sexless marriage :(

farmerboy

Have been following this thread and can't make my mind up wether this is a troll or just someone so stupid.

My wife does everything in our house,but thats for 2 reasons, 1 I work away from Saturday night to Friday morning, and 2 the time I am at home is also split between my family and our smallholding. We don't have any of the problems that you have because I appreciate her and what she does, I also acknowledge that I couldn't do it without her. Any spare time I do get I help where I can, fetching logs in, tidying up, ect. I also tell her how much I love her regularly, buy her flowers or a gift every so often (very randomly aswell so its a suprise). I spend as much time as I can with my 9yr old daughter (not playing on the PS or Wii with her either). And manage to arrange a sitter so we can have some us time away as well. All this is what makes our relationship work.

You need to get your priorites right, sell the bloody PS, help when you get back, no matter how hard a day you have had. If your the only one that uses the bathroom then bloody clean it. All your post seem aimed at how you can't do things for health or work reasons, the simple thing is if you don't grow a pair and do something you will loose her, although you may have already.

heartbreak_star

dontwannabecelibate wrote: »

this is very difficult. i'm struggling to make sense of everything. my wife is so angry, but she's still here so maybe there is hope. we sometimes struggle to communicate verbally, which is why she wrote me the letter. it means i can read it and ask her if i don't understand anything. it removes the emotional tone which helps me to see what she's saying.

i'm also struggling with the nasty posts on here. people laughing at my situation and so on. no things haven't been like this for 14 years.

our child showers in the downstairs shower room after his dinner. it's only me that uses the family bathroom.

I refer to my earlier post - doesn't the mould set off your asthma? It would mine.

I don't think people are laughing so much as frustrated. You've had lots of good advice and seem to be ignoring it in favour of tiny gestures.

Good luck. I suspect you may need it

HBS x

arbrighton

dontwannabecelibate wrote: »

i'm also struggling with the nasty posts on here. people laughing at my situation and so on.

Unfortunately, by posting on a forum on the internet, this is the risk that you take

TBagpuss

dontwannabecelibate wrote: »

this is very difficult. i'm struggling to make sense of everything. my wife is so angry, but she's still here so maybe there is hope. we sometimes struggle to communicate verbally, which is why she wrote me the letter. it means i can read it and ask her if i don't understand anything. it removes the emotional tone which helps me to see what she's saying.

i'm also struggling with the nasty posts on here. people laughing at my situation and so on. no things haven't been like this for 14 years.

our child showers in the downstairs shower room after his dinner. it's only me that uses the family bathroom.

OK - your wife has set out what she is unhappy with.

So now you can work on that.

As others have said, if you don't notice things or take hints you need to be more proactive. Set yourself reminders (alarm on your phone, maybe, so it is private not a big chores list on the wall!) to do things like:
- when you get in from work - after you've said hi to your wife but before you sit down in front of the TV or playstation, look around to see what needs doing. Picking up your child's toys, washing up, emptying the dishwasher, cleaning the bath / toilet, vacuuming etc. If your wife is already doing something in the same room, ask her first - e.g. if she is cooking, and you can see that the dishwasher needs to be emptied ask e.g "Will I be in your way if I put away the stuff in the dishwasher, or would it be better if I go and pick up in the living room / clean the bathroom / put away the clean washing now, and do the dishwasher later?" and then listen to what she says. The key is that if she says you will be in the way, that does not mean you should not do the job, it means you should do it when you won't cause her more problems by being in the way.

When you sit down to watch TV or play on the palystation, look around first to see what needs doing. If you are not sure, ask - for instnace, if you see that there is an airer with clothes on, feel to see if they are damp. Think whether they are the sort of things you normally iron. If not, put them away. If you think some of them need ironing, then iron them and then pout them away. if you are not sure, it's OK to ask "I was just going to go and put the washing away - is there anything you want me to iron before I out it away?" - again, you are making it clear that you are taking responsibility for the job but you are asking her for input.

Given that she seems to have been doing all of the jobs up until now, she may well have set ways of doing them, so be prepared to listen to her if she asks that you do things in a certain way.

If she comes into the living room with a cup of tea in her hand, ask her whether there is something she'd like to watch, and if she says no, ask her whether she minds you continuing to watch (whatever it is you are watching) if she says no, ask her whether she would mind if you take the iPad and watch elsewhere, or if she';d rather that you found something you can both watch, or that you turn the TV off altogether.

look at her letter, and for each of her specific comments think about how you can change. When you have thought about it, try to put in practice but talk to her.

One ky thing is to offer her choices - e.g "I'm going to go and clean the bathroom, unless there is something else you'd prefer I did first" - tells her that you are doing one of the things she has highlighted, but aslo that you are willing to do something else if gthere is something more urgent.

And try, try, to notice these things for yourself - you are not a child, and while you may find it hard to notice hints, you can learn to take more responsibility, even if that means making a llist of things to check and do and keeping that list on your phone to refer back to (e.g
- are there any dirty dishes which need washing or loading into the dishwasher?
- does the dishwasher need to be emptied?
- Are there toys which need picking up?
- Is the bathroom clean?
- Is there any wahsing in the washing machine which needs to be put onto an airer ?
- is there any washing on an airer which needs to be ironed / put away?
- Have I asked my wife if there is anything she plans to watch on TV this evening?
- have I offered to make her a cup of tea/coffee

and so on.
Check the list just before you get home each day, and again before you sit down to watch TV or play games, and over time you are likely to start to get into the habit of checking.

Tell your wife what you plan to do to help you remember better and ask her whether there are specific things she would like you to prioritise. Which jobs does she dislike most? What would she like you to focus on? are there any things that she would prefer you not to do without asking her first?

Andypandyboy

Surely this has to be a wind up? No man could pen these posts and really not see where they are falling short....

It is almost like when furore dies down they chuck another firework in, another detail that will ignite the thread.

I am not convinced. On the offchance that they are real, my advice would be re read your own posts, then ask yourself would you say were a catch?

itsanne

dontwannabecelibate wrote: »

i'm also struggling with the nasty posts on here. people laughing at my situation and so on. no things haven't been like this for 14 years.

The people laughing do not think you are real or they do not recognise that you have other problems. The best thing to do is to ignore those posts and focus on the ones which have given you very good advice about how to improve things. There are lots of posts like that.


If the mould is in the silicone you will not be able to remove it without completely removing the silicone and replacing it (not a fun job!). If it's in the grout it can be removed.

Mojisola

heartbreak_star wrote: »

I don't think people are laughing so much as frustrated. You've had lots of good advice and seem to be ignoring it in favour of tiny gestures.

Like you, I would think this is more likely to be real if the OP had reacted differently to his wife's words. Despite having the letter to read over and over, it doesn't seem to have sunk in just how close to divorce he is.

All it will take is for his wife to realise that she could manage financially if she left him for it all to fall apart.

If the posts are for real, I don't think anything can save the relationship because he just can't see that the way he's been behaving isn't acceptable.

seven-day-weekend

[QUOTE=duchy;67565802]I have a twentysomething son with Aspergers.
He's a social nightmare -doesn't really see the point of asking people how they are or just doing something nice for someone he cares about - but has learned life is much nicer if he does these things. He also tends to see life in black and white with no shades of grey. He's also nice natured, gentle and has a wicked sense of humour however.

OP You might find it useful to read up a bit about adult Aspergers and strategies you can use . There are LOTS of non diagnosed adult aspies out there . Take a look on Amazon sometime for some useful books. Understanding is the first step -not as an excuse for your behaviour but as signposts to which of your traits need modifying to make life easier for you and your family. People with Aspergers or Aspergers traits just viewe the world a bit differently ...Einstein was one ....so it's not all bad [/QUOTE]

Sounds like my son, also with Aspergers, when he was in his twenties.

As he has got older he's realised his girlfriend needs a compliment occasionally and that mums like hugs .

It was my birthday on Tuesday, and it's his tomorrow. I am having a party tonight. He does not want to share it with me, he does not even want to come but I've threatened him and he is coming. He rang me up at about nine in the evening on my birthday and said 'I suppose I have to say Happy Birthday'

To the OP, even if you don't understand these things, just do them. Pay your wife a compliment. Spend time with the children (that means with them, not just having them in the same room while you do something else). Buy your wife a present occasionally. If you can afford it, employ a cleaner for one day a week so that your wife is not bogged down with domestic chores, it would be nice if you could have a baby sitter for the same evening so that you and she could go out together.

Cuddle her without her thinking it always leads to sex.

Wishing you both well.

Pollycat

Mojisola wrote: »

Like you, I would think this is more likely to be real if the OP had reacted differently to his wife's words. Despite having the letter to read over and over, it doesn't seem to have sunk in just how close to divorce he is.

All it will take is for his wife to realise that she could manage financially if she left him for it all to fall apart.

If the posts are for real, I don't think anything can save the relationship because he just can't see that the way he's been behaving isn't acceptable.

I agree.

The OP came back and mentioned the letter but not his reaction to it - whether he agreed with all of it, some of it or none of it nor if they'd discussed it.
Let's be honest, surely after reading that list of his shortcomings, he would have had something to say.

Mojisola

dontwannabecelibate wrote: »

she keeps hoping that the man she married is still in there somewhere.

seven-day-weekend wrote: »

Sounds like my son, also with Aspergers, when he was in his twenties.

If the problem was Aspergers, he would always have been like this whereas his wife obviously thinks he was different previously.