"He"

The Man in my life/One time Husband /former Master... sometimes I am at a loss to find a word to describe my relationship... one word or a dozen.

We've been together 26 years if you don't count those 3-4 years we were divorced.  Yeah... it wasn't all sunshine and roses.  Technically we aren't married now... well, maybe common law married?  I don't know.  I don't know if I care.

He is a bewildering mix of sweet, caring, gentle, rude, grouchy, irrational... He remembers things that I know just plain did not happen... insists I am the one with memory problems.  He is rigid, controlling, critical.  He is amazingly smart and creative.  And sexy... did I forget sexy?  I love him to death... and funny...    

There is no fighting and winning.  He loves to fight.  If I disagree about anything the battle is on and he will dig in his heels and is a thousand times more stubborn than me.  I have learned in the past couple of decades that fighting is a complete waste of time.  If I just agree, avoid, ignore... he will move on and most of the time forget.  And so much of the time it is his way... how you rinse the dishes before they go in the dishwasher, where they go in the dishwasher, how I brush my teeth... I could go on and on.  If you dispute this... it is a fight... and I refer you back to the beginning of this paragraph...

In some ways this rigidity, this controlling, this determination to win no matter what seemed like dominance... and I tried to build on that.  If I just was submissive enough he would somehow turn in to a dominant... but there is a layer of anxiety that runs through that dominance.  This anxiety tends to make him question everything... and as a dominant in a D/s relationship it does not inspire confidence in your submissive if you can't quite decide anything, what you wanted, how you want it... we worked hard at it for several years.  With some success... but I just could not get around some really basic things... He would arbitrarily decide to change the rules.. without notification... and criticize me for somehow failing to obey... and he would accuse me of lying.  If he would not believe me... it could not work.

I was the one that said it was not working.  That we had to find a different way and we have.  He is still controlling... I still usually try to do it his way... but if he gets off track and starts demanding I just give him a seriously snarky look and a snarkier comment... and walk away.  Sometimes he still reaches for me like he might still be able to physically assert his will and I stop him dead in his tracks... Oh huh, uh... we don't roll that way anymore.

There is very little kink... but there was hardly ever any kink before... Before it was a very vanilla D/s relationship.  Now it is a very vanilla relationship...

So back to the original question... how to refer to him... One time husband, Former Master, Man in my life... I notice I have been calling him "He" with the "H" capitalized... It will do for now until I find something better.