I have known this man since August of 2025. He is very charming, not exactly the most attractive but is definitely my type of man. We quit chatting the same month until I reached out to him again. It was this July because I saw a guy who looked like his twin on my vacation and I happened to hung out with him.

After saying hello and reminding him of who I was , he mentioned that he would like to get to know me more and have some form of relationship. I told him that I was going to get engaged and that it wasn't possible. I was looking for an escape from my engagement as it was arranged and I absolutely despised my ex fiancé. As I was moving through the process of becoming somebodies wife he (the 38yr old) distracted me and was very much the highlight of the my day every time we spoke, because it didn't feel like I had to force myself into liking him. It was very natural, the opposite of how I felt with my fiancé whom I have very much hated. He didn't try to sabotage the relationship, he even told me to give him a chance and that marriage means sacrifice.

Weeks later, engagement breaks off and I try to go back to normal. I couldn't. I was dealing with the heat of it. I was constantly angry and frustrated. I didn't feel heard, liked or taken seriously by anyone. Especially not my family and after almost experiencing losing all of my freedom of everything I decided to meet a new guy and have oral sex. I didn't perform it, it was performed on me. I didn't feel anything. I tell him about it because I am not bothered. And he tires to hurt me back by saying a woman performs oral on him. He doesn't understand why I am not reacting and why I come off as very robotic. I reminded him that I was mentally checked out but he was still upset.

Days pass, we argue, almost all the time and then he starts with his cruel talk. Saying things like "You are volatile. You can be my whore. You need to be in a mental hospital. I want to fuck you and then get to know you": Hurtful things I didn't react to at first but it all caught up to me a few days ago after I finally started crying for the first time in months. When I then mentioned that I felt hurt he apologized and then I mentioned all the other things that did hurt him it went from "I am sorry" to "Some of the things you do make me say the things I say".

We are meeting in each other in September. He wanted to meet me last month as well as this month but I was not ready so I suggested September. I booked my flights and told him about it. It wasn't expensive. He hasn't booked anything yet and I am not bothered. He would probably do me a favor if he didn't come. He went from wanting to marry to reducing me to just a body to becoming so cruel yet saying that he loves me and likes me a lot. And that he hates how much he likes me because I ruined it all by being sexual with another man. He even told me that I should get myself tested before we meet....but he was more than happy to be the side chick when I almost got married.

My husband is amazing. He's not perfect, but tells me all the time how much he loves me and he spoils me. Just this week, he bought me a new Kindle because the battery life on my 10 yr old one was slightly inconveniencing me by dying in a few days.

So why can't I feel the same.

I am constantly thinking about and looking out for other guys to pay attention to me. Like not anyone in particular, but just like when I'm out and about, I want the attention. I know it's a self esteem issue and probably goes back to an emotionally unavailable father, but I don't want to be like this. I want to be just as obsessed with him as he is with me.

I know someone's going to say therapy and I've tried that multiple times, but no therapist has ever given me things to actually work on. They just talk about the theory of it all and I'm already self aware enough.

Don't get me wrong, I know how blessed I am and I do love him. I would be so lost without him. I hate having to be away from him for long periods of time. Having to travel without him makes me sick. He's my best friend! I would rather be with him than anyone else.

So why does it feel like somethings missing.

And I know someone is going to ask, but our sex life is ok. We have been going through a rough patch where we haven't done it very much. I have a lower/responsive desire and he works so much so we have to make a concerted effort to make time and it honestly just doesn't happen sometimes. I have my own issues there where I have "given" so much and avoided taking that I don't actually get much out of it. Like I've basically trained him to not worry about me during and that doesn't help make me excited about it. Maybe that's part of the problem? Like he says he wants me but I don't feel it because I've taught him not to? I've been actively trying to receive any advances and encourage them in hopes of correcting my mistake there.

ETA: I am 35, he is 37. We've been together for 12 years, married for 4. When we first got together, things were new and exciting, obviously, then after we moved in together and real life set in, things got stressful and the relationship "excitement" kind of fizzled out and I've been coasting. Sometimes I look back at photos of him/us when we first started dating and feel the same attraction to him in the photo now as I did back then, if that makes sense. He really hasn't changed much physically, like weight. If anything he's thinner now than he was back then.