Two Years of Marriage Celibacy

I love Nina - I truly do. I care for her and about her and it feels so natural and right to be around her.

This feeling and caring makes this next statement so much harder to write - sometimes I feel like she is selfish, self-centred.

Part of my reason for saying this is that today I celebrate two years of married celibacy ... and this is not by choice.

I long for intimacy, and being married, I long for it with my beautiful wife, Nina. But her response to me often leaves me feeling like I'm less attractive to her than a pile of shit in the gutter.

I feel like I am some sleazy and dirty old man for wanting to "make love to" my wife (she even cringes at the use of this term). I feel like I am in the wrong to desire to pash and have sex with her - like I am wanting to commit some sort of mortal sin or heinous crime.

Leading up to my birthday and Christmas (and perhaps our anniversary) she commonly asks me what gift I want. When I suggest that I just want her, she dismisses that - so no, I haven't even had sex with Nina on my birthday for at least the last four of my birthdays - am I wrong for feeling like this is not right?

I have previously made reference to a quote from a book, "If sex is mutual, when both people want it, that's wonderful. If one partner wants sex and the other doesn't but offers it as a gift, that too is pretty darned good. But when one person complains or begrudgingly complies, that makes the other feel like a thief, as if they had stolen something that was not rightfully theirs." Well, two years ago today I felt like a thief - I had what has remained undoubtedly the most memorable sex of my life - and for all the wrong reasons. I have been haunted by this memory for the last two years and would have been better off if I was fucking a corpse. I asked her at the time if she wanted me to stop and she said something along the lines of "no, just get it over with" - in hindsight, I should have stopped. What a fantastic last memory of sex!

I want to have marital relations with my wife and I want them to be mutual, or at least given with love and respect and kindness. This is not something I want to force on her. It is not something that I want to steal. It is not something I ever want to look elsewhere for (not that I think I ever could - if I did, I'd probably feel even worse).

And what is her view? Well, when we met and started going out, she seemed to take great pleasure and delight in introducing me to the delights of sexual intimacy and pashing. Around the time we got married, things were getting a little slower, but we still had a reasonable sex life. Our honeymoon, however, was not a stream of steamy nights in a tropical paradise, and after about 18 months of marriage I noticed that there seemed to be such a drought that I started making a note when we had sex (along with noting other aspects of her moods, migraines and depression).

So, when we started going out, she enjoyed it and wanted to do it ... perhaps to corrupt me, but now she can't even stand the thought of it. She says that it is not me, it is her - that she is not turned on (by me or anyone else), and that the same thing has happened in all her relationships. But she then goes on to tell me that she's not attracted to me - that I don't do it for her - that she's never been attracted to me.

Talk about a kick in the guts. Should I believe her - does she really hate me that much? At that moment it seems she does, but then later she apologises for and seems to recant those statements.

We've been to counselling and when push comes to shove, we fight for each other rather than against. We seem to both want this relationship to work most of the time, but sometimes Nina pulls away and wants to be free. At those times, I always tell her that if she truly doesn't want to be married, then I care enough about her that I won't stop her from ending our relationship.

As I say, I truly care about Nina, but am feeling betrayed and neglected and am feeling guilty for feeling that. What is wrong with me? What is wrong with us? How do we make things better? Is it wrong for me to want things to change?