Compare and contrast

Over the months I have seen several infidelity bloggers write that they feel awkward or funny having marital sex once they start an affair. I can't say I feel awkward about it, but the two are certainly different. For one thing, marital sex is a lot rarer. It is true that D and I live far enough apart that meeting is a challenge, but so far we have managed no more than about a month and a half between visits (and each visit means a lot of sex); Wife and I, by contrast, regularly go months between fucks. During one particularly depressed period in our marriage, I clocked the dry spell at two years. At this point, I no longer expect sex with Wife -- ever, really -- so it is a bit of a surprise when it happens. But it happened this morning, a scant week after my latest date with D, so I am able to see some of the contrast pretty clearly.

One difference, probably the overriding difference, is that Wife is so much less overt. With D, I know clearly where I stand. If she's interested -- and she usually is -- she's not shy about making it clear. And if, in the heat of passion, she wants my hand or my mouth here instead of there, she just pushes it. This is good: she gets what she wants, I don't have to guess, and we both end up way more satisfied. Wife, by contrast, says less and does less; if she actually wants to fuck, she will say and do almost nothing at all. And it is up to me to read the silence and motionlessness as an invitation.

Take this morning, for example. Wife awoke and was cold. It seems she is always cold, these days, probably because she has been losing so much weight. So she got up, turned up the heat, and came back to bed. As she crawled under the covers, I offered to hold her, to warm her up. I wasn't particularly angling for sex -- as I say, I no longer even expect it any more -- but I thought it would be good just to hold her for a while. Wife rightly pointed out in our last counseling session that we really haven't had time for each other for a long time now; and we haven't followed up on the plan to have lunch together because the very next week I was out of town. And I know that I have been more distant, partly because my affair with D has made it easier to disengage emotionally from Wife. So I figured here was a chance just to be together for a little while. She buried her face in my chest, I wrapped my arms around her back, and I just held her.

We were lying front-to-front, but it managed not to be a very provocative position. Wife was wearing a long flannel nightgown and I was wearing a T-shirt ... and while flannel can be amazingly sexy if it is handled just right, Wife was doing nothing more than lying still. For several minutes I literally did nothing more than hold her. Then I slowly started stroking her back lightly, running my fingers through her hair, and caressing her face. All of this was very slow; and while it could have been arousing, and in the end I guess it was, I took great care to stay away from her breasts or her vulva or anywhere else that could be unmistakeable. I've had my advances rejected enough over the years that I wanted to preserve some "plausible deniability" ... and really, at this point, that precaution had become second-nature. I wasn't even making an advance. I thought about it, and I decided that I wouldn't turn down sex if it developed that way, but I wasn't caressing her with any kind of concrete goal. However it played out would be fine.

After a considerable time, Wife rolled over on her back. What she said -- and note that these were pretty much her first words since coming back to bed -- was that one of her hands was going numb so she needed to shift position. But the consequence was that her whole front was now pretty well accessible to me. Was it an invitation? I couldn't tell ... but then that's typical. Either it was an invitation or else she really just needed to move her hand. I thought about it for a couple of minutes, while still stroking her face and neck, and decided to check.

Note that "checking" is pretty much what I have to do, since she won't (but rarely) say or do anything overt. And "checking" more or less means kicking it up a notch to the point that there is something unmistakeably sexual about the caress, and waiting to see whether she remains quiet and unresponsive (in which case, yes it was an invitation) or whether she objects and rebukes me sharply (in which case, no it wasn't ... or else I bungled something). So I extended my caress of her neck a little farther, ... and a little farther, ... until I brushed against one breast. Silence. I brushed her breast again, a little more directly. She said nothing, but shifted her arm slightly out of my way. Aha. OK, so it was an invitation after all. I caressed her breast with my hand, found that her nipple was standing up, and pinched it gently between my fingers. Still she said nothing, and made no move to turn away. Fine, that is as conclusive as it gets. Wife was aroused and (in her own way) asking to fuck.

But I continued to move slowly; rush her and she'll turn sharp and nasty. So I undid a button at the neck of her nightgown, slid my hand inside, and began slowly and gently stroking both breasts ... and her shoulders, and her stomach. And only after several minutes of this did I slide a hand down one leg. Her legs were pitched apart, carelessly as if they had fallen that way by random chance but allowing my hand plenty of access. On the other hand, I found that she was wearing panties. Fine, no hurry -- I stroked her and caressed her through her panties for some minutes before finally hooking a thumb in the waistband and trying to pull them off.

Once again she actually moved, shifting her weight just a little so that the panties would slide off and then returning to her previous motionlessness. She almost looked bored, or asleep. But as my hand made its way back to her vulva, I found that she was dripping, sopping wet. Fair enough. I slid a couple of fingers inside her, and described tight circles around her clit with my thumb. And finally -- finally! -- she began to move in a way that acknowledged that something was going on. She still didn't speak -- heavens, no! But her hips began to rock in time with my hand and she started breathing harder.

I don't know if she ever came. Certainly there was nothing like the visibly explosive orgasms she had when she was younger, to say nothing of the louder (and far more frequent) orgasms that D is blessed with. She experienced some minor twitching, though, and after a while told me that she was getting too sensitive and my fingers were starting to hurt. (Attentive readers will notice that these were in fact the first words she uttered during this whole process since she complained that one hand was going numb.) Hurt? Is that just inside, or outside too? I tried pulling my fingers out and just rubbing her clit, but she said even that was too sensitive and asked, "How about having you there, instead of your fingers?"

Wife continued to breathe hard as I fucked her; after I came, I rested inside her for a little while and we stared into each other's eyes. Then I pulled out, she rolled over with her back to me, and we spooned for a few minutes. And when she finally said something, it was about what things we had to do today.

As I have been writing the story of this morning, I've remembered so many other times in our marriage that sex was almost exactly the same. What was different for me between today and those earlier times was my own emotional state. Specifically, I had a lot more anxiety then: anxiety about guessing wrong what Wife wanted and being slapped for it (if only figuratively); anxiety that she might not come because I did something wrong; anxiety that the best I could hope for from fucking Wife was silence and non-responsiveness. And this morning, I was free of all of that. I was much more relaxed, and could enjoy myself more. I don't know how the morning was for Wife, but I could imagine that being more relaxed could also make me more loving to her because I would be less on edge, less afraid of being wrong.

And I am sure that the difference is D. Well, mostly: part of it is that I have come to accept that Wife simply may not orgasm these days, so I don't focus so single-mindedly as I once did on the job or mission of gratifying her. But for the rest of it? I know how Wife reacts, I know what to expect, and I now know that it's not all my fault. After spending rapturous nights with D, I know that I am not a hopelessly inept lover, even if I still blush a little at D's extravagant praise. After enjoying D's lavish responsiveness, I know that Wife's non-responsiveness is not simply my fault. And at an even more basic level, I don't feel the same pressure to make it perfect for Wife because I know that failure with her does not close off the possibility of sex for another year.

I have read people discuss the question whether an affair makes it easier or harder to stay married. I don't know the answer; but after this morning, I have to say that I think I find it easier to be Wife's husband when I am also D's lover. It's strange, but there it is.