Mommy Fe here.
When we were younger as in 20s, if he said "not tonight," I tried to understand and think about how tired he might have been doing field work. I knew I too got very tired holding down a Monday to Saturday 8 to 5 job and then rushing home to take care of housework and our child, and then later our two children - and there were times too when I would say, "not tonight, dear."
But then the rejections in bed began to be more frequent, and then boom, someone told me - his office mate who boarded with us - that his subordinate was his mistress. I did suspect but I tried to drive the idea out of my mind, until he did not bring me along to their company party and then only his office mate who boarded with us came home in the middle of the night while my husband arrived in the early morning, and that office mate had to admit that my husband was with that subordinate who was nga his mistress. After that, I did not anymore try to understand. I initially started to feel very very insulted and dejected each time my husband rejected me in bed. Later on, I became angry over his rejections and so we would quarrel.
That is in the past now, and my husband has "come back" to me full time - emotionally and physically. He has asked for forgiveness, has negotiated with me what amends he could do to make things better, and we have both been trekking the forgiveness road for quite a number of years now - decades later - thanks to a marriage healing program we attended and which opened his eyes to the reality that when he married me before God and man he had promised to love me and only me, that his body is mine exclusively and my body is likewise his exclusively and that not one of us has the right to give it to anyone else, and most of all, that our marriage is for a lifetime.
The sex part? Well, senior citizenship is right around the corner for the both of us, I had a hysterectomy years ago which hastened my menopause, but go ahead and call it funny if you think it so that we are more active these days than when we were in our younger days and yippee-yayeyy is all we both can say.
One thing that we did learn about in that marriage healing program we did is that, during those miserable years, our marriage problems did not really start in our bed, but they all ended up there. Now we are very much aware that for us to have a healthy sexual relationship, we must be open to each other and listen to each other so that we can improve our communication and thus improve our overall relationship.
Mommy Fe
