Good afternoon everyone, I apologize for how sloppy the writing may be on this post so bear with me. Ill try and lable stuff to make this easier to read for everyone who is interested in reading my story. Thank you for takeing the time to read my story to offer me feedback, advise, or support, I truly appreciate it.
Introduction to myself and my relationship
To keep myself and my partner anonymous, my name is H(21 male), my lovely girlfriends name is L (20 female). Me and her have been together for over three years. We met in high school in the JROTC program, yes, I was a nerd ans so was she. We both had military family's and did the "program" because we were both interested in military culture. We started dateing when I was in my senior year of high school and she was a Jr. She was 17 and I was 18. We were long time friends for about a year and a half. She had gotten out of a relationship about a month before we started dateing that was nasty. Her ex was verbally abusive and made her have sex with him, she didnt talk about it often but when they broke up she told me a couple of times about it, and about how depressed it made her. She needed a someone to be there for her and I was, and I was happy to help.
When we first got together I told her repeatedly that I never want to make her uncomfortable about sex or anything like that. I told her when she was ready she can move at her own pace and that I was with her because I loved her, not because of what was in between her legs. A few months into our relationship she told me she was ready and we began to have that deeper connection and it was great. The physical and emotional connection we had was amazing. She was very happy to be with me and told me constantly how much she loved me and made many positive comments on our sex life.
A few months later I graduated high school and I went to basic training fir the air force 6 days later. I enlisted in the guard way before we got together, so she knew about my military commitment before we were together and supported it. She wrote me letters every day in basic and sent many pics of her (normal pics) so I could see her face. We called every day when I was in technical training and 5 months later she and her family picked met me at the airport home where I gave her a promise ring.
When our issues begin to arise
Before I left for basic me and her would have sex about once or twice per week, sometimes even 3 or 4. Now of course we were hormonal teenagers but we are still quite young. As I said before, our sex was emotional, passionate, and mutually satisfying. Not to get to gross but I had a non viable injury from when I was young that makes it harder for me too feel. It was more often that I would not finish from sex. While I was gone from basic she began anti anxiety medication and birth control, the birth control was not for sex reasons, she just wanted to skip her periods. In case you are unaware, both of these medications nuke libido levels hard. So we begin having sex once every 4-6 weeks.
As you can imagine, being in a military environment for 5 months can change you physically and can change your personality. For me it was both. Im not a walking stereotype, I am mostly the same as I was before. I am still sarcastic, still goofy, and stuff, I am just more detail oriented and disciplined. I also put on some muscle, so I was not a skinny twig any more. When I returned home, I didnt really expect her to be all over me 247, but she hardly touched more or kissed me any more, and when she did, it almost looked like a chore for her. Our sex life had deteriorated not just in quantity, but in quantity. For lack of better words her heart didnt seem in it most of the time. Again it seemed like a chore to her, she would ask me to hurry up or just make certain comments during it like "your being a bit loud arnt you?" This has been the standard of our physical life since I got home and she was on medication.
However, she has still shown me the same love she did before. Every time I show up to her house to take her on a date she is so exited to see me. We often go dress up to go nice places, see new things, eat great food and so on. Every month I buy her flowers and she puts them on her desk so everone can see them. For the padt few years we have been progressing in life. I work at the base, fo collage online, volunteering with the base honor guard, I was awared airmen of the yeat for my unit and I am currently trying to get into law enforcement so I can serve people in my community more directly. I would ljke to say I live to serve other, and I try to do so, even for her. She has been babysitting and recently got a full time job at a daycare center. That brings us to where we are today, now we have sex once every 2-3 months.
My problem with our relationship
Many people few sex differently, I have read many different articles, publications, and even post on this app from dead bedroom, thr LLC and thr HLC to try and find some advice. What I have gathered is this.
1 Everyone sees sex differently
2 Healthy sex is not a definite number
3 Sex is part of a relationship but it is not always equally important.
I want to clarify a couple of things as well, I am deeply in love with my partner, I do not try to guilt trip her for sex, and I am not a pervert who just was to get his nut. To me sex is part of a deeper connection. It shows what already is in a relationship, it shoes passion, love, vulnerability, trust, and disire for eachother. I know for some in the LLC its not the same and thats perfectly okay, this is just how I personally feel. My partner before she got on her medication had the same opinion about this, I know because we talked about it before we actually started having sex. We have had many talks about sex after our problems have arised and she has told me she "feels numb" sexually. She gave me an apology about food saying she just isn't really hungry anymore and she said it was from her medication.
How I feel
Even though its probably just because her meds, in all honesty I just dont feel desired or wanted. I feel like the passion in our relationship is dead. I know it sounds dramatic but I am just sad when I leave her and she doesn't reach out to kiss me anymore. I will be honest, it makes me question a lot of things and I don't believe its sustainable for a long term relationship. I feel like a bad boyfriend from it or a "perv" but I dont want to be that guy, like that guy from work everone knows who is always complaining about his wife but is a mediocre turd and dosnt even do the dishes. But I can honestly say I really try my best for her. I do the dates, the dog sitting when she is out of town (we dont live together yet bc the housing market is bad) I take horrible orders (temporary military employment in some shithole) so I can buy her beautiful things, I pay attention, I dont think I am a loser but yall can tell me if I am. I truly give her and everything else in my life my all.
I am not entitled to anything in this relationship, I do not deserve or earn anything from my partner, all I can do is treat her amazing and love her the same. But I sometimes feel like I am lifting the world for somone who dosnt desire me or want to be with me. We have been together for three years, and I love her incredibly, and I know she loves me to, she shows me every day, but I just feel like a friend sometimes. I dont mide lifing the world for the person I love, I would lift it gladly, but I dont ljme feeling like I am doing it for a freind. We have worked past many issues, her ex bf being one of those issues and I am almost certain that is not the cause of our problems, I am 99 percent sure it is just the medication. But I just miss the person who would reach out to kiss me and to grab me arm or make a flirty comment sometimes.
What I want/The problem
The main thing I want is the feel disired again. While I do want to have sex again, Ideally once every 6-8 days. But what I really want is to feel like my partner is passionate about me again. I just dont feel that from her anymore. I acknowledge that I am not entitled to any physical affection from my partner, but I really miss it. I thought she was feeling me once after I got home from a trip and she told me she was not interested because she didnt want to take her pants off. It was really hard to hide what I felt in that moment but I hid it, because I didnt want her to feel pressured.
The reality
At this point I am going to acknowledge the unfortunate truth, my beautiful partner has a low drive and sex and physical touch is not important to her and she has a right to feel whatever she wants to feel. I feel the opposite, I have a higher drive and physical touch makes me feel wanted. I have a right to that feeling as well. But our wants conflict in a meaningful way that makes me question if our relationship dynamic is sustainable. She has told me she wishes she could have a high drive for me again, she just doesn't. We have had many talks about our sex life and while many were unproductive, .maybe even harmful, after educating myself we have gotten to a point to where we understand eachother. I was able to articulate myself better, and I was able to better understand her. This has been a subject that has been hurting our relationship for almost 2 years now.
She means to world to me, and she deserves it. But I understand that this is a fundamental issue that in the long run could make us miserable and ruin what could be an amazing life together. I honestly want to propose to her because of how amazing she is, we just have this one issue in our relationship that makes us both unhappy. I dont want her to always think that she is not enough for me or that I may try and get it elsewhere, and I know she doesn't want me to feel undesirable. I have really been working on this issue, I have tried many things but it hasn't gone anywhere. I would appreciate any advice you may have to offer, or any kind words of hope.
Final notes
Thank you for taking the time to read my debacle. I apologize for how poorly written out this is, how long it is, the many typos that are likely in it, and so on. Please leave a comment or dm me or something with advice. Its not my place to control her, I just miss what we had and I dont know what to do.
*TL;DR; : Me 21M and my Gf 20F are having relationship problems because of sex. Because of her medication, she no longer has a sex drive and now I feel undesirable. Any advice? *.