How to is Slate’s sex advice column. Have a question? Send it here to Jessica and Rich. It’s anonymous!
Dear How to,
My husband of 20+ years and I have mixed BDSM/kink for most of our relationship. Even though he is better at certain things than I am, I tried my best to accommodate him, but to maintain certain boundaries. He recently gave me the shock of my life.
He told me he wanted to get a submissive to do things I didn’t enjoy. The past six years have been rough with numerous cancer treatments and surgeries. My body isn’t what it used to be and we don’t have sex or make out as much as we used to. But the thought of him being with someone else makes me sick to my stomach. He backed off once he realized how much it hurt me, but I know he still wants to do it. I want to discuss my fears and boundaries but he keeps telling me how much he screwed up and that he doesn’t know how to fix it. If I don’t allow him to push out his urges and he does it anyway, it would lead to divorce. I have so many questions and I don’t know how to ask him any of them.
— Bound and heartbroken
Jessica Stoya: I feel that our letter writer is a hard no when it comes to opening up the marriage, but they are afraid that their husband will go outside the marriage if they don’t open it up.
Rich Juzwiak: Yeah.
Jessica: And LW seems to be pushing for a compromise because if he were to force the issue by coming out without an agreement, that would be a deal breaker. So the LW is wrapped up in fear.
Rich: Yes. There also seems to be this kind of reflected anxiety. They write that it made them sick to their stomachs. He got upset about it and now they get upset about his reaction to their reaction. It’s probably worth listening to your first reaction. That is, unless you feel like you’re being hasty or dramatic and saying, “This makes me sick to my stomach,” was a knee-jerk reaction that actually evolves over time into, “Well, okay, maybe it’s not. wrong.” Right? I don’t understand exactly where the LW is emotionally. I don’t understand if they’re operating out of fear, as it seems, or if it’s settled in and now they’re like, “Actually, I could do that. I could figure out a way to do that .”
Jessica: You see, that resonates with me, because in business meetings, 90 percent of the time when someone pitches an idea to me, I say, “No, no, that’s not possible. Wait, hold on. Let’s consider it.”
Rich: Yes.
Jessica: “What if it was like this? What if it was…” I’m 38 years old, I’ve been in business in one form or another for almost 20 years, and to this day, when someone brings me a perfectly good idea, my initial response is, “Absolutely not. Wait, hold on, maybe…” So I’m not sure if this is a character flaw that I need to work on, or a very understandable aspect of being human.
Rich: I think the latter.
Jessica: I feel like it’s both. I think it’s a very understandable part of being human that also needs to be worked on. So I can totally see our LW going “No.” And then he said, “Well, actually, if it was done in certain ways, if my concerns were heard effectively, if the boundaries were clear and in a certain position…”
Rich: There is a lot going on within this dynamic that he suggested. It could involve sex, but it also can’t involve sex. I mean, sometimes partial things give basically unpaid work. And if everyone disagrees and this sub is doing things our LW doesn’t want to do, as the husband suggested, you can only focus on the good. You don’t have to lift a finger.
But I know it’s more complicated than that. There seems to be a lot to talk about. It would be good to get back together and lead with, “It’s okay, I’m open to figuring out how to make us both happy. Let’s talk about it. Let’s start this conversation. You don’t have to keep apologizing.”
Jessica: They could try, “I freaked out, and now that I’ve had some time to process, I want to talk about this proposal.”
Rich: Yes. And give it time to process your processing. You are at the end of the cycle of your insanity. Maybe he’s still in the middle. That’s why he’s always apologizing. So it’s kind of a ripple effect. Let the water settle first and then move in and start talking about it. That will have to be a negotiation. Maybe nothing will come of it. Maybe it’s still too much. But if that’s what he wanted, it’s very likely that he’ll be okay with you going back and having a conversation where he gets some of what he wants.
Jessica: For the many questions our writer has, something they can do in their free time is to write down all of these questions. Mental health experts say handwriting is the best way. I tend to write in a note on my phone or a document on my computer. Even talking to a trusted friend can help. But just sort it all out, sort through, and then write these questions down and prioritize them. Find out what the most important questions are and start there. Because this big mess with such an echo throughout the relationship is probably not the only topic of discussion. It’s probably something you’ll have to talk about in parts over time.
Rich: Yes. Also, if for whatever reason you can’t spark that conversation where you both explore it again, you can give him a letter. You can give him basically what you wrote to us in the form of a letter. That could start and then he could write to you. As long as you communicate with each other, there is no problem. It seems that in this case, a slower tempo would actually be helpful because of the shock bounce. So wait a minute, take your time. It’s really okay that.
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I recently went on a few dates with a man who repeatedly shared with me that he thought I was amazing and was very impressed with my career, and I thought he was a great guy himself. I gave him head and he came in my mouth, which later didn’t happen to him for five years. It was “perhaps the best head of his life”. Dude never texts me after that night. I didn’t even text him because I initiated our last date. I am sexually rejected all the time, which makes no sense.