TL;DR – Wife and I have a dysfunctional sex life which led to a lot of hurt feelings on both sides. I bottled that up and stuck it deep inside me and forgot about it. It’s back now and I don’t know how to address it with her in a healthy and effective way.
My wife and I have been together for about a decade, married for about half of that time. I remember that I fell for her hard when we started dating and was ready to propose to her within a year of us becoming official. We clearly took longer, for which I am now grateful, but the point is that I thought the world of this woman.
And I still do. For the most part our marriage is great. We enjoy many of the same things. We laugh, we’re supportive, we regularly do both adventurous and romantic things together. I would say that for 80% of our relationship, we’re in a really great place. My wife is an incredible woman and I am very grateful for who she is and everything she has done to enrich my life.
But here’s the catch, I just (as in an hour ago while filing bills) became aware that there is also a part of me that now deeply resents her. The same woman who has brought so much healing and joy into my life, has also carved out some deep cuts too. So, without further ado, let’s talk about sex.
We were both deeply religious growing up and met in a church environment. Because of the tension between what we wanted and what we felt we should do, we both had minor experiences fooling around with exes but neither of us had any experience with penetrative sex prior to getting married. I think we both expected it to come easy and naturally when we tied the knot. It very much didn’t.
We’ve been married for years now and have never once had “PiV” sex. I know that’s not the holy grail and we have both pleasured each other to plenty of orgasms in other ways. I add that only to provide some context for what follows.
As sexual partners, we were very mismatched. Her birth control had tanked her libido (only learned that within the last year when she went off), so she needed a lot of consistent stimuli in an emotionally connected atmosphere over time to get aroused. I grew up in an emotionally restricted family and have ADHD (diagnosed in pre-pandemic in 2019); balance, consistency, and emotional connection are not my strong points. She tried to push through her lack of desire when I initiated, but any mis-step (miscommunication, wrong pressure, shifted wrong, etc.) would kill the evening. Each time felt like a fresh rejection and hurt began to build up.
I was not allowed to feel as a kid – and carried that into adulthood – so I wasn’t aware enough of that hurt to communicate about it. What’s more, I have always been hyper critical of myself. My dad told me a story once that he came home work one day when I was about three, saw me sitting alone in my room calling myself “stupid”. He left me alone. That was my childhood – and most of my life – in a nutshell. In the darkness of my self-ignorance, vicious criticism flourished like moss on a ruin. I wish I had known how to act then. I didn’t. That’s on me.
Eventually my hurt and self-anger grew too much to mask, and I began to get frustrated with her. I never insulted her, disrespected her, or even yelled at her. I did worse – I emotionally iced her out to protect myself from that hurt. The emotional connection she needed to feel safe shattered.
The cycle got worse from there. She began to blame herself every time we ‘failed’ at sex. Now we were both doing it. Sex became not just a stressor but an outright conflict. Until we started avoiding it altogether.
There are a lot of other factors at play, family crises, job issues, medication side-effects. But the core of the problem is here: I just ran smack into the realization that all that hurt and pain is still nestled safe within me, thriving in a walled off garden that I locked the door to, threw away the key, and forgot about. We’ve been really trying to work on our sexual relationship. We want to have biological children, PiV sex is a necessary for that. But I’ve been struggling to show up completely and just discovered that this is why.
I know I need to talk to her. I want to talk to my therapist first (next session is in a week and a half). The problem is that I don’t want to walk into a conversation with her and just open that garden door up and let all that poison out. I can feel it now and it scares me. I know much of that anger is a protective mechanism against the hurt of feeling rejected by her, of feeling like she also didn’t think I was good enough. And I’ve done enough therapy to realize too that a lot of that isn’t even there because of her, just the remnants of a human being that she inherited from my parents. But I don’t know how to let her in without lashing out (to be clear, not in a violent or abusive way, but my anger or iciness towards her hurts her). I don’t want to hurt her. And I know that not addressing it will lead to further problems and the hurt that I want to avoid. I just don’t know how to.
I love my wife. She wants to make things work with me, she’s willing to work on it. Most of me wants to make things work with her, and I’m willing to work on it. I’ve been in therapy and have gotten much more emotionally connected and aware. Our communication has improved, my ADHD is treated now (which has helped but it’s a temporary support not a permanent cure), and I’ve helped her to feel emotionally safe with me again. I’m just bone deep afraid of getting pushed back into that dark place and I don’t know what to do about that.
I guess what I’m hoping for is guidance from someone who has been here before. I’m not coming into this as a saint. I know my damage is responsible for much (if not most) of this. I know she wasn’t perfect either. I’m not interested in divorce, non-monogamy (cheating or open relationships), or anything separate from making us whole. I just want some help on getting this poison out of me so we can keep moving towards the marriage we’d like to have together.
Thanks.
4 comments
Are you in counseling together?
Ok so firstly when you see your therapist with your partner, make a list of the things you want to talk about. Initially try not to bring up the things that are the worst you can progress from that in other sessions or she will feel attacked emotionally. Don’t deviate from your list and when/if you aren’t hearing the answers you may not want to hear and you get upset. Ask for 5 minutes it’s important how you react at these moments or you could undo your marriage in less than an hour session if you turn poisonous. You called her “this woman” although I don’t know wether you meant it rudely or not she’s your wife. You have no idea how she is feeling, I doubt you’ve gone through all you have together and she’s great and your not. Although she could be blindsided it’s hard to say, only you know that. Remember how much work she’s put in too. You owe it to you both after all these years to invest in multiple therapy sessions (alone/and personal) for you both. I believe you can get past this but you must be willing to give and take and realise no marriage is perfect no matter how it looks from outside. I wish you the best Op ☺️
The difficulties you have are made worse when feelings of anger and resentment come in. This kills any possibility of intimacy and creating a safe space where you both feel comfortable. Counselling for you both as a couple seems essential as there is a lot of good in your relationship. Try to get away from feelings of blame here – you are trying to navigate difficulties where both your personalities and sensitivities make it very difficult . And be kind to each other – where there is kindness then intimacy can grow .
Couples therapy.