Giving but not receiving

[pnkmilk]

So I’ve met this guy online and we’ve been involved in some kind of a LDR for a few months now. He’s the sweetest and we really like each other, but i think our biggest problem is intimacy… we try doing stuff over the phone which is fine but it seems like it always ends up with me helping him and not getting any kind of help in return if that makes sense. We have had many conversations about this and he’s great with talking things out.. we’ve even tried some intimacy related apps and things for couples communication. I get really insecure and I’ve told him I would love to do something together, but I chicken out every time. Part of me feels like I don’t even deserve to feel good. He’s also a shy guy so he it’s really not his personality to tell me to join him or to touch myself or anything like that. It’s also bothered me that at the beginning he seemed just fine to be the only one receiving. I adore him to bits and we’ve had many conversations about this stuff, but I can’t seem to figure out what to do now. I really don’t want to be the only one receiving anymore and it keeps happening. I keep letting it happen because I like him so much. He says he wishes I was brave enough to just step up and join him. What do I do?

[Urna]

Hi pnkmilk,

This sounds like a really difficult situation to be in, and I'm sorry that you're going through it. This is clearly not a sexually satisfying relationship for you (at least, not yet), but I'm glad that you two have had conversations about it and tried out apps and stuff to help with your communication around sex and physical intimacy.

Now, while sex shouldn't be a transaction where what you give is what you expect in return, it isn't right at all that only one person's pleasure seems to be taking centerstage, for whatever reason, and that your pleasure isn't taken just as seriously. A great first step to take is for both of you to (separately, of course) fill out this inventory we have on the site, called Yes, No, Maybe So, so that you can figure out exactly what you two want from the sexual side of your relationship, and whether those interests and expectations align. I'm quoting from this response to a user facing a similar situation to explain to you how this resource may be used:-

I'd suggest you first fill it out yourself, being as honest as you can, even if you feel a little uncomfortable doing so. Sometimes women, specifically, get or were reared with cultural messaging that it's men who are sexual, men who have sexual wants and needs, and that women are either only vehicles to serve those needs, or that women's sexual needs should always come second or aren't even okay in the first place. Those messages, if you have gotten them, don't come from a place of truth about women's sexuality, but are instead primarily based in either the social control of women (including by some women, not just men), or in a lack of understanding or education about women's sexuality. So, if in filling this out you find you feel like you shouldn't be, I'd encourage you to do it anyway and push past that feeling, because not only is it probably not all that authentic to you, it's a big barrier to discovering, pursuing and getting what you really want.

Once you fill it out just take a good, long look at it. Take some time with it to really soak up the big picture of what you want and what you don't, and to get a feel for what you'd want and need in a sexual partner that was a good fit for your unique sexuality that you see on those pieces of paper. You talk in your question about accepting how your boyfriend is, but you also need to be sure you're accepting how you are. Look at the results on those pages and try to fully accept that person and their sexuality, too.

Then ask your boyfriend to fill one out about himself. Tell him that the reason you want him to do this, and why you're also doing it for yourself, is to try and better understand and work through the conflict you two are having around sex. Let him know that something like this, a pretty standard tool sex therapists and educators use with people, can give each of you a good idea of what you both want on your own and ways to talk about it that are more productive and less heated. Let him know that while you want to take a next step and share those lists together, for this to be useful, it's important he answers truthfully, not in ways he thinks you may want him to answer. Let him know that this is important to you and to your relationship.

Once you've both done your lists and taken your own stock of them, share them with each other. You may want to set some ground rules first, making clear you think you both need to be accepting of each other and will try your best to be, and that when you get to the point where you talk about them together, you want to do that in a way where both of you knows the other is accepting, and that no one's sexuality or wants and needs are wrong and right here. Rather, that they just may be different in some places and the same in others, and that both are okay, even if the differences are an issue in your relationship right now, or aren't what one or both of you would ideally want. Suffice it to say, I'd also make an agreement that this information is something you'll both keep private, not bring to friends, since much of it is obviously very personal.

Looking at your lists side-by-side, where are there areas in alignment? Where are there areas of difference? Where are there areas of flexibility? With places you both have yesses, are those areas you both feeling are working and pleasurable for both of you in your sexual relationship? With places you both have maybes, or where one of you has a yes and the other a maybe, are those things you have already tried together? If not, might you want to start trying? In places where one of you has a no, and the other of you has a yes or a maybe, does that seem like something the person without the no can accept without feeling like they aren't getting things they really want or need? While our desires and what we are willing to try might change over time, I'd suggest you both figure that a no to something is something you'll need to live without in this relationship in the foreseeable future if you're going to stay in it.

Given what you said in your question about the oral sex, let's also talk a little bit about sound, fair ways to think about reciprocity. No kind of sex, in a healthy sexual relationship, should be about quid pro quo. In other words, just because you give him oral sex doesn't mean he owes you or should give you oral sex. Hopefully, you're engaging in oral sex with him because you enjoy it yourself, because you receive some kinds of physical and emotional pleasure from that activity, not just because he does alone, or because you hope that if you do it for him, he'll do it for you. In the case that's something you have been doing only because he likes it, or only or mostly because you want him to do something for you, I'd take a pass on that and any other kind of sex you've been having for those reasons pronto. I'd be sure that in doing your list, you answer honestly about an activity like that and discuss it honestly. It might also be a good idea to talk together about each of your motivations in sex, especially about mutual pleasure. Are you both invested as deeply in your partner experiencing pleasure as you are in your own? When one or both of you ONLY really wants pleasure for yourself, are those times you're choosing masturbation, which is about self-pleasure, rather than sex together, which is supposed to be about mutual pleasure?

Looking at both of your lists as a whole, and after those other discussions, how are you each feeling about this relationship as a sexual relationship? Does it seem like it's one that's likely to meet BOTH your needs or not? Do the two people represented on those pages look like a sexual match or a mismatch? For you, does looking at his list give you feelings of hope and possibility or feelings of dread or disappointment? How about the talks you had around the list: did they seem more fruitful and leave you feeling better than the talks in the past, or are you feeling just as crummy as before? All of these feelings and thoughts should give you good information to work with, and, ideally, a better place to make your best choices from moving forward.

Maybe doing something like this is just the ticket to finding out things could be a lot better pretty easily. Maybe you'll find some new things you both do or might want to do you didn't even think of, or one or both of you felt shy about voicing for fear the other wouldn't be interested or would react badly. Maybe you'll find some things that elicit conversations about sex you haven't yet had, or some issues that may be part of why you're not connecting well you didn't even think about, like differences in body boundaries, language or what you each might want in relationship models. Maybe you and he will discover some areas in which he might just not have some information or education: like, he may not know or understand that the majority of women don't frequently reach orgasm or feel satisfied by intercourse or other vaginal-only stimulation alone, in large part because that kind of activity, all by itself, often doesn't stimulate areas of the sexual anatomy that are very rich in sensory nerve endings. In other words, it's possible that going through an exercise like this, using it to reframe, rebalance and better inform your conversations about sex may show you ways to problem-solve with this you would not have come to otherwise. It could very well be that you CAN have a satisfying sexual relationship together, but that one or both of you just needed information you didn't have, different ways of communicating about this, or something to make it all a lot less loaded and volatile.

What if, when you look at these lists, there are, instead, very few places where you have intersections and alignment? If it seems clear that you want and like very different things, or that your boyfriend just isn't open to trying any of the things you want and may or do enjoy, especially the things you like or want most? In that case, it just may be that the two of you aren't sexually compatible: in other words, that you're just not a good fit for a sexual relationship, and trying to continue one together is going to be fruitless, leaving one or both of you unhappy and dissatisfied. Maybe you aren't a good fit because he just needs to grow in some ways, become more comfortable experimenting with various kinds of sex, or recognize what feels good to a partner is probably not going to be only intercourse, things which he may come to in time. But if he isn't in the space in his life where he wants to do any of that or doesn't yet feel comfortable with any of that, you can't force that change or make it happen. You also can't count on it happening anytime soon or at all, because you can't predict the future.

What if all of what I have just said is moot because you don't feel you can ask him to even do something like this or he won't, or he starts, but won't finish, or he finishes but won't share? Or, what if you do this, but the communication around it remains broken down and tense? If any of those things are the case, then I've got to tell you that in that case, this relationship -- as a sexual one, but potentially also in other areas -- may be on the outs, or be one that's just very unlikely to turn out to be satisfying and happy for either of you. In other words, it's one I'd suggest you either reconfigure, perhaps shifting it to be a friendship or non-sexual romance, or just move on from, so that you both can try to find relationships that are a better fit. I'd certainly not suggest that this is a relationship you considered investing more into as a long-term romantic relationship if you want a sexual relationship to be part of your LTR.

I know that's a lot of material, but I thought it may help to have all this info in one place. The fact that you can't seem to "step up and join him" has nothing to do with bravery or lack thereof, it simply means that that's not something you want, sexually speaking. Hashing out what you do want is often a difficult process, which using the list above will definitely help you with. Another article that talks directly about reciprocity is this one: Reciprocity, Reloaded.

Let me know if any of that was helpful?