Virginity is not an obligation

FYI -- my husband and I know very little about each others' sexual past. We know that we weren't virgins, but we were both just kinda squeamish about talking about past experiences (y'all probably know more than he does), and I had just messed up a relationship in part by talking too much about the guy I was trying to get over. (Classic rebound.)

Nothing bad or traumatic, just not something we felt a need to do. Stuff has come out, gradually, but over the course of years. (We've been together almost a dozen years.)

Anyway, I forgot my follow-up point, which was, it sounds like if she won't answer your questions, she's pretty much out of the running. (?) So even if it is done gently, answering questions seems to be a requirement of being in a relationship with you -- which means it is a "demand."

Eh! <instinctive, negative reaction> That sounds like the kind of thing one is endeared to experience with one's children - not with one's grown-up life partner!

I mean, that could just be me, but ... yeh ... <thinks> ...

The thing about finding your partner, imho, is not about wanting to retroactively have grown up together ...

<goes off on tangent> Its not about wanting the other to be lilywhite, a blank sheet which features nothing in the ways of other (past) experiences and commitments that could make you feel threatened. The looming longing for exactly that (which I vaguely tasted in these two of your posts here, and am now hyperbolically magnifying - or erroneously projecting), would I guess come from fear ... After all, just like a virgin represents no past experiences against which one could anyhow be compared, so the longing for a person who "starts out with you", belatedly - who's waited "starting out" in life, in fact, until you appeared - suggests a longing for the other to feature no ties or experiences that could somehow make her appreciation for or commitment to you be less than absolute.

OK, so I'm sure that's totally an overreaction, and that, reading the way I just described it, you'll immediately agree that such would be a Very Bad Thing. But perhaps you'll get what vibe it was that triggered such asssociations?

Better speak for myself - as a partner I would like someone who's already started in life in every which way, who has formed herself already - an independent person with whom I can partner up as equals. Doesn't necessarily need to be all strong and perfect and succesfull - god knows I'm not - but no, no desire whatsoever to somehow raise each other. Care for each other when the other is down and out, sure - but not raise each other to learn the things that you would hope a grown-up partner already knows of. I mean, you'd hope to partner up with someone to then profit from each others separate, divergent life experiences, right? (Ugh, that sounds pretentious). Overlapping - or touching - circles, indeed, like you said.

<thinks> Yeh - you said it: overlapping circles - not two half circles waiting, incomplete, for that other One to merge with, in order to finally become "complete", like your friend would have it. So I'm wondering - why wouldn't that principle (of overlapping circles) apply to sexual experiences, too, in your view? (Just curious ...)

OK ... I'm beginning to think we've given you enough of a hard time already ...

Bicycled home - damn, its cold - cleared up my mind.

Basically, the whole concept of having sex now constituting "cheating" on the future wife you haven't met yet, is based on the assumption that, once you're together, you'll be jealous of each others' lives before you came into it.

But (to just come out with a blanket normative statement), it's simply immature to be jealous of the life your partner had before you. You'll get over it, once you feel confident enough of yourself in that respect - and realise that, in fact, it's the life the other had before you, that made her so interesting to you ;-)

... So now, all i wanna know is - when and why did the brick on Sozobe's head turn into a mushroom?? ("red with white dots" ...)

When the Green Bay Packers met an ignominious end on Sunday. (It's an ice pack.)

Sex is not the most intimate thing shared between people, time is. What I meant when I said ultimately close was that I wanted to know her without any barriers between us, physical or otherwise. Furthermore when I speak of a lack of experience it doesn't only pertain to one's abilities in bed, but to the experiences of relationships and emotion.

Sex is a complex language between people, understand what is being said is not an easy task. In terms of sex being a measuring stick for marriage, it's not. I said that marriage is more complicated than sex, not that it needed to be more intimate. When I think of the person I marry sex IS an issue that comes to mind. One must be mature, open, understanding, and experienced in order for me to imagine being with that person for the rest of my life. Not because I am shallow, but because I want a relationship where physical interplay is as rich as intellectual interplay. Marriage and sex further do not correlate in that marriage is a contract between people that they will share they're lives together (share meaning to be unshakable companionship, not singular entity), where as sex is obviously not a contractual agreement. Though my requirements of who I sleep with are often based on connection and intimacy these things are only part of choosing a spouse. Who you marry has a lot more to do with who you are as people and how that fits together, rather than your degree of closeness. I would gladly sleep with some who I thought was an amazing person for many a different reason, but that doesn't mean that all these people are people I would chose to spend the rest of my life with. That doesn't mean that I am unwilling to open myself up to them and for as deep of a connection as I am able. Often I find myself wanting to sleep with someone to show them how amazing I think they are, not as a way to pleasure myself, or because I am trying to form some serious relationship, but because I feel that genuinely towards them. Sleeping with them is how I would communicate that amazement because it is best suited for what I feel. Words often cannot take the place of non-verbal communication.

Just because I am a guy doesn't mean that when I engage in any kind of sexuality activity it serve as a pure objectification of the woman. I don't look at women as objects to give me pleasure either, but that doesn't mean that I can't share pleasure with them. I can say without a doubt that any girl that I've ever laid hands on had no questions as to whether or not I cared about her for who she was. I also think that it is sexist of you to infer that you are solely objectifying her, she may also want to screw you. Woman are human and like most other humans, they like to be attractive, and sexual as well.

Came back from work to read all this, and found it hard not butting in from post to post.

Oh, I am probably the oldest person on this thread, but not by so much, just enough to have shared what is unusual, to some extent here, an upbringing that left us at, say, bright, fairly curious, very idealistic, fairly dogmatic, between 15-20. (No, I am wrong in that all of us were that way, but not so much in tune with these points of view...)

I understand the views that are claustrophobic to most posters and see them as claustrophobic now myself, but the present me and the person I was in my late teens, yes, a virgin, do have a sort of zigzag connection.
Sex is many things, including sometimes base, in the sense of rape in war, which is really violence and not sex. Love is complicated, but sex can be right at the top of the phenomenon of love. Sex not right at the top and somewhere in the middle can be life affirming too. I do hope you go on to explore this.

If you want to eschew it all in a purist view, well, go on.
I guess we all sort of like you, that we bother argueing.

Oh, and by the way, .OZ., welcome to a2k.

To respond to myself, I see that you can interpret what I wrote as to say that I think fullofmalarkey's views are antiquated. Well, ok, I do.

In my purview they are, and I don't mean that to be insulting. Just that vast understanding of the riches of human emotion and sexuality have been investigated since I felt as he did, as idealizing in the nether as fom is. I am not sure I ever quite felt that way... I remember reading Liguorian magazine thinking, What????, what???? but I can imagine my young self marshalling his arguments.

ossobuco,

I want your vocabulary. As soon as I hit your posts I open up dictionary.com.

And I think you hinted on something that a few others have also mentioned that I certainly didn't expect.


Ae saying that at one point in your life you had a slightly? similar thought process when it came to virginity? Could you explain how you changed? Why you changed?

Portal Star,

I can't say that I know much about biology, which is a shame. And I definitely know very little about evolution, but I had a friend at college who was studying evolution and genetics and we sat up till 2 or 3 in the morning explaining genes and how food sources affect beak shape, etc... I like it.

nimh,
Well I wouldn't treat her like a child. :p But I definitely do value growth in a relationship. In fact, I think one of the more important things in a relationship is that you do facilitate each other's growth as individuals. In other words, I'm not a fan of clingy people. A call saying, "My goodness I haven't seen you since you left the door" while I'm on my way to the curb makes me nauseous.

Overlapping circles does not apply because I don't think sexual experiences can be accurately represented with circles. :p


Nah, she's not out of the running. She's most likely facing an issue of something more than just lost virginity. And I've already stated that I would, and most likely will, marry someone who doesn't have similar views to me. As I stated before, I'm quite alright with that.



I don't know if jealous is the right word, but I can't think of the word I want so I'll just put myself in the situation. My fiancé has told me that she isn't a virgin. (note: this is all what I honestly expect would happen) First thing that would cross my mind: Why didn't she tell me this earlier? I remember asking her, but she brushed the question off...

Then, I know this would happen. I inevitably would picture my future-wife in this case having sex with some unknown man. And then I'd try to push the entire idea out of my mind because I don't want to be looking at her like that.

Random thought: For this, just assume that I don't have any objection to sex in any way, shape, or form. It's as acceptable as breathing to me.

If I was given the choice to have sex with a girl, or just lay in a boat on a lake with that same girl looking at the stars on a crystal clear night. I would pick the stars.

I'm sure 5 people will come in saying "You can't make that decision, it's a fallacy since you haven't actually experienced the first choice." Well folks, I just did (as in made the decision, not experiencing the first choice--but wouldn't that be an unexpected twist!). :p

Mmmmmmm, I'm relishing in that thought now. Gosh, ya know what? I like that thought a lot. I like it so much that I'm going to conclude my participation in this thread on that note. So to conclude, I want to thank everyone who posted in this thread. I may be a little gun shy about making new topics seeing how I don't think many people liked this thread, but if I do... I'll definitely go about starting it in a more constructive spirit.

"If I was given the choice to have sex with a girl, or just lay in a boat on a lake with that same girl looking at the stars on a crystal clear night. I would pick the stars. "

You can do both, you know. You don't have to give any of that up when/if you do decide to start having sex. Sex isn't mutually exclusive with non-sexual romantic activity. Use your voice to get what you want, it's there for a reason.
I -love- Biology, and if I post on here tomorrow I will go into depth (as best I can) about its role in matchmaking. I know it's add-drop time, I highly reccomend a class! Biology made so much sense out of things that hadn't made sense to me before in my life. If you want the straight dope on evolution, get it from the source (like Darwin's Origin of Species.)


You didn't answer my question about whether or not it was okay for you to give a girl pleasure (with her desire, consent, and permission!), and expect nothing in return.

Thanks for the welcome.

Yah, hi, oz.