Struggling Marriage.
 

Hi!

Thought I would join and share a bit of my story and get some advice.
My goal is to create happiness for myself and the people I love in my life. I don't always live up to that though.

I've been married to 4 and 1/2 years to the girl of my dreams. She is wonderful, beautiful, smart, adventurous and everything I could ever want.

We were mormon when we married. I now believe all organized religions are missing the point. To love others and achieve your full potential. At the same time I was on my way out of the mormon faith my wife found out I looked at pornography and masturbated.

I had been lying to her about it. And it nearly caused a divorce. That was almost 3 years ago. We have gone to counseling (by the way I recommend you stay away from any LDS Family Services Counselors they told us to read our scriptures and say our prayers and go to the temple and everything would be ok)

We did Find a good counselor and it seems to have helped. He taught us not be angry at eachother, but the situation and work together to fix it.

Every time I look at porn and masturbate she has requested that I tell her to help build her trust. So I do. I've looked at i about 5 times in the last 3 years and masturbated a bit more.

She doesn't believe me she says in her bones she knows I am lying. (she thinks I am looking at porn more often but not telling her)

Sex was always painful for her. We haven't had sex in 3 years. We do other things about 1 -2 a month, or every other month. I am very sexually unsatisfied.

She doesn't trust me, won't forgive me and hates being intimate with me.

I hope things will get better but she won't even go see the OB/GYN like the counselor asked her to. When I "check in" with her and say I haven't looked at porn or masturbated today she responds just tell me the truth I know you are lying to me.

I don't want to be in a sexless marriage. I want to be in a marriage where my wife loves me and wants me. I don't know if things will ever get better if I stay. I would miss her terribly if I left. She is my best friend and I love spending time with her hiking, camping, going on dates.

We have the most wonderful daughter and I can't bear the thought of not seeing her every day.

What suggestions do you have on how can I meet my needs and my wifes?

How can I help her trust me again? Is there anything I can do?

I wish I could change the situation. I don't want a divorce I just want her love.

Thanks for taking your time to read this.

I am so impressed with you sharing this you story with us as difficult as it is. Welcome to the forum. :D

I understand being in a marriage where both spouses go to church and I understand being a wife. I am also a counselor and have spent time with couples helping them in their marriage.

With that I agree that you need a wife who is going to love you sexually and no sex in three years is difficult for you. Who could bare it? I do not promote masturbation or pornography. But I can see your yearning for deeper affection.

Now about your wife. Are you following up with the counselor on her going to the GYN. If she is not making effort patience is needed. She needs to be accountable by someone besides you to prompt her to go. I suggest contacting the counselor again if you haven't. You should not, I repeat you should not be in a sexless marriage. I am happy you have been faithful to her this far.

Another thing this check up system is one sided. I feel she should also be spending more time seeing what she can do to fix her side of the problem. Between us she may have a lack of honesty as well. Some women just say sex hurts when there may be a deeper issue like she does not want to get pregnant again. The first may have been too traumatic. or honestly they don't want to mess up their body. There is definitely a fear that needs to be addressed. It could be a host of things like birth control issues. Or hopefully she is not seeing some else.

Whatever it is you will have to get to the bottom of things address your needs and let her respond. True love will do whatever it takes. Then make your own decision based on responses and what you feel is best.

Hope this helps.
-Dream.

In my opinion (without knowing either of you) the lying and hiding your habits is far more destructive to your relationship than the porn and the masturbating.

Otherwise I agree with Dream.

there is nothing wrong with looking at porn & masturbating..yes, lying & hiding is not good. but she needs to get over it.. She should be thankful that you didn't have an affair like a regular guy would in a sexless marriage.

Sounds like she's not really trying.. If sex really hurts her then she should have no problem with seeing her gyn about it. You need to tell her that you cant live like this and you deserve to be with someone that wants you.

I think the issue to her might be I lied to her. Now she can't trust me and she doesn't feel safe enough to have sex with me. I am scared that she will never let go of my past sins and forgive me and trust me again.

if she loves you, she will. I highly doubt she will ever find a guy that is 100% "perfect" I would understand how she's acting if u went and slept with a bunch of other women and lied about it... but seriously over porn? most men don't tell their wives about it.. she probably looks at it too...

heres an idea ask her to watch it with you, maybe it will help put her in the mood and after you guys are done she will be over the fact that you lied about it in the past.

Is your love based upon physical satisfaction or something deeper?

Oh boy... I think ur awesome for just being able to share that and for Wong faithful, you really must love her. I think you will find your answer by asking/ answering other questions:

One: do you have children- if yes- how is this issue affecting them.
Two: How much (subjectively) are you willing to sacrifice for this relationship- are you willing to follow Mormonism the same way he does even if you feel like it hasn't hit the spot
Three: how much (objectively) should you have to do to make this work?
Four: what has she said about trusting you?
Five: does she love you?
Sixsome people have noted- it's a hit and miss: is she interested in investing in the marriage?
Seven: this whole no sex thing- was that happening before the whole pornography fiasco?

From what you at it seems like all the answers will come out quite possitively- that you both love being with each other - when it comes to broken trust- is she more bothered that you don't share the same strength of belief as her? Or that you lied?

imho a relationship in which one person acts as if they are superior to the other, or puts themself into a role of an authority figure, requiring the other to 'answer to them', gain their approval, check in with a report on behavior, etc .... is more like a parent and a child, than a relating of two adult individuals. when this dynamic is present, the two people are not on equal footing in the first place. for me, this would be the very first thing i would want to rectify.

If you continue to permit her to 'shame' you, and allow her to have authority over you, the relationship will never be balanced and healthy. i would never be able to have sexual intimacy - or any other kind for that matter - with someone who interacts with me as if i'm a bad child that has to "obey" them. that keeps you in a "one down" position, with her holding all cards and calling all shots, with you having to beg for every crumb, and "be a good boy" so you might get some. FEH!

i can't offer any specific 'action' you could take to address this, but emotionally speaking, just standing up for yourself (in whatever form that may take for you), could go a long way to bringing balance back into the relationship. if at the most basic level, you could manage to return to relating to one another like adults of equal value, you can begin to work on the rest.

i also agree with others who commented she is also accountable, and is avoiding responsibility. it seems as though she is 'blaming, shaming, judging', and making you 'totally' wrong for everything... assuming no responsibility for what she has also brought to this party. but BOTH of you created this situation, and it requires both people's accountability, action, and willingness to share in doing whatever it takes to move beyond it, so you can have a healthy intimate relationship - and that requires respect, accountability, fairness, and an honest good-faith comittment from each person towards the other.

please at the very least take a stand for yourself. if i was in your position, i'd advise my partner i'm declining their request/demand that i 'check in'; that I'm happy to share with them, or give a 'heads up' when I'm motivated to, and they're free to either accept/believe that what i tell them is the truth, or they don't have to - that's on them. But i would flat out refuse to agree to put myself in that position.

i wish you the best....

Love rules....if the love between you two is deep enough, pure enough, then her issues and your issues will find resolution. It will be worth it, but it won't be pretty.

If the love isn't deep enough, then these challenges become a wake up call to what really exists between you. You'll have a power struggle with no winners and two losers. Love can't exist in a competition. It exists in surrender. A true surrender isn't a choice but the byproduct in this case of a deep harmony that makes you inseparable. If it's not deep enough by nature, then you are separable and these unreconcilable differences (because one or both people are not open minded) become the wedge that forces you apart.

When there's judgment instead of compassion know that there is a closed mind due to a lifestyle of beliefs instead of an exploration of life. You already have lived this as you said that you see that all organized religions are missing the point. And the point is that belief systems are in fact human will, not God's Will. They are unnatural. They are an idea that doesn't hold water and requires repetition to take hold of your mind because your true nature rejects them.

How can God's Will be anything other that people simply being themselves?

It's when we can't be ourselves that we have a problem. It leads to a confused mind that can't figure out what's wrong. The theology makes sense but life doesn't seem to fit with it. In that tension of not knowing what's really wrong, we seek relief. We find ways to get the mind to take a break. When we can escape this mental confusion, it feels good!

Who is ever happy confused? No one! Who is happy when there's a clear vision of life? Everyone!

(No judgment here...just observation...ok? :):):))

Drugs, alcohol, porn, misused sex, dreams, religions, hopes, entertainment, etc...., all are artificial ways to trick the mind into resting, providing relief.

Porn and mastubation give you the double bonus of not only relief from your stress but also relief from your instinctual God-given sex drive that is there to keep the human species in business for another generation. So you get to kill two birds with one stone. It's free and is physically not hurtful. You're getting a natural release as far as your body is concerned but not healthy for your mind. In fact, it's an unhealthy confused mind that drives this need to get relief. Better to do it that way than through drugs as drugs hurt the body and the finances, e.g.

You don't want your wife to give you sex if she's not enjoying it. It isn't loving to ask her to be in pain for your pleasure. But the sex instinct is unyielding. It's a push to have sex not a consciousness seeing the pain in her.

You don't have a choice to be celebate. To choose to not masturbate is repression which creates obsession. You are a sexual being so that won't work.

The real celebacy is when you figure out that sex isn't happiness and that we only need these escapes because of the tension of not being able to be our true selves and because we don't recognize who our true selves are. So someone that realizes self, that realizes the innate joy of being alive no longer needs sex for the escape. He still enjoys sex that arises out of love as it's a fulfillment of a joint physical need, but no longer is it driven from a tense mind that needs pornographic experiences to get the narcotic relief.

When the true self is seen, it's impossible not to love and accept yourself. The divine being that you are and the miracle of the human body and mind are awe inspiring!

What's ugly is what we do to escape the tension of not knowing self. The addictions, the ego gratifications, the objectifying of women's bodies, possessiveness, and so on. All these drop in an instant when we realize what we are and that we've wasted our lives trying to become something we can never be.

On top of this confusion are the dogmas we blindly inject into our minds, only increasing our confusion and need to escape. When these dogmas become habitual thinking, the mind becomes an enemy to growth. Whatever is said or seen that is counter to the habitual thinking will be rejected. This is exactly what perpetuates organized religions from generation to generation. These theologies are indoctrinated into the children before they know what is happening to their minds and they carry this closed mindedness to there graves. Very few of us escape their grasp.

I'm suspecting your wife is stuck in a dogma driven closedmindedness and it seems as though you escaped. So you may have two challenges....depth of the true natural harmony and someone unaware of her mental trap.

You can't make her happy no more than she can make you happy. If you're ready to grow but she isn't, you can't do much about that and you can't decide not to "see" when you see. You won't be happy keeping the peace nor trying to push her. All you can truly do is keep growing and let allow life to take it's natural course.

Masturbation is not some degrading sin. It's perfectly natural. You do not need your wife's permission to do so. Unless of course you do it so much it inhibits your relationship with your wife. It doesn't seem like that is happening at all though.

You seem like you are genuinely trying, but she sounds like she is not. You haven't had sex in three years? And she still expects you not to masturbate?

The fact that she does not even attempt to go get this painful sex problem checked out just shows her disrespect for you. She expects you to do all of the work in the relationship. She has no right to get on your case about trust.

I certainly think your marriage needs help. If you didn't have a child together, I would actually suggest you think about leaving, but once there's a child in the picture it becomes a LOT more difficult to leave.

You really need to get to the core of this problem. Yes, you lied...but you didn't lie about cheating on her, or about being a serial killer, or about any REALLY BAD thing. You lied to her about your use of pornography and masturbation (obviously because she doesn't approve and you didn't want to upset her). I do see a difference between lying about something really important and something not so major ;).

Now, you have to check in and confess each and every time you masturbate, which is really beyond a joke. I think masturbation is something private that the majority of people do, that SHOULDN'T need to be discussed with anyone else! In a healthy marriage your wife wouldn't care two hoots about you masturbating (especially as you haven't had sex in THREE YEARS, how on earth does she expect you to deal with your sexual needs and frustrations??!).

I understand a bit why she's more upset over the pornography (I don't necessarily think porn is evil... but I do understand why some women don't like their husbands to view it).

I think avoiding porn is one thing, but avoiding masturbation is another altogether!

I would suggest you go back to counselling, and I would suggest you stand firm on the issue of masturbation. It is not evil, it is not a sin, and it's pretty much the only way short of having sex with another woman, that you're going to get any sexual pleasure or release!

It is more worrying that after all this time she can't forgive you or trust you. I understand that trust needs to be earned, but as I said earlier, it's not as if you did anything really bad! You did what 99% of the male population do at some time or other (okay I made up that statistic :p but I'd be extremely surprised if the percentage was much lower). I would understand her perspective more if you'd actually had an affair with another woman!

For your marriage to work, both of you have to want to make it work. At the moment it seems like she's calling the shots and you're miserable.

A person alone isn't a liar. Lies are told to closed minded people to avoid conflict and retribution. Who tells a lie to a truly open minded person? I don't. What is the need? I won't be judged or punished.

A closed minded person can't handle the truth, doesn't want the truth and will punish the truth. That person deserves the lies.

Closed minded people have a superiority thing about them. They don't deserve respect beyond basic human dignity.

10000% agree with this, it is my own experience exactly.

*reps RonSouther here publically * (only cause the system won't let me do it again the regular way) :D

:d:d:d:d:d:d:d:d

Lots of good feedback.

I think I will setup another appointment with our counselor.

I'm going to give my marriage everything I've got. It didn't get married to get divorced just because things have been really hard.

I wonder how long I can last without sex. I really don't want to find out. 3 years is 3 years to many.

I hope for a sex life that's fun and close and frequent and something that my wife really wants to do with me because she wants me and she wants me to feel good and loved.

I hope for an equal marriage where I feel like I don't have to walk around on egg shells, where it's ok for me to want to have sex.

Thats interesting point about lies

"Lies are told to closed minded people to avoid conflict and retribution.

A closed minded person can't handle the truth, doesn't want the truth and will punish the truth.

Closed minded people have a superiority thing about them. They don't deserve respect beyond basic human dignity."

She and I were both raised mormons. Taught the earth was only 6 thousand years old and sex before marriage was the worse thing you could ever do.

In mormon doctrine the only thing worse than having sex outside of marriage is murder.

Alot of mormon women have guilt about sex and I know alot of mormon men who look at porn and masturbate. I think its sad how guilty I was made to feel while growing up. I thought I was a really terrible person. Then one day I learned over 90% of men masturbate that was a suprising thing for me to learn. It changed my perspective a bit.

My wife and I like to read books together. Do you have any good book recomendations?

Great book...

Online Store - Intimacy: Trusting Oneself and the Other

"Letting Go"...A Beautiful Quote and The Heart of Profound-Self-Help.com

i also thinks it's sad that religious dogma is SO based upon shame and blame, and the 'only way out' (according to the propaganda) is to "obey" 'their' rules. again, here is a system which is based upon framing adult human beings as inferior, "bad little children". it's sickening to me that so many people are so willing to buy into this, and believe that they are inherently 'bad', that natural human behaviors are 'sinful' or wrong, and they must grovel and beg to get 'redemption' (aka the approval of the 'superior' authority figure - who is also just a human being) (i call 'emperor has no clothes' on worshiping other human beings as 'god') - to be considered worthy human beings.

it's no WONDER so many people have a fundamental belief that they're "not good enough". This is what organized religion has turned us into. what a waste of life....

i applaud you for looking beyond that, and for seeing that there's freedom and value in a life well-lived outside of narrow dogmatic beliefs.

Hi there,

Just wanted to let you know that you are not alone. There are so many more people in a loving, yet sexless marriage then you can imagine.

I think the first thing for you to do is decide what you would do if this would never change. If for the rest of your life you would not have sex with her, would you stay with her?

If the answer is no, have a talk with her about this. It is not about blackmail, but it is about being honest with her and letting her know what the situation is.

At that moment, she can decide if the marriage is worth enough for her to work on the issue or not.


Another thing I would tell her is that from now on you are not going to "confess" to her when you masturbated or watched porn. You can tell her that you will continue to do it, that it is no secret, but that you do not have to confess anything to her! (Unless it turns her on, and you can use it for foreplay!).


Also, it might be helpful for her to know (which she might not know, given her upbringing) is that the release a person gets from masturbation is completely different then the release that someone gets from engaging in a loving sexual activity with a person they really love or care about.

Masturbation is about release. Mainly physical and only a tiny bit emotional release of sexual feelings and stress that hides in the body.

Sexual activities together are based on sharing, enjoying, loving, expressing, giving and taking.

Good luck!

(I am someone who made the decision that even if things don't change, I will still stay in my marriage. Things are slightly better now, but nowhere near where I would like them to be. However, for me, my marriage and everything around it is worth this one incompatibility. If it is for you, that only you can decide. And I am not going to lie to you. It is difficult, and it is hard, and it hurts a lot of the time....)

This can be a powerful book re: sexual intimacy. It also talks about "problems" and how to work through them.

Amazon.com: The Heart of Tantric Sex: A Unique Guide to Love and Sexual Fulfillment (9781903816370): Diana Richardson: Books

I'm not familiar with Mormon doctrine, so can't really say if it goes against their teaching. The book talks a lot about energy fields, chakras, etc.

Ultimately, courage is going to be required for her to walk through whatever issues she's facing.

I see your point, but there is the element of honor that should be considered when lying to a spouse. That is, if there is any honor in the relationship. Most of what people say is lies anyway, whether intentional or just because that is the way our culture communicates.

If everyone started telling the truth, after the chaos of the world adjusting itself was over, the world would be a perfect place. But there is too much at stake most of the time to tell the truth.

That's a wholly different topic...

"The forces of retribution are always listening, they never sleep."

The lying is a symptom of an epidemic. If everyone could handle the truth, they would be told the truth. Retribution makes being honest a punishment. The lying will stop when people grow up and welcome it, not condemn it. Lies are only told because of closed minded people.

I think the person lying also has some responsibility to address their own fears.

Let the closed minded person wallow in their own discomfort until they're ready to grow. Their "retribution" only has as much power as the receiver gives it.

Be honest...and choose who you spend time with wisely.

I've been on the deceitful end. I had to learn to let the "punisher" rage at my truth.

The onus is also on the one who lies. If one is comfortable with lying to another person, I imagine that they would also lie to themselves. The theory of the closed minded recipient of the lie would then also have to include the self, and an inability to align with the values adopted within the relationship.

Relating directly to the topic, masturbation and other forms of pure, healthy sensory pleasure are not the business of anyone but the subject. The only reason anyone would ever feel shame or hurt that their companion is masturbating is that they are not receiving the same intimacy and pleasure and want to, or they have entered into a belief system that this act is spiritually shameful. We are on this physical plane to enjoy the pleasures and gifts of our bodies and the bounty of the earth. There are life lessons within the topic of intimacy though, which might be considered or addressed in this situation.

There is always a soulful lesson in any hurtful experience. It's always deeper than the physical aspects, if you're willing to explore the heart of the matter.

Totally agree with you. :-)