Marriage/Divorce

I Overheard The Conversation That Ended My 30 Year Marriage

Or Why I hate the Super Bowl.

AI photo created by the author

How was it that I was in someone else’s kitchen washing dishes instead of watching the big game at a Super Bowl party when I overheard the conversation that ended my marriage?

I am un-American. I don’t like sports, politics, or religion, and I never watch TV. I also rarely eat fast food and haven’t had an alcoholic drink since college, so I dislike all of the top things real Americans enjoy. On a positive note, I am very handy in the kitchen, so when “our” friends would have one of the endless sports-viewing parties, I would quickly gravitate to the kitchen and spend my time helping the hostess.

Some of the wives, including mine, were big sports fans and would be in the living room by the TV, cheering loudly. Most of the wives would sit at the kitchen table, gossiping cheerfully as the sports lovers screamed in the next room. After twenty years or so, I just blended in with the major appliances, and the ladies forgot I was even in the room. I overheard many juicy pieces of gossip in those kitchens, but nothing like what was said at a Super Bowl party six years ago.

My friends told me it was the lowest-scoring and most boring Super Bowl ever. I think they’re all boring, so I’ll take their word for it. I do remember it was a lot more crowded than usual at the kitchen gossip table. On that day, the gossip topic was sex.

I stood over the sink, green rubber gloves and apron firmly in place, and listened. I was stunned as one after another, every woman there gushed about how they never “had” to have intercourse anymore. Some of them mentioned how they kept their husbands off their backs by satisfying them in other ways; a few said there was no sexual contact at all, but the stories were basically all the same. I was floored that all the women were almost giddy about the lack of sex in their relationships.

I admit I almost smirked when the wife of the biggest sexual braggart among the men revealed all her husband’s boasts were lies, and that even when they were young, none of those things ever happened. But the biggest shocker came next.

One woman said her husband wouldn’t accept the death of his sex life no matter what. She said she finally decided to lie to him and tell him that her gynecologist had forbidden intercourse due to her fibroids. She laughed as she told how she had researched sexual problems on the internet so her fictitious story would be believable. Then her laughter died away as she turned and saw me, her husband, staring at her in disbelief.

I left her there at that party, drove home, and cuddled with my three cats. When I was feeling loved again, I did some internet research of my own. I googled “Divorce Lawyers.”

If you want to skip to the happy ending part of my story, read

[embed]A Heartbreaking Accident Made My Relationship Stronger Maybe not what we dreamedmedium.com