Do I leave my wife?

[grimes]

I have known my wife from age 16 I'm now 32. We have been married for 8 years.
Every sense we got married our sex life has been very dull. I have tried to spice it up but it does nothing for her. In the last 2 years we may have had sex 10 times. She and I know that the other will never cheat.
The other issue is she wants kids but if we can't have a good relationship I don't want kids. The history of our relationship is, she always wanted to change me and say she will leave in 3 to 6 months if I don't. So I say whatever I need to to keep her and in 6 months we do it again. This went on for 7 years.
The last big thing is beliefs, like kids school, politics, family, morals. I am someone that likes to debate with my friends and family. But my wife and I can't talk about these things because we don't agree and don't know how to discuss things without fighting.
I do love her but I stay uptight almost all the time. I just want us both to be happy, with or without eachother. It breaks my heart to think of realy leaving but If things don't change I don't know if I can do this for 16 more years and have kids.

[yankeeatheart]

Issue #1 Sex:

You say its boring. You say you've tried to spice it up and wife is not interested. You say 10x in last 2 years? Sex is a tricky subject because alot of women just don't like it. And you said its basically sucked since you got married...so what does that mean? was it great while you were dating??? was there ever a time that sex wasn't just so-so? If so, what would you both do that made it good? Maybe your wife doesn't have O's. I believe if a woman has O's on a regular basis, she would want sex just as much as her partner. O's are addictive. I also believe that after a time, for whatever reason, a woman can have a "dry spell" and not have any O's and if it goes on long enough, her body gets used to that and maybe "forgets" how to O...in which case you have to retrain her body to respond again.
Meaning you have to be totally unselfish and have a few sessions that only concentrate on her. You need to do whatever it is that rocks her boat. Do it for HOURS if you have to. If you don't know what rocks her boat, ask her. Do it until she O's. Don't go for penetration. You just gotta be unselfish. Make her beg for it.

Issue #2 Kids:
Nope, you shouldn't have kids until you straighten things out.
What is it she's trying to change about you that you go along with for a short time only to revert back to again? I mean, is it one particular thing or does she come up with a new gripe every six months?
Its a sad thing what we women do to ya'll poor men. We marry you with hopes of changing you into the man we want you to be. Some women get a little bit extreme about it. I'd say that threatening to leave is on the extreme side. Some things should never be said unless its actually going to be carried out. You've got yourself in a vicious cycle, but cycles can be broken. Don't ask me how cause I am currently in a vicious cycle myself and am trying to break it.

Issue #3 Beliefs:
ok, this one should be easy...you like to debate - you said it yourself. So, DON'T DEBATE WITH YOUR WIFE. She is entitled to her own opinion. Considering you married her and she you, ya'lls beliefs and morals should pretty much be on the same page. But if they're not, there isn't anything you can do about it. Debating and fighting with your wife to try and get her to see your side isn't going to accomplish much.
You should agree on anything that involves children, such as discipline, upbringing, how many to have, etc. But I see no reason to debate with her on politics, church, family or anything else. (And you're just asking for a fight when you bring up the topic of politics or church.)
Save the debates for your friends. You can talk to your wife without turning it into a debate.

You say you've been together for 8 years? (I can't remember exactly what you said now), but that's a good long time. You've made it this far. Your wife has put up with you and your debating butt, so that's a good sign. She needs to lay off the threats tho.

I hope things work out for you.

[Liz]

Hi Grimes,

I wonder what goes on when you're "debating". Do you always want to get the other person to agree with you? Are you good at listening? Are you able to concede a point and see someone else's point of view? It's good to respect each others views and see if you can learn from them.

I wonder if you are just slightly different in your personalities and if you understood that better you'd be able to find strategies to get on better. You could try our Personality Profiler (http://www.2-in-2-1.co.uk/pp/personprofile1.html).

Another thought is to try a Marriage Enrichment weekend (http://www.2-in-2-1.co.uk/healthclub/servprov/). It takes time to get to know each other deeply and sometimes we get stuck somewhere along the line. These weekends are really valuable opportunities to learn to communicate constructively and to get to know each other even better.

In the meantime, why not look at our Basic Relationship Skills (http://www.2-in-2-1.co.uk/healthclub/relbasictopic/) section. There are articles and books there that can help strengthen your relationship. I don't think there's any need to give up on your relationship, when there are probably just a few misunderstandings to shift out fo the way.

Liz

:)