The Surrendered Wife (30 page)

If the doctor says there's nothing to do about your diminished desire but wait (to stop nursing, to complete the medication, or to advance to the next stage of menopause, for instance), make yourself available at least once a week anyway. Assuming you're not going to experience pain, this is really not that much different than not being in the mood. If you don't show up for sex, you will still cheat yourself (and your husband) out of an intimate physical connection. If you do show up—who knows? By the end you may be enjoying yourself too. Remember to speak up about what will make it enjoyable for you.

I
DENTIFYING AND
H
EALING A
S
EXUAL
I
NJURY

“Perfect love is rare indeed—for to be a lover will require that you continually have the subtlety of the very wise, the flexibility of the child, the sensitivity of the artist, the understanding of the philosopher, the acceptance of the saint, the tolerance of the scholar and the fortitude of the certain.”

—LEO BUSCAGLIA

I
f you're experiencing a tremendous amount of fear as you're reading this, perhaps you are avoiding sex to protect yourself from feeling the pain of a previous sexual injury. If that's the case, you're not alone.

I have also felt ambivalent about making love with my husband. I always wanted to enjoy a physical relationship, but another part of me didn't want sex at all. When I started discussing my ambivalence honestly with other women, I noticed we had something in common: Many of us had suffered some kind of emotional injury related to sex and we were haunted by a lingering sense of powerlessness and violation.

Some women had engaged sexually when they were too young, while others were the victims of rape, incest, or molestation. Regardless of the trauma, the travesty was the same: We sometimes associated sexual experiences with our earlier injuries, and could feel tremendous anxiety even during a healthy, consensual sexual encounter.

Simply put, we were fearful of not having control of our bodies.

We preferred to control when, where, and how to make love, because it somehow felt safer, which makes perfect sense since control
comes from fear. We all said we wanted to be pursued, but then when we were, we often turned our husbands down. This prevented us from experiencing the pleasure of spontaneous sex with our partners. Our old defense kept us from connecting and left us feeling lonely.

If you sometimes feel obligation or pressure to perform when your husband initiates lovemaking, you may have a sexual injury. If you're thinking that you
always
feel pressured to perform when your husband approaches you sexually, take a look at the underlying fear. This fear and sense of obligation manifests itself as a reluctance to engage in any physical contact at all. The reasoning goes something like this:

1. If I kiss him, he might get turned on.

2. If he gets turned on, he'll want to have sex with me.

3. If he wants to have sex with me, I'll have to because I got him aroused in the first place.

4. I may not want to have sex with him, so if I want to keep my options open …

5. I won't kiss him—at least, not like that!

The problem with this thinking is that it also prevents us from engaging in sensual activities that don't necessarily culminate in an orgasm. Erotic pleasures like back rubs, showering together, or just being playful seem too threatening to enjoy.

If you identify with having sexual injuries, you may want to find a gentle, safe counselor who can support you in processing your experiences and helping you heal. You may even need to take a break from having sex with your husband while you're opening up the wounds and trying to heal them.

But didn't you just say I should always say yes?

I did, as a matter of fact, but I'm making an exception. If you are working with a therapist or are engaging in some other form of healing, it may be necessary to take a temporary break.

Let your husband know that you're working on some issues of your own that may make you unavailable for sex, but put a time limit on it—say three months. Promise that you'll let him know when you're available again. Thank him for bearing with you. Assure him that you still think he's attractive and that the injuries you're healing have nothing to do with him. He might continue to approach you in the meantime, and in each moment you will get to decide if you're available.

Just communicating about your lack of desire will help to improve the intimacy in your relationship. Instead of wondering if you'll ever be a willing sex partner, your man will have hope for the future. Also, asking your husband to support you in a situation like this taps into his masculine instinct to protect you.

If you're thinking that your husband will not respond supportively, consider Gina's experience.

She told her husband that she was working on some sexual injuries that she endured as a teenager, and that she wouldn't be available for a few months while she dealt with them. Gina was so nervous telling her husband this that she could only look at the ground and try to keep from shaking. But once the words were out, she was relieved and rewarded. Her husband responded like the tender, good guy he is and said he loved her—no matter what—and wanted to protect her. When Gina asked her husband if he would bear with her for a while he said, “Of course, I will.”

You will probably be pleasantly surprised too because telling your husband about the fears you have surrounding sexuality makes you vulnerable. It demonstrates a degree of trust and faith in your husband that he will want to honor. When you reveal yourself
he will not only want to protect you, he will also find you beautiful.

Now that you have his support I urge you to seek help from a therapist, an online or community support group, or a book such as
The Courage to Heal: A Guide for Women Survivors of Child Sexual Abuse
by Laura Davis. Do whatever you have to do to heal so you can be sexually whole. Just as your appetite returns when you're over the flu, your desire to be desired will return as you heal sexually. You need only be tender and reassuring with yourself while you're healing to discover it again.

T
HE
S
EVEN
S
EXUAL
M
YTHS

“Oh, I'm scared all the time! I just act as if I'm not.”

—KATHARINE HEPBURN

I
f you suffer from a sexual injury you may subscribe to common misconceptions that make you feel obligated—and therefore pressured—to be sexual. Here are some of the common myths—and the lesser-known facts—that I've heard from the women I know.

1. Myth:
If I don't have sex with him, he'll look for it someplace else.

Fact: If your husband is one of the good guys, you have nothing to worry about. In other words, if he's not a sex addict who is sleeping with other women, you will not drive a healthy man to seek sex elsewhere by taking a temporary sexual healing break. (If he is a sex addict acting out with other women, see the
section in the introduction called “When Not to Surrender and Get Out.”)

If your husband has a history of infidelity it will be harder to believe that he will remain faithful while you're not temporarily available. But, if he has the capacity to be faithful, he can certainly go without sex on occasion. He cannot, however, live without respect and admiration. Ongoing control and criticism are far more dangerous threats to monogamy than the absence of sex.

If you can't be sexual with him right now, your husband does deserve the promise of sex in the future. Let's say you decide to work with a therapist to heal some old wounds, and during that time the pain is so intense that you decide to tell your husband you won't be sexually available for three months or so. If you talk openly with him about not being available and that the situation is temporary, it's very unlikely that he'll look for sex someplace else during a short-lived break.

It's true that men have been known to cheat on their wives out of anger and loneliness. However, it's usually a last resort for regaining the masculinity and intimacy that are lost when he's lived with ongoing criticism and control. Another motivation for a man to cheat on his wife is the feeling that he may
never
get his sexual needs met in his marriage. While neither of these situations would make his cheating your fault (he is always responsible for honoring his wedding vows), it only makes sense to avoid emasculating him or withholding sex indefinitely.

When you acknowledge that a healthy sex life is important to you, and that you plan to return to one as soon as possible, you are fostering intimacy and trust in your marriage. That's very different from just ignoring his frustration and making no commitments to improve in the future.

Your husband may very well need more sex than you are able to offer him if you're unavailable for a while. Fortunately, men know
exactly how to satisfy themselves when we're not available. Your husband probably went many months or years without sex plenty of times before he met you. A hiatus with you is not going to drive him into some other woman's bed. Remind yourself of this when you feel afraid.

Some women feel threatened when their husbands masturbate, but men tend to view masturbating as a bodily function, rather than a cataclysmic sexual experience. According to the old joke, 98 percent of all men masturbate and the other 2 percent lie. Your husband is probably like most men. He may even use pornography when he masturbates. But what he's reading or watching is strictly between him and God, and it's none of your business. A centerfold is not the same as a flesh-and-bones woman, so don't make it more than it is.

You may find these views on the topics of masturbation and pornography distasteful, but keep in mind that you can't control your husband's masturbating or pornography viewing. Trying to stop him is a form of controlling—which wastes your time and interferes with your intimacy. Remember that part of the reason he's attracted to you is because he's attracted to the female form. That's the way he's made.

2. Myth:
“If I have sex with him, I'll have to work hard to prevent him from seeing how fat/freckled/wrinkled/sweaty I am.”

Fact: We're accustomed to thinking that we're unattractive if we haven't showered, done our hair, put on makeup and perfume, or put on a pretty outfit with matching earrings. We women are especially hard on ourselves when it comes to the way we look. But no matter what your state, you have a womanly shape and scent and a feminine spirit that is attractive to your man, which is why he's making goo-goo eyes. Seize that opportunity to connect.

Try not to flinch if your husband fondles your stomach, looks at your thighs, or runs his fingers through your dirty hair. Don't
stand between him and what he finds pleasurable. Don't worry about how you smell or what bodily fluids you've excreted. If he doesn't care, why should you? Being overly self-conscious is a barrier to intimacy. When you accept yourself as you are, you will even start to feel attractive at times that you never thought you would.

If you refuse him because you insist that you are not attractive, you're acting on the belief that this man has bad taste, when clearly he has excellent taste as evidenced by the fact that he married you. You are also criticizing what he thinks, which is disrespectful and ungracious.

Passing up an opportunity to have a physically intimate moment with your husband because you feel inadequate is unpleasant for everybody. You're denying him the chance to give you pleasure and yourself the chance to receive it and feel beautiful in his arms all because you feel insecure about your body. Why not use the opportunity to feel great? Tell yourself, “I turn him on! He must think I am sexy and gorgeous.” Even if he's not telling you so in words, notice what his actions are saying.

3. Myth:
“If I don't have sex with him now, he won't approach me again.”