The Weirdness of Vulnerability [NSFW]

My husband read my blog.

A portrait of husband? Image by Peggy und Marco Lachmann-Anke from Pixabay

There was no snooping or dramatic blow-up or anything like that. He knew about the blog from the beginning because I told him. Knew how to find it. He certainly wasn’t thrilled about the blog because he’s a very private person, but it’s not like he could do anything about it. But he never read it, I assumed out of lack of interest. And then today, I was planning to show him one particular post because it came up in conversation, and he went and read it himself. Like any other random stranger on the internet. That post and then some more, including some of the more damning stuff. Honestly, none of it’s a surprise. None of the unflattering shit here about me, him, or our marriage is anything that hasn’t already come up in argument.

Not a portrait of my blog. All this shit’s been said already. Trust me. Photo by Marc Schaefer on Unsplash

Still…

I guess it would have been smarter to write this post in bad French too, but I can barely translate my current feelings into English, let alone into a language I don’t speak.

***

I feel strange, for lack of better word. He had as much right to read this blog as anyone else on the internet. To tell the truth, I felt hurt when I thought he didn’t have enough interest to bother reading my blog in the first place. I mean, if I had a love interest who wrote a blog, I would have memorized the whole blog archives!

But now, I feel very weird. Like vulnerable and disarmed. It’s this odd fluttery feeling. I can’t tell if it feels good or bad.

***

Vulnerability feels like a theme of sorts. The last counseling appointment was odd. Husband came to ask about one incredibly specific baby step to solve what he thought was “The Main Problem” in our relationship; I came to say that Husband’s concept of “The Main Problem” wasn’t even accurate and that we actually needed to address Three Different Major Problems and that Husband’s plan to solve Husband’s idea of “The Main Problem” was never going to work because it wasn’t even the right problem. We were already arguing about this on the drive to counseling, and I had prepared a mental list of Even More Things Husband Was Extremely Wrong About to tell the couple’s therapist. And then I don’t know what the hell happened during that appointment, but I left feeling weirdly disarmed and vulnerable.

Then, completely unrelated to the Three Major Problems, (and underlining that to make that super clear in case Husband is still reading this), it dawned on me that I really never made the connection between vulnerability and intimacy. I realized that I have always thought of sex in practical, functional, transactional ways. I thought you had sex because it was fun, because you wanted an orgasm or because you wanted to give your partner an orgasm, or because you wanted to have a baby, or even just a story to tell your girlfriends (in college, I honestly thought this was the primary motivation for sexual activity). Sure, you had to really like and really trust the other person and sure, it took some amount of vulnerability to get naked. But that’s why there’s darkness, blankets, and distraction (eg. doing pleasant things to your partner’s penis to distract him) to get over the self-conscious of being naked. Anyway, it’s pretty weird to suddenly realize in my late thirties, after this many years of sexual experiences and marriage, that I completely missed the point that sex was supposed to be about being vulnerable and building emotional intimacy. This revelation feels incredibly weird.

***

I’ll stop now. If Husband didn’t want kill me after reading my blog before, he will after reading this post. (Not really. He’s actually a very reasonable, gentle, and non-violent person. I’m not in danger.)

I haven’t quite decided what to do about this blog. I started taking down some more damning stuff. Haven’t decided if I’ll stealth-edit and repost or not. Honestly, the original goal of this blog was actually good content tangentially-related to the Jewish world, not life update / complaining shit. Perhaps this will be good motivation.

I’m not quite sure what to write now. Image by luxstorm from Pixabay

***

Update:

I decided to ask Husband what he thought of my blog.

JYP: Are you mad at me?

Husband: No. I get that you excerpted things and changed things for the blog. I don’t mind. I don’t even care if your commenters think I’m a jerk because I know the truth. These people don’t know me.

This cheeky response made me want to repost the more damning stuff so that Husband would read my inner thoughts on our marriage and realize that no, all is not fine and he is not right and not blameless.

JYP: Ok, so that conversation I quoted did not take place exactly on that day, but it’s not like you didn’t say that. You totally did. Anyway, I defended you in the comments. And I write shit all the time that makes me look like the bad guy. Like when I took your Yom Kippur honor, I had readers who thought I was an asshole.

Husband: I don’t care. I thought you did a pretty good job of anonymizing. But [Kiruv Rabbi] would figure out it’s you from this post.

JYP: I didn’t give a location. I didn’t name the organization. I didn’t specify the parsha or the verse that he quoted. And honestly, if he finds this blog, figures out it’s me, and gets mad, I don’t really care. He really did tell me that stupid story and it was really dumb and insensitive of him, and I don’t feel the least bit bad about saying that.

Then I asked him:

JYP: Did you like my blog?

Husband: Yeah. I liked your post about Impossible Pork. And that poem about looking for God. And the one about traditions that don’t make any sense.

JYP: I had a feeling you’d appreciate that one. Actually, I think that scene actually happened in Arizona. The Vegas part of that trip was after Christmas. But “Vegas” always makes for a better poem so I changed it.

Finally, I asked him this:

JYP: Are you planning to troll me in the comments or something? Or are you going to start your own blog?

Husband: No.

***

What I didn’t ask was whether he planned to keep reading in a not-trolling way, either past posts or future ones. I didn’t ask because I’m not sure if I really want to know the answer.

I still don’t know what to write now.