I don't disagree with you on this in general, but it's not always a problem. My husband and I are extremely compatible. Extremely. I think he's gay; he's certainly not palpably attracted to me, and we're both seeing other men now. If the sex was just okay, I'd probably keep him. If it was terrible, but he was trying, I'd keep him. Why? Because I can count on him. He has my back in ways I'm not sure anyone else would.
For example, while I was out of the house for two hours yesterday, my grandmother made an improper transfer from her armchair to her bed, which meant she left her walker inaccessible from the bed. Because she wasn't meant to be in bed, there was no bed pad on top of her sheets. While in the bed, she urinated and defecated. The urine soiled the sheets, and the other stuff got on the bkankets. Then she got up, and because she lacked her walker, she fell. Again she toileted on herself, and the carpet, and her bathrobe. When we got home, I needed to treat all of our pets, furniture, carpets, etc for ticks because I'd been out having a stubborn tick removed from my shoulder and had no idea where I'd picked it up. He discovered Grandma on the floor, filthy, and afraid. He didn't even call to me. He picked her up, and by the time I came to check on her, he'd stripped her, the bed, sent her toward the bathroom and had filled the sink with soapy water for me. His only question was whether I preferred him to bathe her, or do her laundry. His immediate assumption was that he should share in this mess with me because he knew I'd found her in even worse condition when I got her out of bed that morning (Poo everywhere! Including in ears!) and would be frustrated that she was all jacked up again.
This story perfectly illustrates several things. We both have the same kind of family values. She's a handful. She's violent, mean, insane from dimensia, and shits all over my house. Would another man make me choose between caring for her and being with him? Could another man afford to have me put my career on hold again to be with her, or would I have to entrust her care to strangers and go back to work? Would another man recognize my physical and emotional exhaustion and just step in? He's gentle with her, even when she's covered in disgusting filth and biting, scratching and kicking him. Would another man hurt her? On days when I can't keep from internalizing the horrible things she says to me, would another man do his best to pick me back up, or would he be sick of me being irrationally upset by the words of a senile old bat? Would another man share my moral stance on euthanasia and assisted suicide? He knows me so well. Would another man know exactly when I need a lovely surprise and provide me with it?
My life is really, really hard right now. The wrong man would only make it harder, no matter how great the sexual connection. If my husband was actually attracted to me, I know I would keep him, even if he was absolutely the worst lay in the world, and I'd do whatever it took to keep him because he's a good man. As it stands, I am leaving him because he's gay, and I figured I'd be better off back on the market while I'm young, healthy, optimistic and pretty, rather than older, sicker, going blind, and angry because he's finally decided he has to be true to himself. Even so, it took me a very long time to make that decision, a decision most of my friends encourage me to un-make. They too would keep a quality man who was sexually unsatisfactory. I would. I really would. But there's a difference between bad sex and complete sexual rejection.
