05/05/2025
My husband is selfish, I complained of having a headache and all he could think is s*x.
The day had taken more from me than I had to give.
From the moment my feet hit the ground, it was nonstop. Our children needing two different kinds of attention. Dishes piling up. Laundry undone. Crumbs reappearing in places I’d just cleaned. My mind was foggy from hunger I didn’t even notice until the ache set in. My body was begging me to stop, but there was no room for rest.
By the time evening came, I was done. Not the kind of “done” that a nap or a meal could fix but the kind that sits in your bones and makes your whole being feel heavy. I skipped dinner. Didn’t bother with the shower. I went straight to bed and curled up, hoping sleep would silence the pounding in my head.
Then the door opened.
My husband walked in clean, relaxed, humming something under his breath. He smelled good like aftershave and eucalyptus and he came over, leaning in with a familiar hand on my hip.
“Babe… I’ve missed you.”
I didn’t move. “I have a headache,” I said quietly, not out of annoyance, but from pure depletion.
There was a pause.
Then came the sigh. The disappointed kind. “So, you’re saying no?”
And in that moment, something in me went quiet. Not out of anger. But out of realization.
I had hoped foolishly that he’d pause. Ask how I was feeling. Offer a glass of water. Sit beside me. Show concern. But instead, the moment I set a boundary, it became about what he wasn’t getting.
“You always have a reason,” he added, as if my exhaustion was a personal offense.
He walked away, picked up his phone and earbuds, and that was it. No apology. No follow-up. No conversation.
I lay there in the dark, the ache in my head now competing with something deeper - a quiet grief.
I wasn’t angry because he wanted me. I was heartbroken because he didn’t see me. Not in that moment. Not in my pain. Not as his partner, but as a person.
I remembered how, once upon a time, he would call me just to hear my voice. How he would bring soup when I had a cold. How he used to care before he expected.
And I realized… I wasn’t asking for anything grand. I just wanted to matter.
The next morning, he left for work with little more than a grunt. I stood in the kitchen staring at nothing, holding back tears, and messaged a friend - an older woman who’d walked longer roads in marriage.
“Can I come over?”
She said yes without asking why.
Later, in her calm, lived-in home, I poured it all out. She truly listened. And when I finished, she said something I’ll never forget:
“Sweetheart, a good partner doesn’t take ‘no’ as rejection. He takes it as a signal to lean in with care.”
She wasn’t trying to turn me against him. She was simply naming what I couldn’t.
“He’s not a bad man,” she added. “But he’s grown comfortable. And comfort without awareness breeds neglect.”
That night, I sat beside him and spoke not from bitterness, but from clarity.
“When I told you I had a headache, I wasn’t trying to avoid you. I was hoping you’d care enough to notice I wasn’t okay.”
He looked up, surprised. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”
“I know,” I said. “But intention doesn’t erase impact. Marriage can’t survive if I have to choose between honesty and being punished with silence.”
He didn’t defend himself that night. And for once, I didn’t need him to. I needed him to understand.
And slowly over the following days, I saw something change.
He started checking in more.
He started responding with presence, not pressure.
And I started letting my guard down.
One evening, I came home drained again. My back ached. My shoulders were tight. I sat down, and before I could speak, he brought me a cup of tea and said, “You’ve done enough today. Just rest.”
It wasn’t flowers. It wasn’t poetry. But it was exactly what I needed: awareness.
That night, I reached for him. Not out of obligation. But out of peace.
Because when a woman feels seen, loved without performance… she doesn’t shut down - she blooms.
No, everything didn’t magically fix itself. But something vital returned: mutuality.
He didn’t become perfect. He became present.
And in a world where women carry so much, that shift is sacred.
Now, when I say I’m tired, he doesn’t make it about him.
When I say no, he doesn’t leave the room; he leans into the relationship.
When I speak, he listens.
Not because I demanded it. But because I finally named what I needed and he chose to grow.
Because real love doesn’t always arrive with romance.
Sometimes, it shows up quietly… in listening, in patience, in tea offered without expectation.
And that is where we found our way back to each other.
©️Thanks for reading “ Familiar Strain” by Joy Chinonyerem
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