Some Thoughts on Partnership and Extra-Marital Sex; Monogamy VS Sexual Exclusivity

First of all, I need to clarify a very important point, that many people seem to get wrong more often than not.

The suffix "-gamy" means "marriage".
It does NOT refer to sex.  It refers to romantic commitment - and more specifically, a religious and/or government sanctioned commitment (because two people can be entirely committed to each other without ever getting married).
The alternatives to monogamy are being single, or being polygamous, which means being married to more than one person.

The term for not having sex with anyone other than your spouse (or other committed romantic partner) is sexual exclusivity.


This is not just semantics.  It is in fact a crucial distinction, and without proper and consistent terminology, it is completely impossible to talk about the topic in any meaningful way.
So, for example, in a culture where polygamy is legal and culturally accepted, a man could have two or three wives.  If he never has sex with anyone other than those several wives, he is maintaining sexual exclusivity, even though he is not monogamous.  On the other hand, a married couple who are into swinging are monogamous, even though they are not practicing sexual exclusivity.
And both of them are practicing sexual fidelity - the word fidelity means "faithful" or "loyal", and none of the people in these examples are cheating.  It is only cheating if it is against the rules, and everyone involved in both the polygamous relationship and the swinger's relationship is agreeing to the same set of rules.
When people talk about "open" relationships, or polyamory, they can mean either having multiple committed romantic relationships (which might not, but probably will, involve sex), or they can be talking about having only one committed romantic relationship, but one or more other non-romantic sexual partners.


I am only going to be talking about the second option.




Human beings are complicated creatures.  We don't really have emotions and thoughts of our own, they are intrinsically entangled with the people and culture around us.  There may be many other social animals, but none else has communication detailed and complex enough to have a culture that modifies individual preference, opinion, and experience.  So, if we want to try to separate out which parts of those things we take for granted are fundamental to who we are, and which are handed to us externally, its often helpful to look at other species besides ourselves.  In some ways studying chimpanzee politics can tell us things about ourselves that studying human politics doesn't.
Lets try it!
Of course the vast majority of all animal life is not monogamous to begin with.  In mating season its either a free-for-all, or its winner-take-all for the strongest male around.  But 90% of all birds and a small but significant number of rodents and primates are monogamous.  And it turns out that with extremely few exceptions, all of these monogamous species are using the term literally  - once they have picked a mate, they tend to stay with that one partner for years, if not for a lifetime.    Yet among all of those creatures sharing a life with one partner, 90% of those species do not maintain strict sexual exclusivity.  DNA testing of bird families find anywhere from 20 to 70% of the chicks are not technically sired by the father that raises them.  But ultimately, DNA makes less of a difference than family, and the mother's partner is the baby bird's father by default, and invests parental resources in the chick.
Both sexes are observed to have extra-marital affairs, and this generally has little to no effect on the permanence of the primary partnership.  To say these animals are "cheating" is to anthropomorphize them. The idea of monogamy implying sexual exclusivity appears to be almost entirely a human cultural invention. 

Which, if you step back from the assumptions most of us have always taken for granted, sort of begs the question of why we do that.
There may be some part of it that is rooted in biological based jealousy - on some level a person fears that if their partner has children with another person, they may divert resources they would have spent on your shared off-spring on the affair partner's instead.  In an age of cheap, effective and readily available birth control this concern is far less valid, but of course our emotions evolved millions of years before modern technology, and evolution progresses far slower than science.  But the cultural demands of fidelity are much stronger and more consistent than any individual feeling of relationship insecurity.  Many cultures designate adultery to be an offense - in some even a capital offense - even if it is consensual by all parties involved.  When something is considered unethical even if no one is hurt in anyway, chances are there is a more insidious root to it.  Religious and political leaders have used controlling sexuality as a means to control the populous in general for as long as there has been such a thing as religion and politics.  Centralized power is the original reason for almost all sexual morays, from outlawing prostitution, banning non-reproductive sexual activity, to the concept of sanctioned marriage.  The moray against adultery is no exception.  Having someone else decide how, when, and with whom you may have sex train you to be cede independence and be obedient in general.  It also allows much more certainty of paternity, which ensures that males can be forced to help raise their biological offspring, which is good for women and helps make society more stable.  At the same time, it allows keeping track of paternal lines, which is essential for patriarchy to function.  In particular, it facilitates the concept of inheritance, particularly of land, so it is a vital component of any caste, serfdom or capitalist system whose aim is to keep the genetic line of those who are already wealthy, wealthy in to the future.
As with many other concepts of "morality" which began as a means of top down control (like loyalty to country being a basic virtue), or "traditions" which were invented by marketers (like a diamond ring representing marriage) it was almost completely successful. It has been entirely internalized by the vast majority of people, in almost every culture, so that very few even question whether it is actually an automatic and natural feeling, and not something imposed externally. 

I have always known, from as young as I can remember (and probably earlier), that I wanted a life partner.  What that means to me is not universal, but I don't think it is particularly rare either.

In my mind, the point of having a life partner is not reproduction, it isn't for social cohesion or political strategy, it isn't about the convenience of division of labor.  Some or all of these things may be nice side benefits, but they all make for very poor reasons to commit your life to someone.  Furthermore, if any or all of those were the primary reason, then all people (of the opposite sex, for the first one), in the world would be equally eligible for the position.  If it it didn't matter who the person is, that makes it all pretty meaningless.

The point of having a life partner is to have a companion.  A person you share a special and intimate connection with, that goes beyond any other connection with any other human being.

A spouse, or life partner, should be your best friend, and your primary playmate.

One's partner should be their closest confidant. You should feel as comfortable around them as you are when you are alone, and more comfortable than around any other person.  You should trust them - and they should be able to trust you - more than any one else.
You would generally live with your partner, and if you choose raise children, you would do that together.  If one of you moves, both of you moves.  This is not always true of roommates, even if the roommates are best friends.
To me, a partner should be the person you spend the most discretionary time with.  Not only the most, but probably more than everyone else put together.

There are those who have a spouse or a partner or a boyfriend or girlfriend, and then they have a different person who is their "best friend".

I have never understood that.  If the BFF is a better friend than the spouse, then why wouldn't you be partners with BFF instead?
If only difference between friend and partner is whether or not you have sex, then that means the relationship is based on sex. 
Which seems pretty superficial and meaningless.

If the sole defining feature of a romantic relationship is that you have sex together, then it shouldn't matter what her/his religion, politics, culture, values, hobbies, preferences, intelligence, humor, or education are; or even whether they speak the same language.  One's only criteria should be to find the most physically attractive partner that reciprocates your interest.

 In fact, outside of humans, since there is no language, that is exactly how it is done (although, as noted above, that very rarely implies sexual exclusivity).  Non-human animals have no religion, no politics, no education, and no culture, values or hobbies (or so we assume!)

Almost all of us want at least a little more than that though.  Why then do most of us insist that sex is the single defining feature of a meaningful romantic relationship?

To me, having my partner consider someone other than me her best friend, choosing to spend more time around someone other than me, feeling they could trust or relax around someone else more than around me, or enjoying their time with someone else more than with me, all of these things would feel far more threatening to my relationship than her occasionally having casual sex with someone else.  Because those are the things that make a relationship special.  A person can have sex with anyone.
If "cheating" refers specifically and exclusively to sexual activity - then that is saying in no uncertain terms that sex is the one thing that defines the relationship.
To me, making the relationship about sex - by implying it is the only thing the differentiating it from a good friendship - cheapens the relationship.  Certainly, if someone else was your primary sex partner, that might raise legitimate questions - just like if someone else was your primary play partner, or your primary secret sharing partner.  
Even if one specific person was a secondary sex partner, but it was both regular and frequent, that might be legitimate grounds for concern. 
That could be treading dangerously close to affair territory, especially since sex has the potential to stir up romantic feelings. 
But barring that situation to prevent one's partner from straying need not automatically bar the occasional indulgence in a one time random circumstance with a (otherwise platonic) friend or coworker or new acquaintance. 

Perhaps you get invited on a trip to some natural hotsprings on a warm summer night, everyone jumps in naked, and the algae is making the cave walls glow, and some more people come along, so to try to make space your friend moves a little closer to you... and a little closer to you... and before you know it - well, you know... and its crazy and random and fun, and its not exactly meaningless since it was an actual friend and not a random stranger one-night-stand, but there is exactly zero romantic feeling or interest between you in either direction. 

If someone I cared about ended up in a situation like that, I would want them to go ahead with it, to enjoy the night to the fullest, because, if I care about them, I want them to be happy, and I want them to experience pleasure.  Would I feel a sharp twinge of jealousy if my partner came home and shared all the details with me?  Of course I would!  Its only human.  This is why I'd ask her not to tell me all the details (especially not anytime soon after it happened).  But overall, my desire for her to enjoy life would outweigh my own selfish desire to never have to experience sharp twinges of jealousy.  For it not to would be terribly selfish (not to mention possessive).  Frankly, as long as she avoids any pathogens that she could pass on to me, I don't really see how its even any of my business, any more than who her friends are or what she does with family when they visit.

There seems to be - in the part of the world I live in, at least - a growing number of people who get this, but even among those who haven't bought into the "sex and love are interchangeable" non-sense, a lot still get the ideas of monogamy vs polygamy and sexual exclusivity vs sexual freedom confused or at least muddled.

I feel like I was a much better writer when I did it more often.

I can't remember any more how to write a decent closing sentence.

Micheal Scott has it right

• Jan 24, 2010

Micheal Scott has it right

On the popular TV show "The Office", the branch manager is a bit of a doofus.  He's not all that bright, he is totally obsessed with having his employees like him on a personal level, and he has very little knowledge of actual business or management theory.
He makes his superiors wring their hands and shake their heads - but the thing is, his office's sales record is the best in the company, so despite his many, many faux pax, he always keeps his job.

Nobody can quite figure out how he manages to do such a good job in spite of himself.

Even though he tells them quite clearly, time and again.

He considers his employees family.
He wants his customers to feel cared for.
He is more interested in making people happy than in making money.

You can't learn to be community based and to value clients as actual people in business school.  You can't use the idea of caring about people and being friendly to increase the bottom line, because if your interest is in the bottom line, you aren't genuinely interested in people.  You can't fake authenticity. 



Its either about the love, or its about money. Once you start thinking about rate of return ratios, receivables balance fractions, risk-adjusted profitability, or marginal value-added pricing structures, and all the other things one learns in business school, you are far beyond the point of seeing every person you work for and every person you work with as numbers.

From there it is a very slippery slope to the scenario described by "Jack" in Fight Club: If the cost of the average rate of settlement times the expected rate of failure is less than the cost of a recall for a known deadly manufacturing error, we don't do the recall.
In the end it comes down to morality.  Its either being moral, or maximizing profit.  They are mutually exclusive.

No business is going to have as their slogan "All we care about is your money", and a lot of them try in ads to sound like it isn't true; for any public corporation it is actually illegal for them to consider anything else above the bottom line - if they tried the shareholders could sue. 
For the vast majority of companies jumping on the band wagon, being environmentally responsible is a marketing gimmick as much as a catchy jingle.

Thinking in terms of doing productive work for society while earning fair compensation, as opposed to thinking of how to maximize revenue while minimizing costs will not (always) lead to the highest possible profits.

It will, I think, mean that business actually increases while the rest of the country is in an economic downturn.  It means getting so many referrals its necessary to turn jobs down after going a year and a half without any form of advertising.  It means when, inevitably, mistakes are made, no customer ever makes a claim, because they realize they are not just numbers, that every attempt to be careful was made, all actions in good faith. 
It means that quite a few of my customers make me meals while I'm working.

If a job is a paycheck, it will show through to the customer, no matter how you try to hide it.
If I am ever in a position to hire anyone, my first question will not be about education or experience or abilities or references.  My first and most important question is just this: Why do you want the job?  If its about pay and benefits, no matter how qualified, its "next please".

It has to be about the love.

A year later

• May 26, 2009

A year later

I am so sick of dating.

I can't say it hasn't been fun.
Its been really fun.  Many first experiences.

I have been asked out.  I have gathered the courage to ask out. 
Some time later I replaced courage with confidence.

I have learned an awful lot of things (and confirmed a few I suspected all along).
I learned just how different I am compared to so many of my peers in this area.
I learned that finding what I am looking for is really hard.
I learned that all the common stereotypes about gender and dating are totally false.
I learned that people really do have sex on first dates (and not just desperate people, drunks, or players, but ordinary healthy well-adjusted people)
I learned that women are just as superficial as men (just with height instead of weight)
I learned that (at least for those whose standards start at 5'6" or less) I am much more attractive than I had thought I was.
I learned that there is very little correlation between stated views on sex and actual comfort and enthusiasm in practice; and little correlation between visual sexiness and actual quality of performance.
I learned that the single most important variable is that she is truly comfortable with her own sexuality.
I was shocked to learn how many people think that the actions of the female partner have little bearing on the overall quality of sex, or that being "good" can consist solely of how much she is willing to have done to her.  I learned that not everyone can match my stamina.
I learned that people are much more forgiving of me for my infidelity than I am of myself (I decided against ever making that story a blog, but I have nothing to hide, so if you ask me I'll tell you about it)
I learned that I can easily fall in love with someone I am totally incompatible with - in fact, I'm starting to suspect that I have a tendency to do just that.
I have learned a lot about emotional responses and how rare it is to just be told, directly, when something I do is upsetting or annoying or offensive.
I learned just how guarded and polite people are, and how it breeds a sort of inadvertent falseness which I honestly never noticed before.

I have had sex with a number of beautiful intelligent compassionate women of various shapes and sizes and colors. People involved in social justice and environmental protection and education, younger than me, older, people who want to get married someday and others who think monogamy is an artificial social construct. More women in just this past year than I expected to be with in my entire life.
(I've also had my first ever STD test, and got the equivalent of an 'A' on it.) 
I've shared both physical and emotional intimacy with women who I could have conversations with and find myself questioning beliefs I've refined over a lifetime of thought and debate and felt totally confident about. 
I've even fallen in love.  It may have been with someone totally incompatible with me, but it was still nice to know for sure I still can.



It turns out that sex with someone who isn't my best-friend-and-long-term-partner is just as unfulfilling as I always assumed it would be.  They were everyone of them someone I could consider a friend, a whole world of difference from one-night-stand or purely-physical affairs (the thought of which makes me feel a little sick inside).  That just isn't enough. 

I have not had a history of following through on this sort of thing in the past; perhaps a public pronouncement will aid my meager willpower - or at least discourage the women in my life from taking advantage of it:
No more sex on first dates, no matter how good that date is.  Or second.  Or third.  No sex unless I've known you at least a couple months and had some combination of plenty of dates, long conversations, and exchanged emails.  And not unless you are looking, and feel ready, for a serious long term partner.  That isn't to say I want to be celibate until after my next wedding, but I would like that level of intimacy be reserved for when working towards something serious is at least the intention.
My old rule was I didn't want to have sex with anyone I wouldn't want to be friends with.
The new one is not with anyone I wouldn't want to have a child with.

I found my old list which I had written on the suggestion of one of my first dates, one of the people I had been most excited about at one time.  I wrote down a list of exactly what I am hoping to find in someone.
I figured after a year of dating, meeting many new people, romance and relationships and sex and new friends that I might be able to refine the list with new found perspective about what is most important to me.
Turns out I had it the first time.  There is nothing I can remove, and only one small addition.
(Its just that I haven't been actually following it.  I keep giving people chances, even though its a list of "non-negotiables".)

Really, it doesn't seem like so much to ask for.
Just three basic things.

Someone who shares my outlook on life.
Someone who challenges me intellectually.
Someone who wants the same type of life-partnership that I do.

That's it.
Its easy enough to find all of those things.
Just not all three in the same person.

One of my new friends pointed out there is a conflict in what I want:  I want a relationship that builds over at least a year, but I also want to be in that relationship already. 
She made a good point.
So its on me to keep meeting new people, but avoiding all the romantic and intimacy which sucks me in but leaves me discouraged and unfulfilled when I return to reality a few days or weeks or months later.

Perhaps my readers can help me out.
Here is the list:   EXTRA BONUS SUPER FUN PACK

If you know anyone like that, direct her my way.

Flamboyant introvert

• Feb 23, 2009

Flamboyant introvert

I feel like I want to write, but I don't have a topic.

Actually, that's not true. I have several: adoption, consciousness, short-term dating/serial monogamy, and I doubt I'll ever be satiated of ranting about the injustice of a system that allows unrestricted accumulation of wealth across generations.

But as much as I feel like writing, I even more don't feel like writing about any of that stuff.

So I guess this will be more diary entry than essay.



I talked to a customer a couple days ago, a slightly crazy guy who I've worked with many times, get into heated debates with on the way to his storage space. He was shocked to learn that I make personal stuff public this way - (that reminds me, that's another topic I've been meaning to write about for about 1/4 of forever). He also questioned why I might think anyone would care.
I learned yesterday that someone I had never met or heard of found my website after I drove by in the truck, somehow came across the blog, had even commented once. A friend of a friend. There are 5 times as many views of the blog as my actual business website (even though the business site counter counts every refresh as a new view, but the blog counter doesn't).
I really don't know why. Why are you reading this right now?

Anyway...

I have been mentioning periodically for a while now how overwhelming it all is.
I feel tired, but I am still just as much in awe. I don't feel like I am ever going to be able to take all of this for granted.
I mean ALL of it.
That water falls from the sky periodically. That sex works the way it does. That music can affect me so much. How many people there are. That we are apparently on this giant liquid filled rock hurtling through the vast expansive of nothingness around a giant burning fireball of hydrogen and heavy elements it creates by being, basically, a constantly exploding nuclear bomb held together by the sheer weight of itself. The very fact that matter exists seems unbelievable to me.
I am running a business? What the hell is that? I never had a girlfriend throughout grade school, high school, college. I was not exactly an outcast, but I was far from popular. All my life I was the little skinny guy, the weird guy. Invited to parties for sheer entertainment value. And now I look back on a couple recent experiences and wonder if maybe she was in it as much out of lust as anything, and given how I felt, its like I was used for my body. Me? WTF? Mind you, I'm not complaining. It just seems so unrealistic.

This has been fun. No question. Some of my favorite people I met through the dating process. I have no regrets. I have learned a whole lot about life, people, relationships, even myself. I feel almost no connection to my life from as little as a year ago.
But there was something I really liked about having only ever had sex with two people. Something I liked about only having had one partner and planning to keep it that way. I liked being settled. It wasn't an ideal relationship, but my feeling of loyalty made up the difference, and there was also a lot of genuine good. I'm happy to have been released from that responsibility, but I would like for my next serious relationship to be my last.
Obviously I don't think there is anything immoral or unhealthy about promiscuity, but it just doesn't feel natural to me. Before I had experienced it I never understood the appeal. And honestly, now that I have, I still don't.

I wonder if I will end up abandoning my principal. (I will forgive myself if I do, because I don't really believe in principal. Any principal that doesn't make specific individuals happier in the real life is an invalid principal).
I am not much interested in chemistry. I am not much interested in looks or sexual compatibility. True, I didn't know what I was missing, and finding it was incredibly intense, overwhelming as I have not felt since... well, actually, ever.
And I still say I want - no, I need - a best friend first. I need someone I respect and admire. Someone who can point out the errors in my arguments, who makes me think of things in a brand new way. I need someone I have fun with, and who I feel safe with.
If, having found those in someone who also wants something stable and lasting, if she happens to be hot or we happen to like the same things in the bedroom (or living room and kitchen and occasionally outside), that's gravy. Mind-Bogglingly Delicious Gravy, but gravy all-the-same, and totally unnecessary.

The thing is, I don't know that my intellect, no matter how consistent or insistent, is capable of over-ruling my heart.
I can guide in-love, but I can't control it. I'm a surfer, or maybe a tobogganer, mostly at the mercy of gravity, but I can go a little to the left, a little to the right. And, if I so choose, I can resist - the only possible outcome of which is a dramatic crash.
I know how to make it more intense if I want to. I can focus on one person to keep someone else from getting too entrenched in my heart. But in the end, whatever I do, with certain people, certain circumstances, it's gonna happen.
And mind you, I'm fine with that. Its a big part of what makes life worth living.
The thing is that once I get in, it blinds me. I know that its going to. I even know its happening in real time. And yet I fully believe.
So if it happens and its reciprocal - that's when the problem could come in. Because I won't be able to be objective about it. I won't have any conscious choice at that point. I am bent to the will of in-love.

On my side, however, is that those same things which are important to me in principal, intellectual compatibility, friendship, shared values, enjoying each other, are actually what makes me fall hardest.
On my side too is that the passion can develop with the right person even if it isn't there from the beginning. I think this is something too few people realize in our tissue-paper-significant-other society of ours. This isn't to say I think it could develop for anyone, arranged marriage style, but if the core elements of compatibility are there it can be just as intense, just as real, even if there wasn't that initial attraction. Everyone I say this too looks at me as though I were crazy. Why would you get involved with someone in the first place if you weren't initially attracted? I suppose it figures, since in the end it all stems from the reproduction drive. Somehow actually liking a person for who they are seems a lot more romantic and meaningful to me.

I started writing before work. I just came home. Stopped at my ex-wife's place on the way home. It was our first time alone together for anything besides legal paperwork since the divorce. I caught her up on my experiences dating. She seemed genuinely interested, and it didn't feel in the slightest awkward. It was almost as if she were my friend, instead of my "ex". I feel really happy about that, really encouraged. It has felt like she was very uncomfortable with me until today, and I got the impression she was sure I was uncomfortable despite my assurances that I wasn't. Of course I know - I knew all along - that what had to change for us to ever have a friendship was that I had to let go of the "possibility", let go of any romantic thought or desires. This happened for me a long time ago, but given how strongly I felt before, and for how long, given how dramatic and sudden the shift was, it seems pretty reasonable for her to have been suspicious of it.
I am happy that we might someday be comfortable with being in regular contact because, even though I would never want to be in the sort of relationship with her that we once had, there were a lot of legitimate reasons I got involved with her in the first place, it is hard for me to find people who I feel as compatible with, and it is a lot of my life to give up entirely. I want to keep the baby, though it was really good to drain the dirty bathwater. This may not be meant to be, who knows, but at least the experience opened up a part of me that allowed me to miss her, and even though its an unpleasant feeling, it feels right that I would.

I went for 28 years never feeling more than the most superficial type of connection to anyone aside from whoever I was in-love with at the time. I don't even know what "connection" is supposed to mean exactly. It doesn't seem to have to be mutual. It isn't correlated with lust. Sometimes I can feel it quite strongly even while knowing it will be fleeting. I don't understand it, can't articulate it. But something has been opened up inside me, something stemming from the divorce, learning about attachment disorders, dating for the first time and all of the specific experiences I've had, something has opened and I feel these connections, people feel so special and important to me and I feel I want to get to know a few certain people better, I want to share with them, and I want to feel close - even if there's little or no chance of a romantic relationship building from it. My favorite part of dating, I think, is the friendships that began that way.

Still, a part of me is very tired. I want to be settled. I want to be thinking about planning for the future, for children. I don't want to actually be planning yet, but to be able to be thinking about it with somebody.
I realize that I am a-typical, but I just can't understand how people prioritize anything else over love. What point is there in success with no one to share it with? This is a rhetorical question. I know I will never understand the answer, no matter how thoroughly or eloquently it is described.
The trick is in finding someone who feels the same way as I do. Not an impossible task, but that person also has to challenge me - I don't mean to sound arrogant (and I know I do anyway, and I apologize) - but I don't find that often. There is SO MUCH for me to learn. I just need the right sort of stimulus.
I always thought I had been extremely lucky in finding someone with whom things worked - not always perfectly, but well enough that it lasted longer than anyone else I know of my generation - so young. It was suggested that maybe it wasn't so rare, but just that I hadn't been looking once I found it.
Now that I have been looking, I can say the same thing with more confidence.
A great many people are wary of using the internet as a tool to meet people.
I can't imagine wanting to date someone you meet at a bar, a party, the market, where you mainly just know what they look like. I suspect it goes back to the chemistry/compatibility thing again. You can only gauge the spark in person, with expressions and tone and touch. I can read the words written by hundreds of women and narrow it down, people I might very well have been attracted to in real life (and would therefor have been more willing to overlook certain differences). Narrow down from hundreds and hundreds of people down to a dozen dates. People I knew I had some fundamentals in common with, who sparked interest enough to actually meet. And then only a few that really felt significant in one sense or another. And then none that really worked out as potential LTRs for one reason or another. There are just so many factors working against it, so many ways for it to not work.

I have decided to embrace dependence. I think the idea of independence being something desirable goes hand in hand with the value of freedom. Our economic structure is dependent on a populous which believes that freedom is inherently valuable.
As a customer who has lived in a very different culture pointed out, you don't have freedom if you are connected to other people. If you live with an extended family, know your neighbors, and everyone is directly dependent on everyone else, you have to consider the consequences of your every decision for everyone around you.
Freedom is contrary to community. Independence is contrary to human connection.
What he was talking about was the same as what I was talking about, only applied to family and community instead of romantic relationships.
Besides, no one is independent. We are a social specie. We are only able to survive because we are able to work together. We have made comfortable lives for ourselves using technology which requires specialization which makes us ever more dependent on one another. I said this wouldn't be another social discourse essay - but this is all very personal. Relationships with other people are more than ways to get food and shelter, more than a security net or means of reproduction. I feel, always have felt, like I am supposed to be one-half of a couple. A lot of people seem to believe there is something wrong with that. Of course I am dependent. I think its normal and healthy. In the absence of a life partner I have developed friendships that feel more meaningful than I have had in a long time. I am still not happy being single. I strongly doubt I ever would be.

I remain, as always, optimistic. I have no evidence on my side, but it has been my experience that life works out ok in the end. (I suppose in the end we die, so...)
When you are most desperately out of money, with no idea what you are going to do, that's when you win a new car. It couldn't happen any other way. Malomar is obnoxious sometimes, but he takes care of us. Or of me at least. So I will find what I'm looking for. There may be many more trials ahead, more experiences to have first, and it won't be easy. Fortunately I live in the Bay Area, and there are a lot of amazing people here. This has gotten much longer than I intended. I'm gonna stop writing, and go check on my online dating account.

Love addiction

• Jan 24, 2009

Love addiction

I read something recently about psychologists and neurologists who
decided to put people in the early passionate stages of new love into
an MRI machine.  They showed the volunteer subjects various pictures,
some of the object of their affections, some not, and watched how their
brains responded differently.

As it turns out, the analogies with drug addiction aren't just a matter of poetic license.

The craving, the irrational behavior, the withdrawal when forced to go
without, they seem similar because the same parts of the brain respond
to each, and in the same way.

The author of the article I read said that love was like a drug.



But of course, evolution didn't develop our brains to respond positively to
cocaine, heroin, or nicotine.  There would be no incentive.

There is, however, very strong biological incentive to have people fall passionately in love.

Which means its far more likely that drugs are like love, not the other way around.

Perhaps the whole reason drugs have appeal in the first place is that
they artificially take the place that passion and romance are supposed
to.

Makes me think about narcotics in a whole new way.  Sure seems simpler
than dating.  I guess there could be a downside I'm not considering....

Te Quiero

• Jan 13, 2009

Te Quiero

In Spanish the term for "I love you" is the same as "I want you"

Contrary to what English speakers might assume, this isn't meant to imply lust.
Te quiero is just as applicable to love for family or friends (with te amo reserved for romantic love - though te quiero is appropriate for a spouse or lover as well)

This is perhaps no more than an idiosyncrasy of language and translation, but it strikes me as the dominate view of love in our own culture.

We might say "I love ice cream" or "I love that movie", meaning that you really really enjoy it.  When something brings us great pleasure, we love it.
Certainly our friends and family and lovers ought to bring us great pleasure.

This type of love, possessive and self-centered, can certainly be applied to people.  I love you because you make me happy, I enjoy your company, I want you around.

It is perhaps unfortunate that we have one word that should cover such a broad range of emotional experience.


Love can also mean "I want you to be happy".  For objects it never means this, but hopefully for people it often does.  While in the 1st meaning it is dependent on my own happiness to exist, in the 2nd I am willing to deliberately sacrifice my own happiness for the benefit of the object of my love. Ideally a good relationship (any type, not just lovers) will have both types, but really they are two different things.

We feel real care and concern for others, we want to make them happy as they do us, but in a culture obsessed with the self it can be all too easy to get caught up in prioritizing selfish love.

There have been a number of studies out there which confirm in scientific terms what we have known from folk wisdom forever: it is better to give than to receive.  It turns out this isn't just a way of conning the populace into desirable social behavior, its an innate truth of human nature.  Spending money on a gift does more to raise subjective well-being than spending an equal amount on ones self (http://tierneylab.blogs...nytimes.com/2008/03/20/yes-..money-can-buy-happiness/). 

It seems that love as a feeling of care for others as opposed to a feeling of enjoyment of others, particularly within romantic relationships, is strongly de-emphasized in our culture.
We each spend our time focusing on our own needs being met, giving little time left over to question how much we are meeting theirs.

I see people being quick to point out that it would be unhealthy to prioritize another over ones self - but see, as long as its mutual, it balances out.  Its just like in society: everyone does better when everyone does better. 

Imagine a game of tug-of-rope.  Two equally matched opponents face off.  They pull and struggle and sweat and the knot in the middle stays more or less right in the middle.
If either lets go, they lose, and the consequences may be miserable.  But say they both agreed to stop pulling.  The knot still stays in the middle.  But they don't have to fight anymore.  Things are still the same as they were, but both are better off.  This is what happens when you focus on being good to your partner instead of just on them being good to you.  In the end, instead of a sacrifice, you are both better off than when you started, which is how a good relationship should be.

Perhaps a part of our high divorce rate and the increasing age in which, on average, our generation spends serial dating, is somehow tied to our culture's intense focus on self (as opposed to community or family, for example - the rise of both consumerism and the list of terms that begin with "self-" that have entered our collective consciousness) as detailed in the documentary "The Century of the Self"(the entire movie is embedded in my December 17, 2007 blog entitled "Just in time for Christmas").

We question "is this person doing enough for me?" and when the answer is no, we move on, without ever having considered the possibility that maybe they weren't doing enough as a result of us not doing enough ourselves.  If their needs are unmet, it will be hard for them to focus on ours.  I've never lived in any other time or place, so it would be presumptuous to assume that if the expectation were long-term or permanent relationships that we would be any more prone to view relationships as real partnerships, as "we are in this together, lets make it work for us both".

Part of it may also be our focus on romance, on being "in-love".  We grow up hearing fairy tales and seeing romantic comedies and it becomes our model of what "love" is "supposed" to be like.  Who wouldn't want that wonderful giddy feeling of total infatuation to exist forever, for the passion and excitement of a brand new relationship to carry you happily ever after?

Only problem is, it doesn't.  Not for anyone.  On average it seems to last about a year, maybe 2 or 3 for some. (http://articles.latimes.com/..2007/jul/30/health/he-..attraction30) After the honeymoon period is over, once real life sets in and mundane day to day life conflicts crop up, once the other person relaxes off of their best behavior that was meant to win you over, sooner or later the passion, no matter how strong it started out, wears off.  After all, a lot of the excitement stems from the novelty itself, and from the fantasy of a person's potential.  At that point, traditionally, so called "companionate love" is supposed to take over - essentially a strong friendship, and/or feelings of loyalty, commitment, and of course care for the other; these things can give a relationship value and meaning.  But they are severely undervalued in our culture, or at least ignored, in favor of romance and passion. (http://www.utne.com/Science-Technology/Romantic-Comedies-Are-Making-Kids-Miserable.aspx?blogid=36)
The end result: 50% divorce rate (and the accompanying single parent households), generations of people who have endless strings of brief semi-committed relationships, and even an entire sub-culture which insists that polyamory is not just acceptable, but an ideal that everyone should strive for, and the suggestion that a desire for a monogamous relationship is in itself a sign of conformity or repression.

This cultural shift was perhaps inevitable with the nexus of several unrelated social and technological advances.  The invention of a safe, effective, reliable, accessible form of birth control decoupled sex from reproduction (http://www.medicinenet.com/..script/main/art.asp?..articlekey=51170). Without that causal dating and not getting married until well into ones 30s is pretty impractical and something few would be interested in. Like all of our sexual morays, waiting until marriage developed before there was an effective method of birth control, and our collective conscious is relatively slow to adapt to technology. 
At the same time the inventions of the washing machine, microwave, fast food, and other household labor saving devices meant it actually became possible to take care of one's own house while having a full time job. Without those things washing clothes is a major undertaking, cooking a meal needs to be begun hours in advance, and taking care of a household is a full time job in itself.  These changes made it unnecessary to have a spouse for practical reasons, and made the concept of being "independent" available to nearly everyone.
Feminism made what birth-control and labor-saving devices allowed on the practical level also socially acceptable, and then end result is that, while people still enjoy having partners, we don't really need them any more.
Each of these things taken by themselves are obviously positive steps which improve the lives of everybody.  That they happened to all develop in the same time span of time perhaps encouraged the shift in how we view relationships, to the devaluing of commitment and the focus on passion and chemistry as the most vital parts of partnerships.

If for what ever reason (needing two people to run a household, having children in common, or it being socially unacceptable to divorce) a couple doesn't see splitting up as an option, it is more clearly in both individuals' self interest to deal with problems.  Then, assuming an egalitarian outlook (and I acknowledge that in the time I am describing that was definitely not the norm) it makes sense to view a conflict as "we have a problem, and we need to figure out a way to solve it".  If there is no incentive, the outlook by default is often "this person is making me unhappy, and I don't like it". 
Similarly, we don't see any inherent value in commitment, largely preferring to see partners as "the best I've found so far", always leaving the option open to upgrade.

There seems to be a lot of people who believe that things like monogamy, marriage, perhaps even heterosexuality are purely social constructs, are outdated and repressive, and that not being comfortable with sex without love implies someone is less free, open, and comfortable with themselves.
But religion didn't invent the connection between sex and emotion.  Religion tries to make it a moral issue, which of course it isn't, but nature linked the two.
Ultimately, sex is about reproduction.  Obviously it plays a social role as well, and like chocolate cake and rollercoasters we have been clever enough to harness technology to manipulate the pleasure centers of our own brains outside of the ways nature intended. 
Even so, when framing what is "natural" or even "healthy", it is probably helpful to look at it in its most basic, at its evolutionary function.
In a specie where both genders put substantial resources and time into caring for each generation of offspring, its no wonder that we would also tend to develop emotions that favored a single long term-partner, that we would become jealous of infidelities, and even that a double standard might exist between men and women (if he cheats, his partner isn't stuck raising a child that isn't hers).  This doesn't make these things good or ideal, any more than anything which is "natural" is ideal (Being eaten by a mountain lion is natural.  Doesn't make it a good thing.)  But it does make it understandable.

I think our generation may have gone just a little bit too far in rebelling against the old standard in this case.  It is a good thing that everyone has freedom and options and that no one is ostracized or punished for their choices which don't hurt anyone else.  But when in our zeal to allow freedom we try to force ourselves to fit an unnatural standard, or we ignore the valuable parts of things like commitment, in the end everybody loses.

New Year's

• Jan 2, 2009

I still do not put any real stake in sexual compatibility.
What I want is a partnership. 
What matters most to me is being able to fully respect my partner, admire her.
I want us to enjoy each other, have fun together, teach each other, challenge each other, support each other.
I want intellectual and emotional compatibility.
I want shared values and priorities.
What matters to me is who she is as a person, not just what I get from contact with her.

It is very early, we have a lot to learn about each other; I can't say anything with any confidence.  We haven't had a chance to talk about these things.  I don't even know what she is looking for in terms of a relationship.  I have always had a tendency to idealize people, to emphasize the good and overlook the bad, and especially now I am not in a proper emotional state to judge - that being said, I have not felt so positively about a new person so quickly since... well, actually, I don't think I ever have.  


I am learning more and more exactly what it is that I want, raising my standards by having contact with various people who were each wonderful in their own way, and seeing those things which I might have thought I wanted, but turned out not to work for me.
As I become more selective, it has become harder and harder to find someone who held my interest.  I tried not to even think about concepts like "settle"; a slippery slope atop depression.
When I was young the focus of my infatuations were completely random and baseless.  It had more to do with accessibility, proximity, than it did on personality.  I remember in junior high intelligence became a prerequisite.  Then independent thinking.
Kathy, in the first year of high school was the first where looking back, I know exactly what I saw in her.  Aside from my crush, she was also my best friend. 
But then, she was my friend first.  It was based on who she was, not just what she looked like or that she happened to be in my class.  But my interest developed slowly, bit by bit.
And so it was with my ex-wife, Aileen.  We became friends first, and for years after our first conversation I had not the slightest romantic interest in her.  We had sex before we kissed.  We still both considered our relationship to be friendship after we were sleeping together regularly.  I felt that I loved her before I felt in-love.  That was definitely a first.  The feeling of love, not romantic, not passion, but caring deeply for a person, caring as much about another human being as you do about yourself, that does not come easily for me.  I have felt it only very rarely, and usually transiently.  She earned my love by being the wonderful person she is.  We became partners, and romantic feeling developed with time.  That made it no less real, no less strong.  I felt as deeply in love with my wife as I did in any obsession before her.  Combining the feeling of "love" with "in-love" produced an attachment so strong it is a wonder to me that I was actually able to function in the real world day-to-day.  (It is actually a good thing that she didn't feel as strongly as I did, because we may very well have never left each others sides, and would in fact have not been able to function in the real world).

All this to say I don't especially value what most people today consider a prerequisite for a new relationship, a chemistry or passion or attraction.  I know these things can build with time, and just as well that feeling them can be totally meaningless when they happen right away.

My interest this time was very quick, and gathered in strength even quicker.  I started to feel hints of "in-love" from the first day.  I can't remember that ever having happened before.  Ever.  Each contact since then has made it stronger.  There are always a few little things here and there which are less than ideal, but which I may decide are worth it, are minor.  This time there haven't been any.  I am slightly apprehensive about our age difference (though its only 1 year more than it was with my ex, and Valerie is more experienced.  I don't think this is a valid concern; it hasn't shown up in her personality as a problem).  Her being my height makes me slightly insecure, but it doesn't seem to bother her in the least, so I think I need to stop being stupid.  Again, in no way a reflection on her.  More a reflection of myself, my assumptions and prejudices in both cases.
Granted, being in-love makes it difficult to see the bad in someone.  And granted we've only spent a total of about 29 hours together (over 3 days.  And about 2 of those hours were spent sleeping, so they don't really count).

I have never had the chance to develop a relationship with someone I had a crush on.  The combination is intense.  Like it hasn't been since high school - when I first realized what I had been feeling was obsession, not love, and that it was neither normal nor healthy; and taught myself to at least direct it and control it if I couldn't stop it from happening at all.

Believe it or not, all of this has been just to explain that I felt positively about her already, and that it was not the least bit necessary for anything else to be added in.
I feel guilty sometimes for my good fortune; the way I feel that people born into the upper class should feel guilty.  I mean, ok, people win cars.  That merely balanced out the bad fortune that had been happening at the time.
This though...
Too much.
Unreal.

I don't feel that sexual compatibility is important.  You can teach each other what you like.  It is unreasonable to expect you shouldn't have to ask for what you want.  A relationship is about communication.  When you prioritize what is ultimately superficial stuff like that, you end up overlooking the really important compatibility issues, the ones that differentiate a potential life partner from an exciting love affair.


I didn't really expect her to ask me to stay, and I thought it would be rather obtrusive of me to suggest it myself.  But it seemed likely, and I wanted to, so I wasn't in a rush to leave.  I waited patiently on the pretense of waiting for her to settle her other guests on the couch with blankets so I could say goodbye properly.  She didn't say a word to me. As she passed by she took my hand, led me upstairs, left me in her room as she went to say goodnight to them, left me nervous with anticipation.

A part of me is worried about letting things go too quickly.  There is a lot of overlap between the physical and the emotional for me, just like there is between the intellectual and the emotional.  The night had been fun.  Not ideal, for sure, but not bad.  I got to see another side of her, her interacting with others, we more playful with each other, feeling familiar as if we had known each other much more than just the 12 hours we actually had so far.
Willpower is only barely able to hold back the part of me which wants to run and dive head-first off the cliff above "love" and fall in damn the consequences.
The consequences.  Its not getting hurt that I'm afraid of.  Its the trust I'll lose in myself.  Its the ability to fall again if this starts and fails, or worse yet, doesn't start at all.  Its realizing how deeply attached I could get this time, how much better it could get than anything I have experienced before and how, if it ends, how much that will raise my standards.  I don't need higher standards.  Its hard enough to find someone interesting to me as it is.

I made the decision a day or two before to give in.  I have her picture as my computer background. Literally every time I minimize a window it makes me smile involuntarily. I listen to her music on Pandora, mixed in with my own.  I began reciprocating affection (I told her previously that I had been holding back, and why).  I look at her eyes, and she locks my gaze, and its like some cheesy movie, its unbelievable, its something I have never in my life experienced before, but I feel like as much communication is held in that shared gaze, unspoken, as in our conversations.  The first few times I would look away.  It was too much for me.  It scared me.  What if it isn't mutual?  I stopped looking away.

She came back into the room, came up to me, kissed me.  "Do you want me to stay?"
"Will you?"
I told her I would stay if she would agree not to seduce me.  We hadn't talked about what we want yet, our expectations, our feeling toward each other.  We had been out only 3 times, we were only casually dating.  I longed to cuddle her fucking brains out, but I didn't feel lust.
Besides, it was 2am, I had had a couple drinks, she has roommates, and I haven't had much opportunity to practice lately.  Not the best conditions for optimal performance.
I know that I am very short on will power when it comes to lying in bed next to women who make clear that they want me, but I figured as long as she didn't try to entice me and we stayed dressed, it was realistic.
When I came out of the bathroom she was in bed already.  She had a sweatshirt on over her shirt, as her room gets very cold, and so it seemed things would go smoothly, and I could get some good sleep finally, with the comfort of someone special to me in my arms.
As I climbed in beside her she began to kiss me almost immediately.  A kiss I expected.  And I know some people (especially girls, it seems) are content to make out without progressing to anything sexual.  It was nice, but didn't make it any easier to resist the desire to be inside of her. She is really into it, but keeps her agreement not to escalate things.  Next I discover that, while her top half is well bundled, she is wearing these loose "boy-shorts" underwear which offer no more resistance to feeling her thoroughly than wearing nothing at all.  Still, I keep my hands off the juicy center, and I still think we can be passionate and sexy for a little without taking that final step. When she takes off her shirt, inside myself I say "nuts to taking things slow". 
She has a way off moving seamlessly between the passionate and the affectionate, playful and sexual, which makes it all one sensual continuum, which feels at once equal parts an expression of emotion and pure hedonism.  When I do something that feels good to her she has this subtle giggle which was disconcerting at first, but quickly became endearing once I understood what it meant.  All the while, as we enjoyed each others bodies, enjoyed that it was with each other that we were doing this, she honored her agreement not to seduce me, but quickly adapted to the new limits whenever I pushed things a little farther.
I would have liked it slightly better if she were more proactive, but that is of course my own fool fault for asking her to agree to something which I ended up violating myself.
I told her that I wasn't still expecting her to stick to that.
We were lying on our sides, me behind her, against each other, and she presses herself back against me and over, so that she is partially twisted, her legs tangled with mine and just above them, as if shes trying to lay atop me, but not trying very hard.  It is cute.  It has both a seductive quality, and a gentle innocence, a playfulness, which makes me forget that anyone anywhere has ever thought sex could be "dirty" or "wrong". 
I stopped to ask about STDs and birth control.  She's been tested since her last partner (as have I).  She thinks she has condoms, she isn't using hormonals. 

She does, all on her own, exactly those things that I like best.
When she is on top she puts her hands on me, feels my chest and stomach.  She sits upright above me, looking down at me and smiling, like a sex goddess.  She presses herself up against me and rocks and slides to get clitoral stimulation without using our hands.  She lays down on me, and we hug sweetly, no less so for the fact that I am still inside her.  She puts my hand on her breast and squeezes my hand to tell me to squeeze her.  Which is of course exactly what I want to do.  She responds to the things I do just for my own pleasure.  What I want to do is also what she wants me to do.
When she got up to find a condom, as she was still looking I came to her, held her from behind, she told me not to touch her as it was too distracting, I entered her again, encouraged her to keep looking, which she couldn't.  She touched herself, and she came in that position, on the floor kneeling, me holding her back against my chest.
I lay her down on her back on the floor.  I put my hand near her mouth to remind her about her roommates, that she was getting a little loud, and she bit me, her voice still audible.
On the floor still, her on top, me behind, oral for her, missionary, sideways.  I lost it for a while a little bit after I came the first time, and I wasn't in her when she came her second time.  The difficulties were short lived.  I asked her for oral, to help me going again. She wasn't reluctant, but seemed slightly awkward, like she didn't have much experience with it; but it felt better than average just the same.  As soon as she got me ready again, I stood her up, put her on the edge of the bed where I could reach her from the floor.  Her comments about the intensity seemed almost like a complaint, but she didn't object.  I usually don't have much left when I come twice in a row; I had plenty enough to spread around onto her belly and breasts, felt like more than the first time.  This time I kept going without a break.  She wraps her legs around mine, tangling us.  She holds me, and looks into my eyes with that same deep focus that I turned away from the first times it happened.  She gives in to me when I am assertive, and she doesn't hesitate to ask for what she wants or to direct me.  This give and take occurs without any explicit communication, and at no point did I feel she was just doing something for my sake, and yet at no point did it feel she was even remotely selfish.  Instead of two people using each other to get off, for the first time ever it felt like a totally joint venture, a two person team activity. 
Her third was on top of me facing up, the position which tends to be most intense for me.
Her fourth she was lying on her front, I was on top behind her.  It was the first one where I was the one stimulating her with my hands.  That was my favorite.
She seemed to think that was the end, it was a confusing bit of limbs shuffling about before I ended up in her again, her on her side, one leg straight, between mine, the other bent, me sitting upright.  In that position was my 3rd.
Then we lay for a while, talked a bit. We held each other, calmed down. Only for a little bit.  She mentioned feeling satisfied, but still aroused.  My last time I finished off by hand.  I need that pressure at the base in order to feel satiated.  She seemed to get almost physical pleasure from my reaction. 
By now it was quite bright outside. She has a stamina to match her personality.  Somehow I felt no more tired than I had when we had started.  Somehow, even with so much enthusiasm and intensity, aerobic capacity was never a limiting factor.  (I need to do this more often.  I would get into excellent condition.)
We each showered in turn, and after just a bit of talking, (Every part of my insides screamed at me to tell her that I love her, but I used the will power I hadn't used on sex to keep from giving into that premature ejaculation of words) and a bit of snuggling, we got a little bit of actual sleep.
She helped me to tear myself away in the morning; she wanted to sleep more and I had work. 
We haven't yet had a chance to talk.

Hopefully having written this down will be enough to at least get it out of the front of my conscious, and allow me stay present until we do.
Hopefully...

This is too much

• Oct 12, 2008

This is too much

You all know what has been going on.

I didn't seriously expect things to get so...
so quickly

I feel ok
Better than ok

I am in constant awe of everything, of everything, not just the people in my life and our interactions, and it is non-stop, it has been constant - and all but overwhelming - nearly every moment for as long as I can clearly remember (which is about the past two months or so)

As I mentioned before, it is exhausting - but with a week off last week (off from working anyway, though a date, time with friends, and/or a party every single day; and somehow I am becoming aware of my age?  While I have felt like a kid playing grown-up all my life, (well, except when I really was a kid.  Then I felt much more mature than my peers.  Its like I have been at the same maturity level my whole life, and at some point I grew into it, but then I kept aging as it stayed the same (I'm (mostly) kidding)), I have been noticing certain details - owning my home, running a business, being divorced, driving conservatively - which I always associated with "real" adults.  Yet recently I seem to be in the young adult world all over again) I feel re-energized and ready for more.

Except that now I am starting to fear hurting certain people (who shall remain nameless and detail-less to protect the privacy of the innocent (particularly since I was specifically asked to and I am most certainly not the type to pull a Lucy Ford on anyone, no matter how disgruntled or resentful I might be - not that I am, not at all, but I'm just saying, in theory, none of you ever have to worry about that; although I tend to assume that anything is ok just so long as you don't tell me otherwise so if you want not to be mentioned here make sure and tell me explicitly because I'm not any good at taking hints) and while I knew in theory this possibility was lurking, I really never expected it and so now I'm wondering how to cope if this trend continues on its current trajectory and certain other things pan out in a way like they look like they might possibly could and of course I am basing this on solittle, I am, and I know it, but it sure looks more likely than average and I can't help but to think about worst case scenarios and its making all sorts of wacky (and sometimes terrible! :( ) things pass briefly  through my mind (the sort of things which are in direct opposition to the ideas in the love essay I've been telling you all I have been working on (I really have been, life is just very distracting at the moment and its hard to focus) if you know what I mean).
I added a note on the ok account about these potential changes, and deleted the lines with Craig, but as Malomar would have it, these actions are exactly 2 hours too late and as things are I don't feel like it would be reasonable to not at least find out because this is a potentially narrow opportunity to learn, and its too important not to find out.  Is it selfish?  That is the question I am struggling with.  That is the question which is forcing me to write this against my better judgment.  Everything I have said has been true, but all of us know (sometimes we choose to ignore, but I believe that deep inside everyone of us knows) that it is always more complicated than can be forced into a set of rules or theories.

My next therapy session is not going to have enough time to cover a small fraction of all this.
The hour goes by unbelievably fast every time as it is, even when I come in feeling like I don't have much to talk about (this isn't just my perception, he is surprised every week when time runs out)

Bonus Points:

If any of my readers actually read through this and are able to make sense of all the ((((())))) and explain in more comprehensible terms what the hell I am talking about here, I will take you out: ice skating or for ice cream; your choice, my treat (your explanation has to be accurate)

What is this?

• Sep 25, 2008

What is this?

Feeling like I'm in love without having any one particular person to focus it on is an entirely unprecedented experience for me.  I really don't know what to do with it.
It surprises me that its not so overwhelming; even the giddiness of a few weeks ago is fading (a little) - yet something I don't know how to explain beyond "in-love" remains.  It is a little tiring.  I'm not sure why (I'm not sure anything!)
Overall, I don't think I like it.

effective expression, intelligent love

• Sep 3, 2008

effective expression, intelligent love

What tells one person they are loved may be no more than background noise to another.

We are limited to words, gestures, actions, to express our whole range of feelings to one another. 
A smile, a cringe, expressions are largely universal.  But we are quite able to misunderstand each others communication, both verbal and non-verbal, and do so all the time.

Of course the words alone ("I love you"), with no action to support them will not be convincing...though the words are a vital addition for some). The range of potential actions is enormous.

If we go about acting on feeling without really thinking, our own most natural expression of deeply felt love can come across as meaningless.
What matters is not if you find unexpected flowers to be romantic, but if your partner does. 
Our choice of method to express our care for another may be dependent largely on how it was expressed to us. 
Maybe I was not shown much affection growing up, but much emphasis was placed on my health, well being, and nutrition.  Maybe my partner’s experiences were just the opposite.  When I cook her healthy meals it feels to me like she takes this expression of love for granted.  She does take it for granted, since she never considered meal preparation an act of love.  Her parents never cooked, and she would be just as happy eating out.  She assumes I cook for her just because I enjoy cooking.  
When she gives me a hug it feels hollow to me.  I don't associate physical affection with love very strongly.  She feels the lack of response on my part, and takes it to mean I don't feel strongly about her, when really I just don't feel strongly about the method of expression. We don't understand each other, but we can't explain -  we may not even understand the reasons behind our own feelings.

It isn't so much selfishness as ignorance, immaturity.
Its only natural that one would assume that what makes them feel loved is what would make others feel loved, and would therefore express their own in the same way they would like to receive it.  After all, we are reminded to treat others the way we would like to be treated.  The golden rule is unfortunately a bit of an oversimplification, for perhaps I appreciate surprise guests and my neighbor appreciates being left alone and as we each try to be especially kind to each other by doing what we would want them to do our displeasure only grows.

Truly caring about someone, we have to look at them a little closer, and to learn to channel our expression of love in such a way that it is understood. 
If you don't know what would make the most meaningful expression to your partner, probably a good clue would be whatever things they do to attempt to express it to you!

Perhaps many of us never really thought about it.  Now you have no excuse.

A total change of perspective

• Jul 24, 2008

A total change of perspective

What an experience these last few days have been!

So, from where I left off...

I did not end up learning to sail that day, as my friend / instructor had last minute craziness.
However, I actually didn't feel very disappointed because, in a way, now I get to enjoy the feeling of looking forward to it for another week (or perhaps because I'm scared of falling into the cold wet bay - which is apparently inevitable)
With the unexpected free time I did the laundry, the dishes, a thorough work out (I am getting close to being able to clean and jerk my own body weight), proof-read the blog from the night before, checked my PO box, I can't remember all what else.

As night approached, after that horrible experience the night before of trying and failing to sleep, of spending hours awake in the silent dark, alone with my thoughts a second time, I decided that instead I would not even try to sleep.
This time I took the opposite route, modofinil and caffeine pills and some primeatene just to jump start it, cranked up the music, turned on every light in the house, and did some exercising.

With hours to kill, I looked up an internet forum I found months ago when I was trying to learn more about the sort of psychological issues I suspected my wife of having related to her traumatic childhood, and how it was likely to play out in our marriage.

This time though, instead of looking with a focus on figuring out how to best improve our relationship, I was just looking for general validation and emotional support from people who had dealt with the exact same issues themselves.  There are many post both from people who have attachment problems of their own as well as spouses and former spouses of them.



I signed up this time.
I read a lot of posts that felt very familiar.  I read questions I had been asking, feelings I was feeling.  I started writing myself, wrote in detail about my experiences, I offered advice, or more often just sympathy and understanding, when a particular story resonated most deeply.  Within hours I was getting responses back to my own posts, ones which felt relevant, helpful, and always validating.

When I realized that anyone else online had surely gone to bed, and that I had the most recent post in the top 6 threads, I finally closed the computer.  It was daylight by then.  I spent the day variously: pacing around, lying on the floor, considering returning some work calls and deciding not to, lying awake in bed half trying to sleep, checking for new emails or friends online or how many hits my blog had gotten, taking in the laundry I had left on the line over night, and thinking thinking thinking about all that I had learned and how it applied to my past, how it changed the context of my memories.

Occasionally I could not tell if I was having tiny hallucinations

When I would lay in bed, every single time I heard a motorcycle with loud pipes go by on the freeway, for just one instant the thought would flash through my mind that maybe it was her, maybe she was coming over and would tell me that she was willing to try harder after all, that she realized how important I was to her.  Just for one brief moment.
I didn't really think it was true.
First of all, I was already fully aware that that day may NEVER come.
Not only was I aware of it intellectually, but it was starting to sink in, for the first time ever, emotionally as well.

(Some people I read about had experiences like ours, except over marriages that lasted one or two decades.  Some had had multiple separations and reconciliations.  Some had been in individual or couples therapy, or both. There were some success stories, but there were also many that were not.)

Second of all, I knew that even if that day did ever come, it wasn't going to happen in 1 day (wait, no, 2 days, just because I didn't sleep doesn't make it the same day).  From experience I know she can go at least 3 months while blocking out any positive feelings or memories of me. 
Besides for that, even if she did have a change of heart, she would not have made it known, out of wanting to respect my boundaries and not hurt me any more than she already had.  She can be very caring and selfless in that way at times. 
(Did I make it sound like she never was?  I think that makes for a very poor reflection on me.  I should never communicate the bad things without balance, or at least context.  She is, for the most part, very nurturing and giving, sometimes to the point where she needs to be reminded to take care of herself too, reassured that having her own needs doesn't make her selfish)
So, obviously there was a roughly zero chance that she was going to be showing up

then again, there have been a few times where she surprised me that way

And that made me feel the chances were roughly zero, not zero exactly, and that was enough to make me think "maybe that's her" for one moment, every single time.  And I was thinking about this, about how irrational and obsessive I was being, and somehow being aware of it actually made me feel it even more each time.  Which may not have been such a big deal, except it turns out there are a whole lot of motorcycles that go by this stretch of freeway, far more than I had ever noticed before.  Several per minute.
The ones who took the exit of course were particularly hard to ignore.
Then at one point there was one which just seemed to keep being there while at the same time moving closer, but never actually getting closer.  It was distressing, because I just kept waiting for it to go away - once it passed, it was proof that it wasn't her, but this one wouldn't go away.  I started visualizing her bike coming down the driveway, matching the sound I heard to the fantasy.  I started to grow agitated and anxious, my hands started actually shaking a little, because I knew it wasn't her, but I just had to hear it drive past and keep going so I could know that it wasn't - but it was still there.  It didn't sound idle, it was moving; I started to think that it was a hallucination, that I had been thinking about the real bikes so much that now I was just hearing them constantly when finally I realized it wasn't a motorcycle at all, it was a small low flying plane, and eventually it did fade off into the distance.

When I got in bed, it was never for more than a few minutes.  Same with anything else I did, all day.  Between the extreme emotions, the lack of sleep, and the mild stimulants, I was restless and antsy as well as shaking an awful lot.  I managed to force myself to eat (a handful of raw greenbeans and bitter lettuce, followed by a few spoonfuls of ice cream - finishing that meal took up a good 15 minutes).
I noticed that she had removed me from her internet friends list, yet, interestingly, had not blocked me from chat nor unsubscribed from my blog.  This is not much to go on, but I got the feeling that maybe she had de-internet-friended me in symbolic support of my request to end contact, but she was still interested in knowing how I was doing, and so maybe she wasn't putting up that wall of defensiveness at all this time. 
That was some how comforting to know (or rather, to suspect)

When I would check the computer, sometimes I would notice she was online...
just one click of the mouse, I could reach out to her
so easy, so minor
I mean, she has been a constant part of my life from before I even moved out of my mother's house.  We transitioned into independent adulthood together, as a couple, and the most natural thing in the world is to just connect with her, ask her what shes been up to, tell her something I'm thinking
but, I was the one who was making this choice, right?  I am doing it for me.  She can not be careful of my feelings, so I have to keep her away from me.
And I avoided the temptation, but I knew the fact that the temptation was so strong must say something about me

Some of the things I read, which echoed things I had felt, were written not by a spouse of someone with an attachment disorder, but by a person with an attachment disorder themselves.

This was not the first time the idea had occurred to me
After all, I had very abnormally strong infatuations on random girls throughout grade school, I had never felt particularly connected to my family, I rarely formed close friendships and had little desire for them, and clearly how I felt about Aileen was obsessive -

NO!
Don't say that!
Its Love!
Its Real!

why are you getting so defensive?

that totally invalidates my feelings, it denies that my love for her is based on her
it implies all sorts of terrible things
that line of reasoning leads to total disillusionment...

don't be so dramatic
its over anyway, so there is no point
you can stop now...
just admit that your feeling for her are obsessive

NO!
...I don't want to hear...

Hey! Calm down... look, granted, there is, and always was, a real base.  I'm not denying that.  I'm not taking that away from us.  If we didn't have any type of abnormal attachment styles, I'm sure we would still have picked the exact same person.
I'm not saying the love itself is not fully genuine.  I am only saying the degree of the feeling is obsessive. 
Think about it: you don't believe you could live with out her, do you? 

Well...  no

You feel that you don't just want her, but that you need her?

I... I... yes.  I do.

But that is not true, in an objective sense, is it?

I feel that it is.

But is it really?

I don't know...

Yes you do.

ok.  ok.  you're right.

(in case it is not obvious, this conversation took place inside my head, between my intellect and my feeling.  And it wasn't a literal back and forth, this is just a metaphor of the realization and the resistance to it)

There is a word for that:  Dependence.  I am so independent - right?  Never ask for help, living on my own, running my own business, don't need friends; ah, but...
I need her
Isn't that love? Everyone needs someone!
yes.  true.  but not everyone feels that their entire life becomes permanently devoid of all meaning if that one person is not by their side.

Just look at my blog from last month.  Or last night...  I can not understand all the people around me.  Like I said to my therapist last week, sometimes I have to be willing to consider that, if everyone else in the world is a certain way, and I am different - maybe its me. 
In most ways I am perfectly happy to do things my own way when it is actually better.  Common and normal don't mean healthy or ideal.  However, just because that applies in some ways, doesn't mean I get a free pass on my every neurosis.

and I look at the summaries of the types again: Anxious-preoccupied attachment.
that doesn't sound at all like me, does it?  Sounds like the opposite of me.  ok, but now replace the word "others" with "my partner".  Spot on.

But wait, I only felt there was never enough intimacy because my partner has such much trouble with intimacy.
Its hard to say just how much was each, because they were both factors for sure; my abnormally high desire for intimacy and her abnormally low desire for it (well, more accurately perhaps, fear and rejection of intimacy. Not a low desire - but from my side, it felt the same)

When I first learned about reactive attachment disorder, saw how strongly she fit the risk factors, the behaviors, and the feeling and interpretations that went along with it, I went back and reconsidered every single conflict we had ever had, and it was obvious how and why we had misunderstood and misinterpreted each other and how our lack of understanding of the deeper psychological issues had us blaming each other personally for reactions that were totally to be expected.
(She has gone, at various times in our life, between dismissive/avoidant and fearful/avoidant, both of which, although still under the same general category of reactive attachment, have totally different, sometimes opposite, manifestations from anxious/preoccupied)
Now that I saw that I was not the standard of normalcy I had generally assumed myslef to be, I had to go back through everything again, to see how my own unhealthiness helped shape things, and contributed to our conflicts.

If you have a lot of time to waste, and are really bored, and you don't mind losing a lot of respect for me, you can learn far more about my experiences over the last 7 years than you could ever possibly have wanted to know, by reading my post on the partners of adults with attachment disorder message forum.

One thing I want to point out though, is that what I wrote is very disproportionately negative, and not a fair reflection of the past.  I was choosing to focus on the conflicts and mistakes and hard times, to explore why they happened, how they were possibly interrelated, and perhaps think about how they might have been avoided (or more importantly, avoided in the future).
I was giving the examples of my experience to the other posters, because for me, it felt a little better every time I read something I could relate to, and maybe someone would read mine and be able to relate, and feel validated themselves.
I was trying to look back with enough understanding to show her side of each conflict as being just as understandable as my own, even though I could not understand her side at the time it happened.
And I was also just purging my brain of bad memories, as they lose much of the original bad feelings when they become simply a list of things which happened, in order, a long time ago, just a record of fact.

In reality, there was an immense amount of positivity and warmth and fun and shared experiences and mutual feelings. I very often felt totally safe and secure with her and I often felt that life was just unbearably wonderful and that the future held only better promises to come.  There was so much adventure, sometimes things fell into place so perfectly, and she was so unbelievably beautiful, that it sometimes truly felt totally unrealistic, impossibly good, and I often wondered how I could have been so lucky as to have found her, and to fall into this crazy-fun life.

I don't mention much of any of that in this post.

http://adsg.syix.com/adultrad/forums/index.php?topic=721.0

 I was well aware all along that I was not going to be able to stick with my decision to end all contact with her (I even told her that at the time)
By this time, I began to feel that it was ok that I wasn't capable of sticking with it.  At least I knew why, I knew that it wasn't normal or healthy, but I also knew it wasn't just me.

And, if I have come to terms with the fact that I will not be able to stick with it, is there really any reason to delay? 
I have to begin to recognize when my motivation to contact her is because I like her, I feel comfortable around her and enjoy her company;
vs when my motivation is because I feel that I need to be in contact with her in order to cope with existence.
And I need to act on the former, and find another way to deal with the latter (or at the very least, be honest with both her and myself when that is my real reason)

Earlier in the day, it was the anxiousness that kept drawing me to click open the chat window.  I didn't even have anything to say. And I fought it successfully, and I am glad for that.
Now, however, I did have something to share, I wanted to communicate with her these new things I had discovered, because she is my friend and long-time confidant.
Just as it is important for me to learn what is unhealthy dependence, it is equally important not to throw out the baby with the bath water, and give up everything, as valuable as it is.

And so I went ahead and wrote to her.

My dramatic and devastatingly difficult ultimate decision to permanently end all contact with her lasted only about 2 days

A total change of perspective:

http://adsg.syix.com/adultrad/forums/index.php?topic=722.0