Ten years ago our marriage was in pretty bad shape, especially when it came to sex.
Exploring hands at bedtime would have been slapped away. A sexual bid would have been met with either “Seriously? When I’m almost asleep?” or “Fine, let’s get it over with.” Whether we had sex or not, Big Guy would end up feeling unloved and I would end up resentful.
Sex was a significant source of tension in our marriage. We fought about it all the time.
Back in those days, I daydreamed about escaping to a fresh start.
My imagination went so far as thinking about Big Guy dying or us getting divorced. I looked for apartments and imagined what I would be able to afford on my own. I thought about old boyfriends, wondering how much better my life would have turned out if I’d stayed with them.
I was worn down by years of not feeling emotionally safe and weary of seeing my husband’s emotions and interest in me only when he was trying to get sex. I was tired of the same old fight about sex.
Books like Eat, Pray, Love about women reinventing themselves appealed to me, yet I couldn’t bring myself to read them for fear that I would fail just as much at remaking myself as I had at my marriage.
I stayed in my marriage because I was resigned to it. I thought I deserved to have an unhappy marriage. I thought if only our marriage were better, sex would be a natural result.
But I had no idea what it would take to make our marriage better. From my point of view, it was all on my husband to do.
Look Ahead
Let your eyes look straight ahead; fix your gaze directly before you. Give careful thought to the paths for your feet and be steadfast in all your ways. Proverbs 4:25-26
Maybe you’ve been there, too—yearning for the happily ever after you dreamed of and weary of the marriage you have. Maybe you’ve wondered what it would be like to start fresh in some way.
You look at your marriage and wonder, Is it worthwhile to keep going? Is there any possibility that this marriage I’ve invested so much time in could be any different than it is?
Is it worthwhile?
You look back at all the sacrifices you’ve made, perhaps with no thanks or even recognition. You think about the things that didn’t work out the way you had hoped. You consider the things you couldn’t say yes to, or the things you did because no one gave you a choice. You check the weight of the heavy burdens you have shouldered alone. You carried so much emotional labor, and you wonder if you have anything left to give.
When you look back, it can be hard to have hope.
So I want to encourage you to look forward to what just might be possible.
Although I don’t know if happily ever after can really happen, it IS possible to have a marriage with a foundation of joy.
When you look ahead, can you imagine the possibility of what the marriage you have now could become?
Good Things
. . . for he satisfies the thirsty and fills the hungry with good things. Psalm 107:9
Is the effort to invest more in your marriage worthwhile?
A recent sexual encounter with my husband got me thinking about this very question.
The encounter was what I had always imagined sex could be. It grew out of non-sexual caresses that turned into exploration and then into something else. It was erotic but not weird. It involved emotional connection as well as physical It was both comfortable and exciting. It was comforting and unifying.
It felt like an organic outgrowth of the state of our marriage.
In the afterglow, I found myself feeling very thankful to be where we are.
At that moment, I knew that all the effort I had invested was worth every tear, every bead of sweat, every bit of painful awareness as I faced things I’d rather have left sealed up.
Was my investment of effort worthwhile?
Absolutely, my friend. Absolutely.
Joyful, Patient, and Faithful
Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer. Romans 12:12
Are you willing to invest more into your marriage?
That doesn’t mean to just stay married, hoping for the best and waiting to see what happens. That is just an investment of time, which you’ve already been doing.
Trying to bring about change in your marriage also involves an investment of effort. Be active and intentional in doing things that will work through your own issues, speak love to your husband, and pour life into your marriage.
Grow in compassion for your husband.
Work on trusting God.
Learn to trust your husband.
Pray about what it means to see your husband as a beloved child of God.
Pursue healing from your wounds.
Repent of your own sins and accept God’s forgiveness for them.
Embrace your sexuality.
Make your marriage—including sex—a priority.
Nothing on this list is easy. At least, it wasn’t for me.
This work was hard. I discovered that I had a whole lot of work to do on myself. I was a bigger mess than I had realized. Yes, Big Guy had certainly contributed to the problems in our marriage and our sex life—but it was up to me to work on the share of problems that were on my own shoulders.
Fortunately, woven throughout all this effort, God was with me.
We Will Reap a Harvest
It turned out that the struggles I had with sex weren’t entirely about sex. They weren’t even all about my husband or our relationship, at least not as much as I’d thought.
As I worked on sex, our marriage improved in other areas. As those areas improved, I was better able to break down my walls about sex.
As I worked on myself, the good results began to pour over into every area of my life. My effort to work on sex and on my marriage turned out to do far more for me than it did for my husband.
Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. Galatians 6:9
Nothing guarantees an improvement in your marriage or your life. But after investing so many years, isn’t it worthwhile to try investing some blood, sweat, and tears to make the most of the marriage you already have?
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I've moved! While you can peruse the archives here, I am no longer posting at The Forgiven Wife.
Please join me at Honeycomb & Spice.
Ladies, if you're interested in joining me for a study of Juli Slattery's new book God, Sex, and Your Marriage, time is running out! Our study begins with introductions on February 26, 2023, but the study will be open to join until March 5.
I am where you were now except sex has been non existing for a long time and it’s unintentionally mostly my fault (untreated past sexual assault that I naively thought didn’t affect me). The difference is my husband is fed up, unhappy and inpatient for me to get any help and recover. I don’t blame him but at the same time I hoped that he would put some worth in the time we’ve invested (18yrs) together and would give us another chance. I know I screwed everything up but I’m doing the best I can (therapy, prayer, seeking, trying to talk not argue) but we seem to be getting nowhere, he is angry and resentful. If I had trouble approaching him when I thought he was happy, it’s a 1000x harder now. I think at the very least a separation is imminent and I’m so hurt because really, we each thought we were doing right. Your post is encouraging but I just don’t know if we still have a chance to make it, this situation has become such a monster. Thank you for addressing these issues, it helps.
I want to give you a big hug. I’m also a sexual assault survivor. Although I still occasionally run into something that reminds me that I’m not fully healed, I’ve come a long way. Healing takes as much time as it takes, no matter how much we want to get to the end of the process.
It sounds like you are doing the right things now. Is your husband aware that you are working on things?
I’d like to share several posts with you. One is for you to share with your husband, and the others are to help you think about what your husband might be going through right now.
This post is for husbands of sex abuse survivors. While your experience was sexual assault and not abuse, it might be helpful to your husband to know that he is not alone in his frustration.
These other posts might help you understand your husband. His frustration and unhappiness are understandable. For years he has felt unloved, even though of course that wasn’t what you were trying to communicate. Your Husband’s Hurt gives you the voices of men as they express their pain. I want to caution you that it can be hard to read. Even now I cannot read it in one sitting. It’s just too much. It was statements like you’ll find there that helped me develop real compassion for what my husband had been experiencing.
Many husbands struggle with the fact that a wife’s healing takes time, and that’s what I wrote about in He Doesn’t Care About Progress. He Just Wants Results. The post includes a few things you can try to help your husband see your progress.
In I Worked on Sex, and Then He Got Angry, I wrote about my husband’s anger as I was working on my struggles with sex. Perhaps you’ll find some suggestions there that can help you.
It isn’t too late for your marriage to turn around, and I wrote about that in Too Little, Too Late? Your husband may have felt hopeless for so long that he is afraid to allow himself to feel any hope. Keep on doing what you are doing, and look for ways to communicate your love to him.
I’d like to encourage you to see a marriage counselor together. You both could use a big dose of hope right now.
I will pray for you both.
Thank you for these posts, prayers and virtual hug. I definitely need these! Yes, my husband knows I’ve taken these steps but he’s so resentful right now that he doesn’t see it as a good thing but just more patience required from him. To makes matters worse, we just moved to a new state (which is what finally made him express his unhappiness), we know no one and I have no support system to lean on here. He’s just started a new job in trucking and will be going over the road, he’s hoping being a way for a month will change things (he says he knows it won’t fix it). I don’t know that it will but I’m hopeful. Thank you for your reply and God bless you and your ministry.
My husband is also a truck driver, and while he isn’t over the road now, it looked for a while like that might happen. We had talked about some ways to maintain non-sexual intimacy throughout the time he would be away, like flirty texts, talking every night, TV show watch parties, and so on. Helping us stay connected emotionally makes a difference in my sexual interest. You might find that to be the case for you as well. It is a good opportunity for you and your husband to rebuild your relationship in other ways, and that is bound to help you as your work on the sexual stuff.
I encourage you to look for a support system soon, although I know that is difficult during this time when so much is closed. If you’re interested in online support, you might want to try my Honeycomb & Spice community. Your husband could probably use some support, too. He isn’t the only husband who has dealt with this.
Also, I want to suggest that you pray for your husband every day. Pray for his healing from sexual hurt. Pray for him to feel loved in your marriage. Pray for God to help you heal in a way that draws you closer to your husband. Tell your husband how you’ll be praying for him, and ask him to pray for you as well.
Thank you Chris, my plan was always to make new friends but everything started changing before I got a chance to. I will definitely check out your community at least until it is possible. I am praying for my husband and will continue to do so as you said. I appreciate you and your ministry so much, I feel so much better knowing that this is not just happening to us alone. God bless!