Abused, it's so amazing that you posted this, because I was having trouble sleeping last night (well, every night, but whatever) and this is the exact topic I was stuck on. My husband never showed affection at all -- he always joked that he didn't approve of public displays of affection. He never had an affectionate pet name for me -- ever. He never held my hand, or put his arm around me when we were seated side by side, or anything. When I discovered his double life, I started reading his texts with various guys -- and they were all "Babe" and "Hon" and all that. I was so incredibly angry -- I mean, I am angry about his denying me sex all this time, and forcing me to live a celibate life (while he secretly had pay-to-play relationships several times a week for decades). He rationalized this, I don't know how, it makes me too angry to let him explain because it's such obvious BS. It's hard to isolate the "most hurtful" part of what I've gone through, but for me, going without any visible signs of affection is up there in, say, my top five reasons I can't forgive him. He's playing like he's just so stoic, and making me feel as if I'm weak and needy and undesirable, and all along there was the REAL reason he was hiding.
