AM I RAMBO??? REALLY???

BACKGROUND

I have only recently swallowed the red pill (about 2 months ago). I was lifting prior to swallowing and I have read through the sidebar. I have been cautious to take things slowly over the course of 6 to 12 months and am trying to avoid Red Pill Rambo. Our bedroom has not been completely dead, but 2-5 times per month when things are “normal”. We have four kids and the last pregnancy about 3 years ago things got really bad for me. She goes on bedrest the last 3-5 months due to preterm labor. Sex is a no go, doctor’s orders (not her fault). Then, newborn + breastfeeding = zero libido (sort of her fault, but hormones I kind of get some of it). Let’s just say I had two or three wet dreams in that time frame the sex was so infrequent. Pathetic to think a married grown ass man can still get a wet dream. NoFap and no porn.

Even though I probably should have never put up with any of that I did. It hasn’t been until recently that the IDGAF attitude has started to come out even though I am trying to temper it a little bit to avoid becoming Rambo.

About a year ago, my wife started pushing for child number five. About a few weeks before this I had a pretty strong conviction that we should be done at four. However, I said I would consider it and I agonized for about 7-8 months over whether to do it or not. If I agree, I have no doubt the sex will be amazing for the time it takes to get her preggers. After that, I am probably looking at some more wet dreams in the near future.

I have always been blue pill. I was raised religious (still am religious) and was always taught to be a nice boy. She was always taught to be a good girl and suffers from good girl syndrome as many things in the bedroom are off limits (never had a blow job, ever, sigh…). We are each others firsts. I hope to change that someday once I man up, but I feel I will never be successful until I can start making some progress with one major roadblock. If I start some of that now it will freak her out big time. There is a lack of attraction that I need to resolve first.

RESENTMENT

She resents me for not agreeing to child number five. I can with 100% confidence say that this is the Genesis of the most recent tension in the relationship. She feels God has told her to have number five. I being religious as well, am fully confident that God is telling me “no way”. After agonizing over this for about 7-8 months we finally had a conversation where I told her the answer is “no”, but I think I also left the door open too wide as I said I am open to changing my mind. I think in her mind she interpreted this as “not yet”. While I certainly reserve the right to change my mind, I don’t think it is going to happen.

So, I start getting into red pill. Start realizing that I have been asleep at the wheel and not leading the relationship as I should. She has always been the sexual gatekeeper. I get the groceries, do any little job, and have been the worst covert contract beta ever. I have started tying up the little loose ends around the house, being more assertive in setting up date nights, not getting butthurt when sex is declined, planning family events, deciding where to go eat and only changing if there is an objection and suggestion for somewhere else.

However, I still am resented. She feels that I am shattering her dreams by not agreeing to a fifth child and that she can no longer trust me.

ASSERTIVENESS

The only real tests I have encountered since the red pill are as follows. I consider them minor, but were events nonetheless that got a bigger response out of her than expected.

1. Got turned down for sex pretty directly, this was about the first week after the pill. I didn’t handle it well (I have done better since then). Kind of rolled over to sleep butthurt and acted like a pussy. Didn’t really talk much the next day. Was reading one of the sidebar books about getting out and doing more manly activities/hobbies. Guys at our church play basketball Thursday nights at 9PM at night. I always loved basketball in high school. So, I bought shoes that day and lunch and when I came home told her I was going to play that night. I ALWAYS stayed at home at night and watched TV with her. This was Red Pill Rambo to her. After a few days, she approached me and said she didn’t really want me to play basketball. I told her that I have been missing basketball, that I needed it, and that it was one night a week. She didn’t push back any further and shut up really quickly. We rarely confront each other. I never rocked the boat before.

2. Not a huge deal, but I had a differing opinion. Two of my daughters have birthdays within 6 days of each other. Birthdays are completely stupid at our house. Usually they get planned around what is most convenient for her or the grandparents. If a birthday party doesn’t fall on a “good” day, we will have a birthday party 2-3 weeks early. If the birthday itself falls on a bad day, we will move it. Some shifting of parties is actually fine with me, but when we celebrate a kids birthday three times (one with grandparents, one with friends, and one with school) and we actually don’t celebrate anything on their birthday itself I have a problem. The bigger problem is that though I may have bitched about this in the past I didn’t do anything. This year, she wanted to combine two of my daughter’s parties. I finally stood up to her and told her that we need to be thinking about the girls and not about us or the grandparents and what is convenient. She got really mad, quiet, probably cried, but in the end split everything up into two parties on their actual birthdays. Still have grandparents invited though, so I still have a little bit more to do. Regardless, I was more confrontational/assertive than she has seen me be before and she got butthurt.

3. Once again, we are religious, and we both feel pretty strongly that our kids should be active in church activities. At age twelve, there is a youth group that meets every week. We have both discussed years ago the importance of making sure that our kids participate each week at these activities unless there is a really good valid reason not to. We both went through the same program and have mentioned how the kids that didn’t do this had some unnecessary struggles in life. My daughter is only two months into this program as she just turned twelve. Yesterday, I come home and my wife says that the activity this week is volleyball. My daughter is a lot of things, but she is not athletic. My wife asked my daughter if she wanted to go and she said “no thanks”. My wife thought this was cute and texted it back to the youth leaders. I may be blowing this out of proportion, but I feel very strongly that my kids should be around this youth group. So, I told my wife that she needs to be there. She tried to tell me that she doesn’t like volleyball (which she doesn’t) and that she would just take her to do something else. I dug in and said that this is less about volleyball and more about the importance we are demonstrating to our kids about making friends in this group. I said very firmly that she needs to be there. Wife hasn’t really spoken to me since. However, I stumbled across internet history this morning where she has been googling about a “dominating spouse”.

Have I been so passive that even with these small events I have gone Red Pill Rambo? I sort of feel that I just need to stay the course and keep the throttle right about where it is as anything more might be too much too soon for her. Anyways, I need some input on my progress, advice on where to go from here, or a keep grinding away to get back in control of this thing.

I plan to start hanging out with a high school friend a little bit more, doing some more things with my older brother, and then eventually going to a nearby gym rather than lifting at my house. I am going to try and slowly introduce these into the mix without doing them all at once.

EDIT: Thanks for all of the support. I think I needed it to help me know I am going down the right path. I appreciated the words of wisdom and caution from some of you RP veterans. Perhaps someday I can return the favor to someone in my circumstance as right now I have no business offering advice of any kind to anybody. Once I can stand on my own I may be able to share what I will have learned over the next year or so. Probably won't be my last post, but if you hear from me regularly I probably need a kick in the head because I am probably doing it wrong. Advice and encouragement is nice, but I have to fix this on my own.