I Can Tell When He's Unhappy...

...and sometimes it's frustrating. He becomes quiet, goes inward, and his disappointment emanates from him like a heavy fog from a dreary forest. It colors everything in the house. And when I ask what's wrong, and his eyes lower, and his breath catches in his throat as if he could go on for days with the answer, he simply stops, looks away, and says "nothing" or "I don't want to talk about it" or "I'm just in a bad mood."

The thing is, I know what the problem is. Me. The fact that I didn't come to bed last night and throw myself at him. The fact that I didn't drag him to bedroom in a fit of passion. The fact that I didn't wake him up in the middle of the night in heat like a feral cat.

I know he wants to and needs to be wanted. I understand that human necessity. And somehow, I also know I'm a giant failure in that department.

Part of it is definitely me. I'll bear the blame. I get caught up in life, work, the house, kids. I become exhausted, cranky, and hyper-focused on stuff that probably doesn't matter...and surely matters less than my marriage and the happiness of my husband.

But, part of it is also him. His expectation. That I would be the same woman I was, in every way, especially sexually, that I was 9 years ago...before marriage, before children, before mortgages, before...before...before...

This is where we are. This is where we've been for several years now. An almost perfect marriage with a giant hole in the middle that we both keep falling into, climbing out of, and trying to avoid or ignore. It's our elephant...and it hangs out in the middle of everything, swing it's trunk all over the place, making a damn mess.

We've been to counseling. And they all say the same thing...women change, he'll just have to get used to it. But he won't. And I understand that, actually. I don't think he should give up on our sex life. I don't think either of us should give up on the passion. But how, when my libido seems to have sucked its head so far into it's tortoiseshell we may never see it again, am I supposed to bring it back?

I love him. I need him. I just don't always want him. Or anyone. And he wants me ALL. THE. TIME.

It's not fair. Really. I'm so incredibly lucky to have a husband who finds me to be the most desirable woman on the planet and wants to have sex with me every day. Why can't I reciprocate? Why?