Sexolve 233: ‘My Son Is in Love With Our Domestic Help’

(Trigger Warning: Some questions could make you feel agitated. Reader discretion is advised.)

Sexolve is equal rights activist Harish Iyer’s Q&A space on FIT.

If you have any queries regarding sex, sexuality or your relationship, and need some advice, answers or just someone to hear you out – write in to Harish Iyer, and he’ll try and ‘sexolve’ it for you. Drop in a mail to [e-mail].

This week’s Q&As are below:

‘My Son Is in Love With Our Domestic Help’

Dear RainbowMan,

I have been in a terrible state of shock since the past few months. People say that I have gone mad. I have not. I am just very angry. I am angry that I couldn’t save my son’s life from going to the dogs. Don’t get me wrong. I am quite a progressive well-read businesswoman with a PhD in sciences. But imagine what happens when your worst nightmare comes true - I saw my son having sex with our maid. It seems that he is in love with her. The other day I walked into his room casually to see him and her kissing each other. It seems they were at this since quite some time. I don’t know how and when this happened and I don’t know what values I must have given him that he is behaving like this with me. I am a single mother. I looked after him since his birth all alone. His father left us when he ran away with another woman when I was heavily pregnant. I have looked after him so well. Today he has brought shame to my entire family. I have been pressing him to get married ever since he turned 27. He kept postponing it for 2 years and now this is the rude shock I get. He could have married any decent girl. There were so many who drool over him and he has also fallen in love with girls of our standard in the past. However, this is what he has done in the end. Bringing my entire family to shame. How can I move on? He says he loves her and that she loves him too and they want to get married. I think that woman has my son’s wealth in mind. She is not even of the same caste or religion. I don’t want my grandson to be genetically weak. I am sorry for the angry English. I am sorry… but I don’t know what to do.

Upset Mom

Dear Mom,

Thank you so much for writing in. The purpose of language should be to communicate. Referring to the term you used, your ‘angry English’ does convey what you are feeling.

I am glad you are able to articulate what you feel in words. Here’s something personal - I have been in a space where I was cheated and disregarded and can understand that it has left a mark on my psyche. It left me paralysed in terms of all my relationships with people thereon. Things were like that till I finally found counselling. I took therapy and could see things in a new light.

Leaving hurt unattended, doesn’t reduce the trauma it causes. In fact, the trauma accentuates and starts manifesting in ways that adversely impact the way we look at situations and relationships

It is time for you to show some self-love. It is time to seek therapy for yourself.

Now coming to your son. I understand that you have concerns regarding his love life. As an adult though, he is responsible for all the choices he makes in his life. I am sure that you will appreciate that you have brought him up to be a free thinker and with a mind of his own. He is responsible for the commitments he makes.

It is not a lower class that is crass, it is the fact that we tend to discriminate and assume that they have to be limited to their own being.

When we shut the doors on others, we don’t shut them out. Instead, we lock ourselves in claustrophobic walls of privilege.

I am glad that your boy and your domestic employee have moved beyond these superficial walls of privilege and have dared to dream a dream together.

To be crowded in the mix of your own privilege is suffocating. Whether it is workplace or home, or for that matter – the science of gene pools - diversity is extraordinarily empowering.

So don’t worry about their offspring. Here is a little bit of science - marrying within someone who is within the same genetic pool has the chances of the recessive genes becoming dominant. The more diverse and varied and away from the genetic tree both heterosexual partners are, better are the chances that positive traits get passed on.

It is time, Mother, that you seek for love for yourself beyond projecting your desires on your child. Your child cannot love the person you want him to love. Your child can only love the person he loves. He cannot be the manifestation of your ideas and ideals, he is an independent being with his own mind and body.

You are within your limits to let your son know that he and only he is responsible for his decisions. As an adult though, legally, he doesn’t need your approval to marry anyone. You could choose to enumerate your reasons for non-approval to your son. But it would be nice for you as a family to recognise and value the fact that adults can make their own decisions.

Smiles

RainbowMan

P.S. Please seek therapy. It works like magic.

‘My Wife Is Sexually Expressive. Did She Have Sex Before?’

Dear Rainbowman,

I am a 32-year-old man and my wife is 30 years old. My wife told me that she was a virgin before marriage. She wants me to be more expressive in bed. She talks a lot and tells me to do sex in different positions. I have a doubt. Is she feeling like this because she has had sex before she had sex with me? How do I find out if she was really a virgin? She didn’t bleed on our first night.

Mr Doubtfire

Dear Mr Doubtfire,

Thank you for writing in.

You would be glad to know that human beings get to know about sex through films and also instinctively. One doesn’t have to necessarily engage in sexual intercourse to understand their pleasure points.

You are curious about your wife’s past and you want to investigate, just because she is expressive? Who are you, Sherlock Holmes? For that matter, human beings express. I am sorry but didn’t you know that you were marrying a human being and not a lifeless Barbie doll?

The hymen - the presence or absence of it- is no indicator of virginity. The hymen could break due to many reasons other than sex. So please don’t let her not bleeding make you believe that she has had sex before.

You cannot find out if she had sex before. There is no way for her to find out if you had sex before. You guys will find out only if you guys tell each other. And that’s a choice – to tell each other.

Please don’t bother about her past, if you have issues with sex, address them with her.

A woman can ask for pleasure as much as a man can. It doesn’t make her slutty or her past wishy-washy

Give yourself a break from delving deep into her past. Focus on your present and future.

Smiles

RainbowMan

P.S. Imagine, if men had a hymen, virginity would have been a myth.

The Death of a Penis

Dear Rainbowman,

Will my penis die if I masturbate too much.

Worried Man

Dear worried Man,

Is your question is about losing erections because you masturbate too much?

Masturbation is healthy if done only to relieve yourself when excited. However, too much of anything is not a good thing. That holds true to masturbation too. Don’t make it an obsession. Masturbate when you are sexually excited and not just because it’s a habit.

If you are seriously asking me if your penis would die –

Your penis is not a separate living being. It doesn’t have a heart or brain of its own. So it will not die or live on its own.

smiles

RainbowMan

(Harish Iyer is an equal rights activist working for the rights of the LGBT community, women, children and animals)