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For context I'm a male and I've been married to my wife for about 15 years together about 20 years. She had a hysterectomy several years ago that of course impacted her hormones significantly, so our sex life has been lacking since then. All in all I still feel like I have a good relationship with her, but I wish our sex life was better. The few times we have over the last several years, (probably 3 times a year at most) I can tell she just doesn't enjoy it like she used to and is more or less doing it to pacify me. And she always just tells me her libido isn't there due to her hormones, which makes sense. Despite this, she is my best friend and I love her dearly, but I also just can't help shaking the feeling that she is hiding another side of herself, and also realizing I could be taking things out of context or overreacting.
Without being too specific, right after her procedure, she befriended an openly gay woman she worked with. They traveled to work functions at times and I never thought much of it at first. We were having a conversation, and I can't remember the exact conversation it was so long ago, but she said something along the lines of "get out of my bed" referring to this colleague when they were sharing a hotel room together. We both looked each other dead in the eyes and she had this look like OMG I got caught, but I didn't make a big scene of it, or even call her out, as how can you prove it anyway. I'm just not that type of jealous blow your lid type of man. The next sign is one weekend, her friend stayed at our house (she did here and there anyway in a spare room) the kids were gone with their bio dad, and they both wanted to watch movies about threesomes. I thought it was odd, but thought ok and watched the not great movies with them and had a normal evening. Nothing was brought up, but it was like they were trying to float the idea to see how I would react without actually saying it. I didn't because I'm just not that type of guy. Think Seinfeld episode, I'm not an orgy guy. I'm not even sure I could perform in that situation if I really wanted to. I've never been overly sexual as it is. My wife ends up leaving this company, and her friend ends up finding a long term partner who she marries and now my wife and her rarely connect.
Fast forward to more recently and my wife has become a big fan of WNBA. It's cool, I like going to games, they are reasonably priced compared to most sports and I like seeing women thrive in male dominated things. More importantly, I'm happy for her that she's found something she loves. At one of the games we went to, I got a little tipsy and after the game we decided to go back to the hotel to relax but because I got a little too tipsy, I decided to crash out. She wasn't feeling the same and wanted to do more and thinking I was too tipsy to remember I sure, she makes a comment about, I'm going to go downstairs and find me a lesbian. It was a nice hotel with lots of people, players included, running around. I did in fact call her out on this the next day and she played it off like it was just a joke, hinting at how the WNBA does have a lot of lesbian players. So again I didn't feel like it was worth making a big deal out of. So now with her new job, which she again travels frequently, she has made some new friends that she is getting together and going to games with. It's mainly two women but they have a small friend group that she's become a part of, that are mostly gay men and women. I've never met any of them in person. She actually stayed at one of the girls homes on one of her trips, but tells me that one is straight. I didn't ask, she just offered it up one day. But I'm confident the other friend is gay from what I can tell by Facebook stalking, although I wouldn't be surprised if they both were. I saw some pictures of her at a recent game, with her hand on the openly gay girls leg and this has me really questioning things now. I know it's difficult to compare, but I know she would absolutely lose her mind if she saw me with a single woman and my hand on her leg. Any husband that does that is obviously up to something.
Trying to be an understanding friend and husband, I even had a conversation with my wife one evening and asked her considerately if she needed the intimacy of woman in her life. She never asked, I completely offered it up. But she told me no she only wants me. But she also didn't say that she's not gay. Maybe I'm reading too much into that, but if she asked me if I wanted to be with a man intimately, I would say no and I would also say why would you think I want to be with a man.
I'm really just at a loss on what to do. I'm finding myself trusting her less and less, while she continues to reassure me with words that everything's ok and her actions seem to tell another story. I don't want to lose my best friend and our family to blow up, but I also can't live a lie. And at the same time, I don't want her to either. If being with me isn't what makes her happy, then it's not fair to either of us. I know asking internet strangers for advice isn't always the best path, but hoping this group has more insight than I would find posting on Reddit or something like that, so any advice, suggestions or opinions I'm open to. I know I'm not the first person to go through this. Thanks for reading.
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Hi JWT and welcome.
I very much relate to just wanting an honest answer - I could never get one from my ex either. Eventually I said to him I give you three months to answer my questions (basically do you think you might be gay) and when the three months was up I said to him I am giving you another three months incase you didn't realise I was serious - he laughed, but of course I was serious and it worked for me, I was able to proceed from there without having him give me answers.
Turned out my best friend wasn't really my friend at all.
My story is very common, far more so than I realised at the time, but even if you know that it doesn't change the depth of the shock you go into when you realise the one you have trusted has been breaking trust with you from the moment you met. It changes your past as well as your present. The feeling I'd had of being kept at arm's length turned out to be all too real - he was manipulative and most of him stood in the shadows and he had been like that with me all along.
The pushmepullyou - he would neither accept me nor let me go.
Good luck, look after yourself well. all the best, Lily
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Thank you for your reply Lily!
You know for me I honestly am not sure if this is something that has been in her mind for a while and is just now manifesting, or not. I've felt like we've grown apart the last few years and that maybe the hormonal imbalance just reinforced something she had considered. I'm still not 100% convinced (probably because I'm in denial) that I'm even correct about this. But it's like you can't see the picture on a puzzle until the pieces start coming together and it all starts adding up. I hope I'm wrong, and at the end of the day I want her to be happy and if I am right, I don't even want to implode her life around this. It's her decision when she officially decides to come out and I respect that. But I also have the right to not be strung along when it's clear from all other angles, even again if I'm not correct, that our marriage is falling apart. I just want the woman I fell in love with back and I would do anything almost to help make that happen, but I'm not sure that's a reality any more.
Thanks again for you words of encouragement and kindness. This is hands down the hardest thing I've ever dealt with in my life. I expected us to grow old together, as we already have to a degree (late 40s early 50s), but that may just not be in the cards.
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Can you imagine getting through adolescence without having a crush on anyone?
When you say it's her choice when or to whom she comes out that's all very fine except you're married to her - don't you think she should have been honest with you about her feelings from the start?
You are looking at the tip of an iceberg. What she's kept hidden from you.
There's a sense of going over the hill at your age, but really, there's a lot of living to come.
What I want to say, the advice I want to give you is don't try and proceed with your life without sorting things out with her first. Get the feel of the ground under your feet.