SHOP PRODUCTS
Houzz Logo Print
bellegirl_gw

Hi! Surprise! I'm still here

bellegirl
16 years ago

I still remember that some of you were terribly concerned about me back in spring. I do appreciate that so much. You were all so kind and it does mean a lot, even from strangers. And I'm still so sorry I worried you.

But I am tough. I've been through so much in my life and I just keep going. Still..it does hurt.

I am still in my sexless marriage. He doesn't seem to care at all. A few months ago he sent me a poem that said (condensed) that he felt like two people - one married, trapped without fun and excitement and one longing to be free...to GO...to travel and have a good time. So I told him (in spite of the hurt) to just go. Go have fun. And he did. He took a long vacation by himself while I stayed home and went to work every day and took care of our place...the dogs, the chickens.

He gave me a hug before he left. That was the first hug in about four or five years. No kiss. When he got home I didn't even get a hug.

Yes, that bothers me. That hurts.

You see...this isn't the first time. My first marriage was miserable. He lied and cheated the whole time. All 16 years. He even wrote me a rant about how he was having trouble picking up women in bars and then got angry at me because I wasn't appropriately sympathetic about that. What? We were still married...I'm supposed to be sympathetic because he missed out on some nordic blonde in a Paris bar? PUH...LEEZE!

And now...this husband...he decided (and told me all of a sudden) several years ago that he "is not interested in sex any more". Of course, he IS interested in photographs of very young ladies without shirts on the internet. Just not with me. He has hundreds and hundreds of those pictures....they are all twenty something and well endowed...and not me.

So we are roommates. We don't argue. And more and more we separate ourselves. He has taken to sleeping in the guest room whenever we don't have guests. And he does his own laundry. I do mine. AND the towels and everything else like that. He is away most of the weekends when I'm home. I actually enjoy being home alone but I would be very happy to be with him IF he wanted to be with me. He doesn't. So I stay home and do the housework and the gardening. He goes off with his friends.

I can't help but think that it's me. I must be doing something wrong. Or not doing something right. I'm the common denominator. This IS the second time. I just don't know what it is. But I'm 57 years old. I have gray hair. I have arthritis and Crohns disease and I've gained weight from the size six I was when my husband told me he wasn't interested. Yeah. It's probably me. But why is it that I'm the only one who has to try? My husband is older than I am. And he isn't in the best shape either. He isn't going to star in any feature films...I wouldn't care. I just want him to care about me. I just want to be his favorite. That is all I have ever wanted. As the comedian says, "Is that so wrong?"

Someone wrote on one of these sad threads, "Why do all of you stay in these lonely marriages?" Well, I think it is because we are afraid we can't do any better. I've already said that I'm afraid it must be my fault. Living like this really etches away at your ego. This is real damage. Pretty soon you figure that you can't hope for more. I think we stay because we don't really think we can do any better out there. If this person that we have committed everything to, this person who has seen us naked already, this person who knows us and walked down the aisle with us...if THIS person can say, "I'm not interested," then what makes us think somebody else - somebody BETTER - would do any different?

As for me...I don't know what I would do if he turned back to me now. If he decided he was in the mood I would probably hit him on the head. I'd be so embarrassed! I would feel utterly inadequate after being rejected so completely for so long. At this point...hey, let me have a little dignity, please. I sure don't have anything else. He would have to do some serious courting before I'd crawl back in bed with him. And I would never get over being nervous and self conscious.

And that's from a really lonely - pathetically lonely - woman!

Comments (16)

Sponsored