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Hi I'm not ACE but I think my wife is.


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anisotrophic

You might want to try a yes/no/maybe list?

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We did. The "Yes" list wasn't very long but longer than the "maybe" list. The "No" list was massive.

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7 minutes ago, anisotropic said:

You might want to try a yes/no/maybe list?

My husband and I just did the mojo upgrade "quiz" last night. Maybe try that. Though a word of caution - I was not prepared to only have 9 items of compatibility! That really tanked my confidence that we can make us work. Hard. We talked through it though and decided to go through it again, together, and actually discuss each item to see if we have some wiggle room. I knew going into it that I would be open to WAY more than he would be, but still to only have 9 things in our results, and all vanilla, vanilla, vanilla... ugh. But at least he is open to taking a second look. Our discussion revealed there are some things he would do, if we can find a way to do them comfortably (he has some chronic pain issues) so we're hoping and every little thing we find even an inch of common ground feels like progress.

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Telecaster68

 

5 minutes ago, InProgress said:

only have 9 things in our results, and all vanilla, vanilla, vanilla...

I've always wondered about  that last bit, with that mojo quiz. If you have compatible activities, but they're basically hugs/kisses/non sexual touching to the extent that they're basically platonic, it doesn't strike me as being much progress. Maybe it's progress in that at least you've clarified your positions...

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6 minutes ago, Telecaster68 said:

Maybe it's progress in that at least you've clarified your positions...

Yeah, it is. I mean at least we know where he stands. It only shows results where there is some agreement, so all of my "yes" and "if my partner is interested" answers did not even show up unless he answered similarly.

 

Even though I was initially dashed of any hope, my crying and distress led to an open discussion and I asked for some of my wish list items with full transparency and he agreed to reexamine some of those things. So yeah. We're still in this, for today at least and it really is a one day at a time/day by day situation.

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Also, a point of clarification- the mojo quiz is basically sexual activities only, so those more platonic things you mentioned @Telecaster68 don't even show up on the quiz. One of the "least" sexual activities is "give sensual massage to partner" or "have partner give you sensual massage" (2 of our bland 9 right there 😕)

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11 minutes ago, InProgress said:

My husband and I just did the mojo upgrade "quiz" last night. Maybe try that. Though a word of caution - I was not prepared to only have 9 items of compatibility! That really tanked my confidence that we can make us work. Hard. We talked through it though and decided to go through it again, together, and actually discuss each item to see if we have some wiggle room. I knew going into it that I would be open to WAY more than he would be, but still to only have 9 things in our results, and all vanilla, vanilla, vanilla... ugh. But at least he is open to taking a second look. Our discussion revealed there are some things he would do, if we can find a way to do them comfortably (he has some chronic pain issues) so we're hoping and every little thing we find even an inch of common ground feels like progress.

I've seen that quiz and it looks like a good concept, but I suspect my wife would be too shy about sex to take it.  I also fear that I already know the answer.  She just recently let me know that a few new things she had been trying, she didn't actually enjoy doing - so we are back to a extremely limited sex of activities.  I'm just not convinced that there is a good solution to the mixed marriage problem. 

 

 

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26 minutes ago, uhtred said:

I've seen that quiz and it looks like a good concept, but I suspect my wife would be too shy about sex to take it.  I also fear that I already know the answer.  She just recently let me know that a few new things she had been trying, she didn't actually enjoy doing - so we are back to a extremely limited sex of activities.  I'm just not convinced that there is a good solution to the mixed marriage problem. 

 

 

I was surprised, frankly, that my husband agreed to take it. He is extremely shy, too. One thing we're doing, as we're working through this, is each night we're telling each other something we appreciate about each other. I told him last night, after he took the quiz and we talked about it, that I am so appreciating how much I know he pushing the boundaries of his comfort zone. He really is. I want him to know that I see that and feel deep gratitude for it. It's more effort than I have seen in years. That matters.

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1 hour ago, InProgress said:

It only shows results where there is some agreement, so all of my "yes" and "if my partner is interested" answers did not even show up unless he answered similarly.

This is one reason why finding a list, printing it off, and doing it the old-fashioned pen-and-paper way sometimes works better, because you can easily talk about items that appear to have disconnects and understand why.  Sometimes, like you mentioned with pain issues, a minor change to the activity (that doesn’t affect its sex or kink factor) can turn a no to a maybe or a yes.

 

I also personally like want/will/won’t over yes/maybe/no but that’s just me.

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8 minutes ago, ryn2 said:

This is one reason why finding a list, printing it off, and doing it the old-fashioned pen-and-paper way sometimes works better, because you can easily talk about items that appear to have disconnects and understand why.  Sometimes, like you mentioned with pain issues, a minor change to the activity (that doesn’t affect its sex or kink factor) can turn a no to a maybe or a yes.

 

I also personally like want/will/won’t over yes/maybe/no but that’s just me.

Yeah, we agreed to go back through together and talk about each thing. I'll just give an example - oral sex. I give it, freely. He's only ever given to me a handful of times. Enough that I know what I am missing now. So that's on my wish list. When he said "no" to 69ing on the quiz, I was very disappointed. So I just said point blank that's one thing that I want and then I asked him point blank why he is reluctant to doing it. Is it that he just doesn't like it? Is it something with me? "No. That's not it." he said. It turns out he hasn't ever done it in a way that felt physically comfortable on his neck. So we just have to work on finding a comfortable position. We're both heavier people, so it's going to take some experimenting to find what works for our bodies, but that's another thing we're doing - prioritizing our health. We went on a walk together last night. We have everything to gain here by exercising, so really we're working on addressing a lot right now. But I feel my doubt being replaced with hope and that hasn't been the case in a long damn time. It feels good, and very motivating. My body is ready for some action and excitement, get this ass movin'! 😁

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Yeah, that’s the part some of the online-scored quizzes don’t capture well... the cases where the person (didn’t understand the question/term, or) rejected the idea over something that’s just a logistics hurdle.  The solution could be getting a pillow/turning up the heat/only attempting before meals/etc., rather than a major sex mindset change.

 

Also, understanding why someone is dead-set against something (or insistent upon it) may lead to identifying other possibilities that are similar enough to accomplish the same goal but different  enough to be okay.

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When we go back through the mojo upgrade, we’re going to couple it with this chart I found and get into the nitty gritty details of our likes and dislikes. I think I might take us to a hotel, away from our kids and everything else, just to really put relaxation and ourselves as a priority into focus. I’ll even stress that that isn’t to try and get sex. Just a low key, low stress environment to work on this together.

 

 

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Telecaster68

Your husband may find the mere fact of going to a hotel is stressy and pressured.... 

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anisotrophic

Re: the short lists – ouch. :(

I'm pretty thankful, my partner's list was longer than I expected.

 

I guess this is exploring aversion vs. indifference on a more granular scale. When there's a lot of aversion & short lists, I imagine it is much more difficult, especially if it's not what one signed up for at the start of the relationship.

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35 minutes ago, Telecaster68 said:

Your husband may find the mere fact of going to a hotel is stressy and pressured.... 

Yeah, unless he loves going to hotels, I’d probably ask where he’d like to work on it.

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51 minutes ago, ryn2 said:

Yeah, unless he loves going to hotels, I’d probably ask where he’d like to work on it.

Yeah, I realize this. A hotel is definitely my choice, so it's a good idea to let him pick instead. I'll talk to him. I just know at home we have kids (one of which is a toddler) so getting away, if we're really going to focus on us, is a must.

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Getting away totally makes sense.  He just might prefer a park, or a bench on a city street, or Starbucks, or whatever.  Sometimes being alone in a crowd is more comfortable for those types of conversations.

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anisotrophic

A park! How risque! 😆 But, +1 on a "date night" that is... the opposite of standard intent, perhaps? We had one – nice restaurant, walking around, talking, lots of acceptance and reflection.

While, in theory, one could do this after young kids fall asleep, I'm exhausted at that point. (Our younger one is also a toddler.) There's not a lot of breaks for both parents – talking needs more time than sex, I think! – unless you get someone to watch the kids.

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10 minutes ago, anisotropic said:

A park! How risque!

Imagine my surprise when my husband answered on the quiz that in a car or in a park/outside were options for him!! Whenever we go camping, I invite him to sneak off with me and he never has LOL He has a truck and now I am seriously thinking of secluded places where I could throw some blankets and pillows in the back and lay under the stars and see about calling that one in! 🤩

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I’m more on the ace end of things and I’ve had sex in a park. It was even my idea.  It’s probably not everyone’s expectation, though.  :)

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15 minutes ago, ryn2 said:

I’m more on the ace end of things and I’ve had sex in a park. It was even my idea.  It’s probably not everyone’s expectation, though.  :)

What's interesting about this idea is that I'm open to it, but I'm on the averse side about the possibility of getting caught/walked in on. If I was confident in the seclusion or well hidden/covered somehow, definitely sounds like fun.... I should really consider a privacy fence in my back yard 😎

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1 hour ago, InProgress said:

What's interesting about this idea is that I'm open to it, but I'm on the averse side about the possibility of getting caught/walked in on. If I was confident in the seclusion or well hidden/covered somehow, definitely sounds like fun.... I should really consider a privacy fence in my back yard 😎

I was actually thinking about this on my commute too, as one of the things that drew me to it was the potential of being spotted.  My sexual partner on the other hand, despite being very unhappy with the current state of things, is much more private in that sense (which reads as boring and vanilla to me) than I am.

 

Life is strange, eh?

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8 hours ago, ryn2 said:

This is one reason why finding a list, printing it off, and doing it the old-fashioned pen-and-paper way sometimes works better, because you can easily talk about items that appear to have disconnects and understand why.  Sometimes, like you mentioned with pain issues, a minor change to the activity (that doesn’t affect its sex or kink factor) can turn a no to a maybe or a yes.

 

I also personally like want/will/won’t over yes/maybe/no but that’s just me.

The problem with a printed list is if there is a history of the low libido person expressing distaste / disgust at things that the high libido person asked for.  That turns a discussion into a minefield, if any request risks a "that's gross, why would you want that" response.  Unfortunately people who find sex disgusting sometimes react that way to their partner's sexual interests. 

 

 

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13 minutes ago, uhtred said:

The problem with a printed list is if there is a history of the low libido person expressing distaste / disgust at things that the high libido person asked for.  That turns a discussion into a minefield, if any request risks a "that's gross, why would you want that" response.  Unfortunately people who find sex disgusting sometimes react that way to their partner's sexual interests. 

 

 

I think you have to know your partner. If they have those aversions and they're strongly averse, the list may be is a bad idea. Although, I think if a couple were in therapy, this is an exercise a therapist might use. Fortunately for me, my husband doesn't react with disgust to things. If he did, I imagine we'd be having a much tougher time than we are.

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50 minutes ago, uhtred said:

The problem with a printed list is if there is a history of the low libido person expressing distaste / disgust at things that the high libido person asked for.  That turns a discussion into a minefield, if any request risks a "that's gross, why would you want that" response.  Unfortunately people who find sex disgusting sometimes react that way to their partner's sexual interests. 

 

 

I don’t think this is a libido mismatch issue.  Someone can want to have sex multiple times a day and be very vanilla/disgusted with all sorts of things, and someone else can have much less interested in frequency/sex as a whole and yet be more kinky/more adventurous/less squeamish.

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I'm high libido and only crossed off a few things on that list. Thought most of it was pretty gross - but then I did enable "advanced".
If I showed it to my wife she would have a heart attack.

 

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Yeah, I think it’s more a matter of personal taste.  Someone (asexual or not) who is wholly and entirely sex-repulsed/sex-averse would likely reject the entire list but beyond that it’s going to vary from person to person and have little or nothing to do with “ace-ness.”

 

Plenty of people have had to deal with “ugh, gross!” or “OMG no way” or “yikes, there is something WRONG with you,” in jest or in all seriousness, from partners who identify as sexual and may be quite high-libido.

 

Perhaps it’s just harder to hear when a partner is already feeling a lot of self-doubt... but even that is chicken/egg; did low self-esteem develop as a result of being with an ace partner, or did it make not recognizing/staying with an ace partner easier?

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Telecaster68
3 minutes ago, ryn2 said:

even that is chicken/egg; did low self-esteem develop as a result of being with an ace partner, or did it make not recognizing/staying with an ace partner easier?

I've found generally chicken and egg is a false dichotomy. It's more like each factor is there from the start, and feeding each other, so the effect spirals.

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1 minute ago, Telecaster68 said:

I've found generally chicken and egg is a false dichotomy. It's more like each factor is there from the start, and feeding each other, so the effect spirals.

Certainly possible.  Either way, I don’t think adventurousness or whatever you want to call it is directly proportional to where one falls on the ace/not ace spectrum. 

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