1. Connection, excitement, danger
Three weeks ago
If you want to change the world, sometimes all it takes is a kind word. In my case, it came from a very pretty face with a very dirty mind. She sought me out after reading my Lush profile and said, “Hello. I used to feel like you do, with no self-esteem, anxiety, and depression. I saw you were online. How are you feeling tonight?” My wife and I no longer connected on an emotional and sexual level, which was causing me to have a mental health crisis. I was obsessed with a compulsion to cheat, and I didn’t care how it happened. Hookers, dating apps, strangers in bars, I didn’t really care. I just needed to get out there and scratch an itch. For someone who was considering having an affair, the offer of a chat session seemed like an open invitation to explore cheating with a willing participant.
I checked out her Lush profile too. I finally got lucky when the gods sent what I needed: a vision with voluptuous titties, sumptuous curves, and a pouting mouth that said all the right things to lower my defenses. She suggested a little role play, a little mind-fuck, a brief escape from the tensions at home.
I told the real world to take a hike while I indulged in fantasy role play as she yelled, “Yes, pinch my nipples! Harder, faster, deeper!” But that role play will have to be the subject of a different story.
It is still so new to me how online sex can be so liberating. I met her in the middle of the night on a holiday and poured out my heart, speaking all the dark secrets that drove so many others away. When the sun rose, she was still there, despite me talking much of the night about my family and my guilt and my brokenness. She even sent me a picture.
Her dirty mind and mouth were refreshing after the vanilla life I’ve had for the last decade. I had more fantasy sex with her in one night than with my wife this year (although that number is improving). My wife won’t deep throat or do anal, so role play must fill those needs.
It was a coincidence that my new online friend found me when she did. She taught me how to pretend, how to ask for what I want, to get lost in the moment. She suggested lovely scenes for us to play. All the while, I was crossing a line by talking to a woman outside my marriage. I didn’t think my wife would understand, but I desperately needed the emotional connection that I had formed online.
Is it possible to fall in love in less than twelve hours? The whispers of meeting in real life, which will probably never happen, helped to keep the illusion of happiness alive a little longer. Even as we were talking about flights and where to meet, the unreality of the situation was too much to sustain. The threat of losing family and sense of self will keep the affair restrained to the computer screen. One-handed sex remains the only option.
But I am no longer desperately alone in my misery as an online stranger sought me out based only on my Lush profile. Our relationship was interrupted the next day by the migration from Lush 1.0 to the new platform. Since chat and email were unavailable, I thought I had lost her forever. We have reconnected since then, but it isn’t the same. The time and distance have cooled things down.
She gave me a few kind words when she saw me online. “Hello, I might be able to help, I’ve been where you are.” At the time, I was not getting that kind of emotional intimacy in my personal life. She fucked my mind and changed my world. But how much did meeting her endanger my marriage? What would the effect be on my relationships with the other woman in my life?
2. Struggle, guilt, resolution
Present
According to Greek mythology, humans were originally created with four arms, four legs, and a head with two faces. Fearing their power, Zeus split them into two separate parts, condemning them to spend their lives in search of their other halves. For a long time, I thought that my other half was my wife, but lately something was missing.
My wife was adventurous and vocal before she got sick, but she got much quieter after she lost most of her female pleasure center to cancer. I felt guilty and selfish for wanting to stray when she had done nothing wrong, so I suppressed those urges for ten years. I was working on my compulsion to cheat in therapy, and where the urges came from, and what drove them. My therapist stressed open communication in marriage, so my wife and I took a weekend at a hotel to get away. We had an honest, open, painful discussion about our relationship as I saw it.
She was hurt, of course, but agreed that she couldn’t fulfill all my needs anymore. She reluctantly gave me permission to seek out other partners. I was blown away, not expecting that response, and began to cry. A weight was lifted. The option was available, which turned out to be the key. If the chance presents itself in the future, we will see where it leads together. The urgent need to act somehow dissipated, the fantasy of an affair being much different after discovering that I still passionately love my wife.
Now free to chat with others and get my frustrations out online, my marriage seems stronger. We have talked about the immediate threat my breakdown posed. We have resolved to try to regain the spark to the extent that we can. We are more affectionate, and consciously try to be more intimate. And our monthly weekends away from home will continue. We have been getting back to the way things were in the beginning, twenty-four years ago, when trying new things was the order of the day.
Thank you to both women in my life for your compassion and understanding. All brought about, in both cases, by a stranger reaching out with kind words.
