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What Did I Do that was Wrong?  01

By: ohio



I watched them as they walked into my office. A very attractive couple. They both looked unhappy, of course; couples who are happy don't come to see a marriage counselor.

But I watched their body language carefully, looking for clues to the specific nature of their problems. They settled into the two matching chairs across from my desk, and we made our introductions.

"Welcome--I'm Dr. Tom Everett--please call me Tom."

After a mutual glance at one another, the wife spoke first. "I'm Leanne Seidler."

She stopped, and after a moment her husband said, "and I'm Mark Gleason."

"Nice to meet you both," I said, and stood up again to shake both their hands. Then there were a few moments of silence.

Leanne was a striking woman, perhaps 5'8", with wavy black hair just past her shoulders and dark, expressive eyes. She was wearing a sweater tight enough to show that she had prominent breasts, and her legs were shapely as well--a lot of them could be seen with the relatively short skirt she was wearing.

I wouldn't have said Leanne was beautiful, exactly--not in the way that a model is--but she was very attractive, and gave off an air of sensuality. Beyond that, however, she seemed frustrated and defensive. The way she held herself, sitting there in my office, seemed closed and wary. Was she dealing with guilt or with rage? Or both? I couldn't tell.

Mark was a very handsome man, about 6'2". He had sandy hair and blue eyes, and a kind of rugged good looks that I imagined got him a great deal of female attention. He had a strong jaw and looked well-built in an athletic way. I wondered if he'd played tight end in college. 

Unlike Leanne, however, his unhappiness manifested itself in a resigned, somewhat defeated look. His posture slumped, in marked contrast to Leanne's attitude of tension.

"Well," I said after a few moments, "let me ask you just a couple of questions to begin, if you don't mind. Mark, what kind of work do you do, and how long have you and Leanne been married?"

"I'm an architect--but also a builder. It's a little complicated. I originally got an engineering degree, then I worked in construction for a while, building houses. I went back to school for an architecture degree about ten years ago, and now I design houses, but I'm still involved on the building end as well."

He spoke without much energy, as though his answers didn't matter all that much. 

"Leanne and I have been married just under four years. It's a second marriage for each of us. I was married to a woman for just a couple of years, right after college; but it turned out we didn't have much in common."

He stopped, and I turned to Leanne.

"Leanne, do you also work?"

She gave me a smile that would have been appealing had it not been so tense.

"Yes, I'm a real-estate agent for Century 21. I handle residential properties in the Evanston and Winnetka area, which is also where we live."

Then more silence. These first meetings with couples generally go one of two ways. Sometimes the husband and wife are bursting to tell their stories, and I have to slow them down and keep them from talking at once, or screaming at each other. Then there's the other way, as with Mark and Leanne--nobody wants to come out and say what they're here for, and I've got to drag it out of them.

"Okay," I said. "Well, as you know, I'm a licensed psychotherapist and my practice includes a lot of marriage counseling as well. I got my Ph.D. from Northwestern, and I've been practicing here in Chicago for about 15 years or so.

"I'll be happy to tell you more about my background if you'd like, but why don't we get to the reason you have come to see me. How can I help?"

There was an awkward tension, as Mark and Leanne glanced at one another. Neither seemed eager to speak.

Finally Mark said, "we're having...marital problems. Sexual ones, I mean. I've been having...difficulty performing." He was staring at the carpet in front of my desk.

"Lately I've been sleeping in the guest room. It just feels too difficult sometimes, being with..." He waved his hand vaguely towards Leanne but let his voice drift off without finishing the sentence. I looked at Leanne and saw that her tension had increased.

"Has this been a problem throughout your marriage, or is it something that started happening recently?" I spoke matter-of-factly, trying to convey the attitude that we were talking about something not particularly serious.

He looked up at me now. "Just recently. About six or seven weeks ago. I caught..." He stopped, cleared his throat and went on. "I came home early from a trip and saw... saw my wife with another man."

Leanne practically leapt from her chair. "We have an...arrangement. Mark and I. He knows that I...see other men, sometimes."

Again keeping my face bland and neutral, I nodded to Leanne and looked back at Mark. He looked even more pained, but nodded his head in agreement.

"Yes, we...agreed before our marriage that Leanne could.... But it's always been very discreet. I never saw it, never heard about it."

Again Leanne jumped in. "It was kind of a 'don't ask, don't tell'. I knew that Mark didn't want to...to know anything about it, so I made sure it never intersected with our married life at all."

Once more I looked over to Mark, to see whether this was his view of things. Kind of reluctantly he nodded his head.

"Leanne was...she's been very good about...keeping her other activities private and discreet. I never knew anything about...the specifics. Until that afternoon."

I waited for one of them to continue, but the silence returned. Mark looked deeply withdrawn into himself, while Leanne practically simmered with tension.

"And since that time it's been...difficult?" I prompted.

Mark just glanced at me and nodded, clearly not wanting to say anything further.

Leanne burst out, "I've done everything I can! I love making love with Mark, and I..." She stopped for a moment, looking over at her husband. 

"I've been encouraging, I've been patient; I've...given him oral a lot. But sometimes it seems like...like Mark doesn't even WANT to..."

"That's not true!" Mark came to life suddenly, showing the first energy I'd seen since he entered my office.

"I do want to. I love Leanne, and I..." He stopped, and the energy seemed to leak back out of him. "I just keep...seeing them, and it...

"It just...takes away my confidence, I guess."

Leanne had tears in her eyes. She reached across to hold Mark's hand, but he gave his to her very unwillingly. After a minute or so she let it go.

While I prefer to work with both halves of a couple together, it already seemed clear that that wasn't going to work in this case. There were deep feelings on both sides that neither Mark nor Leanne felt comfortable simply expressing in front of one another.

"All right," I said, with what I hoped was a reassuring smile. " I think the best way forward would be for me to meet privately with each of you first, before we all meet together again." I spoke confidently, as though I used this procedure all the time.

"Would it be possible for each of you to schedule two one-hour meetings with me this week and two more next week?"

After a bit of hesitation they both nodded, Leanne more eagerly than her husband, and we worked out the details of days and times.

As they left my office I again studied their body language. Leanne reached briefly around Mark's waist to hug him, but he didn't respond. When they got to my office door he held it for her, but routinely, without any particular tenderness or attention.

Things were clearly in a very bad way. I was glad Mark and Leanne had come to me, but not at all confident I could succeed in helping them put their relationship back together.

MARK GLEASON'S STORY

In our private meetings without Leanne in the room it was far easier to get Mark to talk. He was still unhappy and discouraged, but his body language and energy level were less defeated. I was happy to see that he trusted me enough to tell me his story with what sounded like a reasonable degree of honesty. I could also see traces of the robust, healthy and strong man who must have attracted Leanne in the first place.

Mark grew up in Ohio, the oldest son of a carpenter and a school-teacher. He was always tall, athletic and good-looking, and had been something of a Golden Boy. As a midfielder in lacrosse he was All-State his last two years of high school, and went on to play lacrosse at Miami University of Ohio, where he was an All-Conference player for three years.

He was a good but not spectacular student, graduating with an engineering major and a high B average. He'd done construction work during the summers, so when he moved to the Chicago area after graduation he had no trouble finding a good job with a home-building company. His combination of practical experience and engineering training soon attracted the attention of the chief architect. 

After six years with the company Mark went back to school for his architecture degree, then returned to work as a combination architect and construction supervisor. This mixture of intellectual and physical work suited him, and kept him in terrific shape.

And as for his romantic and sexual life?

"I always seemed to be attractive to girls, I guess. Even in high school. Being a lacrosse star helped, but there were always girls dying to go out with me. Even the cutest ones, the cheerleaders.

"I lost my virginity my junior year with Elly Harmon. She was my girlfriend for about a year, and we had sex together a lot. When we broke up, in the middle of my senior year, I played the field. I must have slept with nearly a dozen other girls by the time I graduated.

"It was pretty much the same in college. Sometimes I was in a relationship, sometimes just dating. But there were always women who wanted to have sex with me, and I was happy to take them up on it!

"I wasn't a Don Juan--I certainly didn't set out to seduce and abandon girls. But I loved girls and I loved sex, and if they wanted to go to bed with me I was ready, willing and eager."

In his senior year Mark fell in love with Catherine Kubek, a fellow senior, and they got married right after graduation. The marriage lasted less than two years, and Mark didn't seem to have much regrets about it.

"We just didn't have much in common, I guess, once the excitement and all the passion wore off. We didn't even fight much, just drifted apart. It was a friendly divorce, no hard feelings. She got remarried and moved to California, near San Jose I think. It was quite a while ago."

At the age of 25, Mark was a single man again, and he happily played the field in the big city of Chicago for a few years. As before, there were lots of interested women--some turned into girlfriends, others were just brief flings.

Here he stopped and looked at me. "It's ironic, actually. I've always had success with women, and always felt confident and in control in bed, you know, sexually.

"It's not that I'm some master of the sexual arts--but women I've had sex with have always acted as though it was great, and so I never worried a bit about whether I was a good lover. Just assumed I was.

"But now, with this thing with Leanne.... That's what's so hard, I guess. A lifetime of feeling confident about myself, and now...now it seems like it's gone forever."

"Tell me about how you and Leanne got together."

As he spoke about his wife, and their early days together, the energy and excitement came back into his voice a little. It was clear that he was remembering happy times--happier than the ones he was experiencing now.

They met, not surprisingly, because she handled the marketing of some of the houses his company built. The very first time they went out for an after-work drink Mark could feel the spark.

"She wasn't the most beautiful woman I'd ever dated, though she is very beautiful. But there's such an energy to her! Leanne is so full of life--her laughter, her gestures, the way she flirts."

He laughed, a little bitterly. "She flirts a lot--always has. And at the time it didn't bother me a bit. I was confident, as I told you, and it was kind of exciting to be with a woman who flaunted her sexuality a little.

"It was never over the top. I never ever felt she was coming on to other guys or trolling for dates while we were together--just that she knew she was sexy, knew that men wanted her, and didn't mind letting them see that she knew it."

Mark said he probably could have taken her to bed after their first date, but he held back. He already had a feeling that Leanne was special, and he didn't want to rush it. For their second date, on a Friday night, he made her dinner at his apartment.

"I pulled out all the stops--I'm a pretty good cook, and I really wanted to impress her, so I made some fancy stuff, had a nice bottle of wine, you know what I mean."

That date ended with snuggling together in front of the fire, then with a night of love-making in Mark's bed. Leanne stayed with him all the next day and night, leaving only to go home for a change of clothes. Almost instantly, he said, they seemed to be in the middle of an intense love-affair.

"I was just crazy about her--not only sexually, but talking to her, just holding her hand. Doing typical lovebird things, like wandering through antique shops or sitting in the park having a picnic. She was smart, funny, so sexy, and endlessly interesting."

Their sex life was terrific from the very beginning, according to Mark. Leanne was obviously experienced--which didn't bother him at all, since he was too--and she was eager and skillful. They made love gently, lingeringly, or at other times they fucked each other's brains out. Both of them enjoyed oral sex, either as foreplay or occasionally instead of intercourse. And Leanne was up for anything Mark wanted to try: unusual positions, making love outdoors one night in a local park, even doing it once with her sitting on his lap in an adult movie theater, while the dirty old men in raincoats looked on enviously.

They saw each other 2-3 times a week for several months. Always they spent at least one day and night of the weekend together, at her apartment or his; but when Mark suggested once that they live together, Leanne told him she wasn't quite ready for that yet, and he backed off.

"I knew she was the woman for me, though. I was 34, I'd been single for nine years, and I was ready to settle down for good with this incredible lady."

After eight months of dating, Mark took Leanne for a picnic one summer day in a park on the shore of Lake Michigan. After a leisurely lunch together in the shade on a blanket, he pulled out an engagement ring and asked her to marry him.

"She reacted so strangely! She looked at me in surprise, then smiled, gave me a huge kiss, then started to cry! She said, 'oh Mark, I love you' a bunch of times, but she didn't say 'yes'.

"And then, still crying, she said, 'let's get back to my apartment this second. I need you, sweetheart, and I don't want to wait another minute'."

So they returned to her apartment, and she made love to Mark with an intensity and tenderness that went beyond anything he'd ever experienced before. It was, he said, the most totally satisfying experience, physically and emotionally, he'd ever had.

"I'd never felt so close to her--to anyone. Never felt so completely loved. We fell asleep for a while in each other's arms. It was the happiest moment of my life, I think. Everything felt perfect, even though I vaguely remembered she hadn't agreed to marry me yet."

When they woke up they showered together, and Mark smilingly reminded Leanne of his proposal. To his shock, she got a serious look on her face and said they needed to talk. They dried off, dressed, and she led him to the sofa.

" 'Mark,' she said to me, 'this is the hardest thing I've ever had to do in my whole life. Please just listen to me, okay, before you say anything? God, I'm so afraid you're just going to get up and walk out of my life!

" 'I love you, totally--completely. And I want so much to marry you. But...but you need to know something about me first. And after you know it, I don't know if you'll ever want to see me again.'

"I had no idea what she was going to say, and I started to protest that nothing could change my feelings for her, but she cut me off.

" 'Just listen first, okay? I'm...I've... Jesus, I don't know how to say it.

" 'All my life I've needed...variety. Different people. Sexually, I mean.

" 'I learned a long time ago that complete sexual monogamy just...doesn't work for me. I've never cheated on anybody in my life--but the times I've tried to stay faithful to one man, to my high-school boyfriend and then later to Adam (her first husband), I was...I just found out I couldn't be happy that way.'

"I was staring at her in complete shock," Mark continued. "I was thinking, has she been sleeping with other guys while we've been going out? And I started to get furious--but I realized we'd never discussed it. I had never asked her to be exclusive with me or told her I was being exclusive with her, though I was. I hadn't even thought about another woman since our second date.

"Well, it turned out Leanne HAD been seeing--let's call it what it is, fucking--had been fucking other guys while she and I were having our love affair.

"She was very vague about it--no numbers, no specifics. It was clear that it was just for sex, just for the thrill of doing it with someone new. There had obviously been more than one during the eight months we'd been together, but I don't know how many. Five? Ten? Forty? I had no idea--she didn't say, and I almost instantly realized I didn't want to know.

"Leanne could see that I was stunned--and hurt. She repeatedly told me how much she loved me, how she'd never felt so deeply for anyone before. She explained over and over that her sexual encounters with other men were fun and exciting but superficial. They didn't connect to her emotional life at all, though they obviously did fill some important need for her. The need for excitement, I guess, or the need to feel attractive. I guess she'll tell you all about it....

"Anyway, she assured me that she would love to spend her life with me, but that she would need to have the freedom to continue to...fuck other guys.

" 'Only from time to time, baby!' she told me. 'Never anything ongoing, no love affairs, nothing serious. Just pure sex, pure physical sex.'

"I was just sitting there, stunned, you know? Probably looking at her like she had two heads. And she was crying a little, and holding my hand, and continually telling me how much she loved me.

" 'I would be totally discreet--just like I've been up til now, sweetheart. It wouldn't ever be anyone we knew socially, no one from work--just something private and separate from our life together. And you would never know a thing about it, never even have to think about it, unless you wanted to.'

"Finally she ran out of words, and we sat there. Her looking affectionate and incredibly anxious, me probably looking like a piano just fell on my head.

"When I pulled myself together to speak I probably sounded pretty stupid. I said something like, 'you mean you've been...seeing other guys since we've been together?'

"And she nodded and said, 'yes, baby. But you've never known, right? And you've never felt the least bit insecure about my love, or how much I want you? God, you must know how crazy you make me in bed!' And she leaned over and gave me a crushing hug, kissing me on the cheek and the neck.

"I was still in shock. I said, 'and you want... You want me to agree to let you...fuck other people after we're married?'

"She just looked at me, sadly, and then she nodded her head.

" 'I just can't...do the total fidelity bit, Mark. I know myself well enough to know I can't be happy that way.


What Did I Do that was Wrong?  01



" 'But you would never have to know! I would never, ever do anything to embarrass you, I swear! It would only be while we weren't together, and when we were together you would have all of me. Just the way you've had all of me every minute we've been together, since that first night you made dinner for me.'

"I knew I had to get out of there. It felt suddenly like I was in the middle of a nightmare, and unable to wake up. I told Leanne I needed to think, and that I'd be in touch. She tried to get me to stay, to talk further about it, but I just gave her a quick kiss and got the hell out of there. I was in total shock."

Not surprisingly, Leanne's revelation completely threw Mark for a loop. It was several days before he could even bring himself to call her, though she had left him a number of affectionate and concerned messages. He could barely focus on his work, with all the thoughts running through his head.

And one thought above all: "Could I have been so wrong about Leanne? Have I been totally blind to what kind of person she is?"

The kind of promiscuous lifestyle that Leanne was insisting on continuing was totally at odds with everything he understood about her: that she was loving, considerate, thoughtful, and devoted to him. Mark just couldn't put the contradictory pieces together, and it drove him crazy.

Finally, after nearly a week, he called Leanne and they met for lunch. 

"My heart lurched at the sight of her, when I picked her up. She was so beautiful, and I realized again how much I loved her.

"When we were waiting for our food to come she took my hand across the table, and said, 'I've really missed you, Mark.'

"Before I could stop myself I said, 'how many...' and then stopped. I was going to ask, 'how many guys have you fucked in the last week?' It was halfway out of my mouth, and then I stopped. I knew I didn't want to know.

"I excused myself, went to the Men's Room, washed my face, tried to calm down, and then went back to the table, and we talked about other things."

After they'd eaten, Mark told her how much trouble he was having with her insistence on being with other men.

"It revolted me and frightened me, quite frankly," he said to me. "I had always been a confident lover, and now I was wracked with doubts that I couldn't satisfy the woman I loved. I obviously wasn't enough for her, or why would she want to fuck other people?"

All Leanne could do was reassure him, over and over again. This had nothing to do with him, she said--he was a fantastic lover and she was completely satisfied with him, in bed and out. This had to do with her own needs, for something exciting and spontaneous and totally separate from their relationship.

And she asked Mark if they could just continue seeing one another? Step back a little, go back to dating, spending nights together sometimes, and see how it went? She told him she was sure that he'd realize how deeply she cared for him, and how her other "activities" were no threat to their relationship.

" 'Please don't give up on me, baby,' she said.

"As crazy as it may seem, I decided to give it a chance. I'd been thinking all week of how much I loved Leanne, more than any woman I'd ever known, and I couldn't imagine not being with her. So I told myself, what did I have to lose?"

One of Mark's ground rules to Leanne was that they wouldn't talk any further about her involvement with other men. He didn't want to know anything at all about it, and was counting on her to keep her activities completely hidden from him.

"I know that I've always been good at denying unpleasant things, pushing them away and pretending they don't exist. I probably got it from my father, who is the same way. During my junior year of college my mother got breast cancer, which she died of after a year and half. I still remember all those meetings between the doctor and me, my father and my sister. 

"The doctor would spell out my mom's condition in detail, and the prognosis. And when we three talked about it afterwards, it was like my father and I had never even been in the room! My sister would say, 'you don't remember the doctor said she only had three months to live?' or something like that, and my father and I would both shake our heads.

"We both just had a need to protect ourselves emotionally, I guess, and we did it by repressing painful things. And I did the same thing with Leanne's 'flings', I guess I can call them.

"I guess that another man in the same situation might have wanted to talk it all out: establish all sorts of rules with Leanne, like no more than so many flings in a month, or never in our house, or always use condoms. But I just didn't want to know anything--I felt like closing my eyes and sticking my fingers in my ears.

"Actually, I did know about condoms, because Leanne always insisted on them. It was a big deal when we decided to stop using them together: when things were getting serious between us, she started taking the pill. We went and got tested for STDs, and when we both turned out clean we celebrated with our first bareback sex.

"So I knew, without asking, that she must be using condoms with the other guys as well.

"Otherwise, though, I insisted that this be a forgotten topic, not to be spoken about again. And Leanne readily agreed--she was so eager to please me, willing to do anything to keep us together. And so we just dropped the subject.

"Actually," he recalled, "that's not totally true. I brought it up one more time with her, about a week later. I asked her whether I didn't have sex with her often enough, whether that was the reason she needed to have other guys. And she looked at me lovingly, kind of sadly, and said No, it had nothing to do with that, she loved our sexual relationship just the way it was.

"It was more like needing a massage, she said, or a vigorous game of racketball. Just a physical release that had nothing to do with love, nothing at all to do with the way we felt about one another.

"I can't say I found that a satisfactory response--but there was nothing to do but let it drop."

After that lunchtime conversation, Mark and Leanne's relationship gradually regained its footing. They took it very slow, backing off to just one date every week or two for a while. At first Mark wasn't sure he wanted to continue having sex her right away--perhaps a combination of resentment and a new insecurity about his performance. 

Every time they were together, he couldn't keep from thinking about who she might have been fucking in the days since he'd last seen her--what they might have done with her, whether they'd turned her on more than he could.

But Leanne was too loving and sexy to resist for long, and when they fell back into bed again their lovemaking was as passionate and satisfying as it had ever been. Somewhat to Mark's disbelief, he found within a few months that things with Leanne were as great as they had been before.

"Like I said, I was good at denying, and I'd had plenty of experience. It wasn't that I forgot what Leanne might be doing when we weren't together. In fact at first I thought about it all the time, every day we were apart. Was she screwing somebody right now? Where did she meet him? Was he better hung than I, was he giving her pleasure I could never match?

"But I resolutely pushed the thoughts away, and after a while there weren't so many of them. And Leanne never ever did the slightest thing to make me jealous or suspicious. She might have been fucking other guys once a month or three times a week, and I would have had no idea."

"How about your own sex life? Was Leanne available to you when you wanted to make love? Did she initiate love-making with you?"

"Yes to both. Both back then and since we've been married, we have a lot of sex, with either one of us taking the lead. I guess there's an occasional night when she says she's too tired or just doesn't feel like it, but it doesn't happen often at all. And there's never been anything about it to make me suspicious. I have an occasional night when I don't feel all that sexy either, so I can understand."

Ten. months after Leanne told Mark about her flings, he proposed again, and this time she accepted him joyfully. 

"I knew I had to indicate to her that I understood what I was agreeing to, but I just didn't want to talk about it. So I said something like, 'I love you, and I love the relationship we have now--and I want it to continue, just like this, for the rest of our lives.'

"So Leanne knew I was accepting that she could have her flings, without me having to spell it out."

And their marriage was happy and fulfilling for both of them--right up to the time he saw her with another man. They had decided not to have children--Leanne stayed on the pill--and when they weren't working they were cooking together, seeing friends or traveling, skiing many weekends in the winter and sailing in the Caribbean on summer vacations.

"I have to say, Tom, I grew to love her more and more. My dad has become a crotchety old man, hard for me and most other people to get along with. But when he comes for visits Leanne turns him into a pussycat! She flirts with him and he flirts right back--he's utterly charming. He's always pulling me aside and telling me how lucky I am to have her. And because of their great relationship, my dad and I are closer now than we've been in years.

"And when it comes to my friends and colleagues from work, Leanne is absolutely wonderful. I was afraid at first that she'd maybe be too flirtatious, you know, a little inappropriate? But she keeps her sexy side completely under wraps. She is utterly comfortable being the devoted, supportive wife, and again, all my buddies tell me how lucky I am.

"It's not that she puts on an act, either, with my dad or my work friends. She is genuinely warm, and thoughtful, and knows how to make people feel at ease.

"And we have such a great time together! I mean, out of bed. I see from your ring finger that you're married, so I'm sure you know what I mean. After a while marriage is about so much more than sex--it's the companionship, the feeling of having a loving friend who supports you and understands you. It's the silly times together, watching a dumb movie, doing the grocery shopping..."

Mark stopped speaking, quite suddenly, and put one hand over his eyes. Then without looking at me he began to speak again, hesitantly.

"What did I do that was wrong? I...just love her so much. I can't imagine being without her. But I can't ...I... just don't see how I can live with... what she does."

We sat quietly for a while, and then I asked him if he would tell me about the day he found her with another man. He nodded, but then he sat for almost a minute before he began.

"I'd flown up to Milwaukee for two days to supervise a project we were doing up there--I've made the trip four or five times over the past year. I was due back on a Thursday at dinner time, but we finished early the second day and when I got to the airport at around noon I was able to grab a standby seat on a flight getting back to Chicago at 1:45.

"I barely made it onto the plane before the doors closed, so I didn't have time to call Leanne before we took off. When we landed at O'Hare, I called her cell and left a message that I'd be home by 3 pm. Then I called the house too, just in case, but she didn't answer--so I left a message there too."

"Were you thinking about whether she might...be with someone?" I asked him.

"No, I...shit, I don't know. Probably. At least a little.

"I'd like to say that after four years I'd stopped thinking about it, but that's bullshit. I NEVER stopped thinking about it. I just thought about it less often--found it easier to push the thoughts away.

"Because as I've said, Leanne never did or said anything to give me the slightest suspicions. No coming home late with her clothes all rumpled, or racing past me for the shower, no people calling the house and hanging up when I answered--nothing like that at all.

"I could have been married to the most perfect, most faithful wife in the world, except that I knew I wasn't.

"So yeah, I guess was I thinking about the possibility. I don't know how seriously I was worrying about it, but.... In any case, when I got to the house there was a strange car in the driveway. Then I really WAS worried.

"I sat there for a moment, not knowing what to do. I used my cell to call the house again, but Leanne didn't pick up. I wondered if a friend had dropped by and they'd gone somewhere in Leanne's car. I guess that's what I hoped had happened. I tried her cell again and got no answer.

"So I walked slowly towards the front door, hoping against hope that she wasn't inside balling some guy. I really didn't want to walk into anything like that! All the same, I was damned if I was going to sit and wait outside my own house.

"As I came towards the house I heard sounds from the back yard, where the pool is. Our house is in a very private location, with a long driveway, set back into the woods, and the back yard overlooks the lake. And it was a really hot, sunny day.

"Anyway, I heard a man's voice--saying something like, 'oh baby, that's so good!' And I--I..."

Mark stopped, grimacing, looking down, folding his arms tightly across his chest, as if to keep from falling apart. I waited quietly.

"I know I shouldn't have gone back there," he finally said. "I should have turned on my heel, gone back to my car and driven away. I still would have had to confront Leanne about it, but it... it wouldn't have been as... as bad as actually seeing it.

"But I just couldn't help it. I quietly walked down the path around the side of the house until I could see the pool deck. Leanne was there, naked, with a naked guy. He was young, maybe 28, tall and skinny. He had a long skinny dick too, which was hard to miss because it was sticking straight out.

"She was sitting on a chair and he was standing in front of her, as though he'd just pulled his dick out of her mouth. She was smiling up at him, her hands on his hips. She picked up a condom, tore the wrapper open, and rolled it onto his cock. Then she got up, took his hand and led him over to this air mattress we have, a double mattress that we use to float in the pool together.

"It was lying on the grass. She lay down on her back and he climbed on top of her, in the missionary position. As he was up on his hands and knees, not inside her yet, she reached up, put her arms around him and gave him a long, loving kiss.

"It shocked me--I mean I just about fell over. I was frozen in place, watching. Then he gently entered her and settled his body on top of hers, and they began to do it." Mark was telling the story in a low voice, almost a monotone, his eyes fixed on the carpet in front of him.

"What killed me was how loving it was. She opened her legs for him so tenderly, like not lustfully but with love; and while they were fucking, slowly and gently, her arms were around his neck and they were having these long, deep kisses, tongues and everything.

"All these years I'd been coping with...Leanne's flings partly by telling myself that her...her sexual encounters with other men were purely physical, almost like a whore and a customer. Just physical lust, you know? Like a sweaty tennis match. But this was..." He broke off for a minute.

"She and I have made love in the backyard hundreds of times--slowly, just enjoying the privacy, and being with one another. And here she was doing the same thing with another guy! It looked so loving and intimate--just like I imagine it looks when Leanne and I make love. She was giving herself to this guy so completely. They were murmuring to each other, and smiling, and kissing a lot.

"I must have watched them for a minute or two, I don't know how long. I was numb, and in incredible pain. And all I could think was, 'this isn't fucking--this is lovemaking. She's making love to him, just the way she does to me.'

"And, of course, it was incredibly obvious to me that it wasn't the first time with this guy. They were so familiar, so relaxed and loving together.

"Finally I pulled myself away--I knew I had to get out of there. I was suddenly terrified that I'd see or hear her orgasm, and it would just kill me. 

"I never even considered breaking in on them--that's the old denial instinct, I guess. I went back to the car, drove to the mall, of all places, and just sat in the car in the parking lot, running the air conditioner and blasting a hard rock station as loud as I could stand. I guess I was trying to turn my mind off, or blow the images right out of my brain. Needless to say it didn't work."

Mark stopped again. He sat, staring off into space; then finally he looked up at me, gave me a half-smile that was more of a grimace, and wiped his eyes with the back of his hand.

"I guess you've got to hear the rest of it, don't you?"

I just smiled and nodded, trying to look sympathetic. He nodded back at me, and went on.

"I stayed away until about 6, the time I was originally due to get home. I wandered through the mall, looking at women's clothes, CDs, hardware. I saw a dozen things I might have bought Leanne as gifts, but I didn't buy anything.

"It wasn't that I was angry--just stunned. Like a truck had hit me and sent me flying, but I hadn't hit the ground yet. It was gonna hurt soon, but....

"I would like to say that I thought things through and figured out what to do next, but it was just the opposite. My mind swirled, taking me back over and over to seeing them together, screwing so lovingly, and I just couldn't get past that.

"When I stepped into the house, Leanne was there waiting for me with a bottle of Sam Adams in her hand. That was kind of an inside joke between us--she always did that when I came back from a trip--but her face was tense and worried.

"She was completely cleaned-up and put together, of course, but she'd checked the answering machine and knew I'd gotten an earlier flight. It wasn't hard for her to put two and two together, and she must have been very concerned about what I might have seen or heard.

"I guess as soon as she saw my face she knew things were bad, because she didn't even try to give me a cheerful 'Welcome home, honey' or anything like that. She just looked at me and said, 'oh Mark, are you okay?'

"And I shook my head, and said something like, 'no I'm not, actually,' and went past her, ignoring the beer and her attempt to hug me, and went straight up into the bedroom and locked the door. I wondered if she'd come up after me, but she left me alone for a while. 

"I kicked off my shoes and lay on the bed, and before I knew it I was crying--sobbing like a baby, my mind replaying over and over what I'd seen that afternoon. I couldn't stop. I must have cried for nearly twenty minutes. Finally I just fell asleep for an hour or so."

When Mark woke up, he took a shower and went back downstairs. Leanne was waiting with dinner on the table, looking even more worried than before.

"I knew I had to tell her something, so I said, 'I saw you with him this afternoon.'

"And she looked horrified, and started to say, 'oh Mark, I'm so sorry!' and I just stopped her. I said, 'I don't want to talk about it.'

"I went over to the table and held her chair for her, and after she sat I took her hand and squeezed it, just to say something like, 'I'm still here with you', and we ate our dinners. In total silence, at first. Every time she tried to talk about that day I stopped her, just looked over and put my finger to my lips. It was a pretty weird dinner, I guess, ten minutes of just eating without saying a word.

"Finally she said, 'so how did everything go in Milwaukee?' And I realized that she understood, that I just couldn't talk to her about what I'd seen in the back yard. So I told her about my trip, and how the project was going--a nice safe conversation about something else.




What Did I Do that was Wrong?  01



"And then I went into the living room, flopped down on the couch and turned on the TV. I have no idea what was on, but it didn't much matter. Leanne brought us coffee, and she tentatively sat down next to me, probably afraid I'd push her away.

"But I didn't, I just put my arm around her, and she sighed and put her head on my shoulder, and we sat there for a couple of hours watching inane TV, not talking at all.

"When we went up to bed it was the same. We snuggled up together the way we always do. Leanne started to kiss me, and slide her hand down my front towards my cock, as she sometimes does when she wants sex--but I just held her arm and shook my head. She looked into my eyes anxiously, but I managed to smile at her.

"So she turned over and spooned back into me, and amazingly enough we fell asleep. I was afraid I'd never sleep again, but I was out within minutes."

As Mark continued his story, I became more and more amazed at how strong his instinct for denial was. It seemed obvious to me, and presumably would have been obvious to anyone listening, that the next step would have been a long talk between him and Leanne--addressing both their feelings about what had happened, and trying to work out how to move forward.

But he resisted all of Leanne's attempts to start such a conversation, and behaved as though all he wanted was to "get back to normal". Starting the day after his return, Mark did everything he could to act as though nothing had happened. He was cheerful and affectionate, which must have been an enormous relief to Leanne, but he deflected every reference she made to the events of the previous day.

After a couple of days, it seems, she understood that "pretend it never happened" was what he wanted to do, and she went along with him. The trouble, of course, is that it didn't work. And the place that it most obviously didn't work was the bedroom.

Mark and Leanne had previously made reservations for the following weekend at a little inn in a lakeside town about an hour north of Chicago. They'd gone there several times before for romantic getaways, and always had a terrific time. They took walks along the lake, sunned themselves by the pool, and made love--a lot. Mark told me that their previous weekends there had been wall-to-wall sex, maybe six times or more in a 48-hour period.

But this time things didn't go according to plan. When Leanne approached Mark in bed the first night, he was initially reluctant, but then began to respond to her loving foreplay. But they hadn't been having intercourse for more than a few seconds before he lost his erection.

"I could feel it starting to happen, but there wasn't a damn thing I could do about it. We were in the missionary position, and my mind was filled with images of Leanne and that guy in our back yard--how loving and affectionate it was. All I could think was, 'is she that loving with all her other men? How many guys does she make love with? Do I even make the Top Ten?'

"I knew it was ridiculous--I knew that Leanne loved and cherished me--but it didn't make any difference. My cock took a nose-dive. I could see Leanne was worried, because this had literally never happened to me before, but I didn't want to talk about it. Without a word, I slid down and started eating her out.

"It wasn't much fun for me, because of the pictures running through my head. And it maybe wasn't much fun for her, either, but she came after a few minutes--or pretended she did. And then we just cuddled, and went to sleep. She kept stroking my cheek with her hand, and kissing me, and saying 'I love you, baby'.

"And I knew she was really saying, 'don't worry, it's all right'. But it wasn't all right with me, needless to say."

They tried three more times during the weekend. Mark made sure they avoided the missionary position, and he did manage once to keep it up long enough, with Leanne on top in the cowgirl position, for them to reach orgasm, though it was a struggle for both of them. As the weekend went on Mark became more and more unhappy and withdrawn, and Leanne more and more alarmed. But he still wouldn't talk to her about what he was feeling.

Mark stopped speaking, and I waited, but it seemed as though he didn't want to say any more.

Finally I asked, "and what has been going on since then?"

He sighed. "More of the same. We pretend during the day that everything's normal--I know Leanne wants to talk to me about...that day, but I just can't face it.

"So we smile and give each other a good-bye kiss in the morning, and then at dinner we chat about this and that, summer plans, or how work is going.

"In bed is the worst. I keep having, you know, the same problem. Leanne is always really patient, loving--she'll use her mouth, which sometimes works for a while, but when we get to...to actually screwing, I almost always lose my erection. More and more often she doesn't even approach me--we just snuggle, and go to sleep.

"One night two weeks ago I had drifted off to sleep, and then in the middle of the night I woke up because I could hear Leanne sobbing. She'd turned away and buried her face in the pillow, but I could still hear her. I felt awful!

"Since then I've been sleeping in the guest room a lot. I'll stay up late, watching TV or something until she's gone to bed, and then just go into the guest room rather than our room. I hate doing it, but it's...it's too humiliating to be with Leanne and feel like such a complete failure."

"Do you think," I asked carefully, "that it might make sense to go ahead and have the conversation that Leanne wants? To talk about...that day?"

"And say what?" Mark's eyes were haunted. "That I saw her making love so tenderly, so affectionately with another man? That I couldn't believe she could be so loving with him? That it wasn't fucking at all--it was giving to him what she should only be giving to me?

"That I'm totally destroyed by it? That I don't know if I'll ever be able to trust her again, to believe her when she tells me our love is special, that I'm the only man she really loves?

"That I can't imagine ever having my self-confidence back--that I wonder if I'll EVER be able to make love to her the way I used to?

"Jesus, Tom, what's the point of getting into all that? How could saying those things possibly make anything better?" By now Mark was nearly shouting, and his hands tightly clenched the arms of his chair.

"At least she would know what you were feeling. And she would have the chance to respond to those feelings--to reassure you."

He snorted. "Right! 'Oh honey, it wasn't love-making, it just LOOKED that way! Never mind that I gave him deep, loving kisses and smiled at him and murmured in his ear just like I do with you--I didn't really mean it with him!' Do you think that would do any good?

"All it would do is confirm to her what a fucking wimp I am--that I'm not the man she thought she married."

"No," I said, "I think it would force her to understand that the arrangement she insisted on before you got married, which you told her you could accept, is no longer an arrangement you can live with."

He stared at me, his angry expression slowly turning to a more thoughtful one.

I continued, "have you thought about what you want for the future, Mark? For yourself, for your relationship with Leanne? Do you know what you want me to help you and Leanne work towards?"

"No, I don't know," he said, shaking his head slowly. "I've tried to think about it--God, I've spent hours trying to think about it, but my thoughts just go around and around without getting anywhere. I can't get past the pictures in my head....

"I know I love Leanne. That hasn't changed. I've never been as happy in my life as I've been with her. I don't want to give that up.

"But I also know I can't stand the situation we're in. I simply can't handle being one of her stable of fuck-buddies. Even if I'm the #1 fuck-buddy, whatever that means.

"And I don't know if I can.... For Christ's sakes, I don't know if I'll ever be able to be the man I used to be with her! How can I, with that image in my mind of her and that asshole in my back yard?

"And if I can't...."

He was silent for a full minute. Then he looked up at me. "If I can't, you know, be a man with her again--have a real sex life--then I just can't see us staying together. It would be a lifetime of hell, for both of us."

****************

The next time Mark came into my office there was a striking difference in his attitude. He walked in loose-jointedly, looking relaxed and at ease. Sitting in the chair, he let a kind of sheepish grin appear on his face. When I asked about it, he chuckled.

"Sorry, Tom, I was thinking about what happened to me at lunch today. I was in a diner on the South Side, just having a burger and a cup of coffee, on the way here from a job site, and the waitress tried to pick me up."

I looked interested and he continued.

"She couldn't have been more than 22 or so! A cute blonde, kind of slim but with a nice figure. She was very attentive, you know? 'How's that hamburger? Can I get you anything else? More coffee? The cherry pie is great today, would you like a piece?'

"And she had a way of bending over just a little further than necessary, letting me see down the top of her blouse.

"I just kept smiling, enjoying the treatment. Then when she brought the check, she gave me an extra-big smile and a wink. When I picked it up there was a business card from the restaurant underneath--on the back she had written, 'I get off at 6 pm and I'm free most nights--Love, Liz,' and left a phone number."

"Are you tempted to do something about it?"

He shook his head. "Not seriously. I mean, she was cute and I'm sure it would be fun to hop in bed with her, but...certainly not while I'm still married to Leanne." He looked sober and thoughtful.

"Okay, but can you imagine doing it? What do you think would happen?"

His response, interestingly, was a very confident one. He described calling Liz, taking her to dinner, then to bed. "From the way she acted in the restaurant she'd be really eager, very into the sex. I imagine we'd do it 3-4 times, spending most of the night at it. I can just see her, squealing and grabbing onto me as she comes. Jesus, thinking about it is getting me going a little!"

"Does this happen to you a lot?" I asked. "I mean, women trying to pick you up like that."

"Actually, it does," he said, looking a little embarrassed. "Not when I'm with Leanne, of course, but quite a bit when I'm by myself, or even occasionally with some of the guys from work."

With a mixture of pride and embarrassment, Mark went on to tell me a number of similar stories. From the sound of it, he was the recipient of female attention nearly every place he went--grocery stores, bars, restaurants, occasionally in the subway.

"Back in my single days, I was more than ready to take some of these women up on it. I remember a time when two girls from Northwestern started chatting me up on the "L". We ended up going back to their apartment and fucking pretty much nonstop from Friday night until Sunday afternoon.

"Turned out they did this from time to time--they were bi, and they really enjoyed sharing a guy. When they'd worn me out temporarily, they'd do a 69 on each other for a while, and that got me hard again in a hurry."

As Mark shared a number of his adventures with me, his tone of voice and his body language conveyed a relaxed, confident side of him that I hadn't seen much of before. Toward the end of the session he started to slow down and I said, "what comes to mind, Mark, when you think about the stories you've been telling me today?"

After a moment he said, "I guess I feel embarrassed now--like I was being some big show-off, trying to impress you with all the babes I've fucked. Trying to convince you I was some kind of stud."

"Convince me, or remind yourself?" I asked.

"I don't...well, maybe some of both."

"The thing that strikes me, Mark, is that you told those stories without bragging, in a rather matter-of-fact way. I think you were remembering that for an awful lot of your adult life, you've not only been attractive to women but a good lover of women, someone who satisfied them and gave them a lot of pleasure.

"Now--why might you be feeling the need to remind yourself of that right now?"

"Pretty obvious question, doc!" he replied sarcastically. "Because since I saw Leanne with...that guy, I've been feeling like a sexual failure."

"But your stories paint quite a convincing picture that you're not a failure at all, don't they?"

He nodded, slowly. "Yes, I guess they do. I guess...in a way I was kind of giving myself a pep talk, wasn't I?"

I nodded. "And it's quite understandable that you would be feeling the need for one, in light of what you're struggling with.

"But the facts are clear, Mark. You are a very attractive guy--one who has no trouble getting together with women, and one who makes them happy in bed. Including Leanne, from everything you've told me.

"Now we have to stop in a minute. But I want you to think about the point we've just arrived at. What you saw that day in your back yard was a blow to your sense of manhood--it would be hard for virtually any husband to take.

"But it wasn't a fatal blow. The story you told me earlier, imagining a night with Liz from the restaurant, was one in which you were a confident, successful lover, one who excited and pleased your partner.

"That is who you still are, Mark, who you still know yourself to be."

He looked at me intently, nodding his head slightly. "I believe that, actually--to my surprise I believe it.

"The only question is, can I still be that guy with Leanne? Or am I going to have to find someone else to rediscover that confidence with?"

And before I could respond he had risen and headed for the door, saying only, "thanks, Tom," as he left.



What Did I Do that was Wrong? 02



LEANNE SEIDLER'S STORY

My conversations with Leanne were very different, right from the beginning. She is much less methodical and orderly than her husband, and we tended to jump from one subject to another. In addition, she was obviously unhappy and anxious, and a mixture of guilt and defiance was evident from the very moment she first came into my office by herself.

"Well, I guess it's time now to hear from the slut, right?" She stared at me as if daring me to agree with her.

"I've never found that to be a very useful term, actually," I said.

"What shall we call me, then--the wife who can't keep her legs closed? The evil, cuckolding whore?"

"Is that how you think of yourself, Leanne?" I asked.

Suddenly she started to cry. "No!" she said. "Oh, I don't know! Maybe I do, a little."

She dried her tears with a tissue. "I never used to--not before Mark and I were married, not even before...before THIS happened.

"I am...I was...a very sexual person. It was something I learned about myself back in my teens, and it's been true ever since. Sex means a lot to me. And the thrill, the excitement, of being with different people--I've always needed that.

"But I never felt like a whore before."

"And what's caused that change?"

"The way Mark looks at me! The way he shuffles through life now, all crushed and self-pitying. The way he can't make love to me any more, or even stand to be around me..." She was crying again, quietly, looking at me.

"After dinner he disappears into his office with his paperwork, or gets lost in front of a ballgame on TV. And he'll stay up until long after I've gone to sleep, or he'll give me a peck on the cheek and go off to sleep in the guest room. I miss him! I want him back, and he won't let me in.

"Tell me, Tom! Tell me, please: what did I do that was wrong? We had an agreement, and no one can say that I didn't keep my side of the bargain. I was totally careful, totally discreet.

"And then Mark came home early one afternoon, and I didn't hear the phone because I was outside, and it's all gone to hell. I'm afraid for him and afraid for my marriage. I'm scared he'll never come back to me."

We sat a few minutes more, while she cried. I handed her the tissue box after a while and she took it without comment. Finally, when she was calmer, I said, "I hope that I can help. I think I can. But I need to know more; is it all right if we go back to the beginning?"

As I said, Leanne didn't tell me her story in a nice chronological order, but I got the gist of it. She was the third in a family of three girls, growing up in Minneapolis. Her mother was a homemaker, and her father, a history professor at the University of Minnesota, was cold, distant, and demanding. Leanne was never as outstanding a student as her eldest sister Mary, nor as good an athlete as her middle sister Kaitlyn, and she always struggled to win her father's approval.

By high school, however, she was clearly the prettiest, and she reveled in her father's belated attention and compliments. Getting the attention of high school boys was a natural extension of getting the attention of her father--only easier--and she basked in it.

She learned how to flirt, how to be sexy without seeming cheap, and the boys flocked to her. Despite not being a cheerleader, the usual requirement for social success, she became the girlfriend of the quarterback on the football team in her junior year and held onto him until they both graduated.

This was partly because she was a bright, attractive and charming girl, and partly because she was willing to have sex with him. Bradley was no virgin when he took Leanne's virginity; but unlike many jocks he was a kind, caring boy, and he really loved Leanne. He was gentle and patient; so her first experience of intercourse was somewhat painful but not at all frightening, and she was happy to continue having sex with him.

Her mother quietly got her on the pill, as she'd done for Leanne's two older sisters, and Leanne and her boyfriend fucked whenever they could find a time and place to do it--every week at least. She found that she adored sex—apparently far more than girls typically do, at least according to the magazines she read.

But after six months or so of screwing only Bradley, she began to be more and more curious about other boys, and more and more tempted to try one of them. Only her strong sense of loyalty and faithfulness to the boy she was sure she was going to marry kept her from acting on her temptations.

"But I'll tell you," she said, "it sure didn't keep me from fantasizing. There were about six boys in my senior class, and a couple of teachers, I used to daydream about having sex with. Sometimes at night I'd masturbate while imagining doing it with one of them, and it was far more exciting than when I fantasized about Bradley.

"One night in my senior year I came home early and my big sister Mary was upstairs on her bed screwing her college boyfriend Teddy. They'd come for a weekend visit. Since they thought they were totally alone in the house she hadn't even closed the bedroom door!

"So I sneaked upstairs and watched them do it. I'd never been so turned-on in my life. Teddy was much bigger than Bradley--he had a bigger cock, I mean--and I was soaking my panties thinking about how it would feel inside me. I knew I could never do it with him, but I daydreamed about him for weeks."

When Leanne began college at the University of Minnesota and Bradley went off to Grinnell College in Iowa, it wasn't much more than two months before their long-distance romance fell apart; he'd met someone else. So much for the man she was going to marry! Leanne was unhappy and hurt, but only for a few days. Then she began to realize that the good-looking guys at Minnesota who were always flirting with her in the dorm or the cafeteria weren't off-limits any more.

"I decided I didn't want another boyfriend, at least not for a while. The whole time I'd been with Bradley I had fantasies about lots of different guys, and this was my chance."

So Leanne gave in to the temptations of casual sex, dating several different men at the same time and having sex with nearly all of them, often on the first or second date. It was exciting, having all that male attention, and she loved it for a few weeks. But she quickly found that her behavior was causing problems.

"First, all that partying was keeping me from getting my studying done, and I nearly flunked two of my courses that first semester. Second, I'd slept with three different guys in my dorm, and word started to get around that I was a pushover. I had all sorts of jerks coming up to me and making crude remarks, or even trying to cop a feel. And then a guy I met in a bar, who I was more than ready to go off to bed with, turned out to be into some pretty rough stuff!

"A girl from my history class saw me with him and pulled me into the Ladies Room. She told me her roommate had gone out with him the previous year and he'd beaten the hell out of her during sex--she ended up in the Emergency Room with bruises on her face and two broken ribs!

"Well, that scared the shit out of me. I slipped out the back door of the bar, so I could avoid the guy, and I went back to my dorm and decided to make some changes."

I was very impressed by Leanne's account of how she took control of her situation, thinking carefully about what she wanted and how to get it while keeping herself safe. First, she cut down on her dating to 2-3 times a week, to make sure that her studies didn't slide.

Second, she resolved to stop getting involved sexually with anyone in her dorm or in her classes. It was easy enough on a big campus to meet men, and much safer for her reputation if they weren't men who saw her every day or knew all her friends.

Third, she enrolled in a Women's Self-Defense course offered by the Phys. Ed. department. She took the course for three semesters, and got very good at the maneuvers necessary to protect herself if a guy got rough, which happened once or twice. Finally, having seen a scary film about STDs at a dorm meeting, she vowed to use condoms from then on without exception.

For the remainder of her time at Minnesota Leanne was a successful student, active in her sorority, with many friends; all the while having sex with a succession of men, usually not more than once or twice each. Her friends occasionally teased her about not having a boyfriend, or wondered aloud why the cute guys they sometimes saw her with never seemed to appear a second time. 

But she was very careful to keep the details of her sex life completely private. She almost always had sex with the men she met in their rooms or apartments, ideally some distance away from her own dorm. Occasionally the back seat of a car proved to be a suitable spot, and a few of her lovers even sprang for a motel room from time to time.

Leanne told me all about this with excited pleasure, but not without a certain defensiveness. She understood all too well what society thinks of a woman who behaves this way, even though a man who does the same thing is considered a "stud" or a "player". 

"Tom, I loved what I did--I don't regret it and I'm not going to apologize for it, okay?"

"You don't have to apologize, Leanne," I said. "I believe that consenting adults can have as much or as little sex as they want, with anyone they want, in any way they want, as long as everyone is in agreement. Our culture frowns on certain behaviors by women, but that's our culture's problem."

She seemed pleased with my reply, but I could tell she didn't completely believe me.

In her senior year Leanne fell in love with a young professor in the Sociology Department, where she was a major. She'd been in two of his courses and he'd taken a special interest in her, praising her academic work and urging her to do a senior thesis. He never violated the rules for student-faculty relationships, but when the second course ended he asked her out to dinner.

"In retrospect it was crazy for me to marry him," she told me. "Adam was older (he was 28), sophisticated, brilliant--it was incredibly flattering for him to want me for more than my body. He thought I was really smart and talented, which just knocked me off my feet. We never even had sex for the first two months we dated, though I would have jumped into bed with him the moment he asked.

"But he was all wrong for me, once the infatuation rubbed off and I could look at him clearly. Adam was a quiet, introspective loner. A typical academic in many ways, I guess. But as smart as he was, he bored the hell out of me! He didn't want to go dancing, or ski, or even take a picnic to the park or go to the movies. He wanted to work in the library, or read in his study at home. And he wanted me to make him dinner, kiss him on the cheek, and stay out of his way--until it was time to fuck, after which he'd roll over and go to sleep. He didn't want to fuck all that often, either—maybe twice a week, which wasn't nearly enough for me."

Needless to say, the marriage didn't last very long. Leanne divorced Adam, amicably enough, after a year or two and moved to Chicago. She looked up the father of one of her sorority sisters and got a job in his real estate office, while she studied at night to get her own real estate license.

Once she had a license she began selling houses, which she's been doing successfully ever since, working at two different firms before joining a Century 21 franchise about a year before she met Mark.

And, of course, once she was free of Adam she went back to her active sexual lifestyle.

"I was making pretty good money within a year or two, and I found a great one-bedroom apartment downtown, just a mile or so from the lake. And I went a little crazy. Chicago is so full of great men!"

She stared at me defiantly, as though waiting for me to criticize her. When I smiled at her without speaking, she went on.

"I know how this sounds, dammit. But I love men--and I love cocks."

Again the challenging stare, again no response from me.

"I've talked to a few guys I know about how they love boobs. How every woman who walks by is an invitation to stare, and to fantasize--what it would be like to see them, to hold and stroke them, to suck on them. Well, that's how I feel about men and their cocks.

"They get so hard, but they're soft at the same time, you can squeeze them and stroke them, and guys go crazy. And when a man is really turned-on they get so hot!"

She was looking at me, daring me to stop her, or to squirm.

"And they're so different. I think one of the reasons I like...you know, one-night stands with new men so much is the excitement of a new cock, one I've never seen or felt before. Will it be big? Will it have a curve, so it hits my G-spot?

"And each new man is so different-- very eager or just playing it cool, powerful and strong or slow and gentle. Sometimes a guy will last for ages inside me, and I'll come several times. That's fantastic. Sometimes a guy will come within a minute or two and be all embarrassed, but I still love it. I always tell him it's exciting to know I turned him on so much he couldn't hold back.

"The difference in skill level is also amazing. God knows I've had my share of disappointing fucks, with guys who haven't got a clue about women. But there are men who absolutely turn me inside-out, they know just what to do and when to do it. Sometimes it's their hands, or their tongues, or the way they thrust against me, hitting my clit just right. Or sometimes I think it's that they know how to pay attention, they're tuned-in to my responses so they pick up right away on what excites me.

"Mark is like that," she said thoughtfully. "He's certainly not the biggest I've ever had, he doesn't go all night long or anything--but he's so attentive and responsive to me, and always so eager to please me. He makes me feel so desired and so loved." Her voice trailed off for a moment, and she looked away towards the window before pulling herself back to our conversation.

"I love to see how a new guy smells, what he likes in bed, whether he'll go down on me, what positions he wants to do it in. It's amazing how nearly every guy thinks the first time has to be in missionary position! But when I ask a guy what else he'd like to try, he almost always has a favorite."

Leanne went on like this for quite a while, with enthusiastic details. I think in part she was continuing to try to challenge me, to shock me or make me call her a whore. But also, I realized, since she was so discreet about her sex life, even with her close friends, she'd never had anyone before to talk frankly with about this. It was a relief to be allowed to say all these things.

"I had a lot of ways to keep things from getting too...too personal with any one man, or from losing my privacy. I didn't hook up with anyone from work or anyone I knew socially. In fact when I met guys, like in a bar or something, I always used the name "Marie". I never gave out my phone number, just took their number if I was interested. And I never brought guys back to my apartment--we always did it at their place, or at a hotel."

When she slowed down a bit she gazed at me again, waiting for me to condemn her.

"I assure you, Leanne," I said, "you don't have to apologize for any of this. Being sexual isn't bad--and knowing what you like is a good thing. You're honest with yourself about your sexuality, and it sounds as though you're equally honest with the men you have sex with."

She relaxed just a bit, as if she was beginning to believe I really wasn't judging her.

"So this lifestyle was working fine for you--and then you met Mark?"

"Yes, exactly. It was a couple of weeks after my 28th birthday. I was handling the marketing of some homes his company had built, and we met on the site as they were showing me the properties.

"I wasn't looking for a husband, or any sort of serious relationship. I was still perfectly happy with my life: I loved my work, I had some good friends, and I was getting lots of sex. When I first met Mark....

"Well, you've seen him. He's one of the best-looking men I've ever seen, so of course I was attracted to him. And I could tell he noticed me, though during the tour all he did was smile and make a few polite remarks. Then when I was getting ready to leave, he walked me back to my car and asked if he could buy me a drink some evening.

"I really hesitated at first, because of my 'no men from work' rule, and because he already knew me as Leanne. But he was such a charming guy, and SO good-looking, that I made an exception. I told myself that we might casually see one another in a work setting, but that we wouldn't be working together regularly, so it wouldn't be a problem.

"We met the next night. At first all I had in mind was going to bed with him. I'd been fantasizing about him, that handsome face and that athletic body. But when we sat and talked I kept being distracted away from my horny feelings.

"He was just so classy and so interesting! He told funny stories, but he also listened to me. I felt like no one ever had listened so attentively and carefully when I spoke--except maybe Adam, when he was first trying to get me to fall in love with him. But that wore off pretty fast!" She snorted derisively.

"But with Mark... He's definitely no wimp, but he was such a nice guy. Polite, considerate. It almost didn't fit, him being such a hunk. Usually guys who are that attractive are also arrogant assholes--fine for fucking once or twice, but you wouldn't want to spend any extra time with them.

"We lingered over our drinks for a long time. When we were finally getting ready to leave the bar, I hoped he was going to invite me over--I was more than ready to have sex with him. But instead, he took my hand and asked if I'd come over on Friday and let him cook dinner for us. 'I'm not too bad a cook, actually,' he said with this really cute smile.

"And that Friday night at his apartment changed everything. I got there still thinking of him as a really hot guy--a nice one too, but mainly a hot one--whom I wanted to sleep with. But by the next morning I was already half in love with him.

"Mark is so gentle, so considerate--but all man too!--and there was just this spark between us. Not just sexual attraction, I'm used to feeling that, but some crazy sense that we belonged together. It scared me a little, because a serious relationship was the last thing I was interested in. 

"My previous ones hadn't worked out so well, and I was happy seeing a lot of guys, keeping it light and keeping my distance. But Mark effortlessly got by all my defenses.

"The sex was incredible, but that wasn't why he got to me so much. It was maybe, WHY the sex was incredible that did it. He treated me like the most beautiful creature in the world--I had his total attention every minute, and he seemed to love every part of me, not just my tits or my ass or my pussy. He touched me, stroked me, licked me, told me how beautiful I was, how incredible it felt to touch me.

"I stayed over most of the weekend. I'm sure we did it at least five times, and it was different every time--always wonderful. The first time he ate me so beautifully I just about tore the hair out of his head when I came. And then he fucked me gently, lovingly, so slowly I nearly went nuts. I shouldn't say 'fucked'—it was making love, even though we hardly knew each other yet.

"And then later it was completely different: hard and fast, a little rough, with my legs up over his shoulders and him slamming into me. I'd had a lot of great orgasms before, but coming with him felt different, because I felt so close to him."

Leanne's account of their love-affair was much like Mark's. They enjoyed everything they did together, from the romantic to the mundane. She adored just sitting on his living-room couch in the evenings, wearing nothing but one of his button-down shirts, watching TV and holding his hand.




What Did I Do that was Wrong? 02



"I knew within a couple of weeks that I wanted to be with him forever. And that scared the hell out of me, of course, given my track record. Could I really give up seeing other men? I thought I should, so I stopped picking up guys for nearly two months.

"And then one day in a Starbucks this 40 year-old guy with a great mustache accidentally spilled coffee on my skirt. He was so cute and apologetic, and insisted on paying for the dry-cleaning... Well, anyway, I got his number and met him the next night and we fucked, at his apartment.

"He was really good, actually, and it was very satisfying. After I left, though, I felt incredibly guilty, like I'd cheated on Mark. But I realized that we'd never promised to be exclusive with each other, and that it didn't change the way I felt about Mark one iota. I still loved him, and still wanted to be with him.

"So I decided that there was room in my life for both, as long as I kept them totally separate. And the next night when I saw Mark and we made love, it was just as wonderful as ever. So it seemed okay, just to keep my love-affair with Mark in one box and my casual sex-life in another.

"I was still always using condoms with all my men; but one day I asked Mark if we could both get tested, and then I'd go on the pill and we could do without them. It felt like a kind of commitment that I was more than ready to make. I'd already been on the pill for years, just in case, but I didn't tell Mark that."

When Mark suggested to Leanne that they move in together, she freaked out a little bit. It sounded like marriage to her, and with her memories of Adam and the horrors of boring monogamy uppermost in her mind she told Mark she wasn't ready for that yet.

So it caught her by surprise a few months later when he proposed.

"I got very emotional, because I felt like everything had suddenly come to a head and I wasn't ready to deal with it. I was kind of weepy, and we went back to my apartment and made love, and I just clung to him. I felt so in love, and so desperate!

"But I realized that I had to tell him the truth--that I fucked other guys, and that I wanted to continue doing that. It scared me to death! But I wasn't ready to lie to him, or marry him under any sort of false pretenses."

"Did you consider giving up the sex with other men?"

"Of course I did, Tom!" she snapped at me. "What kind of selfish bitch do you think I am?"

I just waited, and then she sighed. "Sorry. It's not an unreasonable question.

"Yes, I'd thought about it for weeks, and I had to think about it some more when Mark proposed. I knew that I loved him more than I'd ever loved anyone--far more than Adam. But I was scared that I couldn't be faithful. I'd endured a life of monogamy for nearly two years with Adam and it nearly drove me crazy!

"And the one thing that gave me courage was that all I was asking was to continue what we'd been doing. Mark didn't know it, but I'd been seeing other guys and it hadn't hurt our relationship at all. If I could get him to see that, then maybe we could work it out."

What happened next was pretty much the same in Leanne's version as what Mark had told me. Emotionally and lovingly, she told him that she wanted to continue seeing other men. Mark pulled back from her in shock--but slowly, gradually, she was able to reassure him of her love. 

After a few more months of "taking it slow", their love-affair resumed with its former intensity. And a few months after that, he proposed again, and they got married.

"Leanne, can I ask you about how you...about the things you do to keep your encounters with other men totally separate from your life with Mark? That can't be very easy to manage."

"Well," she said, "it was much easier before we lived together--when we were just dating. But it's not that difficult, as long as I count on Mark not to go through my purse. I always have condoms with me, and a spare set of panties, in case something exciting happens with someone and I get my panties wet before I can take them off. 

"And I have my shampoo, and a toothbrush and toothpaste. I brush every day before I come home, whether or not I've been with someone, so Mark is used to the taste and it won't make him suspicious. I always shower and clean myself up after sex before I come home, so I never need to rush into the house and shower before Mark hugs me.

"And as I've told you, the guys I'm with know me as Marie and they don't have my number--I always call them."

"Do your encounters with other men ever interfere with your sex life with Mark?"

"Mostly not at all. As I said, I would never be with another man except during the day, when he's at work, or when he's out of town. I don't go out bar-hopping at night or anything!

"And since the men always use condoms I don't have to worry about being full of cum. A lot of times I've had sex with Mark the same night I was with someone during the day, and that's really exciting! It makes the love-making with him even hotter, somehow, because I got fucked just a few hours earlier."

With a slightly sheepish look she said, "the only time it's ever been a problem was when I've fucked a guy with a really big cock. I think it's only happened twice: Mark wanted to make love the same night and I had to fake a headache or something. I was afraid I'd feel stretched-out and he'd notice. But by the next day it's always fine."

"Can you tell me about the day that Mark came home early?" I asked.

She grimaced. "I don't usually bring men back to the house--honest! This was only the second time it's ever happened.

"His name is Theo. I actually met him three or four years ago. He was the waiter in a downtown restaurant where I had lunch with a couple of friends, and he was incredibly attentive to us. And cute--really adorable, actually, just 22 or so at the time. He gave us the most attentive service you've ever seen.

"Something about him appealed to me. So when my friends and I were leaving, I said I needed to go back and use the bathroom, and they all left. And I found Theo near the bar. He gave me a big smile but looked kind of surprised that I'd come back.

"I went up to him and said quietly, 'you gave us really great service, Theo, and I was wondering if I could return the favor.' And I put my hand on his arm and gently squeezed--nothing tacky, but he got the idea. I asked him for his phone number, and he couldn't give it to me fast enough!

"I called him the next day--as Marie, of course--and we made a date to meet in the afternoon at his apartment. Turns out he usually worked nights at the restaurant, and didn't have to go in until 5 pm.

"He was really fun in bed. The first time we would fuck he never lasted long--he'd get really excited, start thrusting faster and harder, and groan like crazy when he came. Always too soon for me to get off, but that was okay. Because then he liked to give me the full treatment: stroke and massage my body, lick my breasts, and then eat me until I'd come a couple of times. Then we'd fuck again, and the second time he could last forever--he'd really get me to come like mad. It was so relaxing and enjoyable, and he was so cute--really grateful and everything. I felt incredibly appreciated.

"I saw him maybe four more times before I stopped calling him. It was fun each time, but I never let something with a guy go on too long--you never know when they'll start thinking they're in love with you, or try to track you down or something.

"Anyway, that day I literally bumped into him. I was coming out of the Century 21 office, having returned some keys for a place I'd been showing, and he was headed into the office. He was moving to Philly, and just dropping off the key to the apartment he'd been renting.

"So we went for a cup of coffee, and I just thought, 'I've got the afternoon free, he's moving away, Mark's in Milwaukee, what's the harm of using my house just this once?'

"I told him there was a vacant house I was handling for Century 21 that wasn't on the market yet, and we could use the back yard that afternoon until 4 pm or so. Then I gave him the directions and he drove over later to meet me, around 12:30.

"I'd gone home to shower and change into a real skimpy thong bikini, one I only wear for Mark when nobody else is around. When Theo saw it his eyes practically popped out of his head!

"It was a hot sunny day, so we started to fool around in the pool, and soon our swimsuits were off and I was leaning over the edge in the shallow end and he was pounding me from behind. Just like always, he only lasted three minutes or so, and then I lay on a deck chair and he ate my pussy, taking his time the way I love it.

"Then I sat up, and sucked on him to get him hard. And then we lay down on this air mattress on the grass and fucked again, nice and slow and relaxed, with the sun beating down on us and the breeze blowing.... It was just nice, you know? Not as fiery and hot as it sometimes is with a new guy, but it had a sweetness to it, because Theo was just so cute and because I'd been with him before--it was comfortable and relaxed.

"When I'd come a couple of times and he'd come, we dozed for a little while, then I sent him away. And I cleaned up around the pool, and went in and showered and got ready for Mark to come home.

"It wasn't until 5:30 that I saw he'd left a message on the machine, saying he'd be home by about 3 o'clock! So I ran to the front window, but his car wasn't there. I checked my cell phone and found the same message--and I started to freak out. By far the likeliest thing was that he came home and saw a strange car in the driveway--but what did he do then?

"There wasn't a thing I could think of to do except wait for him to come home. And when he walked in, at 6, I could see on his face that he was very very upset. I knew that he'd either seen or heard me with Theo, or figured out some other way that I'd been with a man. He went right by me, wouldn't let me hug him, and locked himself in the bedroom."

Their dinner, and the next few days and nights, were incredibly difficult. Leanne confirmed what Mark had told me: that he steadfastly refused to discuss any aspect of that afternoon.

Her story about what has gone on in their relationship since that day was pretty much the same as Mark's. How he found it more and more difficult to keep an erection; how their romantic getaway was a painful disaster; how he started avoiding her at night, coming to bed very late or sleeping in the guest room.

"I've really tried everything I can think of, Tom. I'm as loving as I can be, and patient, and always ready for sex. But he won't come near me any more--and he won't talk to me either, despite all my efforts."

Leanne knows that Mark saw her with Theo that day, but she doesn't know exactly WHAT he saw, and what about it bothered him. Is it just the fact that he was finally confronted with something he'd worked so hard to ignore? Is it that she and Theo were in the back yard of Mark's and her house? Is there something about the sex itself that is upsetting him? Leanne has no idea. And I can't tell her--Mark is going to have to do that.

****************

"Well," I said at the start of our next session, "what do you want to achieve, Leanne? What are you hoping for here?"

She stared at me. "I want my husband back! I want things to be back the way they were, Tom--when he loved me and made love to me, when we could talk to each other."

"And what are you willing to do, to make that happen? Would you--give up seeing other men, for example? Or open up your marriage so that Mark could also have other partners?"

She looked thoughtful. "I've certainly thought about it--giving up other men, I mean. I haven't been with anybody since the day with Theo. It's been more than two months now. Sometimes I'm horny as hell!" She smiled.

"It just seems like a really bad idea to ... to be with anyone else while things are so up in the air with Mark."

"But are you ready to give it up entirely, if Mark asks you to?"

"I ... think so. I haven't been this unhappy in years, maybe ever. I certainly realize how much Mark and my marriage mean to me, now that everything's so fucked up.

"It scares me a little, because ... casual sex has always been a big part of my life. But I know that if I had to choose between that and keeping Mark, I'd choose Mark.

"But JESUS, Tom," she suddenly burst out. "I don't even have that option, do I? He won't even talk about it--I have no idea what's going on in his head, except that he's miserable and he can't get it up anymore!"

"What about the other option I mentioned? How would you feel if Mark said he wanted to have other partners too?"

She looked unhappy, but said, "I couldn't really say No, could I? What justification would I have? But I'll admit I don't want him to.

"I know that's unreasonable--why should I be able to screw around while he has to be faithful? And I certainly know that for me, sex and love are two entirely different things. I don't care in the least for the guys I do it with, beyond the pleasure of it. Some of them I like, some I don't even like very much. But there's never any chance I'll get attached to any of them.

"But Mark making love to some other woman--that gets me upset. Worried, I guess. Will he find someone prettier, or hotter--or just somebody with a younger, firmer body? I'm 35, not 25 any more.

"Or will there be someone sweet and loving who he just falls for? That's what really scares me." She stopped, her expression worried and unhappy.

"Do you imagine that Mark feels the same things, has the same worries?"

She looked annoyed. "Of course, Tom--I understand that. That's why I tried so hard to reassure him, back when we discussed this before we got married. And I realize that's why he's clung to the 'don't ask, don't tell' policy all these years. It's easier for him just not to think about it.

"But now that's all blown to hell, and he won't let me reassure him. Won't let me tell him, or show him, how much I love him."

We sat for a minute. Then I said, "I think it's time I started meeting with you and Mark together again--time that this long-overdue conversation between the two of you got started.

"Of course I don't know how it will go, Leanne--I don't even know how hard it will be to get Mark to talk. But I am pretty sure about one thing. The arrangement you and Mark have is going to have to change. I think I can say that without breaking any confidences. You can see how upset he is.

"One way or another, things will have to be different. And if he tells you that he needs you to stop seeing other men--if he says that he can't live with it any more--you need to be ready with an immediate reply.

"It's not for me to tell you what to do. You've just said you'd be willing to do that, to get your marriage back. But you need to be sure about it, I think. If Mark asks that of you, you need to be ready to agree on the spot--to tell him that he is more important to you than the other men, that you are choosing him over them.

"Because if he sees you hesitate, it may only worsen what he's already feeling. It's not hard to see that his erection problems are related to insecurity, or a lack of confidence. Mark said so himself.

"If your marriage is going to survive," and here Leanne gasped in alarm, "it's clear that one way or another, Mark's confidence in himself will have to be restored.

"I could be wrong about what he'll say. Maybe he'll tell you he wants to take other lovers too. Or even that the two of you should find swinging opportunities. But if what he says is that he needs you to be sexually faithful to him--and you're ready to commit to that--you will need to accept that condition as unreservedly as you possibly can."

We talked for another few minutes. When Leanne left my office she looked thoughtful but determined. It was too soon for me to be very hopeful—but I was beginning to think that maybe she and Mark had a chance. 



What Did I Do that was Wrong? 03



Leanne's and Mark's body language were a bit different as they came in this time, exactly three weeks after I'd first met them. Neither was happy, and Mark in particular had an air of dread, but he was less defeated-looking and she was at least a little more relaxed. I was far from confident, but tried to see these as good signs.

"Thanks for coming in," I said after we'd shaken hands and sat down.

"Over the last couple of weeks, as you know, I've met several times with each of you individually, and I'm very grateful for your honesty with me." I smiled as warmly as I could, and they both responded with more tentative smiles.

"Today I think we should begin the process of working through what happened a couple of months ago, the day Mark came back from his trip."

Mark grimaced and started to object. I turned directly to him and held up my hand.

"Mark, what would you do if someone on a job site fell and got his arm impaled on a sharp piece of metal? You'd take him to a doctor and get the piece of metal removed, right? Because if you left it in it would continue to hurt, and it might get infected and make your co-worker's condition worse.

"And it might hurt a lot to take the thing out--but the doctor would still do it, right?"

He sighed, nodding his head. "Yes, I see your point, Tom. Although," he gave me an ironic smile, "I imagine the doctor would use some anesthesia first--are you proposing to dope me up?"

I laughed. "You got me," I said. "This conversation may be very painful, for both of you. But there really is no alternative. Not talking about it isn't working, and it hasn't been working for a couple of months now--would you agree?"

They both nodded.

"Well, then. Mark, can you tell Leanne about that afternoon--about what you saw, and how you felt?"

He sat for a few moments. Then he began talking in a monotone, looking across the room at the far wall. He recounted getting the earlier flight, leaving the phone messages, driving home and seeing a strange car in the driveway. How he didn't know what to do next--he started walking towards the house, only to hear a man's voice in the back yard.

"I knew I should just turn and walk away--but I couldn't. I went around the side of the house, and I ... I saw you with him."

Mark stopped. He glanced briefly at Leanne, then away again. We both waited for him to continue. Leanne had her arms crossed tightly on her chest, and looked as though she was holding her breath.

Finally he went on, still not looking at either of us.

"He was standing in front of you with his ... with his cock sticking out, and you had your hands on his hips. It looked like you'd been sucking on him. Then you put a condom on him, and led him over to that big air mattress on the grass. And you laid down, and he got on top of you, and the two of you started fucking.

"I was kind of frozen--I couldn't move. I watched for a couple of minutes, I guess, and then suddenly I had to get out of there. I hurried back to the car, drove to the mall, and spent a couple of hours just wandering around, until it was late enough that I could come home."

There was silence again. Leanne looked very pale--she was watching Mark intently. He continued to look at nothing. 

"Mark," I said finally, "I know this is hard. What is it about what you saw that upset you--that continues to upset you? After all, you knew that Leanne had sex with other men; you agreed to it."

His eyes moved to my face, then away again. He looked at the floor, and seemed to be gathering himself.

"It's a couple of things. I don't know exactly, but I do know about a couple of things. First, I ... well, this is obvious. Yes, I knew that Leanne ... sometimes fucked other guys, but I never expected to have to see it or be confronted by it in any way. She's been very discreet, so ... so it was a shock.

"Then there's the fact that it was in our back yard. A very private place, just our own, where we've spent so much time together."

He looked up at me, agony on his face. "We've made love there so many times, on that mattress. On the grass, or sometimes in the pool together. We both loved the house the first time we saw it, because of the privacy--we knew right away we wanted to buy it.

"And here was Leanne, fucking some guy..." He stopped for a moment, and I saw his hands were tightly clutching the arms of his chair.

"Here she was having sex with some guy, right where we'd made love so often ourselves. In our private place--our home."

Leanne looked as though she wanted to speak, and I quietly gestured to her to wait. There was more silence.

"But that's not all of it, is it, Mark?"

"No. It was ... it was the way they made love."

I noticed that he simply couldn't look at Leanne or address her directly, and he'd stopped saying "you" and switched to "she". He had to tell the story in the third person.

"I always imagined ... when I thought about her and other men, I ... I guess I tried hard to think of something sweaty and impersonal. Like a whore with a customer, maybe, or a good massage, or a squash game. Maybe that was naïve... But I think that's how she encouraged me to see it, too.

"But what I saw, it was... Dammit, it was love-making! It was gentle, and loving, and incredibly intimate.

"She kissed him, so affectionately, so lingeringly! And she smiled into his eyes, and rubbed her hands over his back gently, and murmured to him while they were doing it."

Suddenly, to my surprise, he swung around in his chair and looked right at Leanne.

"It wasn't just casual sex--it wasn't just a hot meaningless fuck! It was you being intimate with another man, in a way that you're only supposed to be with me! You were loving him, Goddammit!"

Mark stood and walked swiftly to the window, where he stood, looking out. I could see his fists clenching.

Leanne looked terrified--she sat far back in her chair, as though Mark's words had physically pressed on her. She was near tears, and looked imploringly at me. Again I made a gesture intended to comfort her, but to say, "don't speak yet--wait."

Without turning around Mark began to speak again. "Until that day, I could convince myself--just barely--that Leanne's need to fuck other people had nothing to do with me. That it was entirely separate, like she always insisted it was. And I knew she loved me."

Now he turned around to glare at us, his face flushed. "But it was bullshit! It's not separate, it never was and it never will be. That was no fucking squash game, it was making love!

"You were doing with him what you should be doing only with me! That's what marriage means, at least to me."

We were frozen in our places for nearly a minute, and then Mark unclenched his tense body and returned to his seat, again looking at nothing. I heard Leanne's shuddering breath, and looked over to see tears on her cheeks.

"Leanne?" I said quietly.

She turned to me, looking sad and frightened. "I don't know what to say, Tom."

Turning to Mark she said, "I'm so sorry, honey. To me it was just casual sex--I swear. I was just...having sex with a guy I'd been with a couple of times before. It was nice out in the sunshine, it was relaxed....

"But it wasn't making love, believe me! It was nothing like what you and I have! Not to me.

"I had no idea what you saw, or how it made you feel. I'm so sorry."

More silence in the room. I said, "Leanne, maybe you could tell Mark how you happened to be at your house that day."

She picked up on my intentions right away. "Mark, I almost never have sex with anyone else at our house. This just happened, on the spur of the moment. I knew Theo from several years ago, and I ran into him that morning. He'd given up his apartment and was moving away. He doesn't even know my real name! Or that it was our house--I told him it was an empty house that was about to go on the market."

"You sure seemed comfortable with him--relaxed, easy." Mark's words were quiet, but definitely an accusation. He was still looking at nothing.

In a steady voice Leanne said, "yes--like I said I knew him from a few years ago, and we'd had sex three or four times back then.

"But dammit, Mark, he was nothing to me--he IS nothing to me. Despite how it looked to you, I swear, it was just casual...casual, well, fucking."

"That's not what I saw." Mark's voice came from deep within him, almost unwillingly.

Leanne moved to kneel next to Mark's chair. She grasped his arm with both hands, but he still wouldn't look at her.

"I am so sorry, Mark. Sorry for all of it--that you saw us, that it looked that way to you."

They remained in that position for a couple of minutes, her kneeling and holding his arm, him looking away. Finally she rose and returned to her seat, looking older and sadder than before.

"You both are in a lot of pain right now," I said. "You know, during the past couple of weeks each of you has asked me, 'what did I do that was wrong?' "

They looked up at me, both of them a bit surprised, and I went on.

"Neither of you did anything wrong, as far as I'm concerned. Leanne, you were completely honest with Mark about a very difficult subject. When he proposed, you told him you needed to keep having sex with other men. That's how you felt, and it wasn't wrong to tell him that.

"Mark, you struggled with it, but decided finally that you could live with Leanne seeing other men—casually, purely for sex, and out of your sight. It wasn't something you wanted, but you loved Leanne enough that you were willing to put up with it.

"Each of you was honest and brave. But now the situation has changed. Your arrangement might have gone on indefinitely, or it might not have. But in any case, Mark's coming home early and seeing Leanne with someone has changed things.

"It's clear that you love one another very much, and that both of you value your marriage. The question is, what happens now? Can you move forward in that marriage together, and if so how?"

Silence. Both of them were looking at me, serious expressions on their faces.

Mark said, "I don't know if we can—or if I can, to be more specific. Yes, I love Leanne—even more now than when I asked her to marry me. But it feels like everything has changed, and I ... I just ... don't know."

Leanne turned in her chair to face Mark directly. She waited until he was looking at her.

"Mark, I want to tell you something. I haven't been with another man since the day you saw me in the back yard. And I'm not going to be. I'm done with that—I want to be an old-fashioned faithful wife for the rest of my life."

"Are you sure you can do that?" Mark's voice was bitter. "After all these years, all those men, all those cocks? Sure you're ready to give 'em all up?"

"Stop it, Mark! I know you're hurting—but I am too! I love you and I miss you. I want you back.

"And yes, I'm sure. I guess I've realized that when you asked me to marry you I was scared. I loved you so much, and getting to spend the rest of my life with you was more than I ever could have hoped for. I think I didn't really believe it would come true. Continuing what I'd been doing—seeing other guys for casual sex—was a way of protecting myself, of keeping one foot out the door or something.

"I don't know if I'm making myself clear. But I don't want one foot out the door anymore. All I want is you." 

Another long silence. I was proud of Leanne, who had responded just as I hoped she would.

Finally Mark smiled a little. He said, "I'm glad you said that, babe.

"Because I was coming in here today with an ultimatum: me or them. Marriage to me, or all the sex you wanted with other guys, but not both."

Leanne smiled and said, "I've made my choice, honey."

He reached out and took her hand, and they sat quietly, just looking at one another.

Then Mark stood up and said, gruffly, "c'mere". I could hear the emotion in his voice. Leanne jumped up and he embraced her tightly, holding her as though making sure she'd never get away again.

She clung to him, kissing his neck, running her hands through his hair, whispering "I love you, baby". When they finally broke apart they both turned to me, smiling, each with one arm still wrapped around the other.

"Thank you, Tom," Mark said with a smile. "You've really helped us—at least I know you've really helped me. I guess it's up to us to take it from here."

He stepped forward as if to shake my hand in farewell, and I had to smile to myself. For a smart guy Mark was certainly being a little naïve about how things were going to go!

"Why don't you and Leanne sit down again for a minute, Mark?"

He seemed surprised by my suggestion, but did as I said, still holding Leanne's hand and smiling.

"If you'll allow me to beat that analogy to death, I think we've taken the piece of metal out. Surgery was successful!

"But I don't think we're quite ready to stop working together yet. With all the strong emotions you both have been feeling, it's going to be a while before things stop being turbulent.

"I'd like to continue to see each of you alone once a week, and the two of you together as well. We can taper our meetings off as soon as we're all confident about how things are going."

Leanne nodded slightly, still smiling and clinging to her husband's hand, but Mark looked a bit dubious. "Is that really necessary, Tom? I'm feeling pretty damn good right now!"

"Trust me on this one, Mark. There's been a lot of stuff stirred up, and it will need a little time to settle. Believe me, I'm not trying to milk your insurance for the extra sessions—I've got plenty of patients to see."

We worked out a schedule for the next month or so, with me promising again that we could cancel any appointments we felt weren't needed. Then, before I let them go, I said a couple more things I thought were important.

"It may be that things will still get tense once in a while—try not to be surprised by that, and don't get discouraged, either. Talk things through, as much as you're comfortable with. Mark doesn't need to know everything about your past activities, Leanne, but he may decide there are things he wants to hear about. If so, be honest with him. I'm sure you will be.

"Mark, do your best to let Leanne know how you're feeling. Don't hide your negative feelings from her, if they come up. Let her in—give her a chance to reassure you. She loves you very much, so let her remind you of that if you need it.

"And above all, both of you—try to be kind. When feelings run high, try not to say things that might be hurtful, that might linger in your spouse's mind in a painful way. You can say 'I'm feeling hurt' or 'I'm feeling resentful' without lashing out."

All my words were carefully considered, but I could see my intended audience wasn't paying much attention. They were gazing at one another, faces full of affection and relief. It was not hard to predict that their next stop was going to be the marital bedroom!

But that didn't mean everything was fine in their marriage—not yet, and not by a long shot. The operation had been successful, but whether the patient lived or died was still somewhat up in the air.

****************

Over the next few weeks I never knew which couple I was going to see. Sometimes Leanne and Mark were smiling, even giggling. It didn't require an expert to see that things were going well, and that lots of good sex was taking place.

At the very next appointment, though, they might be full of tension. Usually it was Mark who was cold and distant, while Leanne and I both tried to get him to open up about what he was feeling. 

In my individual sessions with each of them I heard the same story: Mark was experiencing volatile emotional swings, from loving and sexually eager husband to distant and insecure partner. And because of his nature and upbringing, he found it very hard to talk about his feelings when he was upset.

"Look, Mark," I said to him in one of his sessions alone with me. "You've been through something difficult and traumatic. The fact that it sometimes gets to you is only natural—it's not a sign of weakness."

He nodded, but it was clear he didn't particularly believe me. Finally, though, I got him talking, and what he had to say was about his lingering lack of confidence where Leanne was concerned.

"I know she loves me, Tom—I know it. And for the most part things between us have been pretty good, even great sometimes. We're loving with each other, you know—being extra considerate—and we're having as much sex as back in the first couple of years of our marriage. It's terrific, too, most of the time.

"It's just ... well, I guess I have moments when that picture, of her and Theo, comes into my mind. And then I can't think about anything else. About her and the other men—were there 20 of them, or 500, or a thousand? And did she look so loving and intimate with all of them? Did they all please her the way he obviously did?

"I mean, there had to be a reason she needed all that strange cock, right? She can tell me it had nothing to do with me, but how could it NOT have to do with me?"

He sat with his hand covering his eyes, and I got virtually nothing out of him for the rest of the session.

My private conversations with Leanne were a mirror image of those with Mark.

"When he's happy with me, Tom, it's fantastic!" she said. "He's as loving as ever, and so full of fun. And we're having a great time in bed.

"But then, apparently out of nowhere, he gets quiet and withdrawn; disappears to his office after dinner, or looks past me while I'm trying to talk to him. I don't know what to do.

"Being patient and letting him come out of it doesn't seem to work, or at least not for several days. And pushing him to talk just seems to drive him away from me."

"Has he given you any idea what's on his mind during these times?" I asked.

"Only that ... that the picture in his mind of me with Theo still bothers him. I know he's still feeling insecure as a lover sometimes, even though he has no reason to be.

"Once or twice he's said something like, 'I just don't get it, Leanne. Either I wasn't enough for you, or...or what? What OTHER reason was there why you needed...' "

Leanne started to cry a little. "He didn't finish the sentence, but I knew what he was going to say. '...why you needed so much strange dick?' "

I sighed to myself. "I'm sure you can see why that question would trouble him. Is there any answer you can give him?"

Usually Leanne bristled when I broached this subject—but this time she looked thoughtful. 

"You and I have talked a lot about my father, Tom, and it's pretty clear what you think. I suppose you're probably right. Growing up I could never get his attention, and the only thing that ever worked was my attractiveness and sexuality. I couldn't match Mary or Kaitlyn for brains or sports, but when I started to be a looker, he stopped ignoring me so much.

"But it's not as simple as 'I fuck other guys to get the attention my father denied me,' though!" She looked a little defiant.

"I don't think it's that simple either, Leanne," I replied mildly. "Most behaviors aren't about any one single reason. No doubt liking sex has a lot to do with it—and most people, regardless of their upbringing, enjoy feeling attractive to others.

"But I do think that your father's coldness is a factor. And it may be that, having learned you could never win his love in a wholehearted way, you concluded that short-term involvements with a lot of men who were drawn to you would be much safer. Far less chance of being hurt, of being let down."

These were issues we'd talked about a number of times before, and I hoped that discussing them with me would help Leanne be clearer about her own motivations for her past promiscuity—whatever the outcome of her marital problems might be.




What Did I Do that was Wrong? 03



****************

It was eleven weeks after their "kiss and make up" session in my office, when Mark had so optimistically tried to say goodbye to me, that it all hit the fan. He and Leanne were scheduled for a joint session at 8:30 am on a Tuesday, but Leanne didn't arrive until nearly 9:00. She'd clearly been crying and looked very upset; and she was alone.

"Mark's gone, Tom—he left last night without telling me!"

I got her to sit down and tried to calm her a little, asking her to tell me everything that had happened. For several minutes she cried too hard to be very coherent; but finally she was calm enough to talk about it.

"Everything was fine the last few days—at least I thought so. And last night was really special! We watched TV in the living room for a little while and then started fooling around, teasing and giggling. And then Mark picked me up in his arms and carried me off to the bedroom.

"And we made love, and it was wonderful—just fantastic. We took our time and really pleased each other, and when we finally got to the ... to intercourse, it got very fast and hard and intense. I came several times, and the last time the two of us came together. It was just tremendous!

"Afterwards we just lay there, cuddling, with me telling him how marvelous he was, and we drifted off to sleep. I felt really content, and really close to him." She sniffled some more.

"And then this morning he was gone! And a bunch of clothes were gone from his part of the closet, and when I looked I found that two of our suitcases were missing."

"And he didn't say anything in particular last night, or leave you a note or anything?" I asked.

Her eyes welled up again, and she said, "he left these on the dining room table".

She dropped two things into my palm. One was a folded sheet of paper, on which Tom had written, "Sorry, I just can't handle this anymore". The other was his wedding ring.



What Did I Do that was Wrong? 04



[Author's Note: Sorry for the delay in posting this chapter--I had an emergency to deal with.] 

I spent the rest of the session trying to calm and reassure Leanne.

"Mark doesn't strike me as a particularly rash person. He's obviously very upset, but I don't think he'll get on a plane and just disappear. It's much more likely that he's still in town, and that he'll find a motel for a few days, keep on going to work, and eventually make contact."

"And if he doesn't?" she replied, starting to weep again.

"I've done everything I can think of, Tom! I've told him I love him, and showed him I love him, every possible way there is! What more can I do?"

My answer didn't reassure her. "I don't think there IS anything more, Leanne—at least not right now. This is a struggle that Mark has to work out within himself, and all we can do is support him.

"Look," I said after a minute. "I'm supposed to see Mark again on Thursday afternoon. Let's at least try to be calm until then. If he shows up, and tells me he hasn't been in contact with you, I promise to call you right after the session to let you know he's still around, okay?

"In the meantime, do what you can to go on with life. See a friend, go to a movie—do things to take care of yourself, and to keep from sitting and worrying. Mark loves you very much—we both know that. His emotions got the best of him, but that doesn't mean he's gone for good."

It wasn't much, but it was pretty much all I had to offer in the way of comfort, and Leanne was a little calmer when she left my office.

****************

To my pleasant surprise, Mark walked into my office right on time the following Thursday. His manner was troubled, and a little sheepish.

As he sat down all he said was, "hello, Tom".

"Hi, Mark. Have you been in touch with Leanne since Tuesday?"

The sheepish look deepened. "Yeah, I, uh, left her a message yesterday during the day. Just saying that I was okay, that I'd found a place to stay for a little while, and that I'd be in touch."

"I guess you can imagine that she was pretty upset when I saw her."

"Yes, well, I ..."

He sat up, and looked straight at me. Sheepishness was gone, and seriousness was in its place.

"I just had to leave, Tom—I didn't have any choice. I felt like my head was going to explode."

I nodded, and said, "why don't you tell me about it?"

What followed was pretty predictable in its broad outlines—only the specifics were new to me. A series of incidents, each of them fairly minor in and of itself, kept reminding Mark of the pain and insecurity he was already struggling to work through. Or, rather, I should say "struggling to contain", because he frequently resisted the opportunities to work through it that both Leanne and I offered to him.

The previous Thursday he'd been home alone, because Leanne had a meeting in the evening, and he'd watched "Unfaithful" with Richard Gere and Diane Lane. It's a devastating film about a wife in a seemingly happy marriage who falls into a torrid love-affair; and needless to say it was precisely the wrong thing for Mark's frame of mind.

What made it particularly bad, Mark told me, is that at one point while having sex with her lover Diane Lane's character said something to him that was just like what Leanne liked to say to Mark in bed.

"It just freaked me out, I guess. Nothing but a coincidence, but my mind started careering down the track of Leanne having affair after affair, all the while pretending to love me."

When Leanne came home Mark didn't tell her anything about the movie, but he was uneasy. Unable to sleep, he found himself in his study, playing chess on the computer for half the night.

"By Monday I was feeling better—I'd put it out of my mind, I guess. Leanne and I made love, and it was really great. Long and incredibly satisfying, I think for both of us.

"We were lying in bed afterwards, half-asleep, and I was feeling really happy. Leanne was kissing my neck, just drowsily, you know? And she said, "baby, you're the best—the absolute best".  And then she was asleep within another minute; I could feel her breathing change.

"I know she meant to be nice, to be loving. But what she said just started to eat at me! I'm the best? the absolute best? But you had to fuck dozens of other guys—hundreds of other guys? How can I be the best, if I'm not even good enough to satisfy my own wife?!

"I realized that I was being ridiculous, that I was taking Leanne's sweet remark and turning it into a knife to stab myself with—but I just couldn't help it! I lay there, feeling worse and worse, while she slept happily next to me.

"Finally, at about 2 am, I got up and went into the kitchen for a sandwich, and I remembered I hadn't put the trash out for pickup on Tuesday morning. I grabbed the bag out of the kitchen wastebasket and tied it shut, and carried it into the garage to get the big trashcans.

"And on the way I snagged the bag on the edge of a rake and ripped it open, and half the trash spilled out onto the floor of the garage. So I cursed, and got a broom to sweep it back up. And there on the floor I saw an open box of condoms.

"It was a box of a dozen, and there were three left. I went kind of nuts—I had to know exactly how many had been used! I laid down some old newspapers and poured out the entire contents of the trash bag, and sorted through it, but I only found two more. Five condoms. So there had to have been seven used—by one or more of Leanne's fuck-buddies, of course.

"I cleaned up the mess and threw it all out, but the whole time my brain was going a mile a minute. Could Leanne possibly still be fucking other people? I didn't want to believe it, and I really didn't believe it. She made a promise to me, and I honestly trust her, I do."

I must have looked a bit skeptical—not about Leanne, but about the depth of Mark's faith in her.

"You've heard her, Tom. She never cheated on her high school boyfriend, or on her jerk of a first husband, even though she was tempted. And I believe that she wouldn't have lied to me either.

"It's just ... well, it's kind of obvious. Were these condoms she was throwing out because she didn't need them any more? And if so, why throw them away now, nearly three months after she promised to stop fucking other guys? And where were the seven used ones?"

His face reflected the anguish in his voice. "Even if she HAS been faithful to me for those months, the condoms reminded me of all the years when she'd been spreading for ... when she'd been having sex with God knows how many men.

"The more I thought about it, the more I thought I could never feel confident that I was enough for her. Would she spend the rest of her life feeling confined by monogamy, wishing that somehow she could keep having her other lovers but restraining herself just so she wouldn't lose me? That idea hardly made me feel better!

"I stewed about it all night, getting more and more crazy. And at about 5:30 am I gave up—I said, that's it, I'm outta here. I packed a couple of bags, left my ring, wrote her a note, and got the hell out of Dodge."

We both sat for a moment, each of us lost in thought. Mark was tired and emotionally wrung-out. He'd been using his life-long strategy of pushing emotional troubles away rather than facing them, and it was tearing him to pieces.

It was obvious that he loved Leanne. And equally obvious that she loved him, that she was ready and willing to be the monogamous wife he wanted and needed. But I wasn't very confident that he could get past his agonized feelings about her sex with other men—certainly he wouldn't unless he started talking about them, with me and with her.

I said, "Mark, it sounds like you're in a lot of pain—but I don't hear you saying 'I'm done with Leanne, I want a divorce'. Is that right?

"No, I ...." He sat silently for a minute. "I love her. I've never stopped loving her. If only I could...I don't know, erase that scene from my brain..."

More silence.

"Listen, Mark—you experienced something traumatic, saw something that's very hard to see. But you know what? A lot of people have been through something like that in their lives, and gotten over it. Not right away, but in time.

"You're going to get over this, I promise. But not by pretending, not by acting as though it never happened. You have to talk about it."

He nodded, and said wearily, "I know that. I don't want to do it, but I know you're right. But I...."

He sat up straighter in his chair, and looked right at me.

"But I'm not ready yet to go through it all again with Leanne, okay? I'll come and see you, but ... but I still need some time away."

"That's fine," I said. "But do you think you could stay in touch with her, call her every couple of days? She's pretty frightened and upset, you know."

"I know—and I didn't mean to hurt her. Yeah, I'll call her."

****************

My session with Leanne that Friday was difficult. I genuinely felt bad for her, because I had nothing much to offer beyond vague reassurances.

She was calmer—a little tearful, but at least not hysterical and terrified. Mark had called her after seeing me, and they'd talked for a few minutes. Apparently he had promised he wouldn't do anything crazy—no quitting his job, no moving out of town. But he wasn't ready to come back home.

We were going over it and over it, with her saying, "...and I'm just about at the end of my rope," when I interrupted her, firmly.

"No, Leanne, you're not. You're not nearly at the end of your rope."

She blinked at me.

"You have a husband you love, who loves you. Yes, you're going through a hard time right now—but he's not dead, he's not in the hospital in a coma, he hasn't hit you or filed for divorce or moved in with a girlfriend or done any number of awful things that husbands sometimes do.

"I know you're hurting—and so is Mark—but you need to maintain some perspective, okay?"

Leanne looked shocked, and then a little hurt. Finally she nodded her head.

"Okay, Tom. I guess I ... yes, you're right. It's lousy but it could be a lot worse."

She managed a weak smile, and I gave her a big one in return.

"Good! Now let's talk a little about being patient, and giving Tom some time—and about how you can take care of yourself through all this."

****************

Mark's next appearance in my office the following Thursday was a revelation. He seemed relaxed, confident, and a couple of inches taller—not at all the tormented husband of a week before.

"Good morning, Tom, how are you?"

Even his voice was different—richer and more confident.

"Fine, Mark. You seem different today—things are obviously better. Want to tell me about it?

To my surprise he looked away from me for a moment, appearing a little embarrassed.

"Yeah, well I—" He cleared his throat. "You remember a story I told you when we first started coming here, about a diner on the South Side and a waitress named Liz, who tried to pick me up?

I nodded.

"Well, I ... on Friday I stopped in there for lunch again, because it was near a job-site, and Liz was there, as friendly as ever. Even more so, once she noticed I didn't have a wedding-ring on.

"She was flirting with me just like the first time, and I.... Well, I guess I said to myself, 'Why not'?"

"So I met her for dinner, after her shift, and we went to an Italian place I like, and then back to her apartment." He looked at me, a little defiantly.

"And I fucked her. We fucked. Not just once, either—pretty much the whole weekend."

I nodded but didn't comment, just let him tell it the way he wanted to.

"It was ... shit, Tom, it was terrific! Nothing like making love with Leanne, it wasn't making love at all. It was fucking, it was just sex, and it was fantastic.

"Liz is only 23, and she's slim and amazingly firm, and she just loves sex. We did it three times Friday night, and at least five or six more times the rest of the weekend. Except for getting something to eat, we weren't out of bed for more than a couple of hours until Monday morning, when I left early to get some clean clothes for work.

"The first time was very exciting and intense. I have to say I was worried—the first time in years with someone besides Leanne, and would I lose my erection? Could I make it good for Liz, or would I disappoint her?

"But there wasn't any problem at all. She was really eager, really vocal, and she seemed to love everything I did. She kind of screeches when she comes, and squeezes me with her arms and legs."

He grinned at me, pleased but a little embarrassed. "So it was easy to tell I was pleasing her, and I could just relax and enjoy myself.

"That's pretty much what we did, after the first time. Just relax and enjoy ourselves."

To my mild surprise, Tom continued to tell me about his weekend with Liz in considerable detail. Clearly he was going over it in his own mind, confirming to himself that he had performed successfully. He spoke for nearly ten more minutes, about the different positions they'd tried, what Liz had said, what had been the most fun for him.

Finally, anticipating a question I'd been thinking of asking, he said, "I'm not going to see her again, I don't think. At least I told her I wouldn't.

"I made it clear that I still love my wife, even though we're going through a tough time right now. And that I wasn't in the market for a new relationship.

"And she was totally cool about it. Liz is a long way from being ready to settle down. She said she'd just liked my looks the first time we met, and thought we might have a good time together. And man, we did."

He sat back, looking a little sheepish, and waited for me to comment. I marvelled at how resiliant a human being can be, and at how much can change in just a few days.

"It sounds like you had a great time, Mark, and I'm glad.

"So some of the sex with Liz was fast and intense, but some of it was more slow and relaxed, right?"

"Oh yeah, after the first time. On Saturday afternoon we had a real slow one, almost lazy—it probably lasted nearly an hour. She rode me for a while, and then we rolled over and spent a while doing it missionary."

"You're a smart guy, Mark, so I won't try to fool you about where I'm going with this. I'll bet that the sex that afternoon included a lot of kissing, a lot of relaxed, intimate talking and murmuring?

"And I'll bet that if Leanne had been watching you, she might have thought that you and Liz were truly lovers, not just a one-weekend fling?"

I saw his face change, and I quickly finished making my point. "In fact, don't you think that she would have drawn pretty much the same conclusions about you and Liz as the ones you drew about Leanne and Theo in your backyard?"

He looked at me for almost a full minute before he replied. Then, unwillingly, he said, "yes, I guess so."

I pushed him harder. "Imagine Leanne there, looking in through a window and seeing you with Liz. Doing it nice and slow—very affectionate I'll bet. Long kisses, smiles, her arms around your neck, maybe sliding her hands up and down your back. Her legs wrapped around you.

"How do you think that would have looked to her?"

Mark was fighting hard to keep his eyes on mine, but he couldn't do it. His gaze broke away from me and darted off to one side. He seemed to be blushing a little. He got out of his chair and started to pace around the room.

Without looking at me he said, "okay, maybe that's how it would have looked. But that wasn't how it was. It was sex, Tom. Fucking. Sweet, slow, fucking."

He turned and faced me. "With a nice, cute, somewhat interesting, very attractive blonde girl of 23—who I could no more fall in love with than I could fly to the moon.

"It felt great, okay? And at that moment, sure, I felt incredibly close to Liz. But it was just sex."

He kept looking at me. "And I can see where you're heading, of course. I'm supposed to shout 'Eureka!' and be cured, because what Liz and I did is just like what Leanne and Theo did, right?"

I waited, not saying anything. He started to pace around the room again.

"I get it," he said. "I don't like it, but I get it." He went back to his chair and sat down, looking at me with anger on his face.

"But that doesn't mean the feelings just melt away, dammit!"

"No," I said, "it's never that easy. Making a rational connection is one thing—resolving painful feelings is something else.

"But would you agree, Mark, that at least this gives us something to work with? A place to start?"

****************

It was three more weeks before I had both Leanne and Mark in my office together again. We'd been taking it very slow, as I waited for Mark's emotional state to settle a bit.

At my suggestion he'd been calling Leanne regularly, and they'd been talking. He told her that he was all right, that he was looking forward to coming home and being with her again, but that he needed a little more time to himself.

Leanne wasn't happy with this, but at least she wasn't so terrified about losing him as she had been in the first few days after he walked out. She and I had spent our weekly sessions together talking about her feelings—how Mark's absence made her feel, what her hopes were for his return.

"I'm pretty surprised," she said at one point, "but Mark being gone doesn't make me the least bit interested in finding another partner—you know, for casual sex.

"All I want is him—I want sex, but I want it with him, the warmth and love and security all together. The idea of a hard cock attached to some anonymous stranger just seems so empty to me."

She looked at me with a slightly wondering expression on her face. "All these years of thinking about that constantly ... when I'd meet the next guy who would attract me, what the sex would be like. And now it's like that switch is just turned off."

She laughed. "I haven't even been masturbating—well, not very much. It may be several years too late, but my sexual feelings seem to be all tied up with loving Mark, and wanting him back.

"I just wish it hadn't taken all this ... all this SHIT for that to happen."

In my sessions with Mark we talked about sex. About sex with Leanne, with Liz, with various past women in his life. He talked about casual sex, about tender love-making with Leanne, about the difference between lust and the loving desire he felt for her. And we discussed confidence, and the difficulties he had maintaining an erection after he first discovered Leanne with Theo.

This might all seem like pretty obvious ground to cover—but Mark was so used to bottling up his feelings, especially the unpleasant or frightening ones, that it was hard work for him. He had trouble at first believing that he wasn't the only man with erection difficulties—or with confidence difficulties, for that matter.

And it was harder because he'd always been attractive, and an athlete; girls and women had been easy to come by. He was used to feeling good about his interactions with them, both in and out of bed. Unlike most men, he hadn't had much experience of insecurity or failure.

I asked Mark whether he wanted just to go home, when he was ready, or see Leanne first in my office. He thought about it for a week, and I was not surprised when he came back in and said, "I think I should meet her here, Tom. I think it ... it might be emotional, and I'm hoping it will be a little easier here."

Given how many unspoken feelings there were on both sides, I decided in advance that I'd have to choreograph their reunion pretty carefully. I asked Leanne to come ten minutes early, so they wouldn't bump into one another in my waiting room. When I opened the door to let Mark in, she was standing on the far side of the office, looking nervous.

Mark came in and went straight to her. "Hi honey," he said quietly, and put his arms around her. She held him tightly and started to cry.




What Did I Do that was Wrong? 04



I waited while they clung to one another, and then after a couple of minutes she pulled back, kissed him, said, "hi baby," and smiled at me through her tears.

They slowly moved to their chairs and sat down. Leanne slid her chair over close to Mark's, so she could hold his hand, and he didn't seem to mind.

"I'm glad you're both here," I said. "I know this has been a very hard time for both of you.

"Mark, I think Leanne really needs to understand why you left that night. Of course she has a general idea, but it would help if you could share the specific things with her, the things we've talked about."

Mark nodded, but he didn't speak right away. He gently detached himself from Leanne's hand, and got up and walked to the far side of the room, where he leaned against the wall.

"I'm sorry for what I did, Leanne," he said. "Leaving like that—it seems kind of cowardly to me now, and it must have upset you a lot. I'm sorry."

Leanne just nodded. She was watching him very carefully, her hands clutched together in her lap.

"It was a bunch of things, I guess. Well, the one big thing you know about—still not ... still struggling to get past all the images in my head, you with Theo, you with faceless strangers. And wondering: how many, how often, when and where? Did you like it better with them? What did it mean about you and me?"

I could see Leanne wanted to reply, but I urged her to wait with a small gesture of my hand.

"Then there were a couple of specific things, just before I left." Mark told Leanne about watching "Unfaithful", and she smiled sadly, understanding what he was saying. Then he told her about their lovemaking the last night they were together, and what she'd said afterwards--"baby, you're the best—the absolute best"—and how that had tormented him.

Leanne cried, "but Mark, I didn't..."

"I know, I know," he said. "I know what you meant, Leanne, I really do—it was a loving thing to say. But I just couldn't help turning it into something really different, a reminder of all the men out there you could be comparing me to." He was still leaning against the wall, his fists clenched a little, looking at nothing. Leanne was quiet again.

"And then, in the middle of the night, I went to take the garbage out to the trash cans and caught the bag on a rake, and when it all spilled out I saw a box of condoms."

Leanne's head jerked up—she stared at him, looking a little pale.

"I couldn't help myself. I searched through the entire bag and found five unused ones. And I sat there and thought about the other seven, and what you must have used them for. And I just ... I just, you know, sort of fell apart."

Leanne looked at me anxiously and I nodded, but gave her a signal that meant "gently".

She turned to Mark and picked up her purse, an enormous dark blue leather one that she carried over her shoulder.

"Honey, do you remember I showed you this new purse that weekend? I told you the old black one was falling apart, so I went shopping and found this new one that I really liked?"

He nodded at her, his face stiff, and she went on.

"That Monday I sat down and transferred all my stuff out of the black one into this new one. And naturally I threw away the condoms, because I didn't need them anymore. I used to carry them with me, but that's all over with.

"You know that, don't you?" Her voice sounded very tense. "You know that I haven't been with anybody else since that day with Theo?"

He nodded again, and said, "yes, Leanne. I believe you."

She went on. "So it was just that I'd never gotten around to cleaning out my purse—never even thought of it until I bought a new one. And I didn't want you to have to see the condoms, so I jammed the box way down into the bottom of the trash bag.

"I'm so sorry, Mark!" She began to cry.

Mark relaxed, a little, and after a moment he came back to his chair and held Leanne's hand. She kept crying, but looked at him and tried to smile. He put his arm around her, and gently kissed her cheek. I waited.

"It's all right, honey," he said finally. "Just bad luck I guess, me tearing the damn bag open. It wasn't anybody's fault."

We all sat for a few minutes, with them holding one another gently as Leanne calmed down and dried her eyes.

"This has been an emotional session," I said, "but I'm so glad that you're here together again.

"Do you think we could possibly meet again tomorrow?" They both nodded, and we scheduled a time.

"Good," I said. "Now—about tonight. Mark, are you ready to go home again?"

He nodded, and Leanne smiled at him, squeezing his hand tightly.

"Okay. Why don't you both go get Mark's stuff from the hotel and take it home. Tonight I want you to have a quiet evening—watch TV or something, be kind to one another, but don't try to talk about anything. We'll pick up tomorrow with the things we have to discuss, but for tonight just enjoy one another's company."

I watched them leave my office arm in arm, and smiled to myself. One step at a time, I thought.

****************

The next day was just as emotional. I had Mark tell Leanne about his weekend with Liz. She took it quietly, but it was obvious that it bothered her. By the end of his story she was huddled in her chair, her arms tightly folded over her chest.

"Leanne?" I asked. "Are you all right? Can you talk about how you're feeling?"

Mark and I both waited, and she said, "I'm ... okay, Tom. It hurt, imagining Mark with her, but mainly ... mainly it scared me. She sounds so pretty, and so enthusiastic. How can I compete with that? I'm older and saggier and heavier and..."

Mark said, "you're the most beautiful woman I've ever seen." He said it quietly, but she heard him and it drew her up short. It was perfect. They gazed at each other silently, and then smiled.

"Really?" she said, shyly, and he nodded back at her, smiling.

"Really," he said.

I waited for them to enjoy the moment, all of it; and only when it had passed did I speak again.

"Mark, could you tell Leanne briefly about the ... encounter with Liz that you and I talked about? When you had sex with her slowly?"

He recounted it to her, telling her all about how I'd pointed out the similarities to the encounter with Theo that he'd seen. She listened gravely, and then turned to me.

"So you told him that fucking sometimes looks like making love? Even when it isn't?"

"That's not how I put it, but yes," I replied. "Sex can be slow and tender, but that doesn't necessarily make it any more intimate, or profound or meaningful.

"If two people who love one another are doing it, then they're making love. If two people are having a casual fuck, that's fine too; but it isn't making love—not in the same way."

Leanne turned to Mark. "Did that help at all, Mark? Hearing about it that way from Tom?"

"A little—no, I guess more than that. It still ... it still hurts a lot, the image I have in my head of you and Theo. But I can also imagine what Liz and I must have looked like, and I know that that was just casual, fun sex. It wasn't any sort of threat to what you and I have."

He smiled. "My feelings about it haven't caught up to what my mind tells me, but I think I'll get there."

I jumped in at that point, because I needed to give them their marching orders. I had a plan for how to get them back on track.

"Okay, let's talk for a minute about the next week. I'd like to see you both together again a week from today, but in the meantime I have a couple of instructions. Did you have any sexual contact last night?"

They shook their heads, and Mark said, "we were a little scared to, I think. We had a nice dinner and watched TV, cuddled a little, but then just went to sleep. We didn't talk about it, but I think we both felt the same way."

"Good," I said. "For the coming week I want you to do more of the same. Be as affectionate as you want to be—lots of cuddling, touching, kissing if you feel like it. Treat each other lovingly, give each other back-rubs or foot massages if you want, but no sex. I want you to have a little time to get back in touch physically without any of the pressure of actual sex."

They both agreed right away, looking a bit relieved rather than disappointed, and we said our goodbyes.

****************

When the following week's session arrived Mark and Leanne seemed happier and more relaxed. Leanne in particular was bursting to tell me how they were doing.

"It was so strange, Tom! It was terrific, actually"—Mark nodded at this—"but it felt like being back in high school.

"The first couple of days we just cuddled a little at night, but as the week went on we started getting more and more turned-on. By Tuesday [two days before our session] we were both ready to jump each other, but we kept telling ourselves to wait. We've been ... necking, and it's been really hard not to go further."

Mark broke in. "Last night Leanne REALLY wanted to do something, so I suggested we ... masturbate for one another. I figured since it wasn't touching each other it would be all right."

"And how did that go?" I asked, very neutrally.

They looked a tiny bit embarrassed. "It was fantastic," Leanne said. "We'd never done that for one another, at the same time and with the lights on and everything. We both were so worked-up it didn't take long at all."

"And as soon as it was over," Mark said, "I jumped up out of my chair and went to lie down on the bed with Leanne, and just hugged and kissed her. I simply HAD to be touching her—and since we'd both just had our orgasms I hoped that would be okay. I couldn't help it, I needed to be holding her."

"That sounds fine," I said with a grin. "And I'm not going to torture you any further—the rules for this week are completely different.

"You can have sex as much as you want this week—any sort of sexual contact that you both want. Including none, of course, whenever one or both of you aren't in the mood.

"But—here's the kicker—everything you do sexually has to be something you've never done before, in at least some respect. So: intercourse in a position you've never tried together, or some other form of sexual contact you haven't experienced, or sex in a brand-new location. Nothing should be a repeat of anything you've done together in the past."

Mark said, "so, like missionary position would be okay if we did it, say, up on the roof?"

I laughed and said, "exactly. Or sex in your bed would be okay, if it's a position you've never tried before."

Leanne said, "honey, how about if we stop at the Barnes & Noble on the way home? I'll bet we can find a copy of the Kama Sutra..."

They left my office nearly giggling, and I was very pleased. The goal of course was to get them out of old patterns, and put them in situations where they had to react freshly to one another. I wanted to give them some time to succeed sexually, with their old memories and fears kept at bay by the need to be doing something new.

****************

Leanne and Mark were a happy couple again the following week. They alternated stories, with lots of laughter, of the various things they'd tried—some fun, others not.

Mark said, "Leanne found one called 'Don't Go' that I really liked. It's intercourse lying down, on our sides, except that Leanne's head is down by my knees. Her legs are wrapped around me, and I can caress her, uh, her buttocks."

Leanne liked that one too, but said, "I liked the 'Sexy Scissors' even better. I was on my back at the edge of the bed, and Mark held my legs straight up against his chest. While he was inside me he kept opening and closing them—it was amazing! First I was tight, squeezing him, and then I was so wide open ..." She looked as though she wanted to describe it some more, but then stopped, a little embarrassed.

They continued in this vein for some minutes. Clearly the week had been a success.

"Okay," I said. "For this week, anything you like, but you take turns being in charge. Leanne, tomorrow is your day. Any kind of sex you want, as much or as little as you want, any way you want it—including none. You decide, Mark goes along with you. Then the next day Mark is in charge. You alternate days until next week. All right?"

We talked about it a little. They seemed excited, but a little concerned about asking for something that the other might not like. I said, "you love each other, and you know one another very well. I'm not worried that you'll stop being concerned for each other's feelings—but I want each of you to have a chance to get just the kind of sexual experience you want.

"And I think you may find that it's a lot of fun being the non-dominant one, knowing you're giving your partner just what she or he wants."

Again they were happy, leaving the office. "So far so good," I though to myself, wondering how long I could keep this up.

****************

I was still seeing Leanne and Mark individually each week; and those sessions were a lot more serious. With Mark I was trying to open him up, trying to get him to talk about his feelings, and work through the continuing struggle with jealousy and worries about his inadequacies as a lover. The weekend with Liz had clearly helped, but it didn't make the problem go away.

One week when he came in I asked him very bluntly, "Mark, are there things about Leanne's encounters with other men that you want to know? Should we talk about your having a discussion with her?"

He looked at me. "What keeps driving me crazy, Tom—even though I can sort of see that it doesn't really matter—is how many men. Was she screwing another guy once a month? or twice a month, or, God help me, three times a week?

"And I guess I also can't help wondering how often she saw the same guy, whether it ever turned into anything more "connected", if you know what I mean—more emotional."

I watched him as he talked; Mark had clenched his fists, apparently without realizing it.

"Let's talk about those two questions," I said. "Just for the sake of speculation, what do you think would have been the minimum for Leanne in terms of other men, and what would have been the maximum?"

"I don't know, maybe once every other month at a minimum. For a maximum—shit, twice a week? I don't know how she would have had time for that, but her schedule selling real estate has always been pretty flexible."

"So in four years, then, it might have been about 24 encounters, if it was every other month. Or it might have been as many as 400, if it was twice a week—though that seems unlikely."

"You don't know?" he asked, looking at me hard; it was easy to see how painful this was for him.

"No," I said, "Leanne and I haven't talked about the numbers part of it.

"But tell me—how does it feel different? How does it feel inside you thinking about a couple of dozen, as opposed to a couple of hundred? That's what really matters."

A long silence. "If it's four-hundred," he said, very slowly, "then she's a whore. And I'm not sure I can live with a whore, even if it's somebody I love as much as Leanne."

"But if it's 25 then it's okay?"

He shrugged, with a look that suggested he was aware of the absurdity of what he was saying.

"I know it doesn't make sense, Tom, but I—the idea of Leanne with hundreds of guys just disgusts me. I can see them, lined up outside our bedroom, the line stretching down the hall and out the front door onto the street; and inside Leanne is lying in bed naked, calling out "Next!" each time a guy finishes fucking her."

He looked tormented. "How can I ... how can I see that picture in my head, and go on loving her? Go on making love to her?"

I waited a long time before I spoke. "Well, first, Mark, you have to realize that that picture is one YOU invented—it doesn't bear any relationship to the reality, does it?"

He shook his head, and I went on.

"What we know is that Leanne occasionally had sexual encounters with other men. Discreetly, and almost never in your home. With your permission, don't forget. And you told me that she said there were no ongoing love affairs..."

"But what does that mean, exactly?" Mark interrupted me. "She said she'd ... been with Theo three or four times. But was that her maximum? For all I know, there were other guys she fucked for months!"

We sat in silence for a minute or two.

"Mark, I think you have a decision to make. It seems to me there are two ways to think about this, and two ways to move forward.

"The first is to say, that was all in the past—it's over now. Leanne has told you she's committed to being completely faithful, and you believe her, right?"

He nodded, and I went on.

"So one alternative is simply to accept that the past is going to bother you whenever you think about it, but that it's past—and that over time you'll think about it less and less. No need to poke a stick into it and stir it up.

"The other option is to say, 'I don't think that's going to work—it bothers me too much to just put aside, and I need to ask Leanne to tell me more'. 

"But in that case, obviously, you have to be sure that you're ready to hear the answers. If you think that Leanne's answers might drive you away from her, is it really worth asking the questions?"

I knew that the Mark who had first come into my office several months earlier would have chosen option one: push it away, try not to think about it. But that hadn't been working, and I was not surprised when the Mark sitting across from me chose option two.

"I ... guess I have to ask, Tom. I'll try not to jump all over her, but not knowing is just driving me crazy. And imagining things feels worse than what knowing the actual truth will feel like, or at least I think so."

He looked reflective, and said, "I guess I've changed a lot, huh? When I first came to see you I was the king of sweeping things under the rug."

"Yeah," I said, "but that wasn't working so well, as I recall."

He just laughed, a bit ruefully.

****************

At my next session with Leanne I said, "Mark's going to ask you some things."

"Like?"

"Like how many men; like how often you had sex with them at your house, and whether it was ever in your bed; like how many times you saw the same guy, whether it ever turned into an emotional connection. And probably—again—why you had to do it."

She looked serious. "And does my marriage depend on my answers?"

"I don't really know," I said. "It might. But I don't see anything that you or I can do about it. Mark needs to hear the truth from you, and then we have to help him handle it. And there are lots of ways to say things, ways that are more or less tactful and sensitive while still being true.

"I think we should spend today's session talking about those."

"Okay," she said, nodding. "A little rehearsal, in a way. That's fine with me."

****************

Mark and Leanne both looked tense when they came in together that week. I asked them how taking turns sexually had gone, though, and that brought some smiles.

Leanne said, "I think Mark liked it—but I just LOVED it!"

She giggled. "It was just so ... so luxurious to lie back and have him please me exactly the way I wanted it, for as long as I wanted. And he made me—well, let's just say he left me really tired and really satisfied!"

Mark smiled and said, "it was fun for me too. In a way, pleasing Leanne on her days was even better than being the boss on my days. To know that I was doing just what she wanted, just what pleased her the most, and to see her pleasure ... it just felt good."

"I loved that too, when it was my turn," Leanne broke in. "Being, like, Mark's little sex-geisha, just serving him however he wanted—that was hot!"

"Good," I said. "It seems as though the last few weeks, with these crazy rules I've given you, have worked out just as I hoped they would. You've had some fun, done some new things, and maybe learned a little more about what each of you likes, and what your partner likes.




What Did I Do that was Wrong? 04



"I'm taking you off game-playing now: make love however you want, whenever you want. Try an occasional "Mark's in charge" day or "Leanne's in charge" day, if you feel like it. Pull out the Kama Sutra book and find a new position, if you feel like it; etc. As long as sex is fun and the feelings are good, you can do it on a trapeze or the same old familiar way in your bed."

They nodded, still smiling, but I could sense the tension return. They both knew what was coming.

"Mark," I said, "you have some questions for Leanne—about her encounters with other men. Why don't you go ahead and ask them?"

A brief silence. He looked serious; she just looked scared.

"Baby," he said, "I thought before we started coming to Tom that the best thing would just be, you know, not to think about any of this, just push it out of my mind. But that clearly wasn't working.

"So Tom and I have talked about the fact that if I know the truth, I can deal with it—instead of having to fight the pictures in my head.

"Is that okay with you?"

She nodded tensely. "Yes, Mark. Whatever will help us move forward, I'm willing to do."

"Besides Theo," he said, "how many times did you ... have sex with somebody else at our house?"

Leanne relaxed a tiny bit. This was an easy one. "Just once. A long time ago, a couple of years at least. It was in the backyard, like with Theo, one afternoon when you were away at that conference in Seattle."

"Okay. Um, you said that you'd been with Theo a few times before the day at our house, right?"

She nodded.

"How often in general did you ... have sex with the same guy?"

"Most of the time it was just once. Once in a while, but not too often, I saw a guy two or three times. But never more than four or five."

"So there was never anything ongoing, or anything that got to be more than ... than casual fucking?" This question mattered a lot to Mark—I could see it from his attempt to look relaxed and casual as he asked.

"No, baby. For me it was about no-strings sex. Sometimes I could tell that a guy was interested in more than that, and I just stopped seeing him.

"They never called me, Mark—I always called them. No one ever had my number, or knew where I lived. And the only guys I saw more than once were ones who had the same attitude I did—this is for fun, and nothing more."

"So there were a ... few guys you saw four or five times, like Theo, but never more than that?"

"Maybe half a dozen I saw five times, I don't know for sure. But never anyone more than that.

"This wasn't about love, or love-making, honey!" She suddenly looked worried, and she clasped Mark's hand tightly. "It was about excitement—about feeling attractive. About staving off feelings I didn't even know I had."

"Okay, Leanne—can we talk about that? Can you ... can you try to help me understand WHY you needed to do this so much? What were the feelings you were staving off?"

I was watching quietly from behind the desk. Mark looked serious but in control—he seemed to be managing to listen carefully without being emotionally overwhelmed.

"You ... you know what my father is like? Well, I never felt sure of his love, never felt I could hold his attention for more than a few minutes. One-night stands were safe—I wasn't risking anything. I was getting a shot of reassurance, you know, almost like a stiff drink: a belt of 'I'm attractive, I'm sexy, men are turned on by me'.

"And because there was no follow-up, no lasting connection, I could never feel hurt, like I did so often by my father, when his interest in me didn't last. I was the one in control, never the one being let down."

"And you don't think you need that any more?" Mark asked quietly.

Leanne glanced at me and smiled. "When I met you, Mark, I was still finding it hard to believe that anyone I cared for could really love me—you know, in a lasting way. And these quickie ... these ... one-night stands kept me from ever being dumped, the way I always feared I would be.

"But you LOVE me." She gave him a dazzling, loving smile. "You've made me believe, after all these years, that somebody wonderful could love me, and not lose interest or just drop me.

"And working with Tom has helped me really believe that, and really trust in your love. So of course I'm still a little afraid of being hurt—but not so much anymore, not so much that I need to fortify myself with meaningless sex.

"I really don't miss it, you know? I've been telling Tom—even when you'd left and I was so scared you were gone for good, I didn't want to go out and pick somebody up. I just wanted you back."

She looked at him. "You're the only one, Mark."

Wow, I thought. She'd answered his questions beautifully—truthfully, but also lovingly. I hoped it would be enough, but we weren't finished yet.

Mark was smiling at her. "Thank you, honey," he said. It was a nice moment; but then it ended, and Mark's face tightened again. He looked away.

"How many?" It was quiet, but almost like a growl. Then he looked at Leanne again, gazing intently at her.

"How many men were there, Leanne?"

"I don't know, Mark. Some months there were one or two—or none. There were certainly months when I didn't ... when I wasn't with anybody else.

"And then ... sometimes it was more often. I guess a few times a couple in the same week."

"Did it have to do with how we were doing ... you know, in bed?"

"I don't think so," she said. "It was more a matter of chance—did I meet someone. And how busy you and I were generally, was I swamped with real estate business, were you away, like in Milwaukee, or around a lot.

"When we had lots of time together, like on vacation or over the holidays, there was never anybody. Because all I wanted was to be with you.

"It only came into my mind when I was by myself."

There was a silence; and then, before he spoke again, Leanne continued.

"Actually, you know ... I think that sometimes my one-night stands sometimes happened right after I'd had to deal with my father. A phone call, or sometimes after he and my mom had visited, or we'd gone to see them.

"It seems like several times I went out and ... picked someone up in the next day or two. I don't think I realized that before. I guess talking to Tom about it, you know, about my father, made me see the connection."

He nodded, thinking. "So—how many, all together, do you think?"

"Since we've been married?" 

"Yes," he replied.

I'd warned Leanne not to say, "oh I don't know, Mark"; or "does it really matter?" Because it DID matter to him, intensely.

"Probably about twice a month, on average," she said. "Maybe a little more."

We were silent, and I watched Mark do the math. It was about a hundred, over four years—perhaps 125, depending on what "a little more" meant.

"Is that men, or—or times having sex?" he asked.

"Times having sex. The number of men is less."

There was a heavy silence, which I broke by asking my own question.

"Mark, in the four years of your marriage to Leanne, how often do you think you and she have made love?"

He looked surprised. "Jeez, I don't—I guess, well, at least three times a week on average.

"There are weeks it's less than that, but then again on vacations it's at least once a day, so it averages out. I guess I'd say three times a week."

Leanne was nodding in agreement.

"So, then, just to put it in perspective," I said, "you guys have made love together maybe 630 times or so." I watched Mark's face as that number sank in.

You can say to yourself, "what difference do numbers make?" But to many people (at least many men) they make a lot of difference, whether that's logical or not. For Mark, I hoped it would matter that he and Leanne had made love six times as much as she had been with other people.

It was a bad place to end a session; however, it couldn't be helped. We were out of time and another patient was waiting. But at least I'd managed to remind Mark that 600 was a lot more than 100. Even so, things were tense between him and Leanne as they left my office.

****************

When I next saw Mark, alone, I could tell that he was troubled. Tense and probably angry. I'd barely said "hello" when he burst out, "100 times! Maybe more, maybe 150! Jesus Christ!"

"Okay," I said. "Numbers are obviously on your mind, so let's talk about numbers. How many men was it, Mark, do you think?"

He looked at me, his anger interrupted a moment by surprise, and I said coolly, "oh, you haven't done the math? Well, follow along with me.

"Leanne said 'twice a month, or a bit more'. There are 48 months in four years, so let's call it 100 times, or maybe 125 tops. Now, she said there were perhaps half a dozen men she saw five times—that's 30, leaving 95. Of the rest, she said 'once in a while' she saw a guy more than once, perhaps two or three times.

"If 'once in a while' means, say, one out of every three, then one-third of the guys she saw two or three times—call it 2.5 on average—and the other two-thirds just once. How's your algebra, Mark? You're an engineer, after all. 2x/3 + 2.5(x/3) = 95.

"So 4.5x/3=95, meaning 1.5x=95.

"I get x = 63. Plus the original 6 makes 69 men. How's that, Mark, the number 69 seem fitting somehow?"

I was speaking coldly, even a bit harshly, and Mark was clearly baffled by my tone. He followed the math, though, and nodded his head.

"Yeah, okay, 69 guys."

Not giving him time to say, "and that's disgusting," or "see what a whore Leanne was," I pressed on.

"Mark, how many women did you have sex with in the years between your divorce and when you met Leanne?"

He looked even more baffled. "I ... don't know—a hundred, maybe? Probably at least eighty. But Tom, that was in the past!"

"And this isn't? Leanne hasn't been with anyone else since the day you saw her with Theo—that's several months ago now. So tell, me why exactly are her 69 worse than your 80?"

He looked even more perplexed, then triumphant. "Because ... because I wasn't with her then. We weren't married, dammit!"

"And hadn't you okayed this? Hadn't you specifically told her it was all right with you? For Christ's sake, Mark, it's time to be a man!"

Now he was truly shocked. I think he was too surprised even to be offended, though he probably had a right to be.

"Just answer me some questions, okay? Easy ones, all yes or no." 

He nodded, and I fired them at him one after the other, barely giving him time to reply before I went on.

"Do you love Leanne?" "Yes."

"Is she still the woman you want to spend your life with?" "Yes."

"Do you believe she loves you?" "Yes."

"Do you think she's ever cheated on you?" "No."

"Do you believe that she'll keep her word and give up other men for good?" "Yes."

"Has she ever done anything to make you think that sex with any of these other men was better, or more important to her, than sex with you?" "No."

"Has she ever given you the slightest indication of being less than happy with your sex life together?" "No."

"In fact, doesn't she make it very clear how much she enjoys making love with you?" "Yes."

I sat back, and let silence fill the room for a few moments.

"Bottom line, Mark. You love Leanne, and she obviously adores you. She had sex with other guys; you had sex with other women. You've given it up; she's given it up.

"The love between you is rock-solid, and the sex lately seems to have been going great.

"So it's time to suck it up; it's time to get over yourself, be a man, and go back to your wife. Fully—completely—in every way. Time to drown her in your affection, let her know every minute of the day what she means to you. Time to show her she's the most important thing in your life."

I softened my voice a little. "This doesn't mean you're never entitled to feel hurt or insecure. It doesn't mean you can't ask for reassurance. I imagine you'll want to talk more with Leanne about her encounters, and it will take a while before they really don't matter to you anymore.

"That's all okay. Ask her, and let her reassure you. Let her tell you ten times, a thousand times, that she's done with all that and that you're all she needs. Because it's true."

****************

I saw Leanne alone just once more after that, and the two of them together for about eight more sessions, gradually spreading them out to just once a month. In my session with Leanne I told her I'd hit Mark pretty hard, but that I thought he was ready for it.

"He trusts me, and I think my words will stay with him. I'm pretty confident your husband is going to be loving and affectionate for quite awhile."

She grinned at me. "That doesn't sound too bad!"

"Just be ready to reassure him," I said. "He's not done feeling insecure and hurt. The feelings may come up at odd times; he may want to ask you about it, or just get kind of snarky and make cutting remarks about you and other guys. 

"You've got to be patient and loving. Let him know you understand that it takes time, but that what's past is past. If he has questions, even if he asks the same questions again and again, try to be patient with him. And if he gets nasty and hurts your feelings, call him on it! Make him remember that you're just as entitled to trust and love and respect as he is."

We talked for the rest of the session about how things might go, and how she could handle them. At the end she said, "I really want to give you a hug, Tom—I'm so incredibly grateful to you for what you've done for us!

"But somehow that feels a little ... I don't know, like not quite the right thing to do, with the two of us alone in this office."

I nodded and said, "I know just what you mean, Leanne. But I appreciate the sentiment."

****************

The eight more sessions with Mark and Leanne together were really just precautionary—for me to smooth out the bumps if there were any. Occasionally they'd come in and talk about a testy conversation they'd had during the previous week, or about a moment when insecure feelings had arisen to trouble Mark.

There was one session when Leanne was really down, feeling that Mark was unconsciously poking at her about the other men, making indirect, catty remarks. He was stunned to hear that she was feeling that way, and apologized on the spot.

But there were some great moments too, including two stories that gave me a lot of hope for them.

In the third session Mark said, "something happened two nights ago that I wouldn't have understood before—before we started seeing you.

"I was working in my office after dinner, and I could hear Leanne on the phone in the other room—I figured she was talking to her parents.

"And then after a while she came to the doorway and just looked at me, waiting. And when I turned around, I could see she'd been crying. And she said, 'Mark, I'm sorry to bother you when you're working, but ... do you think you could ... come and fuck my brains out? And then just hold me, and kiss my hair and tell me you love me?'

"So of course I went to her, and gave her a big kiss, and took her off to the bedroom and did just as she asked. Not exactly a tough assignment for me!" 

He grinned, and Leanne jumped in to pick up the story.

"He was wonderful, Tom. He made love to me so fiercely, it was so exciting. And then he held me, and I cried in his arms for a while. And then we made love again, gently, me still crying a little, him whispering to me how he loved me, how beautiful I was."

Mark said, "I could see that talking to her parents had upset her—probably her father, who I have to say is one cold bastard."

"And it felt so great what happened, Tom! I was hurt and upset, but I didn't have the slightest desire to go out and pick up some guy—all I wanted was Mark, and his love and reassurance, and he was there for me so perfectly! It was one of the nicest things that's ever happened to me."

A couple of weeks later Leanne had a story to tell, about a surprise suggestion from Mark.

"Last Saturday, when the weather was really warm, Mark made us some lunch and suggested we eat outside by the pool. We'd sort of both been avoiding it, like that part of the yard was still radioactive, I guess. But we had our picnic and lay in the sun for a while, just dozing.

"And then he came over and starting kissing me, very gently at first, and we started necking, and in a few minutes he had my bathing suit off and had me down on the air mattress, you know, the one where ... where he saw me with Theo.

"So I was really worried about what would happen—but Mark just smiled at me and said, 'maybe it's time to reclaim this part of the house for you and me'.

"And we made love, slowly and lovingly. I knew that Mark was trying to make it like the way he'd seen me with Theo—but it didn't seem to be bothering him. And I started to cry a little while we were doing it, and say 'I'm so sorry!' And he just kissed me and told me he loved me, and we went right on with what we were doing."

Mark said, "I was a little nervous about what would happen—but part of me felt like, 'dammit, I want my pool back! and my back yard, and my air mattress!' We've always loved having sex out there, and I wasn't willing to give that up. And once we got started it was fine. Sexy and slow and loving, and Theo wasn't there any more, it was just Leanne and me."

She got out of her chair, came and sat on Mark's lap, and gave him a big kiss. And then she giggled, and they both looked at me a little embarrassed, while I just smiled back.

****************

By the eighth session, Leanne and Mark were doing very well, and we'd pretty much run out of things to say—it was clearly time to stop. When we got together for the last time I gave them the usual spiel about coming back to see me any time, that it was very common for couples to return for a "refresher" if they felt it would be helpful. 

I did get that hug from Leanne, and a kiss on the cheek, and then a firm handshake from Mark. 

They both thanked me very sincerely, and when I said, "it's been a pleasure, and I'm happy it's worked out so well," I meant it.