"It's not like I don't want to," she said softly, tracing gentle circles on her husband's crying back. "This will hurt you and I don't want that."

She'd been down this road before, acquiescing to his disturbing requests for pain. Sometimes, neglect felt like the kinder cruelty. But five days a week? It was too much, even for her.

"You just don't get it!" he sobbed.

She sighed, trying to understand. A psychiatrist, versed in the darkest corners of the human mind, should have been equipped. But his childhood wounds ran deep, a festering infection she couldn't seem to cure.