[badsanta]

I grew up in my career as a salesman and learned that the rules of algebra apply to everything in life. Everything negative can be made into a positive if you look at it from the other side of the equation. For those in a HD/LD situation to where one spouse has a higher desire for sex than the other, the lower desire spouse usually claims that the higher desire spouse is manipulating the relationship for more sex.

What do you do, because admit it, if it could be done we would indeed do it? Odds are that is what was happening. Also known as the "covert contract" of doing something nice and expecting something (hope it is sexual) in return!

If I have learned one thing it would be the power of validation! If your spouse accuses you of doing something manipulative to get more sex, allow yourself to get caught! Even if it is NOT the case, pretend that that was exactly what you were doing! THIS will be very validating to the LD partner because this person will finally feel validated in feeling how they feel. NOW... here is the important part and where the algebra comes in handy. Claim that you are BEHIND on your ability to manipulate your spouse for sex and that whatever it is you were doing is a partial payment to try and catch up for sex that has already occurred. Then complain that past sex has been way too good and that it has been making the problem worse and that you will never be caught up and actually get to do manipulative things that will result in more sex. You will alway be behind and playing catch up by doing nice things to try to even the score.

Then look at your spouse and ask if you can increase your credit limit!

So what happened here is that you took something that would historically be a point of argument, acknowledged it and twisted it into a compliment! I did this to my wife the other day and she is all too aware of my modem operatum, but she smiled at me and said, "looking at things that way might actually work for you and get you more sex!"

Cheers,
Badsanta

 

[badsanta]

A catchy title! 👍

Let those who think everything is a manipulation commence throwing rocks.

I just use those rocks to add on to the stonework of my patio in my backyard!

 

[badsanta]

Manipulation is tricking someone. Lying to them. Getting them to do something they don’t want to do.

My wife doesn't want to think of herself as beautiful. I think she is, but she generally refuses to believe me. So I do resort to manipulation in order to get her to believe the truth.

 

[badsanta]

It’s not manipulative if you are giving Mrs.BadSanta what she needs. 😆

Sometimes wives aren’t aware (consciously) how bad they need us. Our affection, validation, and prowess (shall we say) can’t just be found anywhere. This is like the only thing wives somehow fail to articulate. 😆

They make us think it’s just US that need them… don’t buy it! 😂

I have read No More Mr Nice Guy and I am aware of covert contracts and perhaps guilty of those in the past. I don't do that anymore. These days if I am in the mood for intimacy, I communicate that clearly and try as best I can to accommodate whatever my wife needs to help it be something we both share and enjoy. Primarily she mostly needs me NOT to disrupt her schedule of things that she wants to get done.

She however knows she overbooks herself and likely feel guilty and perhaps pressured to make more time for me. As a result when she thinks I should be upset and frustrated but she knows I am being nice, she accuses me of ONLY being nice because I want sex to happen soon. To me that is an insult and I have never been able to successfully defend myself against those remarks.

So these days I just validate her concerns and tell her she is too darn beautiful. I'll perhaps ask her to not dress up so nice to make it easier for me. She starts giggling and responds well to that. So that is how I roll with it these days!

 

[badsanta]

You're misusing the word manipulation. Manipulation is defined as control or influence (a person or situation) cleverly, unfairly, or unscrupulously. Trying to convince her she's beautiful is not manipulation. Words matter. Trying to convince her of something because you want her to feel better isn't manipulating her.

If I am completely honest and tell my wife she is beautiful, she flat out refuses to believe me. I do feel like I have to manipulate her into letting go of her low self esteem. It is NOT easy.

An example of such an effort is that I will compare her to a friend of hers that she thinks is more beautiful, I however will point out all of that persons flaws by comparing her to my wife from a male perception of beauty. I'll say, "imagine how much your friend Casandra would pay for breast augmentation surgery to have breasts as nice as yours!" My wife will then be like, "you really think so!" Then I'll play up my ability to be cheap and claim that it is awesome to be married to someone that already has wonderful breasts because I get them for free unlike someone else she knows that had a husband that refused to marry without breast augmentation surgery. Then my wife will look down at her boobs and claim that she saved me money and that I better give her what she wants and not complain about going out for dinner being expensive next time. I'll smile and tell her, "yes indeed!"

Now the above is horrible in my opinion! But it works! It makes my wife feel more confident about herself. I definitely feel like I had to manipulate that situation to get my wife to feel confident about her body.

Regards,
Badsanta

 

[badsanta]

Did Bad santa play upon his wife by artful means for his own advantage?

I think certain people think all forms of manipulation are inherently wicked. Ironically sexuality does not play by rules that are considered fair and democratic (to quote Esther Perel). So one has to be quick, clever, confident and witted in order to overcome emotional tension and barriers!

I could argue that women manipulate men into mostly sexless marriages because they are unwilling to confront their own low self confidence to get the courage to ask for what they want and feel deserving of it. That is not manipulation as for sure it is self sacrifice isn't it? Can't be. No...

Historically I have never known what to get my wife for Christmas. Since I have been working on her self confidence, this year I knew what she wanted for Christmas because she blatantly told me. I went out and spent twice what she had budgeted for this idea to get her what she wanted and to get her the nicer version of what she wanted. She has been so freaking happy with her gift. Historically she would have felt undeserving, never mentioned what she wanted, and basically ended up with nothing meaningful for her gift for the holidays.

Women reading this... Seriously ask yourself what you really wanted for Christmas and what it would take for you to feel deserving of it enough to ask for it? None of that playfully hinting around crap with shy giggles, but to actually say, "I want THIS. GO OUT AND GET IT FOR ME!" to your spouse in time for Christmas. A lot of women reading this probably didn't get that something that the daydream about, but instead got something kind of nice and thoughtful. Is it because your spouse doesn't love you? NO! It is because you need to learn how to love yourself enough to feel deserving of what you want and make it happen. Perhaps your spouse hasn't figured out how to manipulate the situation into allowing you to feel that way and get all the benefits that comes along with feeling good about yourself.

 

[badsanta]

Covert contracts = bad.
Covert compliments = good.

😆

In fact, the more “covertly” you can deliver your wife a compliment- the better it is received. If you say “love the new shirt” in the split second you see it- much better than the calculated, rehearsed compliment. Wives are crazy smart about intent.

LOVE THIS!

 

[badsanta]

You guys win. Apparently it's fine to lie to someone to get them to have sex with you, and the ends will always justify the means. The moderators have spoken, and whatever lies you have to tell to get your way are fine, her feelings aren't important.

Interestingly enough in the book I just read, "Why Women Have Sex" it did claim that someone has to lose in order for the other to win pleasurably. At its core sexuality is relentlessly competitive. Competition is the birthplace of self development. Self development is critical for survival.

Many psychology books that I have read also tend to suggest that deriving sexual pleasure fails to combine with the dynamics of everything being comfortable, familiar, routine, and following a set of clearly defined rules.

 

[badsanta]

Isn't it a good thing that @badsanta figured out a way to get his wife to believe she is as beautiful as he believes she is? Even if it was done through what some may call manipulation?

I'm finding myself drawn to what @CatholicDad said:

Covert contracts = Bad
Covert compliments = Good

But my mind is really going into the gutter so to speak on clever ways to give my wife covert compliments. I think I need to up my game on covert compliments and work on that.

An example of how I traditionally do this might be complaining to my wife that I am not in the mood. Then I'll allow her to quickly prove me wrong and that I was lying. She giggles when I do that!

Badsanta

 

[badsanta]

There are chunks of this thread missing otherwise I might have some input.

I do agree a wife's feelings are important.

Much of her posts were arguing that anything with good intentions to make someone honestly know that they are beautiful is NOT being manipulation. Then there was a debate that the use of the word manipulation can only be associated with wicked acts of lying and deceiving someone in order to get what you want. Things went off the rails very quick and she compared manipulation by using lies to falsely making a woman feel good about herself in order to get more sex to being on par with why not just rape her if you want more sex. Well, to some extend I imagine when women convince themselves they were manipulated and used sexually that it does feel violating.

I'm certain that everyone here agrees that how a woman feels about herself is important @ConanHub so no one is denying that. However in my opinion it is low self esteem and lack of self confidence is what likely causes women to feel used and unable to stop that feeling from reoccurring. Is there a way to break that cycle? When a woman lies to herself and tells herself she is ugly, it can be downright impossible to convince her otherwise.

This is why I think the idea of covert compliments are fascinating. A wife gets to validate that a lie has been told or a false accusation has been made! But in doing so she has to prove she is beautiful. Now perhaps @CatholicDad and I are not thinking the same about covert compliments, but our intentions are the same. But the idea is to awkwardly force a compliment onto our wives and enjoy her feeling good about herself.

A possible example of a covert compliment. I'll ask my wife since she is not attractive if she ever had a hard time finding boyfriends when she was single. I know for a fact that my wife grew up with many men constantly asking her out (even some asking to marry) and all she had to do was take her pick on which one she liked the most. Never in her life has she been interested in someone and been rejected. Faced with those facts she can get upset with me for asking her that and start claiming that she never had problems getting anyone she wanted. Essentially she proves that she is beautiful.

 

[badsanta]

Bad Santa has pointed out in other threads that some women have "responsive desire." That is they normally don't think about sex, but if something causes them to think about sex and get slightly turned on, then it quickly becomes "game on." In this kind of relationships, date nights, watching sexy Netflix movies, having candle lit dinners, etc. can be either seen as being romantic, trying to get your partner to have sexual relations, or just being a good partner. Based on past posts, this seems to be part of the dynamic in Bad Santa's relationship.

I my marriage if I tell my wife she is beautiful she doesn't believe me. If I tell her that I love her, she doesn't believe me. She often comments that, "love is not real as we are just two people stuck together and you need sex all the time!" Historically I used to get crushed by those comments. While working to improve my marriage to some extent one has to up their game and get creative in order to accomplish their agenda. Mine was to simply reconnect with my wife emotionally and physically in ways that we could celebrate our marriage and being together. After about fifteen years of being married, the quality of sex dwindled. It still happened but only because I insisted and put effort into it. Often she would push me away or tell me to hurry up and get done.

Getting back to the title of this thread, I chose it because that is what my wife has perpetually accused me of doing to her. Anything and everything nice I would do is because I wanted sex. She would get upset at me when I would initiate if I had been extra nice recently because she knew it in her heart that it was only for sex. Gosh this would make me so frustrated as I felt there was no way to win in terms of trying to make things any better and more bearable.

I didn't give up. As I do love my wife and love is worth fighting for.

Fast forward another decade and I have learned A LOT. Much of it is about perspective and self confidence. One has to also learn to read their spouse and not react to one's own self doubt. So this is me now in how I read my spouse:

I don't believe in love = I want to be reminded love is real

I don't believe I am beautiful = I want you to prove me wrong and that I am beautiful

I believe you are using me for sex = I need to feel you want me as a person

You would probably f*** any vagina but I happen to be the only one available = I need to be reminded what makes you only want to be with me

I am fat and overweight = I need your help taking care of my health so I can be my best for you

You are lazy and always in a bad mood = please take better care of yourself physically and emotionally so that you will be around for me to love you for many more years to come

So when I read my wife correctly, I often correct her and ask if she means the positive version of those comments above. She will always smile and claim that after all these years that I now know her. Then I'll 180 and ask if I can use her for sex. She will giggle and ask me if I am wanting regular or high octane which is our code words for certain things in the bedroom. Then I'll tell her that I don't love her and that I just want to get in her pants as much as possible until the end of time (which is a covert compliment!). She laughs and the sparks fly.

It is almost as if my wife enjoys role playing the bad version of our marriage as, "just tell me that you want to use me for sex so I can give you what you want as opposed to complaining about all this you want me to feel loved crap!" ...in a way that is actually loving and playful irony of making fun of our past struggles. Then I bring on my game and at some point her jaw drops and she says, "this is not fair that you you can do this to me" right as she is enjoying things the most.

I don't understand why she says, "it is not fair" once she responds and enjoys the moment. Perhaps it is because she still feels I enjoy using her for sex and she didn't anticipate that she too would enjoy it so much as well. In other words I won at my game of manipulating her and getting her into bed.

At one point during intense arguments and debates that were constructive, she did thank me for being pushy about physical intimacy. She said had I not been that she would have missed out on a lot of enjoyment in our marriage because that it is not in her nature to push for that.

 

[badsanta]

It sounds more like you were trying to manipulate her before. Instead of just being honest and telling her you want her in the sack now you'd do lots of nice things to try and get in her pants. Which she didn't respect much. And rightfully so.

So lesson learned. Being direct and honest, paired with being playful and entertaining, is the magic combination to turn a woman on.

There is perhaps a lot of truth to that comment. I however scratch my head and wonder if being honest and playful back then would have indeed worked or backfired. I feel certain that it would have just made things worse if my wife was convinced that I just use her for sex. I think first I needed to help her work on her self esteem and I had to work on mine as well. Once she started feeling somewhat better about herself, THEN I could be honest and playful.

I also have to be able to stand up and allow myself to get hit by a freight train of insults and not even flinch. Perhaps I'll look at my wife all playfully puzzled and say, "well honey, you married me so I am going to assume that is what takes to rock your boat!" Historically I would get all butt hurt, withdraw, and go into passive aggressive tantrums. These days I see her insults as more of a test to see if I can hold my sh!t together emotionally. When I do keep it together I think that is what it needed for her to enjoy being closer to me as opposed to being a grumpy old cooter (just had to look up that word and it means turtle which makes sense).