Curious About Sexless marriges

[dave's thing]

I find myself in the above situation and am curious about how it happened and/or why. I am 67 she is 62. We were married 4 years ago. Sex was fine but pretty vanilla until all of a sudden about 18 month ago she lost interest. She was never a huggy type person and the sex was only at night but now it has evolved into don't touch me anywhere near my boobs pelvic or ass.
I am wondering why this happened? Did it become boring? Was it things that I did or was she just pretending to be into it before, even though I know she climaxed for sure as I felt it numerous times? She is well beyond the change by ovwer 10 yuears and has had a hysterectomy just before that (did not know her then). I'd love to hear comments from both male and females who might have insight thru friends or personal experiences

 

[drobert44]

I find myself in the above situation and am curious about how it happened and/or why. I am 67 she is 62. We were married 4 years ago. Sex was fine but pretty vanilla until all of a sudden about 18 month ago she lost interest. She was never a huggy type person and the sex was only at night but now it has evolved into don't touch me anywhere near my boobs pelvic or ass.
I am wondering why this happened? Did it become boring? Was it things that I did or was she just pretending to be into it before, even though I know she climaxed for sure as I felt it numerous times? She is well beyond the change by ovwer 10 yuears and has had a hysterectomy just before that (did not know her then). I'd love to hear comments from both male and females who might have insight thru friends or personal experiences

With a dame, you never know....

 

[BrendaD]

I know nothing about you or your relationship so please do not be insulted or think I am being accusing. Wow, that sounded awful… anyway, some women have no interest in sex when they don’t feel close to their mate. The solution is talking more, sincere, non-judgemental, talk. And not even about sex, but about how she feels, what is bothering her in life, what is her day like… all that girly stuff.

Of course, she could have physical conditions that makes sex painful or uncomfortable. Normally if everything else is good, she would just say so.

 

[may_I_please]

I’m going to be harsh but I just bet it was not “all of a sudden”l I bet there were warning signs even if you missed them.

so 18 months into your marriage what changed? Did you stop seeing her as someone you had to romance and charm, do you take her for granted? Does she take you for granted?

who does all the cooking and cleaning, is it shared?

relationships and marriages take work

if you’re not physically and mentally affectionate outside the bedroom, if you don’t treat each other with respect and care then you should sit down and talk to her. Talk don’t demand.


or try lube

 

[Rob_Royale]

Brenda and May have excellent points and I'm going to be even harsher and suggest something many that may anger everyone.

Women use sex to get what they want all the time. Is it possible she used sex to get what she wanted? Like getting married in her late 50's? Now that she's married there's no need to keep up pretenses.

Having said that, a real sit-down talk should be on your to-do list, and do it in a place she can't walk away from. My favorite is to pull over in the car and have a talk right there (in a safe spot) on the shoulder, miles from home. She talks or she walks. I've only done this once with my wife and she was pissed for days, but it worked and we were better for it.

 

[may_I_please]

She also may not actually be vanilla and just not be having fun or orgasming

As a woman you can be taught that sex is impure, or dirty. Particularly if she’s from that kind of background.

you honestly won’t know until you communicate with her

as for the threat from @robroy1968, take care - I mean it would work for me but I’m kind of into that type of forcefulness. If she actually is vanilla then it may not be the right approach

 

[munch2much]

I think the suggestions above are well worth listening to. And hopefully ladies who have been through menopause will chip in too.

I’ve been a confident for my ex for a few years now, as she went through the change. I can happily confirm she was horny as hell when I dated her. But she shared with me that her libido has declined pretty much completely. And needs lube for sex now.

One of the things she talked about was that she felt guilty about not wanting it any more. So she “let’s” her guy do it. She basically puts up with it due to feeling guilty.

She has tried HRT and various other things, but with only limited success. And her assumption is that this probably won’t improve as she approaches her 60’s.

Note that tells me this. Not him.

How does this help you? I’m not sure. But it is another perspective. Maybe some food for thought.

Oh, can I suggest that you check out the website sexinfo101? It’s been a while since I was there, but it was a serious educational website with a similar format to the old Lit forums. There used to be a doctor (lady) who was very knowledgeable on sex related problems.

 

[Bbl87]

So, my case is not as extreme as yours. We still have sex, though not as frequently as I would prefer and not as often as we used to. It's an arbitrary measure, but I've often seen the measure of a "sexless marriage" at 12 times a year or less in the context of marital counseling. So while not literally sexless, there have certainly been times when our marriage has teetered on the edge based on that definition.

We are younger (both 35) so take that into consideration. But, for us it seemed to start right when we got married. Honeymoon while not sexless wasn't what you'd typically expect in terms of, well, honeymooning. And the frequency dropped precipitously following that. She was never a huggy person (I am), but she's gotten increasingly protective of her "bubble" over the years and doesn't generally like being physically close outside of the bedroom.

It generally ends up being something that I bring up as a concern, we fight over it, make up, it gets better for awhile, but then we do the same rodeo in a few months.

Cooking/cleaning/etc. comes up often, and I have taken up alot more of that but it doesn't help in the long term. It's things that are good for me to do, but it wasn't a solution.

A realization that I've come to is, at least in our context, each time it's a different "reason" when we fight about it, and fixing that reason isn't a long term solution. There's a deeper issue that's not being addressed. Every reason that's come up taken by itself would be a valid reason for her drive to be down, but the pattern of going from one reason to the next is what, to me, points to a deeper issue.

My theory? I think my wife is dealing with depression and anxiety. I do what I can to help, I've tried to provide resources and be supportive, but she doesn't want to seek professional help. I think she may also be dealing with a hormonal imbalance. No matter the age, both of those could very well be at play in your case as well.

We recently had a better talk than we've had in awhile, and I'm cautiously optimistic but I've been burned enough times I'm not getting too excited.

 

[Cyber_Bella]

Brenda and May have excellent points and I'm going to be even harsher and suggest something many that may anger everyone.

Women use sex to get what they want all the time. Is it possible she used sex to get what she wanted? Like getting married in her late 50's? Now that she's married there's no need to keep up pretenses.

Having said that, a real sit-down talk should be on your to-do list, and do it in a place she can't walk away from. My favorite is to pull over in the car and have a talk right there (in a safe spot) on the shoulder, miles from home. She talks or she walks. I've only done this once with my wife and she was pissed for days, but it worked and we were better for it.

This sounds controlling, threatening and grounds for a 911 call. Maybe the cop would even give me a ride home. Talk or walk would definitely make me rethink why I was married to this person.

 

[AmberLGreen]

I am going to put a different spin on this based on my own experience.

My ex husband and I had a pretty average sex life. After having our son, things did diminish a little due to tiredness. Our son was very energetic which was hard work and exhausting at times but we still had a sex life.

Our sex life stopped for a totally different reason. There was an incident in which I felt my husband should have protected me and he didn’t. His actions, from my viewpoint, put me in a dangerous situation and I suddenly saw him as weak and not a man. Instantly I didn’t have any attraction to him anymore. We had sex probably three times in the following year. I hadn’t said anything to him about how I was feeling. We had a conversation about our lack of sex and I told him why. He never said anything about it, didn’t understand my feelings so nothing changed.

There was still a little bit of intimacy, holding hands, cuddling up, the odd touch. Whenever there was intimacy, he would try to initiate sex but I wasn’t interested in that with him so I gradually pulled away from the intimacy too.

I still had a sex drive and still wanted sex quite a lot but the thought of having sex with him instantly turned me off. He worked away a lot and masturbation became my best friend on the nights I was alone. We spent over seven years in a sexless marriage before we separated. It wasn’t a happy time for either of us because we both needed more than we were getting from each other.

There are many reasons why people don’t want a physical relationship. You have to talk, listen, understand and find a way forward that works for both of you.

 

[Purple_Fronds]

I am going to put a different spin on this based on my own experience.

My ex husband and I had a pretty average sex life. After having our son, things did diminish a little due to tiredness. Our son was very energetic which was hard work and exhausting at times but we still had a sex life.

Our sex life stopped for a totally different reason. There was an incident in which I felt my husband should have protected me and he didn’t. His actions, from my viewpoint, put me in a dangerous situation and I suddenly saw him as weak and not a man. Instantly I didn’t have any attraction to him anymore. We had sex probably three times in the following year. I hadn’t said anything to him about how I was feeling. We had a conversation about our lack of sex and I told him why. He never said anything about it, didn’t understand my feelings so nothing changed.

There was still a little bit of intimacy, holding hands, cuddling up, the odd touch. Whenever there was intimacy, he would try to initiate sex but I wasn’t interested in that with him so I gradually pulled away from the intimacy too.

I still had a sex drive and still wanted sex quite a lot but the thought of having sex with him instantly turned me off. He worked away a lot and masturbation became my best friend on the nights I was alone. We spent over seven years in a sexless marriage before we separated. It wasn’t a happy time for either of us because we both needed more than we were getting from each other.

There are many reasons why people don’t want a physical relationship. You have to talk, listen, understand and find a way forward that works for both of you.

Thanks for sharing it‘s really interesting, without getting into details do you think there was any way for him to get back from this and rebuild trust? From your writing it doesn’t seem so. I also do think there is still a large aspect of male female relationships at least that are based on some kind of protection a lot if time mutual. Also, should that I hope you’re in a better space now.

 

[Bbl87]

Our sex life stopped for a totally different reason. There was an incident in which I felt my husband should have protected me and he didn’t. His actions, from my viewpoint, put me in a dangerous situation and I suddenly saw him as weak and not a man. Instantly I didn’t have any attraction to him anymore. We had sex probably three times in the following year. I hadn’t said anything to him about how I was feeling. We had a conversation about our lack of sex and I told him why. He never said anything about it, didn’t understand my feelings so nothing changed.

Curious, do you think if he had wanted to address it, tried to understand your feelings, etc., do you think he could have changed things. With as instantly and strongly as your view of him changed, I wonder. As someone who has a strong protector drive (part of why I ended up in a law enforcement-adjacent profession), I can kind of feel where you're coming from. From the other side, if I didn't feel like I could adequately protect my family, that would be very emasculating for me.

 

[Bbl87]

This sounds controlling, threatening and grounds for a 911 call. Maybe the cop would even give me a ride home. Talk or walk would definitely make me rethink why I was married to this person.

Agreed. I can understand wanting to talk somewhere away from home. It can be alot less intimidating.

But ya, talk or walk, hell no. Aside from being an asshole, that's putting her in alot of danger in multiple ways, the controlling aspect aside.

 

[LeeKee]

I am going to put a different spin on this based on my own experience.

My ex husband and I had a pretty average sex life. After having our son, things did diminish a little due to tiredness. Our son was very energetic which was hard work and exhausting at times but we still had a sex life.

Our sex life stopped for a totally different reason. There was an incident in which I felt my husband should have protected me and he didn’t. His actions, from my viewpoint, put me in a dangerous situation and I suddenly saw him as weak and not a man. Instantly I didn’t have any attraction to him anymore. We had sex probably three times in the following year. I hadn’t said anything to him about how I was feeling. We had a conversation about our lack of sex and I told him why. He never said anything about it, didn’t understand my feelings so nothing changed.

There was still a little bit of intimacy, holding hands, cuddling up, the odd touch. Whenever there was intimacy, he would try to initiate sex but I wasn’t interested in that with him so I gradually pulled away from the intimacy too.

I still had a sex drive and still wanted sex quite a lot but the thought of having sex with him instantly turned me off. He worked away a lot and masturbation became my best friend on the nights I was alone. We spent over seven years in a sexless marriage before we separated. It wasn’t a happy time for either of us because we both needed more than we were getting from each other.

There are many reasons why people don’t want a physical relationship. You have to talk, listen, understand and find a way forward that works for both of you.

Thanks for sharing. Itbhas given me a bit of perspective as to what may have happened in our marriage. I didn’t put my wife in danger, but some work/health events in the last 6-7 months makes me believe my wife of nearly 20 years no longer thinks I’m a piece of iron. Being human is a turn off to her. And honestly, if I’m correct on a few other points not mentioned here I’m just going to leave. Not getting stringed along for seven years.

 

[AmberLGreen]

Thanks for sharing it‘s really interesting, without getting into details do you think there was any way for him to get back from this and rebuild trust? From your writing it doesn’t seem so. I also do think there is still a large aspect of male female relationships at least that are based on some kind of protection a lot if time mutual. Also, should that I hope you’re in a better space now.

Curious, do you think if he had wanted to address it, tried to understand your feelings, etc., do you think he could have changed things. With as instantly and strongly as your view of him changed, I wonder. As someone who has a strong protector drive (part of why I ended up in a law enforcement-adjacent profession), I can kind of feel where you're coming from. From the other side, if I didn't feel like I could adequately protect my family, that would be very emasculating for me.

I don’t think there would have been any way back from it. Not seeing him as a man anymore took away any attraction I had for him. I like to think we could have tried but when we spoke about it and he just shrugged it off, that was the final nail in the coffin. I felt like not only was my safety unimportant to him but my feelings were also something that were not on his list of priorities. I felt very much alone and insignificant. The emotional and mental state this put me in, made me pull further away all the time.

 

[EnigmaSquared]

Women are different creatures than men; they need romance, affection, to be valued for more than their sweet tits, soft curves, and moist holes. Treat her like a queen, spoil her with attention, make her feel special. And then throw it in her butt.

 

[MedicalMuse]

Women are different creatures than men; they need romance, affection, to be valued for more than their sweet tits, soft curves, and moist holes. Treat her like a queen, spoil her with attention, make her feel special. And then throw it in her butt.

This made me laugh. Thank you lol

 

[Rob_Royale]

This sounds controlling, threatening and grounds for a 911 call. Maybe the cop would even give me a ride home. Talk or walk would definitely make me rethink why I was married to this person.

Agreed. I can understand wanting to talk somewhere away from home. It can be alot less intimidating.

But ya, talk or walk, hell no. Aside from being an asshole, that's putting her in alot of danger in multiple ways, the controlling aspect aside.

Let me reiterate. I never threatened talk or walk, nor would I. It was just a turn of phrase in this instance. But my wife is notorious from walking away from a difficult discussion. She suffers from depression and avoidance is her go-to. So by pulling over and talking in the car didn't allow her to avoid the issue.

 

[PMarky2]

In our situation it was initially medical in that she developed an auto-immune disease that made intercourse uncomfortable. Unfortunately, the dermatologist she initially consulted followed the flow chart, and got the treatment utterly wrong, so there were times when she was in agony. She subsequently developed a form of lymphoma, which tends to manifest itself in the skin, so that did not help. In the process of diagnosing her with lymphoma, the oncologist missed that she had uterine cancer, which resulted in surgery, a near death experience, and a long recovery! So from the physical side, sex is often uncomfortable and not enjoyable on her side.

Somewhere in the middle of all this, she let me know her opinions - for two hours solid - on my two "useless" jobs, the "worthless" people I work with, etc.. She subsequently backed up that rant with accusing one of my friends of having a gay-crush on me, accusing me of having an affair with a woman at work, and some other stuff which should have been left unsaid, or at least tackled in a different manner. Even though I still love her, that killed a lot of the attraction on my side, and I don't quite trust her. I only feel attracted to her now when she is in a good mood, whereas before it was variable but constant. I suppose it was a case of 'once too often' with the ranting and accusations.

I do have one major fault, which is that when I get stressed I tend to crush a couple of young women I know through work, but that did not start until after things in my married life went south. It is straightforward fantasizing about having a nice home life again, and I keep my thoughts on that subject to myself and the board. As a result of all this garbage, we only have sex when she is feeling relatively well physically, and I can forget that she despises my work, my friends, and much of what I stand for. That was a grand total of twice last year. I have had a couple of goes at getting us to do therapy, as that might be a relatively non-confrontation way of dealing with some of the issues, but she rapidly turns that from a joint endeavour into 'diagnosing PMarky.' Her theories so far have included the early onset various age-related cognitive problems, a couple of slightly exotic degenerative diseases, and Asperger's syndrome. About the worst they have come up with so far is that I drink too much, and I have a some Asperger's traits*, but am non-clinical. All in all, I've become good at passing tests.

* - I know they don't diagnose Asperger's separately these days but include it with ASD, but using the old terminology is clearer.

 

[Damanhere]

I know nothing about you or your relationship so please do not be insulted or think I am being accusing. Wow, that sounded awful… anyway, some women have no interest in sex when they don’t feel close to their mate. The solution is talking more, sincere, non-judgemental, talk. And not even about sex, but about how she feels, what is bothering her in life, what is her day like… all that girly stuff.

Of course, she could have physical conditions that makes sex painful or uncomfortable. Normally if everything else is good, she would just say so.

I agree Brenda but to a certain point if she's saying all three areas are off contact and she has slowed down in her affection towards him I think there's more going on than a physical condition I mean I've never heard of a physical condition that affects breasts anal and vaginal areas and that intimacy just wanes away unless it's she's hit a certain point where she has no interest in physical contact in any form or way