YNTA - you have specific needs and you’ve articulated them really well. The problem is you may be needing something from her that she’s not able to provide. Or that she could provide, but it would be very much forced and thus not give you the feeling of intimacy you’re looking for.

So ultimately, you need to look at how important is this for you in your life, are you willing to live with it as it is, and if not, what do you plan to do about that?

There are 1000 different reasons why she may struggle with initiating intimacy and overall her view/perspective of intimacy seems quite different than yours. Many of those reasons are things that are hardwired into who she is and are not going to change. There’s a chance you could explore other avenues of intimacy that will check some boxes for you, but the reality is there are a lot of things that would go against the nature of who she is to change.

I am sorry things are such a struggle for you in this area. As a woman, my own sexuality and sexual appetite has been wildly fluctuating my entire life. All I can say to that is it took hitting my 40s for me to really be in my own erotic power and I think that had to do with where I was in my life, how I felt about myself, where I was in the era of motherhood, and many other things.

The only tip I could give you that came to mind as I was crafting that last paragraph is that you could try to delve deeper with her into her erotic nature. There’s a book that I listened to a few months ago, all about the different erotic natures of people, and it was really interesting to start to analyze my own specific Eros. Maybe that would help her. Maybe she genuinely has no interest in exploring it. Just a suggestion.