THE BEGINNING OF THE END

It all started when I got married to my best friend in October 2000.  We were in our late 20’s, both working, both healthy and everything seemed fine.  My husband had a lower sex drive than I did and was a little more prudish than I was, this didn’t concern me as long as we were intimate at least once a week.  I was happy, he seemed happy and I thought our relationship was just fine.  Then cracks started to appear.

 

His refusals to have sex with me started gradually and the excuses began… he was tired; stressed with work; more interested in playing the computer; he had too big a meal and felt too full and tired; it was too late at night (tired again); then it seemed he was a ‘morning person’ and didn’t want to have sex at night like I did.  The excuses went on and on while I grew more and more insecure and frustrated.

 

It’s been my experience that women always seem to look to themselves as the source of the problem first, blaming themselves for something that they have done or haven’t done as the case may be.  I was no different…

 

Before I met my husband, I had a very full and satisfying sex life with my ex.  He made me feel like a goddess in the bedroom, he loved everything I did for him, and in turn he was happy to do whatever I asked of him.  We had a lot of fun experimenting with sex toys, positions etc but unfortunately as compatible as we were in the bedroom, we tended to clash on the day to day things and ended up parting ways.  When I met my husband, he was an inexperienced virgin.  I had hoped that with time, he would gain confidence and experience and we could have a similar sex life as I’d had previously.

 

My belief in myself (as a sexual goddess in the bedroom) took a severe blow each time with each of his (husband) refusals to have sex with me.  “What was I doing wrong?”  I tried to talk to him about it, asked him if he would like me to do anything different, stop doing something that made him uncomfortable… But he didn’t want to talk to me about sex.  He felt uncomfortable having those kinds of conversations with me.  I’d always been open about sex, it wasn’t something I considered taboo or dirty in any way.  I couldn’t persuade him to talk to me about it.

 

My next theory was “What was wrong with me?” Was I getting too old, too boring, not dressing attractively enough?  I tried wearing nicer clothes, putting on makeup and sexy underwear all to no avail.

 

Three years later while I was deciding whether to leave him or not, I discovered I was pregnant…

 

Considering how little we had sex, it came as a bit of a shock to both of us that I fell pregnant so easily.  All of a sudden I felt trapped and terrified.  What was I going to do? I couldn’t leave now.  Who would help me raise the baby?  I couldn’t rely on my family, so I figured I should stay with him.  I was going to keep the baby, there wasn’t any question about that as I did want to be a mother.  I just couldn’t believe what lousy timing this was.

 

At least my husband was happy about it, and once I got over the shock I tried to enjoy being pregnant and having something else to distract me.  It proved to be quite a distraction in the end and I was very grateful that my sex drive didn’t increase during my pregnancy.  It was actually a relief to experience it decrease.

 

However it was around this time that I discovered his frequently masturbating with quite a large collection of ‘Barely Legal’ pornographic magazines.  I don’t know if it was my hormones or if it was the fact that these girls looked so young and he preferred them over me – but I snapped.  I started yelling at him and shredded all of his magazines in front of him.  Thinking back I know I over-reacted and I feel ashamed about it, but I just felt so hurt that he’d rather have a wank over pictures of teenage girls than have actual real life loving sex with the woman that was carrying his child.

 

I avoided sex (not that it was difficult) for my entire pregnancy after that…

 

In August 2004 we welcomed our son into the world and for the next 5 years I threw myself into trying to be the best working mother possible and trying to keep busy.  Unfortunately as every year passed, my son grew more and more independent which was a relief and a curse at the same time.  A relief because being a mother was the hardest thing I have ever done, but having more free time meant that I wasn’t as tired and I longed for intimacy.

 

… Ifeoma Iloh