Dear Evan,

I have a problem with my boyfriend and our sex life.

I want sex more often than he does. I have never had this problem before in other relationships and its starting to make me feel rejected.

We have sex two or three times a week, but the other day I wanted it again in the morning (we had it the night previously) and I came onto him and he pushed me away saying he had just been in the shower.

I’ve always been told I’m attractive and have never had any problems with men before so I don’t know why now. We’ve only been going out for about 7 months and in the beginning (before we slept together) he was really eager, but a couple of months down the line it’s all slowed down. He’s even told me I’m the best sex he’s ever had so what’s going wrong? I don’t know how to handle it.

Sarah

Dear Sarah,

I get this question as much as any other question. Except for maybe the “He’s just not that into me” question, which takes on many forms.

But I haven’t tried to tackle it until now, because I wasn’t sure what I wanted to say. I’m no Dan Savage/Sari Locker/Dr. Ruth sexologist. I’m just a guy who’s dated a lot and spends 90% of his waking hours talking about dating, sex and relationships. So take what I say with a grain of salt.

You didn’t say how old you are, Sarah, and that’s relevant to the conversation. Because a man’s sex drive – and testosterone level - is highest when he’s 18, and a woman peaks in her late 30’s. (If I’m off, forgive me.) What this means is that as our hormones slow down, we meet up with women who’ve never wanted it more. You can see how this can cause a problem.

You’re equating his sex drive with his attraction to you, and they’re not entirely correlated.

Instead of taking his lack of desire personally, I’d take it to heart when he says you’re the best he’s ever had. But that doesn’t necessarily mean he’s going to want to have sex as much as you. You’re equating his sex drive with his attraction to you, and they’re not entirely correlated.

Plus, one’s sex drive is highly individualized. For many, sex is best when it’s exciting and new. Once you’ve been together for seven months, the attraction may still be there, but the excitement may not be. This is why some men turn to porn, and others, to infidelity. Lust may be enough to start a relationship but, in and of itself, it’s not enough to sustain a relationship. Are there some couples who have extraordinary sex lives? Sure. But there are many more who, after a long day at work, just want to go to sleep.

And that’s another thing to consider – sex, done properly, is a lot of work. It’s fun work, no doubt, but in order to do the proper foreplay and pleasing and switching positions and stamina thing, you need a lot of time and energy. And frankly, we don’t always want to be all adrenalized and sweaty at 1am, especially if we have to wake up at 6:45am….

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As a woman going through some much desired transformation, I am taking my boyfriend to strip club to celebrate his b-day (because I know he likes ‘em). I would LOOOOVE to be the girl who doesn’t mind, but the images are stamped into my memories, and my heart hurts. 

Please help me accept the human nature that is “men”.

Juliette

Dear Juliette,

Contrary to what many of our readers might think, you’re taking a very evolved stance and I want to congratulate you for it.

Relationships are about doing things for our partners that make THEM happy, not just doing what feels best for us. Holding the girlfriend’s purse when she’s shopping for perfume? That’s for her. Spending $350 on a meal because we’re hanging out with her wealthy friends? That’s for her, too. Calling her at the end of the night when I just want to go to sleep? That’s for her. It makes her happy, it makes her feel connected, and it keeps our bond strong, and that’s what I’ve got to do to make my relationship work. Believe me, I’m not complaining. I get a LOT out of my partnership and my girlfriend makes all sorts of sacrifices for me. I know it, I appreciate it, and I never fail to express how lucky I am.

You might be thinking, “Yeah, that’s all well and good, Evan. But holding your girlfriend’s bag in Bloomie’s is not a real sacrifice. Juliette is talking about ANOTHER WOMAN RUBBING HERSELF ON HER BOYFRIEND RIGHT IN FRONT OF HER. How could you even compare the two?”

Oh, but I can. For one simple reason:

Neither of the two acts means anything. Now, I could CHOOSE to feel emasculated when I take my girlfriend shopping. I could CHOOSE to feel like a loser when I stay home on girls’ night out. I could CHOOSE to feel like the third wheel when my girlfriend is telling inside jokes to her best friend and I’m standing there like a bump on a log. But I don’t. Because it doesn’t MEAN anything about our relationship.

For the average guy who goes to a strip club once a year for a bachelor party, it’s just a meaningless diversion that combines all of a man’s greatest pleasures: booze, boobs, and his buddies.

And that’s what any woman who is threatened by a stripper has to get. Strip clubs don’t turn us on. They make us giggle.

Now, if you ever went out with some guy who blew his paycheck at Crazy Horse or left you for a woman named Sierra and her six inch heels, feel free to ignore my advice. But for the average guy who goes to a strip club once a year for a bachelor party, it’s just a meaningless diversion that combines all of a man’s greatest pleasures: booze, boobs, and his buddies. We get to gawk and point and laugh and drink and bond with our friends before reality sets in and we go home a few hundred dollars lighter….

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I dated my ex for 16 months. We broke up with no hints of getting back together. 2 weeks later I had a one night stand with someone I don’t know. 1 week later, my ex calls and indicates we should try to get back together. In subsequent discussions, she asks me if I had slept with anyone. Being an honest man, I reluctantly told her yes. She is furious and hurt and is accusing me of cheating and lying to her. I want to be with her, never wanted to be without her (she pushed the breakup), and am disappointed that I hurt her, BUT, do not feel like I cheated or lied. Where do I go from here? Lay low and see if time helps or go all in again and try to win her over again?

Thanks.

Brian

Dear Brian,

You did nothing wrong.

You were broken up.

You had no hints of getting back together.

You did what pretty much any guy would do after a sixteen month relationship.

That doesn’t mean you’re out of the woods yet, but it does mean you’re technically “right”. The problem is that having truth and logic on your side matters very little when discussing emotional issues. This, by the way, is the main reason that I blog. I try to inject a little male logic into the largely feminine realm of relationship discussions. (This does NOT mean women are illogical – I’m just making a generalization here). I don’t actively hope to change the world, but I do hope to observe the world AS IT IS, as opposed to how it SHOULD be.

She probably wanted you cry your eyes out for a few weeks, paralyzed, unable to imagine yourself in the presence of any other woman.

Your girlfriend is caught up in how it SHOULD be. After a long, serious relationship – one in which she still had feelings for you - she was clearly hoping for some dating moratorium. She probably wanted you cry your eyes out for a few weeks, paralyzed, unable to imagine yourself in the presence of any other woman. And then, when she came back to reconcile with her beloved, she was shocked to discover that you had drowned your sorrows in the cleavage of another woman during - GASP! – a meaningless one-night stand. The gall! The disrespect! Did your relationship just mean NOTHING?

It feels pretty ridiculous to type those last few lines because they make no logical sense. You were broken up. You did when men do when they’re single – look for other women. When my serious girlfriend dumped me in 2004, I left her house, red-eyed, drove ten minutes home, and reactivated my JDate account instantly. Would I want to be the first woman to date me after my heart had been shattered? Hell, no. But I certainly wasn’t going to repair my wounds by sitting at home by myself for a month….

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I’m in my mid 30’s and she is in her early 30’s. I’ve been dating her for three months now (about 12-13 dates) and everything seems to be going well. A couple of weeks ago she asked me about my feelings, what am I feeling. Well, I told her that I like her a lot…that I’m crazy for her. She told me she feels the same way, but wants to take it slow. She mentioned that the last time she felt this sort of passion she got hurt. 

Ok, I said I understand and we can take it slow and I certainly don’t want to do anything that’s going to make you uncomfortable. I should say that we do “make out” but no intercourse. I have no problem waiting until she is ready for sex, but I would feel much better about it if we were exclusive. Neither of us have brought it up and seeing how it’s only been a few months, I don’t want push her away with the “are we exclusive” topic.

Is there something more to her statement of wanting to take it slow?

Thanks!

Brian

Dear Brian,

One of my clients had the same exact issue going on during his burgeoning relationship. He’s 22 and he’d been on about 6-7 dates without any physical intimacy or exclusivity. And although he, too, is crazy about this girl, he couldn’t help but wonder where things were going.

My instincts told me that he was a victim of “nice guy” syndrome. By being so worried that a woman won’t like him, or that he might upset her if he makes a move, he passively plays the friend card and kills all hope of attraction. I encouraged my client to not be afraid of making a move physically, and, if his date doesn’t reciprocate, sit her down for a heart to heart.

Heart to heart discussions, to me, REVEAL feelings, they don’t DICTATE feelings. Which is why having the conversation won’t change how someone feels about you – it’ll just let you know the cold, hard, truth. I wrote about this extensively for Match.com’s Happen Magazine last year. As long as you’re reasonable and not attacking, you’re just gonna get your answer by being direct. Most people are way too afraid to do this. Not my client.

Heart to heart discussions, to me, REVEAL feelings, they don’t DICTATE feelings. 

He took my advice after she declined to go “any further” than making out… Here’s the recap of their heart-to-heart in which he talked about how he needed clarity on their relationship:…

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I want to know if it is possible to have a conversation with a guy without it getting sexual? I’m not talking about a little flirting, I’m talking about body parts being described, how they would be used, etc. I’m all for a little flirting, but it seems like the internet puts no barriers on what a person will say. I mean, if I met some guy at a party, after a little flirting, he wouldn’t tell me how hard his C$(K is, now would he?!?! And he wouldn’t want to know how I think that would feel, either. Now, he may very well be thinking these things, but he would never come out and say them in person, especially after knowing me only a few minutes.

I’ve even had some quality conversations, that after a few days of talking, turn into this kind of a discussion. Is this just the way it is? Is this what I am to expect?

I don’t have a problem with a man telling me I am sexy, but if I acknowledge that, am I setting myself up for these kinds of conversations? Is there a way to avoid it, or should I just avoid these men if they go into it?

I’d love some advice on this. I’m getting a bit fed-up!

Leah

Hey Leah,

What are you wearing right now?

Sorry. Too easy.

And that’s the thing with conversations that devolve into sex talk. It’s simply too easy to go there.

This is the nature of online communications. Millions of people hiding behind their computers to connect. Except some of them are dorks parading as big shots. And some are men acting like little girls. And some are women being brazen when they’re super-shy in real life. But the one thing we know about online communications is that people can be whoever they want to be. With one amazing caveat – they’re never held accountable for their actions.

The one thing we know about online communications is that people can be whoever they want to be. With one amazing caveat – they’re never held accountable for their actions.

I want to do something revolutionary here and change that statement to “we’re never held accountable for our actions”. Because when we’re talking about policing online behavior, it always seems to imply that it’s everybody else who’s wrong, when, in fact, WE’RE what’s wrong.

No matter how you slice it, this is a societal problem from the presidency on down – we’re a bunch of hypocrites who lie and cheat and misrepresent and fabricate - and cry and complain when everyone else does the same thing. This isn’t about you, Leah. This is just something I needed to get off my chest.

Sure, I’ve gone there before – notably when discussing liars. See, it’s okay when I say I’m 5’10” instead of 5’9”, but it’s awful when a woman claims to be 130lbs when she’s really 150lbs. It’s fine when I say I have an “athletic” body instead of an average one, but it’s not cool when she says she’s 35 when she’s really 37. Telling the truth is for other people; we want the right to play fast and loose with the facts as we see fit. Because WE’RE good people. And THEY’RE bad people.

But good people steal office supplies. Good people get “creative” on their taxes. Good people write nasty things on blogs. And we do this for one main reason – because we’re never held accountable. If we were, we’d clean up our acts REAL fast….

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I’ve been reading for a while, and I find myself hopping on your blog whenever I meet a new guy or am faced with a new situation. But have yet to find something to address my question, given all the differences in the way men and women view sex and relationships and communication: What are the rules about disclosing your number of sexual partners and should it matter?

Now of course I think about this more so in a safety sense, not that I need to know how many girls a guy has slept with but more so I want to know that he is safe for me to sleep with. Inevitably though, this question of numbers comes up and I always hate when my number is higher than his or significantly lower. I know it sounds silly but it’s hard to know what a man is thinking when you share this type of thing. Is it better to just keep it to yourself? Do numbers really matter?

Megan

Dear Megan,

LOVE YOU for asking this question. As always, my opinion is just my opinion. Feel free to disagree. (And I know you will!)

So, like the whole “Who Pays” thing, there are different rules for men and women. Mainly because the sexual double standard is alive and well. I don’t endorse this. I report this.

The average number of partners a man purports to have in a lifetime is around 11. The average number of partners a woman purports to have is closer to 6. Of course, this is not true.

Says Dr. Norman Brown of the University of Alberta:

"Every time a man has sex with a woman, a woman has to have sex with a man. So either there are some very lucky joes out there or someone is not getting their numbers right," Brown said.

I know I haven’t answered your question, Megan, but I thought I would puncture a hole in the “men are promiscuous/women are chaste” thing. If a man’s sleeping with a woman, a woman’s sleeping with a man and everybody’s numbers are going up. So there.

And as far as I’m concerned it is NOBODY’S BUSINESS HOW MANY PEOPLE YOU’VE SLEPT WITH.

And as far as I’m concerned it is NOBODY’S BUSINESS HOW MANY PEOPLE YOU’VE SLEPT WITH.

Similarly, it’s none of your business how many people he’s slept with. This is a classic “don’t ask, don’t tell” situation, on par with “Are you dating anyone else right now?” and “Have you ever had a drug fueled orgy with six Polynesian dwarves?" If you say yes, you’ve got a lot of explaining to do, and frankly, you shouldn’t have to explain….

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Dear Evan,

I keep losing relationships when I say that sex isn’t right outside of a marriage. I used to think that women have more self-control than men, but have since realized that we are all humans.

Is it ever possible to have a year-long relationship without sex? Even the most conservative girl I’ve met gets heavy on that after a while. I feel pressured. They ask questions like "will we be doing that (whatever is the action in the movies) in future?"

I think maybe I’m the problem. I’ve been called frigid, gay (am not), etc.

There’s so much more to life than sex, right? Maybe I should look for intelligent scientists.

Jon

Dear Jon,

You sound a bit like the guy who insists on buying flowers for women on first dates. He seems like a really nice guy, but what he doesn’t get is that his views are out of step with the majority of society.

So it’s not a matter of whether he’s right or wrong; it’s a matter of whether his behavior is effective or ineffective.

When you lead your question with “I keep losing relationships when I say that sex isn’t right outside of a marriage”, you make it abundantly clear that your moral stance is quite ineffective. That doesn’t make you wrong. That makes your choice a highly questionable one as far as most women are concerned.

And, as I am wont to do, I’m going to use this platform to ask readers to consider if they have any hard-wired minority beliefs that prevent them from making a connection. Again, I’m not a moralist; I’m a pragmatist. Just because a guy tells me that his mullet hairstyle is the purest expression of how he likes to look, doesn’t mean that wearing his mullet in his online dating photo will help him woo the ladies.

Just because a guy tells me that his mullet hairstyle is the purest expression of how he likes to look, doesn’t mean that wearing his mullet in his online dating photo will help him woo the ladies.

Lest you think I’m joking – that’s a true story. I had a client four years ago who was a grown-up 70’s rocker who teaches guitar lessons. Nice man. Very passionate. But in his insistence on “being himself”, he pretty much eliminated every woman who tossed her AquaNet out the window in 1989. Same goes for my Jewish client who loved his dreadlocks, and was surprised he didn’t get much attention on JDate. Somehow he was shocked that all the Ivy League women who want to marry doctors and lawyers weren’t flocking to his unwashed nest of hair. Doesn’t mean he’s a bad guy – it just means he had to make some tough choices: Keep the hair and lose the women. Or lose the hair and get the women.

Since I’m not a psychologist, I’m not gonna worry in this space about WHY you’d opt for abstinence. That’s between you and your clergyman. All I can say is that the number of people aboard the no-sex train is increasingly small. So as I see it, you have two choices:

Keep beating the drum that says sex is wrong outside of marriage and continue to wonder why most women keep running away, OR:

Get off your moral high horse and start sexually servicing these women the way they want to be serviced.

If not, someone else will. I guarantee that.

Dear Evan,

I met this guy online and he is incredible. One thing though, I saw a bunch of porn magazines in his bathroom. Should I be concerned?

Tarry

Dear Tarry,

Uh, no.

And for the sake of having a blog post longer than two words, I’m going to try and think of five reasons that you shouldn’t be too concerned.

1. He masturbates. The porn helps to stimulate him. It would be far stranger to if he didn’t have porn. When your sexual peak has passed you by at age 18, when your hormones are no longer raging, and when you’ve had your fair share of sex, it takes more to get yourself going. Magazines don’t even work for me anymore. Good for him.

2. He left it out in the open. This is not a guy who feels he has something to hide. Isn’t that much better than a guy who has an alphabetical stash of DVD’s piled up in the recesses of his closet?

3. He’s comfortable in his own skin. I remember going to a writer’s house back when I was 24 years old and seeing a Playboy in the bathroom. I thought it was so edgy to display it in the magazine rack. And he had a wife who let him do this! Years later, I can’t understand why I found this so remarkable. My Playboy sits in the magazine rack next to my toilet. My girlfriend and her best friend were just citing the Norman Mailer piece in this month’s issue – her best friend read it at her boyfriend’s place. Honestly, ladies – there are some really good articles in there.

4. He probably isn’t going to be vanilla in the bedroom. A guy who fantasizes in a healthy way is more likely to mix it up a bit.

5. He openly appreciates the female body. We can discuss airbrushing, fake boobs, unrealistic standards, the male gaze, and the negative societal impact of pornography – all of which is valid - but the simple truth is – men look at breasts with slackjawed wonder. Better to understand this very base desire than to fight it every step of the way.

I’m sure there are more reasons, but it doesn’t much matter. All that matters is if YOU’RE okay with it. If you’re not, all of the above rationalizations won’t mean a thing to you – and are most likely to piss you off.

But I’ll tell you, whenever I hear about a woman who takes her hubby to a strip club on occasion, I think that’s pretty cool. Instead of trying to enforce the unrealistic fantasy that he’ll never have eyes for another woman, she brings him to a source of temptation, gets him all hot and bothered, and allows him to indulge in fantasy for a night, before taking it out on each him in the bedroom. That’s not just sexy; it’s smart.

Moreover, it’s far healthier than the alternative approach: “Look at another woman and you’re dead!”

Moreover, it’s far healthier than the alternative approach: “Look at another woman and you’re dead!”

Denying someone the right to do something is a sure ticket to resentment. Just ask any disciplinarian parent who’s had a kid rebel by smoking pot or getting an earring. The fight to prevent the act is far worse than the act itself.

To be clear, my “endorsement” of pornography isn’t a blanket statement. Porn can absolutely be problematic. If your guy knows the name of every porn actress, it’s a problem. If he has a lifelike doll that sits with its mouth open in his closet, it’s a problem. If he blows half his pay check at the strip club, it’s a problem. If he locks himself in his room for hours at a time to please himself while you’re in the house, it’s a problem. If he’s into violence or treats you in a manner you don’t want to be treated, it’s problem.

But if he’s got a Playboy next to the toilet?

That just means he’s a guy.

I’d like to hear your take on how a guy can smoothly handle the condom issue early in the dating relationship (assuming things get hot and heavy on the first few dates – before the “safe sex talk” comes up). 

For example, on the first few dates, the guy is not sure if he is going to ‘get lucky’ or not with the woman he’s dating. 

If things start to get intimate early on, the guy is going to look pretty tacky if he just whips a condom out of his pocket when it’s time. The woman would probably think, “The jerk must think I’m always easy – the he put a condom in his pocket EXPECTING sex!”

So what’s he supposed to do to make this go more smoothly? If he just whips out a condom out of his wallet, she’ll probably think he’s looking like the promiscuous high school football star. 

The guy could just not bring condoms on the early dates (so it doesn’t look too obvious that he’s just out for sex), and hope the woman has one in her belongings or at her place. But then the woman could be thinking the guy is not very responsible, and he’s leaving it to her to bring the goods.

Perhaps the guy could put some in his glove compartment and tell her, "Hey, I didn’t know we were going to get intimate on this 1st (or 2nd) date, but I do have a condom in my glove compartment, I think."  It would chill the sudden hot intimacy while he has to dash out to his car, but how else does a guy not look like a jerk in this whole process if things get unexpectedly sexual early on? 

Thanks.

Jim

Dear Jim,

First off, kudos to you for asking this. It’s not only a fun question, but an original one, as well.

Second, you’ve clearly thought this through, although I’m quite sure I don’t agree with your final conclusion.

Dashing to the car to retrieve a rubber from the glove compartment? I know you were going for some sort of compromise between prepared and unprepared, but this isn’t it. Might as well turn on Jay Leno and pour two glasses of milk, because your mood has already been ruined.

So let’s discuss the two alternatives you brought up and allow me to counter with one that you don’t seem to have considered.

You’re right about the perception of the guy who carries the condom in his wallet. I did it myself for years and got nothing out of it, except for a bunch of wallets with raised ring outlines. And, as you acknowledged, it comes off as a bit too slick and tacky. While being prepared is usually a good idea, the negative connotations outweigh the benefits of preparedness.

The other idea you came up with is not bringing condoms on dates, in hopes that the woman is prepared. This is a far better scenario, and I don’t believe that it indicates that you’re not responsible. Rather, it indicates that you didn’t expect to be in the position to have sex.

But what I want to posit with the rest of this post is a mind-blowing new take for men on how to deal with sex and early-phase dating.

Don’t do it….

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You saw “When Harry Met Sally…” but have you lived it?  I have. Once had a wicked crush on my best friend from eleventh grade. Lost touch, got back in touch, lost touch again. We hadn’t seen each other in four years when we reconnected after college, but when we did, we slept together. It was everything I’d dreamed of, but it was so…foreign…and somehow, wrong.  We stayed in touch for years afterwards – but we never ever got together again.

The thing about friendship is that you’re dealing with an established commodity. It’s not like meeting a cute stranger, swapping spit, and giving it a whirl. The stakes, in this instance, are a lot higher, because there’s actually something to lose. 

Now I’m sure you know a couple of longtime friends who got together after a dozen years of dating the wrong people and now they live happily ever after with their three kids in Sheboygan, WI.  It happens and I’m sure it’s close to an ideal situation.  I mean, after all, who better to be your partner than someone who knows you as a friend first? But this is the exception and not the rule. 99 % of relationships fail, otherwise you’d be married to your Spin the Bottle boyfriend from sixth grade. So if all relationships are fraught with danger, yet who better to navigate it than a trusted friend, what can we conclude?

Well, we know that sex is complicated. For some, it’s a lustful response to something visual. For others, it’s a tender, wordless expression of affection. Some people have sex. Some people make love. Women also have the added pull of the “cuddling” hormone oxytocin, which bonds them emotionally to men and makes unattached sex even more difficult.

Factor all this into the loaded variables that come with friendship. 

Maybe he’s been pining after her for years, playing the dutiful best friend. 

Maybe she’s spent all her time dating jerks and never bothered to consider him before.

Maybe they live in different states.

Maybe they work together.

Maybe they’ve never hung out socially before.

Maybe they spend a lot of time together already. 

Maybe their relationship is a secret.

Maybe their friends always joked about them but she said no.

Maybe she tries his last name on for size.

Maybe he pictures her naked….

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