My husband and I recently realized that in order for us to remain happily married, we need to fuck other people. Enter the boyfriend. This 20-year-old hunk has opened the floodgates. He’s gorgeous and athletic and enthusiastic, gets me off every time, and tales of our exploits have made things even hotter between my husband and me.
So what’s the problem? Well, after two months and numerous sexual encounters, my new lover has yet to get an erection. I know he’s been able to get it up with previous partners. Maybe there’s a subconscious part of his brain that doesn’t want to bone a married woman? I’ve made it clear to him that there is no pressure and that I am more than satisfied. He insists that he is attracted to me and that our current activities are incredibly satisfying.
Am I missing something, Dan?
Nouveau Mrs. Robinson
Before I get to your question, NMR, I need to address the recent Arnold Schwarzeneggerunpleasantness.
I’m getting a lot of mail from people insisting that it’s all my fault. The affair, the love child, the split with Maria Shriver—I’m apparently to blame for everything, save Arnold’s oldest son’s slammin’, nearly legal bod (www.tinyurl.com/3zsdmjf). This is the case because (1) I’m a big proponent of nonmonogamous/monogamish relationships, and (2) aging Hollywood action stars don’t get erections without checking in with me first. And look where the nonmonogamy stuff I’m always pushing got Arnold! Look at the chaos that nonmonogamy creates! Failed marriages! Devastated children!
In my defense, ladies and gentlemen of the angry e-mob, I would point out that Arnold wasn’t in a nonmonogamous relationship. Arnold was in a monogamous relationship. Arnold failed at monogamy. He did not succeed at nonmonogamy. If there is a lesson to be drawn from the Schwarzeneggerunpleasantness, it’s not that honest nonmonogamy never works. Rather, it is the critical importance—particularly during adulterous heterosexual encounters—of anal intercourse.
And please bear in mind, e-mobsters, that you rarely hear about honest nonmonogamous relationships that work, to say nothing of marriages like Mr. and Mrs. NMR’s, i.e., marriages that were saved by nonmonogamy. Successfully nonmonogamous straight couples typically aren’t out to their friends, families, and coworkers. We tend to learn that someone we know is in a nonmonogamous relationship only if it implodes. If a couple is nonmonogamous, nonmonogamy always gets the blame if they split up.
On to your problem, NMR…
What a delightful problem to have! A gorgeous, athletic, and enthusiastic hunk with a hard dick is better than a gorgeous, athletic, and enthusiastic hunk with a soft dick, I’ll grant you. But better a gorgeous, athletic, and enthusiastic hunk with a soft dick than no gorgeous, athletic, and enthusiastic hunk at all, amirite?
While I can’t tell you exactly what’s wrong with your hunk’s dick—it could very well be the infamous limpothalamus (the part of the brain that doesn’t want to bone a married woman; most men don’t have one)—I can tell you that you’re doing everything right. You’re not pressuring him, you’re taking pleasure in him regardless, and you’re not neglecting your husband. And if your hunk was getting it up for his previous partners, it’s only a matter of time before he’s getting it up for you.
But was he getting it up for his previous partners? Unless you’ve seen some video—and that’s video we’d all like to see—all we have to go on is his word, NMR, and he could be lying. Young hunks with erectile problems, too embarrassed and/or ashamed to admit they have a problem, will sometimes lie to their partners and refuse to speak to doctors. But your hunk has someone older and wiser telling him what to do, NMR, and you’re going to tell him to talk with a doctor.
Is it better to stay with your overweight wife—who happens to be the mother of your infant daughter—and cheat on her to get sexual gratification (and be a shit of a husband) or leave her (and be a shit of a father)?
Almost Twice The Wife
Cheating shit or leaving shit—are those your only options?
If they are, ATTW, then stay and cheat. Abandoning an infant—to say nothing of abandoning someone with an infant—is a shit move. So is cheating on the mother of your infant daughter, of course, but it’s slightly less shitty.
But here’s another option: You could go without for six months or a year—you know, like most new parents.
Backing way up: You were presumably attracted to your wife before the baby… otherwise there would be no baby, right? And presumably, the mother of your infant daughter is going without, too, as she’s probably too exhausted to bother with sex. Because she just had a baby. She also may not be feeling it for the husband who doesn’t find her attractive in her current state—a state he put her in.
Take a little responsibility here, ATTW: You knocked the wife up knowing that pregnancy and its tragic aftermath, aka “parenting,” leave new moms with very little time for the gym. If you expected your wife to bounce back to her pre-baby weight in 10 weeks like some sort of celebrity mom, then you needed to get her two nannies, a personal trainer, and a full-time nutritionist like some sort of celebrity mom.
Perhaps I’m being too hard on you, ATTW. For all I know, your wife is one of those lousy spouses who abandon routine physical maintenance once the first kid arrives, because, hey, now you’re stuck! Forgoing routine physical maintenance is the mother of all take-you-for-granted moves, one that quickly kills desire and slowly smothers love, and it can constitute grounds for cheating and/or leaving. (Normal and natural aging, health issues that make routine maintenance impossible, etc. do not by themselves constitute grounds.) But it’s too soon to know if your wife is one of those lousy take-you-for-granted spouses, ATTW, as your daughter is still an infant.
Masturbate, help out, make sure your wife has the free time she needs to take care of herself, and you may find that you don’t have to be any sort of shit.
I’m writing about the “Choicer Challenge” you’ve issued to all the bigots out there who say that being gay is a choice. I think you’ve set yourself up for a possible failure here, Dan.
I’m a straight guy. I am also a stubborn motherfucker. If I were one of those choicers, Dan, I would suck your dick just to win the argument. That’s why the Choicer Challenge should say that they have to suck you off while maintaining a glass-cutting boner. I could will myself to blow you, but willing myself to get hard during it? Not possible!
Bone Machine
Good point, BM. The Choicer Challenge is hereby amended to include the production of a glass-cutting boner while blowing me. I’m waiting for your call, John “Choicer” Cummins.
Find the Savage Lovecast (my weekly podcast) every Tuesday at thestranger.com/savage.
@ 152 I have had TWO babies over 8 pounds within two years of each other, I started out overweight and 3 months after having my second child I was back to my pre-pregnancy weight again. The only thing I did was tend to my child and breastfeed. I never gained more than 20 pounds while I was pregnant and eating healthy (as opposed to satisfying every fast food craving you have with gallons of icecream and soda). This idea that every woman is supposed to gain damn near 70 pounds (well 60 since a baby can be anywhere between 5-10 sometimes more pounds on its own) is insane. Your weight gain depends on how much you indulge. I’m not saying he should expect her to lose weight for him but he shouldn’t be expected to be ok with her looking like someone he is not attracted to at all either. There are countless women who are neither wealthy or famous who lose pregnancy weight fairly quickly. He *should* give her time to lose the weight (if he hasn’t already) but if 6 months have gone by and he still isn’t physically or sexually attracted to her at all, why should he force himself to have sex with her? He made NO mention about him wanting to have sex with her and she’s saying no, he’s saying he doesn’t want to have sex with her and because sex is even on the table I’m inclined to believe at least 2 months have passed since the birth of their baby. He sucks for offering being a shitty father as an option. Attraction matters and if you can will yourself to have sex with someone you’re not sexually attracted to that just poves the whole choicer argument doesn’t it?
@156 – the fact that you didn’t gain much weight is probably related to the fact that you were overweight to start with. People who start out underweight usually have to gain quite a bit to have a healthy pregnancy. There’s no reason to attack hypothetical women by saying they must have been “indulging” in unhealthy food.
Stick to your point that he doesn’t have to have sex with someone he’s not attracted to. Sure, but if they were well-matched before, he should wait longer before throwing away a good relationship. Having a baby is stressful; wait till things settle down a little before pressing the relationship-destruct button.
@156. Let’s try this one more time: we have no idea how old the infant is, how much pregnancy pounds she gained, what her weight was before the pregnancy, whether or not she is prone to gaining weight, or her health habits before or since delivery.
But your leap that women who gain more than you did or fail to lose it as you did must be slovenly compulsive over eaters sure says a hell of a lot about you.
“Your weight gain depends on how much you indulge.”
Baloney. I gained my pregnancy pounds on fish, oranges, yogurt, spinach, and quinoa. I didn’t drink pop or eat junk. I actually eat way more junk now than I did then, and I’m midway through another pregnancy but have gained less than 10 lbs. Go figure. You just don’t get to write One Size Fits All rules that apply to pregnancy, even for the same person at different times.
If it’s a realistic possibility that you will totally lose your attraction to your spouse because of normal, predictable changes in appearance that come with things like pregnancy or aging, then don’t have kids or don’t get married in the first place. If your love for this person can’t survive changes in appearance that you know for sure are bound to happen, then why are you getting married?
Nevertheless, Crinoline still poses a serious question. Aren’t there some cases where too much is being asked of the spouse, and if so, where do we draw the line? With weight gain, I’d at least want to see evidence that the spouse had been patient and supportive, and that medical help had been sought. Sudden weight gain happens for medical reasons other than pregnancy, and medical advice can help people take off that weight when possible. I could easily imagine cases where one spouse is doing everything possible to be supportive, but the other is determined to maintain unhealthy habits and shows no consideration. The above letter doesn’t seem like one of those cases, but who knows, maybe next year the guy would write in with more of the story, and I wouldn’t think him a jerk.
@141: “Consider that he’s publicly insulting his wife about her fatness…”
“Publicly”…? Oh, please. If you can find any remotely identifying characteristics in that letter, I can only say “Brilliant, Holmes, how do you do it?”
Why does sex have to end after a baby, and why the time frame of a year? A whole year is a long time to go without sex. Sure giving birth is exhausting and a new baby even more so and you may feel unattractive as well but other things in life are exhausting as well and make us feel unattractive and we deal with them then so why can’t it be done after a baby. This just sounds to me like an excuse and a baby is certainly better then the headache.
I’m not talking out of my ass here either. I’ve had two kids and I wasn’t in at my best either physically or emotionally, however I still found ways to keep the my man happy in bed, yes you have to make a bit of an effort but it’s worth it. Of course it also helps if the guy helps out with the baby stuff so as to give mom some time off to either excersize or get some rest or even just some “me” time.
@143: “…how much the skeletal system weighs (!) and so forth, start to become not only ridiculous,…”
Yes, that is the same point I was trying to make when I brought in the skeleton. This number being necessary in order for it to be reasonable to be turne off, that number being outrageous, the other number being the minimum that it takes to conform to the description, blah, blah, blah. I tried (and apparently failed) to explain that this was mostly a rat-hole to go down, and I was being ridiculous to make that point.
You will hear no argument from me over the idea that the Letter Writer is being a shit. He doesn’t have to be happy about his wife’s weight gain, but he does need to be supportive of her, and it sure as hell isn’t license to either cheat or leave.
As I mentioned before, I’m not even convinced it isn’t a fake. Given Dan’s stances on weight gain and on monogamish relationships, this sounds like an attempt to cobble together a ‘gotcha’ scenario to challenge those.
I really don’t understand why anyone is defending this man. As Dan has always said, you pay the price of admission. If you promised monogamy and commitment to one person, you (if you’re not completely naive and dillusional) should expect some changes in their appearance when throughout your lives together. Whether it be giving birth to your child or age, real love is about supporting them. You don’t just back out as soon as things become uncomfortable or rough. Real love is communication and respect. That includes respect of the commitment you made to that person, and if you would like to renegotiate or have a problem with there weight or whatever, you talk it out with them. This guy is giving his wife, who recently had a child, little choice. Actually, no choice. He gives no information other that they have an infant and she has gained weight (which is to be expected and everybody’s body is different, so those above saying “I lost the weight, she should too,” fuck off. You don’t know anything about it because the LW gave no information). He is an asshole. Or, like I suspect, a fucking troll testing Dan because people who don’t really read him assume he gives license for anyone to cheat. Well no, it depends on the situation ans this is not one of them.
@130: Hahaahahahaha I love you. Let’s tag team Dan!
Maybe ATTW’s baby is to blame? Some babies are just bad babies.
@156
So because your pregnancies and post-pregnancies proceeded in a certain way ALL pregnancies do? Why would that be the case? Metabolism, age, hormone-levels, the type of baby all play into how much weight we gain and lose under normal circumstances. Why would you assume that pregnancies are all the same?
I don’t insist on monogamy, and couples that started off compatibly sometimes lose that compatibility for all kinds of reasons. Spouses turn off to each other, and shouldn’t be required to stick it out in a sexless marriage or feel hostage to a spouse he or she is no longer attracted to perpetually just because they got married. People are allowed to change.
This isn’t a question of whether a wife “lets herself go,” which suggests that her main obligation is to please her husband. People should take care of themselves and make personal appearance choices for themselves alone. But they should also be prepared to accept that their choices affect the way that others respond to them. You are free to make the choice to drive 50 mph in a 23 mph zone, but if you do so, you must accept the responsibility for such a choice and its consequences, if you get caught by a police officer. You assume the risk. Some might not want to risk the getting ticketed, and may choose to drive in compliance with the speed limit, but that choice was made for themselves alone, albeit with other factors informing the decision. Same with weight gain or loss, and grooming. A wife has every right to gain weight, maintain it, or to lose it for her own reasons, and a husband has every right to continue to be attracted to his wife or not for whatever reasons are his and his alone. Maybe her weight doesn’t bother him, but her judgmental attitude does, or what-have-you.
There are marriages that end because one partner no longer is attracted to the other all the time. In all cases where there is a loss of compatibility cheating is not a good option. Communication is.
Talk to each other; try to solve the problem, open up the marriage, or leave honorably.
But in any of these scenarios, I’d like to think that the dissatisfied spouse had tried to be compassionate, empathetic, and reasonable. I’d like to think that a thinking person realizes that there will be challenging moments in marriages, and that over time, we all age, and most of us will look worse than when we were young, in a variety of ways and for a variety of reasons. I’d like to think that a man would try to get past his wife’s pregnancy weight gain at least until their child was past infancy, without having to explain and defend my position to a bunch of readers who seem intent on turning this immature asshole’s attitude into some sort of litmus test for sexual martyrdom.
@167: “In all cases where there is a loss of compatibility cheating is not a good option.”
Well, I have come around to the viewpoint that if you accept that you will be the “Bad Guy” when it all blows up, and if you’re confident your spouse is a traditionalist in such matters, and if you’re fairly neurotic about safe sex, and if you treat your family respectfully in other ways… then, well, cheating wouldn’t make you a candidate for Most Evil Person Ever.
@164 are you str8 like me? It’s only for str8 guys…..like me….. yeah.. that’s it.. let’s do it buddy. We’ll show him!
Seriously, unless you are an endocrinologist, no one here has any room to talk about pregnancy as a one-size-fits-all phenomenon.
I personally gain weight like a puffer fish when I’m pregnant. I even gained weight WHILE BREASTFEEDING ON A RESTRICTED CALORIE NUTRITIONIST DEVELOPED EATING PLAN. To the tune of 20 lbs. Horrifying, trust me. I lost 15 of it within 4 months of stopping breastfeeding.
Look up the connections between prolactin, pitocin, thyroid, and dopamine…go ahead, I’ll wait while you Wikipedia (I concede that while some things on Wikipedia are shit, the chemical entries are not part of that). You will quickly see that there are a staggering array of hormonal and genetic variables in baby-making and post-baby-making physique outcomes. Throw in gestational diabetes, pre-eclampsia, and the xeno-estrogens (found in, oh, all the plastic and pesticides, and a lot of the food additives)? There’s a perfect storm of why some women get in their bikinis 6 weeks post-partum, and some of us cry when we see bikinis.
This guys reality didn’t match up to his fantasy, he should help his baby mama out, not ditch her.
Whatta prick.
p.s. Wynter? Please google “3rd-degree perineal tear”.
Then google “4th-degree perineal tear”, then click on GOOGLE IMAGES.
Answer your question?
I wish I could decide whether the world needs more divorce or less. In a way, more, because so many couples are poorly-matched and/or ill-selected and because, retroactively at least, every divorce was the right decision, even if one would have advised the party differently beforehand. In a way, less, because so many people who want a divorce don’t deserve an easy one.
Hey Dan!
I had wanted to say this before when you started the blow-me challenge: You have made at least one choice.
You didn’t make the choice to be gay, but you did make the choice to be open about your sexual preferences (and for this all your readers thank you). Therein lies the rub, it might be OK with your husband if this happened, but most likely it wouldn’t with his wife (I think??). So really it wasn’t a fair challenge, like who would respond to gay porn faster, or which man loves their spouse more.
Ultimately there isn’t any good test, only bad ones, like all the bullshit ones that end up being applied to terrified souls in fear of damnation, persecution, or violence. And, unfortunately, asking people to leave us to our privacy doesn’t seem to work either, even though that should be the best choice/test.
So, my test would be for Santorum and his ilk to support comprehensive enforcement of civil rights and other anti-persecution laws.
Peace
BONERS ROCK!
@167 nocutename
You are thoughtful and eloquent. I continue to be a huge fan of your comments. Thank you.
I’ve been watching but hesitated writing here because ATTW’s letter hit very close to home.
I’ve always been on the thin side & very athletic (marathon runner). I gained 40 lbs with my baby, who just turned two (including the baby.)
My husband has always been VERY concerned about my looks – he used to proclaim that I had the best body he’d ever seen. That my body was perfect. Things like that.
It worried me, because obviously no one stays physically perfect forever, but he would talk lovingly about growing old together and I pushed my worries to the back of my mind.
Well, I got pregnant, after we’d been together 10 years (only recently married – we made it legal because we were going to try to have a baby.) And as soon as there was a tiny visible bump – I was about 4 months along – my husband became weirded out. Grossed out. Would not touch me, would literally push me away and roll over if I tried to cuddle. It hurt so, so badly.
The birth itself was really difficult and ended in a c-dection due to a chorio infection following prolonged labor – awful. As a result my physical recovery took a while. For most of this time, I was 20 pounds over my ideal weight and my husband was physically uninterested.
By the time I finished breastfeeding at a year, I was within 5 pounds of the day he proposed to me. I looked pretty good, I thought – yeah a few pounds to go but I was a busy mom, working full time and caring for our year-old son. I was 38 years old, and wearing a size 6 (a real 6 not a vanity 6!.
Still, it wasn’t enough. One night my husband and I had a long talk over some wine, a good talk – and then he burst out with “PLEASE lose some weight. PLEASE!! When I’m feeling really good about things, you look OK, but if things aren’t going just right in my life, I’m not attracted to you AT ALL.”
I cried, and yelled at him to get away, he said he was sorry bla bla bla and I went to my room (he’d moved himself upstairs months ago). He knocked on the door, let himself in and said “your crying turns me on, it’s so sexy when you’re vulnerable, please have sex with me, pleease” and he would NOT go away. Of course he was pretty drunk. I gave in and finally let him have at it while I closed my eyes…
But that was it. 6 months ago I left him, and I now have full legal custody of our son. (It’s worth noting that he was verbally abusive to me, on a daily basis, in front of our son. THAT is why I left him, so my son would not grow up thinking that was how people treated one another.) And I look good, and I have a good job, and I have the best little boy a mom could ever hope for…but the thought of trusting another man, of being vulnerable ever again, terrifies me.
Oh and incidentally, he DID cheat on me when our son was just a few months old – I didn’t learn about it till after I divorced the bastard – but that feels really incidental compared to his constand harassment over a few pounds of baby weight.
I would ask, can’t you just love me for WHO I am? I love you. I’m a good person and you KNOW I’m a good mom…doesn’t that mean something to you?
All I can say is, there are guys out there who really, truly cannot get past the idea of having a physically perfect mate. If you happen to be dating someone like that, please run. Run, run, run.
oh, lunachick, you have my deepest sympathy.
But I think you did the right thing, for your son and yourself.
You are worth so much more than your weight, your BMI, your dress size. And any halfway decent and sane man will realize this and cherish you, at 5, 10, even 15 pounds over your 22-year-old weight.
I’m so, so sorry you suffered that.
@176, I am also deeply upset that you had to go through that. Have you found someone solid to talk to, about what was going on during those ten years you were together, before you got pregnant? He sounds as if he was super controlling from the beginning. Isn’t it possible that your current fear of trusting & being vulnerable has as much to do with the lessons you internalized over that decade, as with the abuse he handed out postpartum?
I am not the first woman to offer up her own pregnancy in relation to ATTW’s letter. Where was the one size fit all cry when women who claimed to have taken well over a year to lose 60 pounds worth of normal baby weight? Yeah…thought so.
My point here is this, he’s an ass. But this ralying cry that all women gain half a person from carrying a 5-10 pound fetus in her womb is a crock. I have never read or heard any doctor (and I saw a perinatologist) ever say 50+ pounds of weight gain during pregnancy was normal or healthy for anyone, including women who were underweight. But dont take my word for it: http://www.webmd.com/baby/guide/healthy-…. http://www.americanpregnancy.org/pregnan…
In fact the only thing that says anything about a normal gain of 60 pounds is with TRIPLETS! http://www.americanpregnancy.org/multipl…
Yes there are super douches who expect women to magically go back down to size and even abusive super douches who are well…abusive super douches. But somewhere along the line is a reasonable man who became a father with a woman who no longer looks like herself at all and the change happened in less than 2 years (pregnancy and childbirth plus recovery from said childbirth). That ISNT fair and to say that any man who isn;t ok with YOUR normal weight gain of 60 pounds is an ass is a bit dramatic, especially considering that 60 pounds for a single baby is NOT normal pregnancy weight gain in the first place.
Well someone mentioned endocronologists and well, here you go:
http://www.endocrineweb.com/news/obesity…
“However, too much can be harmful, said the University of Bristol researchers who conducted the current study. The team took body mass index (BMI) and weight measurements of 3,877 women throughout their pregnancy and again 16 years after giving birth.
The results, which were published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, showed that women who gained more weight during their pregnancy than the Institute of Medicine recommendations were three times more likely to be obese at the end of the 16-year study period than those who experienced more moderate weight gain.
Additionally, the team noted that these women were at a higher risk for the cardiovascular and metabolic dysfunctions associated with obesity, which may include type 2 diabetes.”
Doesn’t sound to me as though there’s much of a marriage there to begin with, unless the flippant tone is an attempt to gloss over his deep inner pain… Nope, not buying it. He needs to go find someone he can bone without a blindfold and let his wife do the same; better to be a shitty ex-husband and a shitty dad on the weekends than to be a resentful, seething shit in residence.
Shit.
Oh, and here’s my pregnancy weight gain story. NOT.
@ericaP & nocutename – oh, 20/20 hindsight. Yes, there was a clear, classic pattern, if you look at the course of our relationship. Incredibly good-looking guy, 6 foot 4, charismatic, great family (parents met at Stanford, Dad’s a doctor, family travels the world, etc etc.) He owned a big house, had killer parties…he was king and he made me feel like a princess.
All the while I had a great job and made most of the money; I had a great, loving family, an education, wonderful friends, all that. But all that seemed so ordinary next to him – he seemed special, smarter, better looking, more confident than anyone and he cared about *me*! Oh, I fell head over heels. And the sex was absolutely, mind-blowingly INCREDIBLE. He had a “policy” that I must have 3 orgasms to every one of his…though sometimes he could push it to 10:1. He taught me what a G-spot is, and how to make it sing. That and so much more.
He was gorgeous, he made ME feel so beautiful, and he took my ecstasy as his responsibility. We occasionally had threesomes with other beautiful women, we let male friends just watch sometimes (other guys were never allowed to join in, my rules) – Oh, it was wonderful.
He treated so me well at first, but expected more, and more…and more over the years, while giving less and less. High standards turned into bizarre double standards where he would create rules for me to follow, and he’d set the hurdles higher and higher till there was just no way I could please him. I bought him a Cartier watch, a $5000 sound and navigation system for his car, a Prada belt, nice shoes, beautiful furniture and designer clothes…I’m a giving person (to a fault, in this case). He has expensive taste and it made me so happy to give him the objects he desired. And he was so happy to take, and take. He got meaner and meaner. He could care less if I ever had an orgasm again…he’d beg me for a blow job…then go to sleep without so much as touching me. First on occasion…then as a matter of course.
By the end, not only did I buy the food, and cook the food and serve it, and work full time and care for our son, but if it wasn’t also COMPLETELY cleaned up before we ate dinner, he’d go ballistic. That meant he’d eat the fancy dinners I prepared while he watched TV, while I cleaned the kitchen. He’d be done by the time I sat down. Hardly the family dinners I was raised with, where the children don’t sit until the adults do, and you don’t stand up till you’re excused.
I was a total doormat, and a highly paid professional, full-time working mother at the same time. It was absurd and awful and pathetic, but when I raised a word of protest (i.e. ask him to help me clean the kitchen or serve the food) he would launch into a tirade and be angry for days…it just wasn’t worth setting him off.
So, I left. He was just so rude and so mean and so angry by then, every day. He would verbally shred me in front of our son, day after day. Clearly there’s some mental illness or personality disorder going on, but he would NOT see a counselor, or a doctor. I was the one with the problem, period.
One day I burned my hand pretty badly – accidentally plunged most of my hand into boiling water while heating a bottle of refirgerated breastmilk for our son – and he laughed and laughed, this nasty derisive laugh. Because I was so stupid for burning myself and “don’t you know how stupid that was, how ridiculous you look?” I lost it, cried, said Fuck You!! How can I be with someone who thinks it’s funny when I hurt myself? Our son was 6 mionths old, and that’s the one time I completely lost it in our baby’s presence (he was sleeping nearby). For that I got a long lecture about how I was unable to control my emotions, and how it is extremely inappropriate to use those words and to shout in front of an infant. He NEVER let that one go – from that day on, if e ever discussed self-control, or if I ever asked him to speak more quietly or gently around the baby, he’s go right back to how I’m the one who can’t control myself and swears in front of the baby.
I was never abused in my previous relationships. I didn’t enter this one thinking I would be. We used to have a great time together, really. It’s just, after he realized I loved him, he stopped respecting me. The big change happened the week after we were married – he explained that to me, later. He said he panicked, because he realized I wasn’t his perfect wife, and he set out to make me that – perfect. Believe me, being a narcissist’s project, where they’re trying to “fix” you and force you to become their idea of the perfect wife…it is not fun. Espeially when you’re pregant!
It is insidious. It goes from (seemingly) so good, gradually, bit by bit, to so, so bad once he thinks you’re there to stay. Once you’re married, once you have an infant…if he thinks you need him and you’re not going anywhere because he knows you want to keep the family together…look out.
I’m a lot happier now – that’s perhaps the understatement of the century. And for better or worse, I’m a whole lot trusting that men are who they claim to be.
sorry, edit on last sentence – *LESS* trusting.
@179
“I am not the first woman to offer up her own pregnancy in relation to ATTW’s letter. Where was the one size fit all cry when women who claimed to have taken well over a year to lose 60 pounds worth of normal baby weight? Yeah…thought so.”
No one needed to bother about “one size fits all” because that woman didn’t argue that every single woman should always, without fail, gain 60 lbs and lose it in a year. She didn’t argue that not gaining 60 lbs was some sort of weird moral failing that involved living on potato chips and ice-cream. From what I’ve read, you are the only person claiming that “all women” do anything during pregnancy.
@176 / @183, lunachick. So sorry. It’s all the words I can find, and I apologize for that. So so sorry.
While function (vagina healing, bleeding stopping) returns after 4-6 weeks after childbirth, hormones, especially with a breastfeeding woman, often do not return to normal for some time, which effects both mood and physique.
It was hard as hell for me to lose weight after my 2nd pregnancy, even with the low cal, low fat foods the FDA and the Dr’s push on us.
Turns out i had to go educate myself about food…no sugar, no carbs, no processed food, nothing but meats, veggies, healthy fats and some fruit and weight fell off.
Nobody understands or bothers to mention that she may be trying and like many other Americans, the SAD (Standard American Diet) just isn’t cutting it and the weight stays.
Dude doesn’t say how supportive is, my ex wanted me to eat healthy and lose weight but if i brought healthy food into the house, he wouldn’t touch it. He expected me to still cook for him, all the unhealthy food of course, and choose differently for myself. That isn’t support..several of you said he should go shop and cook, and I agree. If he wants to help, he can educate himself on food and take that over for her. She is a lot more likely to eat healthier food if she doesn’t have to shop and dream up the recipe. Buy a jogger stroller and the two of you go for sunset walks and eventually jogs. Do it together, don’t expect her to do it alone and you might actually grow as a couple too.
@183, wow, thanks for sharing that story. I wish there was a way you could take the good years you shared (“the sex was absolutely, mind-blowingly INCREDIBLE ….he made ME feel so beautiful…it was wonderful…He treated so me well at first”) and appreciate them in isolation from your ex-husband’s descent into some kind of mental illness. But maybe he was always that controlling perfectionist, and (as you suggest) he was directing it at himself first, with his killer parties & orgasm policies.
“But this ralying cry that all women gain half a person from carrying a 5-10 pound fetus in her womb is a crock.”
Nobody is saying that. It’s just you insisting that larger weight gains aren’t normal, or must be a matter of indulgence, or whatever.
“I have never read or heard any doctor (and I saw a perinatologist) ever say 50+ pounds of weight gain during pregnancy was normal or healthy for anyone, including women who were underweight.”
Well, now you have: my OB, who has been practicing for 20 years and also teaches at the medical school here. Do you want his card or something? I’m a little less likely to take medical advice from the generalized guidelines on WebMD than from my own doctor who knows my personal case.
“That ISNT fair and to say that any man who isn;t ok with YOUR normal weight gain of 60 pounds is an ass is a bit dramatic, especially considering that 60 pounds for a single baby is NOT normal pregnancy weight gain in the first place.”
There you go again, telling us what’s “normal” and right and fair based on your narrow view of what pregnancy should be. Why shouldn’t my spouse have been okay with my weight gain, given that our doctor said everything is great, keep eating the same diet, and so on? I’m on pregnancy #3 now, I’m not obese and never have been, I’ve never had diabetes or any type of health issue during pregnancy. I gained 65 lbs with pregnancy #1, around 45 lbs with pregnancy 2, and in the first 6 months of this pregnancy so far I’ve gained 10. Go figure. There’s not even one size fits all for one person.
But even if I WERE obese or unhealthy, and even if my spouse was NOT okay with it, he would still be an ass if he wanted to cheat or leave without putting any effort into solving the problem together. For pete’s sake, people get cancer and lose limbs and develop terrible odor problems and all kinds of “abnormal” things that might make them unattractive. Maybe it’s even their fault, if they smoke or have terrible diets or bad habits or whatever. But spouses who love each other try to work that stuff out together first, before ditching each other.
lunachick, I was so sad to read your story, and I’m glad you made it out and on to better things in life!
SuzyI didnt say he should leave you if he didn’t want to, I said why is he an ass because he doesn’t want to maintain a SEXUAL relationship with someone he is no longer SEXUALLY attracted to? He could still be a good co-parent without having sex with you, he could still be a good co-parent without being in a sexual/romantic relationship with you. But why should he stay in that relationship if he doesn’t want to be in it? Why should he be shamed for not wanting to stay? It wasn’t JUST WebMD it was also on americanpregnancy.org and endocrinologists themselves have published papers in the Ameican Journal for Clinical Nutrition saying the same damn thing, 60 pounds of weight gain is NOT normal, it is NOT healthy unless you’re carrying triplets. Show me one link from a reliable source where it says 60 pound weight gain is normal during a healthy singleton pregnancy and you have your point, until then I am inclined to stick with my facts because they are widely validated.
The other point of the matter is, the man isn’t attracted to her anymore. It isn’t fair because he was the one that got her pregnant and he made vows to love her regardless. Well he could very well still love her but love does not equal sexual and physical attraction. He shouldn’t be shamed into staying with his wife and being celibate and she shouldn’t want to be with someone who thinks she’s unattractive and “unsexy” what could that be doing to her self esteem? I’m not on such a moral high ground that I’m in the realm of telling people that they have to just suck it up and fuck someone they are not sexually attracted to.
@191
If pregnancy weight gain (which is reversible) is enough to make him throw in the sexual towel, how was the letter writer planning on dealing with the irreversible ravages of age? Was he planning on getting a divorce or having an affair as soon as the wrinkles got a little too close together and the breasts started sagging? After all, the poor fellow just doesn’t feel attracted to wrinkles and saggy boobs.
Mmmm… Arnold’s son is pretty hot indeed. But is he really jail bait? At 17 years old, you can just drive him to a neighboring state and be a-okay. 😉 Who knew California had such prude age of consent laws?
@191 – Just curious, how overweight are you? You’re tearing into all these normally-thin women for gaining more weight during pregnancy than WedMD says the average woman should, and you go on about how YOU barely gained a thing…but you also say you were overweight to begin with. So. How overweight were you before you ever got pregnant? And how overweight are you now? Weight and height would be great. Since you’re so interested in everyone else’s BMI, let’s calculate yours.
@194
AzaleaRose stated that the point was that he wasn’t attracted to her anymore and shouldn’t feel obligated to be with someone he’s not attracted to. If sexual/romantic loyalty always boils down to whether-or-not-I-feel-attracted-to-my-spouse-right-now, why does it matter whether it’s from baby-weight, or illness, or age?
Hunter, didn’t everyone already go through this? You’re making all these assumptions that
1. it’s a long enough time after the baby that her weight “should” be gone
2. her lifestyle is conducive to losing the weight (i.e. all the responsibilities of taking care of this baby aren’t piled soley on her leaving her no time to be fit)
3. she’s willfully choosing to be fat
I mean come on, everyone’s already pointed out that there’s in no way enough information to assume one way or the other.
Also…. not that anyone wanted my opinion on this but with Mr. J and EricaP… though I generally agree with Erica that a lot of men would have better sex lives if they approached things better I think she has the bias that all sex-positive women have, that all women can come to appreciate and love sex the way we do if the men in their life do things right (either in bed and/or emotionally) but I do think it’s a little overly optimistic. I’ve met and conversed with women that just aren’t that into sex. It confuses me to no end but it’s true. This might be the case with Mr. J though no fault of his own.
Not everybody is cut out to be a father. Someone so self-centered that they would actualy leave their family because they haven’t had sex in about an hour is one of those. In this kid’s case, losing said father might be addition by subtraction.
@102 and other oblivious dicks:
If ATTW wasn’t prepared to have a child, he should have either a) talked to his wife about it to make sure that they were both on the same page and that birth control would be used; and/or b) WRAPPED IT THE FUCK UP.
Stop whining and moaning about all the poor, oppressed het men who are “tricked” by their evil temptress wives into having kids that they didn’t want. Condoms are the CHEAPEST, SAFEST, AND EASIEST FORM OF BIRTH CONTROL IN EXISTANCE. If you plan on having sex, at all, during your life, you should carry arround some goddamn condoms. How difficult is that? Women already have tons of forms of birth control that they are solely responsible for, and which do not always work as intended. Men need to take some responsibility too. (If your partner doesn’t want you to use condoms, and can’t give a convincing reason why, then you should be suspicious and probably not have penetrative sex, at least until you get to know each other better).
If het men are unwilling to face the responsibility of having children, and too ignorant to buy a fucking condom, they should marry their own hand and not have sex with anyone. Don’t make birth control the sole responsibility of women, and you won’t have to face the prospect of unwanted or accidental pregnancies (barring the extremely unlikely case that both methods of birth control fail).
Before anyone in a het relationship has sex, they should either diligently prepare birth control options to use, or read up on pregnancy and childbirth- preferably both.
Moreover, though ATTW’s letter is fairly vague, he is already seething with resentment towards his wife. If she had “tricked” him into having a child, he would have mentioned it, because it would have helped his case enourmously, and been yet another reason why he feels that cheating or leaving would be justified.
ATTW is a jackass not just because he’s superficial. He’s not a jackass because he’s too stupid to realize that unprotected sex= pregnancy, babies, and all the unpleasant things that come with. He’s a jackass because, instead of TALKING TO HIS WIFE like an adult, he seeks justification to either cheat on her or leave her to raise an infant on her own, just because he can’t get his dick wet. He doesn’t give a shit about the health and welfare of his wife and child. He doesn’t give a shit about his child’s future. The ONLY things that matter to him are how hot his wife looks and how much sex he’s getting (and of course, he’s way too good to just use his hand for a while like other new fathers).
He doesn’t say “honey, I want to get in shape/stay in shape. I was thinking of going to the gym. Would you like to come with me, and we’ll hire a good babysitter so we can both relax and stay healthy?” He doesn’t ask Dan about ways to give his wife more free time to relax and/or exercise. He doesn’t ask Dan about ways to spice up his sex life- assuming that his wife is even ready for sex or exercise yet, this soon after having a baby. He asks Dan whether he should cheat on his wife, or LEAVE HIS FAMILY. He doesn’t ask how he could try to improve the situation; he asks how he can LEAVE the situation, for the sole reason that he’s not getting enough sexual stimulation right now, because he thinks his wife is fat after having a baby.
You really can’t get much more spoiled and selfish than that.
And for hunter78 and others who say “she’s not doing enough to lose weight so she can please her husband” and other such bullshit: their child is an INFANT. A BABY. Pregancy weight, whether a little or a lot, does not miraculously fall off the next day. Pregnancy permanently alters a woman’s body- physically, emotionally, hormonally. It can take YEARS to get the weight off, because hormones are one of the biggest factors in weight gain, and they can take years to re-balance after a pregancy. When your hormones are going haywire, it really doesn’t matter if you run 20-mile marathons every day, you’re not going to lose much weight.
Not to mention, raising a kid is a 24/7 job. You don’t get to just pop in at the gym twice a week for a workout. You’re WAY too busy changing diapers, feeding, cleaning, and picking up slobbery toys strewn all over the house. You don’t have time to eat or sleep or bathe, much less go on a weight-loss routine. A kid is a 24/7 obligation for several years.
Before a het guy has sex without a condom, he needs to assess the risk. He needs to read up on pregancy, childbirth, etc., and decide whether or not it’s worth it. If he can’t handle the idea of sharing the work and being patient with his wife- saggy bellies and hormonal outbursts included- he needs to WEAR. A. CONDOM.
It takes TWO people to make a baby, and both bear responsibility for that child, not just the mother. If this guy is so willing to abandon his own child because his wife gained weight (I mean, really?), he should not have been having PIV sex in the first place. He’s old enough to know how babies are made and how to prevent babies from being made. He’s not a child- he’s just acting like one.
By the way, I’m ONLY referring to heterosexual, sexually active men who don’t wear condoms AND who don’t want to be fathers/husbands. And, to some degree, women of the same type. There are plenty of men and women out there who do use protection responsibly, and I am not referring to them in my comments.
“If I were one of those choicers, Dan, I would suck your dick just to win the argument.”
Sounds like a win-win to me!
@197
“Aging isn’t the same, it takes years and both parties are affected. Illness is not the same, she’s not ill, she can lose weight and become attractive to him again, if she wants to.”
Yup. That’s logical. A man who can’t stick around a year or two for his wife to correct a reversible condition is going to be GREAT at sticking around for 10 or 20 years living with an irreversible condition.
In the 2nd letter, we’ve been assuming it was the husband asking, but the word “your” is ambiguous. Read it again and consider that it could be the wife. It’s signed “Almost Twice The Wife.” What if she’s wondering if it would be better if her husband cheated or left.
My answer: If you have any resources at all, it would be better if he left. If you don’t have family or an income, it would be better if he stayed. If the jerk leaves now, you’ve got a good chance of finding someone better for you– as long as you’ve got people to help with the baby and give provide you with something to live on until you can sue the jerk for child support. If you’re really on your own, living with a jerk is better than nothing.
@198 First off, I do want your opinion, and thank you for sharing it.
Second, I’m not saying that all women could love getting PIV sex every morning if the guy paid more attention to her sex drive. But I think most humans like physical connection. There aren’t many women who turn away from snuggling their children. So – if guys find ways to connect physically to their wives, whether though backrubs, foot massages, back scratching, hair brushing, or through more extensive cunnilingus, or holding the vibrator for her, or whatever — then, yes, I think the emotional connection and the sexual connection between the two people could only improve. It could hardly get worse!
Too many guys don’t seem to have an understanding of what physical sensations their wives enjoy.
And I think a big difference between children’s affection (which women usually like) and husband’s affection (which women often grudgingly put up with) is that the husbands pushed PIV on their wives during those months after childbirth (or at some other stressful time of life) and so the wives got used to putting up with sex they weren’t enjoying, and that created a feedback loop of dreading their husband’s touch instead of welcoming it.
Is that clearer, mydriasis?