Envy

This past week was an exceptionally busy one for my wife.

Thursday her Boyfriend stayed over night and I slept in the other room to give them some much-needed alone time.

Friday night she had a date with her new Girlfriend and I went out to our local pub for some draught and games of Pool with two sneaky sharks. They lulled me into a perceived state of confidence then commanded the table with lightening abilities. I came home to the women’s giggling in the bedroom. It was cute and was glad for their happiness.

Saturday saw the Boyfriend back over at our place and I slept in the other room again. He has been going through some serious changes in his home life and needed the love and support we could provide. It was a special time for them too because he did not have to get up and leave early in the morning. I left them to sip their coffees in bed and rise when they wanted to. He hugged me and told me how wonderful I am for giving them this opportunity.

Sunday night my Wife headed out with a friend to what turned out to be an amazing burlesque show where she also was able to see her Girlfriend again. I fell asleep on the couch and was gently woken up when she returned.

Understandably she is a bit tired and wants to spend some quiet nights with our favourite TV shows and me. I am looking forward to this. But there is a part of me that feels a little left out.

I am certainly not jealous of her Boyfriend and Girlfriend. They are both wonderful people and I am so happy for her luck. She is a Lucky Woman. What this does however is make me feel not so Lucky. Which is silly as I have the most wonderful Partner and Family and it gives me great pleasure to see her Happy and Loved like this. Similarly I feel somewhat alone. Again this is silly but nonetheless true.

I have all I need in my Life yet I feel these things: Envy, Loneliness and Unlucky. I find myself wishing I had some of the things she has in terms of her additional romances and abundance of Love and physical pleasures.

As a man I have found that it is significantly harder to meet new people. There is an immediate sense of sleeziness and predatory behaviour in men seeking out partners overtly. Especially if they are married. Being Polyamorous and an Ethical Slut is a hard hurdle to cross. It does not enter into the conversation very well once the wedding ring is noticed. It always sounds like a ploy “to get into someone’s pants”. Wanting to enter into a Loving relationship appears even less believable.

“Yeah, sure your wife is okay with you seeing other women… sure.”

So I feel I must rely on Lady Luck to put me in the right place at the right time, or rely on being set up by my Wife. The latter makes me feel needed and a charity case. Why can’t I do this on my own?

Anyway, I am not Unhappy and I can find little to complain about. I simply feel it important to express these feelings so that they do not fester. Discussion is a cornerstone of Polyamory and my Wife and I do often. She nods and offers a sympathetic pout for me. I love her for that.

Change

Ah what a difference a change makes.

I have taken the advice of several folks, including my doctor and made a significant change in my Life.

Three weeks ago I had a seizure while sitting in bed having my coffee. This followed a night out on the town seeing KB’s favourite band. I immediately saddled up and went to see Dr Doc and squirmed my way through a session of implicating questions.

“How much do I drink?”
“Do I know that alcohol has serious repercussions on the medications I am taking?”
“Are you aware that alcohol and the medications could cause seizures?”

I sheepishly answered the questions stating that I wanted to stop the intake of alcohol for a number of reasons (vanity in the form of watching my gut expand being a significant one too) but had had no luck forcing the matter.

Well, the fear on KB’s face when I came out of the seizure and the aesthetic pallor of the hole I was digging for myself in terms of my Depression, have sealed the deal finally.

As of then, I quit drinking and sought the help of a counsellor to aid in the transition.

Now, just over three weeks into this change, the world has certainly opened up for me.

I am Smiling again.

We are Making Love again, passionately.

I am no longer plagued with irrational fears.

I have gone back and read some of my posts and am dismally saddened by what I wrote in terms of my irrational reaction to KB’s Boyfriend.

I can only say that I was not in the right mind.

KB is certainly falling deeper into Love with Boyfriend and I am pleased for her. We are talking openly about their relationship and Boyfriend has become a part of our existence. He is welcome over to our place at any time and the atmosphere is Loving. I even bought him a copy of The Ethical Slut for some private reading.

I am starting to feel not so “broken” and am hoping that feeling will translate into a stronger Me.

Impetus for Recovery

Okay so yesterday was a low day and it only got lower.

My post sent me into an unexpected Wallowing, which The Ethical Slut could help nothing with.

I rambled and completely forgot myself. Forgot the parameters of my Depression and the effect it has on those around me.

KB and I met after work and I was asked how I was feeling. I am not good at speaking plainly in person and prefer to write so I told her I had blogged about my feelings. She rebelled against this and demanded that I tell her plainly how I am feeling and that she did not want to “read about it” in my blog as the only way to get into my head.

So I told her, haltingly.

She reacted with heartfelt emotion and tears flowed.

She admitted that she does not feel compelled or desirous of me because I am never Happy. My Depression is taking a toll on her. She cannot support me alone and is crumbling under the weight.

As I have said before, I am not much of a catch at the present. It appears that I rarely laugh or smile anymore and am short with my kids. I am wallowing in my Depression and have been transferring these feelings onto her relationship with Boyfriend.

I have nothing to worry about but I do and that is not her fault. She is doing what she needs to keep Happy herself.

She was honest and brutal in her emotions and I cowered. Staring at myself from the other side of the room and shaking my head in sympathetic disapproval.

I need to pull myself out of this hole and seek help from more sources.

I Own it.

I am starting to feel as if I am intruding on KB’s thoughts.

Bearing in mind that I have been reading The Ethical Slut and have fully embraced the notion that Jealousy and Fear are my own emotions and I cannot blame them on any one else. I actually welcome those feelings as they represent a needed battle between perception and reality. Bearing the above in mind, I Know my initial statement is probably false but then again…

No, I do not think that it is false. I think it is true but I also think that it is understandable and I should not be scared by it.

I can see it in her eyes and gestures that she is thinking about Boyfriend. She now carries her phone around with her religiously as if it is his very hand. She immediately reads his Loving text messages and responds immediately. Occasionally she lets me read them. But certainly not every time. I feel as if she is editing. Or censoring.

It used to be that she constantly forgot her phone or would never be able to answer it in time. She still, despite having her phone close to her body constantly now, finds it hard to answer my texts to her.

It is hard not to feel Jealous.

She tells me that he is not as good a lover as I am. I don’t believe her. He may not know some techniques but he is learning and there is no substitute for her very evident Passion for him. She does keep telling me how much of a wonderful guy he is, though.

It is hard not to feel Jealous.

When he comes over he is overly generous to me with compliments and bringing Pumpkin Pie. He clings to my every word and me and is animated in his desire to impress me. KB is equally animated in her constant reiterating that he is constantly worried about how I feel about things. Again, he is such a Wonderful Guy. I am told often how she did not expect this and how continuously surprised she is at how much of a Wonderful Guy he is. There is the fact that she says she melts in his arms and gets wet immediately in the back stairwell when they meet during work hours.

What a Wonderful Guy.

It is hard not to feel Jealous.

And then there is the Fact that I Know I am somehow interrupting her thoughts. Bringing her Back to Earth and back to her Family. That is not to say that she is not there for us. Yes, she has not stopped being the Picture of the Perfect Wife and Mother. The fact that she can be those things while at the same time keeping a significant amount of Brain Cells focused on Boyfriend is testament to her Amazing Abilities. The Fact that she leaves me, albeit I willingly accept this, alone in the living room most evenings so that she can talk with Boyfriend on the phone.

I do wonder how he manages this amount of contact while having a Wife and Kid at home who know nothing of the Relationship. I mean if it is taking this much time away from my time with KB, and I willingly accept it, how does he do it? I guess that is also a clear indication of how barren his marriage is. I can’t help but think how lucky she is for having this much Freedom.

It is hard not to feel Jealous.

But, I own this Jealously and I have to admit that it is getting better. While I know I am interrupting her and that I probably do not, and may never have, instill in her this much Passion and Lingering Sensations after Love Making that he obviously can, and I do not pull her into nightly engrossing conversations, I also must feel some form of Satisfaction for being able to at least be in a position of accepting her Freedom and having her as My Wife and Mother of my Children.

I know that she will not stop Loving me. I know that she will never leave me. But in the face of the Passion and Desire and Love she has for Boyfriend, I wonder if she will stop Wanting me.

I guess, though, that two out of three ain’t bad.

It is hard not to feel Jealous but I own it.

The Demise According to KB

The day that George and KM broke up, we were on vacation together. KM and I retired to the tent. As we lay there KM said that she wanted to focus her attention on her budding relationship and on our relationship. She said she wanted to be with me. As George imagined our love making, KM rolled over and started texting her new man. So much for focusing on our relationship. The following few days, she was very cold to me. She sat at her computer giggling and laid on the beach with her phone, tapping away.

After returning home I didn’t hear from her for days and days. Then I heard from her. She wanted to retrieve her bike that she had loaned me so that her new man could ride it. She had keys to our house so came when we were at work. I noticed that not only did she retrieve her bike but also any other remnants of herself including her overnight toiletries. Even though she knew that George would be out of town for a few days, I was surprised that a sleepover with me wasn’t thought of. We talked but she said she was staying home.

Next came a phone call late at night. She was on her way to the hospital having taken a bad spill on her bike. As George and I sat poised to run off and meet her and care for her, she simply said she wouldn’t be able to tutor Kid #2 the next day. She said she was fine and that her new man was there.

Through the fog of her painkillers she told me how well taken care of she was. I used to be the one she called to for help. All the times she cried in my arms and I saw her through her daemons, flashed before me. I could only assume she no longer needed me or wanted me.

After about a week of healing she said she would like to see me. I went to her house and found her badly scraped and bruised with a fractured arm and a badly sprained ankle. There was no hugging or holding … she was fragile. She told me that she had been with her new man pretty much every day and that he was coming over in a little while. She told me that he was now her primary relationship and that he is not Poly but he didn’t mind that she continued to see me.

A week later I was invited over to see her. Again she said she had been spending all of her time with her new man. She told me that he suggested that we see each other on Tuesdays. A regular date night.

She wanted to do pedicures and asked if we could go to my house so she could put on one of the OPI colours I had. She assured me she was comfortable seeing George. What I noticed next was how she changed her clothes and put makeup on. I could only assume it was for him. For me, I got the cat hair infested clothing and pimply face. Maybe I should have felt honoured that she was comfortable enough with me to be so plain and natural. I really didn’t notice at the time. This has all come to surface after looking back.

Shortly after arriving at my house, George and KM slipped out onto the deck to talk. I was more and more suspicious that she had planned this already. I felt uneasy. At one point in the evening she reached out to touch me, pulled back and apologized. It was the first time in awhile that she had shown any interest in me in a physical way, and she was apologizing. I felt uneasy.

I very much enjoyed spending time with her. She makes me smile. I love being with her.

I thought and wondered what was going on with us. I went from being her primary support, her primary relationship to being designated a Tuesday-worthy date. To top it off, the Tuesday date was suggested to her by her new man. I started reflecting on the past month and how I had been brushed aside. It seemed that my feelings didn’t matter to her anymore.

I have never been the type of person to stick around in a relationship or friendship that is not real and true. When I looked at my family and saw how much they adore me, I realized that she no longer looked at me that way.

I sent her a message the following day saying that my time is precious to me and that I didn’t think that being relegated to a Tuesday date was very respectful of my value as a friend and lover (although I hadn’t been the latter in some time). I offered friendship if she felt she wanted that but no obligation to see me.

Since then I have not heard a word from her. I sent several messages and haven’t been given the decency of a response. I did however hear from a friend of hers who had a list of things she wanted returned. Several of those were ‘gifts’. I was shocked that she completely cut me out and refused to speak with me.

I have since moved on. I no longer wish to speak to her. She has shown that she is full of anger and has no desire to heal.

This blog is the last I will ever recall any of the difficulties in our relationship. I love her still and only wish her the best. I will only recall sweet memories of us together.

Guest Blogger to come soon

Someone asked me a bit ago what had happened between KM and KB. I felt it was not my place to give the details. However KB has offered to be a guest Blogger and shed some light on the Event.

Stay tuned…

Full Disclosure, …continued

I am not sure what to write but I feel like I should. KB keeps asking if I have Blogged. She is probably eager to read how I really feel because I have not been all that great at vocalizing my feelings to her directly. I normally need to write things out in order to make good use of the Delete and Backspace Keys. Speaking can be way to unforgiving and unclear.

I invited Boyfriend to KB’s birthday gathering. I felt that he should be there for her on her Day. It was a small gathering of those that care for her. Why then, should he not be there? On top of this, this small group knows of her relationship so it was a good opportunity for her to relax among Friends.

Once again, Boyfriend succumbed to the pressure to be Accepted and he worked double time to be likeable. But, he did a good job and everyone had a good time.

At the end of the evening, I left the two of them alone and retired to give them some space. A couple hours later, as I went to the bathroom I, completely by accident, caught a glimpse of them in the Living room: KB naked and draped over Boyfriend, sensually and slowly kissing. They were beautiful.

I quickly withdrew, not wanting to see more and certainly not wanting to interrupt. Happy Birthday, I thought. However, the mental image was etched into my Brain.

I can’t seem to decide if it is a good thing or not, this etching. True, it is not something I wanted to see because I do not want to intrude on their privacy. I do not want to infringe on KB’s Freedom. It is for this reason that I do not feel bad when she leaves the room to talk to Boyfriend on the phone daily.

But then again, this image comes with audio in my mind. I can “hear” her whispering, “I love you” into his ear and I can “hear” his gravely voice responding in kind. They Make Love each time they see each other and while I understand that, I wish we did the same thing as often.

I had read that Compersion can be accompanied by Jealousy but I had not understood how until now. I do feel Happy and Proud and Honourable for accepting her Freedom. I do not want them to stop enjoying their Love. Yet, at the same time I find myself jealous of their Passion. I find myself asking why she does not drape her nakedness over me in the living room and profess her love with passionate kisses. I can see how she looks to her phone in the hopes that he has or will call. I wonder if she thinks of me that way. I know she will never leave me but I worry about boring her in the face of this Burgeoning Love.

All Silly and Ridiculous worries and thoughts, I know. I speak them only to keep things clear in my mind.

700 Words on My Depression

My Depression is creating havoc with my personal life.

Not in the sense that things are bad at home. On the contrary, things appear to be very Good and Loving and Comforting. I just feel like crying.

This annoys me to no end, which only compounds the problem. I have nothing to cry about. Which manifests itself in the fact that I don’t actually cry. I just feel like it and the knot in my stomach persists.

I have had a great week in terms of my work. They have finally sent me a message that they are moving ahead with making me a Partner in the Firm. I should be jumping for joy.

KB is continuously Comforting and telling me how much she Loves me. I should be melting inside.

We have made Love more than in the past little while and it has been Lovely. I should be bragging.

KB is in Love with Boyfriend and that makes me Happy for her. I should be smiling.

But, “nope”. I am doing none of the above.

Last night I went back to doing Paper Art. I started making a detailed model of Tower Bridge in London. It distracted me and I felt good while working on it. Each time I stopped, however, to “take a break” the Sadness would return.

I am not sure how to handle this and I am concerned that it taxes KB’s patience. That is probably not the case, but I feel like that. I want to be Happy for her own Sanity.

Now that my knee is better I am back to going to the Gym every morning as part Physiotherapy and partly to shed the weight I put on while convalescing. Normally this perks me up and it does for a few hours until the effects and confidence wears off.

KB is continuously worried that my Depression may somehow be linked to her Relationship with Boyfriend. I know that would be a good conclusion and many of you readers are probably thinking the same thing. I have to admit that my Depression causes me to think about the two of them together but it is just because I feel disconnected from Life. I need to know what is going on with my Wife and Loved Ones. When I picture them together, Making Love, I feel Alone and Removed. Then I mentally smack myself for thinking that because I KNOW that I am not Alone. Then I feel great about the two of them being able to share themselves like that.

Then I feel Jealous. Why do I not have a Girlfriend?

Then I realize I don’t really want one right now. I wouldn’t know what to do and my Depression would not make me such a Catch. How much fun would I be?

I guess it is a bit of a Chicken and Egg thing. My Depression makes me feel Alone and feeling Alone makes me Depressed.

There is one thing that does annoy me more than others: KB continuously saying that she will stop seeing Boyfriend if it makes me feel bad. That would make me feel so much worse. I am already worried that my Depression is a burden on her. If she ended up sacrificing the Happiness and Joy that she gets from seeing Boyfriend, I would be so angry with myself. That would not be Fair. She has told me that she is In Love. Not to the same extent that he is In Love with her, but she feels strongly nonetheless. How can I let her forsake that due to my irrational Feelings?

I know that she is only looking out for my best interests and only wants to do things to make me Happy too, but I wish she could see how guilty and upset that would make me. I already feel Damaged in some way and I already feel like a Burden.

I don’t know what to suggest to her in the way of making me feel better. She is already doing everything she can and I am Smiling somewhere inside.

The Sun is shining very brightly just beyond the Clouds. I just have to learn to Fly.

Meeting the Boyfriend

So I met KB’s Boyfriend.

I didn’t really have much of a choice. It was demanded of me. Boyfriend is suffering from Confusion and Fear over my existence. He is having a hard time believing that I would allow my Wife to have a sexual and emotional relationship with another Man. He needed to meet me and get to know me. Poor guy.

Boyfriend and KB have been talking daily and he often pledges his Love for her. He tells her that she is the best thing that has ever happened to him. KB describes him as turning to butter when she is around. This is somewhat of a departure for him, from what I understand, for one of the things that drew her to him was his overt masculinity. Now he is a cute and cuddly puppy.

So he arrived with Imported Beer in hand and gave me a big hug right off the bat. It was my turn to feel somewhat uncomfortable. I am not much of a Hugger at the best of times but this immediate display of camaraderie was not expected.

But he was nervous. He talked non-stop about stereotypical guy things: hunting, guns, war, the military. KB’s eyes glazed over and I fought the urge to yawn. To top it all off he kept complimenting me on all manner of things. I felt sorry for him for being so uncomfortable.

KB did her part making it clear that I was okay with things by giving him kisses and cuddling with him on the couch.

Now, I have to say, he does appear like a Good Guy. And the two of them appear to be very comfortable with each other. I am pleased.

Finally I excused myself so that I could leave them alone. They do not have the opportunity to get physical all that often and I did not want to deny them the opportunity. I went out to the local pub.

When I returned they were cuddling half dressed on the bed. I quietly moved about the house so as to not disturb them. They emerged some time later and we chatted in the living room. He appeared to be more at ease. After some time, I decided to go to bed and left them alone again. A couple hours later I awoke to their moaning in the living room. Good for them, I thought.

He called the next day and they talked at length. He told her that he was on Cloud Nine and that he Loved her more than anything before. He is still bewildered by my support of this relationship but appears to be dealing with it.

I, on the other hand, was left with a headache from the Imported Beer he had brought over.

Name thy Daemon

OMG am I angry all of a sudden.

KM sent a postcard to us stating how she wishes she had never met us and that I should stop trying to contact her and express my feelings for her. She says she is so hurt by my words and calls my actions laughable.

On a postcard! How juvenile could one get?

KB is so upset as well.

We can’t believe how she has turned the tables so completely. She abandoned us emotionally and physically. She disrespected our feelings in favour of following her own desires. She diminufied our burgeoning relationship in favour of some stranger and relegated us to a schedule perfunctory relationship. And she has the gall to say she is hurt?

I feel so foolish for caring so deeply for her. I feel I answered the call of the siren in the waves and ended swallowing salt water at the bottom of the ocean. Her words of wisdom, garnered from second hand books and précis of philosophies, and words of enlightenment taken from self-help gurus belied her true self. There is no wisdom and enlightenment there, only the hollow mask of some sage long dead warrior. She is doomed to repeat herself and to harm those around her.

I can now be fully added to the list of broken bones left gnawed on the cave floor by this devilish creature.