I would advise against cuddling until you and/or her get some counseling. Currently your need for physical touch is more than a cuddler would be comfortable providing and your emotional needs will never be satisfied by hiring sex workers. These services only help fill the occasional need; It is not an adequate substitute and will never be. You won't get any satisfaction remotely close to what your wife use to provide. Once you are in a better head space, then it's a matter of your own moral compass and personal boundaries.
Good luck with everything.
@WriterGF this is where I am. I completely sympathize with the view that a little deceit can be good for a marriage, and have no moral objections to secret cuddles if disclosure isn't practical.
But as anyone who has ever snuck around on a partner knows, deception is HARD. Couples recognize departures from each other's patterns. This causes suspicion, which provokes questions that necessitate lies. The necessary lying causes guilt. If the cat gets out of the bag, all hell generally breaks loose.
I'm also unsure that a person in a sexless, unaffectionate marriage can know with certainty that the search for outside substitutes would end with cuddling.
The more I think about this, the more I lean toward couples therapy, where the problems in the marriage for both people could be discussed before jumping straight into a presumed solution.
@achetocuddle Thank you… the word model is valid. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decision_tree The tool really comes to life when you can easily determine outcome probabilities and quantified benefit, since then you can multiply the probabilities to the benefits and get a choice that maximizes expected value. This tool is common in finance circles.
@zerocantaloupe I think so. Using this tool would make it harder to rationalize the wrong choice, whatever that may be.
I would regret marrying the OP knowing he was capable of making the decision without my input. That is not a judgment, it is just how I feel. It doesn't mean most people would feel that way. I wish his wife would quit taking that pill. Many women stop taking it early and statistics don't reflect that. The oncologists are not sure that it helps that much. I'm afraid she is ruining her health.
I know this is going to be an unpopular opinion, but I'd like to say that I don't think that marriage is better than not marriage. It's a personal choice and while I respect that two people can make these promises to each other "forever", I don't think it supercedes the promises you need to make to yourself first. I think making a promise for forever that you cannot change your mind about goes against my beliefs about consent and autonomy. I do not believe in two people becoming one person, you will always be yourself first and the only person who can truly take care of you in the most person way, is you. I think I would hate to be married to someone who felt "stuck" with me because of morals, principles, or "shoulds". I want to be with someone (and I am with someone) who can stay or leave, and I savor their free spirit. You are your body's caregiver. If you choose to stay in a touchless marriage, that's a valid choice, but it's not MORE valid that choosing to leave or choosing to find a way to have your needs met. I realize that there are many, many reasons why someone would choose to stay in a marriage that no longer meets their touch needs, and I think it’s completely valid to stay with someone for other reasons that you do value. I LOVE the idea of platonic families, and I wish these were more normalized. I wish we could all be honest with each other about when relationships change and accept that sex and touch might not be something you can "couples therapy" yourself back into. Maybe things have just changed and it's nobody's fault, nobody has been betrayed, and it's not something you need to fix. I realize this will probably upset people who are in marriages trying very hard, and I don't mean to invalidate anyone's hard work. I just think it's different for everyone and if you are unhappy and feel stuck, I'd like to encourage you to listen to your own voice. I think there's a difference between being in a relationship with someone that's going throught bumps due to circumstances, and a relationship that you truly feel trapped in and unable to honestly meet your needs.
@MxSmith Your comments are very much appreciated. Thanks for your openness.
@MxSmith I also appreciate your comments. It made me think of this quote from Star Trek: Picard, "A promise is a prison, Elnor. Do not make yourself another's jailer."
I think that if you've made an agreement and things have changed, everyone in the agreement deserves to know that information in order change or renew their commitment.
Thank you @Btown & @xelda I love hearing from both of you as well ❤
@xelda that's an amazing quote!!! Keeping it.
@MxSmith I thank you for your thoughts...
@MxSmith In contract law, what I believe you’re trying to describe is an “illusory promise” [1]. In the contract we call marriage, everything except for having to transfer wealth in the case of divorce is an illusory promise. That’s why diamond ring stores are going out of business.
[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illusory_promise
@MxSmith Right on. Marriage is not better than not marriage. I kinda agree with you in general and would like this post even if I did not. Because I do kinda agree with you, this is why I would not remarry. I would want someone that I thought would come to me about wanting to cuddle platonically, but I think that might be hard to find. And circumstances and peoples' minds change too much, including mine.
@Mxsmith I don't find your views on marriage particularly avant garde. I just don't see their relevance here. I don't think most people offering advice to the OP are doing so because they think a marriage must be saved no matter the emotional cost.
This is not the usual kind of sexless relationship, from which, as you correctly suggest, there's no going back. Based on what the OP said, there is nothing wrong with this marriage apart from what cancer medication is TEMPORARILY doing to it. Clearly he wants to get his needs met without causing injury to his wife, who he acknowledges as suffering quite a bit more than he is. Advice is being offered in that spirit. TBH I think a speech about putting oneself first, and leaving if one can't is, in this particular context, kinda off-putting.
I don't think the problem with most marriages is one party's excessive self sacrifice. There is a taboo on running out on a sick spouse and I think that's mostly a good thing . Yeah one can sacrifice too much, and it's good to know the limit But there is no love without it.
@achetocuddle's very informed suggestion to rethink the medication may be the most useful thing offered so far, and I hope the OP takes it up.
@Mike_Girard I can understand how my post can feel threatening especially when you may have been harmed yourself by a partner. I am not saying the OP needs to abandon his sick wife. I'm posting about challenging traditional beliefs about marriage and family norms. I see a lot of married guys who have chosen alternative lifestyles. I think it deserves to be acknowledged.
I think Luther Sloan's "Let's Make a Deal" speech perfectly distills TNG (Kant) vs DS9 (utilitarian) thinking:
"Let's make a deal, doctor: I'll spare you the 'ends justify the means' speech and you spare me the 'we must do what's right' speech. You and I are not going to see eye-to-eye on this subject, so I suggest we stop discussing it."
I think you should satisfy your needs instead of having your needs not being met. @#$% the guilt and just tale care of yourself.
When I've wavered with the decision of to do or not to do I've generally followed the advice of @WriterGF's grandma and not done it. That has nearly always been right for me.
Cuddling is platonic. If someone cuddles without discussing with their SO (if they have one) what will that say to that partner? The cuddling might be OK, but the SO knows for the rest of their time together that the person they chose did not feel like they could talk to them about something important. Assuming that cuddling is considered important. It seems it is considered important by most people based on the responses this thread has generated.
I might go ahead and cuddle, but with the secret knowledge that things will never be the same, whether I'm discovered or not. I would be in a marriage I'm ready to let go of if I did that. This is just what I would have to do to be satisfied. I don't think so much about it when other people say they do it without SO's knowledge.
I wasted many years of my life trying to preserve a marriage that went bad from mental illness out of a sense of duty, and then the circumstances led to having to end the marriage out of a sense of duty (protecting my daughter). It felt awful in both situations, and I still feel guilty about what effect my "failure" to keep it together has had on my daughter's mental health.
I'm also really tired of being expected to throw myself into the meat grinder for societal norms when society still happily buys from companies that made custom punch card equipment to help Nazis organize the Holocaust, used data from horrific human experiments to profit, sold HIV-infested hemoglobin bags to Africa to avoid taking a loss, gave free samples of baby formula powder to African women to intentionally get them to lose their milk and get hooked, etc.
What society thinks shouldn't really factor in much of anything. I understand why some are saying cuddle without telling his wife, but would y'all really be OK with it happening to you? I really just want to understand. Or do you figure it can't/won't happen to you? I am glad for this thread.
I think the OP made up his mind before he posted and the thread has actually been merely beneficial for the rest of us to have meaningful dialogue. I am not judging; I did not stay married nor did I marry for the right reasons for me. That is on no one but me.
@MxSmith I wasn't 'threatened' by your post. I'm well aware of alternatives to traditional marriage. Old gays like me were in the vanguard of alternative family building, of necessity. I've had several open relationships. I knew throuples twenty years ago. I found your post more relevant to lovelessness that has nothing to do with cancer treatment, and off putting in the context in which you offered it.
@zerocantaloupe I can understand why this discussion generates heat for you, given your experience with a mentally ill wife. However I don't think that situation is like this, where the mental problem is temporary, and the OP, by his own account, is very far, and even resistant to, exhausting all possible alternatives
Unlike you, it seems, I'm not presuming that social norms are what's holding him to his wife, or making him ambivalent about sneaking secret cuddles. I'm assuming he loves her, in which case he can't injure her without injuring himself. It's about empathy, not norms. I don't have a problem with a little deceit. But discovery of the deceit has real potential for harm.
This isn't a conflict between utilitarians and stodgy moralists. It's a conflict between those who think the wife's interests are on equal footing with the OP and those who don't. I'll put myself in a third group :one who finds oblique talk of ending this marriage at this stage kinda yuck. Just call me Kant.
I'm not going to make a pitch for social norms, though I think there are many we could all agree are good. Rejecting them, though, because 'society' committed atrocities shows a want of class consciousness. You are equating society with the most depraved and predatory elements in the ruling class and their functionaries. Most people have no influence on these degenerates, not least because resistance can get you killed. yeah I know there are bad people in the rank and file. But this shit doesn't happen without capital and the people who have it.
I wonder why the OP ever got married.
This is not a feasible option, but if the OP took the after-cancer pill for 2 or 3 months I think his viewpoint would be different and more compassionate. The main reason no one works on making a better after-cancer medicine with less side effects is because mostly women have to take it.
@Mike_Girard A deep thoughtful post that I may mostly agree with. I have to contemplate for a while. Great post regardless. The wife's interests not being on an equal footing is what doesn't sit well with me, as well as the deceit. It doesn't matter what any of us think in the end, but the OP did ask.
If I were in your shoes, I would try to eliminate the thing between me and what I wanted (the after-cancer pills). I know very little about these pills or what they do, but I generally don't agree with western medicine's approach to cancer treatment, especially chemo and radiation. Is there an alternative pill with fewer side effects? A second opinion? Maybe see a holistic doctor.
My belief is no medical treatment is worth losing your love life over because what are you living for at that point?
@xandriarain someone else who rejected use of this drug for herself suggested this. Definitely seems worth pursuing.
It has been pointed out to me in a PM from someone whose opinion I value that I may be being too harsh. If so, I am seriously sorry and apologize to Muffin. Your decision is big and it's good that you know that. I'm glad I don't have to make any decisions that big lately.
@xandriarain Exactly. Some oncologists would have you believe staying alive no matter what trumps everything. If a person feels that way, go to an oncologist and do everything they say. If quality of life factors in at all, you better do your own research. They are not taking any individual's interests to heart.
It is a big and kinda scary thing to say you wish someone would stop taking their medicine when you are a layperson unknown to the person you are saying it to. But I am afraid her life won't be worth living when she gets thru taking those pills whether her husband is there or not. Trying to find out who really knows how to save your life is bigger than cuddles. I've done without good quality of life and cuddles. I have an informed opinion.
I just hope it works out for the best, whatever that is
@achetocuddle I was very clear in my post...I have not made up my mind to cuddle. I have been here since 2020 and have not made a move. I have never said that I wanted my wife to stop taking the medication. You wonder why I ever got married...who says that?? And you want me to take the pill so I can see how it's like...wow...So disrespectful. I do not want to hurt my wife and I am really wondering how you came to that conclusion.
I have never cheated on my wife, and I am here because I do not want to cheat or leave her....sheesh
you have serious issues....
@Muffintop_1 I certainly do not have all the answers and you are certainly in a tough spot, but if you are caring for your wife then you need to care for yourself as well. If that means cuddling, then so be it. If you do not take care of yourself you run the risk of resentment or depression and she does not need that right now.
But I would ask, “What is your definition of cheating?” Are you defining it by Judeo-Christian standards? Or someone else’s version of cheating? I personally do not believe platonic cuddling is cheating, but that is my belief. You have to find your own definition but keep in mind that if you are happy you will do better by your wife in the long run.
Good luck my friend. I have known a few people in your situation and the caregiver’s well-being is overlooked far too often.
That is a great question....How do I define cheating....
The best way to explain it in this instance is "would I be comfortable with her cuddling with someone" and that is a big negative...I would feel useless....
@Muffintop_1 Then it sounds like you have answered your own question. If you wouldn't want her to do it, then I don't think you will feel right doing it.
aughhhhh.... 😭😤
@Muffintop_1 Would you feel the same way about a massage or chiropractic session?