I have been married to my wife for 13 years and we have had our fair share of relationship problems in the past. What has surfaced recently (but been there all along) is my sex (over) drive. When I don't get it for a while I either get extremely anxious or switch off as a defensive mechanism. Problem is that the closer I get to her emotionally, though affection or normal physical contact, the quicker the sexual build up and subsequent angst and problems.

I love my wife and our 2 kids a lot and she loves me. But all the good I do towards her gets eroded when the Hyde in me takes over. I have acknowledged the problem and committed to work on it -- she has distanced herself from me. What are my options? By the way. I don't indulge in extra-marital sex to satisfy myself. Masturbating to relive the tension brings only a temporary calm.

Have you seen a doctor about this?

Not yet. The full realization is very recent. What area of medical specialization should I be looking for?

I heard it in a movie once: "Women need a REASON to have sex, men just need a PLACE "... (or something like that).


What that means to me is that she should be romanced, and feel the love and warmth, first.

What you have described here for us is that you are using sex as a release of tension. A tranquilizer of sorts. Not too romantic, HUH?

I agree with Synnen, have a check-up.

I'm a man, a married man. I know that my wife may not feel like making love at the same instant that I do. I know how to get her in the mood though. I also know when it's NOT going to happen either.

Find out what it takes to get her in the mood. I.e.: candles, music, massages,. a romantic vacation...

But, most importantly, learn to appreciate her feelings when she does say "No way".

I'm undecided here whether the main problem is that you want sex very frequently or that you are unable to deal with sexual frustration after a period.

I make the distinction because I'm wondering whether you might actually have a sexual addiction or whether it is more of a general difficulty in handling frustrations, or in fact just you becoming more aware that your behaviour gets a little unreasonable when you feel sexually frustrated.

We all feel sexual frustration at times (yes us women too) but the question is how big a problem is it?

Ok, I'm not sure if I fully have a handle on this yet but these are my thoughts at the moment:

I'm guessing you probably were always the one with the higher sex drive. This may well not have been apparent right at the beginning since most of us are at it like rabbits in the first flush of love and attraction. Time goes on, you get less sex than you want. You get frustrated and become a bit difficult. Your wife feels your frustration and is on the wrong end of your bad moods. This makes her feel less like sex. You get even more frustrated... That about right?

Ok, the good news is you have realised your reaction isn't helping and decided to do something about it.

So work on getting rid of Mr Hyde first. Remind yourself when you feel him rearing up that you need to handle your frustration better. Go dig the garden or something. That works for me! Since feeling close to your wife brings on some of the problems perhaps you could suggest doing something physical (not sexual) together - gardening, DIY, a nice walk, whatever. Try and find constructive ways to handle it - whatever works for you. If you keep trying and find you really can't then maybe consider some counselling or anger-management or the like to help you find ways to handle it.

Once you know that nice Mr Jekyl is in charge work WITH your wife on finding a compromise. Hopefully the absence of Hyde (over a period - not instantly) will make your wife feel better towards you anyway. Remember that sex for a woman starts in the brain. Make her feel safe from Mr Hyde and appreciated by Mr Jekkly and find out what would make her more likely to want and enjoy sex. Yes, ask. But only when you can do so reasonably, not from a place of frustration.

Incidentally, while masturbation is a perfectly normal and healthy way to relieve sexual tension, it can be overdone and lead to increasing frustration in the long run. So do experiment with other ways of making yourself feel better, just so you know that you can. After all if you felt sexual frustration in an inappropriate venue you wouldn't be able to masturbate then.

Do get a medical check up if you feel you can't get this under control. It may be that your testosterone levels are unusually high or something similar.

Edit - I just read some of your posts from last year and realise you and your wife have been working through a lot of issues for quite some time now. I can see that this is probably part of what you are working through. You mentioned in one post that you had started counselling. Is that still continuing? Has it been helpful?

One final thought, if you have owned this as a problem you need to work on, I hope you have shared that thought with your wife. That would cut a lot of ice with me if I were her.

Appreciate the thoughts QLP. You are correct in your assessment of our sex drive past and present. One would think that age would have brought mine down but it hasn't. And I am looking at medical options to evaluate and treat if necessary.

Counseling in the past has helped me tremendously. I had a lot many more Hyde-effects which have since been under control. However, this may be the underlying one that was never addressed. And needless to say it is the strongest trigger and the hardest to manage. I must admit that I haven't come to this realization on my own; it came about through a bad outburst, a severe fight that ensued, and a lot of mental trauma I caused my wife about a week ago. We are using a close friend as an intermediary to hold our marriage together -- she all but has walked out on me since then. And while it is hard discussing such issues with a friend it is even harder that I have to work on this problem without her support to win her trust back.

You and your wife need to be in marriage counseling together.

It's not fair for your friend to have to moderate between the two of you, and frankly neither of you is going to be 100% open with a friend that you want to keep in the long run--NO ONE tells a simple friend the whole truth, or all the dark evil parts of ourselves.

Since it is only a week since you had a big bust up your wife is understandably probably feeling too raw to deal with this yet. Since this was the trigger that made you realise that you really have this problem it will take time for you to fully take it on board and longer for your wife to understand that you have done so.

If your wife is reluctant to work with you on this, continue or resume proper counselling on your own for the moment. This will help you and show your wife you are serious about tackling this problem. As synnen wisely points out a friend is just not neutral or distanced enough to do the job.

You are moving slowly in the right direction by seeing the problem and looking for solutions. Hang on in there. We can't do an awful lot but are here to try and support you or let you vent when things are difficult. Remember, it's often darkest before the dawn. I do hope this all works out for you.

Okay, finally had a chance to read through some of your other posts.

YOU need to go to counseling on your own. Your wife doesn't trust you, and isn't going to sleep with you at this point. Feeling close to her emotionally makes you, well... horny. In turn, that makes her feel like you are only doing things to get emotionally connected in order to get into her pants.

I think there is way more going on here than you are telling us. I also think your wife's version of events would be EXTREMELY different.

If you want to save your marriage, start seeing a marriage counselor--even if you need to go by yourself at first before you can convince your wife to go.

Frankly--this is not the first time your wife has walked out on you in the last two years. I have the feeling that she's always waiting for the other shoe to drop. Yeah, you'll be nice for a while, and yeah, you'll do things her way for a while--but then you'll "explode", and everything you've been doing looks like an act to get back into her good graces, with the "outburst" being the norm.

Get to the doctor... things of Bipolar Disorder can't be self diagnosed or self treated... not saying it's that... only saying you NEED to have a doctor see you can decide what you might have, IF you have anything at all other than poor self control.

Wouldn't help me holding back points I believe were relevant from this anonymous group. At the same time in the interest of brevity I could have missed a few points.

My wife has had a chance to share her side of the story with me and yes, trust is the single biggest issue for her. I meet a doctor / counselor later this week on my own. So thanks for the honest feedback and push in the right direction.