Trying this and need help /advice

[AloneHere]

My husband and I have been married for over 10 years. He has always been open about wanting lots of sex and with many partners. We have tried various forms of open relationships, mostly involving casual threesomes in the past. For the last five years or so we have been having trouble being sexual with each other. I have a lot of pain during intercourse which has caused me to avoid sex. This obviously caused him to be angry with me and hurt. He felt like he wasn't getting what he needed in the relationship. It came to a head a couple months ago and we started a "don't ask don't tell" open relationship. He could go out and just wouldn't tell me what he was doing etc. I could pretend like it wasn't happening and not feel hurt. It didn't really solve anything because we still were not having sex or feeling intimate with each other. It came to a head again about two weeks ago and he was t day to call it. At that point I asked him what he needed and he needed to be able to see other people. He told me often that he is too sexual to just be with one person and even if we could get my pain issue under control he would still need to sleep with other people.
The transition over the past two weeks has been really hard and emotional for me. I feel like I am being thrust into a full poly relationship with no time really to get used to it. I feel like I have come to understand and accept the sleeping with other people and of course I don't want him to feel that every one of his outside relationships needs to be a one night stand BUT now he is saying that he is in love with one of the women he is seeing and I feel really hurt by this. I can't help but feel like this is not what he led me to believe he needed previously- as he made it seem like it was all about sex.
I should mention that we had a really good breakthrough in the midst of all this regarding our sex life and had some really great nights and sex. During this one we both felt incredibly close and hopeful about the future. I finally felt like I could be intimate with him again. Like my sex drive came back after being gone for years and we were working through my intercourse pain. Some of it stemmed from my feeling like he didn't care that it hurt me and like I was just too boring in bed. We literally fist bumped at one point because the sex had been so good, like I had my "groove back".
Anyway, now I am trying to move past him simply sleeping with other people and trying to accept that he wants to LOVE other people and and have other committed relationships. I'm having a much harder time with the idea of him being in love with someone else and don't really understand why he can't keep it casual. Not one night stands but not "In Love".
Do you have any advice? I can't stand to end the relationship because I really love him.

PS he isn't really ok with me seeing other people. Also he gets angry and defensive whenever I bring up my feelings of jealousy or feeling hurt. This makes it difficult to talk with him and sometimes I feel like I have to just suck it up and take whatever he wants to give me so he doesn't walk.

 

[vinsanity0]

Hi, and welcome!

My husband and I have been married for over 10 years. He has always been open about wanting lots of sex and with many partners. We have tried various forms of open relationships, mostly involving casual threesomes in the past. For the last five years or so we have been having trouble being sexual with each other. I have a lot of pain during intercourse which has caused me to avoid sex. This obviously caused him to be angry with me and hurt. He felt like he wasn't getting what he needed in the relationship. It came to a head a couple months ago and we started a "don't ask don't tell" open relationship. He could go out and just wouldn't tell me what he was doing etc. I could pretend like it wasn't happening and not feel hurt. It didn't really solve anything because we still were not having sex or feeling intimate with each other.

Well, poly isn't meant to solve something in an existing relationship.It can add to a relationship in some ways, but that shouldn't be the purpose. If a couple is having problems they need to work those out. It's best to do that before taking the leap.

It came to a head again about two weeks ago and he was t day to call it. At that point I asked him what he needed and he needed to be able to see other people. He told me often that he is too sexual to just be with one person and even if we could get my pain issue under control he would still need to sleep with other people.
The transition over the past two weeks has been really hard and emotional for me. I feel like I am being thrust into a full poly relationship with no time really to get used to it. I feel like I have come to understand and accept the sleeping with other people and of course I don't want him to feel that every one of his outside relationships needs to be a one night stand BUT now he is saying that he is in love with one of the women he is seeing and I feel really hurt by this. I can't help but feel like this is not what he led me to believe he needed previously- as he made it seem like it was all about sex.

There is always a "risk" of falling in love with someone you are screwing. That is why that no romance rule rarely works out.

I should mention that we had a really good breakthrough in the midst of all this regarding our sex life and had some really great nights and sex. During this one we both felt incredibly close and hopeful about the future. I finally felt like I could be intimate with him again. Like my sex drive came back after being gone for years and we were working through my intercourse pain. Some of it stemmed from my feeling like he didn't care that it hurt me and like I was just too boring in bed. We literally fist bumped at one point because the sex had been so good, like I had my "groove back".

Sounds awesome.

Anyway, now I am trying to move past him simply sleeping with other people and trying to accept that he wants to LOVE other people and and have other committed relationships. I'm having a much harder time with the idea of him being in love with someone else and don't really understand why he can't keep it casual. Not one night stands but not "In Love".
Do you have any advice? I can't stand to end the relationship because I really love him.

I suggest doing some research. You will see that it is perfectly natural for people to be able to love more than one person.

But...

PS he isn't really ok with me seeing other people. Also he gets angry and defensive whenever I bring up my feelings of jealousy or feeling hurt. This makes it difficult to talk with him and sometimes I feel like I have to just suck it up and take whatever he wants to give me so he doesn't walk.

This is not good. Why is it okay for him but not for you? Obviously he has some jealousy and insecurity issues of his own, yet gets angry when you try to discuss your feelings? He needs to do some reading as well.

You guys are not ready for this. It sounds like it will take awhile for you to be. It's time for a serious talk.

And ask yourself why you want to be with someone who has no considertion for you.

 

[FallenAngelina]

For the last five years or so we have been having trouble being sexual with each other. I have a lot of pain during intercourse which has caused me to avoid sex. ...my sex drive came back after being gone for years .....my feeling like he didn't care that it hurt me and like I was just too boring in bed. .... I feel like I have to just suck it up and take whatever he wants to give me so he doesn't walk.

Five years is a very long time to be having sexual issues with a spouse. What is the pain all about for you? I suspect that it's much deeper than just physical. This is important for you to explore - the origins of this pain. You focus a tremendous amount on your husband's feelings, needs, desires, reactions, etc. What you mention of your own feelings, well, it's mostly about inadequacy and not being enough. Even your brief high-fiving period led to a huge let down for you and even deeper feelings of inadequacy.

There's a lot going on with your husband that is highly distracting, understandably, but as you make your way through this, keep in mind that a partner can only be as hurtful as we ourselves hurt. His behavior illuminates a great deal of pain in you, it doesn't create this pain. What is your pain all about? Focusing on the source of your existing pain is what will ultimately get you to a better place. Standard relationship advice will all be about his behavior and while that might temporarily soothe you (if he cooperates) it will not get to the heart of your self-perception of "I'm not enough." The long term solution isn't to get him to change his behavior, nor is it to break up with him because both of these actions leave you unchanged and you'll just roll off of him onto a partner who brings up the same issue. This isn't about your husband's needs, this is about your pain. That pain is talking to you and there's a lot of wisdom and good information in there for you to explore.

 

[GalaGirl]

I am sorry you struggle.

FWIW, these things pop out to me from your post.

For the last five years or so we have been having trouble being sexual with each other. I have a lot of pain during intercourse which has caused me to avoid sex. This obviously caused him to be angry with me and hurt. He felt like he wasn't getting what he needed in the relationship.

I'm in that stage of life with perimenopause/menopause weirdness. We've had to adjust how we make love to accommodate my having pain sometimes during sex. I didn't pick this out. I just have to deal with it and my therapies.

I am not sure what your source of sexual pain is... but I can guess you didn't pick it out to have. I don't see why he's angry/taking it personally. Does he believe you "owe" him sex and are now not giving him what he's entitled to?

I am being thrust into a full poly relationship with no time really to get used to it.

Well... you are.

If you had a standing DADT agreement that you could live with, why was he telling you about loving one of his other partners? Doesn't that break the DADT agreement? You seemed ok with his other partners being regular partners. They did not have to be one night stands.

He gets angry and defensive whenever I bring up my feelings of jealousy or feeling hurt.

So... is the expectation that you listen to him talk about his feelings and accommodate for him but he doesn't have to listen to you talk about yours or accommodate for you? Sounds like a double standard.

he isn't really ok with me seeing other people.

Also sounds like a double standard. It is one thing for both you to be free to date and YOU choose not to exercise that option. It's another for HIM to tell you that you cannot have that option.

sometimes I feel like I have to just suck it up and take whatever he wants to give me so he doesn't walk.

I think you pretty much call it right. In this relationship, you are expected to suck it up and take scraps.

Are you happy in that sort of relationship? It doesn't sound like it.

Do you have any advice? I can't stand to end the relationship because I really love him.

If you could live with DADT, then you have to tell him to STOP telling you extra details because he's breaking the agreement. There is not need to be telling you extra stuff like he loves his other partner X.

If he will not respect that boundary? If you love him, but staying in this relationship is bringing you a lot of hurt? I suggest you do some soul searching. I think you have to love YOU 51% more than anyone else. You can love them a whole lot, even up to 49% of your love. But you get the largest share. Because that stops you from doing things that could hurt you. That allows you to say to them "No, not even for you will I do that. That would hurt me."

Even if you don't like thinking about it? You may have to think about leaving and decide to love him from afar. Because loving him "up close" hurts you a lot.

There has to be more than love. There must also be respect.

Galagirl

 

[AloneHere]

Thanks for the replies. I know I didn't do enough reading about polyamory before posting, so I plan to do that as we move forward. Part of the problem
was that every article I *had* read seamed to take the loving multiple people aspect as a given. This didn't assist me in coming to terms with it within myself. It was a an extremely new concept to me in terms of my own relationship. I was certainly aware of polyamory and know that it is necessary and wonderful for a lot of people. Karen is correct in that a lot of my negative feelings about it come back to my own feelings of inadequacy.

The breakthrough regarding my sex life with my husband had to do with him going on hormone therapy a few weeks ago. He realized as a result that he had been having progressively more difficulty maintaining an erection but never knew it was a medical issue. His libido/desire to have sex had not changed. This caused many a long discussion of sex and all the surrounding feelings. But it feels like now that we just had a missing puzzle piece and without it the problem could not be understood. He previously felt that our sex problems were all stemming from my frigidity and my lack of interest in sex. I am very emotionally involved with sex and the feeling like he was impatient with me and my pain issues made me feel progressively less and less interested in sex.

My medical issue was real in the sense that I did need surgery which I had last summer. It was also a very emotion based problem as Karen mentioned because after the surgery, despite the seeming correction of the problem, our sex life did not improve. The pain continued and I felt more hopeless than ever. Once he admitted (about a week ago) that he had been putting all of the blame for our sex problems onto me and that he actually had not been very patient during sex I suddenly felt like I could try to be sexual again. It was extremely emotionally significant for me to have successful fulfilling sex after so long because I had *really* started to believe that I was defectively non-sexual.

My post last night was a little more desperate sounding than it probably needed to be. I had convinced myself during the day that he was going to respond badly to my continued fears. He did not react negatively at all and we had a long discussion last night.

Is there anything anyone would suggest I read regarding a commited marriage becoming more open? I guess what I'm looking for is examples of different types of relationships that will help me understand what I want to get out of this and what I can accept as far as his level of involvement in outside relationships. I have read some things which all seem to describe a certain type of poly relationship where the secondary relationship is close to equal or completely equal to the primary relationship. I'm wondering if some polyamorous couples have other experiences and what that looks like.

I would also like to mention that I'm fully aware that we have gone into this change from a very difficult place and that ideally you decide to open the relationship when everything is good and all are feeling close etc. I do not want to lose my best friend and companion so it is worth it to me to try this even though it is hard.

I said in my original post that he would not be okay with me also being open to other relationships. After our talk last night I think that he is actually okay with it, provided I'm not doing out of a desire to hurt him. Which is reasonable obviously as I wouldn't want him to do that either.

Thank you for reading this and for any other thought or insight you may have.

 

[AloneHere]

If you had a standing DADT agreement that you could live with, why was he telling you about loving one of his other partners? Doesn't that break the DADT agreement? You seemed ok with his other partners being regular partners. They did not have to be one night stands.

We had decided to start being more honest about what was going on about two weeks ago. The DADT arrangement wasn't working. It was logistically almost impossible due to our work schedule and also it was unpleasant for him to be lying me about what he was doing. Also I'm guessing that he had started to have feelings for someone and wanted to spend the night which we weren't doing. So I agreed that he could start telling me when he was going to go out with someone else and he could start spending overnights a few times per week.

If you could live with DADT, then you have to tell him to STOP telling you extra details because he's breaking the agreement. There is not need to be telling you extra stuff like he loves his other partner X.

I basically brought this on myself because after I realized that I could totally be ok with him having FWB relationships, I wanted reassurance that he wasn't going to become involved with someone who would have rights to make demands on his time. I wanted him to tell me that he wouldn't start wanting to go on romantic weekends etc.

Quote:
he isn't really ok with me seeing other people.
Also sounds like a double standard. It is one thing for both you to be free to date and YOU choose not to exercise that option. It's another for HIM to tell you that you cannot have that option.

I was wrong about this ( sorry I hadn't seen your post before I wrote my last reply).

I'm in that stage of life with perimenopause/menopause weirdness. We've had to adjust how we make love to accommodate my having pain sometimes during sex. I didn't pick this out. I just have to deal with it and my therapies.

I am not sure what your source of sexual pain is... but I can guess you didn't pick it out to have. I don't see why he's angry/taking it personally. Does he believe you "owe" him sex and are now not giving him what he's entitled to?

This is the medical issue I had: https://www.dermnetnz.org/topics/recurrent-fissuring-of-posterior-fourchette
It took a long time for a doctor to take me seriously enough to notice that my skin would split at the slightest stretching. Even from basic medical exams. I finally found a doctor who was like "Oh yeah I see what you mean! Its bleeding a little just from me examining it." I literally started bawling right there. Doctors can be such dicks! I had literally half dozen doctors over the years tell me that I "just need to try some lube". So I had the repair done, but emotionally I had not repaired anything and the pain continued whenever we would try sex even after the surgery should have long completely healed.

It's kind of funny: he casually mentioned to me the realization he had had about lack of testosterone and how it was effecting his ability to sustain erections and how it had caused him to see our problems as completely my fault since he didn't know he was having a physical problem too. He didn't know it would be such a huge deal to me, but it was. When he said it I suddenly realized how strongly I had felt like he didn't care about me / my feelings. Like whenever he would lose an erection is was because I was being too boring or putting too many demands about slowness or lube on him.

I'm having a hard time figuring out how to express just how significant it was for me to know finally that it wasn't all my own problem. So after that revelation we started trying sex again and I realized that I am a sexual person after all, that there isn't anything wrong with me that a little time won't fix. Sex wasn't completely painless but I can see that it will be in the future. He was able to get what he needed from me finally after all these years. Not the sex, but the feeling like I wanted him and that he is deserving of being wanted.

 

[FallenAngelina]

My medical issue was real in the sense that I did need surgery which I had last summer. It was also a very emotion based problem as Karen mentioned because after the surgery, despite the seeming correction of the problem, our sex life did not improve. The pain continued and I felt more hopeless than ever.

Just want to clarify that I wasn't implying that your pain is not "real" or that it was all in your mind. Pain is always real, no matter the source, and usually there's a very real medical explanation for it. When I said that the pain is talking to you, I meant that paying attention to pain is helpful. There's always a reason for it and that this persisted for five years is significant. I wasn't discounting the reality of your pain, but instead was encouraging you listen to it.

From what you write, it sounds like you have quite a bit of unsettled feelings around your sexuality in general. You might consider exploring this before you jump into trying to make polyamory ok for yourself in an attempt to make it work with your husband at all cost.

 

[GalaGirl]

Is there anything anyone would suggest I read regarding a commited marriage becoming more open? I guess what I'm looking for is examples of different types of relationships that will help me understand what I want to get out of this and what I can accept as far as his level of involvement in outside relationships.

This is not exhaustive, but it describes several types of Open models.

http://www.kathylabriola.com/articles/models-of-open-relationships

This might also help in terms of feelings you might be experiencing.

http://www.kathylabriola.com/articles/are-you-in-poly-hell

These pages might yield some helpful articles.

http://practicalpolyamory.com/downloadabledocuments.html

http://openingup.net/resources/free-downloads-from-opening-up/

https://www.morethantwo.com

GL!
Galagirl

 

[kdt26417]

Hi AloneHere,

Have you read the book, "Opening Up: a guide to creating and sustaining open relationships," by Tristan Taormino? It may prove useful to you.

That aside, I recommend for you and your husband to do plenty of talking with each other going forward. Each talk can be limited to an hour or so, but the talks can happen often, at least once a week.

Just some food for thought.
Sincerely,
Kevin T.

 

[AloneHere]

Thank you to everyone. I will do some more reading and talking.

 

[Shaya]

Hi,

I'm hearing you say that you and your husband are exploring polyamory and that part of the reason is that you feel you are having difficulty enjoying physical sex in your relationship. Your husband then felt that pure physical sex with others was ... kindda flat... and wanted something more authentic.

The underlying issue here that I feel you would like addressed is the pain you experience during sex. I suspect you've tried it before, but a sex therapist might help. These are counsellors or even pseudo-counsellors without necessarily formal university degree, who specialise in sex related issues including desire, technique, pain, etc. In addition, forums or boards devoted to this issue might help more than we can if you haven't already looked into it.

If you've already exhausted your options with addressing the pain from sex, and polyamory is exactly what you want, then I'm sorry for my earlier assumptions. Instead, I would offer a beginning polyamorist the following links to consider and I'm sure other polyamorists here will have their own bunch of links they found useful.

Finally, you seem to have mentioned previously that your husband would not be happy for you to have intimacy with others. I see two possible interpretations of this and I suspect there may be more subtleties I'm not seeing:

1. Your husband being unable to allow you intimacy with others whilst asking for polyamory for himself is a clear double standard here that needs to be addressed. Unfortunately, unless this setup is something you both desire, I feel it is unlikely to result in a healthy longterm poly relationship.
2. His discomfort with you having other partners actually stems from his preference for monogamy with you. Under this scenario, consensual nonmonogamy is merely an outlet for his physical needs and would be discarded if the sex life between the two of you improved. Under this scenario, your being intimate with others but not with him makes him feel unsafe in the relationship since it may make him feel that your pain during sex is primarily to do with him and not with you since you don't hurt with other partners. I don't want to discuss this further in case I am way off track and it comes across as offensive, but if this is the case, there are other complex issues here that will need unpacking, including why he feels the need to extend the consensual non monogamy practice you are currently doing to one that includes feelings and how this extension might make you feel insecure in your relationship.

Good luck!