Every marriage has some drawbacks. But imagine as many drawbacks as you can, all wrapped up in one marriage, instituted by one spouse:
No conversational intimacy
No listening on his part; only talking
No emotional intimacy
No everyday closeness
No touch
No physical intimacy (except on extremely rare occasions when my initiations weren’t repeatedly rejected)
No spontaneity
No friends over
No hospitality (only on very rare occasions)
No laughter
No verbal uplifting, no compliments, and no encouragements No sparkle in the eye across a crowded room
No crowded room ever because having friends means having get-togethers, which cost money and create messes
No shared bank account, no questions about how much money he has, and no access to cash or checks for me, only the use of a shared credit card
No time for others
No break in routine for any reason No time for being with me, period
But when you love someone:
You want to be with that person, and you just can’t wait sometimes You think about them all the time
You dream up what you want to do together
You want to know all about them
You love holding them, being held by them, snuggling, and everything-ing
You always want a little more time with them until the world pulls them away
So there I was, going to work every day, cooking dinner every night, cleaning a house every week that never got dirty, going to bed alone, and waking up alone to start each new solo day all over again. I’m not the lonely, sad, “poor me” type, so my days out and about were full of life for the most part because I love lightheartedness and happiness. But walking into our white-walled, white-carpeted, white-furnished house each day and taking off my shoes to engage with a person who never seemed interested in anything past himself or the superficial world literally right in front of him seemed like a cruel joke. I was lonelier than I’d ever experienced in life, yet I was married.
If my friends saw that it was an unfit match before the wedding, why did I go ahead with it when I saw triple the warning signs they saw? Because I had never in my life met a person who didn’t love love. I was the fifth of five children. I had friends of all kinds in high school. I had eight suitemates my freshman year of college, I’d been a children’s camp counselor, I’d led adults biking on their dream vacations, and I’d lived with umpteen river guides in one house. I had done more jobs in my life that had involved social skills than I could list on a page. I had been around all kinds of people. There had never been a break in social life for me. In all my years, I had never met someone who didn’t respond to love and affection. I didn’t know it was humanly possible to actually care more about tedium than love because I had never seen it in action. I truly thought he needed love in order to jumpstart love back in his system, since he had been single for so many years before meeting me. I knew he had remained single all of those years thanks to many quirks, but love is the thread that binds us all together and fills our holes, right?
For a certain few in our population—as I have been painfully forced to learn—it’s not. I love love, wanted to shower him in it, and was rejected at every turn. It wouldn’t have mattered who I was—a stunning model, a curious muse, an intellectual giant, a meek introvert, or an exotic life of the party—from what I know of him, I’m confident that he would have been the same with anyone.
There’s a book called The Five Love Languages, in which you can easily see how you show love to others and how you like to receive love. I borrowed it at the library and felt a little dumbfounded after reading what the five love languages are: words of affirmation, acts of service, gift giving or receiving, quality time, and physical touch. What do you do when your mate never speaks life into you, cringes at doing things for you or sharing things with you, is tight with money and doesn’t like to put time into thinking up gifts, doesn’t like surprises and doesn’t want you to spend money on something he’ll probably just return, doesn’t ever want to include you in his daily routine, and prefers anything over intimacy? In other words, when the only love language your mate communicates is his need for cleanliness and order done in his way only, there is little love in such language. Who he was was so entangled with his OCPD that had it been removed, he wouldn’t have known who he was anymore. His life was structured so fully, and so fully around himself, that there was no room for anything beyond his daily design. For him to abandon routine would’ve meant to invite chaos that would scare him. If he wasn’t organized, he feared he’d be a mess. If he wasn’t on a schedule, he feared he’d be lazy. If he wasn’t doing a triathlon every day, he feared he’d be a slob. Fear played a big role in every decision and routine. What about marriage? What if he didn’t spend his moments loving his wife? Somehow that question was never considered in his mind, even when I asked over and over. Tragically for me, it was the one fear that never seemed to concern him. I just plain didn’t figure into his daily equation.
His priorities included many things, but they never included me. I simply coexisted around him during transition times. He would discuss bills or house particulars for extended times while standing up or open the sliding door to tell me immediate things on his mind while he was watering plants or just about to leave on a ride. He would talk while preparing his own food. No eye contact, no conversation. Just talking to me, eating briefly, and going on to the next thing. Conversation never happened on the couch cozied under a blanket or over breakfast at the table. It was just monologues. Long, standing monologues that never invited my input. There was always no more time left on his end if I had anything to say. He either had to “get going” or his body language communicated an instant disinterest or deficiency in attention; his looming routine was omnipresent once he was finished talking, despite how long-winded he was when he spoke.
It’s okay to have a routine. Routine is a healthy thing for the body, and it makes things easy on the mind. But intermixed in a routine can be sweet words, knowing looks, loving touches, stolen kisses, conversation, even some quick wham-bam-thank-you-ma’am on the table. But when not one of those exists—ever—a girl starts to pine for what could be.
I kept my mind from dwelling on past relations that were full of emotional chemistry and naked, entangled intimacy. Not to mention loving caresses, caring embraces, and soul-filling holding, both given and received. Though I longed to be held and touched and gazed at and cherished in every way by my husband—and to hold, touch, gaze at, and cherish him—I was intentional not to look beyond him at the masses in order to fill my need for love. For me, love meant choosing someone for life. It wasn’t something I wanted to experience in brief, meaningless interactions with people who didn’t want me as their other half.
I felt no freedom to love or be loved by him with abandon. Oh, how I imagined some spontaneous afternoon delight, to be whisked off my feet in a whirlwind of passion that was never once discussed or rejected. After realizing again and again that my mate was not comfortable with the one thing that required the utmost in comfort- ability and trust, I knew it was impossible to force it. It’s impossible to feel comfortable when you know that what you’re proposing is uncomfortable for the other person.
Because I had such hope that he would gradually become more lovingly aware, emotionally connected, and physically interested, I endured. If my spouse wasn’t naturally interested in touch, intimacy, romance, holding, snuggling, and sex, how long might it take for him to grow into those very important things? What if he tried to incorporate more of those things for my sake even though he was obviously uncomfortable in the process? Could I feel comfortable with him being the one to do those things with me?
My heart ached and my mind buzzed with questions. All the time.
I didn’t feel at liberty to go up and start kissing my own husband. I didn’t feel freedom to spontaneously pull him close to me as we passed in the living room. He told me in every verbal and nonverbal way from the inception of us as a couple that those kinds of things would be awkward and untoward.
Ironically, I am the one who initiated sex. I say that because I love when it’s the other way around. He turned me down more times than I could handle. I’ve never felt ugly or unattractive. I’ve always been a clean person, attentive to fitness, and intentional about having an active physique. My libido certainly yearned for intimacy, but there were always so many reasons why we couldn’t go for it. He was tired. He slept warmly and didn’t want the bed to be sweaty. He’d have to get to the pool in the morning before the lanes would fill up, so he needed adequate sleep. There was always a reason I wasn’t welcome in his physical world. I fought to make sure I never took all of it as a reflection of my unworthiness.
It’s easy to feel comfortable with someone who is comfortable being intimate with you, but it’s not at all comfortable for either person when skin-on-skin marital love isn’t allowed to just flow.
I know what you’re thinking: could he be a gay man trapped in his own rigid preconceptions that he should marry, have children, and live like a family man? No. I don’t think so. Oddly enough, he enjoyed the rare moments of intimacy when we were in the midst of it. He just couldn’t get his habits and routines out of his head. There was a self-imposed schedule he had to stick to, and a cleanliness aspect to maintain. Letting go and enjoying spontaneous lovemaking was an uncomfortable place he had no intention to explore.
The harder question to ponder was what if his habits were to never shift? Which life together would be better: an uncomfortable one or a cold one?
Here I was, finally married, pausing an aching libido, and our bed acted as nothing more than a co-sleeping surface.
What does a person committed to marriage do with that?
Neglect’s Toll on a Wife: Perfection’s Grip on My Husband’s Attention © 2023-2024 Lila Meadowbrook
