How I Fell Madly In Lust With My Husband

by Susan Shapiro

I’d broken off with macho David and Brad because of their insensitivity and infidelity, and I was starting to worry that the Lotharios who stimulated me most in the sack were bound to make me sick when we put our clothes back on. By my thirties, I seriously suspected that there were only two types of men to choose from: bullies who’d bewitch my body, then try to seduce my best gal pals when I wasn’t looking, or sensitive souls who’d take me on nice dinner dates but put me to sleep under the sheets.

Then I met Tommy, a kind, good-looking lawyer who treated me well but was also up for a little deviant dance in the dark. Once, after my roommate Emily, a radical documentary filmmaker, overheard some minor smacking and tickling in the bedroom, she asked if Tommy was abusing me. Of course, not. We were just having fun, I reassured her. She eyed me skeptically, as if I was exhibiting signs of battered woman syndrome. But as a big-boned, 5-foot-7-inch gutter-mouthed girl with a decent right hook, I knew for certain that if any guy ever really tried to hit or touch me against my will, I would have beat the hell out of him.

Still, as more years passed, I felt increasingly ready to make a trade-off: rambunctious lovers into lying, head games and cheating for an honest, caring spouse I respected. So, at thirty-five, I wound up with a mensch who walked me down the aisle and swore he’d be faithful. That he also happened to be a big, hot, hairy, sardonic sports-obsessed man’s man who easily returned my father’s and brothers’ male-punch hellos made the decision fairly easy.

Yet only a few years into our blessed union, my spouse seemed to find me too warm-blooded. On Saturday nights he preferred work to body wrestling me to the floor and taking me where I wanted to go. If I tried to bring it up, he’d get defensive, as if I was insulting him. But I felt too young and frisky to forfeit my physical fervor. I wasn’t self-conscious about pleasing myself, but it felt sad not to be sharing my pleasure with the partner I adored.