After years without marital sex, I’m thinking of paying a prostitute to ease my frustration

DEAR DEIDRE: AFTER years without marital sex, I’m thinking of paying a prostitute to ease my frustration.

My wife has shut up shop and won’t even talk about it.

I don’t want an affair, so I feel it’s my only option. I’m 56 and my wife is 54.

Although I love her to bits, our sex life has never been brilliant.

That’s because she was brought up by strictly religious parents, who made her feel that sex was a sin and only for procreation.

She wouldn’t sleep with me until we were married, and even then was never able to let herself go properly.

She’d never try oral sex, or let me try it on her.

Despite this, we had a regular and loving sex life, which continued after she gave birth to our two sons, who are now grown up.

But a few years ago, when menopause hit, she started avoiding intimacy altogether.

She said she found it un-comfortable and that we were too old for such things.

She made me feel dirty.

But I’m a healthy and fit guy and still have a high sex drive. I feel extremely sexually frustrated.

Masturbating in secret has helped a bit but I miss the warmth of another body.

My wife is the only woman I want, so I wouldn’t contemplate having a relationship with anyone else.

I just want sex — and the simplest way, it seems, is to pay for it.

Is this a bad idea? I’d make sure I used protection, and my wife need never find out.

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DEIDRE SAYS: Sleeping with a prost-itute is not the answer. I think you know this, or you wouldn’t have written to me.

It’s clear you love your wife and what you miss is not just intercourse, but the intimacy and affection it comes with.

Paying for sex won’t give you this.

It could also cause guilt, with the burden of a secret you can never tell your wife.

Your wife’s lack of libido is probably due to the menopause.

If sex feels uncomfortable for her, a doctor could suggest a treatment that suits her.

But this downturn in her libido is compounded by her feelings about sex, which she’s never overcome.

Relationship counselling could really help you both.

Make it clear how much you miss the feelings of intimacy, and ask if she’ll consider it.

My support pack How Counselling Can Help has more information, as does How Sex Therapy Helps.