Daksh: We always asked you not to do it.
Amruta: But that’s where our problems began—with our parenting. Daksh’s parenting style and mine clashed. And I didn’t like the way he parented my sons. With Rabbani, he was loving but also strict when he needed to be. You know him, that’s how he is, and that’s how it has worked for him. But with my sons, because they are also boys, I have to be a little stern all the time. He started to overrule my decisions. He was too soft with the boys.
Daksh: Because some of her decisions made absolutely no sense to me.
Amruta: I had raised them without you for nine years. They were pretty fine before you came along.
Daksh: This is what our fights used to sound like. On a higher volume though, and more caustic. We would be really, really... mean.
Amruta: And we are podcasters. We have a way with words. We know how to win an argument.
Daksh: We would drive to empty parking lots, away from our children and then shout at each other properly. It was fucked up. And it’s true that’s where it started to break.
Amruta: And another part was that he couldn’t see me scold Rabbani.
Daksh: I just couldn’t. It was unacceptable to me.
Amruta: And then it just went downhill from there. There was also the sex part.
Daksh: Do you really want to talk about that?
Amruta: Why shouldn’t we?
Daksh: It’s private.
Amruta: For the last three years, we have come on this podcast and spilt everything there is to know about us here, and now you’re saying it’s private?
Daksh: Fine. You go first.
Amruta: Our appetites didn’t match.
Daksh: Don’t make me sound sex-crazed.
Amruta: For the first few months, it was fine. I could match up, but then... it just got tiring. There was so much to do. We had thought combining forces would mean less housework, but it kind of ballooned.
Daksh: That’s because we had to get used to each other’s and our children’s idiosyncrasies. Someone would want something for breakfast, others wouldn’t, some wanted to sleep early, others late.
Amruta: It was a madhouse. It was like living in a dorm.
Daksh: It was an organizational problem. That’s what a lot of parents face too. If they are not morning people, or can’t have heavy dinners, but their children do, it becomes too complex to handle. For us, it was like herding wild horses into a single lane that’s acceptable to all.
Amruta: You changed the topic.
Daksh: I never said I wouldn’t.
Amruta: It started to irritate me. His constant horniness was a problem.
Daksh: I had changed the topic. Can we move on, please?
Amruta: You just hadn’t been with enough people, Daksh. So Daksh hasn’t dated a lot of people. So when I found him, it was all... just pent up.
Daksh: And how many people had you been with?
Amruta: Way, way more than you. So anyway, he was like an eighteen-year-old and after a while, it was... a little strange. I know, I know, I come across as some old person who doesn’t want to have sex any more.
Daksh: You don’t come across as anything but real. I get it. You had two kids, parents too, who needed your attention all the time. You were exhausted a lot of the time. But from where I was looking, you were intentionally making things complex... stressing over the littlest of things.
Amruta: That’s a huge part of who I am, Daksh. Even these listeners know it. I am a worrier. You can solve all the problems I have in the world and yet I will find myself worrying about something.
