Cuz You’re My King/And I’m Your/Lionheart/Your Lionheart

I don’t know where to start_{<pick back up>}. If you go back, the beginning’s still here, still as I wrote it when we started all this 15 years ago. When I lost too much weight and I couldn’t sleep and I was always horny and I wasn’t hungry and I finally went and got bloodwork_{<I was hoping hyperthyroidism or something>} and the diagnosis that came back was that I’m a simp. There was nothing wrong with my blood at all; I’m just obsessed with Mister and have been from jump. This fixation has never really waned in the interim. The idea of a single true love or soul mates was silly to me when we met but I have been confronting that reality ever since and it has not lessened at all.

‘Taking
Over this town
They should 
Worry’

When he gets depressed though, he gets mean. The way a wounded animal bites. I’m used to it and it passes in its time without serious harm. I married him knowing how the lows go and I said my vows with clear eyes and no hesitation. But now we have kids and a third adult. So I had to sit him down last month and tell him it’s one thing if he’s shitty to me, but the kids both don’t have the experience to put up with it and should not be treated coldly. I told him if this arrangement isn’t working for him, we’re at a prime time to rearrange our family and set A and the kids free in a few months and it’s time to start that discussion if that’s what needs to be done. He looked scalded. Horrified. He loves the kids. He doesn’t want anyone to leave.

‘But these problems aside
I think I taught you well
That we won’t run
And we won’t run
And we won’t run’

So we spent several days unravelling everything he’s chewing on. His family, his grandfather, his mom, the changes in me over the past two years_{<he very much does not want me to go back to work ever>}, the changes in our life, our sex life_{<or, rather, complete lack thereof>}, aging, how distant we’d grown from each other. He is desperately lonely but also a solitary person. My not pursuing sex for like a year was not the neat fix I thought that just made the whole issue disappear as I hoped, but rather another crevasse between us for him_{<I will never understand quite how demisexual drive works>}. He felt like a ghost in the house; coming and going from work and sleeping on his couch in the evenings. Lonely, haunting the edges.

‘And they won’t wait
And they won’t wait
And they won’t wait
We’re here to say
We’re here to stay
We’re here to stay’

For once, I was able to be the solution partner. I came up with fixes for each complaint. Many of which he did not like, but had refused to offer any thoughts of his own on. I have often not been resolution minded. I have often been the partner mired in pain and bogged down by inaction and hopelessness. Being listened to and offered solutions dampened his ennui. It brought us back eye to eye for the first time in months and he still looks amazing.

‘Howling ghosts
They reappear
In mountains that are stacked with fear
But you’re a king
And I’m 
A lionheart
A lionheart’

I’ve become so much happier and functional and he’s just been trying not to add to my work even when he needs me. Trying not to be a burden when I am a draft horse. I am carrying five people and two dogs on my back for sure, but he is one of those people, and when everyone just lets me work it goes great. But he has to let me and he hates asking for things. He hates needing.

‘We’re still the same
We’re still the same
We’re still the same’

This is still preamble I suppose. I’ll get there eventually. It’s been a long road here; it might as well be a long telling.

‘And in the sea that’s 
Painted black
Creatures lurk
Below the deck
But you’re a king
And I’m a lionheart
And as the world comes to an end
I’ll be here to hold your hand
Cuz you’re my king 
And I’m your
Lionheart
Your lionheart’
– Monsters and Men