Husband won't sleep with wife

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DreadVandal

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Folks,

I would like to offer something here. Please comment, make suggestions, so forth. I know its possible for a person to be in a difficult situation in marriage. A man has lost interest in having sex. The love and romance have just died and he just doesn’t feel like having sex anymore. The idea of having sex with his wife brings on a feeling of pressure and anxiety. His marriage isn’t absolutely horrible. But he feels as though his wife was not emotionally there for him early in their marriage and now he just feels like sex is just going through the motions, no intimacy involved. So, he hasn’t had sex with his wife in almost a year and is pretty much resolved to give up sex. But she gets angry and demands it. She throws herself at him on a regular basis. He feels that all she wants is his body. He feels as though all he is is a machine who is there to work to pay her bills, to do chores so she doesn’t have to, and to have sex with her for her pleasure. What makes the matter worse is that nobody is sympathetic with him. His friends don’t believe him. The wife’s friends encourage her in her behavior. He’s even overheard them saying, “Its about time that men get a bit of their own medicine!”

He gets upset when his wife pinches him and flirts with him. He feels like a piece of used meat. What should he do? Is he really obligated to sleep with this woman? If so, wouldn’t this be a kind of rape? Shouldn’t the wife just deal with the fact that her lack of tenderness early on has damaged him so much that sex is no longer something that can be in the picture?
 
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DreadVandal:
Folks,
I would like to offer something here. Please comment, make suggestions, so forth.

He gets upset when his wife pinches him and flirts with him. He feels like a piece of used meat. What should he do? Is he really obligated to sleep with this woman? If so, wouldn’t this be a kind of rape? Shouldn’t the wife just deal with the fact that her lack of tenderness early on has damaged him so much that sex is no longer something that can be in the picture?
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He is not obligated to sleep with his wife if this would be a denigration of the dignity of his person and an abuse of one’s marriage rights, IMO.

It sounds like their reacting to each other has snow balled into a blaming and defensive posturing.

For starters they need to talk to a priest and seek professional help to begin to start listening to each other, and to cut off/out any influences that contradict reestablishing mutual respect and subordination in the marrriage becoming of Christ.
 
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setter:
He is not obligated to sleep with his wife if this would be a denigration of the dignity of his person and an abuse of one’s marriage rights, IMO.

It sounds like their reacting to each other has snow balled into a blaming and defensive posturing.

For starters they need to talk to a priest and seek professional help to begin to start listening to each other, and to cut off/out any influences that contradict reestablishing mutual respect and subordination in the marrriage becoming of Christ.
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Clearly, this has nothing to do with the sex. The sexual problems are the symptom.

Or, perhaps a detail is missing from this story–has she…ah…stopped bathing every day or something?
 
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DreadVandal:
He gets upset when his wife pinches him and flirts with him. He feels like a piece of used meat. What should he do?
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He should get counseling, both individual and couples. I recommend Retrouvaille and/or Marriage Encounter to help heal the wounds in this marriage. Also I suggest talking with a priest and getting some good books on marriage and relationships.
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DreadVandal:
Is he really obligated to sleep with this woman? If so, wouldn’t this be a kind of rape?
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Yes, he is obligated to the marriage debt. Again, I suggest counseling.
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DreadVandal:
Shouldn’t the wife just deal with the fact that her lack of tenderness early on has damaged him so much that sex is no longer something that can be in the picture?
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No.

Also, the husband needs to go to confession for the grudge he is holding over his wife.
 
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1ke:
Yes, he is obligated to the marriage debt. Again, I suggest counseling.
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The incumbent marriage debt is there. But to honor payment under the current emotional circumstances and the out right disrepectful and abusive manner of the wife would consititute an abuse on the marriage rights. IMO the husband is rightful to insist on a restoration of respect before subjecting himself to an abuse of the marriage rights.
 
As some folks here have already indicated and barring additional information; I don’t think sex is the crux of the problem. Counciling would be a great idea.
 
This is a problem that pops up frequently in the “Dear Abby”-type columns. Sometimes it’s the husband who has lost interest and the wife who still wants it, and sometimes it’s the other way around.

NOT-SERIOUS ALERT

Sometimes I almost wish God would declare a “bad-marriage dispensation year,” when the wanna-be sexually active men could leave their sexually dead wives and go hunting for new spouses among the wanna-be sexually active women who have left their sexually dead husbands.

END NOT-SERIOUS ALERT

It’s a problem that has many diverse causes, and I don’t have any answers. If I can’t fix my own situation, I fer-sure ain’t gonna try to fix other people’s situations.

DaveBj
 
(maybe you should have named it “husband won’t have sex with wife”

Intimacy (to me) is an intrinsic part of the sexual act. If it is missing someone is going to feel used, and in time perhaps come to resent the partner.

Feeling like a piece of meat is seldom good for ones self esteem.

I read somewhere that 2-5 % of married men are uninterested in sex. It does happen. (I don’t know any personally!)

I do know of at least 3 men that have said that they hated having sex with the wife. Some of the reasons were due to obesity, lack of personal hygiene and one wife did not want intercourse, just oral.

All three men ended up in affairs. One ended in divorce the other calls his wife “sister” and the other one wishes he could have a wonderful relationship with his wife like he has with his other woman… One man was Catholic (divorced) the other a Baptist and the 3rd man is an atheist.

Personally, I would get a divorce. Though it is NOT the best solution. I would rather get divorced than have to fight off and aggressive sexual partner. But, that’s just me and I am me.
 
There was a real-life thread that described a very similar situation. If I recall correctly the poster was havin’ a few beers with a buddy who eventually confided that he had lost interest in his wife.

After the evening, the poster was talking with his own wife and learned that she heard from the woman’s side that she was rather upset about the situation.

We had a lot of fun on that thread, but to make a long story short, the man was told that what he was doing was gravely sinful. Like a real man he did his duty, and that duty got easier and easier to the point that he began to take pleasure in fulfilling his duty.

I wish I could remember some of the details so I could run a search on the thread. Cargo-pilot, I think you were involved in that thread to some degree - maybe even the O.P.?
 
The couple described by the OP sound like Al & Peggy Bundy. bundyology.com/If you watch a few episodes of them you might get a few answers. I don’t know…just my two cents.
 
Personally, I would get a divorce. Though it is NOT the best solution. I would rather get divorced than have to fight off and aggressive sexual partner. But, that’s just me and I am me.
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Oh I get it! Those bracelets that say WWJD stand for “what would Jonah do”! Duh. Here I thougth it stood for “what would Jesus do”.

You go ahead and enjoy being you.

While I confess that it is a tremendous struggle at times, I am not just me, I am my wife’s husband, and my children’s father. That means something.
 
The either spouse has an obligation to respond to reasonable requests for sex.

That is one of the things one agrees to when one enters into Christian marriage.

It is a Sacrament, which means that is Divinely Instituted means to achieve Salvation.

It does this both in the spiritual encouragement each spouse is to offer the other, and in the prevention of concupiscience.

When done with the correct intention, the rendering of the debt is a source of Grace. An example of a just intention in this matter would include a desire on one spouse’s part to assist the other in having their ‘needs’ satisified so that they might not look towards sinful expressions, such as onanism or adultery.

It would a sad marriage if that was the only reason the martial act was consistantly performed for, but it is well within the rights of one spouse to have those needs met.
 
Man, I hope I never think of it as my “duty.”

“Not tonight, honey. Can I take out the garbage instead?”

What’s wrong with these men??? At the very least it can be a way to avoid talking!
 
Has he communicated his concerns with his wife, or is she clueless? The OP doesn’t say. First he ought to communicate, if that hasn’t been tried.

Does anyone have any statistics on why men refuse? I assume it is usually the woman who is the uninterested party, but maybe that is a cultural assumption. Do men and women refuse for the same type of reason?
 
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setter:
The incumbent marriage debt is there. But to honor payment under the current emotional circumstances and the out right disrepectful and abusive manner of the wife would consititute an abuse on the marriage rights. IMO the husband is rightful to insist on a restoration of respect before subjecting himself to an abuse of the marriage rights.
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I disagree.

I think it’s the husband’s unreasonable rejection that has created a wife who continues to try to attract her husband and obtain affection from him-- physical and emotional.

The husband is punishing the wife for past slights by withholding himself from her physically and emotionally.

That is 100% wrong.
 
In the real-life thread I cited, the wife apparently did not manage her appearance very well.

It is possible for a wife to turn off a husband. Some wives can be very controlling insisting on their terms only. She may insist that sex be limited to such a narrow set of circumstances that the husband loses interest. Same room, same position, same time of day, same day of the week, lights always off, no kissing, little or no foreplay.

Some wives can be derogatory in their disatisfaction with their husbands performance. I.e. she lays into him if he fails to bring her to climax (even though he tries).

Finally within a given gender there is a variable amount of libido. Some men have a stronger libido than others. Some women have a stronger libido than others. So it is possible to get a couple in which a man with a weak libido marries a woman with a strong libido.

I hope I’ve illustrated the possibilities that might explain how a man can be the one denying his wife the blessed marital embrace. Although it is less common for this situation to occur.
 
At the core of the problem seems to be a misunderstanding of what Love is.

Love is not an emotion, it is not a thing that can ‘die’. Love is a continous decision to place the needs of the one we love over our own.

It’s nice when one feels pleasure from that decision. But that feeling and pleasure is a Accident of Love, not it’s Substance.

What this man needs to do is to recommit to the decision of Love, and if done in Grace, the ‘feeling’ of love might follow.
 
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1ke:
I disagree.

I think it’s the husband’s unreasonable rejection that has created a wife who continues to try to attract her husband and obtain affection from him-- physical and emotional.

The husband is punishing the wife for past slights by withholding himself from her physically and emotionally.

That is 100% wrong.
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Instead of placing blame over who offended who first, this couple needs to check in with each other and make amends to be able to move forward. I believe that the mutual emotional abuse as an obstacle to intimacy, especially as it impacts the ability to render good on the marriage debt, needs to be addressed to a satisfactory degree. Otherwise the marriage rights will be further abused, as in compounding resentment over feeling used. The fact is that this husband is feeling emotionally used and abused.
 
Black Jaque:
There was a real-life thread that described a very similar situation. If I recall correctly the poster was havin’ a few beers with a buddy who eventually confided that he had lost interest in his wife.

After the evening, the poster was talking with his own wife and learned that she heard from the woman’s side that she was rather upset about the situation.

We had a lot of fun on that thread, but to make a long story short, the man was told that what he was doing was gravely sinful. Like a real man he did his duty, and that duty got easier and easier to the point that he began to take pleasure in fulfilling his duty.

I wish I could remember some of the details so I could run a search on the thread. Cargo-pilot, I think you were involved in that thread to some degree - maybe even the O.P.?
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forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=64315&highlight=beers
 
There may be a number of factors that may lead one or the other spouse to lose interest or have diminished interest.

One is just age, or energy. In my younger days, I could go for months with shorter hours of rest. Sex was never a problem. When you get over 50, I need a full 7 to 8 hours sleep and IF it is after midnight, I have a toughtime staying awake no matter what the wife does to start anything.

Now a days, it just seems as if there are a lot more things that need to be done each evening. It probably takes me an hour to an hour and ahalf to get ready for bed. We actually have to schedule time for intimacy. I love my wife more than ever but sex is less an integral part of that. Maybe when I retire and things may get back to a more regular schedule, but for now, neither one of us are concerned about the lower frequency.

Sometimes she complains, but late at night if I try to start something she rolls over and says it’s way too late. She has a tough time staying up after 11. So if it’s past 10:30, you can forget it. It’s not going to happen.

SO folks who are having troubles with an over active libido, just wait until you get over 50, some of those problems go away on its own. and it’s perfectly natural and okay.

As someone else says, sex may not be the problem but only the symtom.
 
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