Hi Annon,
I did wanted to answer your post soon. First of all to say I am so sorry you find yourself in this position which you didn’t anticipate nor detected to begin with when you got married.
I sincerely value your inquiry to my advise but want to emphasize I am no counselor! I am just speaking from the experience my husband and I learned during our road through all this, through a land of not knowing where to go. The importance to have (some) people in your life with whom you can be frank and open to talk to about anger, doubt and confusion and ask questions which you yourself don’t have answers too.
So by far…that would be my first advice, try and find someone with whom you can talk to, cry and be just yourself. Have your own inner perspectives straight in what you want and need. Clear your head and feelings, level them out so to speak.
Do not feel limited by your wife with what she feels is the right way to go in what you have to speak about and your inner feelings according to her sexual need and being. Because you need it, maybe even more then she does! Just a few people which you trust!!
I absolutely realize this is a very difficult time for you right now, and the damage this news causes for your marriage, and it’s painfulness of realizing some borders you do not want to cross in the midstream of letting your wife explore her feelings and wanting her to be who she is.
I have read your other post and I am making an educated guess this is not something your wife discovered a few months ago. She probably thought about it for a long time but now told you consequently as a result of being honest and transparent and responsible.
And that is probably even more painful to grasp then accepting your wife’s feelings for women. But being kept in the dark all those years and you being the victim of her secret, not being her main objective of significance the same as you held her. Broken promises and trust.  
I don’t know, I am just being candid, because I don’t think you asked me for rosy dubious answers.
 
And that is probably the main issue first I think. You. Because if you want to pursue a monogamous marriage with your wife it is not at all just about accepting and maintaining her feelings as valuable and being who she is. But it’s about accepting the fact that you both are equal in value and importance as well. If you want to go this road ahead, it is a road together. It’s a bond and unity you share together. It’s accepting both your feelings in the equation and finding away in open and honest desire to have the responsibility to choose for each other as you once promised when you got married. Those promises do not diminish at the crossroad as one side of the marriage demands to earn the right to be herself and makes you choose as it is her awareness and being herself.
If you lose that aspect, then you yourself diminish your value, not only as a husband but also as being a man. That is the whole problem with tunnelvision, the slipstream of deliberation of sexual feelings are considered the sole priority and primary issue and source for every other step one takes, leaving the spouse on the sideline. And downplaying the importance of the value of who she really is as the person she wants to be in the totality of things. Thinking it is alright and for the best for both to set sexual orientation on the first place, but in fact building a gap farther and farther away from each other. Because it is all based on a one (self-seeking) sided need.   
She has to acknowledge that fact too in the deepest need she feels obligated to. Not by mere will to be in a household together, paying the bills and accommodate your needs twice a year. But from and with her heart, because that is what a unity, the bond of marriage contains. The essence of love.
 
If you want to tell her something that has merit: she should not leave the totality of who she is as a whole person. Sexuality doesn’t just hold or keep merely and simply feelings toward…, it is about (in her case) being a woman. Knowing what she is in the totality of her existence. It is so much more, the feelings she has are just a part of that. And moreover, if she knows that fact, she does not have to be a victim of her feelings as if she is out of control when she makes an other choice that comply with her preferences to the whole she wants to be in life. The world and social media is telling every one to obey feelings or otherwise be unhappy and wanting, but that is not so!! For instance, my preference is not my feelings toward woman, although I do have those feelings and acknowledge that fact and accepting myself as a result being in peace and satisfied with myself, knowing and acknowledging that part of who I am. But my actual preference is with my marriage and the love for my husband, wanting that even more and also belongs to me, as a part of who I am. Among a whole bunch of other personality stuff that makes me to whom I am. I have the choice. I am in control of what I want to pursue and fulfills my longings. For it is my will, not my feelings, who run my life and my love for the person I want to share my life with.     
 
This information she should have shared with you (earlier) and be on the table as a mayor issue of why your sex-life or intimacy were not there to begin with as it should have been. Knowledge you should have had a choice about whether you could or would be able to live with that.
For this is not something that will, if controlled and modified correctly, goes away.
So it is important you personally think long and hard (= heart desire to the depth) of what you feel, need and want in life to live in acceptance and accordance to those standard that require all that, but her needs and feelings as well. This is no one(wo)man show and you are the audience.
Going together requires not just acceptance for her, like I said before, which, from what I gather in your story is agreeable to her except going outside the marriage seeking comfort for her feelings. But if you do not comprehend that to the core that’s actually not even the issue in the source, then… how can she? (for instance: If she would have had feelings for a man…would you make this same remark? ) So the core questions involve more than sexual orientation.
Acceptance is good and important, but it is going deeper and further than only accepting her feelings.
Both have to get out of the tunnel-vision that focusses on sexual orientation as the main and central aspect of life and decisions. Letting loose, and then grasp other values that make us a person. That opens  up a broader perspective and actual freedom. That is the place to take decisions from. And yes feelings will follow in accordance. Sexual feelings as a result of love instead of the other way around. As such a monogamous MOM gets fulfilling to both.
 
Do realize well, both have to be willing to go this path, if one doesn’t want it, then it’s simply not an viable option.
Your wife is free to contact me through my personal mail you find on SSN, but like I said…I am on holiday 😉 so not always able to respond immediately.
My thoughts are with you both wishing you a way through this turmoil.
 
Sam

Anon42 wrote:

Thank you, Samantha for taking time and answering me. I'll see if I can share some of these ideas with my (so far) wife.

Welp, the wife is not open to any such ideas. She claims she can't see any way of changing her mind, and won't even try to understand what your thinking is, SamanthaNL. Thanks for giving it a try. I would work hard for saving the marriage, but that would require two people thinking that it is possible, and it's not the case unfortunately.
I've basically accepted the inevitable divorce, am feeling pretty much ok and distancing myself from the wife.

Today we found this video from Joe Kort on youtube.
 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ddEc_hyCXAI&pp=ygUaam9lIGtvcnQgbWl4ZWQgb3JpZW50YXRpb24%3D

 
When discovery/disclosure happens somewhere down the line in marriage, it causes a complex set of initial difficulties and turmoil to overcome (like we ourselves had to work through). Nevertheless the core principles and characteristics of the relation (on the way forward) is very much the same as described in the story in the video. There are so many key points we share with their story. A MOM is not doomed by definition, nor should it be because external opinions say so. Whatever you choose together, be aware you’ve power of choice and free will.

Hi Irish,

quite something, this situation you find yourself in (and your wife too of course). I'm glad you found this forum/topic, because usually people have no information about the different routes and outcomes that are possible. When I entered this situation twenty years ago, I was told that it would inevitable lead to divorce, open marriage or some sort of platonic relation stripped of real meaning.
This was the seemingly predestioned lines of thought that (still) exist. There are many more related tropes: gay spouse should live in accordance to their sexual preference otherwise they are not authentic. One (or both) spouses will have to live a closeted life, keeping up appearances. A MOM must be sexless and living together like brother and sister. etc.
It's true that if a couple isn't working really hard on themselves and their relation and the questions that arise, they most likely will end up in such a situation. 
Maybe one or both spouses didn't actually and realy want to save the marriage, communication is and was lacking all along, maybe it's one side always giving while the other is just taking. 

Well, no marriage is perfect, but the decisive factor is the Will to seek eachother, the Will to reach out and break the barriers, improve what is lacking. So at the center is Free Will, and use of the power that is given to everyone who wants to. There is no predestination how a MOM will evolve and work out. No, you both decide and determine that. Not just staying together, but the quality of the resulting relation as well.
It will be a quest and not easy, but I hope you get from our story it's in your own hands as a couple.

On the way there, there are many sub-plots. Things to work out, together or each individually. In our path these came up over the years. Solving and overcoming them, resulted in growth. Sure al lot of trouble going through it, but all so very valuable in hindsight.

I get from your description that acceptance of your wife is important, and this is totally right! Acceptance who she is and what she feels, is very good. So she can be honest and feel save. But remember acceptance has to go both ways. You being understanding and supportive, is very understandable and okay. It's love in action. But this goes for your wife too. She's not incapeable of loving you the same way! 
It has to be/become reciprocal, not a situation in which one is victim that is sacrificing to the other. Both decide and act from Free Will. No guilts or claims, its totally voluntary all arround.

Dutchman.

PS. As I'm writing this, Samantha is writing her own reponse too.

Last edited by Dutchman (August 14, 2025 11:49 am)

Dutchman, I am very grateful that you have responded and are willing to give any wisdom you have, thank you so much. Right now we are still hugging, holding hands, and trying to work through any awkwardness. I am discovering as of yet, nothing has changed other than the not knowing what is next... and of course what I wrote about as a part of my own self reflection. At least this is how it appears to me. My wife wants me to talk and express how I feel, she wants me to not hurt, she has expressed that she wants to stay married and maintain a relationship with me, but we just don't understand what comes next as this is extremely new to us. Through her current actions, I have hope she will continue to choose me. Now, what are our options... what can we both accept? As you mentioned I thought of three options originally and none of them aligned with the one I have discovered through your and your wife's generosity in sharing with us. This was a very powerful and thought provoking and also hopeful outcome. Please know you sharing has helped me and made me realize even more that if we choose we have the rest of our lives to figure this out together.

I also believe in free will as expressed in choosing something. I appreciate this new simple way to express these thoughts "free will". I also really appreciate you saying and reminding me of, "It has to be/become reciprocal, not a situation in which one is victim that is sacrificing to the other. Both decide and act from Free Will. No guilts or claims, its totally voluntary all around." I in no way feel like a victim, but I have yet to ask if she feels this way. Nor have I yet reflected on this idea and how it could impact decisions in the future. Thank you for sharing this insight with me. 

Thank you.