Counseling #2 - Nothing Much New

All I can say is that there were no new revelations or breakthroughs during our second counseling session.  I think it was Emily who suggested that real work didn’t happen until session #3.  In my case, it may be session #4.

This session was spent with the counselor getting more background on our parents.  I can’t think of much that was revealed that I haven’t talked about before.  Her Dad’s alcoholism was a major theme, as well as the tendency of him to favor her two younger brothers over her.  For instance, she’d ask for a game or something for Christmas and it would appear under the tree…for her brother!  She spent quite a bit of time going over the strains of that relationship, and then when my name came up she dealt with comparing my frugality juxtaposed with her father’s monetary generosity.  Thing was, her dad was so fraught with guilt, he felt the need to compensate in the form of money and stuff.  So while I was trying to pinch pennies when we were starting out with very little money and lots of debt, she rebelled and went out and bought stuff anyway.  This just made things worse, money-wise.  So in a certain sense when comparing me to her father, I was coming up short in the money/provider department.

That was a bit difficult to hear, but I couldn’t apologize for that.  But I could acknowledge that I enabled it by avoiding talking to her about her spending.  I saw a lot of stuff coming into the house and didn’t question it much, figuring her dad was bankrolling her.  That was a mistaken assumption as she was using her credit cards and pretty much maxed them out.  We finally, finally have those crooks from Visa paid off.  They have steadily been shortening the grace period, raising the interest rate, increasing the amount of time on the penalty rate from 6 to 12 months and raising the late fees .  Playing with credit cards is like playing with poisonous snakes.  Sooner or later you will get bit.

I talked a bit about growing up on the farm and how that took priority over everything in the family.  It was an oppressive enough atmosphere that looked a lot like a sweatshop type of thing to us kids that we all live as far as Iowa as possible with my brother on the West coast, my sister on the East coast and me in the deep south.  But I think climate had quite a lot to do with it, too, seeing as you Midwestern folks are suffering this winter.  I have not forgotten frigid mornings fighting snow and ice or sweltering humid summers. 

I sat in the counseling session and found myself wondering why we both needed to be there and why we needed a babysitter.  Reflective listening is comforting in a way, but it was not getting us anywhere.  Little new ground and certainly nothing approaching resolution.  I’m willing to give it a half dozen more sessions but at some point there needs to be some progress made considering the time and money invested.  Arwyn and I have made progress on our own individually but not much together as a couple.  The next session, Arwyn will be going on her own followed by me going on my own the following week.  Maybe those sessions will shake something loose and I’m willing to stick with going a few rounds with that.  The fees are reasonable at $75 per session, but not if we’re not getting anywhere.  I might as well spend the money on lottery tickets.

One thing of note, is that starting in January (well before counseling appeared on the radar) I did confront Arwyn about her odd sleeping posture, i.e. sleeping with her head at the foot of the bed and wrapped in a totally separate blanket.  She has since reoriented her self back to having her head at the head of the bed, but she is still wrapped in her own blanket.  Cold weather would seem to be opportune snuggling weather since her chief complaint about sleeping close to me is that I’m too hot but that hasn’t happened.  So maybe there is some progress in there somewhere, but it has been glacial at best.  Warm weather WILL be back soon enough and then the hot complaint will kick in.

So you Yankees just hang tough and stay warm! 

D.

LOST

That’s what I’ve been watching the past week ever since I discovered all of the seasons are now available online. I’ve watched a few episodes before but never really got hooked. I’m kind of glad I didn’t because now I can just watch as many consecutive episodes as I want without having to wait! It’s a lot like watching the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy (extended version) when you didn’t see the original movies. This being made even more true by the presence of Dominic Monaghan a former hobbit of said trilogy. I’m almost through season 2!

But it also reflects where we are the past few days. Thanks for all of the comments and encouragement, and I expected a lot of positive feedback given the fact that most of you have been beating me over head with a counseling club the past couple of years. Arwyn is willing to go, this is true and good. But we’re still not really going anywhere. I looked at some old journals and found that this business of being marooned dates back to at least 1999! Which happens to coincide with the birth of our first child.

Desmond asked for some special needs child backstory. No, this has not been a theme of this blog although it has been a major theme for Arwyn’s emotional storyline. I actually do have a blog out there that deals with autism and disabilities (she knows about that one but doesn’t read it) but my personal story as a parent still is not a major theme there. It’s sort of a secondary story. It has been a big part of our lives and I think we’ve been dealing with it. But I put the marriage on a higher priority level than any disability. This is easier said than done for any mother I’ve ever met. The children usually are elevated into a position of supreme importance and most other things become marginalized including the mothers themselves. In the process, I had to learn to be less selfish which has been a constant and painful exercise.

The divorce rate for parents of children with special needs is about 80%. For autism it is around 90% according to statics Arwyn has read. The question of “why” has not been sufficiently addressed in the professional literature of either autism or marital therapy fields. It’s not hard to imagine how increased medical costs can strain a marriage financially. Or the stress of raising a child with physical and behavioral issues. However autism lends itself to stresses as far as cause and treatment unlike any other disorder or disability. There are no physical markers. There are no blood tests. There are behavioral rating scales and tests of physical, emotional and adaptive development. Even though everyone agrees this is neurological no one knows exactly the the cause and there is no cure. So it is like there is this mystery thing at work and Arwyn set off to solve it. Mostly without me, even though my education and background are more in-depth in this area. She set off to find the cure. This involved trying a lot of stupid crap. Special diets. Special nutrients. Special therapies. All of it is pseudoscience and all of it is expensive as hell. Our financial hell was mostly fueled by this sort of crap financed by my limited salary as a special education teacher.

As I started to say last post, my response to Arwyn’s deepening obsession with pseudo science was anger and withdrawal. Supportive? Why on earth would I support something that is so obviously fraudulant? It is a long con that always opens with “Just try it! Wouldn’t you do anything for your child if there was only just a chance? Why won’t you just try it? How can you put a dollar amount on the health of your child?”

All cons make use of pride, guilt and fear. With autism, the guilt is already there and so is the fear. All the con artist has to do is fan the flame a bit and then pride takes over when a family who is doing the diet, therapy or other expensive intervention is seen as being more hopeful, more intelligent, more diligent and a better parent than the ones who are not throwing money down the toilet. I might even get a comment or two here from purveyors of crap if I give this an “autism” tag. It’s like the spanking discussion; it’s hard to have a rational conversation about interventions when so much is based on irrational feelings.

Parents of older kids know what we’re just starting to learn: we have to accept our kids as they are. Autism is not the end of the world. It doesn’t have to be the end of marriage. But it frequently is.

If you talk to women, they will point the fingers at the father. He is in denial and can not handle it so he abandons his wife and child. I do see that sometimes, but that is making it seem more simple than it really is. The man might not be abandoning his child as much as his wife. Is it because he wants no responsibility? Not likely since most guys are willing to put forth a minimum of effort if they get married in the first place. But I have seen firsthand the change the mother goes through once she becomes mother. The whole concept of “wife” get thrown out the window in favor of this new role. The guy who is now “father” doesn’t anticipate the role of “husband” coming to an end but that pretty much becomes the reality. Most couples do experience a cascading effect where marital satisfaction declines after a child is born. It involves a fundamental shift in roles and responsibilities and if a marriage is already weak, having a child makes it even weaker. If the child has special needs, multiply that effect by a factor of 4.

Arwyn did admit that she was consumed by the autism world until fairly recently. She can still get caught up in things but she has mellowed on it a bit. Her and I would still have intimacy issues regardless of our child’s disability, so I have not made that a major theme here. We are exceptional and extraordinary because of what we’ve been through. But we haven’t gotten any closer as much as we’ve gotten less hostile which is progress of its own. But we can do so much better if the marriage could just show up on the radar screen for both of us once in a while. The counseling at least helps put it there for an hour or so a week.

D.

Counseling #1

We didn’t talk much about it, except I did ask her if she still wanted to go and she said she was fine with it. And that was that.

We drove to the church in silence. The closer we got, you could feel the tension ramping up. We walked into the counseling center and filled out a variety of miscellaneous papers. While insurance would not cover these visits, the cost was within our range. While this guy has a Master’s degree, he is still working under the supervision of someone who is licensed and working towards his own license. It occurred to me that by the time the church took their cut and he spent time going through the paperwork and such, he was not getting paid very much for his time, relatively speaking. Pair this with the odd hours and it adds up to a tough career. It beats farming, though.

So we walked in and he went over his credentials, approach, privacy policy and other things and then asked us why we were there.

So I had to do some talking not unlike what I do here with you folks. He’s a skilled empathetic listener, often restating what I said to make sure he was hearing it correctly. I’m not a big fan of empathetic communication skills for marriage counseling but I do have a better appreciation for it now that I’ve seen it done with some skill.

We talked about our own marital history and some of the stressors we’ve had to endure. Like having a child with special needs, which our particular disability category gives us about a 90% chance of being divorced. Or put another way, 10% of making it all the way. When we went over the stressors it did give me an appreciation as to how we’ve managed to persevere. We know a few other couples with special needs children and most of them have marriages that are falling to pieces. But 90% of the time a divorce is in the cards under the emotional, financial and general stress generated by this sort of trial. You don’t have to look too far in our little community to find casualties of the struggle to raise kids with extra needs.

We briefly went through so family history but not a whole lot of time. He had a little family tree where he took notes on our parents and on us and the kids. Given our moving around and how spread out our families are, I can see some utility in trying to keep track of everyone. I could see more utility in family systems therapy for younger parents who had extended family close by and where there was deeper enmeshment or even estrangement. But we’re just connected by distance.

Not a lot of real deep disclosures were made in this initial session. We did talk about the where we were in the sexual arena which is to say we’re having sex about every other year. And this is supposedly his specialty so it will be interesting to see how he deals with this. Our initial goals are to get out of our marital rut and to move into an area of greater intimacy. Or, if sex wasn’t going to happen, I would have to deal with that. He said dealing with not having sex would be a last resort, as it would be preferable to move into greater intimacy.

Arwyn appeared to be fairly relaxed in the session. She voiced her own anxieties and frustrations in being a mother to a demanding son and wife to an equally demanding husband and the seeming never-ending crises that we endured as parents. We were both pretty needy at that time with very little in the way of family and social support. Thing was, especially early on, as Arwyn’s anxiety was always high it sent my own anxiety into the stratosphere. Not knowing how to deal with that, I did what pretty much every guy does when confronted with domestic stress; I dove deeper into work and spent more time away from home. Home was too stressful a place where things were out of control, contrasted to work where I could exert control and get positive feedback and respect. I’m not saying it was right. It was classic avoidance and denial. I have no idea what else I could have or would have done. Better to live on a corner of a roof than to live with a contentious wife. But I was not helping her be less contentious by avoiding while still being demanding.

Anyway, since we had her mother watching the boys we did go out to eat and it was a fairly nice and relaxing time. We’re in a place where I think we can move on because we’re not embroiled in contempt and hostility. The counselor said he thought he could help us and we are setting up for next week. We’ll then maybe do some individual stuff for a couple of sessions which will help from having to scramble for childcare every week. Arwyn seems to be pretty open about the process so that will help move things along. It’s too early to place a whole lot of confidence it this guy or the process but we’ll see.

D.

Kissing and Foreplay

I’m working on an entry applying some of the Schnarchian principles to chastity but since doing more reading I need some additional processing space.  So here you go.

 

The hugging chapter was revealing as was my little experiment which has not been repeated.  Schnarch says that it usually takes at least 2 minutes to find a truly relaxed and connected state and sometimes over 20 minutes and even then there’s no guarantee.  I found it interesting because in Dr. Phil’s Relationship Rescue program he prescribes hugging for 2 minutes every day.  And it was at that point that Arwyn decided to opt out of it for an unspecified amount of time.

 

Schnarch’s most famous suggestion for revving up sex is to have eyes-open sex.  And he does get to that, but I wanted to spend some time with kissing and foreplay as a sort of foreplay into actually talking about sex.  And like the hugging, there is a lot going on in the kissing and foreplay.

 

First off, Schnarch does chide us all for feeling perfectly comfortable demanding that our partner look at us while talking but see nothing wrong with not looking at the person we are kissing while kissing them.  Movies and television and other role models perpetuate this behavior for sure.  Everyone closes their eyes when they kiss!  Right?  In fact I remember an old song (maybe by Crystal Gayle?) that chided her lover for no longer closing his eyes when they kissed. But we really do sort of put ourselves in a position of having to practice some sort of emotional braille with this particular foreplay-like behavior.  In fact I’ve started sometimes opening my eyes when Arwyn and I are doing the perfunctory “off to work” kiss.  I’m not sure how I’d feel about have her eyes looking back but I’m willing to explore.

 

Kissing is one of those areas where we begin to negotiate the terms of our intimacy.  It probably means more in terms of our own perceptions than it does about our partner’s state of mind in how we perceive it.  We can’t really truly know, even if we ask.  But we usually don’t for the same reason we keep our eyes closed.  Namely, we can only tolerate only so much intimacy.  We may claim we want more but that claim rarely truly plays out in our own behavior.  We act in selfish ways and succumb to selfish interpretations in order to justify our own behaviors which usually truly get in the way of intimacy.

 

Foreplay is even more of a mine field.  Or mindfield.  According to Schnarch, foreplay always takes place.  It may be pretty freakin’ short, but it always happens.  It is where both partners negotiate where the boundaries are for whatever intimacies that are to follow.  He even goes so far as to describe it as a sort of pushing and shoving match between married couples as they attempt to gain whatever position.  Anyone reading me for a long enough time can attest to that as we’ve had a number of these sort of interactions.  According to Schnarch, it’s not about communicating because we are, in fact, communicating butt loads in these little slapfests.  It happens because we are so emotionally fused that there is total and absolute gridlock.  Arwyn feels like an abused victim and I feel like a rapist.  Poorly differentiated couples can not tolerate a lot of intimacy so it is not uncommon that foreplay be very short or almost skipped altogether.  What little there is is often scripted and mundane.  This is because the fused couples can not self-soothe and opt for the safety of a routine. 

 

For instance those of us who begin with a back rub every time.  What is your partner doing during the backrub?  Mine is lying face down and is almost always absolutely silent.  In fact, sex is a terribly silent exercise.  There is very little talking but I’m sure there is gobs of tension, anxiety and insecurity.  We’ve both gotten to the point where sex isn’t a lot of fun for either of us.  Much of it is because of all the tension around the fusion and me simply appealing to my reptilian self just to get off.  I’ve written before how I felt like a reptile and that insight was more accurate than I knew then.  Arwyn treats me like one because I act like one. 

 

The scripted aspect of sex is all about regulating the intimacy and finding comfort in the routine.  I know where the script is going to go pretty much every time and I don’t like most of it.  But I go along with it anyway.  I almost skipped this section to run ahead to chapter 12 where Schnarch talks about the mercy fuck.  But I’m glad I didn’t, since the section on kissing and foreplay really hit home.

 

Schnarch talks much about treating past issues in the present.  Psychotherapy has traditionally involved going through past issues and hurts and dealing with childhood issues.  Many times the claim is made that “We need to deal with the underlying problem before we can move forward” or “We need to deal with this past abuse or history first before moving on:”  The efficacy of this approach is pretty minimal because it simply isn’t realistic.  It’s not how life is lived.  It also involves leaving people stuck and then spending years and thousands of dollars delving into past issues that simply can not be changed. 

 

Schnarch uses the sexual crucible approach to deal with these past issues in the present.  So unlike a behaviorist who really isn’t dealing with past issues at all, he uses present behavior and the solutions to move forward within present circumstances.  How dependent this is on the skill of the therapist remains to be seen.

 

In my own case, the fear of abandonment is an underlying factor that has absolutely ruled all my relationships.  I can not stand for things to get too good because past experience tells me that it will turn to shit.  Opening up to another person involves a hell of a lot of risk and a hell of a lot of hurt.  I swore to myself that I was not going to be hurt like that ever again.  The result is this terrible gridlock we have now.  I am absolutely not any more differentiated than Arwyn who has divorced parents and an alcoholic father to contend with.  Arwyn means a lot to me but more intimacy means a lot more hurt.  But there’s obviously a part of me that really wants it.  I want to know and be known.  But only so much.

 

This even goes into my smoking which still rules me.  I started way back when as a way of self-medicating myself after a bad, bad emotional breakup.  I was devastated beyond words because I had opened up so much.  Truth was, this other girl couldn’t handle the intimacy of that relationship.  Neither could I, as it turned out.  So on the heels of heartbreak, smoking was my way of self-medicating.  It still is.  And this is one area where Schnarch is less focused and fuzzy.  He places a lot of importance on the skill of self-soothing but has not explained exactly what that looks like or how to do it.  In a way, smoking could be a way to self soothe but it is also a way engage that marital sadism that I wanted to skip ahead and read about because I know Arwyn dislikes it.  Why she married a smoker lends itself to a certain amount of masochism inherent in the system.  Don’t worry.  Arwyn and I both share equally sadistic qualities.  I’m just more willing to admit it at present.

 

I’d like to see Schnarch get together with John Gottman, who quantified anxiety and how couples reacted to each other in more concrete and tangible ways through pulse and respiratory rate and facial gestures.  Anxiety and tension do have quantifiable analogues and using single subject research designs, the effect of different self-soothing techniques could be compared. 

 

Okay, now I’m ready to talk about doing things with eyes open.  Schnarch actually spends a couple chapters on this, with eyes-open kissing and foreplay leading to eye-open sex.  I used to open my eyes open a lot more but I don’t know if I’ve ever seen Arwyn do it.  And sometimes I don’t like what I see.  Not only are her eyes closed but there is a sort of grimace in her face.  Pain?  Could be.  Concentration?  That could also be.  The eye-open bit flies directly in the face of a lot of modern sex therapy that is sensate focused.  The therapists tell a person to focus on their own sensations which means keep the eyes closed.

 

Schnarch sees things decidedly different and I have to agree with him.  One of my chief complaints is that Arwyn “isn’t there” during what few sexual encounters we have had.  Her handjobs pretty much are sterile exercises.  Her kisses perfunctory.  Her fucking is scripted.  Her boundaries are rigid.  But all that says a lot more about me than her in that I’ve been willing to accept these paltry offerings until relatively recently. 

I’ve written before about how I did better during the handjobs when Arwyn and I would talk.  We’d talk about dirty diapers, laundry, finances, chores that needed to be done and pretty much what every couple talks about when they talk.  She just happened to be rubbing my cock at the time.  But what made these encounters better for me rather than her doing it in stony silence was the fact that while talking, she was at least somewhat present.  We tried it with her facing me, and I did like that but I don’t think she did.  She preferred to lay down beside me where she didn’t have to look at me.  But I do enjoy having my eyes open more than not, at least to a point. 

 

The purpose is to actually connect, emotionally and mentally as well as physically.  But that sort of connection can only really be made if we’ve done a lot of our own internal work where we can comfortably invite someone else in.  It represents a more authentic form of intimacy.  I’m living proof that it is possible to have sex without really connecting and I’m not sure I have ever truly connected with Arwyn during sex.  I’m not exactly an open book as noted above so I picked someone in a very similar stage of differentiation as myself.  And we really are well matched in many ways.

 

It is impossible to not communicate during sex.  Fact is, I’ve been getting the message louder than I would have liked.  So now I have little choice but to grow in response to dealing with it.  It may take the proverbial atomic bomb blast to get Arwyn in motion and that might be where we’re headed.  But I’m still getting a handle on my own insecurities in the meantime. 

 

Cat asked an interesting question in a comment below.  What if Arwyn is just honest and says she loves me but isn’t in love with me?  What that is, is a code that basically says that she wants to be nice and somewhat caring but does not want to be with me and does not want to want me.   Wanting to want and working towards making an intimate connection is an act of will at this stage of the game.  For my part, I need to be willing to deal with that possible reality.  At that point I have some serious choices to make.  Adult choices that involve my own integrity.  If I’m reading him correctly, I think that is where 2amsomewhere has come out.  He looked at the situation and saw where he was not going to grow a lot more with the woman he was with because she was unwilling to differentiate and grow.

 

I’m not in that spot right now and funnily enough, I don’t think Arwyn is either.  When we do speak of these things there is a fair amount of emotionality involved and my gut tells me she is more keen to working things out than she lets on.  But she has no idea how.  She longs for deeper emotional connections but not with Lizardman me.  I have some personal and self-centered issues of my own to work out in order to escape my inner reptile.

 

It’s a paradox that getting emotionally closer to someone else involves becoming more of myself.  This is because being emotionally fused and relying on this other person to hold me up through borrowed functioning and a reflected sense of self is inherently a very selfish thing.  It places the responsibility of my anxieties and fears in someone else’s lap when I need to be holding my own self up so that I have a greater capacity to care.  Emotional fusion places rules and expectations on the other person that are heavy and burdensome and pretty much suck the life out of desire, passion and sexual intimacy.  My pushiness with Arrwyn and trying to guilt and manipulate her into sex was sort of akin to rape.  But I was raping myself emotionally as I set myself up perfectly to be rejected and then hurt by her rejections.  That also sort of answers the chastity cage comment by Snow66, at least in part.  It was a game we were very poorly prepared for.  While it might have fostered some strong feelings by me it was still not on a human level of depth as far as intimacy and closeness.  In fact, it likely increased Arwyn’s anxiety level which would send her desire even further in the crapper.

 

However, I do think there was valuable and necessary growth that took place there.  Arwyn could see my attitude improvements while wearing the cage and she was somewhat open to that.  But the emotional weight of holding the key combined with the guilt factor of me kinking up probably didn’t advance things the way I had hoped.  That’s not to say there wouldn’t be any benefit later.  I think Tom over at Vanilla Edge demonstrates that good things can happen if the relationship is in a better place.  At least they’re funner to read.  I’ll think about expanding that later as I get further into the book.

 

It still feels like it’s taking me a long time to get through it.  I know, it’s all a process and it’s all good but it is not a fast read. I can’t tell you how many times I’ll read and reread various points.  I wouldn’t mind spending $30 on a DVD movie version of this thing.  Maybe even $50 if they had live demonstrations performed by actual couples!

 

D.

Have a Happy and More Differentiated New Year!: Hugging

I laid down my notes for chapter 5 of Schnarch’s Passionate Marriage over at Unsolicited Advice WP.  Now I’m going to see if I can illustrate how those concepts have worked and played out with Arwyn and me in our marriage.

 

When we first met, Arwyn was the one who went after me.  She pursued me, called me and asked me out.  She’s the one who suggested getting naked the first time we ever had sex.  She seemed to like and want it everyday, twice a day!  I almost got concerned about whether or not she was some sort of nymphomaniac and whether I could keep up or not!  In fact, I almost (almost) got to point where I saw sex as a chore!  I mean it was night time and it was time for sex.  We woke up and it was time for more sex.  But the sex wasn’t terribly adventurous and the passion…meh.  But she was perfect in so many ways and had such an apparently easy temperament.  She seemed so perfect.  Almost too perfect.

 

Sex is a crucible for growth and seems to cultivate emotional fusion.  It can deepen emotional ties and create increased significance between two people.  It’s the wonderful and awful thing about it.  It feels pretty good, too!

 

So why was my now overly frigid wife so willing to fuck the hell out of me back in those early days?

 

It’s because she was far from the laid back person she presented.  She suffered from some really deep insecurities that created tension.  That tension and anxiety drove her into seeking acceptance in the one way pretty much guaranteed to get my attention.  Sex.  This is why Schnarch says that some tension can increase sexual desire and behavior.  This is why we see this tape played and replayed so many times over and over.  That early sexual feast is largely driven by insecurity and a need to be needed and accepted.

 

But that sort of acceptance is only so deep.  At some point, someone is going to feel used and in this case it was the person who started it, which was Arwyn.  It was inevitable, though.  Either she was going to get there, or I would.  I could not even sustain the everyday 2x a day rate we were doing and if I had backed off sooner she might have stepped up the eroticism.  However any move she made in that regard was going to be short-lived.

 

A lot of people have commented that Arwyn lives in a world where she gets what she wants.  She can live and enjoy life at my expense and doesn’t have to suffer through sex.  But that isn’t true at all.  Like anyone else, Arwyn wants intimacy and closeness and she doesn’t have it.  And she isn’t keen to fuck someone who treats her like a fucktoy.  So she avoids sex and sexual discussions and even sexual thoughts.  The reason is that intimacy involves a whole lot of risk, not the least of which is the risk of losing it.  She knows full well the pain of such loss.  So in a sense, there is some operant pain-avoidance going on.  It’s not so much the fear of intimacy, but the fear of its loss.

 

And that, my friends, perfectly and utterly matches mine.  I fear abandonment and loss every bit as keenly as Arwyn.  Make no mistake: intimacy scares the hell out me.  Not so much the closeness itself but the fear of its loss.  Therefore, these fears play out neatly in how I experience Arwyn’s sexual rejection.  I feel like she is totally abandoning me.  I feel like that because I am not sufficiently differentiated.  I need her to validate me through sexual desire.  It’s the reflected sense of self at work.  That’s where all this loneliness and depression comes from.  I feel abandoned.  At the same time, we have pretty much adopted the same strategy for dealing with our mutual fears: emotional withdrawal. 

 

We really are a perfect match.  Only in a fairly destructive and dysfunctional way. 

 

Ironically, that distance and avoidance has given us some room for introspection.  She is working on herself independent of stuff I’m doing.  In a sense, the avoidance has sort of worked for us.  We’re growing in ways we would not have done outside of the marital system.  And that’s kind of what’s amazing about marriage: it’s a system unto itself that sort of encourages growth and correction in its own way.  So while Arwyn and I follow this one particular path, other couples can grow following a different and less avoiding path.

 

The insight I’ve acquired here has helped me see where some of those folks on my blogroll are at.  FTN, who seems like a fairly decent guy and his wife, Autumn, sometimes defy conventional explanations of sexual dysfunction.  But apply the idea of differentiation and some of Autumn’s hang-ups (and FTN’s corresponding self-reflected insecurities) make sense.   XH and his wife have a similar interaction going as far as intimacy.  XH has a basic awareness that they aren’t meeting their sexual potential but is a bit confused by it in light of improved frequency and more varied sex acts.  It’s more a matter of intimacy than just sex as an act.

 

Hazel who is the perfect female LL person models this very well in her relationship with a husband who appears terribly selfish and lazy.  Her and her husband both seem to suffer from a buttload of anxiety.  It keeps her from enjoying sex and keeps him from even trying to connect emotionally during sex instead preferring to make it a mechanical porn reenactment. 

 

Mu Ling, C-Marie, Joeflirt, Nutty Man, Xi , Aphron and right on down the blogroll…these are all the same sort of growthy systems which seem to have big doses of emotional fusion going on.  We’re frustrated because we care about what the other person thinks.

 

I need to give a few folks special mention, though.  Oblivion, Trueself and Desperate Husband have seemingly responded to their issues by going outside the system.  They got lovers on the side or “friends with benefits.”  On one level they are trying to get out but on another they seem to be lingering where they are.  They may have progressed a bit on the differentiation ladder bit it isn’t going to be much.  The reason is that a new and long distance relationship is going to involve the same sort of dynamic Arwyn and I had and every other relationship in the beginning.  They have the tension of insecurity and newness and that super machine of the reflected sense of self working overtime (along with a biological cocktail of powerful endorphins) combined to blind them to the fusion they are going to have to work through down the road eventually. 

 

Two others need to be mentioned, here.  Therese and RS give us some unique perspective because we have two married folk blogging separately.  It’s also unique because RS has been the lower desire one seemingly pulling the puppet strings to Therese’s HL.  Funnily enough, I expect this script to be switched with the second child.  But regardless, it is similar to all the other cases above.  It is a case of two people who do care about each other but struggle with how to deal with the other person’s significance and the threat of loss through lack or respect, lack of acceptance or abandonment physically through divorce or death.  They have done so many right and proper things to get closer to each other before and during their marriage.  RS’s affair wasn’t so much a sexual thing as it was having issues with his emotional fusion with Therese.  They are going to be working on that issue the same as the rest of us; forever. 

 

I never said differentiation was fun. 

 

Like any other kind of growth it is pretty painful.  But you are either growing or you’re not.  And if you’re not, you’re probably dying.  But take no solace there, as I suspect there will be a lot more growth in the hereafter!

 

D.

 

Hugging Till Relaxed

 

Since I’ve started this chapter I might as well blog where I’m at with it, since Arwyn is camped on the computer.  Also working on this is relatively easy so far.

 

When I first saw the title for chapter 6, I thought, “Why devote an entire chapter to hugging?  The title pretty much says it all right?  You hug and keep hugging through the initial jolt until you are both relaxed.  Good enough.  Next!”

 

But with Schnarch nothing is ever straight forward or as simple as it seems.  I may or may not get into all the theory and mechanics behind it all, but I can report on some initial findings in this area.

 

First off, Arwyn and I are not terribly huggy with each other, especially when we’re not feeling close.  However, it is something that we can still do and she really doesn’t feel terribly threatened by it.  So while reading this chapter, I couldn’t wait to try it out to see how things worked or didn’t.  And it was interesting.

 

One thing emphasized about Schnarch is the idea of having a self-supporting stance during the hug instead of leaning into each other like an A frame.  This is what you might call a “Differentiation stance” with the idea being that both partners can enjoy the hug more when neither or both are off balance.  So when I did this, it made we realize how much I was usually leaning into Arwyn and how much weight I would put on her as I would try to meld into her.  Ah!  Fusion!  And fusion is not a good thing, here.  So I do have a recollection of her complaining about my heaviness at times, and herr not being able to handle extended hugging because of that.

 

I approached her in the kitchen and she was taking some shirts somewhere to be hung up and I simply stepped in front of her.  And that was all there was to it.  She went easily into a hug and had no problems with it at all.  And she really had no problems staying in the hug for an extended time either.  There wasn’t as much interaction with each other because my youngest son wanted to either get in the act or deliver commentary.  But we hugged for a good minute or so.  She wanted to finish hanging her shirt so she gave me a quick kiss and was off.  End of experiment.

 

How relaxed was I?  Not terribly.  Looking right at her just had me getting awash in insecurity about my breath, my hair and my face.  But I held on.  She was sort of leaning on me and would drop her head on my chest as I am a full head taller than her.  Her arms were up about my neck and shoulders and were a lot more relaxed than my arms around her which were a bit on the tight side until I noticed and sought a more comfortable posture for them.

 

So in this particular exercise, it would appear that I might be the more tense partner of the two of us.  Also it does nicely demonstrate that we are not so totally estranged and separate as I might convey at times.  There’s at least enough room for this little affection and that’s something.  It shows that there is room for affection and maybe some intimacy down the road, you think?  A lot of the lack/loss of intimacy is on account of me being such a prickly pear.  I do project a heaviness that can often intimidate.  Also I don’t invest a lot into relationships because I don’t want to lose and be rejected.  It’s just easier to ward people off in the first place than contend for them to keep them from leaving.

 

All that from just a hug.

 

More research to follow.

 

D.

 

 

Emotional Gridlock

 

Hahahaha!  I laughed out loud when reading chapter 4 of Schnarch’s Passionate Marriage.  He spends a lot of time setting up the interplay of other-validation v self-validation, self-presentation v self-disclosure and fusion v differentiation.  Basically, Schnarch describes a process that begins during courtship when we are poorly differentiated and seek emotional fusion.  We then seek validation from others (our date/perspective partner) and get all fused up.  Once we get emotionally fused we discover that many things we might otherwise do, say or feel make our partners anxious which makes us anxious.  And often when we seek validation it sometimes forces the other person into saying what you want to hear instead of how they truly feel thus creating this sense of self-betrayal.  So we end up presenting something from almost the outset that violates our own integrity instead of real disclosure.  Sometimes we disclose in the hope that the other person will validate us in addition to disclosing something about themselves.  Often, neither happens which frustrates us.  The icing on the cake is when our past disclosures become ammunition during heated fights!  We become walking wounded, and pretty soon a stony, icy silence sets in.  Total emotional gridlock.

 

This, according to Scnarch, is the perfect and most fertile place for true intimacy to blossom!  Hahahaha!

 

No, I’m not kidding.  Emotional gridlock happens when we run out of accommodations, we are tired of the mask, and we refuse to violate our integrity anymore.  Basically we have run out of patience and tricks and now must choose to confront ourselves because we are not making any headway with changing our partner.  Ain’t that a hoot?!?  According to Schnarch, I’m on the verge of some real electric sex, here!

 

In this section of the book, Schnarch just doesn’t confront contemporary psychology and marital counseling; he stands it on its head.  It’s not a problem of communication as emotional gridlock can only happen when the communication is really happening.  Otherwise one partner would still be blathering on and trying to attack the stone wall.  But when both partners know the score (I’m not changing and I’m sick of trying to change you!) and silence ensues progress can be made.  It looks like “falling out of love” but we are truly incapable of love “until the honeymoon is over and gridlock arrives.”(p.119)  

 

What finally made me put the book down and begin writing this was a statement Schnarch made about self-confrontation.  Basically when we are finished confronting our partner in an effort to either mold and shape them or seek validation from them (it ain’t coming) then we have to deal with who we are.  We have to differentiate.  “Only when we confront our own essence do we become more tolerant and accepting of everyone else, including your partner.”

 

It’s taking the plank out of our own eye before deciding to remove the speck in someone else’s.

 

So marriage and emotional gridlock and anxiety and tension and trying for intimacy and not getting it and being all angry and frustrated are all just steps up that staircase to a new level of growth. 

 

Arwyn and I are definitely in that whole frozen tundra area of emotional gridlock.  That blow up of the last entry which took place over a month ago is almost a last gasp of confrontation in trying to get her to move.  And she is not budging.   Talking more is not going to get us anywhere, and I can see that now.  More confrontation isn’t going to work at the moment, until I know I can handle where ever it ends up going.  I’ve accommodated way past my comfort zone.  At least reading Schnarch’s take on icy conditions around here makes me feel better about it!

 

But I still have questions here.  Schnarch does a swell job of incorporating emotional and spiritual intimacy into the whole sexual arena.  But I still wonder about the concept of attraction here.  I guess I’ve had people tell me I look good since dropping the fat and I feel better about it.  But how in the world would I expect her to ever light up physically if she’s just not attracted to me in that way?  Yeah, yeah, sex has a lot more going on in terms of intimate connection but a body has to get naked and in the sack at some point, right?

 

I feel like I just took a step backward right there.  Oh well.  I’ll keep reading and writing as the mood hits.  This particular subject also has some implications as far as our other discussion at Unsolicited Advice, but I’ll get to that later.

 

D.

Envy

 As you can see, the post below was written over a month ago.  But I figured it was time to start releasing a few of these things (old unpublished posts) otherwise they might never see the light of day.  And this may yet be an important bit of backstory for anything that happens down the line.  But don’t hold your breath.  This process has been glacial, at best.

11/19/2007

 

Envy

 

Yesterday, we went to our perspective churches.  While I was rocking the boat with the Reveal video, Arwyn was listening to a sermon on envy.  When we got home, she was keen to talk about envy.  It was a pleasant discussion, namely because I don’t have typical envy issues.  I’ve never wanted the big houses cars and possessions others might have.  Arwyn, OTOH, has struggled with these exact issues.  My weight loss and financial plans have been driven by a desire to live better but not in comparison to anyone else.

 

However, I do have one very deep envy issue.  It didn’t come up right then, but it did later.

 

This morning, I had the boys set up with a video and I brushed my teeth while Arwyn was in the shower.  She, in typical fashion, got defensive by cutting her shower short and grabbed her towel as fast as she could.  I undressed and got in while she was toweling off and we did embrace and kiss for a bit.  But her body betrayed her physical defensiveness.  My erection was at half mast as we hugged, her being carefull not to get close to it or touch it.  And then I brought up the envy discussion and disclosed my deepest envy.

 

I envy the physical intimacy other couples seem to have.  I don’t fault other couples for having it, but I want it in my own marriage.  She listened for a bit and then offered some of the same things I hear every time I try to discuss where we are.  She brings up all the past hurt, and that she has a lot of healing to do.  I tried to convey to her that she was engaged in hurting me now and I’d like to move on from the past.  Yeah, we’ve each done our share of hurting each other.

 

While this discussion is taking place, she is in the process of getting dressed while I’m standing there buck naked.  That earlier erection was long gone.  I finally put my underwear back on.  She asked, “Aren’t you going to take a shower?”

 

“We need to talk about this.” was my reply.  So talk we did.  Or we tried to.  The boys began banging on our bedroom door and that put an end to it.

 

So I’ll see if I can hit the main points…

 

-She complained that I didn’t seem to want to do things with her and the boys.  I told her that it was difficult to spend time with someone who found me so physically repulsive.  This is borrowed from 2Amsomewhere.  I thought it was very poignant when I read it and still do.  She had no real reply to this.  Fact is, I’m not turning her on.

- She wants me to go to her church meeting/recovery group to begin working on myself.  I told her we would be better served going to see a counselor.  Her church does, in fact, have two they have hired one of whom is a Christian sex therapist.  BUT, I told her we need to get off the idea of curing one another.  Fact is, I have made dramatic changes in my life that have positively impacted my life and hers.  However when it comes to marital intimacy, I haven’t been able to make a dent.  Her recovery group thing has made zero impact on us as a married couple.  She has yet to show up.  I’m not keen to join her little cult group.  Maybe if I saw some results.

 

- After some time, she was throwing everything into the conversation.  An inability to hold an erection (the result of being psychologically neutered) the fact she had some history of painful sex, the fact that she would never, ever, ever want to have oral sex of any kind, and how she felt like she had been somehow sexually abused by me.

 

Yeah, there’s a buttload of issues there.

 

Not very detailed is it?  But this is what happens when we have a direct confrontation.  It quickly devolves into blaming one another and comparing who hurt who the most.  I would like to move on, but Arwyn is stuck, stuck, stuck.  Subsequent entries after this confrontation illustrate that I have been trying to get unstuck.  Without much success, though.  Holiday/year-end madness has reigned.  The problem with therapy is that it seems to be process driven, meaning that it has to be done regularly and over a period of time.  Like weight training, diet and exercise.  However, unlike those other things, it involves regular interactions with a professional making it more like seeing a doctor or lawyer.  Or chiropractor.  That means an appointment and finding a convenient time.  Egad, I can’t even fit in or find time for a 15 minute phone conversation with a therapist!  It’s been frustrating, but I’ve been coping.  Having Schnarch’s book to read has been helpful but I’ve struggled to find time for that, as well.  That thing takes a degree of mental effort which isn’t conducive to late night reading marathons.  It’s not like a story that reads itself.

 

Okay, enough of my commentary.  Let Fly.

 

D.

 

RWB 2006 Day 5: The Lost Scene: The Destruction of the Moped and the Piggly Wiggly

I’ve been reading FTN’s Real Blogger World and I see some water skis and pointy fins approaching. Thank goodness for The Lurker and his sidekick. I’m looking for some plot, conflict and character development. Or perhaps David Hasselhof can save the day. Somebody needs to move this thing along. Maybe another mystery death or two would liven things up. Or some girl-on-girl action in the shower.

Perhaps it’s time for that long-lost scene….

Blogger RW 2006 day 5

If you’ll recall, Desmond was busy trying to bake a birthday cake for a certain birthday girl, but he was out of baking powder. I volunteered to go to the local grocery store on the moped, and Satan invited herself to go with me. This was going to be trouble, I just knew it.

Satan was still wearing her bikini but did put on some leather boots and a long, pink furry bathrobe with white trim. I was just in blue jeans and a long sleeved T-shirt.

I hopped on the moped and it cranked on the first kick. Satan hopped on behind me and held on. Wow, it felt good having someone hug my back like that! We became one, Satan, me and the moped. We drove through the Midwest suburbs, on to the main road and towards the closest grocery store. Despite my light attire I was heating up as Satan had her hands all over me, grabbing and groping. It’s amazing we weren’t killed on the way there. But we managed to survive for other death defying adventures.

The Piggly Wiggly was busy that day with shoppers getting ready for Thanksgiving. The parking lot was jammed with cars, trucks and minivans. But one corner was dominated by motorcycles, almost all of them Harley’s. This looked odd but this was the nearest section of the lot to the store. We parked next to the bikes and walked in the store.

The Pig was busy and packed. We got the baking soda and Satan had the bright idea of buying some wine to make it a proper birthday celebration. Apparently the Boone’s Farm supplied by the RW producers wasn’t good enough for her. She was used to a much finer vintage supplied on her Sugar Daddy’s estate. So she picked up 4 bottles of the most expensive stuff in the store while I was in the baking section.

She also was busy attracting attention, which is where the trouble started. It just so happened, the biggest part of the biker gang oddly enough happened to be in the alcohol/snack section of the store.

Biker gang. Booze. Satan in a bathrobe and bikini. Connect the dots.

Apparently, one of the dudes thought it would be fun to grab Satan’s butt. Normally she wouldn’t have minded so much, but she dropped a bottle of wine, which broke and splattered all over. All over her boots and fur robe. Now she was pissed. She wheeled around and kicked the offender squarely between his legs sending him backwards into a display pyramid of Schaefer’s Beer before he hit the floor and doubled over.

I was just going through the checkout line when I heard the crash of a broken bottle and then a loud “Thwack!” and “You stupid shit! These boots are Gucci and this is real fur!” Then I saw her peeling around the corner and through the produce section followed by half a dozen guys with bandanas and black leather jackets. She was knocking over every shelf and display she could in order to slow them down.

“Go, go, go, GO!” she shouted as she raced for the door. I grabbed the baking powder and reached the door with the 6 guys now joined by 6 more guys who had heard the ruckus and were now joining the chase. I shoved some shopping carts at the front of the door which slowed them a bit as some of the glass shattered and it jammed the door as it tried to open again. Then I saw their eyes get wide. I turned around and saw Satan had knocked over every Harley in the parking lot. Gas started spilling out everywhere.

We were dead.

I jumped on the moped, she hopped on and we raced away as the bikers hurled bottles, snacks and groceries at us. Three of them managed to get their bikes up and cranked them up and began their pursuit but not before one of them discarded a cigarette into the gasoline soaked pavement, thus causing an explosion that destroyed most of the remaining bikes and blew the windows out of the store. Fortunately no one was hurt beyond some cuts and scrapes.

We were in some serious trouble, though. These three guys were faster, bigger and meaner than us. The moped whined as I throttled it wide open but it would be no match for a Harley hog, especially with two of us on our bike.

This part of the midwest happens to have a lot of lakes and this suburb was built in such a way that every subdivision, it seemed, was on the shore of some lake or pond of some sort. The houses were built on high ridges, with the lakes in the back. I knew this was our only hope.

The Harleys were full speed and gaining fast. We would get only one chance. I sped up the closest ridge between two houses and down the back slope. There it was; a boat dock.”JUMP!” I yelled. Satan was on the same page and we both ditched the moped which careened down the dock and into the water, followed by three astonished bikers aboard their heavier hogs. There was no way they could stop or even slow down.

SSSLOOOOSSSHHH!

They went into the icy cold water while we ran back to the blogger house. We could hear the rumbling of other bikes in the distance as other gang members were converging on the store and then searching for us. But we stealthily stole our way back without being spotted.

Throughout this adventure, I managed to hold on to the baking powder, so we still succeeded in our mission and saved the birthday party.

But we would be fugitives for the entire year, hiding from biker gangs. As it turned out, the Piggly Wiggly was a sponsor for this particular outfit calling themselves The Hogs. We were banished from ever going there again. Photos obtained from the secuty camera were posted in every store in the chain.

So that was the demise of last year’s moped. It was actually only the beginning of the destruction and mayhem that would ensue, but you can read about that in last year’s news.

[Post Production notes: This really was a lost scene in the truest sense of the word. It really was written, but then was inadvertently cut and deleted. The cut was deliberate because I felt I had already just had a….er…climactic moment with Satan and Emily and we were rapidly heading to another one leading to a whole lotta frosting licking. This scene was over the top and did not help with the pacing of the scenes and other characters’ development. It only fleshes out some of the relationship between Satan and I in that we happened to share this one other adventure. It also tends to simply add more gratuitous violence and destruction. All in all it was not terribly essential to the plot of that story and I doubt any subsequent writers could have made much use of it. But it might explain why this year's cast got a decrepit old castle, since producers were not going to invest a lot of money into something that might eventually get destroyed anyway. The budget is very tight this year, especially in light of a lawsuit from the Piggly Wiggly.
Perhaps this can be added to the DVD extended release version due out in stores when the Day 5 2007 is written and posted.]

198.4

No, that’s not a misprint.  For the first time since starting this little adventure, my weight has remained the same on weigh-in day.  Actually, Monday morning happens to be the worst day to weigh-in for me because I don’t always exercise on Sunday and often end up snacking and eating heavier on weekends.  In my last entry I had dropped a couple extra pounds but rebounded in the meantime.  But I’m not making a huge deal, yet.  I’ll just work a bit harder during the week.  I’m thinking I’ll see if I can get my stepcount up in the 5000-7000 range per workout.  That represents almost a full day’s regular walking beck when I wore a pedometer.  Getting it done in 30-40 minutes is the trick.

 

Moving on…

 

Christian Husband recently wrote about hating group projects, which is a loathing I share.  But there is a type of schoolwork that I hate even more.  That would be The Project project.  You know the ones.  They often involve constructing miniature nuclear reactors, scale models of windmills or some other silly craft work.  I remember in 7th grade social studies, we had to make some sort of tool.  Someone made a wooden waterwheel.  Someone else made the windmill.  Others made assorted crafts that required lathes, table saws, arc welders, soldering irons and oscilloscopes.  I cut a tree branch, bent it and tied the ends with a string.  Found a straight stick, sharpened it and voila! Bow and arrow. 

 

In 8th grade, we had a similar project that involved making something from the 1800’s.  I made a model of a still with tin foil, oatmeal containers and straws.  It wasn’t very neat or flashy compared to everyone else’s, but it was definitely made by me.

 

I hated these crafty projects, because my parents were mostly busy making a living on the farm and these things always seemed to take place during harvest or planting season.  So it was up to me to do the things on my own which meant I was most definitely not be using the arc welder or the power saw.

 

Thanks to parenthood, I get to relive this insanity.  My oldest, Thomas, who happens to be in the second grade, was assigned a project involving doing a report on something in the solar system.  This involves having a visual aid.  He was assigned “Earth” so at least it wasn’t too exotic but also not terribly interesting. 

 

Today, Arwyn tried to help him construct a model of Earth using homemade play-doh.  But she discovered halfway into the prroject that we didn’t have enough salt.  She still made a go of it, so we’ll see if it gets painted or not.  Next, she went out and bought poster board, getting home late.  

 

After doing some work on the posterboard, They went off to do something else.  Then my youngest found a marker and drew artistic squiggles on the poster.  AAARGHH!

 

Did I mention that this thing is due tomorrow?

 

Yeah.

 

I HATE these things.  Regular homework is bad enough.  This project junk is for the birds, because parents end up having to lay out the money for supplies and do a great deal of the work.  It’s like the group work only you’re doing it for a course you’ve already taken and and someone else gets the grade.  It becomes less about the kids and more about the parents.  No wonder more parents are choosing homeschooling.  At least then you get to choose the project.

 

D.

Younger Girls

Xi Summit has been chronicling his history with Queenie and it has actually been an interesting read.  Not just for content but for the style of his writing, which always contains a fair amount of restraint.  I imagine him blushing with embarrassment when writing about accidentally touching his then-girlfriend’s breast.  But this girl became his one and only and he’s been playing it straight and narrow all the way since.  He’s a better man than me.

 

One prime source of embarrassment for him was Queenie being 4 years younger, which was sort of a big deal when she was 13. I do get that.  But like I said, he’s a better man than me.

 

My first steady girlfriend might have followed a similar trajectory if things stayed on course.  Suzie was 15 when we first went out.  I was twenty *cough* one!  And we dated off and on for the next 4 years.   We did kiss and make out.  I did touch a bare breast of hers…once.  We could have done more but it was a mismatch.  So this was the biggest age difference for me, right?

 

Right?

 

Um.  No.

 

I was 26 when I met Ellen.  By this time I had quite a bit more experience with some women my own age.  I went back to college for a year after working a year or two, and that is where I met Ellen through some roommates.  What I did NOT know, was that she was only 16.  How in the hell does a girl get into college at 16?  I don’t know, but I did show her some of the famous artwork prints on my bedroom wall which led to some awkward fucking.  She was cool with it, but I did feel guilty about that later on.  And that was a one time deal. 

 

So there you have it.  My run-in with the younger girls that could have landed me in jail.

 

Right?

 

Um.  Well.  There’s one more.

 

Fast forward several months.  I’m a camp counselor for little kids as a summer job.  And there is this CIT (Counselor In Training) who could not have been more than 17.  Melanie was what you might a call a free spirit.  One night she took ME somewhere to show me some professional B&W photos she had done of herself.  Nekkid photos.  The guy who took them could have been arrested for child porn.  But they were…um…tasteful other than the fact she was at least a bit under age.  I was a bit more reluctant with her, but she’s the one who slipped into my bed late at night.     We didn’t get to any full-blown intercourse, but there was semi-naked making out aplenty over a few weeks, including one memorable session in a covered wagon.  That still ranks as the most exotic locale, even though we stopped short of going all the way.  JUST short.  But naked making out is still pretty good.  And still would land me in jail today. 

 

I’m not exactly proud of any of this, but at the same time this was almost 20 years ago and I have been through too much to have a lot of regrets.  I really liked all those girls and they all really liked me at least at that point in time.  In all cases we parted as friends, with no regrets as far as I know.  Thanks for the memories.

 

I do think it is worth mentioning (again) that I waited to have sex until I was 25.  Did I wait too long or not long enough?  I don’t know, but I was immature and a late bloomer in that regard.  Melanie was ages beyond me in sexual experience or so it seemed.  Suzie and I were equally clueless, and Ellen was sort of looking to gain experience.  I was in a very rebellious phase when I met Ellen and Melanie, and went through a sizable string of women during a 3 year stretch.  I’m okay with having those experiences, especially considering the desolate place I’m in now.  I at least have those fond memories to look back on.

 

I would eventually begin dating older women, which is where I would get my real sexual education.  The younger girls did have a sweetness about them that I remember fondly, but the encounters were always a bit awkward.  But they loved kissing and being touched.

 

One thing Xi noted and I’ll concur with, is that the younger girls never really did give a lot of thought touching me.  They let me use their bodies as amusement parks and I was all too happy to do it.  But now it occurs that they were always looking for me to be the aggressor and they were relatively passive.  Even Melanie who was a little seductress, basically showed up with few or no clothes on and let me do whatever without a lot of reciprocity.  

 

The idea of a woman taking some initiative and exploring her man’s body seems to be a relatively recent concept or one that age and experience teaches.  Figuring out what gets a guy off, or what makes him tick physically is the domain of today’s Cosmo girls.  I don’t think most older married women even give it a thought.  Perhaps they think they don’t need to explore.  Or they are not as inquisitive and curious as most guys.  Or they do not care how to make sex better for their man.  In fact, there is a cluster of us guys who seem to be married to women who seem more vested in making it worse!

 

 

D.