OK. Back to those answers. I'll take them in turn. But since it's been a while, the Question was "Why are you here (in couples counseling)?"
Answer1: For the most part, we are fine. We don't fight or yell, we enjoy one another's company. We have no major cultural issues that are at odds with the other. We have similar religious and political views. We have the best son that ever was. He is a bit of a mama's boy and that may be a contributing factor. So you see, we're ahead of a lot of couples. But that's not enough for S- and he does have a point.
Answer 2: Yes, it's true. I have serious problems with relationships. It's not just sexual ones, I have very few close friends, either. I just seem unable to give much to any relationship. Perhaps it is because I am a fundamentally selfish person. But I am willing to do just about anything for people I care about, I just don't often think to do them. My husband does the bulk of the housework, (at least what is not done by the part-time nanny, which really is most of it, but still...) most of the cooking, most of the shopping. To be fair, he also cares a lot more about how things are cleaned or cooked and what gets bought. He makes pretty much all the money, and is very good about helping with our son. When you get right down to it, I'm really not offering much to the relationship, other than being kind of cute and the mother of his son.
Then there the sex issue. I honestly could just do without it. I enjoy it when we get around to it, but it's not a driving factor. I find it difficult to keep my mind on the subject at hand during sex, everything else creeps in and invades my mind. It's just hard for me to get into it. It's been the same in every long relationship I've had, the first few months I'm interested, after that, not so much. I think there are some really complex reasons for my lack of interest that have to do with my upbringing (very sheltered, my introduction to sex (very young) and my very weak will. I should probably do a whole post on that at some point but I'm not sure I really want to get into it that much. I will say that while I love my parents and hope I can be as good a parent as they are, I totally disagree with there complete lack of discussion about sex, drugs, and other such teen issues. That is the one area in which I hope to be dramatically different from my parents.
The result though, is that at some point before William was even an idea, we started having intimacy issues. Our discussions about it centered around 2 big issues. He didn't feel like I was still interested in him and I felt the only time either of us expressed any affection was leading to or during sex. There was no in between, it was all or nothing. That made me afraid to express affection at times I did not want to have sex, which made S- feel more rejected. It's all snowballed of course, because the more S- felt rejected the less he showed affection. He left it up to me but I'm not all that interested. So now, if I do start something, he feels I'm just trying to make him happy, if I don't, he feels neglected.
Somehow, he often manages to start something when there isn't time to do much. If I say something, he feels rejected, but the one time I tried not saying anything G- woke up before much had happened and he resented that too. When we talked later, he agreed that that was worse than me saying something, but he still gets upset when I do. If we could find a middle ground of just affection but not sex, it would help that problem immensely. But for some reason we can't. I know part of it is that S- feels like he gets action so rarely, the slightest advance turns him on completely. And I think he also feels like he needs to take advantage of the slightest show of interest. But that, of course, makes it even harder for me to want to show interest.
Answer 3: has to do with S- and how he aggravates the problems in Answer 2 and add his own little neuroses. As I mentioned before, he rarely shows affection when it isn't going to result in sex. He also has his own long history of relationships with people that were not able to hold up their end of the deal, his parents, previous girlfriends, etc. I'm not really sure he knows what a healthy relationship should be. So in part I think he is projecting on me, some of the attributes he's seen in other relationship, in other words, being hyper sensitive.
He also has a serious issue with how my parents treat him/us as compared to how they treat our BIL/my sister. He believe they do more for them, are more interested in their lives, care more about their children, and like the BIL more than him. In a certain way, he is right. They do treat us differently, but that is because we have made it clear that is what we want. S- would never allow them to loan us money or pay our rent, he would never want that, but he still resents when they do it for them. He would not want my mother practically raising our child, but he resents that she spends more time with their children. He gets upset that they sometimes pay for my sister's hotel on vacation, but he knows they could not come if they had to pay for it themselves. Plus the BIL came into our lives when he was 16 years old. S- was 32. BIL is practically a son to them, S- came to the family a fully opinionated adult. It is a whole different kind of relationship, bit S- resents what he sees as favoritism towards the BIL.
The problem in all this, though, is that I too have a serious inferiority complex when it comes to my relationship with my parents. My sister is much more like them and has always needed/wanted their support and input more than I have. Intellectually, I understand this but when my mother forgets she was supposed to keep G- I can't help but let those little questions creep in. Maybe she doesn't love my baby as much, Maybe... What I need from Erick is reassurance, not more doubt. It's a big emotional issue for me and they are MY family and it is much harder for me to deal with. He might feel a bit slighted by them, but my whole world would basically unhinge if what he were saying was true. I've pointed this out to him many times but he seems unable to support me on the issue.
Finally there is the problem of the lack of respect I feel from him. We are both architects and have been trying to design a house for ourselves basically since we got married 6.5 years ago. I have finally had to accept that if I want to ever have a house, I will have to let him design it. We don't work all that well together and he simply will not accept something that I have designed because he does not believe it could be as good as what he would do. He cites his greater experience, blah, blah, blah, but the fact of the matter is that he simply does not respect me as a professional. Every time we discuss the house, we end up fighting, not over the house, but over our treatment of the other. But our current house is springing apart at the seams and simply does not suit our needs anymore. That alone puts a huge stress on the marriage so we really need to get the new plans complete, but trying to complete them strains the marriage even more. I'm trying to step away from the whole thing because at this point I just want a house. But I have more free time than he does so, it frustrated me that I can't help get it done. NOW.
So there are plenty of issues to work out, but I'm not really sure a therapist is going to help that much, other than perhaps making a particular time that we have to set aside to discuss all this. She is gone for the next 3 weeks so we'll see how we do in that time. Hopefully we can make some progress on our own before we see her again.