I Can’t be Responsible for Your Mood

And other things that came out in therapy

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“Do you know why Daddy is mad at Mummy?” Sienna asks Raph with a mischievous glint in her eye.

He looks slightly bored but willing to humour his little sister.

“Why?” He shovels some pasta into his mouth and chews while looking across the table at her.

“Because, you know the night when they went out and Meme looked after us? Well, she kissed some other boys and even danced with some.”

I snigger and make eye contact with Franc, but he doesn’t crack a smile.

“That’s about right,” I say casually.

They are both well aware that I’m in big trouble. Each night they hear their parents arguing, discussing, talking and talking, endlessly talking. Not really shouting, but the tension in the house is thicker than a winter soup and their father is smoking again.

Sometimes, they sneak out the back in their pajamas to catch him in the act and he calls me, “Debbie, can you please get them to their beds?”

So I hustle them inside and get started on bedtime stories.

When Craig, our new therapist, asked us about any prior issues in our relationship, we came up empty.

“I mean, we argue a bit about who should walk the dog, but that’s about it.”

Sitting beside each other on a plush brown fabric couch, we kept enough distance between us not to touch as we shuffled in our seats.

“So, no major incidents? No illnesses? Issues with the kids? Financial problems?”

We looked at each other and shrugged.

“We’re not rich or anything, but we get by,” I said. “We’ve come a long way. When we came here after Africa, I went back to school and he got a job waiting tables. Now he has his own restaurant and I’m a postdoc.”

I was talking more than him. I had told the orgy story as evenly as I could in response to the inevitable “so, tell me why you’re here today?”

Explained how we had gone to the sex bar with a certain understanding. We had agreed to stick together and only do things that both of us were comfortable with. And that I had broken that agreement and gone off without him, grinding against women’s thighs and getting spit-roasted while groping a pierced breast and hanging out in a puddle of bodies on a queen-size bed for aftercare, all while my husband sat downstairs getting more and more upset.

Franc poured water from a jug into two plastic cups and listened passively.

“So, this is the first major challenge to the relationship?” asked Craig.

We nodded.

“And no infidelity?”

We nodded again.

I couldn’t bring up Paris. It felt needlessly provocative and would take away from the real reason we were there.

Or maybe I was just too gutless to come out with it. I had no plans to tell him about it. What would be the point?

“What would you like to say to Debbie?” asked Craig, giving my husband the floor with such obvious intention that I pressed my lips together.

“Euh, I don’t know. I want you to say what you feel,” He swiveled on the couch to look at me.

“I’m sorry,” I said mechanically. “I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

“I don’t believe you,” he replied. “You haven’t shown any remorse at all.”

I looked at Craig. It was the same argument we’d been having at home daily. Except mostly it was incomplete. We’d get through the evening routine—homework, dinner, shower, teeth, stories, bed.

I remained normal as much as possible, playing with the kids and cracking jokes, while he carried a black cloud whenever he was in my presence.

I would go to bed before him and then he would come in and start to “talk”.

“How can you be so cold? It’s like you don’t care at all!” he would say to my drooping eyes.

“Of course I care, but I’m tired now. I need sleep.”

Craig listened to our description and took a few notes on an A5 notepad. “Do you regret what happened?” he asked me.

“I mean, I regret that I lost my head, yeah. I should have stayed, but it was thrilling. So exciting. I can’t even explain walking into that room and seeing all the bodies and the skin. I just lost it,” I admitted.

“Well, maybe this is something that is just not for you, Franc.”

Franc shrugged. “I would like to be able to do things, but I’m not at the same level, clearly. And she doesn’t want to wait for me.”

“It’s not that… I want to…” I couldn’t find my words. “If I thought…”

“Don’t lie,” he said, his tone dripping with accusation. “You had every opportunity to come downstairs. I waited for hours!”

“It was like five minutes!”

He raised his eyebrows.

“Maybe ten?”

“You had time to find out the people’s names. You had time to check they were wearing condoms. You’re obviously lying when you say that you were out of your mind.”

I took a deep breath. How could I explain this?

“I enjoy being dominated. It’s not sexy at all to have to take someone by the hand and guide them every step of the way.”

Craig said nothing, but suddenly I wondered if maybe I should have taken issue with the question of whether we minded having a male therapist. The first thing he’d said when he pulled out his little notepad as I finished telling the orgy story was “Aaaaaand the name of this bar is….”

He was joking but I could tell he did want to know.

Franc scoffed, “There was nothing submissive about anything I saw you do in that place.”

“I mean…” How could I explain that being submissive involved shit-testing men to see if they were up to the challenge? Not just giving it up for anyone with a hard-on. I could barely articulate it to myself, it was just a feeling. “You could have stayed upstairs.”

“No, I couldn’t. You didn’t want me there.”

“I…” Saying the opposite would have been untrue. I wanted to assure him that he should always be there. That we were a unit, like the other couples we met there who did everything together. Why couldn’t we be like that?

“So, everything we’ve been through is a lie,” said Franc through gritted teeth.

“No, of course not!” I insisted. “It’s just sex. There’s so much more to life than that! Look at everything we’ve achieved together.”

“But you’re clearly unhappy.”

“No, I’m not. Things are fine, it’s just this one thing. And even that.” I looked over at Craig. “Sex between us is nice, it’s beautiful. It’s very special. I don’t need the domination and the play from him. He’s not into that kind of thing, and that’s fine. He doesn’t even watch porn!”

“Sure.” Franc was looking defeated.

“What is it that you need from him?” asked Craig.

“A partner. Someone to share my life with. Raise the kids. Look after the house and share the chores. Plan holidays. And he does all that brilliantly. Except now he’s depressed and I just can’t handle that. I’m walking on eggshells all the time. He’s sad and mad and I can’t be responsible for someone else’s mood.” I could feel pressure building up behind my eyes and I reached for a tissue from the box that sat on the same little table as our glasses of water. “I tried to do that for my dad, and he ended up killing himself.”

For a few moments, the only sound was my infuriating sniffling as I tried to stop the crashing wave of guilt that hit me every time I thought about my father. How I knew he wasn’t OK. How I’d tried to be there for him, but nothing had been enough. And how even now, over 20 years later, I still missed him every day. But I didn’t want their sympathy. This had nothing to do with anything.

I took a jagged breath and looked at Franc, who had his head cocked to one side and he wore a softer expression than I’d seen in weeks.

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I stare at the ceiling and listen to his toothbrush hum. I don’t turn off the lamp even though I’ve finished my chapter of Homo Deus and put the book down on the bedside table.

I know he’ll want to talk more, but even so, I turn onto my side with my back to him as he sits down and slides under the covers.

“You enjoyed that, didn’t you?” I mumble.

“It’s the first time I’ve seen you get emotional since it happened.”

“Yeah, well, you know I can’t handle depression. Are you going to get the meds?”

Craig wound up prescribing Franc a course of anti-depressants.

“I don’t know. Do you think I should?” he asks.

I shrug my horizontal shoulders.

“Dad said they worked well in the beginning. I guess it might help.”

“It’s not true that I don’t watch porn,” he says.

I frown and turn over to look at him. I can still smell the tobacco over the mint on his breath.

“What?”

“Of course I do, I thought you knew that.”

“How would I know? You never shared that with me, I thought you weren’t into it.”

“I’m not really, but I watch sometimes.”

I sigh. “I don’t know what to do with that. You don’t seem into anything. Every time we fuck, I have to initiate it. We can’t do it with the light on. We always do it in the same position. You don’t even get hard most of the time. I don’t feel very hot lately, that’s for sure.”

“I didn’t think you wanted it.”

“Of course I do. But I don’t want to tell you. I want you to take it. To take my body like it belongs to you. Don’t you understand that? I won’t reject you. I want you. I love you.”

It seems like the therapy session has opened something up. I’ve never said these things to him. I’m scared of hurting him. I don’t want him to think I don’t appreciate his affection. In normal times, he always gives me kisses hello and good-bye—in fact, he gets upset if I forget to give him a kiss before I leave the house. Whenever he sees me naked, he says I look like a statue. When I dress up and put on make-up, he tells me I’m gorgeous and I can tell he’s proud to walk beside me. When I’m paranoid about my belly, he reassures me, telling me I’m allowed to exist between my hips and my boobs.

But for sex, I have to make the first move. Sometimes months go by and I can’t be bothered. When the kids were tiny, I never felt like it anyway, so it was fine.

But the frustration must have been building up for it to explode out of me like that. Like I was a caged animal suddenly set free.

And ever since, I spend every night getting told off.

Being told I’m cold, uncaring, selfish, remorseless, and devoid of emotion.

“How can I defend myself?” I say over and over again. “I know I’m wrong. I acted badly. I shouldn’t have left you behind.”

“Well, it means that I’m not enough for you,” he says. “Everything I thought we had is built on lies.”

I absorb it passively, which infuriates him more. He says he wants to fight, that his Mediterranean blood demands it. I wonder if I should act indignant and defensive to placate him, but I don’t know how. I feel physically exhausted.

And every night, he cries. Then he gets up and goes for long walks. Smokes cigarettes. Jerks off, I guess.

“I’m going to turn off the light,” I say. “Can we talk more later?”

“Mm.”

I roll back over and close my eyes.

Darkness starts to creep through my mind when I feel him shuffle closer. Then his hands are on me. He runs them over my arms, my hips, my thighs.

I respond immediately, letting a gasp escape my lips.

He rolls me back towards him and pushes my t-shirt up so he can grab handfuls of flesh at my chest. I move my hands above my head so he can touch me more easily.

I shuffle and wriggle to help him pull my pants down and raise my legs so he can pull them off.

Then his fingers are inside me, moving quickly in and out like he wants to hurt me. I groan and spread my legs wider, scrunching up my face at the pleasure/pain.

I close my eyes and wait while he hurriedly removes his shorts and I open up as he shifts forward to straddle my face and push himself into my mouth. I can barely see in the darkness but I can feel that he’s as hard as a rock.

He lifts up my head and fucks my face while I grip his thighs.

It’s the first time I’ve gone down on him in about four years.

After a short time, he releases me and flips me over onto my front. I let out short bursts of noise with each breath which increase in speed and intensity as he raises my hips and starts fucking me from behind.

I don’t dare resist in the slightest. I only want him to feel welcome and free to use me as he likes. To know that I am his. I don’t play the games I would with a stranger.

He empties into me with a quiet groan. Neither of us dares make more noise. We’re still in the dark, the kids asleep down the hall. I immediately run off to the toilet and wipe the cum away that’s dripping out of me. I have an IUD but I still feel weird having cum inside me. Conception is the last thing I want at this point in my life.

When I return, I kiss him passionately and tell him it was good and thank him. We fall asleep hand in hand.

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Things weren’t magically better, but there was some improvement after that.

Franc went on the anti-depressants but he also joined a gym.

We asked Craig if he thought it would be a good idea to return to the club to see if we could do a better job. He gave a non-committal answer.

“There’s no trust,” said Franc. “You’re not capable of sticking to your word, you’ve said as much.”

I disagreed and I wanted to prove it to him. I wanted to try again.

A few weeks later, the kids had a camp on the weekend and we had a free Saturday night. I called our friend Natalie and asked her how she was feeling.

“I don’t know,” she admitted. “Last time was really fun, but I felt a bit bad the next day, and I worry about the two of you.”

“Yeah, I know what you mean. But it would be a shame if that was the only experience we ever had.”

“Let me just see what’s on,” she said, pausing while she did a quick search. “There’s another MFM night this weekend.”

There was a gap in the conversation.

“I want to go,” I said.

“OK,” she said. “I’ll grab a ticket.”

We giggled with excitement, like a couple of teenagers, rather than the two suburban mothers that we really are.