Hi,
I've been with my wife for over 8 years and married more than 5. We have two children.
When we were first dating, there was lots of intimacy and sex in our relationship. This continued until we were engaged, a little over 1.5 years after we started dating. We went from having sex multiple times a week to about once a week. I didn't pay it much mind then.
When we got married, our sex life had another hit. She, from my perspective, was increasingly less interested, and we were then only having sex once every 2 weeks. We got married after 3 years of dating. At this time, it was growing frustrating.
Once my wife was pregnant with our first child she went cold turkey; no sex at all. Only the rare prescribed sex such as to induce labor at the end of our pregnancy. Other than that, since her pregnancy, we didn't have sex once for 2 years.
The conception of our second child was a miracle, much like our first, she fell pregnant after our first try. After the 2 year dry spell as mentioned from the pregnancy of our first child, we had sex about once every month or 2 months.
Similar with her first pregnancy, only prescribed sex by her doctor during the end of her second pregnancy. I felt my intimacy was being used. Of course, since then we haven't had sex at all. Our second child is now 10 months old.
Over all this time, my wife frequently and explicitly push away my advances, no matter how subtle. Then, my growing frustration and resentment resulted in blunt and direct advances by asking if she'd want to have sex. After the continued rejection, my advances became completely effortless and in the form of jokes as a defence mechanism to preserve some dignity and self respect.
Paired with the lack of sex is a lack of intimacy. My wife had birth complications which caused her pain after our first child which re-presented after our second. My wife says she's it'll be too painful for intercorse, though we've never tried it. This excuse is used for any form of intimacy whatsoever, as if intercorse is the only form of intimacy.
