The Fourth Wife

This behavior was a radical impact to our relationship. I told her I was not against her going back to teaching high school but she should have at least talked to me about it prior to making that decision. I asked her where was she applying for a teaching job. She avowed that she had not made that decision yet. There is only one high school in our little community. The next closest is a distant 30 miles.

"Susan," I commented, "if you plan to teach here again, you definitely need to talk to the principal or school board soon. Any position available might otherwise get filled before you even apply."

She said she would do that at the appropriate time but for now she was "too busy. First things first," she said.

"Susan? Are you too busy to make even one phone call or two just to see if a position is available this fall? We have to plan ahead. Do you want me to find out for you?"

She told me in no uncertain terms not to get involved in her affairs. She could handle things by herself without my "interference," as she put it.

"In my own time," she said with finality. Nothing apparently mattered now to her except her thesis completion and degree acquisition.

I felt she was not seeing herself, or me perhaps, as an integral part of each other's lives. This attitude of forcing me out of her decision making concerned me. Did she not realize how integral a part she is of us?" Her decisions would be affecting me and I didn't have a vote.

Time seems to have a way of continuing without asking me. We continued superficial dialogue and a little about her peculiar need and intense desire to rush her degree to early completion.

Her stomach quit bothering her, health improved but our marital relationship continued to deteriorate. We grew increasingly distant.

I had a busy job as a research geologist. My days were filled with meetings, reports and trips to the home office. I had another of country trip for which I needed to plan. Susan wouldn't talk about future dates and plans. We had always coordinated my trips with her. Now I could not make plans with her input. Our life together was coming apart. My life was interesting and happy other than my deteriorating home situation with my wife.

We rocked along rather precariously. I tiptoed around her emotionally and literally. She was absorbed in another world in which I had no place nor was I invited into her new world. In fact, quite the opposite; I was both directly and indirectly excluded. My anxiety thickened. I began to have stomach pains. My doctor prescribed a stomach acid inhibitor but it was only partly successful. My gut was being wrenched apart not by acid but by anxiety.

I need for my life to be organized. I hate surprises. I need for things to be discussed, agreed to and planned carefully. Sure, we need to have contingency plans but these need to be part of the planning. Now, my wife was turning my world into a morass of unknowns. I don't deal well with just going with the flow and letting things happen.

Was my loving wife abandoning me for her precious academic career? All this seemed entirely unnecessary to me. How long could I endure uncertainty? I was fearful I could crash anytime. Neither of us used alcohol or drugs so I retreated into playing and practicing my cello to fill my emptiness, loneliness and rejection. In short, I was miserable. I couldn't even see when all this was going to end.

In the evening supper times, I would frequently ask her about her progress that day and about her daily activities. I made this a point when I had been gone for the day. Our conversations were always superficial and banal.

One evening I decided to again probe into her living conditions while she had been on-site with her research.

"Susan, just what were the details of your living arrangements? Did you have a separate bed room?" I probed.

"Ethan," she only used my formal name when she was irritated. How many times do I have to tell you I'll tell you everything when the burden of this thesis is off my back. Now quit making life harder for me while I have so much to do. Just don't ask me again," Susan practically yelled her answer at me.

"Damn it, Ethan, you're really making me very angry with all these questions when you know I won't answer them until my PhD is assured. I've told you that time and time again but you won't leave it be. Just get off my back about all this. You know I'm stressed out as it is trying to get this thesis completed. Your hassling me just slows me down."

She walked off in an over-exaggerated stilted walk. Looking back over her shoulder, she spit out, "Now you have made me angry and I won't be able to concentrate on my thesis tonight." She disappeared into our (well, hers now) den and locked me out.

She had spoken those exact words a few evenings ago. My patience was wearing very thin very rapidly. My attitude toward her became increasingly belligerent. My anger was not just subtle anymore. Nevertheless, I had to be content with no wife and no information about her life. Time kept moving right on and the days became weeks which merged into months. I just couldn't understand. Creeping suspicions of future marital disaster invaded my mind and scraped open sores on my psyche. Would you have concerns like mine?

Her standard and pat answer was always, "Unexpected changes in my methodology have made me change lots of things."

She did say, "I have obtained some totally new information requiring extensive and necessary changes. Everything seemed to need to be changed and discussed with my thesis committee. The changes have complicated everything for me."

"Susan, can you not tell me at least what this new information was? What exactly were all these unexpected changes that require so much of your attention? You know, the one's that make me excluded from your life? Sweetheart, if I may call you that, how did you go about getting this new and revealing information you speak of? Surely you can tell me, your trusted husband."

Her reply was to the effect that she was worried that I might get all emotional if she were to tell me all the details. I might get mad at the people involved in the family and community. My emotional feedback would have a negative effect on her recording her true and unique feelings and experiences. Understanding any of this escaped me totally. I could give a rat's ass for those people. I already abhorred what I knew about their incestuous and polygamous relationships. How could her telling me more about their family and community life make me anymore disdainful or incite any new anger or more emotional response.

I was already burned out even thinking about their odd lifestyle. I was glad these people were stuck away in a distant corner of nowhere. I wanted nothing to do with them. I think I was beginning to hate them. They had stolen my sensuous wife and turned her into an ogre. My anger and resentment grew for her seemingly unnecessary secrecy. She stuck with her explanations and I stuck with my anxiety.

I wondered out loud to her that I would only get emotional if she had been caught up in their polygamy personally, not just observing it. She would not reply. She said she used her intelligent ingenuity to obtain the information in what might be seen as 'unconventional' methodology. Her explanation raised more questions than it answered and certainly added significantly to my stress level.

I told that her refusal to reveal her activities were more stressful and a source of more anger and frustration to me than if she were to just be totally truthful and tell me everything. Anyway that is how I assessed the situation.

"All will be revealed and discussed in full at the proper time which is soon approaching." We had been loggerheads now about five months.

From the very day I had returned, she refused sex with me. Our sex life had not just deteriorated, it had died. We have not had sex since the day before we both left. It was after that tender and satisfying intercourse that we had lay in each other's arms and again sworn our love and fidelity. We had had great sex three or four times a week before this fiasco. Our sex was always tender and gentle and mutually fulfilling. She made suggestions as to how I might please her more. I always did these. I made requests of her and she always complied.

Neither of us wanted for anything regarding sex within the bonds of marriage. We both enjoyed the teasing and foreplay of the romantic encounters. We had snuggle times after sex. Not infrequently we would go for a second bout before retiring for the night. I miss all of this a lot. I just hated to resort to hand jobs for relief.

I couldn't see how depriving me (her confidential life mate and loving husband) of my rightful access to her body could taint her research. If it could, I began to wonder just what all had her research entailed. If sex with her husband could contaminate her 'research', then it seemed logical that sex had to have been a part of her research. We had agreed and promised at our marriage that monogamy was to be sacred to us. We had agreed several times to be faithful. I was doing my part by refusing the many opportunities I had both here and abroad.

Susan and I had even talked about how these groups practiced multiple wife families before she went on her research trip. We had joked about her becoming a third or fourth wife 'for research purposes.' I had expressed to her how abhorrent that practice is. She knew that I could never live that way. I also remember telling her that to listen to the wives was one thing but to actually experience that role would not be acceptable to me in any fashion whatsoever. She agreed totally before she left. I had trusted her implicitly.

Since I was so sure of her fidelity to me before she went to southern Utah, I had had no reason to have any fear or even suspicions neither of infidelity nor of her research methods. I really felt secure in allowing her a solo visit to the community she had targeted.

But now our sex life had died. Why would she not have sex with me anymore? We did kiss and renew our vows of our everlasting love for each other but she allowed no sexual contact and refused to allay my fears of her infidelity. Other than some less-than-just-polite kisses, her body had been off limits since she came back.

She had moved my books and computer into a corner in the large dining room and had bought several large book cases and file cabinets. These nicely matching book cases were stationed adjacent to my computer desk in the dining room. Effectively she had moved my work into the dining room. I had quite a bit of research findings to compile into reports to my company superiors. She could, and did, lock me out.

After a few more days, I just outright asked her if she had participated in any sexual way that might have a negative on our marriage. Had she kept her promises of sexual fidelity within our marriage? She really got hostile and defensive, and then in an angry outburst said she would not discuss anything about her research until her dissertation was completed and accepted by the university. I was not to ask her again. Now I knew I had a really major marital problem. No denying it now. Would you agree?

I actually expressed anger and outrage (this being quite unusual for me) that she would be gone for two months and not at least reassure me that she had been true to me and our marriage. Her body language and her facial expressions told me that this was a very sensitive and emotional issue with her. Yet she would not relent in her secrecy. I told her I could see that my questions were evoking emotional responses that she averred she wanted to avoid.

Seems her secrecy was provoking more emotional turmoil that just sharing. That is if there was nothing serious to hide. My concerns were now almost out of control. My stomach was growling in constant turmoil. I began to look forward to going to work and regretting to have to come back to my own home. She was 'home' to me but she was not mine it seemed. She belonged to her degree-seeking. How would you feel?

She and I have an otherwise happy marriage, or at least we did have and maybe could in the future. I wondered if other marriages suffered as ours had when one partner was working on a thesis. I hadn't heard of it but then again I did know that her doctoral thesis must be one hell of a project. Her self-imposed time constraints made everything worse.

After one discouraging and anger filled encounter I had had it.

"Susan," I angrily spouted out, "it looks like you have destroyed our sharing, confidentiality and trusting. I think our marriage is very close to past history for us and you are entirely to blame."

I kept berating her about everything she was doing to me. Finally I just stomped out and drove around to nowhere hoping my anger would dissipate in the cool night air.

As I drove around I tried to get my thoughts out in front of my emotions. She has been telling me that she loves me and hopes I will love her also. I kept reassuring her that I do still love her but I hated how she was treating me. Communications is the key to a relationship and she won't talk to me about so many things in her life now. She won't reassure me about her marital fidelity.

Why? Did she have an affair? Did she do more sexual stuff in order to get her research done? All I knew was that this was putting a terrible strain on me and my marriage. Do I have to prepare for single life again? My mind just couldn't emerge from the morass of my anxiety and emotional turmoil. I determined that this turmoil would end sooner than later. If she wouldn't end it, I would. I thought of the pain of moving out and getting on with my life without her. I couldn't yet visualize life without her.

I decided not to ask her anymore but to find out what I could on my own. Perhaps someone at the university could help me: but who?

I began to reflect more and more. Looking back, I began to summarize for myself the changes I had seen and experienced. Her strange dress and lack of makeup were more than just odd. Her not using her favorite perfume was not like the Susan I knew. Her refusal for sex almost five months was most alarming. I hated the radical changes in her behavior. I was even beginning to hate the one I had loved. From then on she expressed further interest in what I did or how I felt.

There was no cuddling, teasing or sex that night or any subsequent nights. Naturally that brought about a lot interest on my part, not even considering the anger for her boorish behavior.

I began a new way of interacting with her. A way that was distasteful, distressing, anxiety producing and increasingly barrier building.

I avoided asking her about anything.

Routinely she locked the door when she was typing. Therefore I had less opportunity to confront her. This was something new. I had never been locked out of anywhere in my house. She had a headset with microphone and earphones.

She explained this was needed to communicate with her major professor at considerably less expense than by phone. Her campus was only a mile or so from my headquarters, closer to the eastern edge of the city.

She also said she used her e-mail a lot to write to her professor. I had to agree that e-mail was cheaper and faster than ground snail mail, even though it was only fifty miles to campus for her.

This all made good sense to me except why I was locked out until she was off the computer. That made me suspicious. I told her that I was really uncomfortable with her locking me out of her life like she did. She would smile and tell me that she just couldn't have any interference when she doing her research. I could understand only some of that. I had lingering doubts. I told her I felt she was not being open to me as we had always promised to be. She dismissed my concerns as trivial and nothing to be concerned about. Her refusal to be open and then to say it was not important was totally discordant, totally new in our marriage. I really took offense and told her that. Susan continued to downplay it even with my vigorous objections.

Another change had occurred. She was now keeping everything on her computer under password protection. I asked her about this and she got angry at me for me poking around on HER computer.

"You have your own computer so you don't need to be messing around on mine," was her standard answer. She really got touchy about that. I guess the academic types are paranoid about their research identities. I could see nothing to get excited about if she had nothing to hide. I told her that and she really lit into me about distrusting her. She said I might mess up her research by accidentally deleting something. I asked her if she didn't back up her files at least every few hours in case the computer crashed. Susan had no answer but just turned away, indicating that the conversation was over.

Why was her 'research' so confidential? I wasn't going to tell anyone and let someone else know of her findings, that is, steal her research. She just wouldn't budge on the secrecy thing. In fact my concerns were adding up to a major problem for me. She wouldn't acknowledge any marital problem, or any problem for that matter. She was just closed to me.

Too many things had changed. We just weren't communicating like we used to do. That was my biggest concern; everything else paled when compared to the lack of sharing. There was an intangible barrier of distrust developing on my part. I told her so and she dismissed it as nothing. But it was everything to me. I tried to tell her that but it seemed like it didn't sink in. Something about her had changed radically. I could sense it and see it. It was painfully evident to me.

"Susan," I told her," you have changed so much since going out on your research project." I was being emphatic. Her replies were all the same standard nonsense. She would just say that now she had to get her research completed. She had worked hard and long and now her degree was only a few months away. She reassured me that everything would be okay "real soon."

"Susan," I responded, "I need to be your husband now. I need you as my wife now, not at some future unknown time. When is this 'future time'? When will we be a couple again? Tell me, Susan!"

"Honey, just hold on." She avowed how her dissertation was most difficult. She told me that the research had taken an unexpected "twist" (whatever that meant). This change had complicated her research which meant the extra month and the extra time on the computer to reorganize her thesis and its defense. She would not give me an actual time frame for when this strange behavior would return to normal. She would reassure me her thesis was almost completed. Then she would disappear back into her locked room. Real reassurance that satisfied me just wasn't forthcoming. I had never distrusted her before, but I never had cause either. My concerns deepened about what had happened. I was becoming increasingly suspicious and paranoid.

All during this time, I was commuting back and forth to the main office in the big city. It was a pleasant drive there and back. The roads were in top shape and, in the city; streets were so wide that traffic was never a problem. When not commuting, I was reviewing the reams of data or on my computer completing the entry of our research findings. Making reports seemed endless. Sometimes I just surfed or got my cello out to play.

On one of my numerous 50 mile trips to my main office, I suggested to my boss that we set up computer-to-computer voice communications between the home office and the various field units to include those of us who were commuting to work. This suggestion was met with approval and I was provided with the passwords. After installation this cut down the need for the less important but time consuming trips. As a result I had more home time. It was time to exercise and practice the cello.