Intimacy is possible even when sex isn’t
DEAR ABBY: Six years ago, my husband of 20 years was in a serious accident. He was placed on disability because of it. Because of the accident, he can’t perform sexually because his “goods” don’t work.
I am many years younger than he is and still in my prime. I need and want the cuddling and intimacy I’m not getting and haven’t gotten for years. I have thought about finding a friend with benefits, but that’s risky. I can’t talk to him because he flips out and says, “Then leave!”
I feel our marriage has become just a living arrangement. Talking to a counselor or a doctor is out because he will refuse. Please help. — LOST AND LONELY
DEAR LOST AND LONELY: Your marriage doesn’t have to be “just a living arrangement.” Although sex may no longer be possible with your husband, there’s no reason why there can’t be cuddling, intimacy and affection. Talking to a licensed marriage and family therapist will be helpful for you, whether or not your husband agrees to go with you.
DEAR ABBY: I have been with my boyfriend nearly 19 years, and we both agree that we don’t want marriage. I just found out that for the last nine months he has been seeing someone else on his lunch break.
He says he loves me and doesn’t want to lose me, but he loves her, too, and she is his friend. He said he would stop the affair, but because she’s his friend, he won’t stop texting and seeing her “as a friend.”
Should I trust what he is saying? We don’t have kids together, but we raised his two and my one together as our own. — SILENT PAIN DEAR PAIN: Should you trust that your boyfriend won’t resume the affair with his “friend” — or that he has stopped it? I don’t think so. Although the two of you aren’t formally married, you have had an understanding that lasted almost 19 years, and he has breached it. You now must decide whether you want to be part of a “threesome,” and for that, you have my sympathy.
DEAR ABBY: My boyfriend, “Troy,” takes it as a personal offense that I won’t share a hotel room with him and his younger son (age 15) when we go out of town to see his older son play college sports. Troy wants me to go to all of the games, but I have said I will only go when it’s the 15-year-old’s weekend to be at his mom’s (Troy’s two sons have different mothers).
I am extremely uncomfortable sharing the same hotel room, and Troy refuses to get separate rooms. Do you agree that I’m unreasonable? — “BAD SPORT” IN OHIO
DEAR “BAD SPORT”: No, I do not. You should not be talked into doing anything that makes you uncomfortable, so stick to your guns.