Right now, this is the first time in our marriage he actually seems to enjoy sex freely and for the first time he is being more adventerous. This is the first time he has suggested us getting away as a couple for us, for sex. This is the first time he has expressed ideas and fantasies. I don’t want to undo all of that. It took so much out of me the first time. This is the first time since he stopped giving me oral and manual nearly 8 years ago that he actually participates in my pleasure (which is me masturbating during PIV). It isn’t perfect by far, but it is a LOT better than the hell we had before. This has taken nearly 5 years to rebuild.

Only God knows the path, the hearts, the motives. I need His wisdom so much.

I wonder if she’d listen to our podcast on what men think about their wives’ beauty: http://forchristianwives.com/episode-14-guy-talk-a-wifes-beauty/ We’ve also got an episode coming up in a couple of weeks on body image. Blessings!

Thanks J. I’m sure it’s stress on her part and not feeling her best. She has complained about her weight and questions why I would even want to see her in the nude. She’s been overloaded with tasks at work. Maybe I’m making a mountain out of a molehill and being selfish but we have gone like this for a few years now. I feel the more patient I am, the more passive I become. The more passive I am, the less I lead. Maybe I need to start playing golf again to divert my thoughts and attention elsewhere.

I just want to add that I know libl is here on my blog often enough to glean quite a lot of what I’ve said about a healthy theology of sex.

Of course it’s hard to take one part of the scenario and give very specific advice, but what I appreciate most is when spouses are intentionally trying to figure out how to make progress in their marriage bed. This, libl, is clearly not an ideal situation, and there are issues both on your side and his side. But I do believe that your husband needs to rethink his approach, and I pray that you can find words of wisdom and/or the right actions that can make a difference. Many blessings!

If I’ve said this once, I’ve said it 2,376 times… 🙂 Do you know WHY your wife isn’t engaging in more frequent sexual intimacy? Because there’s a reason, and pushing her to have more sex isn’t likely to work nearly as well as finding out the reasons why and addressing those. You might check out my How to Talk about Sexual Problems with Your Spouse post. Wishing you all the best!

That’s a great insight!

Emily may have hit on something, even without intending to. I wonder if one spouse’s mountain is sometimes the other spouse’s molehill. My wife and I have a few issues we’ve wrestled with for decades. While I confess that, in some cases, I make the issues larger than they need to be, I sometimes feel as if she sees them as smaller than they really are. And, on other issues, we’re just the opposite, with me minimizing what she seems to be maximizing. My guess is that, on these issues, it doesn’t matter which one of us moves, just as long as one of us does.

Libl, I have a great deal of respect for you, and I am praying for your husband to see the damage he is causing, and start fixing it. My suggestion was not meant to be a vindictive measure on your part, but more to make him actually aware of the problem. This is based on my personal experience with my own husband who, loving as he is, sometimes doesn’t really understand what I’m going through until I force him to walk in my shoes. For instance, after our second child was born, my husband pressured me a lot to keep up with our old “late night, hanging out with friends” habits. The thing is, our baby was extremely colicky, and I was getting at best three hours of broken sleep a night, with no naps during the day. I was utterly exhausted. He knew I was tired, but really didn’t feel like it was that bad. Until I made a deal with him. For one night,I would wake him up every time I was up, and he would have to stay awake until I could go back to sleep. Three hours into that and he was profusely sorry, and was far more understanding and helpful towards me after that. His issue wasn’t that he didn’t care,he just didn’t understand.

You know your husband better than anyone. You know if that kind of thing would be a wake up call or a marriage death blow. From my perspective as an outsider, neither one of you are experiencing sexual intimacy anyway, so it seems just that you BOTH bear the burden of that until you both find a way to fix it together, whereas currently, you are bearing that burden alone. And it is big! He is denying you an entire aspect of your humanity, yet expects you to fulfill him. (This is similar to a wife refusing her husband, but with the added aspect of demanding frequent orgasms anyway.)

What if your finances were so limited you couldn’t afford to feed both of you? What if you still gave him a full plate of food all the time, but skimped yourself because there wasn’t enough? You might complain about it, and an observant husband would notice and take action, but a thoughtless or obstinate spouse might judge the budget based off his own full belly and just ignore the issue while you slowly starve (and really, a weak, starving wife is not good for him, either!) It might not be until he is served your own portion sizes that recognizes a problem. That was the thought behind my comment. I hope you can see that I didn’t mean unkindness towards your husband. I appreciate your ability to take advise and discern what is right for you, and I really pray you find some answers.