Porn

I've been talking with a friend about porn.  Actually talked with several friends about porn!  The day my divorce was final, several of my girlfriends gave me a party and took me out.  They gave me several things but one of the things they gave me was a DVD.  I watched it - or some of it.  Basically the entire thing as far as I've been able to watch is one girl with sometimes two men and sometimes one.  She's either giving them blow jobs or they're both doing her - one from behind, one in front - or she's giving them BOTH blow jobs or some sort of combination of these scenarios.  It does nothing for me.  I've seen porn before - and I sometimes wonder if I've got a little lesbian in me!  If I get anything from it at all, it's usually when two women are doing it.  But for the most part - it doesn't do much for me.


Ex however - that's a different story!  I don't think I really even know how bad his porn habit was.  And while I've been thinking about this, it made me think about all those surgeries to his right arm!  Perhaps if he'd broken up with Mrs. Palm and her 5 daughters - he wouldn't have needed the surgeries! 


He loves to blame me for never wanting to have sex with him - but there were MANY times would he couldn't because he'd beat off too much that day.  Like a damn 14 year old boy.  He also got to the point where having sex with a live woman was not enough to get him off.  He'd have to either watch porn while we did it or beat off after he'd "done" me.  Didn't exactly make me go rushing for more.  It was humiliating and depressing.  It certainly did NOT make me feel the least bit sexy  - and I think it's a pretty fair generalization to say that women have to "feel" sexy to want to have sex. 


When did porn start to effect our sex life?  When we were younger, the very little porn that we ever saw was a little exciting to us both.  But back in the 80's - you really didn't have the kind of stuff that's out there now.  But I didn't think it was any big deal - and of course we were younger, thinner and didn't have a kid yet.  Ten years later - it was a different story.  He'd leave magazines in a drawer that was easily accessible to our daughter. He'd leave them lying around in the bedroom.  One time he left a tape in the VCR.  It made me furious and I told him to get rid of it.  As far as I know, he did at that time - at least he got better about hiding it anyway.  


But then we get to the 2000's when you can practically go in Walmart and buy porn.  You can get it anytime you want on the computer and they have infomercials selling dildos on cable tv. And coincidentally (?) - our marriage basically started going to shit.  Which came first?  The shitty sex life or the porn?  Which one caused the other one?   I don't know - but I know it didn't help.


And I KNOW that after I had my double mastectomy in 2004 - that was pretty much the end of any kind of sex life.  We literally went TWO years once without having sex.  We pretty much would have it on our anniversary and that was about it - and it was VERY unsatisfactory.  It was like a chore.  A 43 year old woman who used to have large boobs - now with no boobs - just doesn't fit the fantasy little 15 year old boys have when they're spanking the monkey - and my 44 year old husband was a 15 year old boy.


He would lie and say that the mastectomy didn't matter - but little Willie couldn't lie.  Just like any teen-age boy - he needed the boobies.  If there's anything that can make me hate him - and sometimes I do - it's thinking about that.  About the fact that he told me the night we decided to divorce that he could get it up - but not for me.  It still PISSES me off - because it's like he's blaming ME for the demise of our sex life.  When I had the surgery, the docs told me I couldn't have reconstruction for 2 years because of the kind of cancer I had.  At that time my survival % was 26%.  It tended to come back and it tended to come back in the scar and on the chest wall.  So they didn't want me to have anything that would delay them seeing it if it came back. 


After the 2 years (yay Herceptin, YAY GOD!) I asked him what he thought.  Should I get the surgery?  I'd had one very close friend and one acquaintance who'd been through reconstruction and they'd both had TERRIBLE experiences.  So I was very afraid of doing it at that time.  So he tells me that no, I don't need to have it if I don't want to, it doesn't matter to him.  Which was BULLSHIT.  Maybe he was trying to keep from hurting my feelings - but that was not the time to do it. (The night we decided to divorce - that would have been the time to worry about hurting my feelings)  That was the time to be honest and tell me he would like it better if I had it.  And I would have done it and I wouldn't have been mad with him about it.  But once again this was his way of dealing with.... CONFLICT - oh God - conflict... he couldn't run fast enough from conflict or what he perceived as conflict anyway.


Would that surgery have saved our marriage? No.  But at least it would have kept him from hurting me worse than he ever hurt me in 33 years of us being together.  Hurt me so bad that I was just totally numb.  I guess the good thing about it is that it pretty much killed any remaining traces of love I had, any remaining thoughts about trying to save our marriage.  But it also fucked me up big time in how I feel about my looks and my sex appeal.  So much so that the reality that Convention man wanted to have sex with me was inconceivable to me.

Married woman panties vs sexy panties

I guess the very title of this gives quite an insight into the problems with my marriage.  In all fairness, I NEVER had cute panties growing up.  I don't know if they weren't out there yet in the 70's and 80's - but my Mom was always a cotton brief person and so was I - even when I was thin.  But I realized when part of my fear with conference guy was that I had on ugly panties with a stained crotch - that married panties were NOT the look I wanted for my first sexual encounter with another man in 33 years.  


So it occurred to me - why didn't I care about that with my husband?  Even when we were younger, I might occasionally get "special" occasion panties - but why wasn't every day a special occasion?  And I NEVER owned a cute bra - a combination of too cheap and too broke.  Now it's pretty much impossible to have a cute bra until I get reconstruction because I have to wear a mastectomy bra.  Ugh.  So ex, I apologize for not giving a crap about whether you would appreciate sexy panties or not - even back when things were pretty good between us. 


A friend of mine put together a picture montage of our girls trips to the beach over the past 4 years- and I've got on the same damn clothes in most of them.  So it's not just a panty thing - I think it's been an "I don't give a shit about myself"  thing for the last 10 years.  I've been a classic case of "when I lose weight I'm going to......."  fill in the blank.  I treated me like I didn't matter, I put myself as a low priority - of course my ex would - why not?  If I didn't give a shit why should he?  


I read an article in a magazine today by Olivia Wilde - the hot chick from House - who talked about wearing high heeled booties because they made her feel powerful.  Her point was that women dress up, fix their hair, etc - not for men - but because of how it makes them feel about themselves.  So I'm guessing the worn out khaki's, baggy jeans and dumpy shirts I used to wear pretty much told how I felt about myself.  


So late yesterday afternoon I went out for some retail therapy and pretty much bought all new clothes to wear on my cruise.  I've never felt so indulgent in my life - especially considering that they will be too big for me next season because I AM going to be in a smaller size!  I was very particular about making sure I got flattering colors, good fits and no "old" lady looking stuff.  My main criteria in the past has been is it comfortable and can it be washed?  I know it's a cliche' - but the cliche' starts somewhere - the divorced woman losing weight, buying new clothes, getting a haircut - but now I know why.  It's not to "catch" a new man - it's because she is ridding herself of her old unhappy life and moving on. Moving on to confidence, to happiness, to freedom.  Most importantly - moving on to love herself.


And I bought some pretty panties!

Do the "Right" Thing?

I never thought I would feel so full of regret over doing the "right" thing.  I never realized until he kissed me - no, it was even sooner than that - just sitting near him, having him touch me on my leg, my arm - flirty touches - that I missed sex SOOOO much!  I can't believe how I just turned that part of me off. 


 When ex and I first met we couldn't keep our hands off each other - this was back in a small southern town in the 70's when "good" girls didn't have sex before marriage.  Which is a crock of shit - but we at least had to pretend we believed that and you certainly didn't go around having sex with anyone who wasn't your "steady" boyfriend.  I'm a Christian and I believe in doing the right thing - but I really think the no sex before marriage is bullshit - people used to get married at 14 or so - probably because that's when the hormones started raging!  I certainly didn't try and fill my daughter with that guilt trip and she and I have a very honest relationship because of it.  In fact, I probably get on her nerves because I keep stressing to her how important a good sex life is to a marriage.


  I'd say our sex life started going to pot about the time it became obvious that I was the breadwinner in the family - because he couldn't keep a job.  He's a screwup - unorganized, forgetful and terrible at office politics - but kept getting jobs that required that he'd be good at all of those things!  He had a college degree in communications and wanted to go into radio - but wasted the first 9 years of our marriage on jobs he hated and wasn't good at instead of risk the rejection of trying to get a job in radio.  Finally, when he was literally driving a scooter around Atlanta and working several part time jobs, I told him to get a job wherever he could in radio and I'd go there.  We were $17,000 in credit card debt, we were very close to losing our house and I was completely stressed out.  But I thought it was my job to "support" him and just couldn't understand why people were so "mean" to him.  Ugh - Why didn't I leave his ass then?  But our daughter was young and he was a great daddy that she adored.  I still loved him - just started to lose respect for him.  And when you lose respect for someone - you damn sure don't want to have sex with them.


  So yeah - I will admit now that I did turn him down a lot. The few times we've tried to openly talk about the fact we never have sex, he's accused me of that and I would deny it. I know now that I was furious with him and didn't even realize it.  I was so sick of taking care of everyone and being the only one who was capable of making a decision.  I was tired and depressed and never knew it - because everything was all about him.  For years he had back pain, then back surgery, neck pain, then neck surgery, shoulder pain, then shoulder surgery, wrist pain - surgery, hand pain - you guessed it surgery!  Notice how it worked it's way down - if he could have figured out some sort of finger surgery I'm sure he would have had it!  But it was all his fear and depression being held in his body - God knows I couldn't suggest to him that HE was the cause of his pain.  I wasn't saying he was a hypochondriac - I do think he was in pain - but I think it was all the repressed shit in him!  And I was right by the way - once he finally got on meds for bi-polar all that went away.


Anyway....so I just ate chocolate and got fatter.  When that movie came out "Down With Love" I loved it - because it was so true!  No sex? Eat Chocolate!!  He got fatter, I got fatter -  the few times we tried to have sex his back would hurt or I'd get a damn UTI - it was pathetic.  So we just gave up - and I shoved that part of me way down inside the fat and said I didn't need it.  He became the worlds best and probably most frequent masturbator so that the few times I would try and initiate it - he couldn't get it up!


So the other night when someone actually paid attention to me - I was literally hot for him just from being TOUCHED! and when he kissed me - I practically had an orgasm!  I think part of my fear of letting go was that I would literally explode and scare the shit out of him.  I had no idea I was still capable of that kind of a response.  That even now I can literally think about him kissing me and still feel that way.  And guess what good girls of the world?  I'm not "in love" with this guy and may never see or hear from again - and I know that and still want to just fly to his town and knock on the door and say - I really FUCKED UP!  Please do me NOW!  And then just fly home!  

First Contact!

I'm starting this blog more as a way to examine myself and try and keep me honest more than anything else.  I am recently divorced after a marriage of 28 years to my high school sweetheart.  We've been (we'd been!) together for almost 33 years - ever since I was 16.  I always thought we had a good marriage - but looking back on it now - I think I just let myself be happy with what was there - or should I say "happy".  I didn't actually look closely at how things really were and completely believed that once you were married, you stayed married unless there was some sort of abuse going on.  He'd say stuff every once in a while - but only in his passive aggressive way for the most part.  He was completely incapable of what he would call "confrontation" - what a normal person would call communicating.  

I don't want this to be about how much he sucked - because he's a nice guy - but he was really a pretty shitty husband for the last 15 years and really as far as "traditional" husband goes - the whole time.  From about the 3rd year of marriage on, I was the one who made more money, I had insurance, I decided we ought to have a baby, I decided we ought to buy a house - I took care of EVERYTHING and worried about everything.  He would just ga-loop, ga-loop along like he was watching from the sidelines and go along with everything I said - but come up with nothing from himself to add to the decisions.  We started out in a mother-son relationship and were 15 years into it before we recognized it.  He lied to me about anything he thought would make me mad....  blah, blah, blah - water under the bridge now - but I need to recognize how I basically stuffed - literally - my feelings down instead of dealing with them. 

I was always trying to "fix" things for him - even in high school.  But he was cute and funny - wasn't that enough?  He was one of the quickest wits I knew and he was very creative.  Ahh yes - NOW I know it was manic depression - then I just thought he needed my support to realize his potential.  The "potential" that he still talks at 51 about having.  Did it matter that he never had a good job and that the job he's had for 20 years now is a crappy job for low pay that became more important to him than me, our marriage and quite frankly even our daughter who he supposedly was crazy about.  But since he's left - it's pretty apparent to me that more than anything she was someone who would listen to his bullshit and feel sorry for him when she was younger and even as she grew into an adult and saw his flaws, she didn't call him on it like I did.  But since he's left - she is pretty much the one that calls him and makes any plans for them to see each other.  He can't get out of his own head to have a real relationship with anyone. 

Anyway - we both got fatter, our sex life SUCKED, and we both thought it was the other one's fault.  What made me want to start writing was something that just happened to me.  I went to a conference for work and flirted with this really fun, outgoing and attractive MAN for the first time in my life!  When I married the ex - he was a boy and still is - but I'm a loyal person and NEVER cheated or even put myself at risk to cheat our entire marriage - the same cannot be said about him.  But this man was interested in ME.  Don't get me wrong - I'm not saying it was love, that it was even romance - it was just fun and major LUST.  The last night of the conference, I could have had sex with someone new for the first time in 33 years - and for the first time at all in over a year.  And I blew it! God knows I wanted to go to bed with this man - he kissed me and I practically melted.  I can think about those kisses now and get tingly.  It shocked the hell out of me.  I wanted to so badly - but the 16 year old girl who was the last person in this body to date took over and I couldn't do it.  Why? Why????  He lives 1000 miles away, he wanted me and I know it would have been SO good - but I am so fucked up about my body image I just couldn't let myself go.  And while that's not all from my ex - it sure as hell is a lot of it.  I'm 80 pounds overweight, I have no boobs (literally - breast cancer) and I was just too afraid he'd get me in bed (and he knew I had no boobs - the fat part is obvious!) and really see me and go limp - like my ex. My ex who told me years after my mastectomy when we decided not to do reconstruction that it didn't matter to him, he was just glad I was alive and loved me no matter what - but who now told me that he just wasn't attracted to me.  Who told me when we had the divorce talk - he was the one who asked for it - that he can get it up, just not for me.  I just couldn't let go of the fear when the opportunity was there.  I couldn't believe that anybody smart, accomplished and good looking could be attracted to me.