This is really a vent/discussion more than anything, not really explicitly searching for advice. I want to preface and say that my love for my husband outweighs my love for kink ten fold. If my husband woke up tomorrow and told me we would never have sex again, I’d be okay with that. This sucks, but for me, it is absolutely not a dealbreaker.

So I’ve pretty much been into kink since I knew kink existed, hell, even before that, I just didn’t have a name for it. When I met my husband, I was looking more for a kink partner than I was a relationship. Okcupid had some questions you could answer that were kink related. When my husband and I started talking on there, our answers matched well together which is part of the reason I started talking to him.

Sex was pretty frequent at the beginning of our relationship. It quickly dropped however. He was pretty clearly sexually repressed and it was something we worked on. He also had a porn addiction which did effect our sex life. Our sex wasn’t quite vanilla, but it wasn’t really kinky either. It was something we, especially me, talked about but never really came to fruition.

This all changed last year. Suddenly, my husband wanted sex with me, frequently. He was suddenly very, very open about his own kinks. We matched up a lot! It was great! We wrote out some rules and boundaries, talked a LOT about our kinks including our past experiences with others, to my surprise, he was actually way more experienced than I was! We were heading towards working to a 24/7 dynamic, which is something that, at the time, we both wanted.

He wanted to see about opening up our relationship as well. I wasn’t 100% for or against this and agreed to try and see how it went. We’re both bisexual, and we both had sexual encounters with someone of the same sex, separately. It seemed like we both had a fun time!

Now this is my monkey brain reacting, not a rational thought. It didn’t bother me at all that he slept with another man, but just him flirting with other women ended up really bothering me. I don’t see it as a “same sex relationships are less valid” thing, more so, he has vagina at home, I don’t have a dick, so if he wants dick, that’s fine. I do see it the same for myself as well, I don’t really have a need for another dick, but sure, I’ll eat a pussy, you know? Again, I know this is my monkey brain talking, but that’s how I feel.

Anyways, he stopped talking to women because of this and all the kink we had built up also fizzled away.

Here’s where it gets more complicated. Remember how I said this came on super suddenly? He was started on a SSRI, ended up actually being bipolar, and was manic, hyper sexuality can be a component of mania if you’re unaware. I have bipolar too, so I get it. I don’t want to push him into doing something he only enjoyed because of mania. But damn, I’d be lying if I said I didn’t miss it.

Not too long ago, he said he lost interest in kink because he realized he’s actually a switch, not a dom. I figured okay, well I’m definitely a sub, but I also kind of have a kink for being a kink dispenser if that makes sense, so let me research what I can do to accommodate his switch side. I did a ton of research, came up with some ideas, and tried to initiate a conversation about it. He shut me down so fast, which is unusual for him, and said we would talk about it later. That was at least two months ago, later never came.

One big issue that there’s no easy fix for is we have fundamental differences in how we view kink. For him, it’s just sex, which is a valid view, but for me, it’s basically a love language. I could easily be in a kink situation that doesn’t involve sex at all. Sex is a bonus, not a prerequisite.

The obvious answer to all of this is talk to him. He just won’t talk about it though. He’s so open with me about everything, but anything sex related he just shuts down. I’ve wondered if he’s either gay or somewhere on the ace spectrum. I wouldn’t judge him for either, I don’t think sex is really even a prerequisite for a relationship, and he really is my best friend. I can’t elaborate enough on how great and supportive he is as a partner in all other areas of life. But we just can’t solve any of this without simply talking about it and he just won’t which I don’t understand.

For now, I live a kinkless life and live through you all lol. But damn, I wish I could engage with this part of me, or at least understand why I can’t.