Am I wasting my time? SO CONFUSED :(

Dear Jenii,

I completely agree with Natalie. If you text him first he will feel smothered (yes,it is overeacting and yes, in some aspects of life men are babys) and that he was right to only want an open relationship.

He said he would contact you. So either he does or he does not. But I would advise you not to wait it’s excruciating and is always coupled with self loathing (I have been there myself just a few days back). Fill your calendarand your time with things you did before. You seem out going and fun so I think you will find a ton of things to do and there will be surely others you can date. If he made it an open relationship, use it and enjoy it^^

And if he does text you don’t always make time for him. Don’t delude yourself into thinking that this is something it is not. If he texts you and you have a full calendar and maybe another date or two (you don’t have to tell him that) then he might start missing you and maybe want something more. BUT you have to make sure you are happy without him and that he is at most the cherry on top of the whipped cream on top of the sundae that is your life. That’s my rule of thumb.

Your title asked if you are wasting your time. Did you have fun? I am guessing very much. I think he made you feel good about yourself and that you found yourself to be even more beautiful and greater person through his eyes. Keep that feeling and keep the memories and know that you did not waste your time.

Now go out there and have fun

Good luck
Mary

Hi Jennii,

What went wrong is you wanted more and so you ACTED like a GF without being one. Never act like a GF without a confirmed commitment with a man. Like he said, you were in an “open relationship” which in guy speak means your FREE AGENTS who can date and see whomever you want and either of you can stop seeing the other for any reason.

Chalk this up to a lesson learned and try to vet this information in the very beginning so you don’t unwittingly fall into this trap again.

I agree with Lane, for the most part. However, I would just like to add one alternative strategy/perspective:

1) One way to escape the trap of the hormonal bonding mechanism is simply to have sex with multiple people (aka, noncommitted dating or an open relationship). If you’re only having sex with one person, it’s not just the hormones but the fact that this very intimate experience of yourself is now only possible through that one person, so you become very attached to them in ways that don’t necessarily reflect the reality or depth of the relationship. I DID experience extremely powerful (and usually misguided) bonding mechanisms when I was only having sex with one person, even when they weren’t the right person for me…..when I embraced a more open sexuality, that pattern completely stopped and I was much more able to be real about the depth (or lack thereof) of my connection with any given person. This is not for everyone, but for me it worked EXTREMELY well in terms of getting centered about my relationships.

2) This may be a generational thing, but I have never had the “sex box” experience. I think what guys respond to is not whether or not you have sex but your attitude towards it and your general level of confidence and self-respect. I’ve had many experiences in which my connection with a guy was mostly physical, but in those cases I felt like it was a pretty mutual feeling…..since I was having sex with other people, I didn’t feel particularly attached to him and had no interest in forcing the relationship to be more than it was. Usually I think women PERCEIVE themselves as having been judged and put in the sex box, when in reality the connection WAS mostly physical, with not a lot of emotional depth, and that would have been true regardless of the timing of sex. I don’t think I have ever had an experience where I had a deep emotional bond with someone and then because we had sex they didn’t want to pursue it.

3) DO know that if you wait to build an emotional connection until you have sex, this DOESN’T guarantee a guy is going to stick around. As Lane has said before, there is no safety in relationship, and no guarantees…..a great sexual connection IS really important to most guys, it is one of the MOST important things they are looking for (in addition to an emotional connection, shared values and goals, etc)……so if you wait and wait until you are both REALLY emotionally invested in each other and then have sex…..and the sexual connection is only so-so…..you are both in a tough position in terms of having invested very deeply in a relationship that cannot and will not fulfill some of your deepest needs.

I think the healthiest way to approach sex is simply to see it as one dimension of the relationship and one very wonderful way of bonding. I often think of it in reverse: if I had sex with everyone I met, but waited and waited and waited to have deep conversations until I was absolutely sure we had a wonderful sexual connections, and ONLY had deep conversations with one person…..the same thing would happen in terms of feeling VERY bonded to this one person I allowed myself to have deep conversations with AND the potential disappointment of having built up this amazing sexual connection and then discovering that our emotional connection was really not on the same level. It’s not a perfect analogy but it helps explain why sometimes holding off on sex (for reasons of control or the desire to win a commitment) can end up making you feel MORE needy rather than less.

I think the right time to have sex is when you want to and when you’re completely ok with whatever happens afterward in terms of the relationship. When you can fully enjoy sex in itself, for itself, then you don’t have to worry about how some guy is judging you for it or what its effect on the relationship or your own emotional state will be, because you know you’ll be centered and open no matter what happens.

I have personally NEVER had a guy react to my voracious enthusiasm for sex with anything but total happiness (if anything it will PREMATURELY cause them to project an emotional attachment to you or feel an emotional bond that is somewhat unwarranted, but that is a whole other story).

My personal feeling is that most guys, no matter what their age, are way more interested in having lots of great sex than going around categorizing women…. much less valuing them for withholding sex. I think they are simply much more realistic about the fact that many of our connections ARE very physical and don’t need to be more than that in order to be enjoyable. IF you embrace a life of multiple sexual partners (and you should do this ONLY if it’s truly right for you, I would never suggest anyone do anything that doesn’t feel absolutely right and good and true for you), I think you will find that YOU put many guys in the sex box too…..not because they are fundamentally unworthy of or incapable of deeper connections, but simply because your particular connection with them is more physical than anything else. I don’t think it’s a bad thing at ALL to have many kinds of connections in your life….some will be mostly physical but that’s only damaging to your self-worth and self-respect if you interpret it in that way, rather than honoring and embracing and enjoying all the different kinds of connections (physical, emotional, and spiritual) that come your way, and recognizing that they all contribute to the richness that is your experience of human connection.

hope that helps
xoxo

Babe, kissing and cuddling and deep conversations have NOTHING to do with a guy’s desire to be your boyfriend. Nor, honestly, should that be SUFFICIENT CAUSE for you to desire him to be your boyfriend. Ever.

Acting like a girlfriend has NOTHING to do with sex or making out (unless you refuse to have sex/make out outside of committed relationships). It has everything to do with your EXPECTATIONS.

Expecting that what you have shared means he owes you ANYTHING (further connection, communication, exclusivity, whatever) is acting like a girlfriend.

Drop the expectations and you won’t have this problem in the future. I know it’s not easy, but it works.

Xoxo

10000% agree with Maria.

Also……”sex box” somehow implies devaluation and disrespect to me. I think a slightly more helpful way to think about is just in terms if the connection you have with someone – every connection is a different mix of physical, emotional, and spiritual….some are more physical, some are more spiritual, some are all three. But this has nothing to do with the intrinsic value of either person, just their unique and unpredictable chemistry. I also agree that the timing of sex has nothing to do with it – except insofar as that if you have sex sooner, you’ll know sooner if you have a sexual connection or not.

There are plenty of guys that I’ve put in the “sex box” (ie I just want to fuck) or the “cuddly sex box” and the “cuddly sex and deep conversations box” if you put it like that……but to me a more accurate description of it (rather than boxing someone in as if it were some kind of judgement) is simply “our connection consists of sex and/or deep conversations and this is an utterly valuable wonderful lovable person who I choose not to be in a relationship with.” It’s not a comment on their worth or value as a person, but just a realistic assessment of the connection we share.

I don’t think guys are going around putting girls in “sex boxes” (apart from some wild bdsm parties that I definitely need to find lol), and if there are those that do, I think that simply suggests they are not having much sex and are certainly far too judgmental about sex to ever enjoy it. Which pretty much makes them irrelevant. I think most guys are just going through the world looking to enjoy themselves and enjoy whatever connections come their way……they’re just WAY more realistic than most women about the fact that MOST connections are not about relationships at all, they are just about experiencing the moment and the infinite connections that come our way.

Yes totally. To me the biggest sadness of sex box thinking is that it makes it impossible to fully and authentically enjoy sex itself. If you are wrapped up in fear and anxiety and self-judgement and worry about how some guy is going to judge you for being a sexual being, the sex will be TERRIBLE. Even if you are faking your way through being totally comfortable with sex it will be so, so obvious if you are wrapped up in that kind of thinking, and I think it’s THAT that’s most likely to alienate you from any decent guy. But even that is not so bad as the fact that it prevents YOU from fully enjoying yourself. I truly believe fear of sex and fear of judgment is the issue. Thoroughly enjoying sex with someone is never going to be anything but a positive thing.

I personally can sense when guys have issues with sex in this way (it’s much more rare, but it’s soooo unattractive…..no matter how much I like somebody it’s just really really hard to respect somebody who is afraid of being used for their sexuality. I can still respect them as a human being, but it means our sexual connection is pretty much zilch).

I think it’s FEAR of being used for sex, which leads to bad/inauthentic sex, which leads to alienating those you most want to connect with. IF you can embrace sex in itself, it’s much easier to connect with people on all levels and sort through the different connections you have to feel out which ones are most valuable and powerful for YOU…..CHOOSING the connections that are most fulfilling for you rather than trying to use sex or withhold sex to make someone feel a depth of connection that simply isn’t there in the first place.

I have NEVER met a self-respecting guy who didn’t 100% enjoy amazing sex and want more of it. If there’s an emotional/spiritual connection there as well, it only enhances it, but a purely physical connection can be wonderful as well. I would personally say that I felt MUCH MUCH MUCH more respect from guys once I decided to embrace sexuality as a powerful and joyful and magnificent thing than when I was hiding, anxious and scared about it. It doesn’t mean I wanted a relationship with all of them (far from it!!!) but the RESPECT that a guy has for a woman who fully owns her sexuality is a VERY, VERY, VERY powerful thing.

Oh good grief, too much DRAMA on here!

He put you in the “SEX BOX” which is what GUYS call it btw—its no different than a “sex buddy” or “FWB” or whatever darn analogy, acronym, or word people come up with where they have sex but don’t want a commitment, geesh. “tomato-tomato”

If you have sex too soon a guy can instantly change his mind about you. I have a very good male friend who tells me a lot about the “man code”. He’s actually looking to settle down but can’t find a decent lady, whereas all he want’s to do is get to know them on a personal level, but they keep pushing the SEX and he knows the moment they go SHE goes into the “SEX BOX” and that’s where she will remain—you can’t sex a guy into a commitment.

In a nutshell, if a man is not in the “relationship mindset” you won’t be his GF with or w/o sex. Even if a man is ready, having sex with him at the wrong time can change his feelings so there’s a huge RISK by doing so. Like I said, if you bond to men through sex then its a good idea to abstain unless your 100% positive he’s ready to commitment with you, IF that’s what your seeking.

Anna, I’ll answer you later <3

Thanks for your comment, Eric. I truly appreciate it :-D

I actually like the advice of Steve Harvey “Act like a Lady, Think Like a Man” where he asks the girl to wait for 90 days. I don’t believe it has anything to do with the guy though, I think its more to do with the girl and give her time to check out the guy logically to see if he meets her criteria and so as to not miss out on any red flags when the oxy/dopamine kicks in. I don’t stick to the 90 day rule strictly but then at the same time, if a guy doesn’t do or treat me the way I think I deserve to be treated, I actually either let myself walk away (this is a required life skill which girls need to teach themselves) or else put him into the FWB box till I actually find a guy whom I want to date RFOL.

My interactions with men go back almost three decades and I disagree that having sex doesn’t change their thought process. I’ve been on both sides of the spectrum where it didn’t affect and did affect the interactions I’ve had with men. You just never know which way it will go, and its a RISK because if he retreats the women is left to deal with all the hormonal issues and emotions that results from it! To say sex never changes a man’s “perception” or “feelings” about a lady is not accurate, at least from what I’ve personally experienced, watched, talked and discussed at length with the average common day man, and my TWO SONS now in their early 20s.

I absolutely agree that you can’t sex a man into a commitment, but I disagree that having it too early can’t screw up their process in the way they need to properly “bond” to a woman. I also disagree that if it “doesn’t feel good they leave”, whereas I’ve had many boyfriends chase me like a wounded puppy, begging and pleading for me to stay when it was no longer good and I wanted to end it. This was also the case with my now ex husband of over 20+ years. He made a few threats and when I said “there’s the door” he NEVER LEFT. My best friend even told me “he will never leave because HE NEEDS YOU more than YOU need him”. I was the one who finally ended it and walked out the door.

There is no “one-size fits all” which is where a lot of relationship advice goes wrong and why its best to gain a lot of perspectives, which this forum does. What one man feels will be completely different to how another does, and same with women—humans are far too complex to wrap it up, tie and bow around it, and call it the only right path to success or failure.

If something’s not working, then you need to figure out the root cause of where your issues most likely lie, and this is where outside advice from many perspectives is helpful. It can be LIFE SAVING because when you’re IN something so deep its almost impossible to see it as others do, and when you finally can its like WOW, holy crap, how did I not see it?!?!

We didn’t have the “FWB” term back in the late 70’s/80’s, whereby I don’t see how that isn’t just as degrading for a woman to be thought of as a “BENEFIT”. The term “friend zoned” is no different either, whereas it describes the category a woman has been placed in terms of a man’s lack of romantic interest level in her. I just starting using this analogy (FROM A MAN) to help woman identify how men categorize them which is no different than all the other analogies, acronyms, words, or other descriptions that are used now, or in the past to help one “identify” where they stand in relation to a man’s or woman’s feelings, or lack thereof.