Holiday horror

Merry xmas. Merry? Never.

My christmas this year hits an alltime high, or at least I did. The holiday is the most difficult time of the year for me to stay clean. Believe it or not, since my last post (I know, like years ago), I haven't touched any narcotics (I use that word for it as it includes my medications) or had any alcohol (except wine, but seeing I'm euro it's what runs through my veins).... UNTIL the holidays. I hate christmas, I hate everything about it. I've pretended to be jewish for many years just to avoid christmas. Noone's ever asked since I'm wealthy and a New Yorker, so everyone takes for granted I'm jewish. As long as they don't ask, I won't tell. (I know all the lingo so I infiltrate them rather well, like when wearing my kenzo schmata to the spa).
My mom left one christmas when I was 5 or 6 years old, and ever since, dad and I always travelled someplace exotic with a non-christian state religion to avoid any jingling bells or santas. Now dad's gone and I hate the holidays more than ever, which I never knew was possible.

This is the time of year I'm forced to 1) leave Manhattan, 2) visit my in-laws and 3) hear all their worries in person (it's better when hubby passes them on, since I can just put on my ipod and shut it out). "Aren't you terribly skinny?", "When are you gonna have a baby?" and the all too loud whispering when I leave for the loo "is she doing drugs in there?".
I still don't count valium as a drug per se, I see it as a must to survive the holidays. Hubby caught me packing them before our trip, and after a short fight he agreed it can come in handy, but as a compromise I could only bring half my stack. Only ten minutes into dinner my heart was racing, my head was pounding and I felt that salty liquid attempting to leave my eye balls to create tears. I wouldn't have any of it and hit the valium. I'm much more accepting of the in-laws and relaxed in a catatonic state, so I made sure to stay that way for the three days.

As we were going to bed on christmas eve, hubby brought up the baby talk. I was shocked, as this is normally always up to anyone else in our surroundings!
"Do you think you'll ever want to have a baby?" he started while striking my valium-stricken forehead.
"Umm.. eh.. well.."I stuttered.
"I don't mean now, but they might have a point deep down in all that nagging.."
And then he pulled the trumph card:
"..and it might fill that void inside of you that you long to fill".
He went on to talk about family values, the span of life and what he'd get our future baby for christmas, not noticing my heart beat went up a hundred notches or so.
First, I was terribly upset. He made it seem like I needed a baby, when he was obviously just wanting to satisfy his family's and the society's demands of us. But that night, even in my valium-induced REM sleep, I dreamt of a little girl with blonde braids playing beside me in the sand, both of us wearing the same type of designer bikinis...

Not in the mood?

Problem of the month: my sex life. Or actually, the lack of one.
Hubby is a sort of a prude and doesn’t really have that strong of a sex drive. That’s fine, we’ve been more into the love-making, which I assume is expected from a husband and wife. Naturally, we had more sex in the first year or so, but now it's a rarity. Problem is, I’m used to the passionate foreigners that wants it 'right here, right now' (actual place and time is irrelevant to them). Also, as a European woman, I’m very sexually open, forward and won’t deny my cravings. Fine, as a married woman, I can’t expect my husband to want to have dirty sex in the bushes of the country club or a quickie whilst stuck in a traffic jam, but I kind of miss the passion. When your man needs you, can’t wait to get in the door, can’t take either his eyes or hands off you. Is it not reasonable to wish for just a little of that from your husband, too? Lust doesn't die once you've tied the knot, does it?

Before I learnt, one month after our wedding, I put on a fur coat and heels and went to surprise him in the office. I closed the door behind me, dropped the fur and approached him.
“Keep the blinds open”, I told him.
He put on his glasses, straightened his tie and said with a stern face “honey, I don’t have time for this right now”. My heart sank.
“If you really want it that bad, maybe you could buy a vibrator”.
As if I didn’t have two already (but I’d never say that aloud)! Need I say I hopped on the party train that night? I didn’t come home until I knew he had left for the office the next morning. I had never before had a man dismiss me when I come charging in wearing only red lipstick, heels and his favorite perfume.

He has called me a ‘nympho’ on more than one occasion when I’ve been the sole initiator of sexual activities.
“Sometimes canoodling is just as nice”, he said. “You don’t always have to have S-E-X”.
No, really, he did spell it out!
“I agree, not always”, I pouted, “but OCCASIONALLY wouldn’t hurt either”!

We didn’t talk, nor were we intimate, for over a week after that conversation. I learnt it’s better to keep my mouth shut and play the role of the obediant satisfied wife. I’ve never complained again about either the quality or quantity of sex in our marriage. Many, many times I’ve contemplated picking up on the offers of casual encounters with potential lovers, but I kept hoping the problem would solve itself eventually (without me having to turn to another penis). I begun spending even more time on keeping in shape, looking pretty and being all he’d ever want. And? Nothing’s changed.

The worries are now constantly present. Why isn’t he attracted to me? If he chose me as his wife, how come he doesn’t want to make love to me? Our weekly sex seems like a mandatory must for him, a chore on the to-do list. While he dozes off right after, I’ve cried myself to sleep.
I can only see that I was the one to blame. He’s still young and healthy, shouldn’t he be peaking sexually right about now? It has to be my fault. Is he sleeping with someone else? After seeing ‘Brokeback Mountain’ my fears mounted; is hubby secretly gay? Do I smell bad, moan too much/little, am too fat or too skinny? Do I need any sort of surgery?
Sex isn’t really the issue either, it’s the affirmation. No matter if he says ‘love you’ every day on the phone, you also need to feel that your husband loves you. And currently, I don’t.

Letter from the desert

Hello friends (or whatever you people are),

First off, if anyone cares, I apologize for my abscence. I was MIA. After Otto died, things got nuts (things being me). Hubby saw no other solution than force me to what he called a 'countryside retreat, almost a spa, honey' in the desert in fucking fly-over country. Fine, I was semi-aware that I needed a minor make-over in the addiction area, but a whole f*ing eight weeks? I'm sorry I curse so much, it's against everything I ever believed in and I picked it up at boot camp (operation rehab), but it will wear off soon once I'm back. Using the f-word was sadly the only way I got anyone to listen to me. There was only one person there that I could bond with, a British model who makes a pretty decent living by looking doped up (she still didn't see a point in quitting, it'd just cost her gigs). The only thing we had in common was that we were hot, rich and considered euro trash by the rest of them.. oh, and that we'd dated the same polo player. I've never been much for comparing odd, sexual activities w other girls though, so the friendship quickly came to a halt.

Hubby came to visit once. He looked miserable, but as did I (there was noone to do my hair around). He said the supervisor said I'd made small, tiny baby steps in the right direction and I could tell he was pleased.
"This bodes well, hopefully we get a new fresh start".
He'd brought Casablanca, my favorite movie, and anytime I felt depressed I had the soothing voice of Ingrid Bergman close by. That worked, until during a therapy session, it came up she has the same accent my mom had, and that I must subconsciously miss her. I despise any freudian mom/dad bullshit and gave away my dvd player to a midwestern housewife with pot issues down the hall (see how pathetic? Rehab has lost all the glamour, and I'm not going back).

Anyway, I'm assumingly 'cured' from addiction, and am at the airport on my way back to Manhattan now. The flight is delayed and as I've read every magazine in the store, I turned to the net and realized I need to get back on here if I want to get back to my old life too. This will be the only thing in my old life my shrink said worth continuing ('it's therapeutic'), so I'll please her at the same time. How convinient.

R.I.P. Otto

Oh no, I failed. Failed hubby, failed shrink, failed myself.
I did coke last night. I was beyond myself, so upset. I am still crying - nonstop 24 hours.
Otto died!
The love of my life is gone.. and I had to witness it! A serial killer dog (aka pitbull) attacked Otto yesterday in the park.
We were enjoying the snow and the crispy clear air in the morning. I wore my chinchilla fur boots and Otto had on a Burberry vest. Otto loves my boots and was trying to mate with them. So happy, frolicing and dragging his ears in the snow, getting all wet but loving every minute of it.
Then, out of nowhere, Otto was laying on the ground with satan's dog biting his neck.

Otto has brought me so much joy and anyone that's ever had a dog know what I'm talking about. On the days I couldn't manage to get out of bed, he peed on the floor and I had to bring in carpet cleaners. (Or I managed to bribe my 10 year old neighbour into walking him). He was my reality wake-up call every day. Either way, even when I wasn't there for Otto - he was there for me. Loving me unconditionally.
So where did the coke come from? You know I don't like coke. But the state I was in, I didn't care, I would've done anything self-destructive I'd got my hands on.

Hubby knows Otto was the love of my life, and a substitute for hubby since he's always gone. So he was very understanding when I came stumbling in this morning after a wild night out. I'm not even sure which doorman dragged me from the car to upstairs. Hubby was home (for once!) and took me in his arms. He held my hair back when I puked, and ordered in gatorade and advil, since he was too worried to leave me alone.
"I failed you", I wept into his robe. Through my tears I told him I was beyond myself with grief and couldn't resist temptation. I had been offered and accepted coke. Hubby didn't flinch.
"First things first. We'll sue the devil dog's owner", he said but it didn't bring me any comfort. "And we'll have a proper burial under Otto's favorite tree in the Hamptons, ok?"
With those words I could finally fall asleep. Dreaming of Otto.
Today, all I can do is nervously wait for hubby to come home from work to discuss the small matter of the drug abuse...