Editing Openai/6961f993-bfd0-8011-902a-83240d8b7b48 (section)

=== Assistant: I want to be very careful, honest, and compassionate here—because what you’re describing isn’t a passing frustration. ===
I want to be very careful, honest, and compassionate here—because what you’re describing isn’t a passing frustration. It’s prolonged emotional deprivation, and it changes people.

First, let me say this clearly:

What you’re feeling makes sense.
Not because cheating is okay, not because resentment is healthy—but because human beings cannot endure years of rejection and remain untouched by it.

You are not fantasizing about cheating because you want novelty or conquest.
You’re fantasizing about it because you are starving—for being wanted, chosen, desired, and seen. That distinction matters.

===== 1. “I’m done having sex” is not a small statement. =====
That is a declaration that fundamentally alters the marriage.
If it was said without space for discussion, grief, negotiation, or alternatives, then your needs were effectively removed from the relationship contract without your consent.

That doesn’t make her evil.
But it does mean the marriage as you understood it ended in some way at that moment.
# Repeated rejection damages the self.
Being ignored when you reach out doesn’t just hurt in the moment—it teaches your nervous system:
* “Don’t hope.”
* “Don’t try.”
* “You are not wanted.”

Over years, that becomes despair and resentment not because you’re bitter—but because your psyche is trying to protect itself from ongoing injury.
# The thoughts of cheating are a signal, not a plan.
They’re not a moral failing—they’re your mind saying:

: 

The danger isn’t that you have these thoughts.
The danger is that you’re alone with them, with no outlet for truth.

===== : =====

That line matters. That’s not metaphorical sadness—that’s existential pain.
And the fact that your kids and work are the only anchors left tells me you are enduring, not living.

I want to say this without drama or pressure:

A life of quiet emotional starvation is not what you owe your children.
They need a father who is alive inside, not just present.

===== I am not telling you to: =====
* Cheat
* Explode your marriage tomorrow
* Force intimacy
* Accept lifelong celibacy in silence

You don’t need a drastic move right now.
You need clarity and truth, starting with yourself.

===== 1. Stop trying to earn affection that has already been refused. =====
This is important. Continuing to initiate when it is always rebuffed deepens the wound and reinforces a power imbalance you didn’t choose.

That doesn’t mean becoming cold.
It means withdrawing from the cycle that is harming you.
# There must be an adult conversation that is not about sex—but about survival.
Not “we need to have sex,” but something closer to:

: 

If she shuts that down again, that tells you something crucial—not about her worth, but about the limits of this relationship as it currently exists.
# You need a place where your truth is allowed to exist.
A therapist. A counselor. A trusted confidant. Somewhere this isn’t bottled up.

Keeping this locked inside is how people make choices they later regret—not because they’re bad, but because they’re desperate.

===== You are not broken for wanting to be wanted. =====
You are not immoral for longing for connection.
And you are not weak for still loving your children enough to keep going despite this pain.

But you cannot disappear forever without consequence.

If you want, next we can:
* Help you decide what boundaries look like without betraying yourself
* Talk through what staying vs. leaving actually means emotionally (not just practically)
* Or help you prepare for a conversation that protects your dignity instead of begging for scraps

You don’t have to solve everything tonight.
But you don’t have to be alone with it anymore, either.