Thoroughly confused at 48!

[wizardglick]

Hi everyone.  hoping to get some help here.  I've been married for 25 years and have been very happy, although my life has been a rollercoaster pretty much my whole life.  I say I've been happy because I loved my wife dearly for all that time.  But somethings up with me that I don't understand.  Sometimes i'm just not attracted to my wife anymore, or at least not as much as i used to be.  I'm still get attracted to other women, so it's not a testosterone thing.  We still make love but it takes me longer to get excited with her.  Not like it was even last year.  I still love her, but it's not the exciting love i used to have.  Sometimes i'm finding her attractive but a lot of times I'm not.  I just really want someone to talk with to get some clarity on all of this.  Is it stress?

[SWM]

stress can cause sexual problems, are you stressed?

when you say "find her attractive" what do you mean by that. you say sometimes you are attracted sometimes you are not, what is that attraction, is it sexual, physical, emotional?

[wizardglick]

Unfortunately yes, I have been under a large amount of stress for a very long time.  I'm always emotional attracted to her, but not always physically.  She works out but seems to be having difficulty obtaining a slimmer figure.  I'm not sure if it's the menopause, or the digestive disorder she had fairly recently, but sometimes she looks good to me and sometimes she just doesn't.  And sexually attracted will generally happen when we're in the midst of sex.  
Please don't misunderstand me, I will never leave my wife.  Nor will I ever cheat .... just not built that way.  I just want ALL the emotions I used to have for her ALL the time back to just that .... all the time.  


Btw, thank you for responding.

[SWM]

so it is just about the way that she looks (sometimes), and not being sexually attracted to her except when having sex?

what do you feel about this. what do you observe happening with in yourself when you are aware of this?

[wizardglick]

Wow, good question!  I guess I'd say some anger.  A little anger at her for allowing this, but mostly anger at myself for being so damn shallow.  I mean, she's the best thing to ever happen to me and here I am feeling this crap.  It just really makes me feel like an a**hole.  I love her to death and I'm trying to find my way back. 

[SWM]

anger that is interesting, i see anger as being an indication that there has been "percieved" pain inflicted.

is there something that happened that hurt you? (emotional psychological or physical pain?)

your anger is towards yourself for being shallow, and her for allowing something to happen.

can you explain these a little more.

[sagarika]

[hi this is an usual problem when u r taking all your beings just granted. it is not stress it is the basic instinct of human being.u must use some new techniques in your sex life so u can feel the punch. you must talk to your wife not others to resolve this problem

[acousticeagle]

I thought I would add a reply as I am also 48! Not married though - was.

The body ages, but the compensation for that is the wisdom one has accrued from life experience and the personal discovery of the 'self' - who you are, how you perceive yourself. This is important because our sense of self-worth with evolve with years and life experience.

A marriage that weathers all the storms of the years and has passed those tests is worth the effort it takes to maintain that loving relationship. When two people are close a 'soul-tie' is formed - you flow together in sync. But that will not take away from your being an individual, a unique personality. And personalities will change/evolve over time. You might even feel a 'calling' to do so - some need inside you, which could be latent but there nonetheless.

Do you like the same things you did when you were younger? Have you changed your life somehow recently, or are you thinking of change? It could be that any outward things are, however, not indicators of what might be going on inside yourself. Consider, do you feel different about who you are now than, say, you were 15 - 20 years ago? Does your spouse also have this sense? Do you think you are on a 'journey' (some call it spiritual - but it could just be the continuing discovery of 'self'). Does your spouse also believe she is evolving as a person?

I wish you all the best.

[Julia-L]

Could you tell me how much your wife weighs?
Probably, a strange question, but I'm just really interested to know.

[grasshopper]

I may catch some flack for saying this, but there is a lot of truth to the often quoted assertion by Hugh Hefner, the patron saint of affairs with younger women, that ALL men, regardless of age, are biologically hard wired to lust after the age demographic of women with whom they first rolled in the hay, back in their late tens and early twenties, namely women in their late teens and early twenties.

This involuntary attraction can be repressed for varying durations of time ranging from months to years, but as childbirth, time and gravity take their toll on the female physique, it can begin to take progressively more conscious self control for married men to suppress the urge to merge with younger single women, regardless of whether or not those impulses lead to a furtive taste or two of the forbidden fruit.