SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

I bet I’m going to regret posting this, but I’m not sure where else to turn with this. If you don’t want to hear a middle aged woman talk about sex, just back out now.

My husband and I were together for 20+ years prior to his affair. We had ups and downs in our sex life—I’m a CSA survivor, we both came out of ultra conservative religious communities with problematic approaches to sex, and we had the normal ups and downs with babies, small kids, life stress, etc. He’s always had a somewhat stronger drive and more appetite for experimentation than me, but over the years we were consistent with frequency, our bodies have always worked well together, and our norm was regular good sex interspersed with occasions of spectacular sex.

After d-day we were in hard core hysterical bonding mode for close to nine months, with a generous side of sexual pick-me dancing from me that I wasn’t even fully cognizant of.

One night, in the middle of sex, wearing something more risqué than I tend to be comfortable with and that he didn’t really notice as something new and out there for me, something in me snapped. I felt broken and disgusted with myself. It was a healthy realization for me. I wanted my husband, I wanted our relationship, I wanted to reconcile, and I wanted a sex life with him, but I was done performing.

Our sex life since then has been regular, but pretty vanilla and lacking the pre-affair experimentation and fireworks. It’s been complicated by our recovery process, and over the last year a lot of the physical changes that come with nearing 50 have complicated things further and made me even less inclined to be fun and free and experimental. We still have sex regularly (I do have a sex drive), but it’s cut and dried. This has hit my husband pretty hard. He feels like I’m hiding my body from him, having sex only on my terms, and not compromising and trying to build a good faith sexual relationship between partners. He’s not wrong, but somehow I just don’t have it in me. Having basic sex feels natural and good, but i have this huge block in my head about doing anything performative (even wearing basic lingerie) or experimental/adventurous. The thought of it makes me feel sick and distressed and sad, to be honest.

At this point I don’t know what is affair related or just marriage and stage of life related, but it’s at least somewhat about the change in my head and heart with the betrayal. I feel like the sex life we had before was built on the trust I had in him. I don’t have that trust anymore, which is actually healthier and I feel good about the level of trust I have in him and the relationship. But it’s not a level that seems to allow for sexual vulnerability on my part.

Thoughts? Empathy? Advice? I’m sequestered in my room with Covid over Christmas and it’s giving me too much time to think.

I never realised how much a sex life can change after an affair! I’m not sure it’s talked about much really other than the hysterical bonding.

I’m just under a year and a half out from D-Day and our sex life is still amazing BUT I haven’t made love to my husband since D-Day and I don’t think I ever will. We have spoken about this at great lengths and as hard as it is to accept I now only ‘fuck’ my husband.

When we are done we are done. I don’t allow any closeness. It’s sad but I just can’t put any ‘emotions’ into this part of our married life.

I am experiencing almost exactly the same process and timing. We had hysterical bonding for the first year. Lots of ups and downs but when I think about it I did the same thing you did some sort of subconscious pick me dance. At about the year point I really fully realized this was not about me or our past sex life, which was actually very good and very frequent. I also found out about more affairs. At that point something majorly shifted in me. Sex became more triggering and was completely just physical for me.
I also don’t feel any sort of emotional closeness or feel adventurous in any way. We’re at almost 3 years from d day. I have a hard time even kissing. I really miss our old sex life and relationship but it’s like you said I don’t have that vulnerability that I did. I don’t know that I will. My WH has been extremely patient and is just happy with whatever. I think I’m more dissatisfied than he may be. Anyway just wanted to say that I understand what you are feeling. Big hugs to you, I feel like there are so many layers to betrayal and it has affected me in every possible way.

Thank you Webbit and Salt. My husband has also been patient and hasn’t made this an issue, but we both know it is one. There are definitely times when sex is loving, but the post affair norm is mostly basic and physical, not emotional or exciting. Emotionally I feel like I’m moving beyond the plain of lethal flatness, but maybe sexually that’s still where I am? I don’t know.

Emotionally I feel like I’m moving beyond the plain of lethal flatness, but maybe sexually that’s still where I am?

I think that's a very real possibility.

Is your CSA interfering with your desire? I don't have words to say more, except that CSA isn't your fault. It's a terrible, difficult burden to carry.

Hiding your body? Does 50 bother you? My W & I have been together 59+ years, and she looked better on 1965 than she does now. I did, too. She looked better 30 years ago than she does today; me, too. We can't build long term relationships without getting older, and we deteriorate physically as we age. I still harbor within me the 21 year old who fell in love with W2b, and that 21 year old thinks that 30 is too old for sex. But I know the 21 year old has a lot to learn - and other ego states in me have learned it.

The only antidote I can come up with is to accept yourself and feel the joy of doing so. And really take note of THIS: you may not be happy about getting to 50, but your H still desires you, and you still desire him. The clock has a lot of uses, but the mind and body know those uses are limited.

There's nothing new you might want to try? Nothing?

If not, then as a rather vanilla option... you can make animal noises. Both you and him.

He takes his boxers off and an elephant call comes from no where... kinda sets the playful mood a bit.

Thank you, not the victim, for making me laugh.

And thank you as always, Sisoon, for your wisdom.

I don’t think the CSA impacts my baseline sexual desire. But it’s a complicating factor. Before my husband’s betrayal I honestly didn’t think much about it. It was something that impacted me and our sexual relationship in our early years together, but I honestly felt like it was something I had faced and accepted and moved on from. It almost never came to mind, and when it did, it didn’t feel particularly traumatic. But man, it hit me like an effing freight train after d-day. And I sense that it’s a factor in me feeling incapable of the kind of vulnerability that improving our sex life would require.

In isolation, I don’t care that much about aging. My self worth hasn’t ever been that tied up in what I look like, and in a lot of ways I like my upper 40s more than lots of other stages of life so far. One of the epiphanies I had when thinking through boundaries in the wake of my husband’s affair is that I have very solid boundaries, not because I’m a saint, but because romantic/sexual attention from men has always sparked caution and fright in me (probably CSA related).

I think the hiding isn’t because I’m ashamed of my body (I have a better relationship and view of my body at 47 than I did 25 years ago, when by conventional standards I was pretty hot). It’s the vulnerability piece of not actually wanting someone else to see it, especially someone who didn’t value my hard-earned sexual vulnerability enough not to destroy it. And at this stage I have less than zero desire to try to achieve that vulnerability with anyone else. If our marriage dissolves I have no interest in forging a relationship with anyone else.

It’s a lot simpler for my husband. He’s deeply remorseful and wants an open, free, exciting sexual relationship. I don’t think it’s possible for him to understand why it’s so complicated and painful for me, even when I try to explain and he tries to understand. I’m a tangled up mess in this area, and he doesn’t get it.

And it scares me, to be honest. I don’t think many men in their 40s in our polyamory-infatuated, porn-saturated day and age are willing or happy to stare down bland monogamy for the rest of their lives. In my lowest moments I feel like I can never be a satisfactory partner and that he’s going to leave or want to leave at some point. I talk myself down from my bleakest thoughts, because I know they’re not helpful or representative of where we are overall, but it’s also difficult to gin up real hope.