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LONDON, England – Heather Howland looks at the floor as Andy, her husband of 15 years, tries to work out how many men she has had inappropriate relations with in the past two years.
“We were going through it all the other night and I said I reckoned there have been about 50,” he says, quite matter-of-factly.
“Heather said ‘Never!’ but I started to list them all and, yes, it is that many. I think she’s only had full sexual intercourse with five or six, but let’s just say that things have gone on that shouldn’t have gone on, with many more.”
Incredibly, they start to discuss some of these illicit “dalliances”, in the way that any couple might discuss holidays taken, or restaurants visited.
In any other circumstances, the only response to such jaw-dropping openness about marital indiscretions would be “yuck”. Surely such dysfunctional marriages only exist on television?
But the Howlands aren’t television sort of people. Before “all this” started, they were the happily married parents of a seven-year-old boy.
<span style="font-style: italic">Andy worked in a children’s home, helping youngsters with behavioural problems; Heather was an advertising executive.</span>
<span style="font-weight: bold">They had been teenage sweethearts since the age of 17, and had strident views about the sanctity of marriage. Heather was from a particularly church-going family, and hadn’t as much as looked at another man since her wedding day.</span>
So why would she cheat on her husband with up to 50 other men?
The answer is that Heather is ill.
In May 2005, she suffered a massive brain haemorrhage while gardening. She was in a coma for ten days after the haemorrhage, during which time she suffered two major bleeds in the brain. Andy was told she was not expected to live. He even signed the consent forms that would allow her organs to be donated.
When she pulled through, the doctors warned him that brain injuries were complex things. He was not to be alarmed if Heather’s personality changed. What no one could have predicted is the manner in which Heather’s personality would change.
<span style="font-weight: bold">Hypersexuality</span>
“The medical explanation is that she suffers from hypersexuality. It’s a convoluted way of saying she’s a nymphomaniac,” explains Andy.
Heather looks suitably mortified as she sums up her plight, which is that her life has been reduced to sex, sex and more sex. It would be funny, if her face wasn’t so serious.
Since then she has put her marriage under unfathomable pressure, and played Russian roulette with her own health and her husband’s.
What has happened to this couple is simply incredible. But perhaps the most surprising – and touching – part is that they are as united as ever.
It all began after Heather regained consciousness. A few days afterwards Heather asked him to help her to the bathroom – then pulled him into the toilet cubicle with her. There, they had the sort of sex that couples who have been married for 13 years tend not to have. Andy was bemused, but not complaining.
For the first three months of her recovery, Heather did not really leave the house. And when she did the first indication of her illness manifested when she pulled a builder into a house he was repairing and began kissing him.
“The builder was just the start. . . . She was flirty, forward. It was painful, but even I didn’t realise how far she would go,” Andy admitted.
“I went to the doctors, asking for help. The counsellor said she had heard of such things, but wasn’t experienced enough to know what to do. She said I should just make sure Heather always carried condoms. What sort of answer was that?”
Six months after her brain surgery, Heather went back to work. Andy made sure that her bosses knew about her unusual “condition” but within weeks she had embarked on a passionate affair with a startled co-worker.
Heather admits that she was ruled by her libido, pure and simple. Nothing else mattered, so she even took men into their house exposing her son to this behaviour.
“He has had to know about things that no boy his age should need to know,” admits Andy. “I had to sit him down and tell him that mummy isn’t well and that was why she was bringing strange men home.”
Few men would stomach this, so why did Andy? He seems puzzled to even be asked.
“Because she is my wife and my best friend . . . I love her more than life itself. When they told me she was going to die, I stood by her bed willing it not to be so. I said I could cope with anything, if only she would live. And I can, even this.”
The couple are clinging to the fact that the human brain, complex though it is, is capable of near miracles. Thankfully, there has been progress. With medication – an antidepressant and a birth control pill – Heather’s libido has been reduced somewhat.
(Daily Mail.co.uk)
From Here
“We were going through it all the other night and I said I reckoned there have been about 50,” he says, quite matter-of-factly.
“Heather said ‘Never!’ but I started to list them all and, yes, it is that many. I think she’s only had full sexual intercourse with five or six, but let’s just say that things have gone on that shouldn’t have gone on, with many more.”
Incredibly, they start to discuss some of these illicit “dalliances”, in the way that any couple might discuss holidays taken, or restaurants visited.
In any other circumstances, the only response to such jaw-dropping openness about marital indiscretions would be “yuck”. Surely such dysfunctional marriages only exist on television?
But the Howlands aren’t television sort of people. Before “all this” started, they were the happily married parents of a seven-year-old boy.
<span style="font-style: italic">Andy worked in a children’s home, helping youngsters with behavioural problems; Heather was an advertising executive.</span>
<span style="font-weight: bold">They had been teenage sweethearts since the age of 17, and had strident views about the sanctity of marriage. Heather was from a particularly church-going family, and hadn’t as much as looked at another man since her wedding day.</span>
So why would she cheat on her husband with up to 50 other men?
The answer is that Heather is ill.
In May 2005, she suffered a massive brain haemorrhage while gardening. She was in a coma for ten days after the haemorrhage, during which time she suffered two major bleeds in the brain. Andy was told she was not expected to live. He even signed the consent forms that would allow her organs to be donated.
When she pulled through, the doctors warned him that brain injuries were complex things. He was not to be alarmed if Heather’s personality changed. What no one could have predicted is the manner in which Heather’s personality would change.
<span style="font-weight: bold">Hypersexuality</span>
“The medical explanation is that she suffers from hypersexuality. It’s a convoluted way of saying she’s a nymphomaniac,” explains Andy.
Heather looks suitably mortified as she sums up her plight, which is that her life has been reduced to sex, sex and more sex. It would be funny, if her face wasn’t so serious.
Since then she has put her marriage under unfathomable pressure, and played Russian roulette with her own health and her husband’s.
What has happened to this couple is simply incredible. But perhaps the most surprising – and touching – part is that they are as united as ever.
It all began after Heather regained consciousness. A few days afterwards Heather asked him to help her to the bathroom – then pulled him into the toilet cubicle with her. There, they had the sort of sex that couples who have been married for 13 years tend not to have. Andy was bemused, but not complaining.
For the first three months of her recovery, Heather did not really leave the house. And when she did the first indication of her illness manifested when she pulled a builder into a house he was repairing and began kissing him.
“The builder was just the start. . . . She was flirty, forward. It was painful, but even I didn’t realise how far she would go,” Andy admitted.
“I went to the doctors, asking for help. The counsellor said she had heard of such things, but wasn’t experienced enough to know what to do. She said I should just make sure Heather always carried condoms. What sort of answer was that?”
Six months after her brain surgery, Heather went back to work. Andy made sure that her bosses knew about her unusual “condition” but within weeks she had embarked on a passionate affair with a startled co-worker.
Heather admits that she was ruled by her libido, pure and simple. Nothing else mattered, so she even took men into their house exposing her son to this behaviour.
“He has had to know about things that no boy his age should need to know,” admits Andy. “I had to sit him down and tell him that mummy isn’t well and that was why she was bringing strange men home.”
Few men would stomach this, so why did Andy? He seems puzzled to even be asked.
“Because she is my wife and my best friend . . . I love her more than life itself. When they told me she was going to die, I stood by her bed willing it not to be so. I said I could cope with anything, if only she would live. And I can, even this.”
The couple are clinging to the fact that the human brain, complex though it is, is capable of near miracles. Thankfully, there has been progress. With medication – an antidepressant and a birth control pill – Heather’s libido has been reduced somewhat.
(Daily Mail.co.uk)
From Here
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