I really am strange, but bear with me...

[Cobra_X30]

I went on to talk to her about a few more things (see my other thread in the Sex section of these forums) which made her pretty angry, sad, and offended. To say the least it did not go as well as planned. I think the majority of my problem is that I'm so sexually frustrated that I'm willing to take it out on her and her past, and that is definitely not right. I'm no better than any other of her former douchebag boyfriends, but still, it's so confusing to me...

 

Chauncey,

 

You want to avoid talking to her about your issues with her past for two huge reasons. Mainly it's going to make her feel judged by you. That will drive a wedge between you and make her feel as though she can't talk to you or trust you with her thoughts and feelings. Also, its mainly your mental issue to deal with... it's not something she can change, so you have to grapple with this on your own to a certain extent.

 

What you must do is tackle the present issues, without touching on the past, otherwise it will decrease your chances of resolving your current frustration. It will put up her defenses!

[StartingOver07]

Chauncey, I think you should consolidate your posts so that you can get more on-target responses. I read what you posted in the other forum and it appears that once again, your gf has justified her lack of desire to see you satisfied and managed to leave you feeling as though you are the one in the wrong! She says her sex drive is low because of her foot (which she injured), but this makes no sense. First off, as a woman currently wearing an ankle brace for an injury, I can assure you that nothing about my ankle is affecting my sex drive. Second and more important is that your gf has plenty of sex drive when it comes to you pleasuring her; she just has no desire to reciprocate. This speaks to something much larger than a broken foot, Chauncey.

 

I see you continuing to make excuses and justifications for her but the bottom line seems to be that, in spite of her words to the contrary, your gf is happy to be in a relationship where the sex is completely one-sided. This is NOT how a soulmate responds, Chauncey. Not at all.

 

I dare say that if a woman posted that her bf behaved as your gf does, there would be a cacophony of voices telling her to ditch the lout and find someone who actually cared about her and her needs. Why aren't you doing this???

[StartingOver07]

Chauncey,

 

Read the first paragraph of this post. This is how a woman who cares about her bf feels about sex.

[4givrnt4gtr]

 

She is definitely not the person I first expected her to be, and it's honestly a bit disappointing.

 

This is the best way to ruin a new relationship. To have high expectation of the person you THINK she is. I think when you get into a dating thing is to actually get to know this person from scratch, whether u knew her as a friend before or not. People will hardly ever live up to our imagined, (usually placed in a pedestal) imaged we have for them. When they dont, we feel like they lied and betrayed us, when in reality it is our own fault for ignoring that they are human and have (and will) make mistakes.

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She ended up having sex with a guy she only dated for 4 days, even though when we first began dating (after knowing each other for 6 months) we didn't have sex until 10 months) even though she told me before that she takes sex seriously.

 

I can totally relate to that. I did pretty stupid things in college, BUT those stupid things TAUGHT ME to take sex seriously. Therefore, i can see how, BECAUSE of her past, she now takes sex seriously

 

I think its important for you to realize if and how she grew because of her past experiences. It seems to me that she is now a better person because of them, and is more likely to not ever repeat this things since she already knows, for a fact, that they are detrimental to her.

 

I hope you can move on past all this

[blackbird]

oooh another very nice point. I guess a better way to put it is this - when hearing about the situation and applying it to her, HER perspective should matter, not the guys'. I never even GAVE her a perspective, let alone hearing what it was - my assessment was simply "those guys probably thought you were a whore" and that was it. her reply was quite simple - "so what? what does it matter what they thought? it certainly wasn't about them." ... I guess what I'm saying is that it shouldn't have mattered at all what the guys were thinking. It should only have mattered to me what she was thinking, which was what I told you.

 

Aalike, that is a very good point about looking at the situation from her perspective. But I notice that you mention HER perspective and what you thought of the GUYS' perspective above, but what about YOUR perspective? Ok, you weren't there at the time, but you're the one who's thinking about it now. You say you immediately thought that the guys would have considered her a 'whore'. Why does this bother you unless it's a reflection of your own thoughts, albeit perhaps only in a tiny, warped way? Do you think that a girl who allows herself to have sex in such a situation is a 'whore'? If you don't, and she doesn't, then of course it does not matter... but if she doesn't, and you do, even if it's just a tiny little irrational part of you, perhaps therein lies the problem.

 

What does the word 'whore' mean to you anyway? Is it the foursome situation that bothers you, or is it her attitude towards sex that seemed to have been illustrated by it originally, i.e. that of someone who is fine with sex for recreation and physical gratification without emotional involvement? (I understand that you've worked past that by recognizing that a single situation does not an attitude or person make.)

 

By the way, I'm struggling with a situation which is similar to yours and Chauncey's, except rather than a one-off incident, my fiance's past is filled with threesomes, foursomes, an orgy or two, casual sex galore, many incidences of cheating, and some things I won't mention here. And like you, I never thought of myself as a prude or in any way not open-minded towards sexual exploration and experimentation, but this has been difficult. If I can believe he has changed from that (especially the cheating) and that his past does not necessarily predict, control, nor describe his present and future self, hopefully you can too.

 

However another focal point is the fact that none of these things were known until about 3 months ago. Considering we've been together for almost a year, it was hard to believe she had done these things, as obviously I've been with her since her "transformation". I never even suspected any of this.

 

That's a great point, Chauncey. Why didn't you suspect any of this? Why did you have to find out through her friend, or through her Trash folder? My question is, have you had in-depth conversations about your views towards sex and your prior experiences, prior to 3 months ago? If you did, did she lie to you about her past? If you did not, why not? Perhaps she was afraid of scaring you off with such ideas about her from her past before you got to know her as she is now.

 

Not that I advocate holding such things back. One thing I'm glad my fiance has always done is that he has never concealed any part of his past from me, as far as I'm aware. But instead of being upset that you didn't suspect any of this before now, can you perhaps think about being happy that she trusts you enough now to share more intimately with you? Though she's got to stop telling you half-truths or embellished truths, like with that guy at the party.

[AAlike]

Aalike, that is a very good point about looking at the situation from her perspective. But I notice that you mention HER perspective and what you thought of the GUYS' perspective above, but what about YOUR perspective? Ok, you weren't there at the time, but you're the one who's thinking about it now. You say you immediately thought that the guys would have considered her a 'whore'. Why does this bother you unless it's a reflection of your own thoughts, albeit perhaps only in a tiny, warped way? Do you think that a girl who allows herself to have sex in such a situation is a 'whore'? If you don't, and she doesn't, then of course it does not matter... but if she doesn't, and you do, even if it's just a tiny little irrational part of you, perhaps therein lies the problem.

 

I don't know that it's "my thoughts" so much as a manifestation of a school of thought - one that I try not to aspire to but might have been drawn toward by the fairy tale love that I had for this girl, you know? I'm the kind of guy that people dump a lot of secrets on, so I'm used to looking objectively and emotionless at other's pasts. but I couldn't do it with her.

 

Honestly, I don't even know if I HAD a perspective of my own on this...I didn't even realize that people actually did this stuff in real life - my only real frame of reference for an MMF threesome (plus one but whatever) was pornos and urban dictionary. so yeah, given the nature of how I thought that type of situation works and how I thought that it was viewed, sure, I'm sure my thoughts came into play at the time. however, once I had a real-life view of the situation instead of a sensationalized one, I don't think that I thought of her as a "whore" anymore.

 

What does the word 'whore' mean to you anyway? Is it the foursome situation that bothers you, or is it her attitude towards sex that seemed to have been illustrated by it originally, i.e. that of someone who is fine with sex for recreation and physical gratification without emotional involvement? (I understand that you've worked past that by recognizing that a single situation does not an attitude or person make.)

 

I can't speak for Chauncey, but I think in my case it's just the foursome situation. I completely agree that casual sex is fine - I mean considering pretty much ALL of my sex before her was essentially casual (mostly FWB stuff, I don't really do ONS, but still, people that I was quite certain that I wasn't in love with). and I don't have comparative sexual performance issues or feel threatened by the fact that she's been with plural guys. I think it's that "group sex" as a concept to me just seems so ridiculous, unecessary (and yes, I'm including the "two chicks" thing in here too) and honestly a little bit gross. and again, I'm sure the shock value of a situation like that comes into play, given the visual nature of us cavemen. so I think it was more the replaying it in my head that was bothering me and thinking "yuck how could she have ever wanted that?" I don't think that I personally ever really thought of her as a "whore" per se - moreso I was questioning why she'd want to do something that was (to me) so obviously disgusting and that could potentially make others think that she was a whore. it's totally silly, I know, but again, I was dealing with totally new feelings.

 

By the way, I'm struggling with a situation which is similar to yours and Chauncey's, except rather than a one-off incident, my fiance's past is filled with threesomes, foursomes, an orgy or two, casual sex galore, many incidences of cheating, and some things I won't mention here. And like you, I never thought of myself as a prude or in any way not open-minded towards sexual exploration and experimentation, but this has been difficult. If I can believe he has changed from that (especially the cheating) and that his past does not necessarily predict, control, nor describe his present and future self, hopefully you can too.

 

Well I think that both your and Chauncey's situation is quite a bit different than mine - I think that Chauncey is intertwining his retroactive jealousy with his very real relationship problems in the here and now. I don't have those problems - our sex life is stellar.

 

Furthermore, I don't think that in my situation that I ever applied it to her persona as a whole - rather it's like it stood out there as some isolated smudge that I just wished that I could "get rid of" per se. I think it has bothered me less as i've progressed in the relationship and seen her as a person with flaws like everyone else. Early on, when we were in the "pedestal" stage and I looked at her as totally flawless, it was like the only blemish in my mind and I just kept thinking "why did she have to do that and why did she have to tell me about it?" - it might have been more having to reconcile it than the actual thing itself, which, when it comes down to it, is totally not a big deal in the grand scheme of things. and there's just the stupid guy pride where you don't want to be "dating the slut" - I thought that I was above all that crap. I'm clearly not - haha. but things are fine these days and we're getting along well. every once in a while that might linger but not like before, and I only anticipate that it will continue to fade.

 

Your situation, however - I can't really say how I'd react to that...but I appreciate you disclosing because it only solidifies how trivial mine was, and also the "past" component of Chauncey's.