Was she different in the beginning? More enthusiastic or aggressive? Or more responsive? Because that's what I based my attitude on. When we were dating he was all over me, always willing and ready to go. I still don't know if he changed or if he tricked me into believing we were a good match, but I fell in love with the first guy. I don't expect to get the guy I dated back, we've got years and kids and miles on us now. But somewhere in between what I would like (daily) and what he appears to need (every 3 or 4 days) will keep us both happy. I don't need a hole filled, I need a connection with my partner I don't share with anyone else. But it doesn't matter to me how it gets done. Quickies are fine when we have to rush or we're exhausted, we don't have to kiss if one of us is getting over a cold or having an allergy attack... I'm not picky. I just want us to rely on one another, to seek one another for that one thing that only we do together.

As an aside, I mentally roll my eyes whenever any of the regulars here make some withering comment about how "Once a week is fine, if its * quality * sex." Well Jesus Christ, you just demanded a three ring circus from someone who has already demonstrated they don't want to have sex at all. I love long sessions, taking turns, three ring circus sex. When it's mutual. I'd feel like an ass watching the man I love attempt to follow a formula or emulate a porn star. I want him to get his, too, and if that's flipping me over and banging me like a jackrabbit for 4 minutes occasionally: great!

Guilt? I don't, because I know he enjoys sex and he spent a couple years proving how much he liked it. Maybe he tricked me, maybe something fundamentally changed with his health. But it's not like I seduced a father from his pulpit. I fell in love with a healthy, strong man who loves women and loved sex. I don't feel any guilt about wanting that guy back. But once I told him how I felt, that I loved him less, that he felt so much like a brother I'd started to feel weird on the rare occasions he initiated sex, and that I had started fantasizing about starting over with someone more passionate, the ball was in his court. I told him to find a reason to make sex fun again, whether that was to get back in the mindset he was when we were first together or to finally reveal whatever kind he'd been hiding (He hasn't, I knew this when I said it, I was just trying to prove I was open to anything) or realizing that the only reason I'd leave our happy home was because I didn't have someone in my life to make love with and it felt like an incomplete life. That was it. The whole lecture in a few short sentences, then I started doing all those things by myself again. I never did anything to make him jealous. Never made him suspicious, never stopped hugging him and kissing him hello and goodbye, always considered him before making plans. I never once treated him poorly. But I made it really clear that he could figure it out on his own, if he wanted to have a sex life or live with a roomate who was constantly fantasizing about others and planning to leave him in search of real love. And then I told him what I say here often: "Look, if you are tired of me or are no longer attracted, that's something you need to tell me because we both need to accept it. But whether you stay with me or find someone new to love, you'll have to get your shit together with regards to sex because the next one will leave you, too. You have to find your own reason to seek and enjoy sex, because it's been clear for years that I can't think for you, that I can't do it all for you. You can get it with me, the mother of your kids and the person who cares about your happiness, or you can roll the dice and start over with another woman and see how it goes. Either way, you'll have to get the sex thing figured out."

I don't know which if any of my words rang true, don't know if his motivation came from the change in me or some shift in his own understanding.

I'd tell your girlfriend something very similar. "You are too smart to allow inhibitions to ruin your sex life, and I'm not going to let it ruin mine. You'll have to fix your issues with sex with me or with someone new, or else find someone who doesn't want it, either."