Archives for March 2016

Wednesday Open Thread: Secret Identity Edition

March 30, 2016 by Dr. NerdLove 82 Comments

It’s Wednesday, which means it’s time for the Doc to lock his office and change out of his scrubs into his supersuit in order to defend Hell’s Kitchen with his Anti-Gentrification Fists of JUSTICE. Meanwhile the NerdLove interns and residents take over the comments section for their own nefarious purposes!

This week’s suggested topic: well, on Monday things got a bit weird with the secret identity drama. So it’s time to clear the air and for everyone to come out of the phonebooth. Who are you, really? What’s your secret identity hiding? Share yours in the comments.

You know the rules: no hate, no spam, no trolling. Have fun!

How to Handle Being “Just Friends”

March 28, 2016 by Dr. NerdLove 487 Comments

One of the biggest myths in dating – and one I can’t stand – is the idea that men and women can’t be just friends. In its own way, it’s perversely fascinating because it’s very much a Straight People Problem. The idea that sex will inevitably come between two people doesn’t seem to be an issue when it’s two gay men or two gay women… and then of course, the idea that bi and pansexual people can’t be friends with anyone. But put a straight man and woman together and the general assumption is that somehow sex will inevitably rear its head and make platonic intimacy impossible.

"Oh come on, how is that NOT a one-way ticket to Boner Town?" — “Oh come on, how is that NOT a one-way ticket to Boner Town?”

As tempting as it is to just make jokes and quote When Harry Met Sally, the idea that men and women can’t be just friends is actually shockingly toxic to men. Men already have a hard enough time fostering emotionally intimate friendships with other men; when we also accept that platonic intimacy with women can’t exist, we isolate ourselves even further. As a result: we find ourselves even lonelier than before, even when we’re surrounded by friends and familes.

As part of an ongoing series on helping men be more emotionally intelligent, we’re going to pick apart some of the barriers to cross-gender platonic intimacy and talk about how to learn to be able to be just friends with women… and how this can make us better, healthier men.

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Ask Dr. NerdLove: What’s Wrong With My Libido?

March 25, 2016 by Dr. NerdLove 18 Comments

Dear Dr. NerdLove –

My problem is pretty straightforward: I’ve lost interest in sex with my wife; really, with anyone. I still can get turned on by some porn and masturbate, so the problem isn’t the plumbing (though as I’ve gotten older — I’m 40 — my erection has become less reliable and I do worry about that). Mostly, the effort to connect, to perform, to make things happen, is just freaking exhausting and not at all pleasurable for me. And when she tries to get me interested, I just feel like I’m under assault.

I’ve always had a dropoff in libido over long-term relationships — I found the early meetings exciting, but over time I got less and less responsive. It happened faster in each relationship, and in just a few months in this one. Yet we stayed together, which maybe tells you something about how well we fit in some ways.

It’s been eight years together now, five years married. But we’ve made zero progress in improving our sex lives. We tried couples counseling a handful of times, but it was too emotionally intense for her and we would up canceling. (She doesn’t much like talking about emotions or anything intimate.) I’ve also been in individual therapy several days a week for four years, but while that has helped in some broader areas of my life, it hasn’t shown many results in the bedroom.

I’m at a loss as to where to go from here. I feel like I want sex, I want connection, but in the abstract only. When it becomes flesh and blood, I retreat.

I hate talking about this stuff with her. And I hate the thought of letting her into my fantasy world. (I’m generally turned on by scenes of seduction and boundary-crossing; I’ve done some voyeuristic exploration at kink events; I also have recently started to wonder if I’m bi, just judging from the porn that I’ve started to gravitate toward.) But I love her, too. I worry that I am — or maybe she and I are both — too immature, even at this late date, to ever truly connect sexually with each other or with anyone else.

What do you recommend?

Lust has Gone Bust

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Wednesday Open Thread: Spring GIF Party!

March 23, 2016 by Dr. NerdLove 33 Comments

It’s Wednesday, which means it’s time for the Doc to sneak out of his office and take fiery revenge on the trees that are currently desecrating his sinuses. Meanwhile, the NerdLove interns and residents take over the comments section for their own nefarious purposes! This week’s suggested topic:

Sunday was officially the first day of Spring. Now the birds are singing, the weather is changing and all the damn trees are fucking all over the place.

There’s only one thing for it (besides Benadryl¹ ): Spring GIF party!

Share your favorites in the comments; images get turned back off at 8 PM central time.

You know the rules: no hate, no spam, not trolling.

Have fun!

Benadryl: because you can’t sneeze if you’re in a coma! [↩]

Healing After A Heartbreak

March 21, 2016 by Dr. NerdLove 76 Comments

Occasionally the universe (also known as “my Facebook feed”) will give me things to be annoyed about, which I appreciate because I could always use new topics. The latest example was a post from Elite Daily: “How He Became Broken: 3 Ways Men Never Fully Recover From Heartbreak”, which tops my list of “I don’t even know where to start”.

Except maybe like this…

Articles like this make me twitch because they treat socialization like destiny and gender differences as set in stone. The truth of the matter is, heartbreak sucks, but men aren’t taught how to heal from it. The problem isn’t that men are inherently more easily damaged by heartbreak and sorrow but that we’re taught to be disconnected from our damn emotions. So I want to start off an irregular series of posts I like to call Emotional Intelligence with a little about how to not let heartbreak break you.
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