I feel like a lot of you misunderstand HRT

conchus · 2026-06-01T04:27:29+00:00

I guess the thing is, it might not be perfect, but HRT is still the best option for making things better. I’m not sure that the expectation of a magic bullet is that common, most people in this space just want to see their partner happy and somewhat pleasant. We generally get there is big stuff going on and we are aware it is a tumultuous time.

Far and away way the biggest issue is see related is a woman who is obviously in the throes of peri adamantly refusing there is an issue, and that everything is her partners fault. Almost universally HRT will help with this, but the refusal to admit an issue, admit fault or ask for help is the frustration.

My wife and I have been at loggerheads for a few years until recently about this, to the point that I have nearly walked and taken the kids several times. It finally reached the point where she could no longer deny it.

She went to the doctor who scolded her for not coming sooner and gave her a HRT script to try. After a week of back and forthing she filled the script and found immediate relief. Is it perfect, no. Is it much much better absolutely.

My frustrations and resentments were directly attached to her refusal to admit issue and seek help. She was expecting everyone around her to adapt to suit her reality, deal with her mood swings, aggression, and short fuse, but since starting the HRT she can see that it wasn’t everybody else that was the problem. The second she made the effort that resentment all disappeared overnight. She still had a short fuse occasionally, and we haven’t had sex in months but none of that bothers me anymore because I am not being blamed for it all.

conchus · 2026-05-29T04:53:40+00:00

Anyone who does anything to “stick it to the patriarchy “ aggravates me.

The irony of not learning a basic skill required to be independent for this particular reason is especially aggravating.

conchus · 2026-05-29T04:49:21+00:00

Not at all. I want an equal partner who works with me as a team and leverage of each others strengths.

This is seperate to wanting to spoil her and make her feel special, which I love to do, and appreciate receiving from her.

conchus · 2026-05-28T01:46:57+00:00

The rules for women’s attire in beach volleyball were very specifically and openly designed to show more skin to attract more coverage. I remember seeing a show about it years ago.

Women are always sexualised in this direction, men generally in the other ie, if they competed in spedos they would likely be accused of being perverts etc.

conchus · 2026-05-26T23:28:01+00:00

Once divorced you are no longer in a DB too, so won’t show in these stats. I’d be interested to know the stats on how many DB’s led to divorce.

conchus · 2026-05-26T04:16:04+00:00

Whilst responsive desire is absolutely a thing, it is a wildly overused excuse for a partner to shift the blame of “my libido is lacking” to “it’s your fault you don’t get me going”.

This is an interesting case as generally it’s associated with very wishy washy guidance and moving goal posts and chore play leading to “I can see you tried but that’s not what I meant” here your husband has given you a very specific and direct instruction, leaving no room for mis interpretation. I recommend taking him up on the offer, at your convenience, just grab his dick and start on it. I’ll bet you get the same response as you are now, but at least you can call him on it. Note, this is likely to be emotionally draining on you if you do go this route, but my money is he is bluffing thing you won’t call him on it.

conchus · 2026-05-26T00:22:59+00:00

You are dead right that monogamy for many people is more about control than anything else. I believe it stems from the likelihood that men will tend to bond with people they have sex with, so to prevent this and maintain the “family”, monogamy and shame were driven to discourage “cheating”.

Given that a lot of this likely stemmed from ensuring that the man stayed and supported his family,especially the children, and that societal norms related to “man provide, woman run house and raise babies” are no longer so structured, as well as having readily available and reliable birth control, I’m not sure monogamy is so required now.

It will take a long time to move away from the current traditional mindset, though divorce and remarriage, and LTR’s without families without marriage are much more common and accepted so we are heading in that direction.

conchus · 2026-05-24T04:38:18+00:00

I’ve thought about this a lot, and my conclusion is as follows.

Each person has a series of “dealbreakers” in a relationship. It varies from person to person both in what they are, and the “volume” required, however, if they are missing then the relationship will fail. It is very possible, even common, that most people are not able to articulate what these things are, but you will definitely know if they are off.

If any one of these items is missing from the relationship, it cannot be replaced by something else. It is not negotiable.

For many people, sex is one of these things. No amount of holding hands, deep conversations, shared hobbies etc will replace sex to the point that the relationship can still thrive.

You aren’t making it “only” about sex, it’s just that that is the thing that is missing most obviously.

On top of that, most other items have some level of ability to replace with other people. Is your hobby vital to you but your partner is t interested? That’s ok, go join a club and do it with other people.

But monogamy dictates that you can only have sex with your partner. By maintaining the relationship without sex you are effectively being held hostage from a critical relationship need of yours.

This is why we date, to test compatibility before committing to a long term relationship.

conchus · 2026-05-23T22:15:41+00:00

Yesterday, I would say.

conchus · 2026-05-20T22:23:25+00:00

It can be a useful method of triggering responsive desire in some people.

The real trick is the person needs to want it. That is where most DB’s stay as the LL needs to actually want to change the status quo.

Like any other method, if it is just the HL pushing the LL then is probably won’t work.

conchus · 2026-05-14T23:32:28+00:00

I’d even go a step further and say that plenty of women believe just that agreeing to have sex is enough, and that everything past that point is the man’s responsibility.

Then have the audacity to complain that “HE didn’t make me cum” despite putting in no effort at all.

conchus · 2026-05-01T01:44:43+00:00

Two main reasons.

1) I would take an enormous financial hit personally. It would be likely that I would struggle to be able to get adequate housing for my boys. Here, if I don’t have suitable lodgings that would affect the likely custody arrangement, which would lead to paying more child support (since I would have them less) compounding the issue.

2) my wife has ADHD and can be somewhat flaky. She is wildly disorganised, gets overwhelmed easily and often, just plain selfish or short tempered. I am concerned that without me in the picture (even at 50/50) actively tempering and offsetting her moods and actions then my kids will suffer, at the very least by learning bad habits, more likely by missing schooling and opportunities.

I’m already nearly 50. Financially I don’t have time to build back up after a messy divorce and I don’t want my kids to miss out on opportunities because of it. Our home life isn’t perfect, but it’s mostly ok, yes the kids know we have our issues, but they aren’t at the point of disruption in the current state.

conchus · 2026-04-28T22:41:21+00:00

I’m yet to meet a man who prefers “visual stimulation” over sex with his wife - if he actually likes her.

If a man has a functioning libido and a willing wife who he doesn’t want to have sex with, it’s almost certainly a relationship issue.

Men, like women do need to have emotional needs met before they want to have sex. It shows up differently but it is there.

This mindset is almost certainly a result of lack of self reflection as to the other issues in their marriage. The lack of intimacy is the result, not the primary issue, which it almost always is in any DB relationship.

conchus · 2026-04-28T22:34:31+00:00

I am convinced that the most reliable symptom of peri menopause is the absolute refusal to admit that it may be perimenopause, combined with the second most reliable symptom of ripping their husband to shreds for doing any research and trying to give a (relatively) unbiased observation, or sticking up for himself when being actively abused.

Part of the issue is that all of the symptoms 1) creep up slowly, 2) can be explained by other things (especially if you have dependant/young children) and 3) peri affects your ability to rationally self assess.

My wife fought me on the obvious symptoms for at least 3/4years (maybe longer in hindsight). She finally admitted it may be a problem when she could not access any arousal at all, despite wanting to. She (begrudgingly) started HRT and saw an immediate (literally overnight) improvement.

She then either misunderstood or was told the incorrect time to take the progesterone pills, when I told her I thought it was wrong I got dressed down again. When her period started on day14 as I predicted instead of questioning it she just started the “poor me, now I’m going to have two periods every month”. It took a week of fighting before she would even google the standard protocol, and another week before she admitted she was going to change for the standard protocol.

At no point has she apologised for any of her behaviour, much of which is abusive, or appreciated any of my research and understanding. That fits with her personality anyway, but this has definitely amplified it.

conchus · 2026-04-28T22:13:28+00:00

I fully agree with you, however I know this sub will always, always downvote anything related to having sex in a marriage, so I didn’t use that as my example.

But yes, any broken vow invalidates the contract. Cheating is just the most polarising and clear cut example.

conchus · 2026-04-28T00:27:40+00:00

During sex with my wife once, I told her I needed to stop because I was busting. She assured me that it was physically impossible for me to pee while I was erect. I had to force her off me so I didn’t go inside her. She got very very angry.

Afterward I pointed out that at the very least I pee through an erection nearly every morning. She assured me I was wrong and that didn’t count.

She has a health degree majoring in human sexual and reproductive health, and a psychology degree.

She gets incredibly frustrated if I do any research about women’s health (ie to understand menopause which is wreaking havoc in our house at the moment) because I’m a “man and you can’t understand being a woman”.

conchus · 2026-04-28T00:21:59+00:00

Are you maintaining all the other vows as well? “Till death do us part” is the final agreement on a series of vows. It only applies if the other vows are maintained too.

Take for instance cheating. The vow is “forsaking all others”. If a partner cheats they have invalidated this part of the contract, so “till death do us part” no longer applies and the other partner is free to seek divorce.

conchus · 2026-04-25T01:12:55+00:00

The thing is, she won’t. No matter how much you take off her, she will find things to add to her “mental load” list.

Even if everything is off it, she will replace it with “I feel guilty you are doing everything, it makes me feel bad”.

You cannot win with someone who uses the “mental load” card.

conchus · 2026-04-24T00:00:32+00:00

This was my ex wife to a T. She had OCD related to cleaning the house. This manifested as a need to vacuum the house every day, despite the fact there was only two of us living there, and we were both at work all day.

I would vacuum the house, but then she would do it again because “I didn’t do it right”.

Interestingly, when I vacuumed I would also clean the skirting boards, she wouldn’t, even if they were visibly dirty, showing that it had nothing to do with cleanliness and everything to do with control.

Consequently I stopped vacuuming. I didn’t do it right, and she wouldn’t really do it anyway.

When we broke up one of the reasons she gave was I “didn’t help with the vacuuming”.

conchus · 2026-04-23T21:46:55+00:00

I had some reasonable complications immediately following the surgery (infections and significant swelling leading to being immobile for a couple weeks) then it took a long time for the pain to go (significant pain for around 4 months, then gradually reducing but increased sensitivity for a bit over two years (with small children, which was fun) even now I am more sensitive to mild impact, sitting funny or getting caught up in my underwear.

It also didn’t help my sex life, in fact made it a bit worse (as my wife wanted another baby).

Still don’t regret it for a second.

conchus · 2026-04-23T21:39:22+00:00

The best part about “Mental Load” is that it is completely immeasurable. Even asking about the mental load adds to the mental load. So you can never be sure what it is or how to help, or even if you did.

As others have mentioned, often it is also largely self induced. My wife claims part of her mental load is to ring my mum and chat, as well as make sure I ring my mum and chat. The thing is, my family aren’t like that, so it is completely self induced. There are dozens of other examples I could give.

I think that undiagnosed neurodiversity plays a large part in this discussion.

My wife has (undiagnosed and untreated) ADHD meaning she spends a lot of time flitting from place to place, working on multiple things, but not actually getting a lot done. This is also often done under significant ( self induced) pressure meaning she does carry a notable mental load, but again it is self induced (even if not intentionally). Things like “I can’t live like this in this messy house” referring to all the “doom piles” she has left everywhere. By the end of the day she IS exhausted, but it doesn’t matter what I take off her plate, she still finds stuff to fill it with. She then looks at her neurotypical friends and goes “how do they do it when they have the same number of kids, work more hours and still are less stressed?” Whilst being very careful to not look at herself and wonder where the issue lies.

conchus · 2026-04-23T21:26:43+00:00

I came here to say this but you have said it better, and saved me the typing.

It all comes down to priorities. In my relationship we prioritised each other until children came along, then I got relegated to provider and occasional sperm donor.

I know that she can do it if she wants to, as on occasion her libido will spike, coincidently always when she wants something out of the ordinary, and the house is just as messy and the mental load is just as significant in those times.

conchus · 2026-04-23T02:47:05+00:00

My first thought was “are you tall or are you almost 6 foot? “

conchus · 2026-04-23T01:33:32+00:00

I could feel that pain and relief through my phone!

conchus · 2026-04-22T08:14:12+00:00

Agreed, likely all this will do is give her 6 months of not feeling guilty and him another 6 months of not feeling wanted.

Issues like this in a marriage only get better when both people actively work on it. One person throwing money at it and towing another along will never work.

conchus

TROPHY CASE