My Tupperware Tattoo

I’m a man and like most men, I have needs. But I also have half a brain and a wife that is kind enough to remind me to use it from time to time….like the time I tried to bring a little romance into our post-baby life.

We’d just spent two nights walking circles around our hospital room and were waiting for the doctor to come in and tell us we were okay to go home. He strolled in just as we got the baby back to sleep and asked with his booming voice, “SO, ARE YOU THREE READY TO GO HOME?” The baby woke up screaming and my wife glared daggers at the doc before escaping to the hallway, leaving me to get the last minute instructions. The doctor went over the standard list of postnatal instructions in his same booming tone as I frantically tried to write it all down. Then just as he was about to leave, he looked around and leaned towards me conspiratorially and said in a low voice, “Absolutely no sex for at least six weeks, but once you get the approval, it’s up to you to woo her back into the bedroom,” and then he winked at me and left. You can be sure I wrote that down too.

Six weeks came and went and my wife showed no signs of wanting to do anything in the bedroom other than sleep. Half my brain got that she needed time, but the missing half kept getting over-excited every time she whipped out her boobs. Around the three month mark I remembered that the doctor had given me some advice and so I dug out my notes. “Woo her back to the bedroom,” he’d said. Sure, I thought, I can do that.

I tried everything. I tried strategically bending over a few times when I heard her coming into the bedroom. Her only response was a reminder to go and buy new underwear.

I snuck out of the office over lunch one day and bought myself some silk boxers. She accused me of having an affair.

I reinstated my gym membership and made it a point to go four times per week. After six weeks of the 30 minute ad blaster class, I thought for sure that my ripped mid-section would make her go wild.

It did, but not in the way I expected. She got one look at my defined pecks and then began screaming and pulling her hair out. “I haven’t had a shower in four days and still have 12 pounds of baby weight to lose and YOU NOW HAVE A SIX PACK?!?!?!” Then she squirted breastmilk on my chest. That was definitely NOT sexy.

That low point marked the end of my attempts to woo her back into the bedroom. I cancelled my gymcard and started coming home for lunch so she could shower. Instead of begging for a date night, I stayed in and let her go out with her girlfriends. Good lord are those ladies loud!

Slowly things started to change. One night she goosed me in the hallway on her way to put Junior to bed. A few days later, I swear she was extra slow at tucking away her boobs after a feeding. She was showing some signs, but truth be told, I had no idea what I was doing to inspire them.

Then it happened. It’s late in the evening and we’ve just finished eating dinner. Junior is fast asleep and she’s sipping her one glass of wine while I futz around in the kitchen. I’m bending over the dishwasher when I hear her say, “yeah baby, do that some more.” It startles me so much that I bang my head on the cabinet.

“What did you just say,” I ask. “I said, do that again, but bend over a little more and wiggle your butt around,” she answers. Naturally I oblige.

Before I can get the utensil holder back into the bottom rack, she pounces on me from behind. What happens next should have been a scene in 9 and a half weeks, but in fast forward. The whole things lasts for 5 minutes, but somehow we manage to rip off one of the drawer pulls, break a bowl and I now have the word tupperware permanently imprinted on my left butt cheek.

As we lie there on the cold linoleum floor, I can’t help but ask, “What the hell just happened? I’d tried everything to woo you back, just like the doctor said, and it ends up being the dishwasher that turns you on?”

She stands up and snaps a dishtowel at my Tupperware butt. With a naughty smile she looks down on me and says: “Oh honey, you men really are all idiots. That decrepit old doctor might know a thing or two about how to get things out of my vagina, but he doesn’t have a damn clue about how to get anything into it. All you had to do to woo me back was to give me time and pitch in around the house.” Then she suggested I clean the dishes the next day wearing nothing but a tool belt.

So that’s the secret. It’s not about the tight abs and black silk boxers. It’s about shaking your butt over an empty dishwasher at just the right moment. Well that, and not being ashamed to have tupperware tattooed across your ass.

(Ok fine, so this wasn’t written by a man. I got inspired when I saw blogpost by a Dad complaining that he had tried all of things I listed above EXCEPT helping out, and he couldn’t figure out why his wife wasn’t interested in sex anymore. As I sat there and screamed DUH! at the screen I knew I needed to find a way to knock some commonsense into their heads…I thought they might listen more if the advice came from another man. Feel free to share this piece with your husbands, we’ll keep the truth about the writer all to ourselves, ok? – Lynn from The Nomad Mom Diary.)