Dear Mrs. Bluth,
I have been agonizing about this problem for several weeks now, almost since I came up to the country with my three little kids. It’s my first time in a bungalow colony so this was a little bit of trauma for me in and of itself. The one good thing is that I am here with three other friends who have gone here for the last few years, so I don’t feel so alone. But it’s not me that’s the problem, it’s my husband.
My husband has been pressing me to go away for the summer for the last four years but I am not a country person as I have never experienced it. I did quite well staying home from when my kids were infants and just enjoying the tranquility of my neighborhood in the summer as it emptied out with the migration of all the country-goers. My husband, on the other hand, missed his shul buddies when they all made ‘aliyah’ to the Catskills for Shabbosim. So, this year, because my oldest child was turning seven and would miss his friends, I grudgingly agreed to go upstate. And that’s when the problems started.
I heard stories about certain people, some of whom I knew and others I didn’t, while sitting on the lawn with the other women. Stories about husbands cheating on their wives while they were summer ‘bachelors’, stories about women finding out and then asking for a divorce… so many stories, that I started thinking weird thoughts.
Suddenly, I thought I noticed that my husband had become less interested in intimacy, or that it just wasn’t the same as before. That he tended to glance at some of the women who were younger and prettier at the communal kiddush after shul on Shabbos. That he rarely paid too much attention to me on the weekend but chose to mingle with his friends, going fishing or simply shmoozing for hours on end with others. And before you know it, on most Sunday mornings right after hashkoma minyan, he was on his way back to the city, to beat the traffic.
We have been married for almost ten years, could it be that he no longer loves me and devalues our marriage, that he is possibly seeing other women, as he is very good looking and fun to be around?
I can’t stop thinking about this and it’s disturbing my well-being. Do I really have a reason to worry that my husband is cheating on me? Please give me some idea of how to handle this situation before it gets even worse, if that’s at all possible. I am ready to pack my kids up and go home.
Dear Friend,
Hold your horses. You’re jumping to every kind of conclusion that may not be the right one! Bungalow life is where everyone becomes part of a summer family, much like the different beans that go into a chulent. But sadly, there’s also the spices that make conversation on the lawn so enticing. When we have that much time on our hands, idle gossip turns into the forbidden lashon hara meal storm, where everyone knows something juicy and clandestine about someone else and their problems. You say you’ve become aware that your husband may be one of ‘those husbands who cheat’ because there may be a lull in your marriage from listening to all the ‘lawn trash talk’, when there could be a very simple and benign reason for your worries.
My suggestion to is what you, yourself, offered up at the beginning of your complaint, Perhaps your husband does really miss his shul buddies and gets to hang out with them when he comes up for Shabbos. As for sliding a look at the younger, prettier and probably not modestly dressed ladies, unless a man is dead, that will always be a possibility, although it s not appropriate. About the fear that he is losing interest in you and you really don’t have anything concrete to base it on other than a feeling, I strongly suggest that the next Thursday night or Friday, when he comes up, greet him looking your best, serve him a delicious meal and tell him you’re so happy to see him. His response should be to reciprocate in kind. If, however, he should give you not so much as a glance, turn to the sports page while eating the delicious dinner, I’d say he has a grueling talk coming for an explanation.
Sometimes, and often at the ten-year mark, a marriage goes a bit stale. It’s good to talk to your spouse, whether you’re the husband or the wife who is feeling somewhat neglected, taken for granted or simply ignored, that these feelings need to be resolved. It could well be that the wounded spouse is over-reacting and the ignorant spouse is simply unaware that they are being hurtful. Communication is a vital key to smoothing out differences and hurtful behavior. Where there is love, there is always a solution.
To you, dear friend, I suggest that if you are going to sit in on the circle on the lawn, try to steer the conversation away from lashon hara if you can, and if not, get up and say you left something baking in the oven, and leave! Have an enjoyable rest of the summer!
