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17 minutes ago, Traveler40 said:

Welcome to AVEN.  It seems you’ve found your way here following a few years notice from your wife and a bit of general reading on the subject.  That’s great and often not the case.  Having had both time and opportunity to read up on asexuality, what have you understood the options to be?  I’m sincerely curious as I found this site in ignorance 2 years ago, but I definitely had the options down after having lived with my asexual husband for 15 years.

 

The options aren’t plentiful or great, but there are a few to consider in the event you’d like to stay together.  Not one fits all and only the two of you can find the compromise that may work.

@xstatic I do/we do want to stay together that much is clear.  We have two children together, and we genuinely love and care for each other.  There is an emotional/romantic attraction to each other just the physical and sexual desire/attraction is one sided.  My side to be more exact.  We have discussed some solutions, but it seems as though we arrive at a stalemate every time.  Not to be intrusive, but what works for you and yours?  If you compromise what exactly is the compromise?  I know you said that an open relationship has came up as well.  What are your hangups with having an open relationship?

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Welcome to AVEN, @dbarnes!

 

Have the two of you tried couples therapy?  That might help you both get past the self-recrimination and feeling guilty over what, for both of you, are perfectly natural and not-broken-at-all things.  It might also help you get at what types of compromise activities would be okay for each of you.

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1 minute ago, ryn2 said:

Welcome to AVEN, @dbarnes!

 

Have the two of you tried couples therapy?  That might help you both get past the self-recrimination and feeling guilty over what, for both of you, are perfectly natural and not-broken-at-all things.  It might also help you get at what types of compromise activities would be okay for each of you.

@ryn2  This is something I want and am willing to do I just haven't worked up the courage because to be honest I feel as thought there is a stigma associated with couples therapy and really therapy in general.  It's something that I personally need to work through.

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I’m sorry it’s so tough, and thank you for more detail.  Any advice I could give wouldn’t be very useful as every situation truly is different.  

 

In my case, we opted to open our relationship. To read the journey may be of some use and can be found in this sub-forum among the threads.  If you begin the thread, my only advice is that you read the entire thing.  It’s not a simple thing to open any relationship and lots of factors some into play.  I can report that I have corresponded with others that have taken a similar path, and the journey seems eerily similar.  

 

You both need to be on the same page, but be aware that even that will change.  

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@Traveler40  Thank your for sharing.  This is such a complex issue wrought with so many emotions and pot holes.  It's incredibly difficult and hard to talk about in general.  The anonymity of this forum seems to help me to be able to open up a bit.  I haven't talked about this with anyone besides my partner and honestly I have felt alone for a very long time. Sort of like suffering in silence, but I'm hitting a point where something has to be done.  I just don't know what that something is.  If you don't mind me asking do you deal with guilt and does your partner deal with jealousy?  How do you personally handle these things if so?

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7 minutes ago, dbarnes said:

It's something that I personally need to work through.

I’d definitely suggest giving therapy a try on your own first, then.  Couples therapy is easier to navigate if you have done some individual work first and are already familiar with the process.  Also, having your own therapist gives you a safe place to discuss any concerns that come up in your joint work.

 

If you go either route, make sure you find an ace-aware, lgbt+ friendly therapist.  A therapist who doesn’t believe in asexuality or who holds onto older views about “curing” less common orientations or about how “intellectuals” can “rise above their baser needs” will not be much help and might actually worsen the situation.

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1 minute ago, ryn2 said:

I’d definitely suggest giving therapy a try on your own first, then.  Couples therapy is easier to navigate if you have done some individual work first and are already familiar with the process.  Also, having your own therapist gives you a safe place to discuss any concerns that come up in your joint work.

 

If you go either route, make sure you find an ace-aware, lgbt+ friendly therapist.  A therapist who doesn’t believe in asexuality or who holds onto older views about “curing” less common orientations or about how “intellectuals” can “rise above their baser needs” will not be much help and might actually worsen the situation.

@ryn2  That's what I'm afraid of.  My wife and I are not conservative at all especially from a social standpoint, but we live in a very conservative part of the United States and that may prove to be a bit difficult.  I've also pondered some of these newer delivery modalities for therapy such as VOIP/skype type of sessions.  Do you have any experience with that?  If so how did it work for you?

 

Thanks

 

 

 

Dan

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6 minutes ago, dbarnes said:

@xstatic Not to be intrusive, but what works for you and yours?  If you compromise what exactly is the compromise?  I know you said that an open relationship has came up as well.  What are your hangups with having an open relationship?

Well, the compromise we have has grown over time.  Originally he had hard lines of no sexual contact, no touching of genitals, no kissing.  Just hand holding, and cuddling.  That's why I assumed he was averse.  Of course, he's been figuring himself out through all of this as well.  I'm his first relationship, and I'm experienced.  I'm sure that was pretty intimidating.

 

Kissing came over a few weeks and now it's just a normal regular thing that we do.  It doesn't do anything for him.  He has let me know that.  But for being indifferent, he's good at it.  That was the extent of it until a few weeks ago when he told me that he would do oral on me if I wanted it.  But that I would have to ask, and he could say no if he wasn't up to it, and that had to be okay for me.  We've done that a couple of times.  Both times lead to sex.  I didn't ask for it.  I think maybe he just thought that it was something I wanted (I did) so he just went there.  

 

So he has been much more open about my needs lately.  But I don't push for sex at all.  I figure if it happens, awesome.  But I don't hold any expectations for it.  We had sex a couple of times at the very beginning of the relationship and he really didn't like it at all.  Again, I now think that he was really intimidated and self conscious but also he's not interested in it in general.

 

We have scheduled hang out times of every Monday and Thursday nights for an overnight.  Those are great and we hold each other in bed and cuddle/sleep and it's awesome.  The schedule is nice because then he knows what to expect and so do I.

 

I have a couple of hang ups on the open relationship.  Firstly, I really want to formulate my relationship with him.  He needs a lot of time, and I want to give that time to him.  Second, I'm really really busy right now and I don't even want to bother with it.  I don't have to look if I eventually want to have a hookup.  I have a couple that's totally down with doing stuff with me if I ever want to.  Which brings me to the third thing.  My last marriage opened up and became poly.  My ex thought it would be fun, but then when things started happening he became jealous and bitter and oh look, we got divorced.  Now, my boyfriend insists that he won't be jealous and quite frankly, I believe him.  I'm just personally not ready for that sort of thing again at this point in time.

 

 

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27 minutes ago, dbarnes said:

@ryn2  That's what I'm afraid of.  My wife and I are not conservative at all especially from a social standpoint, but we live in a very conservative part of the United States and that may prove to be a bit difficult.  I've also pondered some of these newer delivery modalities for therapy such as VOIP/skype type of sessions.  Do you have any experience with that?  If so how did it work for you?

 

Thanks

 

 

 

Dan

I have done voice sessions with a therapist and while I prefer being  there in person it was fine.  I have several friends who do voice or skype sessions exclusively.  It would be much better than nothing, and also better than a biased therapist.

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Also, I'm in therapy right now.  I started therapy towards the end of my marriage.  I am fortunate that my therapist has been totally fine with my actions.  Not judgemental at all.  She just wants to make sure that I'm taking care of myself and she gives me questions to think about.  

 

Hopefully you can find a good therapist.  A friend of mine does online therapy and seems to enjoy it.  It's nice to have options.

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I did online therapy, it seemed OK... of course my issue didn't get resolved, but that wasn't really the fault of online. It was more a I wanted to change something that isn't really changeable. *shrug* You can't really touch a therapist so video calls aren't that much different than in person. 

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10 minutes ago, xstatic said:

Well, the compromise we have has grown over time.  Originally he had hard lines of no sexual contact, no touching of genitals, no kissing.  Just hand holding, and cuddling.  That's why I assumed he was averse.  Of course, he's been figuring himself out through all of this as well.  I'm his first relationship, and I'm experienced.  I'm sure that was pretty intimidating.

 

Kissing came over a few weeks and now it's just a normal regular thing that we do.  It doesn't do anything for him.  He has let me know that.  But for being indifferent, he's good at it.  That was the extent of it until a few weeks ago when he told me that he would do oral on me if I wanted it.  But that I would have to ask, and he could say no if he wasn't up to it, and that had to be okay for me.  We've done that a couple of times.  Both times lead to sex.  I didn't ask for it.  I think maybe he just thought that it was something I wanted (I did) so he just went there.  

 

So he has been much more open about my needs lately.  But I don't push for sex at all.  I figure if it happens, awesome.  But I don't hold any expectations for it.  We had sex a couple of times at the very beginning of the relationship and he really didn't like it at all.  Again, I now think that he was really intimidated and self conscious but also he's not interested in it in general.

 

We have scheduled hang out times of every Monday and Thursday nights for an overnight.  Those are great and we hold each other in bed and cuddle/sleep and it's awesome.  The schedule is nice because then he knows what to expect and so do I.

 

I have a couple of hang ups on the open relationship.  Firstly, I really want to formulate my relationship with him.  He needs a lot of time, and I want to give that time to him.  Second, I'm really really busy right now and I don't even want to bother with it.  I don't have to look if I eventually want to have a hookup.  I have a couple that's totally down with doing stuff with me if I ever want to.  Which brings me to the third thing.  My last marriage opened up and became poly.  My ex thought it would be fun, but then when things started happening he became jealous and bitter and oh look, we got divorced.  Now, my boyfriend insists that he won't be jealous and quite frankly, I believe him.  I'm just personally not ready for that sort of thing again at this point in time.

 

 

@xstatic  When you say he needs a lot of time do you mean time to himself?  Is he very introverted?  My wife is, and she can be perfectly content without speaking or touching each other for hours or sometimes days.  We have gone 4 days with zero physical contact.  It honestly makes me feel needy, but yeah.  I need it.  

 

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28 minutes ago, dbarnes said:

@xstatic  When you say he needs a lot of time do you mean time to himself?  Is he very introverted?  My wife is, and she can be perfectly content without speaking or touching each other for hours or sometimes days.  We have gone 4 days with zero physical contact.  It honestly makes me feel needy, but yeah.  I need it.  

 

Four days living together with no contact would drive me mad. And I dont mind months no sex. But, I am very into casual physical touch. My wife is introverted, but she doesn't mind if we sit quietly doing our own things (books, games, whatever separate activity) near enough I can be touching her somehow (feet/legs/arm somewhere touching each other, even if just barely). Maybe you could find some sort of contact that fills your need for touch but lets her feel alone enough to recharge ? One of our compromises is if my wife is on the computer overnight (she stays up all night at times), she sits on the bed and I get to sleep near her (but not too close, cant jostle her mouse arm lol), that way I have the intimacy of sleeping with her in bed and she gets the alone time of video games alone all night to recharge from being social. 

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1 minute ago, Serran said:

Four days living together with no contact would drive me mad. And I dont mind months no sex. But, I am very into casual physical touch. My wife is introverted, but she doesn't mind if we sit quietly doing our own things (books, games, whatever separate activity) near enough I can be touching her somehow (feet/legs/arm somewhere touching each other, even if just barely). Maybe you could find some sort of contact that fills your need for touch but lets her feel alone enough to recharge ? One of our compromises is if my wife is on the computer overnight (she stays up all night at times), she sits on the bed and I get to sleep near her (but not too close, cant jostle her mouse arm lol), that way I have the intimacy of sleeping with her in bed and she gets the alone time of video games alone all night to recharge from being social. 

@SerranMaybe we could figure something like that out.  She just sits and reads on the couch a lot at night and in the evenings.  Maybe I could just sit next to her and be her footrest or something.

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6 minutes ago, dbarnes said:

@SerranMaybe we could figure something like that out.  She just sits and reads on the couch a lot at night and in the evenings.  Maybe I could just sit next to her and be her footrest or something.

Thats something we do. You would be surprised how comforting just reading a book separate but together can be, with a little casual touching, it is both being alone but also sharing intimacy. I am quite needy with touch, I will full body cuddle for 12 hours straight if you let me (I love the feeling, I can get lost in it for hours and hours, just the feel of their body against mine ahhhh I miss it..  stupid Atlantic and stupid visa waiting periods). But, my wife needs her alone time. So, we manage to combine the two enough for us both to be comfortable. 

 

Of course, I am lucky in that my wife loves touch as well sometimes. But, not anywhere near my level. 

 

With a couch you could be her footrest. Or just be sitting close enough to touch arms or legs sitting naturally and both be reading something different, no talking. 

 

Being alone together is a useful skill, especially if your partner is more of a loner type. 

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2 minutes ago, dbarnes said:

@xstatic  When you say he needs a lot of time do you mean time to himself?  Is he very introverted?  My wife is, and she can be perfectly content without speaking or touching each other for hours or sometimes days.  We have gone 4 days with zero physical contact.  It honestly makes me feel needy, but yeah.  I need it.  

 

I didn't.  I just meant that he needs time to really take things slow.  However, he actually is an extremely introverted person.  He needs recovery days.  He needs no contact days.  I don't know how that will affect our future, but I understand his needs.

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@dbarnes it sounds like therapy would be a good idea. I had a lot, my partner had some. You're not a spoiled child for having an emotional need for sexual intimacy with someone you love.

 

Sex is typically connected to love for sexuals. They feel unloved without it, they express their love that way, they are likely to "fall out of love" without it, and they are likely to "catch feelings" if they open a relationship and have sex with others.

 

I now approach sex with my partner as an act of trust (as I feel disarmed by my own desire vs his lack of attraction). I tend to express a lot of gratitude & it makes me feel loved. But compromise works best when a partner is very indifferent-to-positive about sex, not if a partner is averse.

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3 hours ago, xstatic said:

I didn't.  I just meant that he needs time to really take things slow.  However, he actually is an extremely introverted person.  He needs recovery days.  He needs no contact days.  I don't know how that will affect our future, but I understand his needs.

I understand.  My wife is the same way.

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2 hours ago, anisotropic said:

@dbarnes it sounds like therapy would be a good idea. I had a lot, my partner had some. You're not a spoiled child for having an emotional need for sexual intimacy with someone you love.

 

Sex is typically connected to love for sexuals. They feel unloved without it, they express their love that way, they are likely to "fall out of love" without it, and they are likely to "catch feelings" if they open a relationship and have sex with others.

 

I now approach sex with my partner as an act of trust (as I feel disarmed by my own desire vs his lack of attraction). I tend to express a lot of gratitude & it makes me feel loved. But compromise works best when a partner is very indifferent-to-positive about sex, not if a partner is averse.

@anisotropicThat's how I feel.  It's no just that I want to get off for me.  I actually get something out of it on a deeper level.  That's the other thing I'm afraid of if we were to open our relationship.  I know me and I know I'm afraid I would fall for someone and that would hurt my wife.  I "burn hot" in that sense.  I really need to have a talk with her about whether she is averse to sex or just indifferent.  I honestly am not entirely sure because sometimes she seems as though she s and sometimes she seems as though she isn't.

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2 hours ago, dbarnes said:

That's the other thing I'm afraid of if we were to open our relationship.  I know me and I know I'm afraid I would fall for someone and that would hurt my wife.

Yes, I think misunderstanding sex as "just lust" is a common fallacy that both ace & sexual partners are liable to run into -- for an ace partner, sex doesn't have this meaning... so they're going off what they learn from partners/society. And people/society aren't great about describing how sex is about love & bonding.

 

Regarding aversion: ideally you could learn what makes things unpleasant, e.g. why you initiating is unwelcome. Knowing "why" helps you avoid those things & come up with alternative strategies. You should also be communicating about what things are bad for you, but it's tricky to navigate with empathy. (And it feels to me like it's likely to be particularly tricky to be raising issues now, when your partner came out years ago, and you're only now making a reflection/learning effort...)

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37 minutes ago, anisotropic said:

Yes, I think misunderstanding sex as "just lust" is a common fallacy that both ace & sexual partners are liable to run into -- for an ace partner, sex doesn't have this meaning... so they're going off what they learn from partners/society. And people/society aren't great about describing how sex is about love & bonding.

 

Regarding aversion: ideally you could learn what makes things unpleasant, e.g. why you initiating is unwelcome. Knowing "why" helps you avoid those things & come up with alternative strategies. You should also be communicating about what things are bad for you, but it's tricky to navigate with empathy. (And it feels to me like it's likely to be particularly tricky to be raising issues now, when your partner came out years ago, and you're only now making a reflection/learning effort...)

@anisotropic  She came out roughly 2-3 years ago, but it's been hard to get her to talk about any of this.  Also the learning and research I have done has been on going.  It almost seems like she takes offense to me trying to learn more about it.  Just yesterday she saw I had bought a couple of books on the subject and she asked me if her being asexual was really that big of a problem.  Of course I said no that she wasn't the problem and I was just trying to learn more about it so I can try and better understand it and we can try and work on a solution.  This has been an ongoing thing.  It always comes up and one of us always feels left behind it seems like.  

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1 hour ago, Telecaster68 said:

The truth is, her being asexual is a problem for your relationship, and does need some action of some sort.

Maybe going with “your” (“our,” if OP is the speaker) “mismatched orientations are a problem for your” (our) “relationship[....]” would come across better to OP’s wife, because the issue isn’t that she’s ace; it’s that she’s ace and OP isn’t.  Or, conversely, the issue is that OP’s sexual and she’s not.

 

”Your asexuality is a problem for our relationship” is difficult to distinguish from “you are a problem for our relationship,” and may just make her defensive.

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33 minutes ago, Telecaster68 said:

OP shouldn't minimise it, for his own sake.

Oh, 100% agreed.  I just thought focusing on the mismatch and not on one end of it or the other might work better.

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35 minutes ago, Telecaster68 said:

we assume or partners will know what we really mean is 'of course it's a problem, and a huge, urgent one, and we both know it, but I know you feel the pressure so I'm being positive and supportive rather than nagging and trusting you to get on it'. 

Yeah, that’s definitely not going to get results.  I’m probably not even ace and I still thought “it’s not an issue” (and silence) meant it wasn’t an issue.

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1 minute ago, Telecaster68 said:

I think most people assume if you understand 'no it's fine you forgot my birthday again' doesn't actually mean the speaker's happy, you'll understand that 'your lack of desire isn't a problem' comes from the same place. 

But people are different. When I say its fine you forgot my birthday or our anniversary etc I really mean its fine. Its something hard to remind myself of that people actually care about that stuff. So when my wife says its fine, I take her at her word (which she genuinely doesn't care). 

 

If you want someone to know what you mean, its best not to say the opposite. Caring about what you care about isn't universal and people might misread your meaning by giving it their own bias (me and holidays in general dont mix, I was raised by JWs so people caring about them is just weird to me). So where you are trying to say "big deal but im not willing to make it a fight, but I need you to change your behavior" the other person could be hearing "neither of us finds this a big deal so we are on same page, its cool". 

 

Especially troublesome if the person isnt good at reading subtle body language for signs you are upset. 

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7 minutes ago, Serran said:

But people are different. When I say its fine you forgot my birthday or our anniversary etc I really mean its fine. Its something hard to remind myself of that people actually care about that stuff. So when my wife says its fine, I take her at her word (which she genuinely doesn't care). 

Yep, that.  I also mean it when I say it, so it's difficult to comprehend the mindgames at play when some other people say it (but don't mean it)

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44 minutes ago, Telecaster68 said:

I think most people assume if you understand 'no it's fine you forgot my birthday again' doesn't actually mean the speaker's happy, you'll understand that 'your lack of desire isn't a problem' comes from the same place. 

If that’s a game you play regularly with your partner,  they’ve learned to read it as a passive-aggressive message of displeasure, and they normally *do* get it, yes... but otherwise you’re just setting yourself up for disappointment and resentment unless your partner by luck happens to share all the same feelings about things as you do (which, in the case of a sexual mismatch, is unlikely).

 

Like the posters above, my birthday is just another day.  The only time I’ve ever (as an adult) been upset that it got forgotten was when my partner then got super-defensive and went after me verbally when I joked about not getting a card.  It was his reaction that upset me, not the forgotten birthday.  So, if you told me it was no problem that I’d forgotten your birthday I would take it at face value (especially if I said “really?” to give you one last out and you again said it was fine).  I would also be relieved that we (seemed to) see eye-to-eye on it.

 

I grew up in a household where nothing was ever said directly and mindreading was expected and required, too, and even I would get it wrong with someone I trusted to be honest with me.

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3 minutes ago, Telecaster68 said:

 

I suspect Brits don't see it as mind games, we see it as manners. I'm not saying it's right or healthy, but layering in some subtext is more likely to be on the radar, and not a completely unpredictable way of responding. 

 

I was actually wondering if some of it was cultural.  In the part of the US where I live therapists stress asking for what you want/need, owning your emotional health, teaching others around you that you take people at face value, etc.  So, there is more expectation that 1) people will say what they mean and 2) if they choose not to say what they mean, the consequences of so doing (good or bad) are “on them.”

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7 minutes ago, Telecaster68 said:

People who are genuinely, honestly, completely okay with having their birthday forgotten are so rare that I think it's reasonable to play the odds and assume that for whatever reason - passive aggression, diffidence, fear - they're just not feeling able to say what they feel and do in fact mind. It's more likely, after all. 

You just found three of them in a row here, so some of that may be cultural as well.  My sample size is ridiculously small but I do know my one good British friend is always (what feels to me like ridiculously, to the point it makes me really uncomfortable) horrified that no one has celebrated my birthday, that Christmas is not a big deal, etc.  Her family experience of the holidays is clearly vastly different than mine was.

 

My ex’s family hails originally from the UK and has a much stronger family holiday tradition than my family did.

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11 minutes ago, Telecaster68 said:

In other words, they're deliberately injecting some snark to make their point and express their irritation? 

That only works in an environment where that’s a common and accepted way to express irritation.  Where I live it’s seen as passive-aggressive and the “right” approach is not to reward it, to the point others give you crap for “getting sucked into it again.”

 

That said, if I knew that was how my partner expressed “something is wrong,” I would ask what was wrong if it happened.

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