Husband has no sexual desire

We are strict Seventh-Day Adventist now. Thats the religion he turned to 7 years ago.

We have been together coming up 6 years... and are on our 4th year of marriage

From what I understand your church advocates for sexual pleasure, so the whole sin angle is a crock.

If I were you I would go back to hims mom's idea of homosexuality, either that he his or has experienced some homosexual urges which he can not deal with. He pretty clearly is sexually repressed. Homosexuality, or fear of homosexuality, would explain everything, including why he can't get help and why he can't be honest with you or even himself about what is going on with him.

The problem for you is that you keep thinking that the sexual problems in your marriage are because of you, that you want to much, put too much pressure on him and so on.

My immediate impression on reading, before I saw anyone else's posts in this regard, was 'we have a repressed homosexual here'. I still feel that way. Otherwise, if not that, I think there may be some sort of obsessive type anti-sex thing going on, caught up in religiosity - though that seems least likely to me. And I do mean caught up in religiosity, not real religious belief.

Many decades ago when I was an adolescent and very religious, I got caught up on not being able to figure out if I'd accepted a sinful thought or not. They called that - and probably still do call that - scrupulosity. I used to get all worked up about what sins to confess.. so I have a glimmer of memory of this kind of constraint. Maybe something like that is going on with him, but I'm guessing not.

This quote throws me -
"He doesnt like having sex in the morning. Because his sexual organs feel swollen and irritated for the rest of the day. Plus he feels tired for the rest of the day if we have sex in the morning. He does not like it at all. Cuz he never feels awake." As in, you're kidding, right? But of course you are not.

You have your own situation, Jamie, which you have been dealing with a long time, but I don't think, from here, that that is coloring your marital situation except maybe to have you be thinking that somehow this all has to do with you and your behavior. Your behavior here sounds very normal to a lot of us.

What you do about this, I don't know. I think I'd suggest getting counseling for yourself to deal with all this. I'm not sure re a counselor with your religious background or not; might even visit one with your background and a more general relationship counselor as well..

The church advocates sexual pleasure only within a marriage. If jamie's husband entered the marriage in a state of sexual repression based on guilt from their pre-marital sex than it could still be an issue in their current relations.

He became a practicing Christian seven years ago and turned himself off from all sexual stimulation. They have been married four of those seven years. He is 23 years old, so he was approx 16 at the time of his conversion/immersion.

Jamie, regardless of whether he is sexually repressed or a latent homosexual he has sexual hangups within your marriage that are not of your making. Unfortunately, unless he agrees to work through his issues they will be your burden to bear. Assuming his current thoughts of feeling dirty after sex is based on his premarital practices then a good SDA counselor can help him work through his problem. SDA does encourage a loving sexual relationship within a marriage. Perhaps you could encourage him to discuss this with your pastor.

Premarital sex prohibition is the church position, it is not however widely adopted by its members. 54% of young SDA members engage in it and only 70% support the church position. here page 419

Homosexuality however is a huge deal in SDA circles. I do not for one second buy the explanation that this guy is repressed over premarital sex. He adopted SDA at 16, just when his struggle over his sexuality would have been peaking if he was in a struggle...coincidence? I think not. He would be using religion as a shield, trying to protect himself from his desires, as so many before him have tried to do. They usually fail, and it sure is not fair to the women who marry them.

This whole homosexual issue…..I don't buy it. Here's why.

This couple meets at a young age. By her posts…he was 17 and she was 15. Yes, his mother makes a statement saying that she thought he was gay because he was not interested in other girls before Jamie. Well, she apparently didn't know what her son was doing all the time, because he WAS interested in girls. How else could he have felt bad after being with girls prior to Jamie. They apparently had some good make out sessions even though they did not have sex because he was feeling the guilt even back then.

So he meets Jamie…..falls in love. Gets married young. Been married for almost 4 years. Together for 6, and she says 2 years of their dating years were long distance. So do the math. They really were not together day in and day out during almost their whole dating time. Or else Jamie has her times wrong. They entered into marriage with a heck of a lot to learn about each other.

So anyhow ….. he has a sex hang up because for some reason he see's sex as bad. So on top of that issue….he has the daily rituals of being a husband and soon to be father ON TOP of the sexual issues. Bless his heart, he's only 23 years old. He has a lot on his plate. And with things piling up on top of things, the problem just continues to grow. You get the feeling that he loves Jamie a lot. So of course he wants to be good for her and to her. I'm sure the problems with sex became magnified when he probably felt somewhat of a performance issue when she couldn't orgasm. That plus the fact that he probably feels guilty for not giving her the amount of sex she wants. That's a heck of a lot of pressure on a young marriage. Especially when he hasn't even come to terms concerning his guilt over sex.

I think Jamie knows deep down that this is nothing to do with her. That she is not the reason for his sexual issues. If there were nothing here except him not wanting to have sex with her…I could see the homosexual ideas. But we don't know how his mind has absorbed his religion. The guilt he says he feels actually COULD be , just that and therefore the problem. He may have been 16 when he gave his life to Christ and became more involved as a SDA. BUT ……prior to that, Jamie said he grew up with it and it is what helped him to maintain his virginity. So that being said.....SDA was a part of his life prior to the age of 16.

There's just too much here for me to jump on the homosexual bandwagon. You guys could be right. I'm not saying you're not. You just have to consider everything Jamie has said.

It is not our life, we can't say anything for sure. All we can do is go from what one person in a relationship has posted on a Internet forum. Plus we are not professionals.

However, the "it is just stress and sexual inexperience" explanation does not work because it does not explain his frankly whacked explanations for why he (they) can't get help, and why they can't try new things to spice up sex. It also does not explain why to him sex is tied to sin. As I showed premarital sex is not for most young SDA members a sin that will damn them to h*ll, it is common and accepted. Even if this guy did believe that the premarital sex was sinful, he is free and clear to have glorious sex now, his church encourages it. He can't rectify past sexual sin by withholding sexual enjoyment from both his wife and him now.

Homosexuality or fear of homosexuality is far and away the most likely cause of the sexual problems based upon what we know. This need not be doom for the marriage however. His sexuality is in doubt, all we know is that he is struggling with it (assuming that we are correct about what is going on with him). We don't know what he will decide his sexuality is of he should decide to work it out, nor do we know if his wife could deal with who he is.

Well I reckon we're just gonna have to agree to disagree!

well, we do I am sure agree that Jamiewa's opinion is the only one that matters at the end of the day. She came asking for opinions, and the more she has to pick from the better.

Dude, go back and read her posts. He was raised loosy-goosy SDA by his mother (kept him a virgin) until he was 16 and then he "became a Christian" and since then has been a "strict Seventh Day Adventist". Where in there do you see that what the loosy-goosy folk think and do is going to have an impact on his thought process?

He was raised from birth to feel that pre-marital sex was sin and felt that sexual exploration of any kind was sin from the time he was 16 -- very impressionable age in a developing he-person. Now, just because the church tells him to go at it with gusto, it could be a bit difficult to throw off all those years of dirtiness training.

Who said he can't get help? Of course he can get help, but I don't know a whole lot of he-people, particularly young 20-something he-people, who want to run off to a counselor and talk about their sexual dysfunction. He's come up with what he thinks is a workable solution without having to air the dirtiness to an outsider. Unfortunately, his solution will result in a lifetime of frustration for jamie.

He isn't here asking for advise, she is. Jamie -- you're about to enter an entirely knew realm of your life. Motherhood is bound to bring changes you never imagined. Give yourself time to adjust to being a mother and in the meantime perhaps talk to your husband about speaking with a counselor (SDA or otherwise) or his pastor.



Total crap. I think you're projecting.

I find it quite difficult to believe that a 9 months pregnant woman wants sex 3 or 4 times a week. Shes probably in labour as we speak. I reckon a baby will solve the problem.

I am also aware of a gender issue here. Perhaps its only my impression but were this a man posting, concerned about his wifes lack of sex drive advice would be along the lines of suck it up son she doesn't have to have sex just because you want to, and isn't it funny how its always the mans fault. In this case its because hes possibly a latent homosexual.

You're right, dp. Particularly with a 9+ month pregnant wife.

That's 'cuz you's guys are all such dogs.

GRRRRR!!!!!

Generalizing often leads to mistakes, JPB, and undermines credibility..

I dont get the idea that he maybe gay either.

I am leaning more to someone just taking in too much of their religion, or a guy who CAN BE doing some of the things she is swearing he isnt doing.
Porn, masturbation..etc..

Those can be 'distracting' to say the least and ( Here comes a huge , sweeping statement so get ready to gun me down)

AND- in a christian boy, those kinds of things can be common. The idea that you should feel bad about sex and that sex is a sin is just horrific on people. People are naturally sexually active and sexually creative. Tell someone they are going to hell for it and they begin to hide their feelings and their behavior.

But I am not a fan of the christian religion so I'ma have to keep out of this one..

Also how open are you guys when talking about your pregnancy?

If you are ... 9 months? pregnant.. he could VERY WELL be thinking that sex may hurt the baby.

Or sex may hurt him while you are pregnant.

There are a few other things that could be going on here besides him being gay , or him not wanting sex with her at all..

You're just not used to me being out of character, Francis. Chill.

Well, I have a foot in both camps. I suppose there could be a third camp, but I can't immediately work out a concept for a third camp, er, such as nothing wrong? No, try as I might, I still come up with repression of some sort. (Well, maybe simple difference in sex drive and her to-me-normal expression of interest has set him off on a path where only one time of day is a consideration as long as enough days go by - that would be a third choice, though even then, husband has expressed a view of the dirtiness of sex.)

I don't dismiss the religiosity/dirtiness concept as the cruxt of it, especially as JPB last explained it. I still think primarily of the homosexual possibility/probability, or maybe a combo, but that may because I lived that myself a long time ago. Some of you have probably read my posting on this before. In 1971 the love of my life, as I thought, broke up with me and didn't give me a reason except that he had some psychological issues having to do with rage that he was working out with his psychiatrist. I reeled from that in a kind of despair that lasted a couple of years. Yes, it occurred to me he could be homosexual, but I knew he wasn't, that was impossible. In the mid eighties, fifteen years later, I was happily married and finishing my schooling and internship in a new field. One day out of the blue I thought, "I bet Ex is gay", suddenly sure. I called a mutual longtime friend, who lived in another state at that time. I told her what I'd just figured out, and she told me "that's weird, he just told me two weeks ago". She gave me his present phone number........... in San Francisco. I called him, we had a long talk.

Later that year, my husband and I were in San Francisco as part of a california drive vacation. He went for a long walk (his choice) as I went to meet Ex for lunch. The friendship that was a strength of our former relationship came right back, as it had started to renew with the phone call, and the horrible parts had an explanation now. He's still a friend, as is his mate, twenty plus years later.

So, this experience plus various not so personal observations in my life may color my viewpoint.

I don't know, obviously, what is happening in Jamie's situation. I am not clear that the baby will solve anything, although the baby will be busymaking and bring, I hope, joy into their lives.

If husband has been in a sexual struggle the reason he can't get help now is guilt. Just as SDA was intended to be a shield so was marriage and family. These guys take the "fake it till you make it" approach to establishing a heterosexual identity, only it never works because putting themselves in a heterosexual environment will not drive away their homosexual urges. Putting himself in bed next to a beautiful woman does not make him want her sexually.

If he opens up to his sexuality now he very well might be out of is church, his friends, and his marriage. He does not want to hurt his wife and he also has a child on the way. Better to keep locked up, do the best he can to keep his wife happy, and hope a solution presents itself in the future.

Who knows though, all we have to go on is a few posts on a forum by the wife. My conclusions are consistent with what she has said yet could be all wrong. And I hope that I am, because the situation that I outline would be a tragic one for all concerned. I can hardly imagine the pain that would be felt by a young woman with a baby on the way if she were to find out that her marriage is not what she thought it was. That she is part of a "make me straight" scheme that was doomed from the start.