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MISSING THE CLOSENESS wrote in to Dear Abby:

A decade ago, before my wife and I had children, we were deeply in love with each other. Everything was great in the bedroom and outside. After we had children, my wife did a 180. She's no longer affectionate with me at all.

We barely hold hands, we never hug, and kissing is prohibited except maybe a kiss before bed. We kiss like it's an obligation. There's no touching in our relationship.

Why aren't you rushing to get married, men??? I am emphasizing certain words and phrases because a lot of comments accused him of only caring about sex.

In the bedroom we used to be more physical and less restrained. I wanted her to be satisfied, without getting more specific. Now, if we are intimate, it's once a month during the summer and maybe twice a month otherwise. She won't allow me to touch parts of her body, and she's physically and emotionally remote.

Wow, he might be getting more sex than me. How sad for my marriage.

When I addressed this with her, she informed me that other couples are intimate less frequently than we are.

True! And some husbands torture and murder their wife.

Did Her Needs Change?

This entry is going to explicitly cover some sexual topics. So don't read it if that bothers you.

Today's Dear Abby is Exhibit A For Why Men Shouldn't Marry

Here it is. Today's Dear Abby column.

I have been married for four months. My husband and I love each other very much.

Awwwwwww. How sweet!

Although he has asked me multiple times for sex, we have only made love twice.

EJECT! EJECT! He needs to bail NOW, no matter how much money he spent on the wedding, the honeymoon, and everything else so she could have her narcissistic moments. If he's like most men, he shouldn't have married in the first place.

But wait... I'm sure some of you are thinking he's just not jumping through enough hoops. If only he was a better, more romantic lover, right? Yeah, well read on...

My problem is, sex doesn't interest me. In fact, the thought of it terrifies me.

What did she think she was doing by getting married?!? She was thinking she was going to have her bills paid. A live-in bodyguard. An attention slave.

I hate saying no because I know it hurts him, but I'm always scared that I won't enjoy it.

So according to present-day standards, he's raped her twice. Don't marry, guys! It's a burden on women.

I have apologized almost every time I turn him down. He always says I don't need to be sorry and we'll only do it when I'm comfortable, but I'm scared I might not ever be comfortable with it.

And does he go for a drive or lock himself in the bathroom for a while after he says that? This is also the kind of woman who would pitch a fit if she found out he was masturbating to porn and would tell her family, her friends, the Bible study group, her pastor, and she would insist he's a cheater who needs to go to rehab and put filtering and "accountability" software on his devices.

Plus I have doubts that I've ever had an orgasm.

She she's never masturbated to orgasm.

THIS IS THE RISK OF "WAITING". Yes, there are risks. This is one of them. I specifically asked my wife, before we married, if she was able to give herself orgasms for this very reason. Still ended up being a disaster, but at least I tried.

How should I approach this?

1) Admit you have perpetrated a fraud.

2) File for annulment or divorce. Insist that he doesn't owe you anything. Don't make him pay for lawyers, pay alimony, or anything like that. Let him keep/take what he wants. If he wants to stay where you live, you move out. Give him the ring back if he provided it.

3) Pay him back for whatever he spent on the wedding, even if this takes you a while.

4) Either avoid relationships, find a gay man who wants a beard, or get some serious therapy/medical attention.

A Tale of Bait and Switch

Has something like this happened to you? Here's another example of "great as a girlfriend, bad as s wife". "J." wrote in to Dr. Laura:

I am afraid despite any efforts that I might make, my 7 year marriage (2 boys) is coming to an end.

My wife got back in contact with someone from high school and has been having an affair for the last 5 months.

She might realize that she made a mistake in that regard. It happens often in cases like that, though usually the marriage has been in place (and the time since high school) a lot longer.

For the longest time, she has made me feel responsible for our marriage ending and her affair, because I was distant, and working too hard, and I left her alone.

She wanted more attention.

We own our own businesses and it truly was a ton of work, but it provided my wife could stay at home with our kids.

See, there's a rub. If a man is going to support his family, he's going to have to work. In a lot of cases, he's going to need to work a lot. So then the wife is not working outside the home, but she is home without him all the more. It's a cycle.

She has always rejected me when I BEG for sex, and never has she responded when I came home as your book The Proper Care & Feeding of Husbands suggests.

Poor guy. Check the DNA of those boys.

Instead she continually complained about having to do all the housework, children stuff, etc. While I was working 60+ hrs a week to allow her to stay home with them and maintain our lifestyle.

You should have offered to switch places.

I also realized that should our marriage end, there are women out there who understand the proper way to care for their husbands.

Yeah, but you should concentrate on raising your boys until they are grown, not finding a new honey.

I also realized my wife was a great girlfriend (affectionate, loving, respectful, thoughtful) but after we got married, she decided the hard work was over.

Ah, bait and switch. Like when a guy romances a woman but stops after she marries him.

Bait and Switch

Looking to the Future wrote in to Dear Margo:

My husband and I are in our late 20s and have been married nearly five years. It’s been a fairly good and happy marriage.

Great.

Before we got married, we agreed that we would move to my home state (a 12-hour drive away) in five or six years, and also that we would have children in that same timeframe. Now that the five-year mark is fast approaching, my husband is getting cold feet. He is happy with the life we have and doesn’t particularly want children - too much responsibility and money and too many obstacles to being able to go out with friends on a whim, etc. He is also now firmly against moving.

He committed fraud. Very rotten of him. Well, I suppose there's a slim chance that he truly wanted those things and, over time, his mind has changed.

When I bring up that he agreed to these things, he says, "But at the time, five years seemed so far away."

Yeah, so did death, but he vowed faithful marriage until then, didn't he?

Even though I’m fairly happy now and I do love him, I feel I will get more sad and depressed with each passing year, and I’m having thoughts that maybe I should leave him now so I have time to move home, find someone else and have children instead of wasting more time.

Yes, leave him now. Maybe he really isn't all that happy with you. If he is happy now, he won't be once you start doing certain things (and not doing others) because you'll be resenting him. Leaving him will free you up to look for a new husband, one who is right for you. There's no guarantee you'll find one. But the husband you have now doesn't seem to be the right one.

Do not try to get him to change his mind, or go ahead and get pregnant. If someone doesn’t really want children, there is no compromise. Now, as Dear Margo pointed out, do a gut check and see if those things are important enough to you to leave what you see as a happy marriage. Do you really want those things? Don't try to convince yourself that you don't if you really do. And if you do really want those things, and he doesn't, then you should leave.

I speak as someone with experience. No, I never married the wrong person. But I did spend years with girlfriends I couldn't marry if I wanted to keep my goals, and there was a time when I was unmarried and did a gut check and asked myself if I really did want to be a husband & father or not. Either he wants children or he doesn't.

Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow

A recent Dear Abby consisted of letters responding to a column from this past November that I'm sure I wanted to address at some point, so I'm taking the opportunity to do that.

SHORT AND TRENDY IN WEST TEXAS wrote:

How do I make my husband understand that how I cut my hair has nothing to do with him?

Actually, it does. Men are visual creatures. We get turned on, in part, by appearances. We need to get turned on to function sexually, unless we have an implanted pump. We aren't like women, who can use a lubricant if self-lubrication isn't forthcoming.

I am 30 years old, and I have a full-time job and three kids who are involved in everything.

Ah. I see. Maybe she doesn't care whether or not her husband gets turned on because she doesn’t have the time or energy for lovemaking. Doesn't her husband work? Why is she working full-time if she is a wife and has three kids to raise? Liberation?

Because I am always on the go, I need a hairdo that is easy to manage and cute, so I ended up getting my hair cut short. I love it. It makes me feel younger, cuter and trendy.

When my husband and I started dating, I used to have long, thick hair -- but I was not aware that keeping my hair long was "part of the deal."

Should it have been stated in a pre-nup?

Isn't it MY hair?

It's your hair as much as his paycheck is his and his penis is his. If he wanted to take a lower-paying job because he enjoyed it more, should he respond to your objections with "It’s my job."? You pulled a bait and switch.

Too many women are utterly unconcerned about what their husbands want, yet he is supposed to cater to all of her wants – and he is supposed to know them without her explicitly telling him. How many women do you know who have changed (cut short, usually) their hair soon after he signed on the dotted line? Yes, there are men who strongly prefer short hair. They date women with short hair. If they first noticed you with long hair and dated you with long hair, they expect you're going to stick with the long hair.

Dear Abby responded:

You cut your hair "purposely to go against what he wants"? I wouldn't call your husband selfish. I would call him controlling.

Okay, so then husbands should be able to groom themselves - or not - any way they want that's different than when dating, or their wives are controlling? And maybe she has a history of doing other unnecessary things knowingly against his wishes.

You are no longer the carefree girl you were when you were dating. You are a woman with real responsibilities. And it's time for your husband to grow up, too.

Husbands could say the same thing about romancing their wives. You want flowers or chocolates or a nice dinner out? Too bad! We're not "carefree" daters any more.

She needs to put her husband and children before her work.

Here are the letters from the other day.

BEN IN HUNTSVILLE, ALA wrote:

I, too, like my wife's hair long, and I see nothing wrong with urging her to keep it that way. Personally, I hate shaving and have suggested to my wife that I might like to grow a beard. She said, "No way," so I keep shaving.

Oh, but that’s different, because husbands are supposed to do what their wives want.

LONG HAIR NO MORE IN COLORADO SPRINGS wrote:

I had long hair when my husband and I first were married. It was his desire that I keep it long, but as time went on it became a big hassle with the daily grind. Finally I told him that if he wanted my hair long, he would be the one taking care of it. So for one week my husband got up at 5 in the morning to wash it, dry it and style it. At the end of the week he told me, "Honey, you can do whatever you want with your hair."

Nice. How about you also go to work for your husband, mow the law, fix the car, and move the heavy objects? How was it that you were able to have long hair before you married? It smacks of "I got him to sign on the dotted line, now I don't need to try anymore."

J.B. IN WINNSBORO, S.C. wrote:

I had the same problem with my husband. My response to him was if he wanted long hair, then he should grow HIS out. He hasn't bothered me about it since.

Probably because he found a woman with long hair.

Geez. It isn't like these men are asking these women for something unusual or unnatural. Ladies, you can’t help getting older. You can't help the sagging and the wrinkling and all of the other things that come with age without surgery. But you can keep you hair long.

Women like these, believe it or not, are a significant factor in why some men have called a marriage strike. If they are unwilling to keep doing something so simple to keep their husbands happy, it doesn't bode well for husbands.