Ace-Allo couple, it feels more complicated than just "getting old"!

[Russel V]

Hello everyone,

I'm not sure if I belong here, but this forum was incredibly helpful to me this week. I am a married heterosexual male. A week ago, Sunday, my wife shared that she does not experience sexual desire anymore - has not for many many years. We are in our early 60s, married 40 years, and while we are both healthy and enjoy being with one another, our relationship and bodies have gone through changes over the years. All that said, I could not miss the strength and confidence behind her words, "I do not have sexual feelings." She was crystal clear that: "This. Is. Who. I. Am." - and oh my god it felt like someone kicked me in the stomach, and every day last week, kicked me again and again!

As I cycled through feelings of loss, grief, panic (my third and fourth panic attacks in my life), anger, rejection, anxiety, insecurity, more grief... rinse and repeat, all week, I took comfort reading what other folks have shared here - thank you for being so generous with what you've experienced and how you've felt! It's meant a lot to me. MyWifeIsAce really captured it -

Quote

 

This past weekend, we sat down and had a heart to heart to talk. I wanted to talk about all the things I've been feeling but didn't want to begin there. I worried that starting with my feelings would feel to her like sitting on the beach during a tsunami. We started instead with how she feels, I wanted to know more about her experiences and what those felt like. That was interesting (and the reason I prefaced this with "I'm not sure if I belong here"), because I learned that she does not consider herself asexual, despite the sincerity of her feelings about not desiring sex. She seems to view herself as an allosexual whose sexual feelings have waned over time to nothing. I realize this is a natural part of aging for some people, and my own concepts of sex have changed over time too, but I also long to feel, crave even, a physical connection her. Being a child of our culture, my concept of my needs regarding sexual desire, sensual desire, romantic desire, other things I don't have the awareness or vocabulary to name... are tangled together inside my head like a libidinous ball of yarn, and it's a challenge for me to dissect out the sexual desire strands, and keep intact the romantic/sensual things we might still share. I connected with what others have written here because even though she does not identify as asexual, so technically we are not an ace-allo couple, we seem to run parallel to those couples and dealing with many of the same issues. And I want us to work this out, and I am not sure of what the future holds, and I feel anxious and uncertain, and I still grieve and have waves of insecurity... but writing about it and reading about other couples has been helpful. If I am not violating a community standard, I'd like to keep doing that.

So, I suppose this note is a possible introduction, and a sincere thank you.

[Olallieberry]

Welcome!

 

Whatever you do, don't be afraid to assert who you are, too.

 

If it's a tsunami, it's a tsunami. If it's repeated kicks in the gut, it's repeated kicks in the gut.

 

She trusted you to witness her truth.

Can you trust her to witness yours?

[Russel V]

Thank you Olallieberry!

Yes, she got the tsunami too. That was just the second thing on the conversation agenda yesterday. Looking back, I think we both would have benefited from some couples/sex counseling when we were in our late 30s and 40s. Maybe we'd be in a different place, and maybe the same place, but we'd be here with more information and mutual understanding. But... we are where we are for now.

 

The third conversation topic was unraveling the yarn (the conversation was broken up with grocery shopping and a nap), and I've been thinking of it more since then (FYI... sexual stuff follows). There are definitely types of touch we both still enjoy, and after reading what people have posted about "compromise", I'm trying to avoid the type where the best compromises are when all parties are equally unhappy. That is not going to be sustainable. Act III of Sunday's conversation was the start of exploring what we might both feel good about, even look forward to. Will it be enough? Will it at least be "good enough"? I don't know yet, but the more I think about this, the more I feel like I need to tease out my own bits of yarn. When I think about what I want from sex in this part of my life, I find myself focusing more and more on the sense of physical connection with a partner. The pop-up-turkey-timer does not pop up as reliably as it used to, but I can take a pill for that. What I can't take a pill for is that it takes a longer time now to reach orgasm. She started experiencing pain during intercourse after taking tamoxifen in her 30s as part of breast cancer treatment, which triggered an early menopause. A combination of painful sex for her (along with all the other stressors on young families and imperfect human beings/partners), and me not wanting to do something she found painful (and not having the awareness to be the one to reach out), led to a default of not doing anything at all and allowing that part of our relationship to atrophy. My perception was that since she was not initiating sex either, it was up to me to take care of my own orgasms, which continues to this day. I feel bad that maybe it could have been different if one of us had pushed the other to address this, but you get caught up in raising kids, work, all the daily BS everyone deals with, and we settled into a relationship that included affection, but not sex. I don't think the sexual desire part is something that is ever going to come back for her (cue grief etc), so it's been interesting to read how ace-allo couples try to connect with one another.

 

To be honest, the more I think about the physical connection I desire with her, the less it is about erections and orgasms (though I'm totally in favor of both), instead I go to touch, intimate romantic touch, and presence. Looking into one another's eyes, focusing on one another. Sunday, we did identify a few things we both liked, but I don't know if I'll be the one who primarily initiates them, or if one of us will find we don't like it as much as we thought. All of this sounds good, but I honestly don't know it will be enough. I expect this to be a long process, but we have a lot worth saving - a whole lot. I explained to her how I'm not happy in our relationship and that we both deserve to be happy. We'll see how the next conversations affect how we feel and how we interact.

 

Thanks for the welcome! 🙂 I read some of your posts before I registered here and found them helpful too.

[Ceebs]

Ok, so she used to experience desire then. Was your sex life together when you were younger mutually fulfilling? I don't mean just physically, but emotionally as well. Was she emotionally engaged during sex? Did you feel desired? Was she the one to initiate sometimes? Does she not miss feeling desire?

 

I guess I'm trying to discern what your wife's... starting point, of sorts... was prior to things like menopause and general ageing. Everyone is different, of course. Some people are distressed by their diminished mental interest or difficulty with arousal or whatever. Some are happy to be free of dealing with a physical libido that they found annoying. Some were happy with how things were before and are happy now even though they've changed. How your wife felt when she was younger could be an important factor in figuring out how to navigate this issue.

[Ceebs]

Wait, how did that post above mine suddenly appear? It wasn't there when I posted and now it is. Is this something to do with the waiting time for new members' posts?? A glitch? It was 100% not there moments ago. Or not visible or whatever.

[Russel V]

Ceebs, I think my second post was waiting for a moderator to approve. You can't trust us newbies. 😉

 

You asked...

Was your sex life together when you were younger mutually fulfilling? I don't mean just physically, but emotionally as well.

Yes, to both.

 

Was she emotionally engaged during sex? Did you feel desired? Was she the one to initiate sometimes?

Absolutely, yes, it was me more often, but yes she did sometimes

 

Does she not miss feeling desire?

I don't think she misses feeling sexual desire. She said she can very happily live without sex. She still desires affection though, long hugs, kisses, back rub sort of touching - but sex is off the table. We do shower together every weekend and wash one another, including genital touching, but I think in the context of the shower, that touching is desexualized - it's practical (need to wash at some point), and the shower for is not a location, like the bedroom, that has a strong sexual connotation (for her). She told me two Sundays ago that that she has no interest in lying together naked in bed, but then this past Sunday, when I asked how she felt about lying naked together and touching, but agreeing that sex is off the table, she said she may be open to that - I'm not going to rush that though. I did ask a follow up about how she'd feel if I became sexually aroused in the bed or the shower, still with the caveat that sex is not on the menu, and she said that did not bother her.

 

I guess I'm trying to discern what your wife's... starting point, of sorts... was prior to things like menopause and general ageing. Everyone is different, of course. Some people are distressed by their diminished mental interest or difficulty with arousal or whatever. Some are happy to be free of dealing with a physical libido that they found annoying. Some were happy with how things were before and are happy now even though they've changed. 

 

Based on just one conversation so far, I think she is in the last group, happy with how things were before and are happy now even though they've changed. For her, I think it seems more like a natural life cycle. And I understand that for many folks it is. I just wish our life cycles were more aligned! What breaks my heart, especially when I'm obsessing at 2:30 am, is that maybe it could have been different. But then I can't talk to 38 year old me, so 62 year old me needs to focus on how things are now.

 

I appreciate being able to put my thoughts into text like this and read others' thoughts. It helps to work through my feelings. 

[Olallieberry]

3 hours ago, Russel V said:

I'm trying to avoid the type where the best compromises are when all parties are equally unhappy. That is not going to be sustainable.

Just understand that as much as you try (and it is worth it to try), the two of you might still find that the incompatibility is just too great. Don't be afraid to be honest about it and admit it if it comes to that.

 

3 hours ago, Russel V said:

Will it be enough?

[...]

To be honest, the more I think about the physical connection I desire with her, the less it is about erections and orgasms (though I'm totally in favor of both), instead I go to touch, intimate romantic touch, and presence. Looking into one another's eyes, focusing on one another. Sunday, we did identify a few things we both liked, but I don't know if I'll be the one who primarily initiates them, or if one of us will find we don't like it as much as we thought. All of this sounds good, but I honestly don't know it will be enough. I expect this to be a long process, but we have a lot worth saving - a whole lot. I explained to her how I'm not happy in our relationship and that we both deserve to be happy. We'll see how the next conversations affect how we feel and how we interact.

That's a great attitude. If you read some of my posts, you probably read about how important it is to leave no stone un-turned—and how there definitely will be positive stuff to discover. Yet, to also recognize when there aren't any left to investigate.

[iff]

2 hours ago, Ceebs said:

Wait, how did that post above mine suddenly appear? It wasn't there when I posted and now it is. Is this something to do with the waiting time for new members' posts?? A glitch? It was 100% not there moments ago. Or not visible or whatever.

Yes, as it had links to an external website (NY Times), it needed approval as per this test

 

https://www.asexuality.org/en/topic/279979-test-for-excluding-all-links-to-tackle-spam/#comment-1065544976

 

Edited October 13 by iff

[Ceebs]

Just now, iff said:

Yes, as it had links to an external website (NY Times), it needed approval.

Ahh ok. That could theoretically prove problematic for the flow of conversations, I suppose.

[MrDane]

On 10/13/2025 at 9:47 PM, Ceebs said:

Ok, so she used to experience desire then. Was your sex life together when you were younger mutually fulfilling? I don't mean just physically, but emotionally as well. Was she emotionally engaged during sex? Did you feel desired? Was she the one to initiate sometimes? Does she not miss feeling desire?

 

I guess I'm trying to discern what your wife's... starting point, of sorts... was prior to things like menopause and general ageing. Everyone is different, of course. Some people are distressed by their diminished mental interest or difficulty with arousal or whatever. Some are happy to be free of dealing with a physical libido that they found annoying. Some were happy with how things were before and are happy now even though they've changed. How your wife felt when she was younger could be an important factor in figuring out how to navigate this issue.

Good points,  @ceebs! 
I think a lot is hard to distinguish. Perhaps you start off by being carefree, loving your body, being excited about doing grown-up stuff, laughing about doing this silly sex stuff together like it is a new hobby, enjoying the moment….   And then gradually you get bored, lose the interest because it isnt founded or grounded in your core sexuality, no longer enjoy your own body, accept that no more babies will grow here, menopause, tight hips, need for sleeo, medication, grown up-worries, other activities are preferred….  And this is always combined with what the partner brings into the equation.