My wife and I have had some serious talks about what happened to us over the last 25 years or so and its occurred to both of us that while we are devoted to each other and to our family, she hasn't loved me for many, many years.

I was certain that hearing that from her would devastate me. But it hasn't. It really hasn't done anything to me but help clarify where I am with her. I don't even feel reactive about it. I'm angry - perhaps dangerously angry (although not in a violent sense - my anger tends to turn on me instead). But I feel no more angry than I've felt in a long time. Mostly I feel very tired.

She has said she thinks she could fall in love with me again. I don't know what that means, or if it means anything at all. I have told her over and over that I am not going to leave her, and I absolutely will not do that. But I've been needed (desperately) - not loved. It's not the same. And without love, being needed is not a good feeling at all.

Understand that she may not ever have understood love the way I understood it. She has never lied to me and she has never tried to hurt or manipulate me. But her need has always been for security. Life with me is interesting, but it cannot be said to be financially secure. And that has been a source of resentment for her for over 20 years. With the loss of that sense of security, our marriage began to go downhill.

She has been fighting mental illness all her life. She is a fantastic mother and her courage in fighting her depression - and now years of chronic pain - is inspiring. I could no more leave her than I could leave myself. Yet even my touch is painful for her and I feel as if my failures to provide the security she really needed led to the intractable nature of her illness. I didn't "make her sick" but I think I do have some ownership of her inability get, or stay, well. I don't look to be absolved of that, but I would like to find a way for us to move past it.

Somehow I feel a little freer now. I can't understand it well (sure, I could explain it to someone else pretty clearly, but that's a far cry from understanding it). The air is a little clearer and I can breathe a little.

We've agreed to go to family counseling - both of us want it. I mostly want to understand, and I want her to know that I will not live a life devoid of affection and touch. Maybe this is a way to tell her that without hurting her. But if the future is to be as the past was, I have no intention of suffering any longer with this involuntary celibacy. I also hope that this may be a safe place for her to unburden herself at me - if she could only do that in a way where it doesn't come sneaking back at her in the middle of the night. Maybe I just want to be forgiven for my part and to be able to forgive her for hers.

So what is next for us? I just don't know. I do know that I feel profoundly betrayed - half my life has been spent hoping things would get better - but I can't really claim the betrayal is hers. She is who she is and I still love her.

If I begin a relationship with someone else, I want her to know about it unless she tells me she wants me not to tell her. Would that do more damage? I have no idea. Should I try to allow a chance for them to be friends? That's either a very good idea or a deadly one - I don't have a clue which. But I will not sneak around on her.

Would starting something on the side be - simply - selfish? I hope not. I hope that how it might happen could make a big difference. But would it? In the end, would any of that matter? It's a bell you can't unring.

And if I ramped up a relationship based on some (mutually obvious) chemistry with one of my good friends, what would I be doing to her? Is this even fair to ask of another? If she knows that I have no plans to leave my wife, am I simply inviting her to get hurt? She's not a "Friday fnck" kind of person. Would it be a colossal mistake even to broach it with my friend?

I know there aren't any "real" answers to any of these questions. Maybe the answers, if there are any, have to be found in the questions themselves. Maybe this is all something that we need to say to each other, and then leave behind.

I don't know. I do know that to my surprise, I'm looking forward to laying it all out on the table with my wife. And I'm looking forward to being absolute about my need for intimacy even if it requires us to redefine the nature of our relationship. I am hoping that this will be a really healthy thing for both of us.

I never, ever thought I would be writing these words. I've thought about all the things I've written here and over at hasaheadache - advice where I seemed very sure of myself. I don't think this makes me want to change any of that, but I gotta tell ya, the feeling in my stomach is very strange right now. Not bad, not ominous, not even angry, but ... completely unknown. I feel like a neophyte. I might look back on these words half a year from now and cringe at my own stupidity. So be it. For now, letting this out is comforting.

Thanks for sticking with a long post.

Oh wow. Can't say it's a surprise. My ex had similar health issues and mental issues and all that. They've pretty much cleared up now that we've been apart for three years. She will still complain about the chronic back pain from time to time, but it's not like it used to be and it isn't like she's found some kind of better therapy.

Some people hold stress in their bodies and I think the stress of forcing an exclusive, loveless and dishonest relationship on someone while watching them suffer for years for an affection that you know you will not give out of your own insecurity, regardless of promises you made, is bound to take its toll.

They might even deserve the pain. Sometimes there is justice.

Now, on the "needed" thing. I think that you may be the one who needed to be needed more than you needed to be loved as well. That's the only explanation I can come up with as to how you can stick in there for so long. Also, you feel some guilt or something for not having enough income to satisfy your wife.

Well, as to the first part, you're probably more of a "love earner" where you think that you are supposed to earn your love. Not a bad thing, but if you're not getting what you're working for, maybe find someone else who understands you.

AS to the second part, she could have married someone else. I wouldn't take blame. After all, I know of similar situations with guys who make mid six figures and their wives still don't think they make enough to spend on all the status and prestige that she feels she deserves. Unless you're begging, she's dressing in garbage bags and you're living on the street, I wouldn't take blame.

Well, anyway. Tough break. If I lived nearby, I'd take you out for a beer, or a hundred.

Wow. Tonglen.

I want to wrap you in hugs, I really do.

I hope with all of my heart that you get some more movement with these things, that you can keep moving with something that's been still for a long time.

I can't imagine how strange the feelings you must be having are. I'm glad you feel some liberation.

I'd been wondering what was going on with you, sage! Missed you. I hope that these forums provide some support as you keep moving through this.

again - hugs from afar from someone who thinks you're fab. xx

TG, (((((hugs)))))

All Im going to say is , you deserve to be loved ...

Damm TG, 25 years is a long time. I forget how old you said you were but it never too late to start over if you know you need to....Good luck to you...Hopefully you'll find some ansewers soon.

Just checking in on this thread. We approached a therapist to see if couples therapy would be a good idea; she suggested that I needed individual work before it would be a good idea. So I'm going to start with her a few times a week. My wife seems committed to finding a way through this and for that I'm thankful. I just don't know how it can be accomplished. Every time I think about it, the only thing I end up with as a way to address it is for us to move to a more open marriage and that is not what I wanted in the first place.

I don't want to cut her out of a major part of my life, but I may not have a choice. I simply will not go on living a life without intimacy or touch. I will not engage in "penance sex" or "mercy sex" and I will not view love as some kind of a transactional thing. For me it is unconditional or it doesn't exist. I think she never was able to adapt to that. So we'll see.

At least neither of us has fallen into the "hurt first before you get hurt" trap. Apart from this issue we seem to be communicating pretty well and we can make a really good team. She is getting stronger and I'm generally pretty good about avoiding the kind of co-dependent behavior that gets in her way. There's some bitter irony in this.

wow. I can speak to the chronic pain. Especially today, as it's bad.
I left my husband for many reasons. Part of that web was his inability to not take bad pain days personally, making me feel guilty.
Touch hurts us(chronic pain folks), esp. when you carry stress in your body.
But having someone who can touch without you hurting is amazing.
That can be learned, I think. It won't always work, but when it does..wow.

For me, to learn that someone didn't love me but rather needed me would hurt profoundly. Oh, wait, that happened.
It sucks rocks to learn you are a meal ticket.

Sex and love should not be transactional, as you say.
But we do it from busy schedules, to the LDR where you get that small window of opportunity, to the friend with benefits bit, which I see as shaky ground. The friendship is changed forever, and I have been told "I will not leave my marriage" (note, didn't say his wife, but the marriage) Ok, fine, I didn't ask for that, I'm a no expectations gal.

If another partnered man came up to me, I'd run. My two were fun, and we are still friends, but.... I need to not be in the shadows, and that is where the secondary always is unless it is a true Open marriage.

For me, a man who could kiss me in public w/o looking around first became important.

I've been trying to learn that and I think she's been trying to risk it as well. And I think we've been able to go there a little. But for me it seems as if she's simply making herself available - a bit like putting herself on the chopping block - because that's what she thinks she ought to be doing. If that's actually the case, I want no part of it. I've never wanted to "take" love - I've needed it to be offered to me freely. Otherwise it isn't love. What I need is to be wanted. It's very different thing from the dutiful wife thing and it can't be faked or intellectualized into existence. I will not participate in sex coming from a sense of obligation; it feels too much like some subtle kind of rape.



I'll not be that harsh on her, ever, because our history has been that of the two of us, she was more likely the meal ticket than I ever was. Its not even a meal ticket thing. Its more that I provided something she was denied all her life and she built her world around it. But I think she never learned what unconditional love really means. I didn't pass her test early in the relationship, yet her needs were so great that she stayed with me. Now we're paying for that. If she felt that way she should have left me 20 years ago. Yet I love her today still.



I agree. I've told her many times that I will never leave as well. But sometimes when I am feeling bitter I rationalize that I "never told her" I wouldn't kick her out. And that line of thought just gets worse and worse until I break the pattern and return my thoughts to something more sensible. Bitterness makes us sick and has no place in our lives. Yet there it is and there it will stay unless I can find a way to overcome it.



Exactly. That is where my mind always ends up.

on "chopping block": sometimes we just have to go and do, even if we are not yet comfortable. it is sort of like going for some sexual act/position even if it has been painful in the past. At some level we hope it won't hurt, but the body resists, because it remembers.

I'm facing meeting a long distance guy for our first real time together (we originally met face to face, hung out at a concert and exchanged contact info before we had to go separate ways) and dealing with a major flare-up.
I got a taste of what winter in his city is like as we has a freak snow and rain system come through.
and I HURT.
If this is how I feel when I get out there in January, it's going to be rough. But, I'm disinclined to let it get in the way.

With my xh, I let it get in the way more often than not. And it did loads of damage. (me being the meal ticket did, too, esp when he said he'd have left me a few years earlier, but didn't know how he'd support himself)

My two cents ...

I totally understand your frustration with the lack of physical intimacy. I'm a person who needs touch and physical connection like I need air to breathe, and I can't fathom living without it. So I really do understand your unhappiness with that.

But it's also my solid conviction that having an affair never solved anything. I really urge you to think long and hard if you find yourself wanting to take that step. It's an irrevocable step. Once you take it, there's no going back.

Seeing a counselor is a positive sign. And remember that with counseling, it can often be two steps forward, one step back.

I wish you the very best

TG, how is it going? Any progress either way?