samspade,
I can understand where you're coming from. Even if you're married to a good woman, the very nature of marriage limits your freedom and women are very dependent. Even the so-called independent women are very dependent on a man in just about every area. Couple this with a strong desire for solitude and marriage can become constricting. You can also begin to feel a bit "crowded".
The thing is, for me, the paradox is, I'm extremely affectionate with my woman and at the same time, I also need my space and alone time. It's like 2 extremes. We will continually display affection to each other and I enjoy that. The affection part I enjoy and can't get enough of. At the same time, when I need to be alone, I NEED to be alone.
I think part of it is the fact that women tend to become annoying and go into an emotional roller coaster, so the highs are nice but then she will inevitably freak out over something and although the affection part is nice, you get tired of the drama that is woman, and you need to get the f*ck away and breathe. You enjoy the affections and go from that, to the polar opposite of "get the f*ck away from me". And that negative extreme is usually because the woman starts doing or saying or acting in ways that get on your nerves. I'm talking about even the good women.
It's like when a baby cries. Babies cry. Babies get emotional. You have to feed babies and clean up after them. You have to watch them and make sure they don't hurt themselves. You're responsible for them. They're not evil. They are what they are and you might love the baby. But it's f*cking tiring, draining, and it limits your freedom. To have a woman, even a good one, is demanding and time-consuming. She might love you and you might lover her, but in the end you're responsible for her. And you'll have to deal with her irrational emotions and her fickle nature. You'll have to tell her "no" a lot. The other option is to simply do whatever she wants all of the time. And that's no way to live.
Sure, the sex might be great. Sure, the affections are wonderful. Sure, you might love each other. But the constant demands put on the man to manage the household, to keep his woman's behaviors in check, the constant need to steer things in the direction they need to go and the constant bombardment of requests to do or have things that are not feasible to do at the time, is draining. I'm not even talking about wanting extravagant things. I'm talking about being nickled and dimed into a worse financial situation the way you would be if you bought every little cheap, shiny object that caught a toddler's eye. And most of the time when that toddler grabs an object you have to tell him no and put the item back on the shelf. Just the act of hearing the request and going through the motions of putting the object back and saying "no." gets old. It's not always about love. Sometimes it's about whether or not you want to be depended on so much all of the time.