Japanese Marriage

It takes two and only two people to have sex.
If she wants it and you want it, nobody is going to force you out of it because one of you is Japanese!

Also people who marry out of their culture are probably already somehow distant from it, if your girlfriend expected and wanted a fully Japanese marriage where everything happens according to Japanese customs and traditions and habits, she would have it easier marrying a Japanese man, don't you think.

I am also in a relationship with a Japanese man and I did discuss this with him. Once he told me he has no intention of having a sexless marriage (and neither do I) that's good enough for me! It would be really horrible to keep on going even after he's stated what he wants, saying "Hey but you are Japanese and I know what you people are really like, so your words count for nothing!"

Of course stereotypes and generic descriptions of a culture usually have some truth in them, so it's good to discuss things out, because expectations might differ, but trusting the stereotype MORE than you trust what the person actually says and does, I am sorry but this is where racism begins.

I would be furious if someone told me that since my sister is Italian and so am I, what she does is indication of what I will do more that my own will.

Also... I doubt where you are from marriages are perfect... long term relationships require also a good dose of acceptance, and even more so intercultural relationship.

If you wanna be happy for the rest of your life
Never make a pretty woman your wife
So for my personal point of view
Get an ugly girl to marry you

-- Jimmy Soul

If you wanna be happy for the rest of your life
Never make a pretty woman your wife
So for my personal point of view
Get an ugly girl to marry you

I don't know who on earth conceives such ridiculous things.
It is thanks to people like these, that there are many miserable nice pretty women out there, who are miserable due to men's inferiority complex next to a pretty woman.
Believe it or not, there are women who can be both gorgeous and with great personality!
But, someone obviously bitter, insecure and extremely jealous has made many men buy into this nonsense.

On these blogs we only read about people that have relationships problems. No one ever writes just to say that they are very happy..

To the OP: are all marriages in Australia 100% happy? no divorces at all? I don't think so. Happiness as nothing to do with nationality.

However your original post is very disturbing as you sound ignorant and paranoid.

we've been married for about 3 yrs...We are expecting our first child shortly.

Yes we've had ups and downs, like with any relationship but we are both happy with each other. She comes from a very close-knit family.

Sure the sex has decreased, but the romance definitely has not.

I'm guilty of scouring the internet pre and post marriage about being married to a Japanese. Some info has been helpful, most not so.

I disagree that being Japanese is con, as you have listed!

There will be a number of WTF moments on both sides but, for us, at least, we wouldn't have it any other way.

The positives outweigh any negative aspect of an international marriage.

Thanks for everyone's replies. I now understand the feeling I am being way too paranoid about all of this and I should really focus on enjoying my time with my J-girlfriend rather than speculating on what may or may not happen in the future.

I still find it difficult with so many horror stories and seemingly high percentage of J-relationships turning cold after marriage/kids but I think I should wait and see what happens.

I try to ask myself, I've I knew 100% that I will be treated cold/loveless/sexless after marriage/kids would I still go ahead? The answer is an emphatic NO! But the rare successful story I hear gives me hope.

Jin - you said sex has decreased since marriage, I understand this, and probably would be the same with a non-J-wife. I heard it stops completely after the baby. I would be really interested to hear from you after the birth to see if you notice this change or not.

OP, you should send a message to me. I can give you some hopefully useful advice, but I don't want to offend everyone here.

Some good feedback with respect to the subject in question. Unless someone can produce a study, it's hard to come to conclusions as to how much sex decreases, and whether the male or female has decreased demand. And it should be noted that Japan is not the only country that has this issue (it might be more extreme though).

I am really starting to find this post disturbing.
As I said before I am also part of an intercultural couple, and have been living in different countries a few years now. It's difficult and annoying to have people's prejudices projected sometimes, but I don't mind when they don't know me well. When I am with my boyfriend though, it should be the time when someone - the person who loves me - can really see ME as a unique human being. He should be the one person who takes the time and energy to get to know who I am and what makes me special.
Nothing would hurt me more than realising that him, too, uses stereotypes and prejudices to figure out who I am or what I will do.

Maybe your girlfriend is different and she doesn't care. Or maybe she hasn't realised.

Either ways, I have a feeling that you are just looking for an excuse to end the your love story, or that you are not really ready for an intercultural relationship.

This is not to deny that cultural differences do exist, and that of course they can also influence the way we look at romance, sex, education of our children etc. And this has to be discussed in an intercultural relationship!
But culture doesn't take away personal differences and preferences and personalities. It doesn't make everybody predictable, as if all the people who happened to be born in the same country shared the same destiny.
Otherwise, just find yourself an Australian girls (any one will do - since I imagine they also are all the same?), so you have the female version of yourself and you already know for sure there will be a happy ending!

@ Brida,

Ihear what you are saying, but why then are you contributing to a forum where 90% of the questions are about how to deal with their japanese boyfriend/girlfriend?

I don`t find this post disturbing at all and don`t understand why people keep on attacking OP genuine concerns.
This forum purpose, among others, is to share experiences of different kinds. We are all different, aren`t we?
I find it very hypocrtic to act like sexless marriages in Japan don`t exist. As stated some days ago, I have Japanese female friends admitting its a silently accepted that sex life decreases after having kids.
I am in realtionship with a Japanese male, and questioned him about it, he said as well its rather common, adding something quite interesting which sounded like that for woman after 50 is not common to have sex.
If I were to be a man, read stuff around, which is normal by the way, I don`t see any paranoid behaviour, I would ask myself the same question.
Before becoming serious with my boyfriend I spent years tossing the web, this page as well, night and day about being with a Japanese. At that time still to these days I ask myself questions.
This doesn`t mean I don`t love him, I don`t trust him or what ever.
To end, on this site, there sadly not so many happy experiences in meeting Japanese.
Comoon questions sound like why did he or she disappear, why after some time he became vague..so on and so forth.
My boyfriend did the same thing with his friends, asking questions about my country of origin. Often he googles and read blogs about being married to a Caucasian girl, asking me my opinion openly.

I am no trying to deny there is such a thing as cultures and cultural differences! I am also trying to learn as much as I can about Japan. And I can completely understand questions like "I can't read a situation that happened involving a Japanese person, am I missing something because of the cultural differences?", which is most of the questions here.

But this post is more like: "I have a Japanese friend who doesn't like sushi, sure he MUST secretly like it because he is JAPANESE and that's what they do am I right?!"

After birth, the focus is on the child, understandably.

For me, the decrease in sex, thus far is a non issue. There are too many variables right now that contribute to this, i.e. tiredness, busy schedules,laziness.

Saying that, for us, the romance is still there, that's the important part.

People usually look at the negative, but not the positive. There's happy marriage also, maybe the one that isn't so is just brought up more from people with bad experience. My friends parents marriage became loveless and ended in a divorce. She's Japanese. My boyfriend parents are still married and lovey dovey (I really mean it) and they're Japanese. People are different. Who knows what will become of the future or how people will be. For me, as long as my guy still loves and care for me is all that matters. Sometimes he comes home tired from work and just falls asleep. And when he wakes up, he playfully bite my nose to say good morning before heading off to work. I just cherished the happy moment we have together now :) If you think to far into the future about the negative, you'll just only have a headache and could even ruin your relationship.

Same thing happens with us. Sometimes he comes home and just falls asleep and we just meet in the morning to have few very sweet hugs.
We ve found a playful way to cuddle each other. I feel like those moments unite us more than sexual intercourse per se.
Maybe the OP can think about it. In case life, tiredeness, other things will represent an impediment to have regualar sex life..cuddle as much as possible your girlfriend.
Find ways, which suit you both, to nourish romance.

Generally speaking, it`s advisable not to judge people depending on their nationality.
Even so, I see that some traits do occur frequently time and time again.
For example, when you hear about Japanese man working a lot and coming home extremely tired.
This is sooo true.
Years back it was difficult for me to believe it. Now that I am living together with my boyfriend I can see what it implies concretely. No time to talk. Thats why by the beginning of our relationship, he was very scared of him not giving me so much time in terms of night outs.
At that time, he talked about the Japanese way of working, his friends in the same situation.
Some of them come home at 22.00 to wake up at 7.00 and head off to the office again.

There are many things that can be found on the internet concerning Japanese way of leaving. My point is that if many people complain about the decrease of sex life, long working hours, sometimes lack of communication..there is some ground for it it.
If I haven`t become almost a stalker years ago, I would not have been prepared to face some situations with him, which do occur.
In same fashion, I fall with two feet into some general stamements of my country of origin.

Botton line, the OP is not to blame for having expressed his concerns. He can evaluate possible options by confronting with the experiences of others, and find the best way for him and his girl.

Your analysing everything way too much, just enjoy your time with her with no predictions what might happen in the future. It doesn't matter where are you from, any marriage can become sexless!

Here's one article about the sexless marriage phenomenon - http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2013/08/31/national/media-national/ma...

And here's a good article exploring how Japanese think of marriage - http://www.filthylucre.com/japanese-vs-american-courtship-or-marriage

ChicagoMike,
That filtylucre article is an interesting read; recommended for all the posters in this forum on their relationships with the Japanese
Selective extracts snipped
----------------
.... in a survey among 28 countries, Japan ranked dead last in frequency of sex: the average Japanese has sex only 36 times a year vs Americans, ranking first at 124 times a year (Wiseman).
But why,,, do Japanese couples get married if they donft seem to be happy together? And if they arenft happy, what explains the comparably low divorce rate (only 30% of Japanese marriages end in divorce, as opposed to roughly 50% of American marriages, according to Associated Press)?
....gMen tend to see their wives as substitute mothers, not as women with emotional and sexual needsh (Guardian).

As soon as I was old enough to show an interest in boys, my mother began to drill it into my mind that Japanese men were undesirable as husbands.
gThey are too self-centered, they all think theyfre the emperor, and they wonft show you any respect—why do you think I married a haole (Hawaiian for Caucasian)?h
... Unfortunately, when I came to Japan and met actual Japanese men, I was crushed to find that her accusations were right on the mark more often than not.
--------------
But she ended the article with her romance with a Japanese boyfriend; that was in 2009.
No update since then whether she married him, for better or worse.

Three stages of Sex: Tri Weekly, Try Weekly and Try Weakly

On the one hand, I really do think that people in international relationships need to think about this stuff. But I'm not trying to dumpo on Japanese marriage culture. Look at the numbers - 30% of Japanese get divorced, so 70% must find it bearable for whatever reason. The American divorce rate is 50%. I'm guessing a good chunk of those failures are sexless marriages as well. Of course the reasons for failure might be different.

Japan has lower divorce rates as it seems (confirmed by many Japanese friends) that the husband/wife stay together albeit in a sometimes loveless marriage, for the sake of the kids and culture.