Posted on 03/04/2017 7:51:06 PM PST by proud American in Canada
I’m just going to up and leave, will leave money for them to live on but I’m pretty tired of forcing it to work. I think Hawaii is calling my name.
There are more important things in life than sex. You need to communicate with your partner to the best of your ability. The opposite of love is not hate, but indifference. Make the effort.
I like the approach to relationships taken by David Burns in his book Feeling Good Together. Highly recommend it. Focuses on both self-understanding and empathetic and honest communication with your spouse. Evolved from Dr. Burns’ long experience in counseling. Might help you clarify what matters to you, and give you some ways to talk about it, gently, with him, if that is what you want.
be gently insistent, she will thank you later. Might be years later lol We have a set time after dinner that doesn’t really interfere with anything else. We go stretch out in the bedroom (on top of the covers). it’s more relaxing that sitting someplace where it’s easier to get up or get interrupted. We’ve been doing this for years but he still has to come fetch me lol
It's generally humiliating for a man when his "equipment" isn't functioning properly, and not something we like to have to talk about. More concerning, "equipment malfunction" can be an early sign of heart disease
I would encourage him to go to his doc and have a thorough exam to check out the possibility of heart issues. If he passes, it may improve matters if you both adopted a regular exercise program.
Yes, there's lots of good men out there. But many women discover that the ones who are any improvement over the one she left, have little interest in a 40-something woman with kids.
The vow was "For better or worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness or in health, Til death do us part".
The vow was not "Til I feel unhappy".
Though I clearly do not know all the particulars, have you, as a couple, considered investigating his testosterone levels?
I only bring that up because I went through a period where I very slowly drifted into an indifferent state for almost everything. Turned out to be low testosterone. I now get shots (there are other therapies) and am feeling “normal” (?) again; that is, back to being interested and engaged in life.
You just never know about that. You’re right, it’s more difficult to meet someone if you are over 40 and have kids, but it happens.
I know a woman who had a severely retarded child that needed round the clock care. She met someone and they ended up married. The man was very financially secure and was able to provide excellent care for the poor child. So you never know.
For better or worse is the best way but sometimes staying in a marriage just isn’t an option if the welfare of the family is at stake.
Jesus's viewpoint, from Matthew 19:9
"I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another woman commits adultery.”What do you define as "welfare of the family"? I can understand her leaving if he was being violently abusive, or otherwise putting family lives at risk.
Yes, you can leave because you are "unhappy". Just don't do it and then still claim to be a Jesus-following Christian.
Now for the matters you wrote about: “It is good for a man not to have sexual relations with a woman.” 2 But since sexual immorality is occurring, each man should have sexual relations with his own wife, and each woman with her own husband. 3 The husband should fulfill his marital duty to his wife, and likewise the wife to her husband. 4 The wife does not have authority over her own body but yields it to her husband. In the same way, the husband does not have authority over his own body but yields it to his wife. 5 Do not deprive each other except perhaps by mutual consent and for a time, so that you may devote yourselves to prayer. Then come together again so that Satan will not tempt you because of your lack of self-control. 6 I say this as a concession, not as a command. 7 I wish that all of you were as I am. But each of you has your own gift from God; one has this gift, another has that.Perhaps, rather than being unhappy over the husband's lack of initiative, the wife could try to lovingly seduce him. Perhaps (and yes I know I will get some outrage for saying this) she could watch some porn and get some ideas about men's fantasies about how a woman could behave towards him.
Has he bought a red sports car? Could this be a mid-life crisis?
The Russians do.
“Yes, we do have fun and laugh together.
I just miss the closeness.”
The perfect is the enemy of the good. As you get older, the good ones tend to get caught in marriage and are taken, leaving you to choose among a group with a much higher percentage of the damaged. Dump the guy you have fun and laugh with, and what do you end up with? By and large the older you get, the more most of the good people find their way into a successful marriage, and the more the remaining people are single for a reason, and that reason is what you will have to choose among.
You could find a guy who will bang you for a month, and then go banging other people.
You could end up in an abusive relationship that you then have to extricate yourself from.
You could end up with the spendthrift, the angry guy, the coward, the selfish guy, the narcissist, the psychopath manipulator, and on and on. They are out there.
Marriages go bad, and people end up single late in life for lots of reasons. Few are as good as we had fun and laughed together, but we didn’t have sex as much as I wanted.
Having seen really bad marriages end, and what they spill onto the singles market at least on one side, and how the good ones for marriage quickly move on and get hitched, I think your question should be less on how could your marriage be better, and more on how much worse will you be off starting over.
Actually being alone for the rest of your life could be better than many of the other paths you will have before you. Get hitched to a narcissist, and you could end up wondering if he will put something in your food, or sabotage your car. And you won’t see it in the beginning.
Food for thought. If he has your back through medical problems, and is loyal, you can end up doing a lot worse.
You mentioned that your husband had a heart attack a year ago.
That may be a big unspoken issue in your relationship. You just saw your husband possibly dying and you need to hold onto him. He is probably worried that any kind of exertion will bring on chest pain and another MI.
The internet has a lot of articles about the impact of a heart attack on relationships. You might find some valuable information there.
And then there's the issue of the kids. Keep in mind that the father loves his kids. Any future step father is not likely to develop as big an emotional bond, especially as the kids are older. The father has an incentive to keep the marriage together for the sake of the kids, while any future step father does not.
Plus the kids WILL be angry at the parent who they perceive as being the one who decided to blow up the marriage.
Ha ha ha! Sorry, I just finally saw this. That was so...um... almost poetic. Ha ha!
Fungi, what gives?
You really want to know my take on this?
Love to.
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