We were 4 years into our marriage when this happened.

This marriage wasn’t particularly a marriage filled with love but I wanted to be with him. We constantly juggled between being happy with each other, fighting over issues created by his family, establishing a sex life, trying to have children and much more. In addition to this was my devious mother-in-law and her sidekicks who'd constantly reinstate her position as “Queen BEE”, a daughter and a good-for-nothing son. A daughter who was married and shipped to another household, but her umbilical cord that remained attached.

The good-for-nothing son had an evil wife and two beautiful boys who I miss very dearly. Surrounded by all this was my knight in shining armour — funny good-looking, hardworking and most of it all, a good hearted free from all the darkness that surrounded him.

It was an arranged marriage, it was all planned within a span of four days. I was happy that I was getting married into a comfortable household and assumed that I would be provided for and would be allowed to continue working. The courtship started on a rosy note, going out, meeting each other's friends and family, little did we work on getting to know each other. While the hormones were raging and we made out all the time, we drew a boundary when it came to sex.

The first year was nice as we travelled a lot but it reduced with time, thanks to Queen BEE. Back home I had to play the power game all the time, a cat fight between the two daughters in law, a way to “DIVIDE AND RULE”.

I being so naïve didn’t understand what she was doing to my husband when she kept telling me to be out of all this. And when it dawned upon me I was 10 kgs heavier, depressed and away from my husband emotionally and sexually. While we still struggled to understand each other due to constant emphasis on being the “ideal bahu” to his mother. We drifted apart finally.

One night, somewhere in the tenth month of our marriage while we were trying to establish holy matrimony, his goods wouldn’t function. So with the little knowledge I had of sexual intimacy, I shrugged it off. We tried again in the coming weeks only to hear some excuses. Talking about it clearly didn't help. The only conclusion was that we didn’t understand each other.

We decided to seek help. I can only imagine how difficult it could be for a guy to accept and be ready to see a doctor only to know that his manhood didn't function. I knew I had to be supportive of this and not try and put him down, and suggested going on a holiday.

We went to Honk Kong and Macau for a week, and on the first night itself we were eager to try this version of viagra only to realise it’s a long road to solving his problem. This only made me introspect, did I do this to him? Because we had done it before, though the frequency and quality weren't the best for a newlywed but it was there at least. As I flew out of Hong Kong, acceptance set in but I wanted to have children so we started seeing doctors for alternate methods.

On our third anniversary, I was childless, sexually frustrated and 25 Kgs heavier. But yes, definitely wiser having identified three conniving women in every new Indian bride's life — saasu ma, bhabhi and didi, having battled the list of to-dos to be accepted, which included wearing only kurtis, not drinking, submitting your salary to Queen BEE and so on.

After this I was considering slavery in the times of Daenerys Targaryen. May be she could have rescued me then. By the fourth anniversary I was at the peak of my sexual frustration and my ex from Junior college came along. He liked all my pouting selfies on Facebook and Instagram. We spoke for hours. He complimented me on how I still looked so pretty even after I had put on 30 kgs. He appreciated every inch of my existence.

I got drawn to the attention and much needed appreciation. I knew it was wrong and I do carry the guilt of this even three years later.

I always wondered why this sexual encounter happened. Was it a medical condition or something else? I realised chemistry doesn’t start in the bedroom but outside the bedroom. The understanding did drown in the problems of a household, which makes me wonder if I was wrong or my husband to have put me in that situation. Or was it the Queen BEE and her sidekicks to have created the distance between the man and his wife.

Now 2 years have passed since the storm happened, I am divorced now. With no kids and a lot of guilt. When I had the affair I didn’t know the consequences, I didn’t know it would lead to a divorce. But now that I know the consequences, I would still go ahead and have an affair because at the crux of a marriage I forgot myself. I forgot I have to make myself happy, as a wife I needed my husband’s appreciation.

Today, 35 kgs lighter, I realise that yes, my husband put me there, not because of his medical condition but because of his lack of emotional comfort. The appreciation that for the effort I put in to look nice for him. For him I took all the s*** from his family with a smile. I worked outside for money to only give it away. I worked in the house to keep it clean, to make sure there was good food on the table. I just needed his appreciation, that look in in his eyes, the spark on his face.

The affair I had was only in search for that spark. I was searching for you, “my husband” in the extramarital affair I had.

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