Love wife so much, but physical attraction is diminishing

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To force someone to commit an “intrinsically evil act” such as contraception is an “intrinsically evil” act itself.
 
Anon00 said:
I’m not denying her sex.
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If you’re not having sex with her when she asks, you are denying her sex.
Anon00 said:
I’ve suggested recently — again, so I can try to accommodate her desires! — that she not ask but just start in on things to get going, but she says she has seen a look of disgust before (I certainly haven’t tried to share that look!).
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That was a good suggestion on your part.

You should keep telling her that and give suggestions (and demonstrations!) on what she can do to encourage you.

But it’s also not OK if she has to do 95% of the asking and the wooing. That’s not fair to her.
 
I agree. The weight loss might be a plea for attention. Unfortunately, we’re in this weird cultural climate where it’s seen as a tragedy for men to talk about women’s weight (usually not a problem the other way around, though). You need to make sure she understands the over eating is not okay with you. From your post, you seem like a very passive individual. Don’t be passive–be firm about this. It’s very important to your marriage and for her health.
 
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I, too, find it unfortunate that some are so quick to call what is a problem in a marriage sin. I see no sin in it. I’ll offer prayers that the Lord bless your marriage with all the graces needed to carry you both through this challenging time.
 
All it would have taken in your original post is to say “she is currently seeing reputable medical doctors and a reputable therapist for these issues. I’m looking into a therapist as well”. That would have easily changed the tone of your post a great deal, and wouldn’t break the character limit. Instead, you focused on her issues without saying you’re investigating solutions, and complained about your “wants”.

It’s not difficult to add a sentence or two to provide proper context. Don’t attack people here just because you made a mistake in not adding 100 characters or less to your initial comments. Especially when your replies are still essentially all about “you”.
Anon00 said:
picking at sores
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Is this happening physically, or metaphorically? If it’s the former, then that’s a whole other thing which requires patience and understanding on your part, and especially professional help. I know all about this; I scratch myself to the point of bleeding due to my anxiety disorder sometimes.

Listen, it’s great she’s getting help. And it’s great you are looking into help yourself. But I say this as someone who not only has a host of issues, but also has a wife with clinical depression; you will need to make sacrifices to make marriage work. You will need to do things which are uncomfortable, you need to do things that you simply have no desire to do. You need to love her as Christ loves the Church, to metaphorically die for her every day.

I have one expectation for others, my wife included; give your 100%. If your 100% can yield 20/100, then that’s all I ask. I don’t care if the “norm” is 70 or whatever. If all you can give is 20, give 20. Just do 100%. If another day 100% is 10, then do 10. If all you can do is take a shower, take a shower. If this persists, get reputable help, and invest what you can into that.

Treat your wife this same way. Encourage her, support her. Be understanding, have mercy and empathy. Ask if she wants to do marriage counseling to help improve communication, and come up with an action plan during those sessions. Find a spiritual director, one for yourself and a separate one for her.

Walk together, build each other up. Make each other greater than what you would be alone. Be the marriage.
 
“Desire” ebbs and flows. That is perfectly natural.

As married people, in marriage you made vows and promises. One of the foundational truths of marriage is the marital debt. To turn down reasonable requests from your spouse can turn into sin.

Please, seek out counseling. Retrouvaille weekend, if your Parish has “Formed.org” watch both of the “Beloved” series (If your parish does not offer it for free, it is about the same as other video subscriptions like NetFlix or Hulu and worth every penny!)
 
I am a little surprised that the embarrassing [maybe that is why] possibility of the intent being there, and the body not cooperating, has not come up. The OP might be willing, but if your body does not respond, there isn’t much you can do about it, unless you go to the doctor for the blue pill, which may or may not carry health risks. It depends on the OPs overall health condition. It is a very touchy subject. The OP’s wife might have objections to the blue, pill.

We can speak in terms of what the CCC has to say about all of this, but I don’t think anyone should rush to judgement about this situation either. Clearly the OP is concerned about it, as well as his wife, or he would not have started this thread. Kudos to all who have suggested marital counseling. I think that is wise along with visits to the doctor, and or pastoral discussion and assistance.

This is a difficult and complicated situation for both parties. The poor wife did not wake up one day and decide to be heavy or to have these terrible health issues, and the husband only has so much control over his body. There should be matched efforts here, as much as both parties are able to give.

Pax Christi vobiscum
 
EXACTLY. Withholding sex in a valid marriage can be neutral, it can be good (if the spouse is making unjust demands that could lead to spiritual or physical danger), and it can be sinful.

If it were intrinsically evil we would be bound under pain of mortal sin to render the debt even if our spouse were suffering a bipolar manic state and wanted to have sex in the pew during Mass.

Words have meaning.
 
No one said that not rendering the debt one time is intrinsically evil. I did say that not rendering the debt for long periods of time without grave reason is a serious sin.

If an act is intrinsically evil its not always a mortal sin, the sin could be venial or mortal.
 
I’ll talk to my wife about marriage counseling, but it’s hard to find a therapist that is good at what they do and not also going to give anti-Catholic advice.

I suppose I should have expected a substantial number of people tearing me down and jumping to conclusions in spite of this being a Catholic forum. It is the Internet after all. Thanks to those have tried to help.
 
Up somewhere in the 60’s of post numbers the term was bantered about.
 
robertlnorman said:
From you post, you seem like a very passive individual. Don’t be passive–be firm about this. It’s very important to your marriage and for her health.
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I’d go so far as to say that the OP may himself be depressed.
 
There’s something going on, and CAF cannot take the place of qualified medical and psychological advice. :man_shrugging:t2:
 
robertlnorman said:
The weight loss might be a plea for attention. Unfortunately, we’re in this weird cultural climate where it’s seen as a tragedy for men to talk about women’s weight (usually not a problem the other way around, though).
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It’s not actually that weird, if you accept that men and women aren’t exactly the same, and that criticism (even completely fair criticism) of a woman’s appearance may cause her libido to suffer in a way that wouldn’t necessarily be true of a man in the exact same situation.

There’s the potential for a spiral of shame leading to physical and emotional withdrawal leading to more overeating leading to more shame leading to more physical and emotional and withdrawal leading to more overeating…and down and down we go.

You might encounter the same issue with a large husband, but my suspicion is that these behaviors could be triggered at a much lower threshold with women than with men.

As somebody was pointing out, overeating is pleasure-seeking, and the removal of other pleasures (for example marital intimacy) is likely to exacerbate the negative behavior.

This woman needs to learn to replace her eating with other pleasant and enjoyable activities–she can’t be shamed into thinness–at least not long-term, and not in a healthy way.

By the way, I wonder if you shouldn’t ask her doctor if she doesn’t need physical therapy or if there isn’t a specific approach that the doctor favors for people with her issues?

Another thing–one problem with shaming is that she needs to learn to value and care for her body MORE, not less.
 
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Bear in mind that women can be very weird about weight–even women that you might not think have a problem.

Consider Princess Di.

"Diana said: “The bulimia started the week after we got engaged (and would take nearly a decade to overcome.

““My husband put his hand on my waistline and said: ‘Oh, a bit chubby here, aren’t we?’ and that triggered something in me. And the Camilla thing. I was desperate, desperate.”

If even Princess Diana could wind up with a decade-long battle with bulimia after her fiance called her “chubby,” what kind of self-image problems do more average-looking normal women have?

That’s from here:

www.dailystar.co.uk

Princess Diana developed eating disorder 'after Prince Charles called her chubby'

PRINCESS Diana revealed she developed an eating disorder after Prince Charles grabbed her tummy and called her “a bit chubby”, it is claimed.
www.dailystar.co.uk www.dailystar.co.uk
 
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Spyridon said:
Force yourself to take care of her out of love for her.

Shut the lights and close your eyes.
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Guys don’t exactly have the luxury of being able to “lay back and think of England” like women can.

We kinda have to be “into it” for very obvious reasons. This is more difficult to do with age.

@Anon00 you have my sympathy, although I don’t think soliciting the opinions of Catholic internet laity will provide you any headway on the topic. I hope she loses some weight and it works out for both of you.
 
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I suggest asking your Pastor for a recommendation. Not the office lady, not your co-worker.

God Bless you for looking for help and loving your wife!
 
Well, Charles shouldn’t have been entertaining or entering into courtship with a woman when he was in love with another. And that is the most charitable thing I can say about Charles Windsor.

Also, yeah, seemingly trite and thoughtless remarks like that coupled with a ill-suited suitor might make a sweet and insecure girl become bulimic. But, the largest growth in ‘anorexia’ is in middle aged women. Really. I see some in my community. The last time I saw one was at the grocery store. There is a hell on earth. https://www.thesun.co.uk/living/262...ttling-anorexia-and-bulimia-new-figures-warn/
 
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