Getting It In

I left you hanging there, didn’t I? It’s hard to write about all the hot stuff we’ve done when I feel like my ovaries are going to burst any second. That’s actually something the doctor warned me about, so now I’m lying on the couch and trying not to strain myself. I have 8 large follicles developing in my left ovary, so hooray for us! They’ll take them out and fertilize them on Friday, so wish us luck.

It’s funny, that though I’m hurting a bit and quite a bit more irritable and tired that usually, I’m also more horny. Figures, when you think that the hormones I inject kind of make for a super ovulation. I actually badgered Wonderboy to fuck me without foreplay so that after I’d had an orgasm or two, he still couldn’t. Finally he gave up, hugged me and said that we had just started too quickly. Situations like this always remind me of how the world has screwed us up. I would’ve never imagined that a guy would require foreplay and a sense of being loved in order to have sex when I started out this thing called sex. I thought that was something that was reserved for girls – boys just wanted to get it in.

There was also that time that I really wanted sex, but was too angry to have it. We tried to start but everything went sort of wrong when I freaked after giving him head. I just didn’t want to do it, and because I somehow couldn’t say it (because normally I do want to, even enjoy it, and I was baffled, and also just wanted to get to the sex, dammit!), I got angry and stopped everything and said that this is it, I’m done.

Wonderboy tried to figure out what was wrong and tried to cuddle me with his hard cock starting to droop, and we didn’t know where to go from there. And then he said,

I don’t really feel that the physical stuff is enough. I need to feel the love too.

I tried to explain, still pretty angrily, how I felt – what the hormones made me feel and how weird it was. How angry I was, but tried not to be or express it, because I knew I wouldn’t normally feel that way.

So you feel abnormal? Wonderboy asked emphatetically.

No, I feel normal. I just know that I wouldn’t feel this way, if it wasn’t for the hormones.

And no wonder! They are shooting me up with a doze that would work on a horse (because I’m a poor responder).

Even the leaflet on the medicine we inject said that maximum amount injecting a human is X. My dosage was more than X and also I’m being injected with another hormone to do basically the same thing at the same time. It’s perfectly understandable that I’d have side-effects. It’s just that when Wonderboy got used to the injections and treatments, he also forgot that being more relaxed about it doesn’t change anything the hormones do to me. He does remember now, and promised to go to the grocery store today, because I’m not allowed to carry anything heavy now. My left ovary are so full it could twist and burst, if I do something too strenuous. Also, it hurts just about all the time, so I’m not tempted to try anything. Walking’s enough.

After the discussion, Wonderboy started to caress me from head to toe, just sweeping his hands all over me. And it melted me. All the anger was gone. I caressed him too, much in the same way, and he said later how he felt that he was filled with my love – unlike when we started out and I was too angry.

There was sex. There has actually been so much sex during this treatment that Wonderboy’s required celibacy (for 4 days) is something we both notice. It’s been a long time since 4 days was something to remark on. I hope this is something that we’ll get to keep. But of course I start on the progesterone on Monday, and no one knows what they’ll do to me this time.

I don’t seem to get to the hot and juicy d/s games. I have too much on my mind right now. I’ll just leave these ramblings here and try again later.

Tomorrow is the big day!

Married and Dating

So what do you guys think about the TV series Polyamorous: Married and dating? I’ve watched a couple of episodes and I’m still sort of undecided.

On the plus side: The show has made me think about our ways of enforcing certain ideas about love in our society, like the fact that it’s less valuable if divided among many, that it can be stolen or lost and that there are certain expected paths to love and there on after. It has also made me think if I’m actually open minded at all (I never really thought I was, I’m very reserved in some ways and this seems to be one of them), but more over it has made me think how I might change the way I speak and act in the world to try to make it more welcoming to others. I have already done a ton of work trying to include queer relationships, identities, sexualities and also transgender folks in my idle chit chat possibilities. This merely means that I try to avoid making presumptions about their partners’ gender etc, when talking to new people. But I see I might need even more work.

Although my collagues did laugh me off once because I did this and said that I must be very open minded to expect that they might have more spouses or lovers than one. Hmph.

On the other hand the show has probably enforced some of my prejudices about polyamory. Sometimes the show makes me feel protective of some of the people. I also do feel that what the show shows to me seems a little watered down version of love. But this might be because it’s a tv show, because of the type of couples they chose to it and because they only show certain situations and probably mercilessly guide the subjects to talk about certain things in a certain way in their interview clips. It’s just so centered on sex it seems a little hollow. But I guess that’s what the majority of people is (expected to be) interested in: the group sex and the steaming sex with “outsiders”.

I’m happy about the different sex scenes, because some of them I thought were ground breaking on showing some real sexy blushed faces and ways of being in a sexual situation that usually are forgotten in porn.  Also loved the intensive faces. How could they let them shoot all of that? Wow. But some of the people maybe seem a bit childish to me (maybe it’s because jealousy just brings up the child in us and not in a good way). I also know that I could never enjoy a relationship like that. It’s not like I just have it all – although I feel like it now – I just think I couldn’t handle any more than this. It makes me really uncomfortable to see the people who are struggling in the shows poly settings try to find balance. I have thought about not continuing to watch the show because of this creeping feeling.

What do you think? Especially you monogamish readers I know are out there?

Diamonds are forever

Our second anniversary is nearing. So is Wonderboy’s birthday. I haven’t really had the time to ponder such shallow matters, but now that I have, I want to make him shine. I want to make a statement, and I want that statement to be that I’m his sugar mama, that he’s my jewel, that I want this to be forever.

I want to give Wonderboy…

diamonds.

Big sparkling diamonds for his piercings.

Yeah. He doesn’t really care, if he gets a present or not. He enjoys just spending time with me, going out to eat or something. I usually bake him a cake and I’m going to, for sure. I mean money can buy anything, but a cake is hard work, dammit. So is marriage. So is love.

So. Which do you think would be the loveliest for the love of my life?

1. Round

2. Black

3. Square

I couldn’t resist the pull of Polldaddy!

Just a broken dreamgirl shell

This is what I always hoped sex would be like! Wonderboy exclaimed after sex last Saturday as we rolled on the bed exhausted and sweaty.

Just what people would give their left ear for to hear after sex, right? But no. Nothing’s ever that simple, because he didn’t stop there.

I’ll never need another woman, when you’re so thin and sexy, he added.

I am thinner now. I know I look better. I even feel better – and sexier. But.

I have pretty mixed feelings about that. He doesn’t need another woman, because I’m thin now? What the fuck? I know it was meant as a compliment, and he just meant to say that everything’s better than he hoped it would be. But still. Was I on the changing list before? That was the same me, by the way. I might gain weight again – and if we manage to get pregnant, the weight might even stay a while… or years. Would I be interchangeable then?

I know I’m being a little unfair here, because in all honesty I think I’d want him to change, too, if he was really fat. And maybe I wouldn’t see him as as desirable. But when he had pounded me from the back holding onto my waist and slapping my butt and twisting me by the hair… I still feel like I’m just one Sexy Dreamgirl Shell and that I have been fitted in the place of a porn actress.

This is what Clarisse Thorn writes about the sexy dreamgirl shell (above in the link) girls are so adept at putting on even before we ever learn what we desire and how sex feels like to us:

There was a while there, where my sexuality was mostly performance: an image, an act, a shell that I created because I knew it was hot for my partners. I’m not saying I was performing 100 percent of the time—but certainly, when I was just starting to have sex, that’s mostly what it was. And, scarily, I can put the shell back on at any time. Sometimes it’s hard to resist, because I know men will reward me for it, emotionally, with affection and praise. It’s much, much more difficult to get what I actually want out of a sexual interaction than it is for me to create that sexy dreamgirl shell: hard for me to communicate my desires, hard for me to know what I’m thinking, hard for me to set boundaries.

I feel like I’m being judged by my performance. With the hormones I’m taking, I’m less prone to moan out loud, I don’t get turned on as quickly, I require a lot of straight clitoral stimulation and lot of the d/s play just doesn’t turn me on. Now he’s been moody about that, and I’ve been supportive and have tried to explain, how I feel and why it is so… But after yesterday’s 3 hour maraton apologize fest I’m left angry and hurt. My desire and enjoyment seems to be a priority, when he states, how he feels, when the signs of my lust and enjoyment have changed. But when my straight-worded feedback is not believed, is disregarded, and I am constantly blamed for being different and from not taking enjoyment out of something he does… it ends up feeling a lot more entitled, self-centered and just plain bad self esteem.

He can’t handle the fact that I don’t moan out load all the time and answer to his every touch with a shiver? He can’t handle the fact that I ask him to touch my clitoris in a certain way and guide him more, when he licks me? He can’t handle the fact that I don’t get off on penetration alone anymore? Well, tough shit. How do you think I FEEL?

I’m not the dreamgirl anymore, to myself at least. I have to learn to live with a body that functions a lot like many women describe their sexual body functioning like. But to him the most important part is that I look the part. I feel like he just wants the shell. I do not want to act, I want to make the most of this body, however way it functions, and I have been satisfied with how we have managed to play together against all odds. Why does that not matter at all?

So, why haven’t we had sex in a week? Hmmm. Let me think.

My share

I’ve had a lot to think about. I’ve had a lot of emotions to wade through.

After I stopped taking the hormones, and now stopped taking the anti-depressants too, I haven’t felt like I want sex. I haven’t even been able to masturbate. A couple of times I’ve felt the rare urge to come, but it’s been muted somehow. When I tried touching myself, it felt repulsive. I mean literally, the feeling of my fingers caressing my pussy was just all bad. It made me want to puke. So I haven’t done, well, almost anything.

We fucked last week once so that I came. The other time I just lay there, trying to connect and enjoy, but didn’t. When Wonderboy had come, I didn’t feel like I needed an orgasm. I felt like I hadn’t had sex. I felt… not numb, but detatched somehow. I was okay and I didn’t even have to try to convince Wonderboy about it. I was so mellow and okay that he knew I was fine. He asked me, if I liked, when he uses me like that and I said yes. I made sure, when he seemed so chipper about it all, that he did realize I hadn’t come. It’s important to me that he knows, if that happens. I like it when he uses me or hurts me, but he has to do it knowing what he’s doing. He answered gently,

There will be a time for orgasms, and caressed my head and pulled me close, gently.

It had the same effect as a child. He was convincing me that it’ll happen. It wasn’t meant to happen now. I felt safe.

What I have been feeling, though, hasn’t been safe or loved. It’s been angry. After all the medication of both kinds had left my body I felt positively angry. I saw things I hadn’t let myself see before.

I was angry at Wonderboy, because I realized even though we’ve decided to be totally equal and do all the housework 50/50, I end up doing a lot more. He just doesn’t do it and at some point I get fed up, working from home now I see all the shit every hour of every day, and then I do most of the stuff. I realized this, when I fell really, dramatically ill a few weeks back. It was a stomach flu that only touched him, but put me to bed for 5 whole days. I haven’t been as sick ever in my adult life without going to the hospital. I managed to walk to the bathroom and back, but that was it. I couldn’t read or even watch anything from my computer, because that made me feel nauseaus. I just slept through the days, vomited, tried to drink some water and was in so much pain.

And it was my turn to go to the store. When I asked Wonderboy to please go and get some juice and whatever he needed, because I was just way too sick to do it, he said you can do it tomorrow, when you’re better. The next day I asked him to go to the store, and he finally did after many pleads. He came back with only one carton of juice and not anything else for me. The next day I had to plead again for him to go to the store, I even had to make it into an argument before he did, and he still forgot to bring me the yogurt I asked for.

This, for me, was a huge epiffany. I’ve gone to the store on his turn, when he’s been tired of work. When he’s had to use public transport and I’ve had the car. When he’s been working late, has been sick or is feeling blue. I’ve sometimes done it surprise him. I’ve sometimes done it without asking him, sometimes he’s asked me, sometimes he’s… what’s the word… blackmailed me into it. He might have said he’d be too tired to do anything with me, if he also has to go to the store.

I’ve always thought he’d do the same for me in a heartbeat. I just never ask. He just never does it.

Now I realize that even, when I’m so ill I can barely make it to the bathroom, it isn’t enough reason for him to help me. He only went to the store, when he wanted something, not when I needed the juice, because I couldn’t keep anything solid down.

I also realized that he was totally thrown by my sickness. He couldn’t face that I was sick. He kept asking me, if I’d get something for him from the other room and even nagged (yes, I’m going to use that word here) about, how he had to do all the food, that he ate alone, alone. That I wasn’t there helping him. I pointed it out to him that he was the only one A) hungry B) able to eat food C) in good enough health to stand the required time to even cook. But he was persistant and I was really ill and not really in a very good situation to negotiate and defend my case. I fell asleep and he was left to brew.

At first, when I got well enough to think – that’s what I do best – I was just pissed off. Just. Really. Really. Pissed. Off.

I noticed a lot of the same thing in a lot of situations. It wasn’t just, when I was sick, it was every day, everywhere. And I put a wall between us. I needed a wall. I needed a break from anything sexual with him, especially anything d/s, since he wasn’t filling up his end of the bargain. The deal was that he could dominate me, even 24/7 use me in whatever way he desired, if at the bottom of it we would share the same responsibilites and he was doing his part of housework, paying bills and generally caring for our family. He didn’t and hasn’t done. He’s let himself slide right back in where he was while he lived with his mother.

So I started enforcing our deal every time he hadn’t done what he ought to. I didn’t concern myself with thoughts like “ooh, he must be tired”, “it’s too late”, “he’s had a long day” or anything. I just plainly said what he needed to have done already and when he trew a tantrum about it, I just kept insisting that he do it, because it was his responsibility. He threw the mom card at me, like he always does. He got angry, because I hadn’t informed him early enough, so how could he have known. I didn’t fall for it. I calmly said that it was his responsibility, and he needs to do it without me reminding him over and over again. I also said that I’m not his mother and he needs to learn to do these things by himself, automaticly, just like I have.

First time I tried to ask him do something for me, and he didn’t, I slept in the other room. I also threw all the dirty laundry on the floor – I’d been waiting for almost two months for him to do them – and gathered all the shit he’d just left lying around in one place (packages, paper, bills, bottles, anything) that I would’ve usually just sorted and recycled as the day went by and I would pass by it. When I woke up, he came to me, careful and pleading, and asked what was wrong. I told him I didn’t accept what he had been doing, how he was acting. I told him he had not made me believe that he cares about my career or respects my work and the work I put in our home. I told him that it felt very wrong to me that he would have a room to himself and just stay there by himself and then shit all over my workplace in the other room and not care at all about my space. He apologised and promised to change his ways. He immediately cleared my work table of his belongings and generally tried to show me that he cared.

The second time I did this he slept in the other room, angry. I reminded him to sweap my office table from the coffee he’d spilt and some other minor things, and since it was late and he was tired, he just blew up at me. This was the point where I told him I wasn’t his mother and that he needs to learn to do these things on his own. Otherwise…

I didn’t actually say the otherwise out loud. But I was so mad at him that I seriously considered leaving him, if things don’t change. I thought that I can’t live my life suffocated by responsibilities like this. That I will become so bitter. And I thought, this was the thought, the big ball of ugly feeling I had in the bottom of my stomach, that I couldn’t have a child with him, if living with only him meant that I had to take care of everything. How would it be with a child? This was not what I wanted. I signed up for an equal relationship. I had done my share. Where was his?

I didn’t have to tell him, how I felt. He could feel it. He knew that this was the last straw. This was it. He’d have to change.

So, when he came back from work after he’d slept in the other room, he immediately, from the door, asked, if there were things he could do. Trash he could take out, laundry he could wash…

It’s been, I think, a little over than a week from the blowout, maybe two. When I spent a night at my dad’s and came back, he had tidied up the whole apartment, taken out trash, sweapt the counters and tables. He has never done anything like it before. He has also done a lot of laundry. I have yet to hear him complain about his duties. He’s been, I think, more loving, if something. He’s been careful and gentle with me. He has felt, how I don’t desire him and he’s tried to make it right. He’s realized, rightly so, that sometimes not wanting sex and not desiring him isn’t something that’s really about sex at all.

And I think that’s why.

I put my hand on his cock yesterday. I felt it grow a little. I kissed him, but he didn’t kiss me back like I wanted. He was still cautious.

I know what I want today, I said.

What? he smiled tentatively.

I took a pause and then licked the air in front of him a bit.

You want me to lick you? he asked.

Yeah, I smiled and buried my head in my hands, then looked up at him and smiled. Yeah, I’d really like that.

If you’re a good girl, he said.

That’s so unfair! How can I know, if I’ve been a good girl or not! I said, laughing.

We’ll see.

When we fucked I was more assertive than ever. I told him I wanted him to lick me. I told him I wanted to be on top of him for him to slap my butt and for me to feel his cock at the same time. He didn’t oblige to me, he made his own decisions. Made me wait. Made me beg. It made us so happy.

When we were through, or so I thought, he went on to start licking me like I’d asked before.

I don’t think I can have another orgasm so quickly, I said and he came back to cuddle me.

I want it to be know that I was ready to do it, though, he said.

Next time I will not give in into the d/s play. He will do as I tell him, right away. I have no patience for waiting anymore. I wanted him to lick me before, not after. This will not do, no matter, how hot it is for me to lick him.

My share can’t be just to obey. It can’t be to carry all the responsibilites and then having no say. It has to be equal in building this relationship. I need my voice back.

Issues – resolved and new, some of them blue

I ovulated and we didn’t fuck. But we fucked yesterday. There are a lot of things he’s never done before, but does now with no problem. He sticks his fingers in my mouth while fucking me from behind and stretches my mouth like I’m a horse and I need to obey him. He hits me from behind, reaches and slaps my cheek, over and over. But this time he didn’t mold my butt as much, no ass remarks or compliments. I found out why after sex.

I’m way thinner now, because of my sickness. I’m trying not to eat excessively even now, because I like this shape. This thinner body makes me remember, how it used to be 5-6 years back, when I was a size 7, even though I still have a ways to go to that. I liked to be that size. I felt good in myself, then.

Wonderboy wasn’t happy after he came. I didn’t come, but I was content anyway. I came close two times and then it just disappeared. The meds are doing their thing no matter how low my dosage is. I contemplate on giving them up, but I haven’t yet. This has done me a world of good. To see what I’m like, when I can actually control my feelings – and not only control, but let go of some of them. The harming ones. The ones that make me try to make everything better no matter how. These are a much better fit than the ones I tried two years ago. It was this same time of the year. Huh. Could the darkness and cold have something to do with depression then? I never knew. (I’m kidding. I always knew.)

I asked him why he was discontent and he said because he came so quickly.

We haven’t had sex for such a long time, he said in a whining voice. Yes, because he wouldn’t fuck me, when I was ovulating, I thought, but kept it to myself. I wasn’t feeling sexual either at the time, so he would’ve just had to play rape me to make it work. It’s sometimes too much for him, broken and tired, and it’s not fair for him, when I’m not doing anything.

I wiggled my naked butt at him and tried to cheer him up. But you do like my thinner body, right? I asked and wiggled again.

Yeah, well. Your butt is smaller too, he said. Maybe you just need to add to your butt workout.

Talk about adding insult to injury. This is what was making him unhappy about the sex that just passed? What am I supposed to do about that? He wants me thin, likes me thinner, asks me to workout and eat less and when I do and end up getting really awesome results (with the help of a little stomach flu), he is looking down his nose, because my butt has also lost weight! It’s smaller! What a shock. And since I’m me and can never defend myself, I answer him with,

I am already mostly doing workouts for my butt. I have small hips. I can’t get a really big booty and be thin.

That’s the God awful truth. But you know what? I’m really beginning to be pissed off at him for making me feel this way. Is it really appropriate to brood – to me – about my body and what about it doesn’t fit his ideal? I would never do it to him – or anyone! He’s grown a bit of a belly and I always try to find ways to compliment him so he wouldn’t feel bad about it. I know that feeling insecure about your body doesn’t really help. Why is he being such an ass?

I guess – because I’m helping him. If I’d react like a normal person with indignation and start crying and calling him names, maybe he’d realize that he should keep those kind of thoughts to himself. That people are sensitive about their bodies and fitting the ideals and pleasing their partners and that it’s usually a good idea to not insult the body of a person you are sleeping with. Just a helpful hint. Doesn’t really make me want to hit the gym to be more fuckable for him. I mean what the fuck is he expressing his discontent about it to me? I’d maybe get it, if I’d put on like 10 kg in a short time. But I think I’ve actually lost 5 kg or more and also toned a lot. My little sister commented that I look just like I did, when I was size 7. Boy, did she make me happy.

I seem to remember this sort of thing happening before, when I’ve tried to change my body to feel better. And I seem to remember Wonderboy’s reaction discouraged me from trying.

Wellp, I’m not going to let him fuck with my head this time. I’m gonna strive for size 7, healthy and sensibly, and if my butt gets even smaller, I’ll just try to find solace in the fact that probably 80% of guys and girls out there would find it even more fuckable in its reclamed firmness.

I also wonder, not even just a little, how much my orgasmic challenges affect him – once again. Talking with him is much easier. I’m not defencive at all and can talk about my sadness in a new way – honestly and right away. He has learned to ask me, without defencive anger, why am I feeling sad or am I worried about something – like he did yesterday. It gives me a sense of him caring and also trying to resolve things. So that has become easier, the communicating. But I still feel that he doesn’t see me as a separate enough person from himself. That he still keeps on pouring his own bad feelings on me even though we’ve discussed it many times. Where can I hide from them, huh?

We did have an honest and non-hostile conversation about babies. When we didn’t have sex on my ovulation day or the day before, I made it a point to ask him about it. He said he’d lost his hope in us getting pregnant by normal means. He worried about my cervix being too tight and small for the sperm to swim in (I swear!) and dind’t quite understand or believe that the problem might actually not be on my end, even though he is the one whose sperm isn’t lively enough. He said he wanted to take a break from counting the days and forcing himself, as I had said we would, before I started to have these huge ovulation pains and had to count the days. So, I said okay then. Let’s do that. That sounds good. It was a relief of sorts for me too. Not having to wait and hope and try and fight. Just wait for the doctor and the next medications. Just relax a bit.

When he was hugging me, I asked him, maybe crying a teensy bit, did he think that he could at all consider having two kids. I told him, that him saying we would only have one had made me pretty sad.

And he answered yes. Yes he could.

The next doctor’s appointment is on Valentine’s day. Happy Valentine’s day to me!

Ps. I called him later today and we talked a bit on the phone. He said he likes how my body has changed and thinks I have a great ass and that I should keep working out and that he’s proud of me. So there. End of bitching. For today. But, oh, what tomorrow will bring?

Also, I know that he could never make me unhappy, so much so, that I didn’t think to blackmail him into agreeing to try for two children. That’s why I waited many, many years to even start trying and cried many a times secretly in the bathroom, when my period would eventually start. I don’t want to force him. I want him to want it too. Children aren’t a present and they are not my hobby or my thing. They’ll be ours, if there’ll be any.

Enlightment On New Year’s Eve

The funniest thing happened. We went to spend the New Year’s Eve in the city we moved here from. We saw all of my best friends one by one, got to spend wonderful time with them, talk, sing karaoke, dance and finally even have an after party, drink wine and spend the next day together. On the dance floor, in this nightclub that we haven’t gone in years, the same dance floor we actually met for the first time with Wonderboy, we suddenly run into Joe.

What are the odds?

After meeting him I have absolutely no desire towards him. But it was funny seeing him. It was even more fun, or weird, when we took a taxi to my friend K’s place and K and Joe ended up sleeping together. (Not fucking, but cuddling – or so I’m told.) K didn’t know this was the guy I’d mentioned and she was pretty alarmed the next day, when I voiced my surprise that she’d take that guy into her bed. She said that if she’d known he had used prostitutes help, she wouldn’t have. But, you know, I thought it was a good lesson. You can never know where the other one has been, and I guess you should also judge people by what they do and how they act and not so much for their past behaviour.

Anyway. I curled up into a nook with Wonderboy and remember distinctly the last thing I said to be I love you before I fell asleep on K’s living room floor (on a mattress). I have never ever had as much fun as I did this New Year’s Eve. And you know why? Because Wonderboy didn’t drink, except for a couple of non-alcoholic beers, but took benzodiazepine. His doctor prescribed him benzoes for his panic attacks, which have pretty much stopped him from going out of the house, having fun and even having friends. We laid out the plan for the evening beforehand, and I asked that he keep me aware, how much he’s taken at any given time. I didn’t want any surprises and wanted to be alert, if something didn’t go well. He split the pills into 1/4’s and 1/2’s and survived the whole night with only two.

It’s almost impossible to explain, how relieved I was. It’s even harder to understand that I never recognized and handled this huge burden I’ve been carrying all these years. Carrying Wonderboy. Here are things that I was happy about, which might give you an idea what it’s been like to be, live and love Wonderboy until now.

He talked with my friends. He took part in the conversation, he even laughed and made people laugh. I saw him have individual conversations with people, without me. He was funny and himself. His voice was normal, relaxed as he talked – and even once apologetically talked over me! He didn’t cling onto me, didn’t grip my hand under the table or look at me with those panicked eyes. He was up with all the plans we made, all the places we visited. He made decisions about what he wanted to eat and drink, when to go to the bathroom or where to go next by himself. He interacted with bartenders and doormen, people in the bar. He danced with me and my friends, and when Joe came, he even hugged him! He told me he went to say hi to one of his workmates he saw while I was in the bathroom. He took initiave to order drinks, asked me what I wanted and communicated about all of it with ease. He wasn’t devastated that our last bus had gone and came willingly to K even though he was only drinking lingonberry juice while we drank red wine. He wasn’t shocked that we had to sleep on the living room floor and he slept effortlessly even though we weren’t home.

After a couple of hours with him on benzoes and some champagne flutes for me I felt so much in love with him. I felt so connected. I remember thinking this is the man I fell in love with. I guess I was also the woman he fell in love with, because I was beaming. I didn’t think about babies once the whole night. Nothing obscured my happiness, my fun, my enthusiasm. I needed it. I needed to feel loved, wanted, cherised. I needed for him to be my wonderful lover, not just my depressed husband. And he did. He is such a lovable, funny, thoughtful, beautiful and sexy man. I just kept looking at him, telling him how pretty he is and he answered with the same enthusiasm about me. I could feel, how liberated he felt after more than 10 years of trying to fight the panic attacks, trying and failing. And now he could do all the things he dreamt of doing – with ease. Thanks to a drug.

I hadn’t realized, how much I always carry him. I hadn’t realized, how he takes his anxiety out on me, lashes out because of the fear and the stress of not being able to do what other people can. What everyone should. Even taking a bus to the other city would’ve bee too intensely scary for him without the drug. I’ve told K and my other friends about his disorder. Numerous times I’ve had to retold the story: Okay, well if it’s a big party, then only I will come. Yeah, that’s a fun idea, but you do realize that WB will not come? They never seem to get it. I barely get it myself, but I see I’ve adjusted. I don’t expect Wonderboy to be able to go to the store every day. I don’t expect him to be able to ask beforehand about his vacation times, his commute, anything we need to know. I’ve been carrying a huge burden. The burden to be the only one in his life.

It made me happy to be free. I was independent, and that meant that I could choose to come to him, talk with him, touch him, kiss him and breath him in. Because it wasn’t mandatory. I didn’t have to worry about him all the time. I didn’t have to facilitate his every conversation and he didn’t spoil my fun by nagging about wanting to go home the whole time.

I realized last week that when I got angry at Wonderboy, as I’ve let on here, I got very quickly very succesful at setting my limits. I also got good at expressing my desire. When Wonderboy went down on me yesterday, I had the moment of wanting something so bad wrong wrong, hesitated and then asked him to say it to me. Say that I’m a filthy whore for liking this. I guides his hands and gave instructiong to really torture my nipples like nobody’s business. And I amazingly squirted his whole face and the bed into a wet mess. I guess it’s good for me to become irritated then, isn’t it?

When he asked me to play with him later on, but wasn’t sure, if he could carry it out – the same reason why we didn’t fuck earlier – and started to get real pissy, because it wasn’t working, I just left to the bathroom. When I came back I expressed my feelings on how he’d behaved. Not only had he hustled me away from his cock, which he’d asked me to lick, but he’d done it very rudely. He went on complaining and being an asshat taking me into no consideration at all. I told him that it’s not okay for him to bash me in a situation like that. That he needs to hold his shit together and tell me nicely that he liked it, but it isn’t working out. Boom – he started crying and apologizing. I also made sure to tell him that I understand, how disappointed he feels for not having an orgasm and also that I love him no matter what happened. We cuddled, tried to go to sleep, but he would just lie there awake.

Finally I asked him, if he needed to try to take care of business himself and he asked immediately, if I would feel bad about it. I understand that he would feel ambivalent over masturbation, because of what happened last time, but does he really not see the difference?

I just want you to be happy and fulfilled, I said. When he still seemed uncertain, I kissed him and whispered into his ear, how he should think about nice suffocatings. He smiled and hopped off to play with himself. I asked a permission to play too, because he’d denied it after he licked me. He gave me permission and I came thinking about what he was doing. He came back to bed after 45 minutes or so very happy, giddy and kissed and hugged me in an almost childlike manner before going to sleep.

I’m beginning to see, why everything’s been so hard on me as of late. Now that I’m moving on to bigger guns on the fertility proceedings – since nothing’s still happened – I think my mind’s set. He will go to therapy. I will do as I like, when I like and he will just have to manage. I will not be his mom and I certainly will take no shit from him ever again. Because now I realize I have an option. Just let him be. Wow. How could I never see it before?

Happy New Year to everyone and hope you tackle your problems in ways of furious dancing and drinking champagne too!

A Lock, a Key and – a Keyholder

So much has happened I don’t know where to start. Well I do know where to start. I’ll start with the racy stuff to keep you entertained, because this will boil down to emotional turmoil and you know it.

Wonderboy came unannounced on my face. He had not been able to come or to have sex with me the whole week and didn’t come from fucking me. I made the mistake of stating do whatever you want. He did at that. When we tried this the last time, and for the first time, I only enjoyed it. I even wrote about how it didn’t feel degrading to me at all.

Well it did now! I wasn’t at all prepared for it. My eyes were open and really, I just wasn’t expecting it. I felt… desecrated. I got hurt. The stuff was all over my face, my left eye was positively glued shut and it was also in my hair. I just leapt to the bathroom to try to save my eye. I know from my friend’s experiences that not only does that shit hurt, when it hits the eye, it can also lead to an eye infection.

I felt he had walked all over my just to get to his desired end point. I felt that coming on to my face was not in our prenegotiated blanket consent. I really do need for him to ask. So, I addressed it. I said he has to say it out loud. He can say Now I’m gonna come on you’re face you filthy little whore, if that’s the way he likes to play it, but he cannot surprise me with it ever again.

I feel I’ve been too flexible, when he’s been down. I’ve done everything and agreed to anything just to make him happy. (Come.) I really didn’t want him coming on my face. I was already kind of fragile, because things had been so off between us and I still hadn’t forgiven the masturbation incident. I still felt sort of rejected and brushed aside, because he hadn’t trusted in me in such fundamental things. And then he did the stupidest thing he could’ve. Exactly what all degrading porn ends with.

My emotional reaction to the thought was to feel utterly replacable and put in a role I didn’t want to be in. I’m not your sex-crazy nympho dream girl! I deserve to be treated as equal. I deserve to choose.

He was sorry for it, but didn’t quite address the fact. He just brushed the situation aside by promising to state his intentions ahead of time. I really got no emotional cuddling. I was a bit upset and also angry. I hadn’t come although he thought I had. He had rushed me to an orgasm so that it was ruined, because he wanted to get to his. So I said, I’m gonna go play in the other room. Good night.

He didn’t say anything. He must have noticed how hostile the situation was in many ways, that something was wrong, but he did nothing. I haven’t asked his permission for masturbating after the incident. I did I think once, but it just didn’t feel right. I felt. I don’t know. I just couldn’t trust him. I didn’t want to give him the information about me. I didn’t trust him with my pleasure in any way. He made this comment when we were trying to settle the masturbation issue of his that I’m not the one masturbating all the time. It sunk in my stomach. It was so unfair to bring up. It was a low blow for sure and I’m not used to that kind of thing from him. I said so too, immediately, but it doesn’t change the fact that it hurt me and that now he has to deal with the consequences. I also told him that I have never rejected him and then went on to masturbate, and that I would like to only have sex with him, if he only could.

So he doesn’t know that I’ve been horny as hell. I mean it. I’ve had to rub myself senseless twice a day and sometimes I’ve still had sex with him after that. This is the way I used to be. I haven’t been for a while, but this makes me think these hormones are doing something right, when they’re putting me back on my old normal state that has changed with the hard things we’d had to go through.

This wasn’t the end of it. He’s been so down – I mean he’s probably actually clinically depressed, but what can I do about it? – that I decided to surprise him. I made him an abundant snack kind of a thing with many cool things and put it in this old army lunch box we happened to have. I tried to give it to him in the morning, but his answer was I’m just about to run to work. I’m not gonna take that with me. I tried to explain what it was, but he just left and also left me in the hallway completely naked holding the fucking lunch box.

I cried a bit and then I put it aside. I realized what was wrong. What had been wrong in the masturbation incident, in the coming on my face and in many small discussions and situations that had went awry in the last month. He didn’t trust me. He didn’t trust me enough to ask me or talk about it with me. And he didn’t trust me enough to take the lunch box.

Later when we discussed it in bed, finally, after a grueling long day and drive home, he put it in words. He just couldn’t face being seen running with a box like that. He said he had cried in the car, when he found out what the box was about. But he had known it would be something nice. He just couldn’t face carrying the box. He would rather hurt my feelings and cause himself distress in other ways. Because he couldn’t.

I’ve known since the day we met that Wonderboy suffers from social anxiety. He’s been clinically depressed for over 10 years, had no friends, no contact with the outside world. So I know. I take it into consideration every time we go out or I plan something. But somehow. Somewhere. He started keeping it a secret from me. He started covering up the whys of it. And now he had to come clean, because I said,

That is too neurotic. You need help. I can’t help you anymore. It’s not right for you to hurt my feelings over and over again just because you can’t do any better. 

The same words he said to me not so long ago, but ages ago, when I “decided” to try to find a therapist.

His answer was surprising. I’ve been thinking the same thing. I think it’s going worse.

He said many things to me that night that were hard to bare. He said he was not completely unhappy, which brought back memories of my ex, who said he could probably never be happy. He did correct his words later and said he was happy with me, but those kind of things stick. He has made me feel like he is not happy with me. He has hurt my feelings just because there is no one else. He says he was protecting me, because there was so much stuff going on, and yeah, I get it, but it’s not like he can keep a secret. It’s not like I didn’t already know and try to cope with it. It’s just that we couldn’t discuss it, because he didn’t trust me enough to tell me.

I made him promise he was going to call a doctor and find a therapist. He said that he saw really no other way out. That he had tried, if this happiness with me would be enough and seen that it wasn’t. But he didn’t make any plans. Next week, he said. I said okay.

Today he accused me of not being there for him, because I said that it is his fault that he hurts my feelings. The conversation started when he said he had woken up at 2 am and that he was in no shape to fuck me when he got home. This is the day of ovulation. This knowledge had huge impact. It’s not only our sex life now, it’s also our dreams of having a baby that are going down the drain. He managed to fuck me wednesday, when I told him you don’t have to fuck, it’s enough if you just come inside me. In any way possible. It was a good game and made me seriously hot, thank god for being kinky!

Somehow still though he thought that he hand’t done anything and was comparing this situation to what we had before, but with me on the spot. I answered him in detail. I let him know, how long I’ve been biding my time, trying to help him cope without letting him know about it, how I’ve been suffering because of what he’s going through, but since he wasn’t ready to deal I could do nothing. And then I said it. Are you even serious about trying for a baby? Is there any point in me suffering from these hormones, if you won’t do your share? Is this a shit idea and should we just stop trying?

When I wrote it I actually thought that it might be better. If he’s so tangled up in his emotions. If he’s so hard to reach and make happy. Maybe he should gon inton therapy before we do anything else. I can’t handle having a baby with a man like this.

Wonderboy didn’t answer. Since I’ve been working on my emotional container I didn’t freak immediately. I waited, tried to do some work and was planning on going to the gym.

And then he sent me a text message. You know what was in it?

Okay then. I made a doctors appointment for monday. That’s a start.

I said I was proud of him. And I was. when he came home we hugged and kissed a little and now he’s already asleep. We didn’t fuck. Sometimes there are things that are more important.

Caught In The Act – Not As Good As In Porn

Everything was fine. After a long dry spell we’d had sex on both monday and tuesday night. I was feeling so happy about it, I thought things were really looking up. So, while we cuddled yesterday night I didn’t have my hopes up, really. I did desire him, but I know him well enough not to expect anything out of him three (workdays) in a row. Suddenly he blurted out,

I probably won’t be able to fuck you today.

I started laughing because it was so out of the blue. I hadn’t really been making any advances, because I know him so well. I thought that he would obviously start grabbing me and toying with me, if there was any chance of sex. Usually at this point I ask, if playing is out of the question too, but I didn’t, because I felt his cock limp and warm in his underpants – which he always takes off to cuddle! I guess there were signs I picked up on about his desire to not have sex.

Later at night he came to quickly kiss me in the bedroom saying that he only wanted to quickly kiss me. Like I would have otherwise taken it as a prelude to sex. I was happy he did. When he was leaving I asked, if I was allowed to play by myself and he said yes. But I didn’t. I kind of felt like it, but because he was so out of it and I was also a little beat from working out the same day and the day before that, I didn’t.

He’d said he would just go brush his teeth and suddenly I noticed the silence that had been going on for a while. It immediately made my heart pound faster. I knew he was jerking off in the other room. It was too silent and he had been away so long. So, I yelped where my baby had gone off too, but I didn’t get any answer. I waited a little more, but then I went across the living room and opened the door.

It was dark and I only saw him in the light of the computer, sitting on the bed, dashing to cover himself and close the programs.

Are you playing in here? I asked in a cheerful voice, because I didn’t want him to feel bad about being caught. I didn’t want to accuse him of doing it. I don’t really accept accusing about sexual needs and fulfilling them.

Yeah, he answered and smiled at me, kind of apologetic but more just grinned.

I closed the door and went back to bed to read stuff I was earlier reading. My heart was pounding in my ears. It’s okay, I thought. I want him to have pleasure. It’s alright.

I could hear Wonderboy creeping off to the bathroom to clean up, and suddenly the realisation that he had to clean up even though I didn’t made me start crying. I felt used. I felt abandoned. I felt forgotten and betrayed. I felt rejected.

He came to the bedroom talking chipperishly about how I could’ve know to barge in at just the right time, but soon quieted down when he didn’t get any feedback. He came to cuddle me and I cried silently tears rolling into my hair.

Did you still get sad? Do you feel like you’re ugly and I don’t want you at all?

No, I answered. No, I don’t feel like that.

Don’t be sad, he said and curled his hands around me. I was facing the other way and tried to grab his hands, to hug him back in a way.

I know it’s different. I know it’s not the same. Masturbating and sex.

It was just because we had such amazing sex yesterday. And since you wanted to play, I thought I’d play. Just a little.

I didn’t. I didn’t play.

You know I’d rather have sex with you. I only want sex with you. And if there would’ve been any chance…

I know.

I just couldn’t fuck you today.

I know.

Or play with you.

That stung. Really? Why was it so easy to jerk off, but not to play with me? Was it just because I would want something too? Was it because it’s so easy for him to get himself off, but for me it takes longer to finish him?

The thoughts balled up in my stomach and made my ribcage too small. I cried again.

I tried to understand. I tried to think that I’d do the same in his situation. But I wouldn’t. How ever way I turned it I couldn’t imagine a situation where I would reject him and then play with myself. I just couldn’t. And from there came the rage.

I just would never do that, I said in between sobs. First reject you and then just go and play by myself. I would never do that to you.

It’s just the hormones, he answered to my neck.

Big mistake.

I froze. Oh, my feelings don’t really matter, because hormones might have something to do with them? I couldn’t imagine a world where this wouldn’t have hurt me. I even thought about saying, how it might have helped, if he would have just told me that he needed to do this. Maybe.

You can’t say that, I said, anger in my voice.

He sighed, let go off me and rolled onto his back.

We’ve talked about this. Why are you so sad all of a sudden? We’ve been over this before.

I felt like I was being accused. I was being childish for being hurt about him pleasuring himself and not doing it with me. I was the bad one. And I knew I was the bad one too. It didn’t help one bit, I was so hurt. I kept playing everything he’d probably been doing in my head and it was too much. I felt like puking. I just could’t understand. I couldn’t deal. I was so angry and hurt I wanted to punch something.

He went on to find his mobile phone charger and I stayed on the bed, holding a pillow, unable to move or feel anything but the pain I was dwelling in. I knew I should let go.

He came back, cuddled me and sang a silly song about not going to bed while you’re angry. When he didn’t get any reaction from me apart from a hoarse yeah, he asked me quite demandingly, if I was at all feeling like getting to bed with him. I had played down my emotions, I’d thought how I love him and that I should sleep here. I didn’t want to go to the other room, because of what had happened there just now. And I didn’t want to sleep on the couch. So, I said yes and went on to the bathroom, came back, took my clothes off like he insisted and laid myself down. He cuddled me from the back, kissed my back. I was in his arms, naked, but he’d positioned himself so that his cock didn’t touch me at all. And I was tensed up. I felt positive repulsion to think about his cock touching me. But it didn’t.

After some time he turned around, which made everything sprung up again. The rejection. The hurt feelings. I was trying to sleep. I was trying to just focus on how much I knew he loves me. But I couldn’t sleep. I could hear him falling asleep behind me and I moved myself away from him so our asses didn’t touch.

After I’d sulked there for a while trying to coach myself to sleep, I could feel his head rise from the bed, looking at me. I took away one earplug and asked what was wrong. He said something about waking up to feel anxious. I asked why, and he answered, because of this. Oh, I answered angrily. He didn’t say anything more even though I waited so I put the earplug back in. I could feel him shifting on the bed and then rising from it.

I took the earplug off again and asked, what are you doing? although I already knew.

I’m going to sleep in the other room, he said. This feels too bad, or something to that effect.

I felt accused again. More over I was being also rejected, abandoned. He wouldn’t even take the time to calm me. He wouldn’t even sleep with me when I was feeling hurt that he’d caused. Even when I’d made the decision to stay and try to focus on the love, which is pretty much the first for me.

He just left.

Like always when there’s a conflict.

He left and I was left on the bed with so much rage I was thinking everything from cutting myself to cutting his computer or throwing the dumbbels out of the window. I didn’t of course, but it took a looong time to wind down. He had left me hanging in so many ways. And I knew there was nothing I could do. I was still too angry to discuss it. He had expressed no desire to discuss this further and had even taken himself away as a precursion.

It didn’t help that he had the audacity to come back and collect the good pillows he sleeps on for the other room. Way to go man. If you want to make your wife more angry and hurt, this is the way to do it.

Somewhere down the line I even had time to think about, how not like my fantasies this caught in the act scene had been. I think it’s mostly because I knew he didn’t want and also aggressively denied me any participation in it. It wasn’t like yeah, babe, get in here and suck this cock. It was more in the lines of fuck off so I can finish. I wonder how ever that could make me feel unloved or dimished?

Anyway. I slept here alone after masturbating just in spite and to wind down. It took ages, I was so sad, really, too sad to do it. But I finished finally and then I slept without dreams until I woke up to hear him making breakfast for himself. I dozed off only to wake up, when he lay down on my tummy to kiss me and tell me, I like you, I like you, I like you. He then asked, if I could hear him through the earplugs and I answered with a hoarse yeah. It wasn’t a loving yeah. It wasn’t what he was expecting.

He thought I’de be okay now, in the morning. He’s done this before, thought that whatever concern I express late at night is just some phase I will wake up without knowing. He does get angry and frustrated and hurt later at night without any apparent reason. I just start to think about everything that’s hurt me in bed, when it’s quiet. I’m afraid to go to bed to face all that. Because then it has to be addressed. But it’s never something that’s not really bothering me.

I’m still angry and hurt. I don’t want him to touch me. I don’t want to talk with him or see him. I shut the doors to the other room, where I was working yesterday and my good office chair is there. I don’t want to go there. I feel that my trust has been shattered. Why am I not included? This just goes to show that however paranoid it might seem to be suspecting someone of masturbating the minute they close the door between you two, in my case there’s a reason for it. He’s shut me out so many times, it has made me feel cheated upon, when he does this. How can I be happy, if he chooses to have sex with someone else than me? Sometimes it’s been because he couldn’t deal with a possible rejection, sometimes because I had some hurt feelings or anxieties he couldn’t deal with, sometimes it was him and his feelings. And sometimes it’s been because he’s too exhausted physically. A thing I can not accept, probably because all the other reasons (have) existed too.

I’m resisting the urge to text him something bad. Something hurtful. I’m resisting contacting him in any way. He will have to deal with this. But it will happen face to face.

That’s what you get folks for kicking your loved one out of your sex life. Stings, doesn’t it?

Hope and a Few Theories on Early Pregnancy Telltale Signs

So what happened after I shut down the computer and went to bed was that I didn’t sleep at all last night. What I mean by that is that when Wonderboy woke up at 6:15 I was awake on the music room bed.

Why didn’t I sleep? There are all sorts of rumours and suppositions about that, but let me tell you what I felt. Every time I rolled over to my side and closed my eyes I felt ill. There was this weird nag and pull on my womb. A couple of times the nausea just produced bigger and bigger waves until I had to walk around a bit and once I actually sat in the bathroom waiting to throw up. But I didn’t. It was a close call, though. After that I took a bowl with me near the bed just in case.

I couldn’t help but think what you all know I’d be thinking. Maybe… just maybe I can hope a little. I obviously went to look for a little information, but mostly I just read infertility blogs. I cried, oh boy did I, reading them. So many miscarriages, so much pain and so little hope. Both of the ones I read ended up happily pregnant although some of their “test scores” were even worse than ours. In a purely statistic, numeral sort of way, which might or might not indicate anything since many infertilities just go without a real reason.

But yeah, I found out that some women, like I have claimed to twice before, actually feel symptoms of the pregnancy even after just a day of the ovulation. They just get to go through it all. Some say that you can only feel the pregnancy after the egg is fertilized and implantated to the womb. Well, I’ve thought about that and I have two reasons to think that it is actually possible.

First, I feel my ovulation. It’s a prickly, sometimes  even a very painful stabbing pain. I also sometimes feel the way the follicle goes around there in my fallopian tubes. Mostly in the right one, which is too close to my womb. (Maybe that’s got something to do with it!) It would make perfect sense that there would be so severe changes after the fertilization that I could feel them since I’m all sensitive like that anyway.

And the other one is a medical hypothesis. Since even pregnancies that don’t actually include a fertilized egg and pregnancies outside the womb, which are not implantated, can be shown in the tests, because the pregnancy hormone hcG levels go up. That would indicate, she said with triumph, that it is indeed possibly to not only feel but to have the hormonal changes of pregnancy even if it isn’t implantated. Yet.

This pregnancy hope actually started on wednesday, because I had those severe pains in my womb without any apparent reason. My womb now feels somehow swollen and a bit sore. It might not be anything. It might be something. But if it is something, I so hope it’s going to cope!

I did go to our own bed on Wonderboy’s command and fell asleep quite effortlessly. I woke up 4,5 hours later my heart rasing and nausea building up. I had to go eat something. Now I don’t feel the nausea anymore, but I feel a different kind of sensation. Hope. Fear. Hope. Fear. Hope?

I sent a text message about these feelings and symptoms to Wonderboy and he answered That’s so nice to hear! We can’t know what it is this early. But still! Drink a lot of tea and play the Sims. This is an expert’s advice. And then the usual kisses and so on. Feels good to share even a little bit of hope with him after the discussion we had again last night.

I confronted him, because he didn’t even want to cuddle and wouldn’t take his clothes of. We always cuddle naked. I had just talked to him about a lot of these things happening with me, the hormones, the angriness, the scares, everything and I thought we would be in a good place now. But we weren’t. Finally after much pressuring and hugging he said that he’s just so distraught about the changes I’ve been going through. He said I’m a little like I was before and that has put him back there too. He’s scared and alert.

We talked about him feeling like that and I tried to make him realize that, if he doesn’t talk with me nothing will get better. It’s his way to deal with scary situations by just running away. I’m glad I know him this well, otherwise this could’ve gone on for a while. We also talked about the lack of sex. We have had sex, yes, two to three times a week, but it isn’t as much as either of us would like. The most prominent problem is not the frequency but the lack of enthusiasm and spontaneity. We both are scared and tentative. Wonderboy realized while we talked that he’s blamed himself for being too tired, and I think I have too, but that the real reason is that I don’t want it as much and I don’t enjoy it as much either.

Wonderboy is like that, he’s such a dear, that he doesn’t feel lustful, if I am not. It affects him deeply.

Obviously there’s such a wide range of realizations here and reasons behind it all. It’s exhausting to not be able to conceive. It’s exhausting to take the hormones and face the consequences. Wonderboy said he’s noticed so many changes in me and how exhausted and sad I am all the time. Or most of the time. And I hadn’t known that he notices or knows. Because he hasn’t said anything. Sometimes I’d just like to know that he sees me and the stuff I’m going through for us.

But to possibly happier things. I just took my temperature and it was not its normal 36.6, but 37.0. I know this might be a symptom as well, because my temperature has never risen like this after ovulation – although I checked that it’s supposed to. Might obviously just be the workings of the hormones I’m taking. I also didn’t feel any aggression during ovulation, but it shot up straight after, far too early for PMS to start kicking in. Hmmm…

But I’ll just have to wait and hope for the best.