Scarleteen

I think I can try asking him to leave the initiating to me for a while. It might actually mean that sex is off the table for a long time anyway, since I tend to run against some kind of block when it comes to asking for it, just as I do with asking for anything that I want. So it might be good practice for me in that department, as well.

I doubt that he's ever thought about it all that much, since he doesn't seem all that bothered by it. I don't think anyone else has ever thought of this as a problem. He has ex-girlfriends, but we've never really discussed if they ever thought this was an issue or not, and if they didn't, then I wouldn't be surprised if he's just accepted this as a part of who he is. Which is fine, I've done so myself with a lot of my issues (which does unfortunately mean that they're harder to unpack now that I want to, but that's neither here nor there), so I can understand why he's done so if that's the case. But that would also mean that he's never thought of this as a problem that requires a therapist. But I don't know, we've never talked about it in much depth before, so maybe I shouldn't speculate so much.

Yeah, I agree that we need to sort things out both together and individually if this is going to work. I'm honestly just concerned that he'd think that I'm trying to change him into what I "really" want if I start poking at too many things at once, or that I'm suddenly heaping criticism on him out of nowhere, so I realize that I'll have to take baby steps and be very clear that I'm taking care of my own baggage at the same time so he won't take it the wrong way. But I do feel that there's a lot of stuff we need to unpack before us living together would work.

He's two years younger than me, has a job and while he doesn't live on his own yet, he handles so much of his own household chores that he might as well have been living alone. He did mention going to a therapist for a brief time, a long time ago, so he's not completely opposed to therapists in general. Just as a point of reference, I've lived together with people and on my own since I was a teenager, I'm a full-time student juggling a couple of side jobs (which barely cover my rent, but eh) and I've handled most of my economy for years now (my parents help out with some things, like paying for my insurance).

And congrats on handing in your manuscript, as well, good job!

Thanks!

I'd actually bet that it intrudes upon his quality of life more than it seems. He may have simply gotten used to how much it does, especially if, as he has with you, he can find people who basically don't make him have to manage it. By "make" I don't mean force, I just mean will accept the impacts it has on THEIR quality of life rather than set limits and boundaries. And in your case, as we know, some of that is about having your own stuff that makes sexual limits and boundaries, and asserting your own sexual needs difficult, as well as you simply not knowing that a partner basically not regarding your body isn't okay or what we should expect from partners.

In a word, people with profound phobias or OCD (or both) actually tend to have big impacts on their quality of life when either go unmanaged. But fear of managing them and other things that feed avoidance as a response can sometimes feel less scary for people than taking those steps, especially if they aren't even acknowledging there's a problem. I'd say his first step is acknowledging this is a problem, and it does sound like he's resistant to doing that: him kind of trying to turn this around on you by making statements like the only problem is that you can't get off sound, to me, like someone very scared or otherwise resistant to be honest about how there's a big underlying issue here that would be there whether you were even in the picture or not, let alone sexual with this person. And I'd bet that his exes did not think this was all fine and good. Is he friends with any of them; are any of them still any part of his life? (This is mostly just me being curious, so if that feels intrusive, it's fine to ignore that.)

I hear you working really hard here to maintain your own awareness of your own stuff. I don't think this sounds to me, any of it, like you trying to make him into someone he isn't. Really, you know, because you've lived it, that how things have been with you two sexually is just not okay, and is BOUND to make the other person -- anyone he's been sexual with in the ways he has with you with all this stuff -- get little to nothing out of it, at the least, and feel pretty darn horrible, on the other end of things. If after two years of this you weren't feeling at the end of your rope, I'd actually be pretty concerned about you and your well-being.

The deal is that if he wants to have a sexual partner, he needs to be able to be one himself. That's as concise as I can get with that. So, this isn't about trying to make him someone else, it's simply holding a line that if he's going to be your sexual partner, he has to be a partner, and you and your body need to be regarded, seen and included as much as his has been. That's not some crazy ask: it's ground zero for any kind of sexual partnership where everyone involved is treated like a whole person.

So, he gets two choices, then: if he wants to be your sexual partner, then, if he can, he needs to learn how to be that, put the effort in to do what he needs to to get there, and then BE that. If he doesn't want to do any of that, then the choice he needs to make is to recognize he isn't committed to being an actual sexual partner, and so can't ask someone else to be one with him. Get what I mean?

Again, I think if both of you consider what would be going on were the shoe on the other foot, it's pretty obvious none of this is unreasonable. Would he even still be in a sexual relationship with someone were he in your role? Probably not, especially if he doesn't have the same struggles you do with feeling entitled to have sexual wants and needs, or if he knows better when it comes to what we should expect from people who are our sexual partners, as it hasn't sounded like he does. Were the shoe on the other foot, what would he do? I'm actually pretty curious if he's answered that question, but I'd hazard a guess that he'd either have nixed this as a sexual relationship way back when OR be asking the same things you are now, just probably much earlier.

Honestly, the thought that he's just avoiding accepting that he has a problem sounds much more appealing than him trying to manipulate me into dropping this issue. But at the same time, I guess I shouldn't be jumping onto that as the only explanation because it "feels" better and start acting like that's the way to sort this all out. But I want to be there for him and help him work this out, and if that means waiting for the right time to suggest seeing a therapist to look into this stuff, then I'll do that.
As for his exes, I'm not sure about all of them. I don't think he has much contact with all of them (or any of them) anymore, but he seems to regard most of them as fairly neutral people nowadays, as in "women I once had a thing with, but don't anymore". One of them is together with one of his best friends now, and he seems happy for them, for instance. There's just one ex that he truly hates, but from what I've heard from my boyfriend and those that were friends with both him and his ex, there were way bigger reasons that sexual problems there (and while it did throw up some red flags at first, when I first heard him talk about her that way, hearing that other people had the same opinions about her to varying degrees calmed me down).

Yeah, I do get what you mean about being a sexual partner. That makes me wonder if there's a way to phrase that to him without making him feel hurt, or making him worry that I'm about to leave him or force him to do stuff that he hates just to make me happy. The first image that popped into my head is a soccer reference, which just makes me giggle (I want to play the game with you, and right now you're just bouncing the ball on your knee, so let's try just kicking it back and forth a little and see what happens?) and I guess that would be more confusing and silly than helpful at this point.

I used to feel pretty okay with the way things have been sexually, or at least willing to accept it for his sake, but as I grew more and more frustrated I realized that this situation wasn't good for either one of us. I would just feel increasingly worse as time went on, and our whole relationship would probably suffer for it.

I did actually ask him what he would do if he were in my situation. And he said that he would like to change things in that case, but would still value my personality much more than anything else. First, that made me wonder if he was implying that the fact that I was trying to change things meant that I wasn't valuing his personality (or that he meant that he'd want to make changes, but would accept if things stayed the same forever despite him not wanting them to??), then it made me wonder if we're having some kind of misunderstanding regarding whether sex is important to this relationship or not, or if he differentiates between romantic and sexual relationships and hasn't conveyed that (and if that means that he considers the romantic part of our relationship very important, but doesn't really care if we have sex or not?), or if there some flavour of asexuality involved here after all that he hasn't realized or been completely honest about, or a lot of other things. It sparked way more questions than it answered.

For sure, it sounds like there are a lot of unknowns here, and a lot to talk together about. And, of course, he's going to have to do his own Big Thinks like you have to even be able to do that, and then be willing to be honest about them with himself and you.

All of what you've got in your last paragraph here is what to ask him, and you're only going to have whatever answers he gives to that if and when he gives them to you. That sounds a lot like stating to obvious to me, so apologies if that sounds silly.

I think that saying to someone, "I need a sexual partner who includes and regards my body and sexuality as much as I do theirs" isn't hurtful. Again, you wanting the basic things we all need from sexual partners where our sexual lives and interactions have any change of being healthy and of benefit to everyone isn't out of line, and stating you want that ground zero isn't hurtful to someone else. This is about telling the truth.

I'd suggest that if it's painful for him to have to finally deal with the reality that he hasn't met those very basic needs, you try and recognize that that's not about you voicing the reality, it's about that it IS the reality. And perhaps it will be painful to him, but if so, I don't think that's a bad thing or something to try and protect someone from. If you feel like you have to protect him from the truth about some of the ways he's treated you -- which simply aren't okay, they're just not -- and gone about getting his own needs and wants met without being willing to regard you at all save how you meet those, you have to know that's really not good. If someone can't handle the truth of how they are sexually behaving, then seriously, they're just not someone ANYONE should be being sexual with.

I don't know about you, but it'd be a lot more painful for me to have a partner I was sexual with who I wasn't regarding, who I was, in many ways, kind of treating like a sex toy, and NOT have them tell me if I had managed to be unaware of that (and unless none of his partners have felt able to say something, because everyone has felt so unable to speak up for some reason, I'd bet my favorite pair of boots this isn't the first time someone has pointed that out to him) than to have them tell me. In fact, when I put myself in that situation, I find the idea of being with someone sexually for two years and both somehow keeping myself from seeing that I wasn't regarding them and treating them as a whole person, that I would be going about this like he has, without that stopping or anyone even saying something earnestly chilling.

I just wanted to say that I won't be able to answer for a while now, maybe a few days. But I'll take this time to mull over these questions and try discussing them with him whenever he seems up to it. I'll get back with the results as soon as I can.

No trouble: anything here is really about what you need and what works for you, so feel free only to come around when it works for you and you want to!

I hope some of the things settle down for you, or that you can at least do something for yourself in the next few days to find some solace and peace.

Okay, so things haven't exactly settled down around here (if anything, they're a little crazier than a couple of days ago, gah), but there has been some changes despite this.

Now, I was pretty sure that he had put this whole thing out of his mind for now, so imagine my surprise when I show up at his place after work to find that he's filled out the Yes, No, Maybe So form and has put some serious thought into every single one of the questions. I had already done mine, so we had a very in-depth talk about all the things we weren't agreeing on, and I think we both learned a lot about what okay and what isn't for the both of us. And it felt great! It felt so good to be able to put my questions down like that, and really work out some of the question marks here, like which things are hard no's and which are just "eh, not too interested in it". And we did get some laughs out of it, too. It was great.

And it seems like he really did understand that I've reached my limit regarding the problems that I've experienced. I just feel like we've actually started working on the parts that needed working on, rather than just tip-toeing around them, trying to act like they aren't there. And the times that we've had sex lately (yeah, I'm not so good at claiming the initiating sex part, it's just sort of happened and sometimes I can't really tell who actually initiates it), he has actually said that it's been more fun now compared to a lot of times back before I brought this up. So in general, while things aren't perfect and I realize that this will take much more time, I feel like we've actually got started.

Now I can start working on my own issues regarding our relationship with a clearer head and renewed confidence that we'll actually still be together a month from now. And it feels like a load off my shoulders.

This is really great news!

And anything can rarely change radically fast, so between learning to be more sexually assertive on your part, to seeing what might be able to work for the two of you and other bits, steps is all anyone can take, and it sounds like all yours lately have rocked.

I'm on my phone right now, so linking, not so much, but if you search the main site for a piece about sex feeling like it just happens, passively, it has some tips that might be goodies for you.

Thank you for the tips, Heather, I'll do some more reading on that part.

And I just want to thank you again for bouncing these thoughts around with me. This has all helped me feel a little more comfortable asking for things and voicing my thoughts, and I think our relationship is much stronger for it. If I ever need help again, or just a place to discuss things about my relationship or feeling that I can't really talk to anyone else about, I'll come right back here. Thank you. :3

It was absolutely my pleasure, and I couldn't be more delighted to hear you're feeling more confident and assertive!