His and Her Health

I need advice. My wife is no longer interested in having sex. My wife became disinterested in any foreplay, and would tell me "if you're going to do something hurry up and do it." She would then hurry me along and quickly get out of bed to "clean up." All relations must be had in the missionary position, and oral sex was not allowed as it is "nasty." Sexual relations became very infrequent. I decided to be patient and not push the issue. I decided to wait till she was in the mood. This hasn't worked too well as it's been over 18 months since we've had sex. My wife steadfastly refuses to go to a doctor about this saying nothing can be done. My wife is a good person who will do anything for anyone...except deal with this. Is there anything a doctor can do, or is this just my lot in life to deal with? Advice please. Thanks. :confused:

you don't mention any ages for you or her.
kids and ages?
health issues?
weight issues?
how long married?

51 years old for both. Two kids, both grown. Married 30 years. Average weight on both. She had a hysterectomy several years ago. No other health issues. Almost forgot, I'd suggested my wife visit the doctor and perhaps some type of hormone treatment would help. She was not at all interested saying hormone treatments would increase her risk of cancer. She said since she'd be the one being placed at risk of getting cancer she'd have to ignore my suggestion, and that she didn't appreciate me suggesting it since she could get cancer from it. Sign me frustated!

jd5105, here is a link to one of our companion sites with lots of information on menopause. You should read it first and maybe it will help when you talk to your wife about getting a blood work-up for hormone levels .Does she have regular physical exams.She could ask her doctor about her risks of cancer from hormone replacement therapy.
http://www.redhotmamas.org/menopause-health-topics-a-z.html
Also www.menopausewise.com

hjd5105,
hello, i have also had hysterectomy at age 30, now 52. no HRT, only herbs! i know these issues can be resolved with herbs. you just have to study it out. internet makes it easy... NO DOUBT it is hormone related. and i do not subscribe to pharm. RX as i feel they are only concerned about $$$$, and not true health.
good luck to you, and her.

jd- i could have written the same post. same problem here, but mine didn't bring up the cancer reason. she just said she wasn't going to the doctor because she didn't want to. not interested at all. we're a few years older than you and her reasoning is that we've had sex for 25 years, let's take the next 25 years off. huh? i love you, just don't touch me. or why don't i just take care of it yourself. i've heard 'em all.

In my opinion, NO one has the right to unilaterally end another person's sex life. If she doesn't want to do it herself, ask her if it would be OK for you to seek it elsewhere. It could be a professional, or perhaps a woman in the same situation as you. But how can she ask you to forsake all others and then forsake you? If she doesn't understand how deep and natural a need this is, I'd suggest counseling. Taking care of yourself only goes so far (as you know). Intimacy with another human is an innate need. She may not realize it now, but losing intimacy will weaken the marriage. I hope the two of you can find ways to maintain intimacy, even if it doesn't mean actual intercourse.

(I would give the same advice to either party, male or female.)

jd5105 and ohdy, that makes three on this thread that are in the same situation -- my wife is done with sex, doesn't want to talk about it, much less do anything about it. If I keep bringing up the subject, she accuses me of trying to upset her because she knows that I know that bringing it up upsets her. And upsetting her is the last thing that's going to make her feel like having sex. Catch-22 all around.

As for the advice given by all the other replies, reread the original post -- she steadfastly refuses to deal with it.

About the only thing you can do, unless you want to divorce, or stay celibate in the marriage, is to make it clear what the choices are for you. Since she doesn't want to be bothered with 1,000 different "good reasons" to have sex, or "things she needs to check", like hormones, childhood influences, abuse, etc., etc., you want to ask just one simple thing: If sex is irrelevant to her, then she shouldn't mind if you do something irrelevant with someone else. It should all be irrelevant, right?

eva_m, I agree, no one has the right to unilaterally end another person's sex life. As I see it, if you shut off your spouse, you have essentially given them the permission to go outside the marriage for sex.

It doesn't really make sense to shut off your spouse, and then call them a cheater if they go outside the marriage.

My sympathies, jd5105. I am in the same boat, more or less. It's tough, it hurts, it's hard on our self-esteem, and it's terribly confusing.

I wish I could offer more than sympathies, but you and I, and many of us on this board, are looking for the same answers.

Patient, I think you and I have posted on similar topics and run into each other on other postings. Give the turn in this thread, and your most recent posting, I am for the first time ever considering stepping outside the marriage for sex. I desperately don't want to, I have been faithful, I want to love my wife. I don't want a divorce. I don't want to be celibate. I don't want to cheat. Obviously, I can't have everything.

I am interested in opinions from others that have stepped out. Did the marriage survive? Was it done with consent? Was it a huge mistake?

I wonder how she would react if you told her you were thinking of going outside the marriage for sex since she is not interested in being a wife to you.It sounds like a passive-aggressive control thing.

Moderator, I asked my wife just that, and she said no. She does not want me to have a friend with benefits. She thinks I should just take care of it by myself.

I think it's natural to see it this way if you have not felt any sexual desire yourself for many years. It makes sense that she would come to think of my daily need as a mere biological itch and buikdup that just needs a biological release. She sees it as a waste of time, not to mention boring and messy.

I've Been married for 21 years. I returned from a deployment in Iraq in late 2007 (military for 26 years) and had ED issues since then. I have always had to 'chase' my wife for sex. I can think of only a couple incidents that she actually initiated it in 21 years. I need to be wanted. I still love her deeply but have been unsatisfied for years. I made a commitment and want to stick to it, but I'm finding that difficult since my return from the War. I think I deserve more. We are both 44 years old now and I can say I find her attractive still and tell her so often. I have addressed the ED issue with medical help but 2 to 3 times a month is average. Maybe im asking for too much, im not sure. Our kids are almost all grow now and gone most of the time. Im tired of chasing her and essentially begging for her attentions. I try to play the stoic man and deal with it but its hard to do when i need the attention.

To the men here, when it comes to sex, it's very important to understand that women are different, and they have different issues at different times in their lives. And much of this IS NO REFLECTION ON YOU, sometimes even when your wife might say it is. When you no longer want sex, it's natural to thinkt that it's due to something external. It can get to ridiculous proportions, such as when my wife once speculated that she doesn't want sex with me because there was a time, over a year earlier, when I said something that upset her, and which, until that time, she never thought was important enough to even discuss.

If your best male friend has a wife who is hot for him and can't get enough of him in bed, and your wife couldn't care less, it's all too easy to feel that you are somehow a big loser and total klutz. Do not compare yourself to other couples this way.

Having a wife who is totaly uninterested in sex can also be very frustrating from a social-expectations point of view in America. You thought that when you married it meant that you were going to reap the rewards of focusing all of your sexual energy on one person, and having that turn into something deeper and better than any casual or short-term relationship you've ever had before. And instead, that person says no to sex! So here you go from being a single young man, where any woman was a potential sex partner for the night, to being married where you are in a sexual prison. Great!! And then you turn around and get bombarded with all this stuff from women, and talk on Oprah, about how all men are dogs because they cheat -- having sex with their wives, and than going around and having sex with lots of other women at the same time. Bull!! I'm having sex with NOBODY. Yeah, I'm a real dog, right! At this point, you have NO GOOD OPTIONS. The more you try to show your wife you love her and want sex, the more grief you get. If you try to have sex with another woman, you're a total dog. If you suggest divorce, you're a homewrecker and you have to explain to your kids that you're leaving their mother. In fact, if you try to do anything to have sex, you're nothing but a creep. You have no options. It feels like crap, and it's a problem you can't solve quickly, certainly not within any time scale that your sexual biology is demanding. It totally sucks.

I used to think that it was strange that women would be suspicious of married men who claimed their wives were shutting them off -- as if these women couldn't believe wives would ever do such a thing. And yet, I'm sure there are some women who think married men are dogs, and they are the very same women have have shut off their husbands. Duh!

The answer, of course, is that women are all different. Don't look at it as a gender who is against you. It's a particular person who is having difficulty, and loss of sexual desire happens to individuals of both genders. It helps to realize this to keep yourself from running out with another woman who shows interest in you just to prove this point.

When men and women are in their 20’s and early 30’s the levels of sex hormones, the hormones that strongly influence sexual activity are at normal levels. As both men and women get older the levels of these hormones begin to sharply drop off in women while they only taper off slowly for men. By age 45 a woman’s sex hormone levels are extremely low. Since the level of sex hormones strongly influence sexual activity this is a very good explanation for why a woman would lose not only interest in sex but the ability to respond sexually.

It would seem that replacing hormones to normal levels would be a good idea but clinical studies have appeared to show that this is a bad and unhealthy idea. Looking at the details of these studies shows only poor replacement of hormones was done and that this is what’s unhealthy. None of these studies measured any hormone levels and none have tried to replace all of the sex hormones. The only information that is available is the poor results of poor replacement studies.

What is reassuring is that there are lots of good studies that replace other hormones and show how healthy it can be when restored to youthful levels. Look at how much healthier diabetics are when given the proper amount of insulin (it’s a hormone) and how much healthier people are when their thyroid hormone is replaced in the proper amount. People who have low growth hormone are also much healthier when it is replaced.

There is a big difference between the successful studies like the ones for insulin and thyroid hormones and studies for sex hormone replacement on women. The difference is that all other hormone trials measure the levels of the hormones so your doctor can know what the best amount to prescribe is. This is very important because when you work with hormones you get the best health benefits when you get the healthiest amount. When your doctor doesn’t have those numbers then he is uncomfortable prescribing. Unfortunately, when it comes to prescribing sex hormones for women there are no guidelines published at all.

It is very reassuring to know that when hormones like insulin and thyroid hormone are replaced in the proper levels a person is healthier for it. So if you consider replacing very low levels of sex hormones to youthful levels that it is likely a healthy thing to do. The only tough part is that none of the clinical studies on sex hormone replacement measured any levels. A reasonable approach based on other successful hormone trials would be for you and your doctor to use youthful levels as your guide.

So talk to your wife about supplementing her sex hormones as it could improve her overall health as well as help her be able to respond sexually.