My husband doesn’t seem interested in me any more and he won’t even talk about it. I admit I may be to blame in some ways. After I had our daughter, three years ago, I did go off marital relations. And I also have to say that I found my daughter a bit difficult at first, and found that surprising because I really wanted her – so much so that I came off the Pill without telling my husband because he used to say he wasn’t ready to start a family just yet. Now, though, he thinks the world of her, and she’s a real Daddy’s girl. He always goes to her if she cries in the night and she just loves the bones of him. I also have to confess that because I found things difficult at first, I let myself go for a while and put on three stone. I just couldn’t be bothered to get dressed, either, unless I had to take my little girl out. But now I’m really trying hard to get our love life back to where it used to be. I’ve lost two stone, I’ve been looking after myself, and I’ve just started a part-time job because she’s at nursery. I have to look good at work and that’s boosted my confidence again. There’s just this problem of my husband. He’s a good provider, and works really long hours, and like I said, he adores our daughter. But the other night I tried to get him into the bedroom, like it tells you to do in all the magazines. I bought a bottle of wine, and some lovely lingerie, and waited for him to come home at 10 o’clock as usual, and then called him from upstairs. He just popped his head round the door and I beckoned to him, but all he said was, ‘I’m going to make myself a bacon bap, and go on the computer for an hour or two. You get your head down.’ That was it. He never comes to bed until I’ve gone to sleep. Is it my fault or is it his? Will I ever get him back? Do you think he’s going to leave me? I asked him that a few weeks back and he said, ‘Why would I do that?’ But I’m so confused. I love him so much, and I’m lonely.

Barbara says: Now I’m no Sherlock Holmes, but the answer to most of your questions is there in the third sentence. You came off the Pill without telling him, knowing that he wasn’t ready to start a family. He’s sort of forgiven you, but he doesn’t trust you not to do that again. And he felt it was as bad as he’d thought, because it turned you into someone who was depressed, and fat, and not coping, and he was worried. Some men don’t deal well with that. A good heart-to-heart is necessary. You really need to apologise, and get to the bottom of all this. It’s no good being in bed with the wine, no matter what the magazines say. You need to be in the kitchen, making him a bacon bap, and trying to listen to what’s bugging him.