Slowly but Surely

This post was inspired by an email I received recently (and approved by Cole)...

The other night after I got home from being in Las Vegas for a week I walked back into my house at around midnight, the children were asleep, Cole was fighting to stay awake, and all I had been thinking about was how I couldn't wait to make love to my wife and lay next to her and just relax. Of course the baby is asleep in our bed, LB wakes up to the sound of a pin drop, and Cole has to get up for work in 6 hours. Ugh. Well there is always tomorrow. I think it was around 4 days later that Cole and I finally tip-toed to the other end of the house while LB was at school, and Tessa was napping away, that we finally had some awkward (as quiet as possible) sex in the living room with all the blinds closed, so very careful not to make a sound so we don't wake anyone up. Have you ever had sex without making a sound? Try it if you haven't. It's really stupid. Luckily we both thought it was hilarious, and both thought it was ridiculous, and both knew that it had nothing to do with the other and everything to do with the circumstances. Knowing that we are both on the same page that this kind of thing isn't going to fly is comforting, it means that I know we will find a way to remedy the intimacy. Nobody wants to have the "our sex life sucks" talk with one another, so for now we are laughing at the absurdity of the conditions in which we can actually have sex.

Sometimes the opportunity creeps up and surprises us, maybe the kids fell fast asleep at bedtime at the same time, nobody is fighting it off, we aren't completely exhausted, and we're like "Oh yeah! We can totally do this. Do you want to? You do?!" Then I am like "FUCK!! The stupid condoms are all the way in the back of the house." And all of the sudden I am a grown man tip toeing through the dark house as quiet as a mouse, trying not to breathe, down the hallway past LB's door, into the bedroom, opening the dresser drawer as sloooooow as humanly possible, avoiding the creaky floor board--stop, pause, the baby is stirring, no-- NO-- NOOOOOOO!! she woke up. Baby starts screaming. I just walk into the shower and stand there. We missed our chance. It's gone. I am still at the point where I think this stuff is funny, so it's okay. I never thought that the movie "Big Daddy" with Adam Sandler was funny, but now all I can think of is that scene where he is eating that Frito as quiet as possible while the kid is napping, and I am laughing my ass off-- "it's true! it's so true." Oh man.

I am convincing myself that it won't be like this forever.

And I know that it won't.

While our sex life has been on pause, the big difference I have noticed is the frequency in which I say completely filthy stuff to Cole throughout the day about all the things that I want to do to her. Of course this does little to build romance and anticipation, and does more harm than good in building my case for sex later in the night. But it definitely does a lot for the hilarious factor around the house. I take great pride in making Cole's jaw drop with filthy innuendos, and in turn she will totally shock me and do embarrassing things like hump the air like a teenager while the kids have their heads turned, or do the old classic tongue in the cheek BJ face. All of this is a sign that there is some sense of humor intact about the building frustration, but the real actual hard work to get back to blissful intimacy is about to begin. We are making a move that matters.

We are taking our bed back.

It's time to switch Tessa to the crib full time and free our nights of the baby pulling at Cole. It's time to get this baby out of the bed, so when I wake up with a morning boner I am not immediately stricken with shame, "there's a baby in the bed, how could you do this to me? Go away morning boner." Now I have to stop and realize for a second that this is where Cole and I differ. Here is what I mean: Freeing up the bed for Cole means ridding herself of being a human pacifier and her boobs being assaulted all times of the night by Tessa, wrecking any consistent solid satisfying sleep she might get. I sleep just fine, Cole has a baby clawing at her body every hour for snuggles and flesh. I honestly don't know how she does it. For me getting the baby out of the bed means that I get to assault Cole's boobs all times of the night and wreck any chance at all at a solid nights sleep. haha I am kidding. sort of. I just want my wife back. It's to the point when I feel guilty spooning up to Cole cause I know she has reached the limit of anyone touching her between the demands of both the kiddos. So here I come looking for affection and well... I might as well be trying to hug a hornets nest. Knowing why shit happens the way it happens is fine, but convincing yourself not to take it personal is the challenge. And I admit there are some days that I struggle with it and let myself get all butt hurt and frustrated. That is when I have to slap sense into my face and man up, and just realize that this is just part of the sacrifice of having children. It was one of those things that married couples with kids said would happen that you don't want to listen to. Of course we knew that part of deciding to co-sleep with Tessa was going to seriously impair our likelihood of finding time to be intimate, but when these kinds of decisions are being made just after Cole pushing Tessa out and into this earth, the last thing Cole was thinking of was, "man I can't wait to get something between my legs!"

I wasn't sure what was going to happen after she gave birth to Tessa. Eventually slowly, sex comes back into the picture. We were like... so, we want to give this a try again? And it is seriously scary. Will I hurt her? Will it feel so bad she won't want to do it again EVER? Is it too soon? We had been told stories of people showing up to their postpartum exams and announcing that they were pregnant again. and we were like... hmmm, The Duggar's? But yeah. We waited. And we tried. And it sucked. It was like playing a game of operation, and if I touched the sides, Cole would punch me in the nose. We just stared at one another and I would watch her face for any sign of distress, and she was looking back at me with this face that people make when they have to poop really bad and there isn't a toilet around anywhere and we kept saying: "I love you." I can't imagine it is like that for everyone, maybe some people wait longer, maybe some people just don't worry as much, maybe some people just like it to hurt? Who knows, but it gets better, and better, and better again, until months later there are new things being tried out and I am the one wincing in pain. The point is that it gets better-- and that is how this whole post started, someone had written and asked that very question. And I admit I was a little taken aback at first when someone wrote to ask about sex postpartum and wanted some perspective from people who have just gone through it, and then I realized that it is absolutely something people just don't talk about. And maybe something like this would help? Who knows if it did.

So I am going to be clear and finish this off and speak directly to that reader...

All I know is that the chemical reactions and hormones coursing through Cole from the point of conception till now is making it so that she has at least another year (maybe longer) before she is feeling like her old self again, so the fact that she even has a sex drive at all makes me feel so very lucky. It isn't the same for everyone, hormones are unpredictable and tolerances are different. You know this :) So yeah. I know I am lucky, but I am also patient and that is the true path to getting things back to normal again. Patience coupled with a sense of humor, on top of understanding, saves everything. Everything. From the email you wrote I would imagine that you all will be back to full speed just in time for the baby to start blowing your chances. I really do think babies are birth control, they exhaust you, they keep you busy, they do not want another baby coming around and getting on their mamas boobs. They do everything they can to keep their parents from having sex. Anyway, I promise you won't actually rip in half, thanks for writing, and good luck.

All the Love in the Universe ~ Me

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