Topic: Sex and Alexithemia

Right, apologies in advanced for what's probably going to be a VERY unstructured post, as I'm going to brain dump. For background, I'm female. Just so the following makes more sense.


First point is probably to ask: are you referring to sex as the physical act, or as something more deeply emotional?

I personally have no emotional link to sex at all. Probably the first time I really knew something was a bit off - people are meant to get a flush of love towards their partner as they bathe in post-coital afterglow, and throw all logic and planning out of the window when things start to get hot and heavy. Me? I'm making sure there's a towel in place to avoid spillages, and my primary post-coital concern is to waddle off to the bathroom for a quick wash. Probably too much information there... although vaguely relevant, as I think the poor guy actually thought I didn't love him because I didn't want to remain and 'glow' with him.

... which I guess is technically true, with regards to the loving part. And with that somewhat too-detailed rambling, it's put my ADHD-rebound brain into gear.

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Lust and love. Love is hard to characterise. I don't really feel emotions mentally, but I feel the physical symptoms. And, as I'm sure you know, lust is something that can pretty much bypasses the brain and lives in your groin. It's pretty hard to misinterpret the crotch-tingle.

From reading your post, it looks like you're after making love rather than having sex... which may be a problem. However, bedroom fun may not be a problem at all.

SO! Let's disentangle sex emotion from sex physicality. Does he masturbate? Do you masturbate? Is masturbation an emotional thing for you? Do you feel that you should not masturbate, as you should only have sexual outlet with your partner? Does he feel something similar?

What if you approach sex as less to do with emotions (less lovemaking) and more mutual masturbation? Do you require physical contact between each other?

I've just spent ten minutes staring at this post, wondering how much information I should go in to here... and then realised the following: the ideas I was going to mention are definitely not safe for a public forum. Plus, it's mostly me going back and analysing my past experience with sex and relationships, and what I think might have helped me.

I'll happily go into more detail, but only with your permission.

OP: if you don't mind me asking, what felt contrived/unemotional about your husband's attempts?


Athanasa: You can analyze sex/relationships, I'm curious lol.

Anyway, I also can't connect sex and emotions like that. :/

I would find mutual masturbation really boring though... sex is just more interesting, the "real action" is just more fun, I can't explain that better heh.

So to me it's not about a "should" like, it's the only appropriate way to have an outlet lol no.

I dunno about OP of course.

I would find mutual masturbation really boring though... sex is just more interesting, the "real action" is just more fun, I can't explain that better heh.

See, you start at opposite sides of the room, then get closer each time you do it. Eventually it's sex, but hopefully approached from the viewpoint of "masturbation", and therefore without the emotional stuff.

If your partner is doing a sexy strip tease for you, does that have emotions attached to it? What if they get progressively more lewd with it? At what point does it move to "emotional" territory? When it becomes a lap dance?

This whole emotion thing is fascinating - there's got to be a transition from "oh that's kinda sexy" to "WE ARE MAKING LOVE NOW". But where is the transition? I'm convinced it's entirely to do with the mindset of the people approaching sex. Surely there's different emotions involved in a "let's just have a quickie" bonk and a "let's make love" bonk, which would give weight to my theory.

Why bother with the masturbation part? I don't get the point of your suggestion, really.

I don't approach sex from the viewpoint of masturbation, yet I'm not emotionally connected with sex. How is that so hard for some people to understand, that sex doesn't have to be "emotional" beyond the physical enjoyment?!

Lewd stuff... also does not have to be "emotional". I wouldn't say it's about a different "mindset". That sounds like a too mental/detached way of phrasing it. It's just the fact of being *involved* emotionally or not, it's not mental/detached at all.

It seems to require some kind of openness to "touchy-feely" stuff.

Also, I don't think I would put the phrase "we are making love now" in all caps. :)

Many thanks to all of you for sharing and apologies I've taken a while to respond.

In answer to the Qs on whether I see sex as lovemaking:

No not necessarily. My issue is more about passion, lust - neither of which are attributes that my husband feels, or at least displays. Passion is important, otherwise where is the connection? To me, it 'feels' like sex for him is a chemical process more than anything else, ie. feels mechanical to me.

After 16yrs together, lust is hard - hence lovemaking would feel more initiative or 'natural' to me, and i most certainlywould not turn that down! Though it seems he is completely void of any feeling or experience, not psychological anyway. It's hard to lust after someone who increasingly has no reaction or instinct to anything.

He tells me he 'feels' and likes sex but obviously I am unconvinced as he is merely responsive - yes/no answers after long pauses etc. He then may become a bit more touchy-feeling afterwards or wanting to get intimate that evening. Then that's that, the issue gets shelved again and he goes back to his usual monotone self.

I am pretty sure he doesn't masturbate, though I'll ask - don't know when he would do it tbh. I know he's never even glanced at another woman, as he does come straight from work/phones and is very loyal. When he was younger he was more lusty/sexual but like everything else, it has since receded as he ages.

Hence I think he is asexual and he is in denial - for about 14yrs he lied and denied that he doesn't feel emotion (when I had this gut feeling all along). To me, it feels that he is not comfortable with anything more than companionship.

Maybe I should stop thinking about him or 'us', glam myself up and go and seek sex elsewhere, and ask for an open relationship? Curiously he has told me that he would take me back if I had an affair but admitted he would be devastated (he genuinely looked terrified). Even stranger, is that he responded instinctively when asked, and this was when we were dating 16yrs ago (I jokingly asked several times because his response seemed so strange). I asked again recently and it was the same answer though he was a lot more akward this time.

I've flirted and got close to a couple of other guys a long time ago (inc. his friend which only recently he admitted he picked upon), when we were in our 20s etc. I never thought i would be contemplating an affair to save our marriage? I will also answer on the next thread as I really don't know how to deal with this.

To clarify I would be very happy with lust, but I don't even detect any of that!

I read your initial post more closely. It is so interesting you say you are companions in every other part of life despite all the emotional issues.

I asked you about this in another thread, but what is it with the passion, what do you see as that? The genital lust on its own is surely not it, or? That (genital lust) I assume is what you called the chemical process. And still interested in what it is he does or does not do that makes you feel that it's just a chemical process for him.

Also, was it always like that? I read the post of yours where you described how you two met in a one-night stand. That was different back then, I would guess?

I don't think he's asexual if he used to enjoy it more. He could just be depressed. He could be alexithymic AND depressed or dysthymic. Without even knowing it, let alone knowing what's causing it. This is me, but I did not recognize my own dysthymic depression for years. It was just a low baseline mood in terms of lack of positive emotionality or anything. Not even negative much beyond some anger issues. Lack of strong emotions in general beyond some anger.

If he does have this issue, he'd have to get that fixed obviously. With professional help possibly. I don't know, I'm speculating a bit too much right now, sorry, hard to say much without more information. But I'm also basing this guess on how you described in some other post of yours that he's become less sociable, less fun-seeking and does all that marathon training instead. I had totally that same thing going on myself for years.

Just I take issue with how you see him as a robot. No, he's not. Alexithymia is not the complete lack of emotion, it's lack of awareness. Look at it as, emotions being hidden rather than completely missing like it would be missing for an actual robot. I've been seen as robotic or mechanical too and eh, it's not that simple. I'm glad to explain more about this if you want.

"I'm not sure how I can connect with someone I love in a non-loving way - or knowing it isn't loving for them."

Also this. Lack of awareness != not loving.


PS: Do you want to talk more about this in private? I don't know if I can help you understand these issues more, I'm not your husband after all, but something made me interested in your issue. Let me know if you want to talk more outside this forum and if so, I can give you an email address (or you can give yours). Btw, not trying to be intrusive either, of course.

Thanks for your thoughts and I don't at all think it's intrusive. I don't mind posting here as others may find helpful, I certainly have found certain posts to describe my exact situation.

I guess where I differ from my husband/Alexes is 'the feeling' in regards to my point about passion/lust etc. You will note I refer to this a lot. I am a highly intuitive person and high on emotional intelligence whereas my husband does not feel anything, including anger or even happiness. In 16yrs I honestly can't recall any time he has been spontaneously overjoyed or displayed a high level of excitement. That's why I don't think he is dysthemic, he doesn't really have moods.

I do know he is not a robot - he gets very upset when I say this (seems to be the only hurt he feels and I note you also have picked up on this), though he behaves like one. I understand the issue is lack of awareness, he has told me that he does love me. I know he does because otherwise he wouldn't be with me - as he's quite unemotional, he wouldn't stick around if he wasn't content. (Indeed I used to have a fear that one morning he would wake up and calmly say 'I don't love you, I'm leaving.' Not least because of a certain incident early in our relationship where his detachedness hurt).

I do love my husband very much (otherwise I would have left). I know he is only human (as we all are) but that doesn't make living with his behaviour any easier. The way I see it is his/Alexes' brains are wired differently (I mean this colloquially not in medical terms) and he sees the world through a different lens. Not bad or negative, we all can't be the same. Though that means because of the way my brain is wired, I naturally interpret his detached behaviour/non-reaction negatively. I may be conditioned to think like this by society but nonetheless that is my instinct reaction. This is the inherent problem, underlying sex and in broader terms, our future together - he says he wants children (when asked) but he expresses no desire or feeling to make this happen. He thinks in the present and seems to have no capacity to think about the future (ie. when we grow old), or express sentiment about the past. I am the opposite where I very much focus on the future in how I determine my needs for the present, and will very much reflect on the past.

I hope that makes sense and gives an understanding of a non-Alexi partner's view.

No problem. :) OK, oh and sorry for the delay in responding, I hope you still get to see these replies. This is why I offered the option of emailing because I check that more regularly but I'll try to check the forums sooner too.


Yes, it does give more understanding, I totally get it how you need more than just a non-reaction from him.


OK, so my theory is that your husband could have the depressive mood in a less conscious way, even if not felt let alone expressed consciously, it would still "drive" him to do different activities or not do certain activities anymore or enjoy them less. That's what I had, tbh. I do still find it hard to bring out these feelings or face them, they are so "disabled", sort of a milder form of "disaffectation" as described in wikipedia "disaffectation" article. I didn't find a better way to describe this mechanism.

Also, he used to enjoy sex more, yeah? That's a big red flag as to something going on there. I do not believe it's in his best interest either to stay the way he is currently. He needs to realize that for himself though, that there's an issue. Seeing what changed, how he used to enjoy things more, etc would possibly help him realize he's missing/lacking something? For me it took quite a few years to spontaneously realize I was lacking something, but maybe that process can be sped up with your help, if he's anything like that (as per my theory).

A difference I do see though is, you say he never ever in the 16 years, even early on, displayed any joy or excitement - or do you mean he used to, just not extremely strongly? Or not on his own, only if others started on the mood first? If this makes sense. Let me know.


Also... Wasn't it you who said that their husband was actually instinctually responding about how important you/the relationship is to him? Yeah, I looked, you wrote this: "Curiously he has told me that he would take me back if I had an affair but admitted he would be devastated (he genuinely looked terrified). Even stranger, is that he responded instinctively when asked, and this was when we were dating 16yrs ago (I jokingly asked several times because his response seemed so strange). I asked again recently and it was the same answer though he was a lot more akward this time."

I'm curious, what do you mean by, it was more awkward this time? Less fluidly expressed? Or what? I do think this means he cares on an emotional level too somewhere deep. Instinctive response, yeah.

I don't understand the part about him wanting kids but not expressing the feeling to make it happen. Why didn't you two just decide to start on the er, baby making process? I don't understand. Do you need him to be very enthusiastic and expressive before you can decide to do so? Or does he still have some practical argument against starting now? Or is it you being unsure in general if this relationship will last, too? I wondered before too as to what's in the way. Do let me know if that's OK.


Oh and yeah, I don't focus on the future too much or reflect very much on the past either by default. For my process of change I did have to get into that a bit more but also not lose touch with the present, of course.