Voices: I’m in a sexless marriage – how do I spice things up?
Voices: I’m in a sexless marriage – how do I spice things up?
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The Independent’s agony aunt Victoria Richards is here to help. Email dearvix@independent.co.uk for advice on love, work, family and relationships. Dear Vix,. My wife and I haven’t had sex for more than a year – and I’m going out of my mind. It’s making me sad, stressed, sleepless – even physically unwell. I’ve tried tips I’ve read about in other places, like shared calendars for scheduling sex, but it doesn’t seem to work. I’ve tried being direct, and asking for sex, but she fobs me off or says it’s not a good time. I’ve suggested we book a babysitter so we can go out; and have tried to get her in the mood by buying her skimpy lingerie on special occasions. But nothing helps. She just seems distant and moody and turns away, or bats me off like I’m irritating her; or says all she wants is an early night or is always too busy with the kids (which just feels like an excuse). I feel like I’m pestering her and hoping she ‘gives in’.
I’m gutted that we’re young and healthy and have decades more of potentially exciting love-making ahead of us before we get too old and infirm to bother – but instead, here I am: celibate in my late thirties; a cliché of a man. It’s making me so angry and frustrated that I’ve even considered having an affair – I feel like I deserve it. I just don’t know how much longer I can go on like this.
Frustrated. Dear Frustrated,. Let’s get one thing straight right from the outset: don’t have an affair. Or, do – if you want to exist in a maelstrom of stress and confusion worrying you’ll get found out, which you will, eventually – it’s overwhelmingly likely, because when we live with someone our behaviours are routine until, suddenly, they aren’t – at which point you will completely blow up your marriage, make your wife hate you, render future custody of the kids difficult, lose the respect of people you love and those you work with, lose mutual friends in the process because they’ll usually side with the woman you cheated on, move out to some sad “divorced dad” apartment complex and probably discover the person you had the affair with isn’t interested in a man who lost everything because his wife didn’t want to have sex with him. So, no: don’t have an affair. Or do, but then I’ll expect your next letter.
