Sex with an Ex on October 12, 1998…

Dear Breakup Girl,

Let’s-call-him-Jack and I have been broken up for nearly six months after dating for nearly 3 years. We tried the friend thing for a while and it worked out quite nicely except I foolishly took every nicety as a sign that he wanted me back. But now I know that just isn’t going to happen and I’m fine with it, although I still think about him every day, multiple times a day. However, I sort of have the hots for someone else AND am enjoying being single. My question is, Jack and I started sleeping together again in late June (we broke up in March) and have done it 5 times since then. We are always drunk when this happens but the sex is INCREDIBLE. The first few times he would not kiss me and we would not cuddle afterwards, just roll over and go to sleep. However, I mentioned the no-kissing policy made me feel like a prostitute so the last two times he has kissed me and held me BEFORE and AFTER we did it. The problem is, I know it is stupid to have sex with an ex, but what if it is REALLY good and you aren’t nursing false hopes of reconciliation? Also, what’s up with the kissing thing? Please help!!!

— Confused yet Satisfied

Dear Confused yet Satisfied,

I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again: of course the sex rocks your world. There’s no aphrodisiac like a breakup. As in, “You look great without … commitment.”

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Crazy about men on September 21, 1998…

Dear Breakup Girl,

Ok, so here’s the deal. I love sex, I love men and I love life. What I don’t want is a committment. I don’t want a boyfriend. My roommate says this makes me dysfunctional and self-destructive. She disapproves of my (safe) one-nighters or casual sex relationships. I say it is perfectly healthy … the reason I don’t want to have a relationship with anyone is because I have not yet met the man who deserves me. I am a great girl — smart, funny, generous, pretty (ok, I’ll stop, sorry) — and confident. I need a man who can handle all that and live up to some pretty high standards. Relationships, as you well know, take time and effort and a great deal of respect, trust and committment. Why should I give all those very precious things to someone unworthy? So what I’m saying is that I am 20 and I have a lot of life to live — so there’s nothing wrong with filling that life with beautiful men who make me happy, if only for a night (no — I don’t have any feelings of unfulfillment), lovely poetry and moonlit nights? What do you think? Am I delusional? Am I ok? Am I heading for a very large mid-life crisis and an exorbitant therapy bill?

— Siobhan

Dear Siobhan,

No, you’re fine. So are standards. Just make sure of one thing: when he comes along, will you actually let him in?

Love,
Breakup Girl

MSN.com, Match.com, HappenMagazine.com: they’re in a healthy and satisfying 3-way relationship. Meaning that you can find MSN/Match.com’s “Ask Lynn” columns –penned by BG’s alter ego — over at Happen now as well.

This week Lynn hears from Cold Front, who’s seen the same problem crop up over the years in all of her serious relationships:

I feel so sure about my feelings, but a year or more into the relationship I seem to lose interest and the desire for sex with my partner.

Is this weird or natural? Lynn examines three possibilities. Read the full letter at Happen, then come back here and tell us what you think below!

A bit confused on August 17, 1998…

Dear Breakup Girl,

I broke up with my last girlfriend a little over a year ago, and haven’t had any kind of satisfactory relationship since then. I’ve dated one girl four times but have not have not been intimate with anyone. My last relationship ended badly from my perspective from a lack of sensitivity about my needs and feelings; she would say we didn’t have sex often enough.

Since the breakup my attitude has been good, but because of a couple of rejections since then, and my last relationship ending badly I have been feeling a strong sense of alienation from the opposite sex and have had a harder time approaching new women. I have as of late started to question my sexual orientation and have been looking at pictures of transvestite/transexual girls on the net. My question is could these feelings be caused by rejection by women in the hopes that a trans-gendered female would understand my feelings and needs better? Or am I gay and have been suppressing those feelings for 42 years? I have always beeen attracted to a smaller percentage of women compared to the “normal man” and do not usually feel sexually aroused unless there is an emotional attachment also. (I am not turned on by men at all.) Should I explore these new feelings?

— Confused

BG’s advice after the jump!

Things take a nasty turn on August 17, 1998…

Dear Breakup Girl,

I’ve recently discovered your website — though it’s too bad I’ve had to consult it in the first place, if you know what I mean…. I could write an epic saga here, because that’s me, but I must keep it short due to the fact I’m at work. The situation: I’ve been in a relationship with KT for a little over a year now, and I love him immensely. He’s bright, adorable, talented, incredibly fun, hysterically funny, “gets” me, and we truly have a wonderful time together. (BTW, I’m 26, he’s 24). In fact, our relationship — aside from the “normal” issues every relationship tends to face & tackle as it progresses — felt like a truly blissful union of minds & hearts, UNTIL. Until I found out that he’s what some call a “sex addict.” HELLO? Believe me, I didn’t see it coming either. We had certainly gone over our sexual histories together many times (who we’d been with, exes, flings, etc.) AND were both tested for HIV when we decided to commit to each other, but KT rather CONVENIENTLY (for himself) left out the details of his fondness for pornographic magazines, movies, phone sex, chat rooms, etc (to be fair, I DID know about this stuff, but not the EXTENT to which he partook), not to MENTION the fact that, in the years before he met me, he went through a phase where he called escorts and visited booths in Times Square, etc. How did I find all this out? One or two little suspicions ended up becoming a full on Spanish Inquisition one night — and I honestly don’t know…sometimes I wish I’d never even probed. You know the deal about how “don’t ask the question if you don’t want to hear the answer” (more…)

Quoting Shakespeare on June 22, 1998…

Dear Breakup Girl,

You are the most level-headed and genuinely thoughtful advice heroine in all cyberspace. And so, I submit my problem to Your Superness…

I am an attractive person; I want to make it clear that my comfort level with my admittedly-rather-average-but-unique-and-therefore-desirable appearance is satisfyingly high. I also sighed right along Will Shakespeare when he wrote “My mistress eyes are nothing like the sun…”, because sometimes a lover’s so-called imperfections are her most perfect attractions.

My problem is a small one: one small mole, present since birth, on the left cheek. Now, I will normally be the first to champion the fact that beauty is in the details, that it’s the tiny unique things about each person that makes him/her desirable. And it’s not as if this is a particularly ugly feature–it’s basically just a big 3-D freckle. No ugly discolorations, no honking huge black hairs growing out of it.

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The Predicament of the Week from July 13, 1998…

Dear Breakup Girl (I do believe that is the traditional way of starting these letters),

I’m in a bit of a fix. While it may not be anything new to you, it’s still causing me emotional distress on levels I didn’t know existed. Here’s the setup:

I’m 16 years old, give or take a month or two. 5 months ago, I entered into my first relationship–an odd thing in this state of society (waiting until my age, that is), but i’ve always been waiting for the right person. Anyhow, five months ago, I asked this person (let’s just call her “Sherry,” since that sounds clever if you know her real name) if she would care to be with me. Remarkably enough, she accepted. And even more remarkably, things were almost perfect…we grew very close, very fast, and were practically inseparable. I recall meeting a new friend about a month and a half into this relationship, and her shock at how long we had been together…she figured we were at least at the 18 month mark. We even lived together for a brief period, and that worked out magically. About two months into the relationship (in fact, exactly two months) I came to the informed decision that this was truly something special, and that I was now willing to take our relationship one level higher…thus, I let her take my virginity away. Realize that this was a conscious decision that I made before the relationship began, and that she would have been more than willing to do this earlier on…I just wanted it to be something special. And it was.

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It’s the cover-up on June 29, 1998…

Dear Breakup Girl,

First things first, I think your page is awesome. But the real reason I’m writing to you is because I have a guilty conscience and I’m wondering if what I’m doing is actually wrong. Well see, there’s this guy that I like a lot but I can’t see us ever going out. he’s super nice, and he’s even pretty sexy. My best friend loves him and tells me all about how she fantasizes about him kissing her and being with him — me, I don’t have to wish, because we’re fooling around behind her back. The only thing that I feel bad about is that one time we (ME and HIM) were talking and he said that he wanted to tell everyone about us and I can’t do that because my best friend thinks he’s like a GOD or something, so I know it would hurt her. I meant to tell her the first time we kissed but when I called her she told me that he had talked to her that day and she got her hopes up about them hooking up. So now I don’t know how I should tell her about us. I know she’ll get REALLY mad if I tell her that we have been for a pretty long time, but I don’t think she’d care if I told her he’d just kissed me — she’d probably be psyched for me. So, is it okay to lie to her this once, or should I stay straight?

— Guilty?

BG sets her straight after the jump

Taking things to the previous level on June 22, 1998…

Dear Breakup Girl,

Do you think a relationship that is essentially based on sex has any chance of becoming a “real” relationship? How does one make the transition from weekend partner to “girlfriend?”

— Kathleen

Dear Kathleen,

Excellent question. Now, at the risk of sounding old-fashioned (I’m going to wax sentimental about sex AND use a bread-baking analogy), I will tell you that what’s hard here is the sense of going backwards and filling in a step — say, the foundation of emotional intimacy that, according to many, should precede sex — that you’ve already skipped over. Like the time Breakup Girl was about to put a loaf of bread in the oven and looked back over at the counter and realized she’d forgotten to put the yeast mixture in the batter. D’oh! I had to squish it — the most essential ingredient — back in and re-blend it all smoothly. It worked, but it was really, really hard. I was lucky — the chemical balance of the gluteny goodness had not yet been irrevocably upset. So in your case, well, try it, but be circumspect. What you could do is, um, not have sex. How about a movie? A sundae date at the soda fountain?Just talking? (I told you, old fashioned.) Give it a few whirls, see what happens. Do you have something to talk about? Yes, or no? There’s your answer. In this case, anyway.

Love,
Breakup Girl

Next time you’re on a first date and you’re getting to know eachother, pay close attention when the discussion of music likes and dislikes comes up. Tastebuds.fm asked their users how far they would be likely to go on a first date. 408 readers responded  and the tastebuds team cross referenced this with their pop music preferences. The result?

Coldplay fans came out as the segment of our users least inclined to jump into bed after a first date. Why is this you ask? Beats us. But next time you’re having inappropriate thoughts it may be wise to save on your water bill and instead of taking a cold shower put on X&Y. Just sayin’.
…
At the other end of the spectrum fans of grunge-rockers Nirvana were the most likely to end up doing the walk of shame the morning after the night before. Now don’t get us wrong – we’re not saying all Nirvana fans are nymphomaniacs, oh no. But on average you’re more likely to get lucky on a first date with someone who’s a big fan of Kurt and co, if that’s what you’re after…

From blog.tastebuds.fm via BuzzFeed