Hello Doctor NerdLove, I’m 25 and been reading your website for over a year since my friend C. recommending it to me. For about that same time, I’ve been dating my girlfriend, L, 23. This has been the first great, stable relationship for me in a long time.
Now she is bisexual with a stronger preference towards women. I’m still a virgin where she has had intercourse been with women but not men. She’s gone down on an ex-boyfriend and decided she prefers receiving oral than giving it. She prefers to wait until we’re married not for religious purposes, but more of being ready for men. We have fooled around, dry humping, going gown on her, rim jobs, her giving me handjobs, etc.
I been fine with this, understanding her and all. She once made a comment that she finds the male genitalia disgusting. Recently she’s discovered so I asked if she was ready for sex but seems she still really much prefers women, saying she’d rather not do guys and suggested we do an open relationship or become polyamorous and find a bi-girl to be our third in a triad so we both get what we want. Us to be fulfilled sexually while maintaining our emotional connection and also having a threeway.
I was fine with it, truly, being patient and also supportive but I always felt like why am I here if she might not even fuck me? I was never about it, I was all about the emotional side. Things aren’t made better by the fact we’ve been long distance for the past 4 months due to school and well traveling for a family member’s funeral. Why commit this long with a girl who’s said my junk is disgusting? Who isn’t exactly factor my needs of wanting to have full on intercourse with her after this long? We got into a huge argument over this one and aren’t talking to each other at the moment.
– Waiting to Start
So let’s break it down a little:
She doesn’t want to go down on you.
Fair do’s some women don’t like it or have an aversion due to a bad experience.
She wants to wait until you’re married before you have sex as a way of being ready to sleep with a man.
Slightly odd, but ok, some people prefer to wait. I don’t think it’s the wisest of ideas, but hey, to each their own. That’s her boundary, and we need to respect it.
She finds penises disgusting.
Um…
She’s decided she doesn’t really want to sleep with a guy and is suggesting a threeway/poly relationship with another woman before you’ve even had intercourse together…
Riiiight.
WtS? Can I be blunt with you here? Because I think you know damn good and well what’s going on here.
Look, female sexuality is famously fluid; the Kinsey scale is more of the Kinsey slide and women are more prone to move around the scale than men are1. On occasion, a self-identified lesbian will discover that she’s into guys too – or just one particular guy. A self-identified straight girl will realize that she’s attracted to women as well. And occasionally a self-identified bi girl will realize that she’s not bi at all.
Your girlfriend isn’t bi. She’s gay. This doesn’t mean that she doesn’t have feelings for you, but she’s very clearly not into dudes sexually. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but you’re going to be breaking up sooner rather than later. She’s asking for your permission to find the girl she’s going to dump you for under the pretext of trying to help your relationship. An open relationship is going to very quickly become a closed relationship… with somebody else. Polyamory isn’t the answer here either; to start with, it’s varsity level relationship management and you’ve barely started warming the bench. Moreover, a poly triad requires honesty and trust… and right now, she’s not being honest with you. She’s holding onto the relationship for reasons of her own – she may not be ready to admit to herself that she’s gay, she may be trying to avoid hurting you – but it’s going to come crashing down pretty soon.
You want someone who’s into you, not somebody who’s leaning on you while she comes to terms with who she really is. The best thing you can do for the both of you is to end it now. The clean break heals the fastest and it’ll be easier for the two of you to possibly salvage a friendship if you do it before bitterness and resentment creeps in. Give her a call – I’m giving you a pass to do this via the phone since you’re long distance at the moment – and call it quits. Then move on with your life. There will be other women, and university is one of the best places to find them.
Heya, Doc. I like your article about dealing with girls’ male friends, but there are some guys who need the opposite of its advice.
I’m a college student. I’m female, and pretty physically acceptable according to other people and my time at the gym. However, I’ve got the natural social skills of a chatty rock, and even though I’ve gotten better at being friendly and normal since I started college, I don’t have a lot of friends, and I’ve never dated. (I’m not that broken up about the dating thing. It just seemed like something I should mention.)
Now. A few weeks ago, I started playing with the Quidditch team. Some of us hang out after practice, and I really like the group. One of the guys, however, has a habit of trying to pick up all the girls in order of whoever he finds hottest and hearing “no thank you” as “flirt harder,” and of the three or four girls who stick around after practice… well, he hasn’t been as into the ones who aren’t me. It wouldn’t work out, Doc; he’s looking for something more serious than I want with ANYONE right now, and I’m just not attracted to him no matter how much he touches me or talks up his looks and history.
I do enjoy talking to this guy in groups, and I’d like him for a friend even though I’ve told him I won’t date him, but his advances are making it difficult for me to cultivate other relationships in the group—for example, he started talking to me about something unrelated while I was in the middle of a conversation with some other girls, and kept repeating himself until I turned to him and said I was trying to have a discussion here. While my focus is on making friends, there have been a couple guys I’ve wanted to hit on. Guess how easy it’s been to talk to them one-on-one. Go on, guess.
My problem, Doc, is that I don’t think I’m established enough as a group member to initiate a Come to Jesus talk about how he needs to take no for an answer and stop cockblocking me without making it weird between me and everyone else. We usually treat his skirt-chasing as a joke. I’m pretty sure getting him alone to discuss it would be received as a sign of interest. You write a lot about subtle ways to increase someone’s attraction to you. Have any insight on how to shut someone down without making a big production out of it or ignoring them entirely?
– Golden Snitches Get Stiches
In every group – especially amongst nerdy ones – there tends to be at least one person who has boundary issues and doesn’t understand that the first rule of other people’s conversations is that you don’t just barge into them.
(I could tell you stories. Oh how I could tell you stories.)
Sometimes they’re creepers who are only kept in the group due to Geek Social Fallacy #1, sometimes they’re an otherwise good guy who just needs to be smacked across the nose with the clue-by-four until they learn. But whether it’s a creeper, a guy with an annoying crush or just plain old Captain Oblivious, it’s obnoxious as hell and it annoys the living piss out of everyone around him.
Now I totally get not wanting to cause a scene amongst your new friends; after all, geeks are notoriously drama averse. I can totally understand fearing that by initiating the Come To Jesus meeting with the Would-Be Weasley might lead to your being kicked out of the group for teh sin of ‘causing drama’ even when it’s ultimately somebody else’s fault. But at the same time: you’ve got to stand up for you. You have to be your first and last line of social defense and that means being willing to tell your boundary-ignorant buddy to step the fuck off.
So here’s how you handle things.
To start with: talk to your friends, especially your new female friends, about Captain Come-On’s behavior. Mention to them that it’s starting to legitimately bother you and find out whether other people feel the same way or how they handle it. You may very well find that there are others who feel the same way you do but don’t necessarily feel empowered to bring it up. It’s generally good to let others know how you’re feeling, so it doesn’t look like you’re just suddenly exploding at their teammate for no good reason.
Plus, it helps you find your Team You to have your back when you do have your mini-confrontation.
Next time he does this, excuse yourself from the original conversation and take him aside. Don’t lead him off alone, just a few steps away from the person you were talking to. Explain to him firmly that he’s being obnoxious and rude, that you’re trying to have a conversation with people and you don’t appreciate his interrupting it or trying to barge into it, the way he keeps touching you or humblebragging about his various conquests. Let him know that his behavior is making it extremely difficult for you to be his friend and if he doesn’t cut it out right-the-fuck-now, you’re not going to be interested in talking to him at all. Don’t let him rationalize, deflect or otherwise shirk responsibility; this isn’t a dialogue, it’s a download. You’re letting him know very clearly where your boundaries are and he needs to respect them.
And be willing to follow through with your threat to not talk to him. Next time he pulls his barging-in schtick, tell him “We’ve talked about this. I’ve told you to stop. Now stop.” If he continues to pester you, be willing to cut him out of the conversation via body language and positioning. Turn your back on him, edge him out of the group so that he’s on the outside trying to reach in. If need-be, take your conversation elsewhere and leave him behind.
It can be hard standing up for yourself when you’re relatively new to the group and the person you’re dealing with is an established member. But at the end of the day, you have to be your own advocate and guardian and that means being willing to enforce your boundaries even in the face of potential drama.
Good luck.
Related Posts
- Obvious disclaimer is obvious: I’m not saying bi dudes don’t exist, just that male sexuality as we currently understand it is less of a moving target than female sexuality [↩]