“30 Years in a Dead Bedroom… Then She Finally Told Me Why” - Live Chat With Michael

Okay, if you're a frequent listener of the Dad Starting Over podcast and you find yourself saying, "Yeah, that sounds like me," well, you don't need another podcast episode. What you need is support. The Help for Men Brotherhood is where men go when they're done pretending that they got it all handled. You know, your dead bedrooms, your divorce, your loneliness, your rebuilding life. We have private forums, frequent live Zoom meetings, one-on-one coaching courses, all my books at no additional charge. And yes, we get together in person. Real men and real conversations. So stop doing this alone and join the Help for Men Brotherhood today at help4men.com/join. I look forward to seeing you in the next member meeting. So, Mr. Michael, you reached out to me via email and told me your story, and it was an interesting one, and it is one, unfortunately, that I hear quite often in my world. So I guess, you know, for those that are watching or listening to this on the podcast, tell us, why are we chatting today? What's going on with you?

Well, I'd seen several of your videos on, I guess, through Facebook. And, you know, a lot of the stuff you were saying kind of, kind of hit home for me. So I thought I'd, you know, look into it and saw where I could, you know, possibly do a podcast with you and chat with you directly. So, uh, you know, for me, uh, 57-ish years old, been married a little over 30 years, uh, you know, 3, 3 kids all grown and out of the house, last one still in college. And, you know, I guess the proverbial, you know, empty nest really started to, uh, expose some things. And, uh, you know, um, to really get down to it, you know, the, the sexless marriage, or as I guess your term is, the dead bedroom, has been been there for us almost from the beginning. Um, you know, I would say, uh, you know, you think about the honeymoon time frame or, you know, that first year or so, and it was, uh, even then not, not a lot of physical affection, whether it be sex or, you know, hugging or anything like that. And, um, you know, I guess like so many times I hear and read that, you know, I tried to initiate things for quite some time, and after being you know, touching the hot stove too many times, you stop touching it. And so I kind of really quit for the most part. And, you know, looking, reflecting back for the, you know, there were, there were times, you know, on the physical side of it that things were going okay for a while. But for the most part, they just— sexless marriage, you know, I've seen the definition that I've seen is less than 12 times a year, and we rarely eclipsed that in the whole time we've been together. And when And when we would, you know, have sex, it was usually somewhat— I felt somewhat forced, you know, almost as I've seen that the term duty sex. And then so fast forward to just, you know, a month or two ago and having a heated discussion and so forth. And it finally came out. You know, she'd never told me this before, but she was molested as a 9 or 10-year-old. And I never knew that. And but, you know, I guess, you know, just take a step back for that, for that whole time, or most of our 30 years, it got to where I thought there was something wrong with me, that I was doing something wrong, that undesirable, you know, all, all those things that I guess every man starts to feel when things aren't going right. And, you know, it affected my health, as you know, with the, you know, frankly prostate problems that popped up and so forth that are still affecting me. And, uh, you know, I guess to a degree mentally as well. So that's the kind of the long and short of it.

Yeah. Okay, so this begs the question then, if 30-some-odd years ago, even during the honeymoon phase when you guys were first getting to know each other, I would assume If we were to go back and take a time machine and ask Michael back then, are you happy with the old sex life? Would he have said like, I guess it's okay? Or were you pretty upset back then as well?

I was, you know, and again, my mistake, I guess, was I didn't, I wasn't forceful enough in bringing it up, bringing it up in that, you know, the old military family, German family that, you know, men don't complain about crap, you know. And so it was just one of those things.

So culturally, you're saying like it was embedded in you, like you just, you just suck it up.

Yeah.

Basically, you get married, you have kids. It's just what you do. It's not all wine and roses. It's not a romance novel. It's just what it is. And so you're like, I guess this is, this is the way marriage is. Oh, well. And you stuck with that for 30-some years. And if it's like typical relationship, even though it wasn't so great at the beginning, it— I would assume it did one of those and teetered down to basically almost nothing there towards the end, especially after the kids left the house.

Sure, sure. And we're still married, um, you know, and, and, you know, the full disclosure, you know, it hasn't been torture the whole 30 years. And, you know, there's been, been good times. We had 3 great kids together and, and everything. And it's— I don't have any ill will. It's just looking back on, you know, this revelation just, you know, just literally a month ago And it feels like, you know, betrayal is not the right word, but, you know, something in that vein, I guess.

Well, let's try to devil's advocate, I guess you could say, and look at the other side. I can see a lot of women listening to this. I attract a lot of women to me in my material that the women aren't necessarily the most sexual human beings in the world, and they admit that, like, it's not, it's not that important to me. Right. And in their mind, unfortunately, they say, and it shouldn't be that important to my spouse either. If he wants to be my spouse. Kind of a shitty attitude, but that's how they see things. So I can see one of them, whatever we want to call them, listening to this saying, what does that change? Whether, whether this was as a result of past abuse or this is a result of her just saying, that's how I am, what, what's the difference in your mind?

I guess if, if it was just, that's the way she is, um, I guess that would be okay. And that's a really good question. But I think with having something like that out there, it feels like it was left, you know, it was left on my shoulders and me feeling inadequate. I was doing something wrong, you know, all those things. And I guess almost becoming a beta-type male that I've never been that well. I guess after 30 years I am that way, but, you know, not what I was, I suppose.

So you feel like this beaten-down guy who was led to believe— and here's the question— were you led to believe that you were at fault, at least in part, for this lack of sex between the two of you? Was that something she overtly said to you, like, uh, you just ain't cutting it, mister, or is that— that's just all in your head? How did she explain this away, or did you even have such a conversation?

That's just it, we, we didn't have much of a conversation around that. I guess I figured, because I could, you know, I'd, I'd walk up and hug her, and I could feel her kind of, you know, tensing and pulling away, uh, type things. And I get, you know, the whole time I was thinking there was something wrong with me. Was, you know, was I, was I getting fat and out of shape? Was I, um, you know, not making enough money? Just, you know, all those things that go in your head. And, you know, turns out, all after all this time figuring out that, uh, you know, it was something external that I 100% support her in and can understand why she might not want to talk about it. And, uh, you know, feel terrible that that's something that she went through and so forth. But at the same time, you know, thinking, I guess, selfishly, it had a huge physical— I mean, it's, you know, all the prostate issues that come up and the things that come after that, I've got them, you know. And so that's, uh, you know, that's part of it.

With the prostate, everything you're insinuating that— pardon me for being crass, but we're two adults here, right?

Sure, sure.

Did you not take care of business otherwise?

Uh, not as much as, uh, as was needed apparently. And again, it was one of those things that was, uh, you know, frowned upon and actually a time or two made fun of, uh, you know, being caught in the shower, etc.

Oh, I see. Wow. So you're getting into something there because not only was she— we'll just assume by virtue of her past abuse who we don't wish that on anybody, you know, that is not her fault by any stretch of the imagination. Sorry that she had to go through something like that. It's terrible. Oof. But that's one component of this, is because of that, I am averse to personal connection in that way, all the way to things like the hugging and the kissing. You can sense that she's kind of like, oh, this is uncomfortable for me, right? And then the full-blown act, of course that's going to be somewhat uncomfortable for her. It's going to bring back past memories. It's going to whatever it may be, whatever the mechanism is at play that caused her to be a— let's call her asexual. That's not necessarily fair, but that's the best word that's coming to mind— asexual creature. But then it's one thing to say, that's me and that's my flavor of sexuality. That's who I am by virtue of past traumas. That's how I was born, whatever it may be. That's me. But then to apply that to others and shame them for not being like her, I guess that's one way of looking at it, to shame somebody for taking care of business on their own. To shame. I mean, what if she had caught you, uh, pornography or something like that? Would that be a major no-no?

Oh yes, definitely. Would have really blown the roof off of everything.

So is it fair to say anything that's overtly sexual in nature was a big no-no? Like if you were watching a movie and there was a sex scene that came on, is that like she would get up and go to the kitchen and get something type of moment?

Or— no, not so much. But, uh, you know, I think what— to put a bow on it, it always felt like anything sexual was, was dirty and, and filthy and, you know, not to be, you know, discussed or anything like that. Mm-hmm.

Which would be fine. Which would be fine if she was matched up with a Michael or that wasn't a sexual creature. If he was like, yeah, you're right. I don't know. I'm not into that much either. Those couples exist out there. I think they're a vast minority, but there are those couples that are like, we're both just not sexy creatures. We're not going to have kids. We're just roommates and we're cool with that, which is fine. God bless them if that's what they want to do. But that wasn't you. And so is it, is it too simple? Are we kind of waving away a big issue here? You threw out the cultural thing, the German staunchy background of men don't do that kind of thing. My wife's German, by the way, so I know that world well. So is that kind of an excuse, I guess we could say? Are we not digging into the deeper issue, which is, Michael, why did you stick around through all this for so much with somebody who very obviously you are mismatched with in a pretty big way. The old, the old sexy way, right? The romantic way, if we want to get kind of softer about it, because it's, it's everything. If you talk about the hugging, for goodness sakes, that's like step 1 of 100 to get to the main event. And she kind of put the hand up at step 1. We don't hug, or when we do hug, it's like, so did you not have much relationship experience prior to meeting your wife?

Uh, not deep relationship. Um, you know, I guess I would say just it was more, um, very shallow, uh, you know, college boy type relationships, for want of a better term.

So you did have an example for, I would assume, how good a physical relationship can be at a shallow level. Absolutely. You know, so there are some guys out there that are zero luck with women, nothing at all. They fall in love with the first gal who basically says, I like you. And then, and then it's sexless for 20, 30 years. But no. So you had an example of, you know, what, the— you had a taste of the good life, right? Well, while it wasn't rolled into a full-blown relationship, it was, oh, that's nice, that's fun, that's fun. And then you meet her and you're like, not so fun. So, but it was to— in your defense, it was under the shroud of marriage, and that changes everything, doesn't it? Culturally, for a lot of people, it does.

It does. And I think, you know, the proverbial, you know, once the kids came along and, um, it, you know, stayed together for the kids. And it, you know, it was never— like I said, it was never what I would call, you know, torturous or, or, uh, overtly bad. It was just that side of it was missing. The physical side was missing. And that, that had tentacles into most everything. About, you know, uh, feelings of inadequacy or invisibility even, um, thinking that, you know, my only role was, was that of supplying a paycheck. And, you know, she's worked for most of our, our relationship as well, but, uh, you know, when the kids were small, she was working, you know, extremely part-time and, uh, and so forth. So, um, you know, I guess my point there is back to your, you know, why'd I stick around um, to, uh, to the chicken to, to make any changes, I guess.

And where do you think that comes from? Maybe your mom and dad, what was their relationship like?

Uh, well, they were married for— I don't remember how many years when my father passed away, but, uh, you know, um, I remember getting quite physical quite a bit, you know, old, old soldier. Um, not that that, uh, is any, you know, any excuse, but, uh, I, you know, there was— it got real physical quite a bit.

Meaning he was abusive towards my mother?

Yes.

Oh, I'm sorry to hear that. So do you— how did you, how did you take that in as a kid? Did you later say, I'm never going to be that way to my wife? I'll never lay a hand on her. I'm going to be a good husband.

You know, I think, um, subconsciously, probably so.

And that may have, in a really ironic way, kind of made you suppress some things that maybe you feel like this is kind of a bad— the bad man side of me, the, the evil man side of me, the sexuality. This— I need to push that down because that's bad. I've seen how bad it can get. I gotta— this, you know, it's, it's not fair necessarily, but it's understandable to equate physical violence with masculinity and being a man. It's more often than not the man who is the abuser to the woman, right? Or at least the people that get in trouble legally for such a thing, it's more often than not men than it is women. So I'm just trying to think, is there— I'm trying to psychoanalyze something I'm not qualified to do so, but trying to better understand. Is there a— yeah, there's some repressed feelings against father and stuff that caused you to be like, well, let me, let me soften me, my approach, my persona in this, in this marriage. And when things like this come up, I don't go, whoa, wifey, this is not right. Let's talk about this. Let's, let's— maybe we need to split up because— no, you, you erred more on the side of shrugging your shoulders, saying it is what it is. I better just keep quiet for the— for what? The grand goal of keeping this marriage and family humming along, I guess.

You know, I can distinctly remember thinking, you know, I made my bed, you know, got to sleep in it.

You know, in hindsight, did you make the right decision?

It's complicated, uh, I guess, for, you know, if I'm thinking about myself, probably not. But, you know, the kids are all, you know, got great kids. They, they, they are all very successful in their chosen areas, and, and, uh, you know, looks like they're gonna do well in life. So from that standpoint, I mean, and she was a huge part of that, raising the kids and so forth, and did a fabulous job at it.

Um, but here's something difficult.

No, go ahead. I'm sorry, I was just coming to the point of saying that, Dev, I think we're great parents, just not a good couple.

Well put. And I hear that from guys all the time. But here's one negative aspect of all this we don't think about until after the fact. Um, how old are your kids now?

Uh, oldest is 26, 25, 25-year-old, and then a, uh, 21-year-old.

Any of them in a long-term relationship?

Ironically, the youngest. So, you know, not, not married yet, but I've been dating the same young man for quite some time. But from my, from my view, it looks like a good relationship.

I was going to ask you, sitting back and watching them too, do you see some similarities? You're like, oh gosh, she's just like Mom when it comes to this and this, or—

well, to a degree, yes. The, the whole, um You know, it seems like she hasn't trained well. And I mean, I've even thought I need to talk to him.

I would suggest it. And in a really negative, cynical thing, and oh boy, if they find out you do this, you're going to get in big trouble, mister. But having been through some version of what you've gone through and talked to so many guys have been gone down your road. Yeah, I think it behooves you as kind of a, you know, I don't know, a champion of how relationships should be by our definition. Yeah. Pull, pull the dude aside and say, I just want to— let's go have a beer somewhere. Let's talk about this. Cup of coffee, whatever it is. And if you tell my daughter I said any of this to you, I will deny it until I'm blue in the face. But here you go. And really let them know, like, This is what I as a dude endured, and this is what I saw early on in the relationship. And I'm here to tell you, if you're seeing the same— which, by the way, Michael, he probably is. If she's got him on a leash and he's well trained, he's probably— you hate— it's your daughter we're talking about, so you don't want to go down this road, but he's probably not getting a lot of nookie. It's probably not the most romantic relationship in the world. Sure. And he'll probably— if you if you have that sit down, you'll probably watch a guy nodding going, this sounds familiar. This sounds familiar. And I wouldn't necessarily say dump my daughter now and run for your life, sir. But I would say now's the time to have those very adult conversations about where you both want to take this relationship. Because, because, son, look at me. You don't want to be sitting where I'm sitting right now. It's not, it's not fun. It's not fun. I love my daughters, love my kids. I'm all that stuff. But there was a lot of things I wish I would have done differently. One of which is I wish I would have had somebody like me sitting across the table from me telling me this kind of stuff. So I am, I'm paying it forward what I've learned. And here you go, son. Don't just brush this crap under the rug. This is important stuff. Your romantic connection. Notice how she's kind of bossing you around. Not good, my man. It's not a good thing, especially at this. You haven't even had kids yet. You haven't moved in together. You haven't done any of this stuff yet. And she's already doing this? Timeout. This isn't good. That's the kind of conversations you need to have with her. Um, the point being is that we see almost invariably how this kind of— these kind of dynamics do in fact kind of, for lack of a better word, infect the future generations. So much so that when men come to me saying, I'm, I'm dating this gal, we've been dating for 6, 7 months. She seems to be the one. She, you know, I'm head over heels for her. She's got all these great qualities. What are some things, Ralph, that you suggest that I do before popping the question? And the number one thing I say is, have you met mom and dad yet? You usually answer is no, not yet. We were going to wait. Just cool, cool your jets and go meet mom and dad, because what you are seeing is probably in some ways your future. As horrible— I remember when I was a kid, I was in junior high. What was her name? I think it was Miss Atkinson. I don't remember the why she said it. Somebody must have been talking to her about something off to the side, some boy in class. But all of a sudden she just yelled out to the whole class to where we all looked at her. She goes, boys, listen to me. And we all were like looking like, what? What is this? And she goes, If you're dating a girl and you want to know what she's going to be like when she's your wife, go meet her mother. I still remember this, 7th grade, and I remember this and I was just like, wow. So that stuck with me all those years. So sure, I ain't the first to say this. It's been going on for probably hundreds and hundreds of years where people say, go meet mom if you want to see. But and probably the same with the guy. You're with a guy, go meet his dad because that's what you're going to be marrying later on down the life. That's why. Because your kids had a front row seat for watching a mom and dad and how they interact with each other. Now, in your defense, it probably wasn't like overtly horrible. It's not like you were at each other's throats every day screaming and yelling and throwing plates across, you know. No, not across the kitchen. It was just if they had to think about it, if somebody sat them down and said, did you ever see your mom and dad like kissing and hugging in the kitchen, dancing with each other, having those little romantic moments, little— did Dad, you know, sneak a little butt squeeze a mom every now and then and she would giggle and they'd chase each other around and they'd probably say no, no, because my hand gets slapped away. And the, and, and this, and the sad part would be your daughter may say something to the effect of moms and dads don't do that kind of stuff. No, right? It's like, yeah, they do, sweetie. They're supposed to if it's a good healthy relationship. And that's the thing where it— what, so you have that one. What are the genders of the other? It's the other two. Is it three total?

Son in the middle and daughter, the oldest daughter.

So I think you're probably going to have more luck in connecting at that level with son, right? Same gender. So, son, let's just— let's just get this all out there. When you're in a relationship and, you know, man to man, he's old enough, you could say there were some great aspects to your relationship with your mother. I'm not going to lie. It wasn't all wine and roses, but there was some really good. And here's the good. But on a romantic level, your mother and I just did not connect. And that was really tough on me. And I'm telling you, I'm telling you this now, son, not to gross you out or anything, but to, but to kind of warn you, like, do it right, you know, don't do necessarily what I did when it comes to that. You want to find a woman who's a good match for you. So do you have a girlfriend? Are you looking at a girl? Are you dating anybody? And this is the kind of stuff to keep in mind. What can hurt, you know, it's an awkward conversation, but those are, those are important. But he has that programming. It's, it's It's built into him already. He's going to look for mom. As weird as that sounds, it's just psychologically we see it again and again and again. Not always, but it's pretty damn common. They go, they find somebody that looks like mom, acts like mom, same kind of background, same kind of temperament, and away they go. So back to the original point, we kind of went off on a tangent there of you have newly discovered this past abuse on her part, which, by the way, how did that come up in conversation?

Well, we were having basically this conversation because I guess I had, um, it had been— had just gotten to the point where I was, you know, I'd sit in my chair and watch TV at night. We weren't communicating at all, and it was— it just came to a head. And, and, you know, I kind of— that it wasn't a blowup, but just, uh, saying that, you know, there's no— there's no physical relationship, there's no, you know, nothing going on.

Uh, you saying this to her? Out of the blue one day, you just like, you know what, this, this sucks. But did you try, did you try to touch her at some point? She did the flinch and you go, you know what, that's it. Like something had to spur this on.

I, I don't recall. I mean, I know we, you know, we were sleeping in separate rooms and then, you know, so, but I think that was part of it. But, uh, I don't recall exactly how the whole thing came about. But, um, and so, and I told her basically what I told you earlier, you know, that the few times that year that we do end up having sex, it felt really forced and almost like she was, uh, um, doing it out of, uh, you know, duty, or, you know, felt like she had to. And, you know, it was more felt like let's get this over with type of, type of situation. And she, she got really mad because she didn't— she said she didn't feel that way. And, you know, to, to get really graphic, I mean, there was Really, it was just, you know, the— not a lot of, not a lot of foreplay, then get the deed done, and then it's over and done with.

Yeah, very mechanical.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then, um, she sat there for a second, and then she said, well, I thought— I guess something to the effect of this, uh, I thought I was past this, or something like that. And she didn't tell me that day specifically what happened, although, you know, I could fill in the blank basically. Um, that, uh, you know, something had happened in her childhood, you know, or, you know, teen years, whenever it was. And then finally, a week later, she finally admitted kind of what happened and, and so forth when she was, you know, 9, 10, 11 years old. And, and, but, uh, you know, that's where it all came about.

And I can see from a variety of different angles how that could be so upsetting to you. Number one, your wife had to go through that, that It's terrible. And more selfishly, why didn't you tell me? I'm your husband. You're supposed to be sharing these kind of things with me. What else are you hiding from me? That's kind of a reaction that a lot of people have, right or wrong. That's a knee-jerk thought for a lot of people, men and women. You know, why didn't you just share this with me? And why am I learning this now so many years later? And then the other one is the one you're alluding to is that would have kind of helped me. Go through a lot of this. It would have put an answer to it. You know, I hear some semblance of this. This is strange from men in long-term dead bedroom situations where they discover an affair on the wife's part. And they say there is an element of a lot of, you know, trauma, betrayal, sadness. But then there's an element of, phew, now it makes sense. Because all this time I was thinking it was me. All this time I was wondering if it was an abuse thing, past abuse. All this time I was wondering if she was depressed. You know, maybe there's— what the hell's going on here? And she would just cut me off at the pass every time I got anywhere near, like, maybe we should go talk to somebody.

No.

Have you thought about depression? No. Leave me alone. No, no, no. And then finally he has an answer. Oh, she's been fooling around with some man for years now. Now it makes sense. And now everything starts tying together, like, oh, that explains this thing and that explains this moment and that moment. Ding! The light's coming on for these men. It's still sad, it's still traumatizing, but everything makes sense in that moment, right? You kind of had your ding. Oh, now everything kind of— that explains why she acted like this, why she's averse to touch, why she was so cold. And when it comes to the sexuality, but, um, it sounds like to you there wasn't much of a relief from all that. It's just more of an angry response, really. Yeah.

Well, you hit on most of it already. You know, one was, you know, I was just devastated that that even happened to her, that she, you know, that the person that was supposed to be protecting her kind of let it happen. That was her biological father, and, and he, you know, he, he wasn't involved in it, but, you know, she couldn't tell him, you know, and she hasn't really talked much about why. But I never met the guy, and he was never in her life when, when I'm— when she she and I started dating, um, and, you know, she, she never had anything good to say about him. And, you know, so there's a lot of insecurity around that, you know. Then a lot of stuff really comes into— came into focus, like you said, when, when she said that, as far as, uh, you know, um, when she's at home, has to have the alarm set on the house and so forth. And just, uh, in, in my words, in the past, kind of scared of her own shadow sometimes. But, uh, you know, but back to, you know, the way I was feeling, and that was sad she had to go through that, um, sad that, you know, that she didn't feel like she could tell me about it, and understanding why she might not want to. And, uh, and then lastly, um, you know, it kind of felt like that was laid on my shoulders for, you know, 30 years as far as, um, why, why nothing was going on, and, you know, what was wrong with me. And, you know, again, I keep alluding to it. It has had, you know, physical, uh, effects on me as well as, you know, a little, you know, I'm not, I don't think I'm very weak-minded, but you know, that it does have a little bit of a mental effect on me as well.

Sure, absolutely. So, you know, back to the original question, you had to endure a lot, but what if in year number 2 of being together she says, sit down, I, I have a confession to make. Confession is not the right story, a story to share about my past. I just want to get this out there so you understand this happened to me. And as a result of this happening to me, I am not the sexiest person in the world, as you've noticed. I don't— I'm not big on touch. I'm not big on— I feel very unsafe at all times. A lot of anxiety, a lot of this and that. I'm playing pretend here. What if she says, and I've gone to therapy over it, and it's just something that I'm going to have to deal with for the rest of my life. And if you want to be my husband, that's something you're going to have to deal with. I bet you if she had that sit-down talk, it probably wouldn't have changed much, would it?

Maybe not back then. I mean, it would have been something, you know, at least then I knew about it. And, you know, part of it is she's never dealt with it either. And so, you know, I've been trying to tell her to go see someone, and it feels like she's dragging her feet on that. Said, because I'm just like, because I can't, you know, I'll listen all you want, but I can't help you, um, you know, other than just listening. And, uh, you know, she hasn't gone to see anybody about it either, you know. And so You know, back to the— your, your kind of comparison to, you know, it being an affair. Had it been an affair, I'd have a clear-cut answer on what to do right now.

You would leave. Yeah.

Yes. And, you know, so that, you know, is it in the same realm? I don't know. And I guess part of me is, is wondering, you know, leaving someone on, on that note, what a jackass.

There you go. I was just going to say, in fact, this makes it more difficult because if you were at the end of your rope, like, I don't I think I can— the remaining 20, 30 years of life that I have left, I don't think I want to live in this. I've already done enough. I paid my price. I got 3 kids, they're out of the home, it's time to leave. And then this is dropped in your lap and you're like, well, shit, now I'm going to leave a woman who basically just confessed to one of the biggest, if not the biggest, pain point in her entire life, which she just finally— it's— this was very, very difficult for her to do, by the way. If she's, you know, if she has that avoidance streak in her as a result of this past trauma one of the big characteristics of said people is that they don't like to open up at all to anybody. So when you're like, you should go talk to somebody, a therapist, they're like, heck no, I'm not talking to somebody about all my nonsense going on in my head. That's for me to— I don't like talking about stuff. And they don't like you talking about their business. They don't like anybody knowing their business. So for her to say that to you, she must have really felt painted into a corner, so to speak, like she lashing out. She had no choice. I mean, did this really come to a head?

Because I mean, it was at that point where it felt like it was coming, you know, that conversation itself was coming to— there was going to be a conclusion at the end of it. Um, you know, who's leaving? Wow.

And so, you know, it's, it's not necessarily a moot point, the past abuse. It's monumental in her own personal development. It is very much a huge impact on your relationship. Obviously, and impact on her going forward in life. Unless she gets help with it, it will always be a factor. But it doesn't really change anything because you just said it yourself. Even if at the beginning of the relationship she had told you, this happened to me, and as a result, I'm not a sexy person, sorry, you probably would have still hung around anyway because you had your vows and your— this is the woman I've committed myself to. I already said I'm going to start a family with her. Let's do this. So it's kind of a moot point, isn't it?

It is somewhat.

How would happen? What happened? It just— it is. Michael was going to stick around no matter what. Some people will say, bravo, Michael. Others would say, ooh, you see where that leads you? Not very good.

So yeah, and that's, you know, that's kind of where I'm at right now, dude. You know, I think you nailed it a minute ago. Do I want to spend the, you know, the next, you know, what's that number, 10, 15, 20, 30 years? I don't know.

Who knows?

But, uh, you know, do I want to be fairly unhappy? Um, you know, and that's, that's the, the, I guess, the million-dollar question.

If we want to go by, uh, if we want to go by scientific stats, my friend, I'm not too far behind you age-wise. Um, you got a good 20 years of life left. Let's call 15 years of those healthy and active. And then towards the end, everyone just starts slowing down and it's not good. So 50, and that's going to go, dude, like that. You and I were 25 yesterday and that's it. But when I put it out there like that, my goodness, how negative that sounds. Or it can be a real positive. Let's, let's do this right, man. 15 good years. That's— we need to get a lot of living done in 15 years. My goodness. But within the confines of the relationship with your wife, who, no fault of her own, has gone through a lot, but she's never addressed it. And it's had an effect on a lot of different people. Its effect on you, obviously. We'll see what kind of effect on the kiddos. But none of that has to continue to hold you down and constrict you and confine you in a cage. And there's going to be a lot of people are going to tell you Michael's a royal dick for leaving under these circumstances. And I'm not going to be one of those. I'm just going to say You can still— here's the ironic thing— you can still be a loving person, uh, the guy who fathered kids with her and all this other stuff, but still say, as far as romantic relationship and everything, that's important to me, and, uh, it's not to you, so I'm going to go seek that elsewhere. Now, some people result— and I know this isn't your world, trust me, I've already picked up on the fact that you this isn't your world. But some people resolve this by saying, go ahead, husband, do your thing. I just don't want to hear about it. That's not as unusual as you may think. And while others are like, no, we need to divorce, while others are like, go ahead and do your thing and I want to know all about it. I must know where you're at at all times. I must know who this person that you're going to be with is.

I don't know.

But let's play pretend and say like this evening you guys have a sit down and she says, Yeah, I agree. This can't go on like what we're doing here. Um, what— where do you see the resolution? What do you see it being?

You know, I don't think I could do any of the, the above other than the— than just, you know, just leaving it off, leaving. Yeah.

And where would that leave you both lifewise? What would life look like for her going forward?

Oh, that's, you know, that again I don't know, you know, I think, you know, assets would be, you know, there'd be enough there to be somewhat comfortable. She, she has a good job, um, you know. I would, uh, hope that we could be, you know, for the sake of the kids, could be, uh, amicable and, and, uh, you know, because there will be weddings and, you know, grandkids and so forth down the road to where it's not uncomfortable for where we don't make it uncomfortable for everybody else.

Does she have, uh, friends?

Yeah, she's got, you know, several friends. And, you know, and are they— a lot of them are other couples. I don't know if that would still hold, you know, hold true or not, but, uh, you know, and then, you know, then part of me selfishly, selfishly is like, that's on her to figure out. I can't be responsible for her happiness.

It's true. Here's another angle at this that may be uncomfortable to face, or maybe not. It may be a bit of a relief to you, comforting to you. If she is like most women in such cases, she may actually be relieved and may actually say, oh yeah, this new chapter of my life I always kind of envisioned would be on my own with my friends and being the widow or whatever you want to call it, even though you may still be around. That's kind of the lifestyle she may be aspiring to post-kids. A lot of women admit that. Like, it's almost— it's kind of cold, however you want to look at it, but it's almost as if saying, all right, husband, you can beat it. Your job is done here. We made the kids. The kids are out of the house. They're all fully grown. The romance and everything has obviously been done for quite a while. So you can skedaddle. You can beat and go get your girlfriends in Thailand or whatever it is you want to do. And, um, when we poll those ladies or talk to those ladies, whatever it may be, they're pretty happy. It's still single grandmas. They have their little social life and they do what they want to do.

And, uh, I mean, we've had discussions, you know, that not— we still love each other, there's no doubt about that. But she wants to, you know, she says she wants to work on it, and I guess I kind of go through the motions and say, yeah, okay. But I don't, I don't think that's— I don't see change happening.

Yeah, you need to really— I want to work on this. I don't want to divorce. What does that mean to you, wife? What does work on look like to you? Well, I bet you if you really drilled it down into actionable things, it would be continue what you're doing now. Do you realize that means we have to go talk to somebody, right? No. Yeah, that's, that's part of the work. You do realize that means we got to work on our intimate life together, hugging and stuff like that. That needs to come back in the picture. Oh, it's like, yeah, wife, no, this is what the work is. The work does not mean just stick it out no matter what. And if she's a very conservative type, she'll push back with, that's what my mom and dad did. And so my grandma and grandpa, they did— they didn't fall in love with each other in that way, but they stuck it out because that's just what you do. Yeah, well, that's—

well, the complicating factor in all that is, at this point, until I get together with my doctors, uh, there's not much I can do about it anyhow. So, um, it's because it's had that much of an effect on me. Again, the prostate problems and everything.

Is that prostatitis? Is it just an inflammation? Are you— is there a cancer story?

Or, uh, no, it's not cancer. It's just an enlarged prostate plus prostatitis.

Yeah, yeah. Okay. And, uh, yeah, usually, as you— sounds like you've already been told, a lot of doctors will say that can be avoided in most men by cleaning the pipes out on a regular basis. Yeah, it's Mother Nature's way of saying that's what you're supposed to be doing, right? And And it sounds— this sounds horrible and cold. Women love when you go down this road, but really it's Mother Nature's way of saying you're supposed to be going out and making babies with like a lot of different women all over the place. That's kind of what we're engineered for. So to constrain ourselves is kind of a sacrifice, if you will. It's over— that's overstating it, but you know what I mean. It's— we're supposed to be doing it certainly more than what you're doing now, right? And your body just let you know that.

Yeah, I mean, jokingly, back way back when, after the third child was born, um, you know, went and and to the urologist to have everything fixed so we couldn't have any more kids. And, you know, they were— he was saying that, you know, after you have to, as you said, clear the pipes, I think 20 times before, you know, oh really? Wow, you're not, uh, so fertile. I might not have some, uh, some issues there. And yeah, and so my joke was, well, hell, that'll cover— that'll take 2 years, 3 years. Got in trouble for that joke. But anyhow.

Well, yeah. Hey, here's a question. Do you consider yourself a pretty high libido person?

I would say normal. I don't know about high, but normal.

Yeah. Because, you know, to be honest with you, again, not to be too crass here, but most men hearing your story would be surprised that you weren't taking care of business more often than what you were. But you pointed out the shame factor and other things. Yeah. Still, most men sneak and they have their own little secret separate life doing just that. That?

Well, I mean, not— certainly not as much as, as I needed to be, but yeah, I was, but not— obviously not enough to, uh, to avoid physical problems.

Gotcha, gotcha. Wow. Well, where are you leaning more towards? What are you thinking?

Depending on what day it is, you know, some, some days it's like, you know, I can see the path and got to just got to you know, rip the Band-Aid off, so to speak. And other days I just think through it and it's more complicated. I don't, you know, I don't wish her ill at all. And then I start worrying about what would she do. And then, you know, other days I'm like, that's not my problem, you know. But it's hard after being with someone for 30 years not to, you know, not to be, you know, thinking about her. Because I mean, I do still love her, do still care about her, don't, don't want anything bad to happen to her.

Yeah, it'd be weird if you didn't. Yeah.

We might be better off in different houses.

We have a gentleman in our group, the Brotherhood, our community for men that we, that we run, and he's very active in there and he's in a lot of meetings and he's 72 years of age. And he and the wife basically at the same, basically the exact same position you're in, minus this sexual abuse part of it. But basically she shut down shop quite a while ago. And then finally, at the ripe old age of 72, he's like, I don't want to do this anymore. And now they live in separate homes that are literally like a block away from each other. And he goes over and has dinner once a week, helps her out with some stuff around the house, but they're just two separate people now. That's just their life. And when they sat down and thought about it, they're like, there's really no reason to be together other than to help care for each other at the waning years of their life. But, um, now he's doing things that she forbid when she was, uh, um his sexless spouse, which didn't, you know, on paper doesn't make much sense. I don't want you, and other people can't have you either, and you can't do that other thing either, and no, you can't do that either.

And he—

it didn't make any sense to him. He's like, finally, I've had enough. So they went to separate homes and did their thing. So you may be going down that road. Um, so let's pretend and say that the health issues squared away, everything's cool, perfect bill of health. Does the split happen? Papers are signed, assets are split. You're still friendly, but she's doing her thing with her friends. She's in grandma mode, as we call it. And you are— and you are in what mode? What's life look like for you going forward?

I don't know, just be— I guess just doing kind of what I want to do, you know, maybe find that— you know, not looking— I don't think I'm looking for— would be looking for another girlfriend or wife, but, uh, you know, going out and just having fun and doing what I would like to do, you know.

What does that look like?

Well, I mean, you can probably see over my shoulder some, some dead animals. And I do hunt. And, uh, you know, one of my, one of my lifelong dreams has always been I'd like to go on a safari. And I don't, I don't even know at this point where, if I'd want to go to shoot anything, but would like to go to Africa and see the animals. And, you know, there's some of them you can do where you actually, you're embedded with the different, uh, tribes where, or villages where you're at, and you get to really see their culture and so forth. That's fascinating to me. She has no interest. Too long of a flight. Yeah, too long of a flight. And that's just one, one example, you know. If, if I had to really boil it down, we're two 80-year-olds right now, you know. She wants to go pick strawberries, which I enjoy doing with her, but, uh, you know, it's, it's not stuff that is really high on my list of what I want to do.

You're touching on something that I hear a lot And I don't know if it's as my advancing years as I get into my 50s and everything else, but I just hear it all the time now, which is it's very obvious for a lot of people, not everybody, but a lot of people, that there is a— oh, Mother Nature has played this cruel joke of the, the aging timeline for a lot of men and women is such where the woman's very natural, normal aging progression, whatever you want to call it, leads her to a point of saying I call it grandma mode. Let's shut this down. No, I don't want to go on world safari trips. No, I certainly don't want to have sex. No, I don't want to go out dancing, everything else. I'm cool just on the couch doing my crocheting, go to see my friends for coffee, watch my movies. Just a very sedate kind of quiet life. Grandma mode. Bake pies every now and then, whatever. And then here's hubby over there going, let's go dancing, let's go to the African safari, let's have sex, let's do all this. And she's like You're acting like a 20-year-old. No, this is the new chapter. What the hell? Why aren't you coming along with me? And he's like, no, I still got the energy. I'm still rearing to go. Very mismatched. And I hear that all the time. And then, well, what's the grand solution here? There's none really, other than one of either he comes down or she goes up to meet him. And from what I've seen, the coming up to meet him is pretty damn rare. Often what I see is a lot of men just resigning themselves to, oh well, it is what it is. And then they have their little secret secret life of possibly maybe an affair on the side or taking care of business themselves to— for the sexual thing. But then they, they drop the whole dream of the, the Alaskan hunting and the African safari. They're just like, that's just not happening. It's just— and it's sad, isn't it? So here you are going, once I get the— what's the word I'm looking for— get that monkey off my back. That's not the word. The anchor. Yeah, untether the anchor from me. I'm free. It's like, woohoo, you'd be able to live. So we're not just talking about a sex thing here, are we? It's just like an overall life outlook thing.

Yeah, I think so. I mean, I alluded to it earlier, and it— that just had felt invisible for a long time, you know. And so the forgotten father, and I guess, you know, and— but, you know, I joke with, you know, with my best friend since, you know, I don't know, 5th grade, and, you know, we kind of kid each other. It's like, now I know our dads are always so pissed off.

It's true. I used to joke that my dad would take off for the hardware store for 4 hours, like 5 days a week. It's like 20 total hours a week of the hardware store. And he used to take me with him. You know, some of you listening to that probably say like, we know what Dad was up to. No, he was wandering around the hardware store, talking to people, doing his thing. He would bounce from hardware store to lumberyard to this place to that place. Just something to get away from the doldrums of the life and the that domestic stuff that was just so stifling to him. He had his own little world, his own little life. And it—

my kids laugh because they can, they can call me, and if, if they need something at Home Depot, I can tell them exactly where to go find it.

You've got that place mapped out.

Yes.

Oh, that's funny. Yes. So, um, that's a very real thing. It also ties into why we tend to be in the bathroom for 45 minutes. It's our little escape. So, I mean, it sounds like you're resigned. How do I encapsulate this? You're resigned to separate yourself from her, but it's to what degree, I guess we could say. Are you going to further separate yourself emotionally but still live under the same roof? And are you going to say, screw you, I'm going on the African safari whether you want to like it or not? That's one avenue. You don't need— just because she's wife doesn't mean you have to be tethered to the woman. Let her do her thing and you do your thing. Or are you going to say, no, let's make this official? I want to feel free, free to explore romantic relationships if I want, because that's been eluding me for the last 30 years. I mean, come on, I'm a human being here. Or I don't know, something in between there. What are you leaning more towards right now?

I think it's only fair if we go that route to just split it for real, split it up. So there's no, no ill— as little ill feelings as possible, and no feelings of, uh, you know, that you got to keep checking in or anything like that. That, you know, do your own thing, and whatever your own thing is, is going to be fine.

What do you think her reservations would be towards that solution? Why would she hesitate against that?

I don't know that she's there. I, I don't, I don't know that she thinks that there's anything real wrong.

That's perplexing, isn't it? Yeah, but you're probably right. She'd probably be like, what? I mean, if you sat down at a counselor and really aired your grievances, she'd probably be like, I had no idea it was that big of a deal to him. And you're like, how can you not know? What, what in the world? And you'll realize just how on two different planets you really are.

And I think that's, I think that's 100% correct.

Sad. And but sad that that's the state of the relationship, that it's so against what Michael and frankly 90% of men would want in a relationship. But that's her, man. It's always been her. And I hope you have any thought in your mind that she's going to change tomorrow out of your head because that ain't going to happen. No change tomorrow, next year, next week, nothing. It's— that's who she is, dude. It's—

well, because that's been the discussion. Like I said, you know, I'll fight for it and I'll fix it. We can fix this together. And I'm like, after 30 years, you know, are we old? And, you know, we're old dogs, you know. Okay, I don't know that we could learn too many new tricks at this point.

From what I've seen, you can gauge just how serious they are about that change by basically crossing your arms and saying, how about it, let's see what you got. And invariably the answer is, I was kind of hoping you would do everything. I was hoping you would arrange for this and this and schedule the counseling session and do everything. I'm going to need some effort on your part too, wife, you know, to do this. And sure enough, she's like, fine, I'll schedule the appointment. And then she doesn't show up. Or she's like, no, I can't do Tuesday. We need to be— and then next thing you know, 3 months goes by and you haven't seen anybody. And it's the same old, same old. That's not the effort you want. She has to be like, I already got the appointment made. This is what we're going to do. I want to talk about this. We're going to work on this. That's the effort you want, but that's not what you're going to get from her, unfortunately.

You kind of nailed it. I, you know, she said, well, I don't know who to call. So I looked at our insurance, found out who does, you know, um, that's the kind of effort. Yeah, remote, uh, online, you know, just, just for Zoom thing.

Yeah.

And, uh, you know, well, I sent him an email, haven't heard back.

What's her talking—

what the answer was. Yeah.

It's not going to happen, dude. Yeah. Sad.

I think I just needed someone to tell me that.

I knew it already, but yeah, yeah, yeah. And I'll end with this. You can still love her.

You can always—

because just because you're like, we're going different directions with the romance thing and we both know whether it may take you some time, wife, to realize this, but eventually I think with some introspection, possibly via a third party sitting down with you, you will realize that this has been pretty dysfunctional and broken for quite a while. It's not healthy. It's just taken me this long to realize it and all this other stuff. And this has nothing to do with your past abuse and everything else, wife. I'm still here for you. I still love you. You're the mother to my children. You know, I'll always be a part of your life. I consider you one of my best friends in the whole wide world. But we have to realize that this is— this can't go on like this. But, but it's not— I'm going to disappear and you'll never see me again or whatever. So if there's ever anything you need, I'm here. And I would hope vice versa, you know, to help with these kids and all this other stuff. But it's time for us to go our separate ways. I think that would help ease the blow. And she would— I think there's a very real sentiment for a lot of ladies and men for that regard that have been hit with something like this because it'll feel like it came out of nowhere to her. Probably, even though that's kind of silly, that's how it will kind of feel to her, is a feeling of abandonment, of like, I'm scared. Like, where am I going to go now? What am I going to do now? My whole life has been with this dude. Every morning we get up and do the coffee this way. We do the lunch this way. And we— every Wednesday we watch this show and we do— that's just gone.

And that's specifically said that the other day that, you know, we were having a conversation around that, but it was, I'll be all alone.

Sad. It's scary.

Yeah, it's scary.

It's scary to a person who has, um, basically self-limited herself with, you know, you just say, I'm not going to go to Africa to some safari trip, flights are too long, too expensive. No, I'm not going to go do that. No, I'm not going to. She has limited a lot in her life just by waving it off, saying, that ain't me, that ain't me. So of course she's going to be more apt to be feel lonely because she's cut off a lot of the world from her. She's gonna— she's gonna have to open herself up a bit. Maybe this will be a good chapter and a good turn for her in life. We're like, oh, I need to make some changes. I don't have much going on here. I got these two friends, but they got their own thing going on. The friends can't hang out, you know. I need to do more with my life. I don't know, could be. But I'd be curious to see, uh, how this all turns out. So keep in touch.

Will do. I mean, I probably planned on joining the, joining the network there.

Just haven't yet. The Brotherhood. Yes, we would love to have you. Happy. We would love to have you. So for those listening, help4men.com, go there. You can go to help4men.com, go to /join in your browser and it'll jump you right to the page or click on Brotherhood within the website there and you learn all about it. So you share your story. You're going to have a lot of guys in there going, boy, that sounds familiar. And whereabouts in the world are you? I don't know if you want to give that away.

I'm in Texas.

So am I right now. Whereabouts in Texas?

Uh, South Texas.

Okay, well, I'm in North Dallas area, so.

All right.

Okay, okay. So you're near the Mexico border there? Yep. Oh, very cool, very cool. Well, we have lots of Texas dudes, so all you have to say is, anybody want to get together? Texas, go hunting, you'll find somebody. But we get together and we do the online chatting that's on— that's going on all day, every day. We get together in live Zoom meetings, talk face-to-face that way. We do a bunch of those every week. So it's a good tribe to kind of align yourself with at this next chapter in your life, because this could be, I mean, this could be pretty awesome. This next chapter.

It feels to me like it'd be good to talk to someone that's third party, not my friends who are going to have my back no matter what, you know, and have, and don't get me wrong, they'll call me out on my bullshit too. But at the same time, you know, someone that kind of has been through it and, yeah, uh, can maybe see it from all angles and, you know, help me with something maybe I'm not seeing.

I've talked about in the past where when I went through all my difficulties about a dozen years ago, um, I had friends with good intentions, but their, their scope of their experience with what I went through was so limited, like nothing, that they didn't know how to talk about it. They didn't know what to talk about. They would just sip their beer and stare wide-eyed and go, man, that's terrible. I don't know what to tell you. Anyway, and just change the subject. Very uncomfortable. So when you surround yourself with guys that are like, been there, done that, let me tell you about this and this, and here's some advice, and here's what I wouldn't do. You're like, here's a whole world I didn't even know existed. Oh, thank goodness. There's other people. I thought I was alone. That's what so many people say. It's like, oh no, oh no. There's a lot of guys that have gone through exactly— is that your puppy dog there?

It is.

Yeah, I see something.

Very neglected if I haven't pet him every half hour. Sure, sure.

Understood. Understood. Well, brother, it was a pleasure chatting with you.

It was good. It was a good hour. I didn't know that we'd take this long, but it was well worth it.

It goes by fast, doesn't it? Yeah, it does. And, you know, for—

Go ahead. And where would the podcast end up?

We're going to put this up on the Dad Starting Over podcast itself, which has already got scheduled for the next month or so. So it'll be a little bit of ways before it shows up there. As well as the Dad Starting Over YouTube channel, which again, we won't see you. Everybody will just be hearing your disembodied voice in the background and they'll just see my pretty face.

All right.

Yeah, we'll put it out there. And guys that are watching this, listening to this, um, be curious. Let me— let us know in the comments, can you, uh, relate to this? Unfortunately, I bet a lot of you can. You're at that chapter in your life where you're going this direction and the spouse says, I ain't following you. Combined with discovering this past abuse and long-term sexlessness and all this other stuff. I think there's a lot of guys, Michael, that will relate to what you're saying, and we'll see if we can get some good chatter going in the comments there and get some good discussion going there. But I appreciate you. I appreciate you bringing this to us all and sharing. That's really big of you. Appreciate it. Appreciate your time and wish you all the best.

Thanks, Ralph. I appreciate it.

All right, brother. Thank you.