Several years ago, a seemingly insignificant incident happened in my life that started a thought process that weighs on my heart to this day.  After reading a Facebook post this week, I feel the need to try to articulate this to anyone in the fetish world who is willing to listen.  I am trying hard to not sound accusatory or judgmental (as I feel these are two huge downfalls in the gay community), but rather I am trying to share my passion.

About 6 years ago, I had gone out for the evening to a leather bar.  I was wearing a pair of chaps, a jock, and a black novelty t-shirt that said “Good boys need spanking too.”  Since I typically carried a paddle or a flogger, I thought the shirt was appropriate.  That night, however, I did not have any gear with me, nor was I flagging anything.  While there, a man came up from behind me and smacked me in the ass.  He smacked me hard, and it was a complete surprise.  It actually left a bruise.  I’ll be honest, my initial instinct was to turn around and beat the hell out of him.  However, I collected myself, put myself back into my surroundings and addressed him.  The conversation went something like this:
Me, “Why did you just hit me?”
Him, “Your shirt says you want it.”

Me, “My shirt has a phrase on it.  How does that mean that I want YOU to do anything?”
Him, “You have a bare ass.  If you don’t want it smacked, you shouldn’t be showing it.”
Me, “You have a bare face, so does that mean that you want me to slug you?”

Him, “If you do, I will knock you out.”
Me, “Well, if fair is fair, bend over…because I’m gonna give you the paddling of a lifetime.”

Him, “I’m a Domme, I don’t do that.”
Me, “In order to be a Domme, you have to have permission to put someone into submission.”
Him, “I don’t need permission from anyone.”

Me, “Then you don’t know what it means to be a Leatherman, OR a Domme.”

At this point, it got very ugly.  We argued about permission, respect, and submission.  After a very heated discussion, an astute bartender separated us….

I went home very angry.  I wasn’t angry because he had hit me.  I was angry because he truly felt that he had the right to do so, just because he had proclaimed himself as dominant.

The things that originally drew me to the leather community had nothing to do with attire; they had to do with respect.  As foreign as the concepts of BDSM were to me, I was drawn by the level of trust and respect that I saw.  The leather was just a bonus.  I was drawn by the concept that someone could have such deep appreciation for someone that they would be willing to put themselves under submission of the other person.  Although I have always had a bit of a dominant streak in me, I had never seen it displayed the way that it is displayed in the leather community.  It was a depth of relationship that I had never seen before.  It’s a beautifully symbiotic relationship…most of the time.

Since then, I have moved on into different levels of the leather community.  I learned from a very gentle, patient man.  He recognized that I was not built to be a “forever” boy.  Rather, he groomed me to draw from within myself the kind of Sir that I would be.  Several hit-and-miss relationships later, I found myself with a leather pup.  It was the niche that I had been missing.  Playful boys and/or pups were unquestionably what I had been looking for.  Although I am in the dominant role, I find that I am probably more passive about my requirements, rather than demanding.  To my mind, a different style with the same results.  Perhaps ONLY to my mind…. 

About two years ago, I was out with my pup at a leather bar that was having a bondage night.  It was a typical leather bar night, but amped-up a bit.  The pup and I were having a good time.  We had warmed up and were moving progressively higher…with a long way to go.  Out of the blue, something unexpected happened.  I suspect that this has happened to many leathermen in play sessions.  My hand was not as steady as I expected…he moved in a direction that I didn’t anticipate…I’m not exactly sure how it happened…but I hurt him.  I knew INSTANTLY.  It was not a question of him having to yelp, or whimper, or use our safe word.  I could tell by the look in his eye that I had hurt him.  I stopped immediately, grabbed him around the neck and pulled him close to me.  I asked if he was ok.  I apologized.  …and my eyes welled up with tears. 

Later, I was chastised by a few of the local leathermen for this.  I was ridiculed, publically, for not being a very manly “Sir.”  Truthfully, I distanced myself from the local leather community for a couple of years because it.

You see, my concept of dominant and submissive is very different.  I’m not in a dominant role because it makes me manly, or because I’m a top, or because I have a narcissistic need to be in control.  I’m in a dominant role because that is how my love expresses itself.  When someone submits to me, it doesn’t make me want to lord my dominance over them.  Rather, it is a new responsibility to me; A responsibility that was freely given to me.  This person is now completely trusting me to treat them right.  This person is now depending on me to take control, but continue to keep their safety and best interests ahead of my own.  This person has trusted me to protect them and care for them.  They have trusted me in a way that I struggle to trust others.  I take that as a promise…a commitment…and I take it seriously.  I take it far too seriously to make it all about ‘me.’

Granted, each relationship that we enter is different, and every person that we play with has different thresholds of physical pain and/or emotional humiliation.  So, I am in no way trying to judge any one person or any one relationship, because I have no way to externally know what their relationship is about.  I’m just asking us all to look closely at those who submit to us to make sure that we, first and foremost, have their best interests at heart.  Without it, I personally think that we have lost the most important part of the relationship:  respect.  And, unlike submission, respect can never be forced, it can only be given.

Life is in somewhat of a funk for me.  I feel like I’m lost in the woods.  There are still a lot of nice things to see, but ultimately, I have this sinking fear that I’m not going to find my way out.

I was talking to a friend of mine the other day and he made a statement about simplifying his life.  He did exactly what I plan to do:  get out of the rat-race.  Downsize the house, downsize the “stuff,” move to a more laid-back area and stop being consumed by the city and all of its insanity.

I think part of my feelings of angst have to do with the fact that I am very ready to make this kind of move…but nothing is happening regarding the sale of the house or the job market.  And still, there is a part of me that questions my sanity for even THINKING about making a life-change like this.  Sure, I love the country…but where do I really want to be in my life 5 years from now?  My last 5-year plan didn’t work out so well.  I had decided to invest my time, energy, and money into a house instead of into all the things the city has to offer….  I had decided that I wasn’t finding what I was looking for in all of the socialization.  All I was really getting was broker, with nothing to show for it.  So, I took my “going out” money and invested it into my project house.  4 years later, and a crappy turn of the economy has me broke and house-poor.  Not exactly where I planned to be.  As it turns out, I could have continued in a futile search for socialization and be no worse off than I am now…maybe even better.

So now, I want to make a decision for similar motives.  But moving back to a small town will inevitably push me partially back into a closeted world.  I will have to be a lot more careful there…and let’s face it, the prospect of finding a partner is pretty limited.  Every ounce of logic that I possess tells me that this is a bad choice…but my heart continues to lead me out into the forest….

I had an amazing weekend with the “Cupcake Camping Crew.”  We went back to the Whiterock Conservancy in Iowa again.  There were about 12 of us this time, and it was a lot of laid-back fun.  Some canoed, some fished, some hiked, and ALL of us sat around the campfire laughing and sharing.  I love this group of guys, and I cherish the time that we spend together.

In honesty, I had my reservations about going.  Financially, it was not a good time for me.  My finances are imploding around me.  Camping in tents instead of renting the cabin was cheaper, but the gas to and from was really more than I should be doing.  I also have a bit of ill-will toward one of the campers.  He has shown himself to be somewhat manipulative a couple of times, at really bad times.  Then there are two sets of “exes” there this trip.  I had fears that there could be some drama that I wanted to have no part of.  And then, of course, there’s MrMan.  Our friendship has still not been fully tested since our fling…and my new-found state of “single-ness.”  Pleasantly, my fears were for naught.  It was a peaceful weekend.  Saturday night, I laid out on the grass and just stared up at the sky.  One of the other campers (a newbie at this trip) came out and joined me.  We just talked, lay around, and enjoyed the cool evening, basking in the splendor of the vastness of space.  It was very calming and very refreshing.  A new friendship sparked, I’m sure.  yes, that’s code for, ‘I slept with him.’

I headed home Sunday afternoon and found myself very melancholy.  A part of me didn’t want the weekend to end.  A part of me could feel the pressures of reality starting to creep back in.  I still find myself slightly out-of-ease about where I am in life.  My job is getting worse and worse as does my paycheck.  If there is one thing that the camping trips do for me, it is to remind me how much I am “over” the city life.  But my lifestyle comes with a lot of baggage and a lot of cost.  To move away from the city would mean moving away from access to other guys like me…and moving away from at least minimal acceptance.  Moving away from a city ultimately means making a decision to be ok with being alone.  I struggle with this idea, and yet I am so ill-at-ease in the city life.  I am a country boy at heart.  Even in the gay culture, I don’t understand “city gays.”  There is a different attitude and lifestyle that I just can’t relate to.  Perhaps that’s why I have a lot of first dates, but very few second dates.  When I do, they are most often with transplanted small-town boys…like me.  So is moving out of the city such a bad thing?  It ends up limiting access to something that I don’t really like anyway…LOL.

I know that a move is in my near future.  I am unhappy and bored with myself right now.  It’s time for me to move on and close this chapter of my life.  Unfortunately, I just don’t know how or where.  I need the house to sell.  Once that happens, I may just pick a spot on the map and start applying for jobs in the area.  A small town within an hour or so of a decent-sized city would be fine.  In fact, the area that we camp in would be fine.  Although, I may elect for a warmer climate…LOL.  I’m thinking that I pick up a house at auction (or a repo from a bank) and fix it up.  Hopefully I can find a job with benefits in the area.  That buys me a year or so to decide if that’s where I want to lay down new roots.  If so, great.  If not, I move on down the road.  Scary.  But no scarier than drowning in the life that is around me right now….

After a long holiday weekend that kept me too busy to know if I was coming or going, my mind finally settled down last night.

I’m an analyzer.  It’s just what I do.  At times my analytical ability is my best friend…at other times, it’s my worst enemy.  I woke up this morning angry.  very angry.  angry at me; angry at hotboy…mostly angry at me.  I have a tendency to be pretty confident…but behind that confidence is always a shadow of doubt.  Very few instances in life can bring that shadow of doubt, that in-borne insecurity out of me.  Hotboy managed to do that.  As the emails, etc, continued, and got more angry, bitter, and accusatory…I started to doubt myself.  When the initial incident happened, I was angry.  But as he insisted that I was over-reacting, I started to doubt myself.  A small part of me was starting to look around and wondering if I should just accept the crap.  Do I really deserve better?  Am I truly capable of doing better?  Maybe this is the best that I can ever have.  I struggled with this insecurity for days.  When I made the decision to try to forgive him and move in, it had nothing to do with forgiveness…I had given up.  I had decided that I am damaged goods, and maybe I just don’t deserve any better.  A couple of days later, crap hit the fan…not just because of the circumstances, but because I was angry.  I was angry that I would ‘settle’ for someone who would steal from me, cheat on me, and lie to me…many, many times.

So, out he went.  And then the desperate attempts to fix this started.  Again, I started to doubt myself.  I’m not perfect, do I have the right to demand perfection?  I don’t think I do, but I was certainly accused of that.  Now I’m confused again.  Each night that I lay in my bed alone, I realize how much I didn’t really want him gone.  I know that I’ll get over it…and I know that I need to…but it still a struggle in my little mind.

I’m better off…I know that.  He’s better off too.  And normally, I like being alone…but this isn’t normal….

I think I might be broken….

After a long horrible day of ugly conversation, angry accusation, and polarized emotion, Hotboy-X finally pushed me over the edge.  It wasn’t until I went back and re-read days of conversation that I really realized how unstable he was.  I guess it’s easy to blind ourselves from things that we don’t want to see.  I allowed myself to be blind to the fact that he was never going to get a job because he doesn’t want to work.  A good friend of mine, this morning, made a comment that hit the nail on head.  Expounded, he said that Hotboy-X is just a child looking for a daddy to take care of him.  He’s right.  Hotboy-X is incapable of taking care of himself.  He has to have someone there to lead him in the way that he needs to go.  there is a shallowly charming naivity in that…until you realize the depth of the dependency.  I don’t want to have to take care of someone.  (and I don’t mean in times of need)  I don’t want to feel like a parent disciplining a naughty child.  I want a partner; someone to share things with.  And, quite frankly, if that is too much to ask then I’d rather spend the rest of my life with a group of good friends….

ahhhh.  the peace.  I had been feeling like I needed to try to fix this…like I needed to make this relationship work.  Now I realize that I’m ok.  I can’t change anyone…and I can’t help anyone to change who doesn’t WANT to change.  All the talk about change was only for my benefit anyway.  And that’s ok.  It taught me a valuable lesson about myself…I need to get over my obsession with fixing things that are broken.  Not everything can be fixed.

I find myself being very quiet this week.  I have a brooding question in the back of my mind that is hard to express.  I keep wondering about the term ‘unhappy.’  Is unhappiness the presence of something that makes you unhappy…or is unhappiness simply the absence of happiness.  I think that there’s a difference. 

I can’t say that I’m unhappy in life right now, i.e., I don’t have something that is making me unhappy just by its presence.  Still, I am definitely NOT happy.  My whole life has kind of hit a flatline of emotion.  I suppose that it’s a form of depression, perhaps.  I just find myself having to fake my emotions.  I simply don’t care about anything right now.  I don’t care about my job, my friends, my house…nothing.  I don’t want to go do anything, but I don’t want to stay at home either.  I am restless and bored with myself.  I know that a lot of it has to do with Hotboy.  His presence in my life always made me feel good…until it made me feel very bad, of course.  I guess that I don’t want it to be over, but I know that I wouldn’t survive the emotional crapstorm of mistrust and insecurity that had become the defining point of our relationship.  We’ve emailed back ond forth a couple of times this week.  Mostly emotional purging on his part.  He’s hurt…and he’s completely incapable of understanding my point-of-view.  No matter how hard I’ve tried, he just doesn’t see the gravity that I feel.  And I don’t think the communication is particularly helpful to either one of us…at least not at this point in time.  Emotion overpowers everything in situations like this…and my emotions have been turned off like a light-switch.  I can’t be sad any more.  I can’t hurt anymore.  I can’t sympathize anymore.  I’ve turned into an emotional rock.  That doesn’t make the conversation flow….

SO now I sit…empty.  quiet.  lonely.  but am I *really* unhappy?  I don’t know.

After the work week from hell, and the emotional week from hell, I had come to peace with things regarding Hotboy.  Ultimately, I had hoped that he realized how seriously I had taken things and had decided to try to move on.  To be honest, I wasn’t sure how to.  Yes, I wanted to love him and get over it, but I knew that it’s never as easy as just pretending things are suddenly ok.  I told him that I wasn’t sure how to fix things.  He told me that he’d do anything to fix it.  I had hoped that we had at least reached a common goal, if not common ground.

Friday night, he wanted to go out.  I had no desire to, but I figured that we needed a little decompression time.  This morning, we headed out to the house.  We got a few things done and then headed back to the city for the evening.  There was really no point in staying, and not much to do, so we headed back.  My roomie was having a few friends over, so it was an uncommon evening around the place.  We watched Dr Who, and then he suggested that we go out.  I was immediately on edge.  Money is tighter than tight for me.  The only money that he has coming in at the exact moment is money from his family…his Mom had given him some money this morning.  As is typical, as soon as he has money in his pocket he needs to spend it.  he started bugging me about going out, and I was getting more and more obstinate about it.  We CAN’T afford it.  *we* can’t….but apparently *he* can.  not a penny to help with rent, not a penny to help with utilities, and definitely not carrying his own on groceries, but as SOON as he has money in his pocket, he wants to go out drinking.  There was booze at the house that he had already been drinking.  There were people at the house to socialize with.  i simply failed to understand why he needed to go out and spend money.  Ultimately, because everything that was mine is now *ours* but everything that is his is still *his.*  And the bad part is that I simply can’t make him understand that if he spends all of his money if affects BOTH of us.  Again, a recurring theme of him doing what makes HIM happy with no thought about me, my feelings, or what *I* might want.  It started a heated discussion before he left, because to him, I’m denying him the right to go out and see his friends.  I just don’t see any advantage in it.  There is nothing going on at a bar that is going to strengthen our relationship…ever.  So, he went.  When he came back he came straight to my face and started patronizing me about all of my *bar concerns.*  he starts with this patronizing, condescending little tone and mocks me, saying things like, “look…I went to the bar and didn’t do drugs!  Look, I went to a bar and didn’t cheat on you….”  I was immediately furious.  He just completely lacks the maturity to understand what a partnership is.  A huge fight ensued…in which he had the audacity to say that he didn’t trust ME.  Then he dropped a bomb that, as I suspected, he STILL hadn’t told me the truth about last weekend.  He was smiling and revelling in the fact that he had still been lying to me.  At that moment it was over.  I was done.  I wasn’t mad anymore, I wasn’t fighting anymore.  i told him that we would go to the house to get anything that he had there, because this whole thing was over.  He gloated saying that he had been trying to break up with me all week.  not true, as usual….  His justifications and insanity just went out of control…but I just couldn’t feel bad for him.  He can’t get his shit together because he has absolutely ZERO self-control.  I can’t allow his destructive behaviours to drag me down.  Life is screwed up enough without inviting anyone else’s crap in to it.  My emotions flipped off like a light switch and I told him to leave.  He continued to hurl insults and accusations.  Occasionally, I would get angry and defend myself or hurl statements back.  Finally, I had enough.  This would not benefit anything.  It was time for him to leave.  Done.  Over.  Crying.

After working two 15-ish hour days in a row (with only 6 hours between the two), I was NOT in the mood to do anything but go to bed when I got home last night.  I’m not one to shy away from my feelings or a confrontation, but I don’t like to deal with them when I’m in the wrong state of mind.  Despite, this Hotboy wanted to talk last night.  I can’t say that I blame him…he’s in a complete state of upheaval…but I could barely function, must less really be on top of my thoughts.  The conversation went about as expected.  I know that he wants me to be able to tell him that I forgive him and that everything will be ok.  But the truth is that I can’t tell him either one.  I’m still madder than hell…and madder that he lied about it than anything else.  Will I get over it, yes…but I can’t promise that it hasn’t doen irrepairable damage to the relationship.  The trust is broken.  And so is my confidence in the relationship.  do I WANT it to end, no…but I also don’t know how to make to move forward.  If I can’t rely on a partner to be honest with me…well…what kind of partnership is that? 

He said a couple of things that were probably mis-placed…or just not the right time, given my exhaustion.  He said that he couldn’t believe that this could end over something so “small.”  That bothers me as much as anything else.  A breach of this level is far from small…and the fact that he doesn’t see it as a big thing speaks volumes about the chances of this happening again.  He ‘promises’ that it won’t.  The problem is that I don’t trust that…the trust has been destroyed by multiple lies.  I can’t move forward with any confidence…and questioning everything he says or does is not only exhausting, but it’s not healthy for either one of us.

He asked if I wanted to break up…that it seems like the decision is made.  I can’t even give a clear answer to that.  The answer changes every 5-10 seconds.  Things can’t go on the way they are…things can’t go back to the way they were.  So what’s the next option?  Is there one?

This morning, as I left the apt, hotboy reaches from the bad and grabs my leg.  It was an uncomfortable moment.  He looked up at me and said, “I love you.”  I said, “I love you too” and he looked perplexed.  I didn’t have time to get into it again, but it occurred to me that he truly doesn’t understand that love is not enough to make a relationship work.

Yesterday, I got up and made the decision to go to work.  Honestly, I just didn’t want to see him.  I was still angry and still trying to get my head around the whole situation.  When I got home, he was napping.  I sat around for a while, stalked FB, watched some TV, talked to the roomie.  He got up about the time that the roomie headed out to the store.  He wanted to talk, despite the fact that I told him that I wasn’t ready yet.  So, we talked.  And he got the “raw” emotion rather than the purified, oragnized talk that we would have had later on.  As soon as he started to talk, I stopped him and told him that I didn’t believe a word that he had said.  At that point, his story changed…naturally.  He told me that he had taken them and sold them (to some of his old, unsavory friends).  Then, when we went out to see his Mom on Wednesday, he had come out with some money and said that it was from his Mom…who had “actually” given him nothing.  I watched his face, listened to his inflection, and observed his mannerisms.  About halfway through the new, elaborate story, I stopped him and called “bullshit” on it.  I told him that I believed him to be lying.  At first he tried to pull the “hurt look” on me, but it only fueled my fire.  Seriously…don’t lie to someone and then try to get indignate if they don’t believe the re-telling of the story.  He stole 2 pills…perhaps 3.  He came out with $120 and said it was from his mom.  Quite frankly, I’ve had people offer them to me for 10 or 15 bucks at a bar.  As soon as I told him that, his story changed again.  THIS time, his Mom gave him SOME of the money.  And I cornered him on that.  I told him that there was NO reason that we drove 2 hours round trip for him to see his Mom for LITERALLY 2 minutes, if it wasn’t for money.  I know him too well.  No matter how hard I pushed, he is determined that this third story is the accurate one…despite the fact that it makes no logical sense at all…and he prides himself on his logical abilities.

So…what *do* I think happened?  I don’t know.  Because of his past actions, I automatically jump to thoughts of cheating.  It would make sense to cover that up at all costs because he knows that there would be no further discussions…relationship over.  But there is yet another possibility.  That he DID sell them…or more to the point, traded them for drugs.

Whatever really happened, I suppose that I’ll never know because he is so deep into the lies that I don’t know that I’ve lost the ability to believe anything that he says.  I told him that I didn’t want to live my life as the grown-up, having to spend my time cleanign up the messes from the juvenile delinquent teen.  He looked offended, but let it slide.  I was pissed and he KNEW it.  I asked him if he REALLY thought that I wouldn’t notice, and how he EXPECTED me to react when I found out.  He said that he makes bad decisions in life.  Yeah, no shit.  I understand that he has made bad decisions…but at some point, don’t you start to learn that actions have consequences.  I sit here, willing to love him for who he is…crappy past and all…but rather than trying to be a better person, it seems to just make him think that it gives him license to do whatever he wants to.

I’m tired of being the only one that contributes to the relationship…unless his story is true…in which case he stole from me, sold my property, used half the money to fill up my gas tank and feed me, and then expected me to be thankful for him buying me dinner.  Is that contributing?  I think not.  So, I moved in for the kill:  Here’s what I think.  I think that there is a deep, deep issue within him that I willingly blind myself to.  I think that he is an absolute sociopath, devoid of all feeling unless it is giving him what he wants.  I think that his step-dad has finally put his foot down and told him that he wasn’t welcome there until he gets his shit together.  and so, he has latched back on to me because he has nowhere else to go.  He’s telling me everything that he thinks I want to hear in an effort to get another 6 months of life out of me.  But, I caught him in some deep shit.  Now, he is crying and carrying on, not because he loves me…but because he has no where else to go.  The options are to fix it with me or risk being on the street.  Yes, that is horribly mean…but it also explains a couple of other inconsistencies.  Why his mom turned off her debit card on him…why his things were all in garbage bags at the house….

He asked if that was really the way I felt…I told him ‘yes, sometimes.’

I truly do love him.  and I truly do hope that I am wrong.  The only thing that I know for sure is that he has to level with me and tell me the truth…and it has to be RIGHT NOW.

As always, at times of confusion, I turn to my blog.

I often wonder what it is that makes relationships/friendships strong…what makes them last…and what makes one able to look past some issues but not others.

Hotboy is far from transparent.  This is not a surprise to me…or anyone he really knows, I would assume.  And while I don’t believe that embellishing a story is the same thing as telling a bold faced lie, it is concerning to me.  Sure, I think we all suffer from the “the older I get the better I was” syndrome.  And I also think that, when were are in “group story telling” mode, we can present the story in a certain light to make it more fun.  I’m not sure that it’s lying, even though it’s not completely the truth.

Hotboy, on the other hand, has flat-out lied to me on many occasions.  I suspect that he thinks he’s good at it, but he’s not.  There are just a lot of times that he says things, and I can just tell that he’s not being honest about something….sometimes it’s just a small piece of it, sometimes I think it’s all BS…no matter, I can tell that something isn’t on the up-and-up.  Often, he will later tell me the story again, and eventually the truth comes out.  I just don’t understand why he feels the need to lie to me about it in the first place.  All it does is make me study every single thing he says.  and then, once my BS alarm starts ringing, I start having to analyze every single word that comes out of his mouth so that I can figure out what’s going on.

Last night an incident happened that has me on edge….completely on edge.  When we broke up last year, we did it because he cheated on me.  Game over when that happens.  We broke up for almost a year.  When we ran into each other again, I had no doubt that the past year had impacted and changed him in a lot of ways.  Uncharacteristically, I gave him a second chance.  I say that because I generally believe that “once a cheater, always a cheater.”  I’ve backed down from that a bit, though I have a tendency to believe that it is still true within the same relationship.  Whatever the reason, after spending a couple of days talking and getting to know each other again, I made the conscious decision to move on.  But is forgiving the same thing as forgetting?  I get really confused on that point.  I don’t hold it against him, but there is definitely a lack of trust that has resulted from it.

So, case in point.

A couple of years ago, my doctor put me on a medication for night terrors.  The side-effect is an occasional lack of libido.  So, she also prescribed me viagra.  Honestly, I’ve never really needed it, but once a year or so I would fill it, and if I felt a lack of interest I would take it…and honestly, it was kind of fun.  I don’t think that I abused it per se…but I’m not really sure that I needed it either.

The point is that I reached into my bag last night and noticed that there were several missing.  I confronted him on it and he admitted to taking them…but his eyes and demeanor told me that there was more to this.  So, I asked him, ‘why?’ He came up with a lame-ass excuse about using them to jerk off because his meds affect his ability to get hard.  While this *may* be true….I’ve certainly not noticed him having any problems with it.  His night meds do the opposite.  and if his morning meds caused this problem, one would think that I would have noticed it by now….since we have a tendency to have sex several times a day on weekends.

So, the nagging questions are:  why did he steal them, when he doesn’t need them (and I didn’t notice he was on them).  and why was his answer to me less than honest?  He swears that he used them ‘just for himself.’  but my BS-o-meter is still fluctuating.  I’m not sure that I believe him.  maybe it’s simply paranoia, because he’s cheated on me before…and if it is, quite frankly, that’s of his own doing.  But that still leaves the nagging question of how I deal with it….

Trust is important.  Even if he didn’t cheat again, if I can’t trust him, what’s the point?