My partner [32M] and I [36M] love each other very much but aren't intimate anymore and he couldn't care less but it's driving me crazy.
My partner and I have been together for 6 years, almost 7 in a few months, and he's completely stopped being intimate with me. Now for context he's never been a very cuddly or intimate individual due to some religious trauma and mental abuse he suffered through his childhood. He had so much abuse for just over 2 decades that he was diagnosed with Complex-PTSD after a scare four years ago. So intimacy has always been a difficult thing for him to embrace without getting into his head and shutting down. But he has been working on it for years with his fantastic therapist and I have to give credit where credit is due, he's gotten a lot better.
That being said, it's been like pulling teeth to get him to have any sort of intimacy lately. He's not cuddly on the couch or in bed, he doesn't love tender hugs, he'll accept a kiss but nothing more drawn out, etc. And when I try to be intimate in any sort of sexual way, he'll squirm and say he doesn't want to or he'll sigh and reluctantly ask if I want to. Which of course immediately turns me off, because who wants to be sexually intimate with someone who's reluctant?
I've brought this up before in the passed and he takes it well enough: admitting he knows it's a problem but he's not comfortable talking about it with me or even allowing himself to want intimacy. And he has brought it up with his therapist before but nothing seems to have come of it. He's also played with the idea of opening the relationship up to a close and old FWB of mine because he knows he can't meet where my wants and needs are. Plus said friend would respect our relationship boundaries. But my partner has been dangling this above me for years now. Also when I bring it up he gets super depressed for days and then afterwards tries to be more sexual but it's always forced and that turns me off. I want intimacy to be natural and fluid, not penciled in or something that needs to be checked off a checklist.
And it's even more frustrating because we genuinely love each other very much. We are similar and yet different enough that every day with him truly is a blessing. We talk through our problems, our frustrations at work and/or with family, and when heated we both are able to admit when we have been in the wrong. It's just this one aspect of our relationship seems to be the one taboo. I really don't know what to do.
TLDR; Partner and I are are a very happy couple but being intimate in anyways is like pulling teeth. I try to be sensitive to his C-PTSD but my own needs are being neglected.