Housewives hussles to get over the hump of not loving hubby

By Ryann Connell
February 15, 2005

Nights are depressing for this 43-year-old Kanagawa Prefecture housewife we'll call Aki. She finds it hard to keep coming up with excuses. One day, the kids will have colds, the next day she'll be tired. Married almost 20 years, hubby still wants a bit every night, but Aki can't stand the thought.

"My husband only wants to have sex in the positions he likes. What I want from my husband is somebody who'll be a mental pillar and listen to my problems," she gripes.

Furious at a husband who complained of being too busy to seek counseling, entrusted child-raising entirely to her, showed a complete lack of interest in the household, yet still demanded his nightly "connubial right," Aki had few qualms going along when a classmate from her junior high school days suggested they begin an affair, a fling that has now lasted four years.

"I know I'm doing something bad," she says. "But since getting married, I've learned how to switch love on and off. Honestly, though, the time I get with my boyfriend is so good, it's enough to get me by in the time I have to spend with my husband."

Japanese women like Aki, the women's weekly says, are hardly rare, with a survey of its core readership of 30- and 40-something females showing three quarters of them don't love their husbands. About 40 percent have also admitted to extramarital affairs, whether physical or merely the unconsummated mental type.

Not every woman playing around on her husband is entirely unhappy with him. A 34-year-old temp agency worker gets along like a house on fire with her spouse, getting in the bath together every night and enjoy an average of three hours conversation a day, even on topics like politics and economics.

They're incredibly good friends, but she yearns for the thrill of new love and is upset that her practical husband shunned the idea of a wild night at a posh hotel because it would be a waste of money. She now gets her life's dose of romance courtesy of trysts every three months or so with an old boyfriend she dated before she met her husband.

"No matter how old you are, you still need that thrill that love brings. But I don't think it's possible to obtain that from marriage," she says. "So I balance my life by having a boyfriend."

Comment on this story, click here.

Copyright 1999-2004, Mainichi Shimbun.  All rights reserved.  No content may be reproduced in whole or part without written permission.  Please contact us via the link below for re-print and syndication policies.

Japanese houeswives lather up to erotic herbal soap
2-2-2005