Last session, Roxy asked us not to talk about anything heavy until this session. I could see that my husband was upset by that. He didn’t emerge from his bedroom much for a couple of days; I thought I knew why.

I’m afraid, I rather enjoyed the peace and quiet!

It wasn’t until a few days ago that he broke his silence and asked me if we could talk. I said yes.

It seems that he felt that she wasn’t impartial and seemed to direct the request not to talk about anything taxing at him. At the end of the session, she’d asked me if there was anything I’d like to say, but hadn’t left enough time to check in with hubby. He is very sensitive to being silenced.

He also felt that she was pushing something – maybe pushing us towards breakup. She might get that’s where we need to go. Based on what he’s saying, that’s not what he wants. He’s not sure that’s what he doesn’t want either, which is the same and different.

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The session started with my husband telling Roxy how the last session made him feel. She understood his point, and apologised.

There were a couple of times where neither Roxy nor husband could remember something, but because it’s written notes for myself and read them before the session, I was able to remember. I gave myself a little pat on the back.

We talked a lot about our different communication styles, how my husband feels that when I write things down and read them to him that I seem robotic, unemotional, and impersonal. I find that difficult, because what I write and read is the unedited truth of my thoughts. I do sometimes read him my blog without paraphrasing, so he hears “my husband”. I guess I can understand that might feel impersonal.

She observed that when I talk I say “I think” a lot, whereas hubby says “I feel”.

As I write this, I feel frustrated that my efforts to communicate are not recognised nor appreciated.

She suggested that I read a bit to myself, and then paraphrase it to him so that he feels more of a connection to what I’m saying; she thought I might be able to emote more if I do that.

We also discussed a problem with the time it takes me to come back to him on things that we are talking about. It might take a week, or weeks, before I’m ready to talk to him about something.

She asked whether I understood the frustration. I avoided answering directly. She is gentle, but persistent! And wouldn’t let me get away with not answering the question.

Ok! I get it, but that’s my process! I need time to think about things, to write them down, reflect, revisit, and rethink, before I know my own mind. Again I felt frustrated that what I do to help me process things and prompt me to talk to my husband about them later was not being understood and recognised. Maybe that’s the little boy in me wanting some reward.

Somehow, the subject turned towards sex. Husband told Roxy that he’d made a number of attempts to instigate sex by sending me pictures, videos, and texts, but it hadn’t been reciprocated. I said that I didn’t feel that we were in the right space to do that kind of thing at the moment, given the anger and unhappiness that is around. I don’t feel sexual towards him at the moment – it’s hard to hug a hedgehog: all prickly.

This week, without intense conversations, I’ve felt more able to approach my husband with affection and warmth. It’s hard to feel able to approach someone with warmth when there is a cold anger burning away.

I did realise something very important at this time in the counselling session: during my “peak crazy” when I was unable to filter anything I thought, I’d said something like “I need a nice Dom to help me explore this darkness, you can’t do that for me, so we have to open the relationship up or we can’t be together any more”. What a bastard I was! No wonder my husband felt unable to refuse – my words amounted to “give me what I want or we are over”.

He was upset by this and I could understand why. I myself felt hurt and angry still after something he’d said at the very dawn of our time together, over twenty-five years ago or more, where he’d threatened to go find sex elsewhere if I didn’t give him more. I’m afraid I acted very badly to that threat and called him all kinds of names.

When I made my demands, he actually tried to accommodate me.

Towards the end of the session Roxy asked me if there was anything I wanted to say. At the time I was feeling a bit hard done by about the Dom thing, especially since my husband had tried the same thing on me way back. I started to say something, but there wasn’t time to finish.

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After the session, my husband was upset that he was left hanging by my half finished sentences. So while I was driving us home, I told him that I still felt upset about the threat of him going elsewhere when we first started. “How many times are you going to punish me for that?” he asked, “I apologised for it and you punished me anyway and called me horrible names.”

At the end of the session, I kind of felt ok, not nearly as bad as I had at the end of the last session. By the time I got home I was feeling like shit. Well, serve me right!