How To is Slate’s sex advice column. Have a question? Send it to Jessica and Rich here. It’s anonymous!
Dear How To,
My husband of over 20 years and I have been into BDSM/kink for most of our relationship. While he is more into certain things than I am, I have done my best to please him while maintaining some boundaries. Recently, he gave me the shock of my life.
He told me he wanted to find a submissive to do the things I don’t like. The last six years have been tough with multiple cancer treatments and surgeries. My body isn’t what it used to be and we don’t have as much sex or intercourse as we used to. But the thought of him being with someone else makes me sick. He backed off as soon as he realized how much it hurt me, but I know he still wants to do it. I want to talk about my concerns and boundaries, but he keeps telling me how much he screwed up and doesn’t know how to fix it. If I don’t let him express his kinky desires and he does it anyway, it will lead to divorce. I have so many questions and I don’t know how to talk to him about it.
—Tied up and heartbroken
Jessica Stoia: I feel like the person who wrote the letter flatly refuses to open the marriage, but is afraid that her husband will walk out of the marriage if he doesn’t open it.
Rich Juzwiak: Yeah.
Jessica: And it feels like the LW is forcing himself to compromise because if he forced things by walking away without a deal, it would be a deal breaker. So the LW is stuck in fear.
Rich: Yeah. There also seems to be this kind of ricochet anxiety. They write that it made them sick to their stomach. He got upset about it, and now they’re upset about his reaction to their reaction. It’s probably worth listening to your initial reaction. Unless you feel like you were being reckless or dramatic and saying, “That makes my stomach hurt,” that was an instinctive reaction that over time evolves into, “Well, okay, maybe it’s not that bad.” Right? I don’t understand exactly where the letter writer is emotionally. I don’t understand whether he’s acting out of fear, as it seems, or whether it’s set in and he’s now thinking, “Actually, I could do that. I could figure out a way to do that.”
Jessica: You see, this resonates with me because in business negotiations, 90% of the time, when someone presents me with an idea, I say, “No, no, that’s not possible. Wait, let’s think about it.”
Rich: Yes.
Jessica: “What if it were like this? What if it were like this…” I’m 38, I’ve been in business for almost 20 years in one way or another, and even today, when someone presents me with a perfectly good idea, my first response is, “Absolutely not. Wait, maybe…” So I don’t know if this is a character flaw I need to work on or a very understandable aspect of the human condition.
Rich: I think it’s the last option.
Jessica: I feel like it’s both. I think it’s a very understandable part of being human that needs to be worked on as well. So I can totally see our LW saying, “No.” And then saying, “Actually, if it were done in a certain way, if my concerns were actually heard, if boundaries were clear and placed in a certain position…”
Rich: In this dynamic that he proposed, there are a lot of things. It can involve sex, but it can also not involve sex. I mean, sometimes submissive things result in unpaid labor, essentially. And if everyone is okay with it and this submissive is doing things that our LW doesn’t want to do, like the husband suggested, you can just focus on making that feel good. You don’t have to lift a finger.
But I know it’s more complicated than that. There seems to be a lot to talk about. It would be good to get together again and start by saying, “Okay, I’m open to finding a solution so that we’re both happy with this situation. Let’s talk about it. Let’s start this conversation. You don’t need to keep apologizing.”
Jessica: They might say, “I panicked and now that I’ve had time to think, I want to discuss this suggestion.”
Rich: Yes. And give him time to process your situation. You’re at the end of the cycle of your panic attack. He may still be apologizing. That’s why he keeps apologizing. So it’s this kind of domino effect. Let the waters settle down first, then go in and start talking about it. You’re going to have to negotiate. Maybe nothing will come of it. Maybe it’s still too much. But if he wanted to, he’d most likely agree to you coming back and having a conversation where he’d get some of what he wanted.
Jessica: As for the many questions our writer has, she can write them down at her own pace. Mental health experts say writing by hand is the best way to go about it. I tend to type up a memo on my phone or a document on my computer. Even talking it over with a trusted friend can help. But get it all out, sort it out, and then write those questions down and prioritize them. Figure out which ones are the most important and start there. Because something this tangled and resonating throughout your relationship is probably not a one-time topic to talk about. It’s probably something you’re going to have to talk about in bits and pieces over time.
Rich: Yes. Also, if for some reason you can’t have that conversation where you both revisit this issue, you could send him a letter. You could give him essentially what you wrote to us in the form of a letter. That might get things moving, and then he could respond to you. As long as you’re communicating, there’s not really a problem. It seems to me that a slower pace in this case would actually be helpful because of the kind of instinctive ricochet that’s happened. So take some time, take your time. It’s definitely OK to do that. that.
More advice from Slate
I recently dated a guy who repeatedly told me he thought I was gorgeous and was very impressed with my career, and I thought he was a great guy himself. I gave him oral sex and he came in my mouth, which he said he hadn’t had in five years. It was “maybe the best blowjob of his life.” The guy never texted me again after that night. I didn’t text him either because I was the one who initiated our last date. I’m constantly being rejected sexually, which makes no sense.