Another door slams shut.

Since my last post we have had sex exactly six times - an average of about ten days between each awkward, embarrassing fuck. I guess I got a little overexcited thinking that a new motivation might actually be motivating.

I admit I'd been using Project Knock Me Up as an excuse to badger him into sex, or at least a new reason to bring it into our sphere of reference. What could turn a man on more than "We need to have sex, I have egg white mucus and I think I'm ovulating"? Yeah, I know. Not the sexiest. But if all the usual reasons to fuck - bonding, attraction, wanting to help your partner feel happy and desired and loved, wanting to feel happy and desired and loved in return, blah blah blah - aren't enough, if both my caresses and my plaintiff and blunt "When can we have sex?" are met with blank indifference, then surely he can't argue with science? He's a man, for fuck's sake, men love science. So I've been all about the luteinizing hormone surge and the cervical mucous, and boy doesn't he know it. I'm a trying-to-conceive junkie, a babyvangelist.

But it would appear that this, too, is an unwelcome approach. The night of my ovulation, I got a blunt rebuffal (I can't remember if it was "too tired" or "sore throat") and a ticking off. Apparently, all this sexy medical talk is offputting. And yeah, I can see that might be the case. But, I explained, it's important that he understands what is happening to me so he knows when and why it's important to fuck. And while trying to be seductive and sexy, you know, kissing him and trying to turn him, on has zero effect, talking to him about fertility matters is a way for me to segue the subject of sex into our conversations.

He said he just didn't want me to talk about it right before sex, and that I should carry on trying to be seductive and sexy, it isn't pointless. Yes, I said, it is, and constantly getting knocked back is horrible. Embarassing, awkward, demeaning and depressing. How, I asked him, does one arouse the unarousable man? At which point he went stony-faced and silent, and I went off to the bathroom to cry.

So I'm back to blatantly asking, because I don't know what else to do, and I feel more anxious than ever about it. I've been promised (and denied) sex "tomorrow" every day for the past eight days. Every single day he's found an excuse. And just when I thought I'd found a new way to gently trick him into talking about, or even having, sex, a portal through which I could ask him to address this issue without putting my self-esteem on the chopping block, he's taken it away from me. Time to find another door, and hope he has the strength to hold it open.

Happy Valentine's Day.

I was surprised this morning by V presenting me with a dozen roses and a card which was extremely "us" in nature, plus two tickets to see a show. Sadly, the lovey-dovey ended there. I spent the day cleaning the house. He spent it playing video games and complaining of a headache.

Late afternoon, I announced that I was heading to the bedroom to play with a rather extraordinary new toy, and did he want to come with me. He stopped play for a second to look up at me, remote control in hand, with a smile at half-cock and exaggerated sleepy eyes. And unpaused the game.

"I guess that's a no, then."

Quite literally, go fuck yourself. And I did, loudly and vigorously, and in front of a mirror.

Round two, ding ding. I wandered back into the living room in just my T-shirt, to debrief him on the performance of my new plaything. Perhaps sir would be interested in a demo?

No, sir would not be interested in a demo, even if the demo is a visibly aroused, wet and slippery young lady, hard nipples poking through her T-shirt, sliding a large buzzing dildo into her cunt right in front of him. See how much I can take, sir? Sorry, sir, I can see now that you're busy. With Mario Kart.

I give up, I honestly do. Except clearly I don't, because I like sticking rusty pins into the rotten cabbage of my self-esteem.

So Valentine's Day and the ensuing evening passed much as most Saturdays do, and it was fucking boring and depressing and not at all romantic, and I had another good cry, though not entirely for the state of our relationship. Ho hum. Yeah, it's probably just the intensifying ray of Valentine's Day thowing a spotlight on the shitty, but today has really bummed me out. Hope springs eternal. I promise to endeavour to make tomorrow better. Maybe even he will too.