Breakups & Divorce Support Group
Just broke up with someone or in the midst of a difficult divorce? Breaking up is difficult no matter what the circumstances are. They say that time heals all wounds, but sometimes a listening ear or a hug can work wonders for the heart. Whether you need a place to vent, someone to hold you to No Contact, or need advice about what to do, we're here to help.
My marriage was totally doomed!
http://www.businessinsider.com/formula-predicts-success-of-marriages-2012-12
"Many have spent long hours wondering if a marriage is going to last, considering things like love, children, taxes, and the opinion of friends and professionals.
But the best and easiest answer may be this formula:
frequency of lovemaking minus frequency of quarrels
A positive difference predicts marital happiness, a negative one unhappiness."
Yeah, so number of times the STBX and I got busy in a month, let's say twice (and that was a good month)
...Minus a month of arguments-8 times: one for each day we had off together.
That puts my marriage at a minus 6...in a good month.
In a bad one it might be more like 0 sex, 15 arguments, because we could still squeeze several of those arguments into one day.
She could always find something more important to do than lovemaking, though.
I really loved her. She really broke my heart.
http://www.businessinsider.com/formula-predicts-success-of-marriages-2012-12
"Many have spent long hours wondering if a marriage is going to last, considering things like love, children, taxes, and the opinion of friends and professionals.
But the best and easiest answer may be this formula:
frequency of lovemaking minus frequency of quarrels
A positive difference predicts marital happiness, a negative one unhappiness."
Yeah, so number of times the STBX and I got busy in a month, let's say twice (and that was a good month)
...Minus a month of arguments-8 times: one for each day we had off together.
That puts my marriage at a minus 6...in a good month.
In a bad one it might be more like 0 sex, 15 arguments, because we could still squeeze several of those arguments into one day.
She could always find something more important to do than lovemaking, though.
I really loved her. She really broke my heart.
On the way out...
My ex was into having sex so much all day long (even at work in my office) that I couldn't take it any more. He was waking me up at 2:00 AM every day to have sex and I was sound asleep, unaroused and not wanting sex. I was married with a young child, working full time, taking care of a very large home, doing cooking, laundry and every other weekend going to his mothers with him and helping HER by painting her house, digging out tree roots--I was exhausted from just working at his MIL's place. I could not have sex with him 5 and 6 times a day and I felt he was unreasonable. He didn't help me and I would be outside mowing the lawn and cutting the hedges and he did nothing at all around the home, he didn't help with the child. He just sat building up more sperm.
I absolutely detest these articles that promote more sex as the best thing for marriages. They forget that it's not just sex, there's the need to promote romance without sex, foreplay, and try to understand there are limits to sex in a day and a week. They forget all that.
Someone that wants so much sex, there is someone wrong there. It's not the norm and when the sex has to be so many times a day, all day long, every day for so long, there's something wrong there and eventually it becomes all about him, and then you can "after all he can do it quickly", and not about the woman and her needs and wants.
My ex and I had sex every day... Sometimes twice. We fought every few days, but he barked at me and ordered me around most days. Most days I was too exhausted and nervous around him to bother fighting him.
My sex drive is high no matter who I'm with though...
Sometimes a man sees an argument as just a bitchbaiting session, whereas the woman might see it as a necessary route to clearing up something the man doesn't even recognise as a problem.
Are we back to the whole "man = mars, woman = venus" thing, with the man in his cave and the woman so frustrated at not being listened to it turns into a confrontation?
it's back to communication I guess. Hell, as if I can comment on relationships.
My STBX has NEVER had a sex drive. I was lucky to "get lucky" a few times a year. In recent years it disappeared all together.
I've been reading that asexuals crave social interraction just like the rest of us, but sexual intercourse is a huge source of anxiety for them. Their personal space is too encroached upon. So when in a relationship like marriage where sex is expected, it becomes a negative for them. But rather than understanding that it is the intimacy they abhor not their loved one, they transfer that feeling to the other person. Which causes more of a chasm and fighting.
Simply put, sex is important in a relationship.
The same explaination goes for a man who has erectile dysfunction or a woman in peri-menopause who has declined sex drive. Or in both sexes hormone imbalance.
The point is, lack of sex in a marriage is due to many reasons. Only one and rare at best, is the excuse that they just don't "love" the other partner anymore. The average human will have sex with someone they do not love or are having conflict with simply because sexual arousal and need is not dependent upon a "good relationship".
Only in persons who have serious emotional problems or physical ailments is lack of sex defined.
I'm referring to the Post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy.....
Which is: A occured, then B occured, therfore A caused B. The rooster's crowing does not cause the sun to rise.
Simply put, if a relationship is quite healthy, people are more likely to argue less and be intimate more. It's not the other way around.
Less arguing and more sex is merely a byproduct of a healthy relationship, not the cause of a healthy relationship.
As to the rest of you, I have been in both situations, where sex seemed like the "chore" in my first marriage because I knew the days were being counted and to where sex was a pleasure that I never refused even if I wasn't in the mood, I got in the mood by my 2nd marriage. Go a couple years without and then see where the importance lies. That, and I loved him and never wanted him to feel rejected....
"...I've been reading that asexuals crave social interraction just like the rest of us, but sexual intercourse is a huge source of anxiety for them. Their personal space is too encroached upon. So when in a relationship like marriage where sex is expected, it becomes a negative for them. But rather than understanding that it is the intimacy they abhor not their loved one, they transfer that feeling to the other person..."
"The partner not getting sex feels sad, hopeless and confused. The asexual partner feels anxiety, anger and frustration."
.....This encapsulates my last 10 years of marriage perfectly.
@ astimegoesby:
6 times in a day?!?!?! YIKES!
You totally have my sympathies, that's too much!
From:
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/06/03/when-sex-leaves-the-marriage/
".... its estimated that about 15 percent of married couples have not had sex with their spouse in the last six months to one year..."
@ Blindsided...I agree correlation is not causation.
I would say a better heuristic might be number of positive experiences versus number of negative experiences...although you would then have to weight those positive and negative experiences.