Hi Ladies, I thought my husband was cheating last year. Turns out he had low libido due to cancer but also still may have seen a prostitute once or more but he won't admit to that. I think he wanted to know if things still worked. He has a chronic history of online affairs and excessive and blatant porn use, while we have low to no sex. After a lot of prodding, he told me he loves me as the mother of his kids but is not attracted to me, never actually was but didn't think he could do better. I know that some actresses he likes are underweight versions of what I look like and he has never been shy about telling me to please lose weight. He also said he does not equate sex and love which I found revolting at the time, but now understand a lot of men feel that way. I had a legitimate mental breakdown and manic episode at that time. I threatened to leave and didn't. My ultimatum was counseling and regular date nights and he said no to both. Message was loud and clear- I can stay or leave but he will not do anything to appease me. The stress of this time worsened his health and that resulted in his diagnosis. It may have saved his life. We left those things to the side and worked together on his health. The time together was nourishing to our marriage but after he got better the same patterns reemerged.
When I did individual therapy what I got out of it is that I can't change or control him and I need to radically accept who he is or leave. Therapist was gently pushing me toward leaving, but I don't want to. I want us to love and respect each other and I want more sex. We both want to keep our family together. I'm fearful we will split when my youngest turns 18. I want to stay married because we want to be together. Now I'm personally working though how to accept him as a person, but not the behavior I don't like. I absolutely will not accept physical cheating and we have discussed such. For the online affairs he says he doesn't see anything online as cheating but will refrain out of respect for me. But he doesn't refrain. He has been caught sexting and confronted 5 times. He just gets better at hiding it. I have confronted him twice about the weekend I think he saw a prostitute and neither was fruitful. I am not going to get answers from him. I know that something I would not approve of happened on this boys weekend but I will never know the details.

My askmen post about lack of intimacy got 5 'lose weight' and 3 'communicate better' replies. I know both are valid. I am unsatisfied sexually and have been the entire marriage. My husband prefers porn to sex with me. I think that he is inclined to prefer porn regardless of me specifically, he has health issues, and he is not attracted to my overweight body. If we are arguing even a little bit he doesnt want to try. I lost (later regained) 80 pounds, ED improved but not frequency. An intense discussion led him to tell me "It's not your body, it's your mouth." He had agreed to toy play but it never actually happened because he's always mad at me about something. He has a history of agreeing to things in order to deescalate an intense argument and then not following through. At the moment I am trying hard to be respectful. It's so hard when I know his disrespectful behavior goes on in the background. I am trying to focus on what I want and how to get those things. In one moment I can think about this betrayal and start hating him again. He is also very demanding and results oriented. He needs housework to a standard that I cannot keep up with for his 'acts of service' bucket to be full. He grew up with very conditional parental love. It is overwhelming for me to remember all of the rules and requests even when I want to comply. I'm not getting what I want so a lot of the time I don't want to comply and I'm either angry and rude but do it anyway or just say no, usually not nicely. I have noticed that saying 'No' politely does usually work ok. It is exhausting to feel like I'm treated as an employee or child.

I think my question is, can he ever stop doing those things if I can become his soft place to land? How do I get over that if it's not possible? Can we have a fulfilling sex life?