for you and more destructive to the marriage than anything else. Men think that sex=love so they feel unloved when they don't get sex. For women it is entirely different. The fact that she didn't have sex does not mean that she doesn't love you or that she was trying to hurt you. You need to understand that and move on. She is trying to give you what you need and you need to put in the same effort to give her what she needs or you don't have a marriage. Let it go and start from here.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:She is now finally responding--so by holding a grudge and continuing to hold it against her, you are now the one withholding--emotionally if not physically.

And if you show your wife all your cards (the bitterness, anger, vengeful feelings, etc.) you risk losing the sex at this point too. Maybe you can keep the sex, go to therapy to work on your immediate feelings and then do couples counseling. Baby step your way to the marriage you'd like to have.

I disagree completely. First, the only thing she is doing is responding to his threat of divorce. If she truly had some watershed, come to Jesus realization that she'd been emotionally abusing him for a decade, and had gone out of her way through her actions to demonstrate that she recognized the gravity of her abuse (by seeking medical attention, therapy, etc) and truly sought to make amends for her actions, I doubt OP would be on here posting about his bitterness. Instead, he delivered his ultimatum (no doubt after years of pleading, begging, and constant rejection), and she "responded" by essentially throwing him obligation sex. In her mind (and apparently in the minds of some of the posters here), "she's giving him what he wants." To the contrary, I think he probably "wants" (i.e., is entitled to and still is not getting and is therefore bitter) more than "allow me to insert Tab A into Slot B or I will bring a lawyer into this."

Second, the statement that she might again choose to withhold sex if he dares to be honest with her about how her obligation sex hasn't fixed anything simply proves the point. She ruined the marriage and is now "responding" by giving him ransom sex, which she may again deny him if he's honest about what she's done.

Nothing has been fixed here. She is who she is. If she wanted to change, she would have.

I'm the PP you quoted. Is this situation ideal? Absolutely not. She should have gone to see some sort of Dr. - any sort of Dr. - years ago and she didn't. OP said he didn't want to end his marriage now. Sure he can drop a bomb into their relationship, make every day a battle, let his bitter flag fly freely - but they've got kids and he pretty much said he's not interested in doing that. So his options are to get himself to a therapist and try to start improving a lousy situation, get a divorce now or stuff his feelings and withhold emotionally (which IMO is doing no better than she did for 10 years). Is it fair? No. Should she have done differently? Absolutely. But she didn't and he didn't force the situation at year 2, 3, 4, 5... and you can't woulda, shoulda, coulda this into something else.

One thing I've learned about marriage since getting married is that it's rarely 50/50. Sometimes one partner carries 80% of the load while the other only carries 20% and vice versa years later. I'm not saying that the OP should sweep this under the rug. That's what she's done for years and he complied with it. Unless you genuinely don't want to make the marriage work long term - don't do what she did.