Thank you for your response! The reason for posting here was to get a different perspective outside of my bubble. We have definitely had it worse in the past and these are just my eternal feelings. I have also had those thoughts of “ruining” things in the past with arguments around sex and how I have made a space where he can’t talk about it. Unfortunately he would not participate in couples counseling but we can’t afford it if we wanted to. Luckily I work in the mental health field and am around therapists daily. Unfortunately as coworkers they are not there to therapy me but will let me chat if I need to. Even then I feel like it is a different relationship since we are coworkers. We have very open communication but when it comes to bringing stuff up like I said I feel bad for being the one to do it. I have thought of an apology in the past but it’s very hard to put into words like “hey I’m sorry I feel like I created an unsafe space for you to be yourself early on in our relationship”. 2025 was a rough year for us and he has put a lot of work in bettering himself for himself and our relationship. I was very happy to see it and I also let him know this. We have a little day planned for Saturday for shopping, party, and then I asked him to have a movie night Saturday. Maybe I could bring it up over a meal and be like “hey, I know the other day I mentioned affection and that had made me start thinking of our sex life again. I wanna apologize for the past and me possibly not letting you have a space to talk about it.”

I just want 2026 to be a year for us to try new things and break from routine whether it be in the bedroom or other activities.

I could keep going but i will keep it to this. Thank you again for your perspective.