Not long after his forty-eighth birthday, my husband Joe began to act strangely. He'd been a moody guy as long as I'd known him, occasionally going through short periods of crankiness and lethargy. This was different. Now, he was angry all the time, particularly angry at me, but not for any specific thing that I'd done. As well, he stopped doing the things that he enjoyed. His woodwork shop in the basement gathered dust, and he sat at the computer playing endless games of solitaire, and to top it off, he'd lost all interest in sex. When I suggested that something was wrong, he threw a tantrum, and told me to mind my own business.
I had the opportunity to talk to one of my closest friends, who's an RN, about Joe. She was almost certain that the problem was depression.
"He should get his ass to his doctor, and get some antidepressants, if it is depression." is what she told me.
I sat down with Joe that evening and tried to discuss the issue. I got the same angry response as I did the first time I'd tried to talk to him.
Life at home was bloody near unbearable. He'd been like this for almost six months, and I'd had just about enough. The final straw was when he slapped me in the middle of an argument that started when I tried for the ninety-ninth time to persuade him to see his doctor. He'd never raised his hand to me in the twenty-six years we'd been together. I went up to our bedroom and packed a bag and left, slamming the door behind me.
My sister and her husband put me up in their spare room for a week, until I found a small apartment. In the meantime, Joe found out where I was staying and phoned continually. In the one conversation I had with him, I told him that we could talk more once he'd been to see his doctor. "There's nothing wrong with me, Goddamn it!"
What a stubborn fool. After several weeks he stopped calling, but I got regular updates on how he was making out from our older daughter, who was making sure he ate properly. I don't know why, but I still loved the big idiot, and wanted to know that he was OK.
Despite the fact that he was still my husband and I still loved him, I decided to accept when a casual acquaintance asked me for a date. The second time we met, I let him take me to his place after our evening out. I hadn't had anything resembling affection from a man for almost eight months, so it wasn't hard for me to let go and ask him to make love to me. We fucked up a storm, and then woke up in the middle of the night and did it again. He wasn't particularly well endowed, but was a skillful lover, and really rang my chimes. I felt only slightly guilty.
We continued to see each other for a month or so, but it ended when his employer moved him to the east coast to open a new branch office. I was on my own again. I was introduced to a several men by my friends, and I started seeing a couple of them occasionally. Neither knew about the other. One was younger, and sex with him was great, not because he was a good lover, but simply that he was very enthusiastic and had good stamina. Peter, the other one, was a good deal older than me, and had some difficulty maintaining an erection, but was otherwise a patient and loving guy. Viagra helped a lot. He was much more grateful for my company than Karl, who tended to be arrogant at times. Peter and I cared a great deal for each other.
About that time I got the shock of my life, when my daughter called to tell me that Joe had been taken to hospital earlier in the day after swallowing a bottle of pills, and had almost died.
I rushed to the hospital to find him sedated and restrained to the bed. I sat with him though the night, and talked with his doctor in the morning, and told him the whole story. Once Joe recovered sufficiently, Dr. Grannville was able to talk some sense into him, and referred him to a psychiatrist. Thank God!
