# Won't keep up



## Sable (Apr 23, 2017)

Hey,

It's my first time on here and my post will probably seem a bit juvenile in comparison to others due to my age.

My wife and I are both 22, and we've been married for a year now. At the beginning of our marriage and certainly before it the sex was constant, sometimes 3 or 4 times a day, 7 days a week.

There was a sort of willingness back then that I simply haven't got anymore, not because I'm bored of her or anything, never, but just because of the difference in circumstance. 
Back then I had just moved to her city, I knew nothing and had nothing here so my only form of occupation (aside from the odd exam here and there) was sex or going outside with her. 

As time passed I lost interest in leaving the house, and spent most of my time gaming. At that point the sex wasn't as frequent as before, maybe only once or twice a day... eventually I quit gaming to resume working on a project I was excited about.
Nowadays it just seems pointless. She asks for sex sometimes and it's not that I can't keep up, but simply won't. I don't see the point in it. 4 times out of 5 when she asks I would much rather be working, studying, or doing anything fruitful rather than humping for an hour and gaining nothing.

I just wonder if you guys have any suggestions in how to reverse this mindset I'm in. I have no will to engage in anything I don't see beneficiary.


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## EleGirl (Dec 3, 2011)

Do you have a job? 

What do you fill your time with? 

How many times a week or month are you having sex with your wife now?

How many hours a week do you spend doing things with your wife that both of you enjoy, just the two of you?


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## Sable (Apr 23, 2017)

I'm a government funded med student. Not to come off as spoiled or anything but as long as I pass my exams every 6 months I have an empty schedule.
I spend almost my entire day working on an unrelated project.

Sadly, right now we have sex about 2 or 3 times a week. 
We spend most of the day together in the same room, but not really doing anything together unless we watch maybe half an hour of tv. Thing is she also studies, and she takes a while to study too, whereas 40 days a year are enough for me. 

If she's not studying her interests and mine are completely opposite. She enjoys being outside, even just being outside and doing nothing really...which was something I could tolerate before, when I had nothing but time to kill.

It's just that now with this project I'm working on, I find myself unable to tolerate any activity that involves going out, the only time I stop to work on it is either a 30 minute break, or a week or so to study.


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## uhtred (Jun 22, 2016)

OP, you need to find common interests with your wife. 

What sort of outside project do you have?

A good sex life is vital to a happy marriage.


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## Sable (Apr 23, 2017)

uhtred said:


> OP, you need to find common interests with your wife.


I agree. We have almost nothing in common, but love eachother intensely nonetheless. The biggest problem is that I can not interact with her or any other person for more than a few minutes unless we are actively doing something, I have severe ADHD.
Last weekend I took her to Prague to hang out with her sister, it was only an hour train ride and half way through it I got so impatient and embarrassingly childish that we argued.

I'm working on creating a hyperrealistic 3D human figure and taking advanced course in animation. My wife enjoys watching me work, a lot, but when it comes to actually "doing" something together, she's not very tech-saavy, and I've got no patience for romance.

The reason this alarms me is that I share this trait with virtually every male in my family.
They've all married stupid women for their looks (my mother included) that have nothing in common with them, and they all spend much more time on their own interests. The heavy majority of them are in loveless marriages. 

My wife's smart, interesting, fun to be around, I lucked out and so I know I should be working hard to avoid that happening, but talking is easy, when it actually comes to doing something about it I have absolutely no patience. It just feels like my skin is crawling and my time's being wasted and the second I get the chance I immediately occupy myself with something else.


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## Livvie (Jan 20, 2014)

It sounds like maybe you are just a person who isn't suited for marriage, generally. Everyone is different. I'd advise not to have children until you sort out if you want to stay married.


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## She'sStillGotIt (Jul 30, 2016)

Who's actually *supporting* you two?

Sounds like you both have far too much free time to do a whole lotta nothing. I mean, you have a 'project' you're working on but neither of you seems to be interested in actually supporting yourselves.

Why do neither of you work for a living?


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## ConanHub (Aug 9, 2013)

Your attitude is obviously a huge part of your problem.

You can train yourself to be a better mate and limit how much your attention deficiency controls you.

I have to admit that I don't like you.

You called your mom stupid.

Your arrogant lack of respect for even your own mother speaks volumes about your character.

Maybe changing yourself a little would be beneficial in many ways and your marriage might be one of them?


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## NoChoice (Feb 12, 2012)

Sable said:


> Hey,
> 
> It's my first time on here and *my post will probably seem a bit juvenile* in comparison to others due to my age.
> 
> ...


First bolded sentence: Accurate.
Second bolded statement: See #1
Third bolded section: See #1. If you are not excited about it it does not matter?
Fourth bolded segment: See #1. You do not see fulfilling your spouse's needs as fruitful and consider it gaining nothing, problematic.
Fifth bolded statement: See #1. Do you see anyone else on this planet as being even mildly important?

You are on the fast track to losing this "wonderful" woman you have been so fortunate to have married. Some serious introspection is in order if you wish to keep her. There are no doubt many men that would not see sex with her as fruitless and gaining nothing.


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## ConanHub (Aug 9, 2013)

NoChoice said:


> First bolded sentence: Accurate.
> Second bolded statement: See #1
> Third bolded section: See #1. If you are not excited about it it does not matter?
> Fourth bolded segment: See #1. You do not see fulfilling your spouse's needs as fruitful and consider it gaining nothing, problematic.
> ...


Thank God for patient Vulcans!!

Great post!


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## Todd Haberdasher (Apr 23, 2017)

I can't see a single thing in any of your posts that indicates what she might see in you. Your statement about your mother being stupid is pretty much all I need to know about the quality of your character.


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## katiecrna (Jan 29, 2016)

Your obviously selfish. Marriage takes work and sacrifice and if you don't want to end up in a loveless marriage you need to WORK toward that. Work meaning doing things you don't necessarily want for the greater good of the relationship.


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## WilliamM (Mar 14, 2017)

Tech savvy is meaningless.

What do you know about the human body?

What do you know about the human mind?

Next to nothing. You have a perfect specimen to study, and you ignore her. Oh, but you do not want to be bothered studying a real live flesh and blood person? And you call yourself smart? There is more to be learned from a live person than you could possibly learn in a lifetime. And that is just the biological. The psychological is mind boggling.

Your wife could teach you so much it is simply amazing. Study her!


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## Yeswecan (Jul 25, 2014)

Sable said:


> I have no will to engage in anything I don't see beneficiary.


Good luck in your marriage.


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## Puny_T-Rex_Arms (Apr 20, 2017)

You come across as spoiled. You have a good thing going for you, but instead you're wasting everyone's time and attention by complaining about it.


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## Sable (Apr 23, 2017)

She'sStillGotIt said:


> Who's actually *supporting* you two?
> 
> Sounds like you both have far too much free time to do a whole lotta nothing. I mean, you have a 'project' you're working on but neither of you seems to be interested in actually supporting yourselves.
> 
> Why do neither of you work for a living?


I mentioned above, I'm a government funded medical student. My grades were perfect, my government saw potential and now pays for my living and educational expenses so that once I graduate they can benefit from me.


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## Sable (Apr 23, 2017)

ConanHub said:


> Your attitude is obviously a huge part of your problem.
> 
> You can train yourself to be a better mate and limit how much your attention deficiency controls you.
> 
> ...


Change I am open to. But check yourself. My mother was an abusive religious fanatic. Incidentally she spent a great deal of time trying to convince me that my wife was a ***** because of her faith. I'm being very restrained by referring to her as merely "stupid".


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## Sable (Apr 23, 2017)

NoChoice said:


> First bolded sentence: Accurate.
> Second bolded statement: See #1
> Third bolded section: See #1. If you are not excited about it it does not matter?
> Fourth bolded segment: See #1. You do not see fulfilling your spouse's needs as fruitful and consider it gaining nothing, problematic.
> ...


#2: Mentioning gaming was to show the extent of my loss of interest in the outside world.
#3: I've already said I am a student. As a student we are forced to do tedious projects time and time again which we typically rush to get it over with... this one was a personal one, thus I was "excited" about it. Don't get smart.
#4: That's the entire point of this post, my lack of will for sex.
#5: Obviously she is. Otherwise I wouldn't have bothered myself posting this.

Appreciate your contribution, whatever it was.


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## Sable (Apr 23, 2017)

Todd Haberdasher said:


> I can't see a single thing in any of your posts that indicates what she might see in you. Your statement about your mother being stupid is pretty much all I need to know about the quality of your character.


Bit of a narrow-minded thing to say... We weren't all blessed with a decent mother, Todd. One thing that deeply hurts me in life is that I can't relate to your obvious love for your own mother.


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## Sable (Apr 23, 2017)

WilliamM said:


> Tech savvy is meaningless.
> 
> What do you know about the human body?
> 
> ...


Tech savvy was a reference to her love of my project, but her inability to contribute.

I know you mean well man, but I know more than I want to about the human body, can't specialize before completing general med, heheh. I've never called myself smart... but your point of view is interesting, thank you.


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## Sable (Apr 23, 2017)

Puny_T-Rex_Arms said:


> You come across as spoiled. You have a good thing going for you, but instead you're wasting everyone's time and attention by complaining about it.


I didn't want to come off as spoiled. On the flip-side, I didn't ask for your attention. On the follow up, if all you saw was complaining then I doubt you could give more than you've just done anyway.


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## Yorkie_Lover (Jul 25, 2013)

Sable: I'm sorry to say but I believe your marriage is likely doomed to fail. Because if you don't have enough common interests with your wife to enable the sharing of quality time together as a couple, the marriage will ultimately fail.

Read "His Needs, Her Needs" book by Willard Harley to understand what "emotional needs" men and women typically have that need to be fulfilled in order to have a successful long-term, loving marriage.

Harley recommends spouses find activities that they both truly enjoy doing together, so that they may share quality time together. 

Harley also wrote a book called "Lovebusters" where he explains what makes for withdrawals from the "love bank" of a relationship. One of the categories was labeled "Independent behavior", where one spouse goes off and does their thing alone. 

In my previous marriage, I was married to someone for whom being physically fit wasn't important. I have hiked all my life in the mountains in order to be physically fit; so I may enjoy the mountains via downhill and cross-country skiing, elk-hunting, snowshoeing and hiking. I have a need to be physically active and my previous wife just didn't have it. When weekends would come, I wanted to go out and exercise in the mountains by hiking or road biking up steep mountain passes. She just didn't have the "exercise gene" and would stay home. And she would chide me for manifesting "independent behavior" as described by Harley. Well, you know what? She was right. I was being independent. Except if she'd enjoyed those activities, then she'd have been right there with me and they wouldn't have been considered "Independent Behavior". 

There's another book, "Will Our Love Last?" by Sam Hamburg that describes what it takes for a relationship to be successful from a compatibility perspective. He writes about three categories of compatibility: Everyday decisions, sex and wavelength. I won't describe them here, but I will tell you that you don't sound very compatible with your wife. And that spells doom for your marriage, sorry, but that's the way it usually works out if there's not enough compatibility. Compatibility is on a continuum, there just has to been enough to make it easy to get along as a couple.

I recently remarried and am ecstatically happy; we dated for two years before marriage. During that time, we had plenty of time to test our compatibility as described by Hamburg's book. 

When weekends come, we head for the mountains together, to hike, ski, snowshoe or snowmobile together. And we bicycle in the better weather. But we do it together. And yes, I sometimes wind up waiting a bit for her because she can't quite keep up with me. But that's a small price to pay to be able to enjoy the time and experience together. 

One area of compatibility not mentioned by Hamburg that I feel is worth mentioning is "Intellectual Compatibility". My previous marriages were to women that had not earned college degrees. I hold a Masters in Management and my wife has a JD (law) degree. We both can hold up our respective ends of the conversation and are capable of challenging each other's views without the marriage being endangered or one partner feeling stupid or ignored. I became frustrated in my other marriages because my partners weren't my "intellectual equal". So watch out for that one, too. 

One of the unfortunate aspects about higher education is that there are no classes taught about the truly critical life skills that are so important to happiness and success: What are the emotional needs of men and women? What it takes have a successful marriage (compatibility); how to be a successful parent; how to invest for retirement. None of that is taught in academia. The student must seek such knowledge and much of it is learned by trial and error, painfully and wastefully so, especially in the area of relationships.

I wish you good luck in your marriage.


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## EleGirl (Dec 3, 2011)

Sable said:


> I'm a government funded med student. Not to come off as spoiled or anything but as long as I pass my exams every 6 months I have an empty schedule.
> 
> I spend almost my entire day working on an unrelated project.


I was married to a man who was in medical school. He and his classmates did not have the time to spend most of their times playing around.



Sable said:


> Sadly, right now we have sex about 2 or 3 times a week.


That’s a pretty normal average amount of sex in marriage.


Sable said:


> We spend most of the day together in the same room, but not really doing anything together unless we watch maybe half an hour of tv.


Watching TV is not spending time together because you are not really focused on each other. 

I can understand why she would not want much sex with you. You don’t really spend any time with her. That would pretty much shut down any woman from wanting sex.



Sable said:


> Thing is she also studies, and she takes a while to study too, whereas 40 days a year are enough for me.


How long will it take you to get your MD degree? 40 days a year of study is nothing.


Sable said:


> If she's not studying her interests and mine are completely opposite. She enjoys being outside, even just being outside and doing nothing really...which was something I could tolerate before, when I had nothing but time to kill.


What is so important about this project that you are working on that it is more important to you than spend quality time with your wife? What is the project?


Sable said:


> It's just that now with this project I'm working on, I find myself unable to tolerate any activity that involves going out, the only time I stop to work on it is either a 30 minute break, or a week or so to study.


Well that means that you have not time to give to your wife. So you need to accept that you are killing her love for you and she will want less and less sex with you. Why would any woman want sex with a man who has no time for her.


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## EleGirl (Dec 3, 2011)

Sable said:


> I agree. We have almost nothing in common, but love eachother intensely nonetheless. The biggest problem is that I can not interact with her or any other person for more than a few minutes unless we are actively doing something, I have severe ADHD.
> Last weekend I took her to Prague to hang out with her sister, it was only an hour train ride and half way through it I got so impatient and embarrassingly childish that we argued.
> 
> I'm working on creating a hyperrealistic 3D human figure and taking advanced course in animation. My wife enjoys watching me work, a lot, but when it comes to actually "doing" something together, she's not very tech-saavy, and I've got no patience for romance.
> ...


How far along are you with your model? Is it online? I’d love to see it. You could send me the IP address via private message if you are ok with doing that.

You are doing something that is very common with people with AD/HD. You have found something that excites your brain and so you are drawn to it to the point that you can hardly stand to be away from it.

I’ve seen people do that, mostly men. Most of them end up divorced because as some point their wife realizes that her existence does not matter… except to do things to make it easier for him to stay entranced with what he’s doing on the computer.

You also say that you game. I’m assuming that means you play games on the computer. That’s more of the same type of activity that traps you mind.

Computer gaming and certain types of work on the computer, like what you are doing, are very enticing for people with AD/HD as they seek out things that they can focus on. Most AD/HD people become bored very easily. But the immediate feedback on the computer and the computer screen refresh rate keeps exciting the part of the brain that allows them to remain focused.

I also have some AD/HD. I have noticed this with myself and have had to really be careful with getting sucked into thing like the project you are working on.

This activity is unhealthy for you. Look what it is doing to your life. You no longer want to do much of anything else. You could not even handle a day away with your wife. If you continue down this path, it probably will not be able to complete your medical education because you will not be able to tolerate the education once you have to in a hospital learning environment. You need to get control of this now.

Your first step is to stop using your computer all the time. You will go through withdrawal


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## ConanHub (Aug 9, 2013)

Sable said:


> Change I am open to. But check yourself. My mother was an abusive religious fanatic. Incidentally she spent a great deal of time trying to convince me that my wife was a ***** because of her faith. I'm being very restrained by referring to her as merely "stupid".


Check yourself first.

Calling your mom good looking and stupid while referring to yourself as intelligent is a far cry from claiming she was abusive.

Communicating that she was harsh and/or abusive towards you would have clarified your position.

Sorry she was a ***** to you. That sucks.


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## Puny_T-Rex_Arms (Apr 20, 2017)

You are young and naïve. You will learn ... the hard way.


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## Rowan (Apr 3, 2012)

EleGirl said:


> How far along are you with your model? Is it online? I’d love to see it. You could send me the IP address via private message if you are ok with doing that.
> 
> You are doing something that is very common with people with AD/HD. You have found something that excites your brain and so you are drawn to it to the point that you can hardly stand to be away from it.
> 
> ...



Yep. It's called hyperfocus. And it's a trait common to many with ADHD. Interestingly, many people with ADHD are capable of hyperfocusing on pretty much any shiny new thing that grabs their attention - a project, a game, a sport, a hobby, a course of study, a person. They also tend to be very goal oriented. But once the goal is reached, they quickly lose interest and move on to the next new thing. 

What that means for relationships is that, all too often, the ADHDer will hyperfocus on their partner until whatever the imagined goal is, is achieved. For some, that's just "until this person sleeps with me", but for others it's "until we're married". After that goal is met, their attention quickly moves on to other more interesting things. They suddenly lose the ability to tolerate having to pay attention to the partner that so enthralled them a mere few months, or even weeks or days, ago. That same partner, who was swept up in the all encompassing love, attention and devotion of their partner, suddenly finds themselves an obvious irritant in a relationship that was so recently so very good. They now exist only to facilitate whatever their partner has moved on to in the way of new focus.

And, then, sometimes it's hard to tell mere ADHD from a true personality disorder. And, like left handedness, brown hair, or any other trait, it's possible to have ADHD and a personality disorder. The lack of focus on anything that's not immediately of interest, can look and feel a lot like narcissism to those who are being ignored. Sometimes it's actually narcissism, even if the person also has ADHD. The difference is usually that someone with only ADHD will care that they're being an ass to their partner and want to fix it. The PDer, whether they also have ADHD or not, will keep thinking that the other person is the problem.


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## WilliamM (Mar 14, 2017)

If he is creative, and comes up with new projects to keep his interest in studying his wife, she remains the focus. It can work. Especially for someone interested in the human body, or perhaps the mysteries of the mind.

It was just an idea.

Some people need to be challenged.


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