Knit booty call

I left my husband for a co-worker I was having an affair with, and accidentally got pregnant. He wasn’t thrilled, but manned up and married me. Sex soon dried up. We haven’t had it for two years! He never hugs me, never says he loves me, I kissed him and he recoiled, saying I was “in his space.” I asked why he married me. He said, “I never wanted to, or to be a father, but now I have to deal with both.” I know he isn’t cheating (I always know where he is). My girlfriends say I should leave, that children are resilient, but I’m almost 40, and my 5-year-old son adores his father. We don’t fight, but we don’t talk, either, and he won’t do anything with me unless our son’s involved. — Not Miserable, Not Happy

This little boy isn’t in your lives because a stork in a UPS outfit dropped him off in a basket: “Gotta sign for this kid, lady. And I think he needs his diaper changed.”

Since you aren’t 11 and sneaking cigarettes behind the elementary school dumpster when you should be in sex ed, you know very well what happens when Mr. Sperm and Miss Egg have a meet ‘n greet. I’m guessing you gambled that having a kid would move your relationship to the next level. And lookie here, it did: into bitterness, envy and resentment. Your husband’s paying bigtime for his own cavalier approach to birth control: the unspoken understanding that he was up for a few hot minutes in the office supply closet, not 21 years in a suburban tract home in a pretty good school system.

Terribly sorry you aren’t getting any, and that it’s awful chilly in there, but it isn’t like you bought a new purse that didn’t quite have the pockets you need. Your right to be all about you ended the day another human being came out of your body. Those so-called “resilient” children of parents who’ve split up have the worst outcomes across the board — in everything from school performance to emotional stability to their own relationships as adults. Unless your home life is so ugly that your kid would be better off if you divorced, you and Frosty need to “do what you need to do” to make this work the best you can.

Although he was as big a boob as you were about birth control, your best chance of thawing him a little is expressing remorse for sucking him into this situation. Give him props for what a great dad he’s been, and ask him to team up with you to do right by your kid. This isn’t about getting him from “you’re in my space” to “you’re the light of my life,” but getting him to a couples therapist so you can figure out how to be a couple of loving (or at least friendly) roommates raising a kid together.

Got a problem? Write Amy Alkon, 171 Pier Ave, No. 280, Santa Monica, CA 90405 or e-mail her at [email protected] (www.advicegoddess.com).

© Copyright 2009 Amy Alkon