I’ve been married for 6 years and we’ve never had what I would consider a good sex life. I would consider a good sex life, having sex twice a week with her showing an equal (or close to equal) interest. Instead we usually have sex once every 3 weeks (sometimes less, we’ve gone 6 weeks without sex). By the time it’s been that long she usually starts saying something like, “I know you need it so we’ll do it soon.” It’s basically a chore for her that she puts off for as long as possible. When we do have sex it’s always the same way. She refuses to do anything that requires effort on her part so it’s always in our bedroom, in the bed, me on top. If it takes more than 5 minutes she gets mad and says I’m trying to not “finish” to make it last longer. It’s gotten really depressing. I feel like I biologically need it, but it’s not enjoyable and it makes me feel bad every time.

She works more hours than I do (sometimes 60+, compared to my 40), but she says up really late. I usually go to bed between 10 and 11. She stays up until 1 or 2, sometimes later. I’ve told her before that I feel lonely. We don’t see each other all day, then I go to bed by myself.

About two weeks ago I saw a Groupon for a trip to Jamaica. I was going to put it on her phone and then tell her we should go. When I went on her phone there was a ton of porn videos that she’d been watching that week. She says that’s the first time she’s done that in years. I guess I believe her, but it was still really hurtful. Anytime I make a suggestion that has something to do with sex she acts like I’m the most crude person on the planet. And I’m not making out of the ordinary suggestions. This would be a suggestion like, her on top, oral, sex in the morning, etc. One time I had read that couples watching soft porn together can improve or spice up their sex life, so I suggested it. She acted like that was completely disgusting. So when I saw on her phone that she’d been watching extremely graphic, very hard-core porn at night while I was asleep it really hurt.

I confronted her and at first she denied even watching it, even though it was right there on her phone. Then she said she was just curious that one night. When I told her the history showed that she’d been watching it the past few nights she said it was just because she’s been off of her birth control and that makes her think about sex more. I said, “But I’m laying upstairs, lonely, wishing I could have sex with you. If you were in the mood I would have thought your husband would be the first option, not porn.” She said she didn’t think waking me up to have sex was an option. That hurt. To think that porn would come to mind as an option over me really hurts, especially since our sex life has been so bad.

After all of this happened I wrote down everything I was feeling. I told her how unhappy I was because of our sex life. I told her I feel selfish, but as a man I “need” to have a sex life and as her husband it really makes me depressed feeling like she has no interest in me. We talked about it and she said she feels like she should be the one getting mad because I’m making such a big deal about it. I told her if we had a healthy sex life I wouldn’t mind her looking at porn at all, it might even be a turn on. But in our situation, when she seems to be picking porn over me, I told her it was almost like cheating. She laughed when I said that. I told her that she has a husband who practically begs her for sex, however and whenever she’ll have it, and instead she’s watching some guy online having sex.

We’ve talked a lot since then. I told her I had been so unhappy with our sex life that it is affecting everything else and I didn’t feel like I was being fair to myself to stay around being unhappy and feeling unloved (in the bedroom at least). Everything outside of our sex life is great. We get along really well. But the lack of sex, and now this, are making it really difficult. Since all this happened about a week and a half ago we haven’t had sex. We even went on a date Thursday night, but when we came home she just went downstairs to read her book. Then again last night we went on a date, but again, when we came home she went down stairs and read her book until around 1 a.m. She reads on a Kindle, and I’ve been thinking about getting a Kindle. So this morning I looked at hers to see if I think I’d like it. The page she was one when she stopped reading last night was more graphic than anything I’ve ever seen. It was some guy in the kitchen, kissing this girl, then “pressing his erection deep in her.” I couldn’t believe it. It actually made me sick to think about. She has probably over 100 of these books, but I didn’t realize what they were. I knew they were “Romance Novels” but I didn’t realize they were written graphic porn. Now I know that even if she did only watch videos those two days, she’s reading porn every night.

Am I wrong to be hurt by this? Is it wrong for her to, even after all we’ve been through the past few weeks, still be reading this when she knows how much that hurts me? I just don’t know what to do.