Did you know there are women who will try and steal your husband while you’re fighting breast cancer, struggling with surgeries and chemo and trying to maintain some semblance of a normal life? Before a couple of these women lunged for my husband, it never occurred to me I knew anyone like this: women with no moral code, and more importantly, no concept of self-worth. Who does that sort of thing? A woman at my church, that’s who.
One Sunday, because of chemo, I barely had enough energy to blink, much less get dressed and make it to church, I told James to go on without me. Moments after he walked into the church, one of these husband-stealing Jezebels leaned into him, gave him a full contact body hug and proceeded to grind her crotch into his leg. “If I can ever do anything for you,” she whispered in his ear. “Call me.”
Another time chemo zapped me of energy, I asked James to meet a woman, I thought was my friend, and a workman at our Little House so they could hang light fixtures. This hair-flipping floozy came-on to James bigger than Dallas. When her floor-length trench coat came off, she had on a micro mini skirt, cowboy boots and a thong. Repeatedly she bent over, as though retrieving something from her bag, fanny side toward James. James said each time he moved, so he didn’t have such an up close and personal view of her derrière, she moved so that he did. The Little House is only 22 feet by 22 feet, so there wasn’t much room to escape her, plus there was a rain storm going on outside. When he tried to move toward the front porch, she cornered him.
“Has anyone ever told you what pretty eyes you have,” she asked.
“Yes,” he said. “My wife.”
James never liked her because, as he put it, she was always looking to “better deal herself.” When he told me the “pretty eyes” bit, I knew it was true because she says that to most everyone she meets, men and women alike. Later I discovered some of the other women who knew her had a saying: “Don’t ever leave your husbands alone with her.”
While neither woman’s true character surprised me, I was disappointed at their lack of compassion for me and for James. Women who brazenly offer themselves like that show disrespect for husbands as well. We all know husbands can be overwhelmed with their wife’s breast cancer, even vulnerable in many respects. The statistics about marriages that breakup after a breast cancer diagnosis are well-known. I know how hard it is to be wife, mother, lover, housekeeper, and hold down a job while going through breast cancer, but hear me when I say this: Talk to your husband about his fears and yours and sex, or lack of sex during breast cancer.
A man’s “little brain” has a tendency to dominate his “big brain,” and while you may not be as interested in sex during treatment as your husband is, his sexual needs do not go away. Even if you’re not lucky enough to be best friends with your husband, this is a time to treat one another like best friends. Try to talk honestly and openly with one another about different ways you can handle sex, and other issues, over the course of your treatment and recovery. Perhaps a counselor can help. If your marriage is a good marriage, this is an opportunity to grow even closer. If your marriage is rocky, perhaps you can find a way to role reverse with one another. Work at becoming best friends, and seeing things from your spouse’s point of view. James was a great husband who loved me beyond all reason and placed our marriage first and foremost. We both did. We talked daily about everything, and for the most part, we were usually on the same page.
Women who try and steal another woman’s husband, while his wife is fighting for her life, are contemptible creatures. At least vampires come out at night, but these desperate housewives brazenly do their best work in the daylight with no remorse or misgivings as to the consequences of their actions. They are sad pathetic women in search of an ego fix with no regard for anyone, not even themselves. These women are little more than pit vipers with the word, “Juicy,” emblazoned across their butts. Watch out for them, girlfriends. I guarantee you; they’re closer than you think.
