The Logistics of A Lover, A Husband With Alzheimer’s and Kids
By: Jennifer Mcdougall
Tags: Relationships, Adultery, Dating, Love, Sexuality

The Logistics of A Lover, A Husband With Alzheimer’s and Kids

My life is too complex to lie about cheating — so I don’t

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“Wow,” I thought to myself as I read Teresa J. Conway’s article, “The COVID Cheater’s Lies That Are Getting Old,” and considered the logistics of lying and the intricate engineering of affairs. It would be extremely draining to constantly construct reasons and then keep those in my head, for later questioning.

My first few weeks of Ashley Madison meet ups — attempting to find just one equally attracted and sexually fired-up person open to long term lover status — was, well, exhausting. It involved enough mental strain that I finally grew tired of the falsification and just, with a dramatic shoulder shrug (at least in my own narrative), said “screw it.”

I quit contriving socially distanced front porch coffee dates with friends (hey, the weather was much warmer then) and I told my kids the truth.

I told my husband nothing.

In one of his fleeting lucid moments I had asked my husband with Early Onset Alzheimer’s, “if I found someone to fulfill the needs you can’t — conversation, sex — in order to take care of you better and be less angry, would you want to know about it or not?” His response, after a few questions and comments, was “I have to accept that you need those things and that I can no longer give them to you. Just don’t tell me. I’ll probably know, though, because you’ll be super happy.”

So I tell him nothing because —

I respect that he doesn’t want to know, and He wouldn’t remember anyways.

To find out more you can read my article —

When I commented on Conway’s article she, in true writer’s fashion, suggested I pen a piece on how I make it work.

I am extremely fortunate that I can just head out for a temporary fill of orgasms and that I don’t have to lie about my affair. I realize that few mature adulterers have this reality. Does this make the logistics easier? Sure.

But more accessible and completely effortless? Nope.

I have certainly learned that being cautious with whom you share information about having a lover is critical. My sister will no longer talk to me: claiming I am an adulteress who should stop complaining about the state of my sexless and difficult marriage, stop cheating, or simply walk away from my ill husband. So while I may generally promote authenticity and honesty I also, with non-safe and erratic individuals, embrace the idea of omission.

At this point my husband is still able to work because he was transferred from sales back into the factory where he worked as a teenager so the repetitive motions are still engrained in his hole-filled brain. Although he doesn’t shower or wash his hands post-pooping without suggestion and I literally looming over him to make sure he does, he is still able to toilet himself.

And our newly teenage children are able to “babysit” him while I escape. Expectations of anything other than toast being eaten while I am away is rarely exceeded and the hurricane-ish state of our home when I return has simply become one of the costs of having my vulva licked with pure adoration.

Small Town Lovers.

My lover lives a little over an hour away. For us small-town-in-the-middle-of-nowhere folks who are used to having to drive to get anywhere the mileage isn’t a shocker but it does add time — visits are never “quick” or “on the way home from work”.

He is separated and the freedom of us nonchalantly hanging out in a space bigger than a van’s backseat means I am more than willing to drive. We can wander naked. He cooks for me. He even purchased a cheesy but special mug for me to hold our between-fucks morning coffee. Often my visits are overnight meaning I get my “morning cuddles” and then morning cuddles before I need to return to the real world.

Geographical distance means neither his neighbours nor mine raise eyebrows or question. It also means my students’ parents’ Facebooks aren’t cluttered with posts about my unprofessional evening or weekend exploits.

I realize that this will get more difficult as my husband’s Alzheimer’s progresses. Spouses on our monthly support meeting for Early Onset Alzheimer’s can barely steal away for that hour.

It’s already threatening change. My husband and daughter are oil and water. Actually: Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy or Sherlock and Moriarty. My son’s hormones have mushed up his lovely brain almost as much as Alzheimer’s has riddled my husband into a state of stupidity, meaning only my daughter remains responsible.

However, her reminders, of “Dad, you need gloves to shovel the driveway,” or “Dad, you’re looking for milk for your cereal so can you grab it and shut the fridge door now?” drive him to huffing and puffing and door slamming. And on one occasion that involved the Children’s Aid Society, of pushing her and throwing his water-filled glass at my head.

During Covid times, with only my parents in our bubble, the struggle will now involve organizing grandparent-sitters for children and/or a spouse who refuse to admit to needing them.

In this situation having your needs met is rarely easy.

Thankfully, texting isn’t problematic. I have always been blessed with a large circle of tech-friendly friends who send regular messages. And the friend whose flair for sending 1/8 of the sentence per bubble bing-bing-bing-bing-bing times 23 once sparked frustration now often proves highly beneficial!

Friends and family residing out west in a two and three hour earlier time zone difference — who always seem to hit send right near my bedtime — gratitude and appreciation air kissed your way…And slowly building a following on Twitter means quick screen switches to read-alouds to pacify hubby’s questions about why I’m typing so much and so quickly.

“What are your Twitter friends chatting about?’ he’ll ask, crawling into bed, and about the only time he actually commences a ‘conversation.’

And, thankfully, multi-tasking and I have always had a fairly non-rowdy relationship. I can assist my son with maths homework while sexting about what a certain hard cock could do with my very pussy…I can hop between scanning the pedicure my daughter is giving me and my phone screen’s silent but violently intriguing reminder of what is going to be done to me in a few days…I am able to listen to my husband’s endless and recycled-every-2.6 minutes tale of kitten videos or upcoming weather while chatting with my lover about his day…

I make it work because I need it to work…just as I make running at 5:00 am before my family arises work because my heart, lungs, muscles, and cerebellum need their workout. I make an affair work because my emotions, physiology, playful parietal lobes, and clitoris need their workout. I need the exhaustingly dopamine-infused rolling-about-any-and-every-surface-possible in order to face my Alzheimer’s-infused reality with even a little patience and the odd smile.

Thankfully making it work for me means rarely having to lie. Though I did admittedly fib about that box in the back of the van with a wrapped Christmas gift in it…

So, hats (and thongs?) off to those of you who are brilliant enough to intricately engineer the falsifications needed to allow for our needs to be met!