exiled_oblivion
Virgin
- Joined
- Sep 6, 2009
- Posts
- 24
OK, so there is a lot of backstory to this; please bear with me:
My wife and I met 7 years ago, and initially things were great; things seemed normal.
She confessed fairly early on that she had depression, to which I thought "fine, I can deal with that". It was a result of a fairly horrific childhood, and also abuse that occurred later in her life.
She was a virgin at the time - and still is if you have a traditionally narrow definition of the word - and again, told me that fairly early on. It had no effect on what I thought of her, although it obviously changed how I approached the topic of sex.
She was affectionate and loving, and so was I...everything seemed to be going fine despite the depression.
The depression gradually worsened; I did as much as I could to help the situation (although sometimes due to my ignorance of what that illness entails I probably made things worse - thankfully I think I'm now a little older and a little wiser), and the affection gradually dropped off.
Now we're in a state where all the affection seems to be coming from me, and I get little in return. She does occasionally give me a hug or a kiss (without me asking for one), but usually I have to push for it, and I almost get the feeling that she's doing it just to appease me, or because she feels like she has to do it for some other reason.
Any time we do have any physical affection, it's brief - as in, she won't let me give her a long (i.e. longer than 5-10 seconds) cuddle unless we're in bed and she's trying to get to sleep.
We still haven't had penetrative sex, but there are reasons for that that mean that I wouldn't feel comfortable pushing her for that. Frankly, I can wait for her.
What DOES concern me though is that all the stuff we used to do (oral sex, handjobs/finggering etc) has also died off.
It happens once a year if I'm lucky, and usually it's her giving me a handjob and looking fairly disinterested during it. And again, it feels like she's doing it because she feels that she has to.
There was some brief hope when she decided to take up pole fitness classes, but it doesn't seem to have made much difference.
The excuses come thick and fast: can't possibly do it on a weeknight, too tired, not in the mood, too ill (yet not too ill to go to pole classes or go out with friends), and so on.
We've tried to talk about it and resolve it a few times - and each time she gives me contradictory information: she wants me to take control of the situation, but feels pressured if I suggest that we do anything sexual.
I should point out at this point that I have been as careful and understanding and gentle about approaching the subject as I feel it's possible to be. At no point do I feel like I've pushed her into anything - frankly I would feel like a complete douchebag if I had. That's not what I want from her; forced sex is not something on my list of things that I like. Quite the opposite.
She once admitted that she is scared of anything sexual - what I can't understand is why the things that we previously used to do are now scary to her. She doesn't seem to be able to (or is unwilling to) answer that herself. "I don't know" is the response I get when I approach that question.
At first I thought "maybe I'm just not good at it", but after some research, and judging from her bodily reactions and the things she said in the heat of the moment, I'm struggling to believe that it's technique that's at fault.
I did some internet research to see if I was misunderstanding something, or to see if anyone else was in the same boat, and I started to wonder if maybe she just needed a bit more romanticism.
So I put as much of my life on hold as I could to pay as much attention to her as possible - I don't game any more, and if we're together I try to be as attentive as possible to her without crowding her.
I went down the route of trying to do romantic things - e.g. I've drawn her a candlelit bath with rose petals and aromatherapy oils and stuff for when she gets home from work and so on, I've bought her gifts (and explained that I'm not trying to buy her love)...she thanks me verbally, but nothing changes.
What gets to me most is that she seems to be unwilling to help the situation; she seems to want me to do the work on fixing it...but I feel like I've done the work and nothing has changed.
I'm regularly accused of not loving her (which I do), but I chalk that one down to the depression speaking, rather than what her non-depressed self actually thinks - she was diagnosed as being bipolar years ago, and while I think that side of things has improved somewhat, it is still there when the usual Sunday 3pm depression spiral hits.
She refuses to go back on her depression meds (she hates being dependent on them), refuses to see a therapist of any kind, and refuses to be brave enough to actually do anything sexually.
At this point, it's been so long now and there are so many things that aren't making sense that I'm starting to consider possibilities other than depression as a source of all this:
- Has she just lost all sexual interest in me? She claims otherwise, but I don't know whether to believe that or not.
- Has she lost all sexual interest in men entirely? She was quietly bi when I met her, and there are certain things that led me to believe that she leans closer to the gay than straight side these days, but is too scared to come out. This would explain a lot, but somehow it just doesn't quite fit 100%...
- Does she just THINK that she loves me/finds me attractive, and is she kidding herself?
A few things about myself that I should make clear: I do not EXPECT sex. Knowing her past and how she feels (or at least claims to feel) about it, I long ago shook off the notion that sex is something that a man is entitled to. That said, I DO very much miss having a face full of her.
At this point, I am more interested in rekindling our sexual relationship because she appears to now be worrying that she is incapable of it, or that someone will find out that she is a virgin (this post is the first time I have ever discussed our sexual relationship with anyone, and it's anonymous, so that fear is unfounded, but persists), and that she will forever be 'frigid' (her own words, not mine). I want to rekindle things because I think she NEEDS to re-find her sexual self in order to get rid of at least this one fuel for her depression. Not to mention that sex is allegedly good for alleviating depression.
So my question is: what the fuck do I do? I've run out of ideas. She's a great girl and I love her dearly, even when I'm being shouted and screamed at by the 'other' wife that rears it's head on a Sunday afternoon. So I can't leave her. Not to mention that I'm not sure she'd survive it even if I DID want to leave.
Random extra info: we don't have kids, and she has told me that she isn't interested in having kids, although she suspects that she isn't capable of having them anyway; the latter fact also contributes to the depression because she feels like the choice was taken from her. We have two cats that she loves like children instead.
Thanks in advance.
My wife and I met 7 years ago, and initially things were great; things seemed normal.
She confessed fairly early on that she had depression, to which I thought "fine, I can deal with that". It was a result of a fairly horrific childhood, and also abuse that occurred later in her life.
She was a virgin at the time - and still is if you have a traditionally narrow definition of the word - and again, told me that fairly early on. It had no effect on what I thought of her, although it obviously changed how I approached the topic of sex.
She was affectionate and loving, and so was I...everything seemed to be going fine despite the depression.
The depression gradually worsened; I did as much as I could to help the situation (although sometimes due to my ignorance of what that illness entails I probably made things worse - thankfully I think I'm now a little older and a little wiser), and the affection gradually dropped off.
Now we're in a state where all the affection seems to be coming from me, and I get little in return. She does occasionally give me a hug or a kiss (without me asking for one), but usually I have to push for it, and I almost get the feeling that she's doing it just to appease me, or because she feels like she has to do it for some other reason.
Any time we do have any physical affection, it's brief - as in, she won't let me give her a long (i.e. longer than 5-10 seconds) cuddle unless we're in bed and she's trying to get to sleep.
We still haven't had penetrative sex, but there are reasons for that that mean that I wouldn't feel comfortable pushing her for that. Frankly, I can wait for her.
What DOES concern me though is that all the stuff we used to do (oral sex, handjobs/finggering etc) has also died off.
It happens once a year if I'm lucky, and usually it's her giving me a handjob and looking fairly disinterested during it. And again, it feels like she's doing it because she feels that she has to.
There was some brief hope when she decided to take up pole fitness classes, but it doesn't seem to have made much difference.
The excuses come thick and fast: can't possibly do it on a weeknight, too tired, not in the mood, too ill (yet not too ill to go to pole classes or go out with friends), and so on.
We've tried to talk about it and resolve it a few times - and each time she gives me contradictory information: she wants me to take control of the situation, but feels pressured if I suggest that we do anything sexual.
I should point out at this point that I have been as careful and understanding and gentle about approaching the subject as I feel it's possible to be. At no point do I feel like I've pushed her into anything - frankly I would feel like a complete douchebag if I had. That's not what I want from her; forced sex is not something on my list of things that I like. Quite the opposite.
She once admitted that she is scared of anything sexual - what I can't understand is why the things that we previously used to do are now scary to her. She doesn't seem to be able to (or is unwilling to) answer that herself. "I don't know" is the response I get when I approach that question.
At first I thought "maybe I'm just not good at it", but after some research, and judging from her bodily reactions and the things she said in the heat of the moment, I'm struggling to believe that it's technique that's at fault.
I did some internet research to see if I was misunderstanding something, or to see if anyone else was in the same boat, and I started to wonder if maybe she just needed a bit more romanticism.
So I put as much of my life on hold as I could to pay as much attention to her as possible - I don't game any more, and if we're together I try to be as attentive as possible to her without crowding her.
I went down the route of trying to do romantic things - e.g. I've drawn her a candlelit bath with rose petals and aromatherapy oils and stuff for when she gets home from work and so on, I've bought her gifts (and explained that I'm not trying to buy her love)...she thanks me verbally, but nothing changes.
What gets to me most is that she seems to be unwilling to help the situation; she seems to want me to do the work on fixing it...but I feel like I've done the work and nothing has changed.
I'm regularly accused of not loving her (which I do), but I chalk that one down to the depression speaking, rather than what her non-depressed self actually thinks - she was diagnosed as being bipolar years ago, and while I think that side of things has improved somewhat, it is still there when the usual Sunday 3pm depression spiral hits.
She refuses to go back on her depression meds (she hates being dependent on them), refuses to see a therapist of any kind, and refuses to be brave enough to actually do anything sexually.
At this point, it's been so long now and there are so many things that aren't making sense that I'm starting to consider possibilities other than depression as a source of all this:
- Has she just lost all sexual interest in me? She claims otherwise, but I don't know whether to believe that or not.
- Has she lost all sexual interest in men entirely? She was quietly bi when I met her, and there are certain things that led me to believe that she leans closer to the gay than straight side these days, but is too scared to come out. This would explain a lot, but somehow it just doesn't quite fit 100%...
- Does she just THINK that she loves me/finds me attractive, and is she kidding herself?
A few things about myself that I should make clear: I do not EXPECT sex. Knowing her past and how she feels (or at least claims to feel) about it, I long ago shook off the notion that sex is something that a man is entitled to. That said, I DO very much miss having a face full of her.
At this point, I am more interested in rekindling our sexual relationship because she appears to now be worrying that she is incapable of it, or that someone will find out that she is a virgin (this post is the first time I have ever discussed our sexual relationship with anyone, and it's anonymous, so that fear is unfounded, but persists), and that she will forever be 'frigid' (her own words, not mine). I want to rekindle things because I think she NEEDS to re-find her sexual self in order to get rid of at least this one fuel for her depression. Not to mention that sex is allegedly good for alleviating depression.
So my question is: what the fuck do I do? I've run out of ideas. She's a great girl and I love her dearly, even when I'm being shouted and screamed at by the 'other' wife that rears it's head on a Sunday afternoon. So I can't leave her. Not to mention that I'm not sure she'd survive it even if I DID want to leave.
Random extra info: we don't have kids, and she has told me that she isn't interested in having kids, although she suspects that she isn't capable of having them anyway; the latter fact also contributes to the depression because she feels like the choice was taken from her. We have two cats that she loves like children instead.
Thanks in advance.