No; not that there wouldn’t be any, I just couldn’t find them. Almost all my attempts to show interest in women have been misunderstood, and if there have been any cases of the reverse, I haven’t noticed them.
I have quite a few female friends, about the same number as male friends. If having sex was sufficiently important, one of them might be willing; but if I was that kind of guy, I doubt I’d have made friends with them in the first place. Setting me up with their friends has been talked about many times in theory, never in practice.
This isn’t the type of thread I normally post in, but what the heck…
I’m 44 years old and a woman. Besides some sexually activity in college and then maybe 8 years later, I’ve been celibate. It isn’t that big a deal, really. I’m not opposed to sex, but I’m not interested in casual sex and I never had the knack of attracting men. I’m not terribly ugly, hugely fat, hyiene deficient or anything else. I’m not able to see when (if they have) men have been attracted. I’m sort of a literal person - you have to tell me what you’re feeling.
As others have said, it isn’t something that occupies your brain 24/7. I’d love to find someone to love, and to have sex with, but failing that, I’m not unhappy.
In answer to those who don’t get it: I don’t get how I’ve done it, either. I am far from asexual; in fact, I have a strong, at times almost unbearable, desire for physical intimacy with an attractive female non-professional.
Then I remember something an economist friend told me when we were just out of college. That was: look at the numbers. If you approach every woman who seems promising, you have a roughly 10% chance of even a first date, maybe 5% of a second date, and <=1% of Anything Serious.
The longest I’ve gone without sex since losing my virginity is about 7 or 8 months. It just didn’t bother me. That may be because this “dry spell” occured straight after losing my virginity until I got together with my fiance. Now I know sex can be good, if you took it away, I don’t know what I’d do.
A hooker is a good idea if you are after sex just for the physical act. Hookers have to have sex with you if you pay them. The trouble is that sometimes there are guilt feelings associated with hiring a prostitute. Another problem is that it does nothing for the psychological reasons we have sex. That is to know that we are sexually attractive to someone. There is always MDMA, but you may not want to go the route of drugging someone to make yourself sexually attractive. If you have friends, of either gender, they can set you up with someone. If you don’t have friends that are able or willing to do this, you may have to work a little harder. Find something you enjoy doing, and do it. Take a college class, take a part time job, Hell, take a walk around the neighborhood. Your purpose is to meet people. Not to meet sexual partners, but people. One of them will have an interest in you and can help you meet more people. You can find someone to share your bed, eventually, but if you go out looking for that in any place other than a bar at closing time, people may become uncomfortable.
Another suggestion is look at the type of person you are looking for. Look for internal beauty. Try to find something attractive about the people you meet. It may be something physical, it may be the person’s laugh, it may be his/her interest in the city council. If you like someone and that person likes you, it is easier to share things, and sex can be one of the things you share.
If you are comfortable with being asexual, I am happy for you. If not, try this out.
Women are not lottery tickets or meteor strikes, and statistics ain’t sexy. You need to stop talking to economists, unless they are hot and swing your way.
But see, it IS simple. Women are people too. We eat three meals a day, and if you ask a woman point-blank to share one of them with you (instead of hinting and skirting and watching us like we’re animals), chances are usually pretty good that she’ll say yes. Women like nice guys, but only when they’re genuinely nice. Referring to women as odds, or as some unattainable trophy, is not nice and it will not get you laid or in a relationship.
And there is nothing less sexy than an obsessive guy, FYI. We know you’re over in the corner with your calculators and economics books and your “nice” guy credentials, and we’ll stay away like you’ve got the plague.
The ones I quoted sure as hell aren’t. But 1% is about equal to the likelihood of a given job interview resulting in a job you want at a livable salary, so I always figured this is one of those things in life you just have to get used to. I wonder if I shouldn’t have jumped to conclusions there.
Oh, I don’t deny it for a second. You just happen to be people who don’t want sex nearly as often as men, or under any of the same circumstances, or for any of the same reasons.
I’m also not that into the whole man thing. There are a lot of guys out there who do it better than I do.
I can speak to this, because I too was a virgin until relatively late in life. I’d say in my case it was not being able to read signals, or realize that someone was interested in me. Whatever it was I sure didn’t seem to get it. Even on occasions when even I realized there was some serious flirting happening, I couldn’t capitalize on it. Whatever it was, I sure didn’t know it. So I came to a point where I told myself I wasn’t going to let my happiness be predicated on having a girlfriend. I wanted a GF, of course, but I wasn’t going keep knocking myself down because I didn’t have one.
I started doing things alone…walking to the pub to have a couple, occasional trips to SF and LV…the sorts of things that I used to feel one couldn’t do without either a gang of friends or a significant other. I got more comfortable around people generally, and it wasn’t too long before I met my future wife. Until that happened, I dealt with the immediate need for relief like the others here, lots of sublimation, mainly into work and recreation, with some jerking off. YMMV.
You’re jumping to conclusions about me. I haven’t referred to women as odds, or as an unattainable trophy; and I’m in no way obsessive about them.
I have asked a woman, “point-blank” as you say, on a date, and had her accept without even realizing it was a date. Spectre has it right, that some of us simply aren’t tuned in to the unspoken signals and counter-signals that others take for granted. Whatever hints I’m supposed to be picking up, or sending out, just aren’t there.
I had a decent one-night-stand with Bachelor #1 this time last year, immediately followed by a few months of excellent relationship sex with Bachelor #2 (before B#1 I’d been celibate – for varying reasons – for 6 years). But for the past 9 months I’ve not so much as kissed anyone, despite remaining horny as hell. Could I have gotten laid by anyone? Probably, and probably even by more than one guy (despite being short, fat, and sarcastic). Could I have gotten laid by anyone I was attracted to? Nope.
Now, I’m not saying that only scuzzy guys have been interested in me since last spring, because I’ve gotten good vibes from some perfectly non-scuzzy men. It’s just that the attraction hasn’t been mutual.
I wasn’t necessarily directing that part of the post at you, but at several of the posters in this thread. Beware of Doug is the statistics guy.
First, I seriously doubt that statistic. Maybe that would be the overall rate if you’re just randomly asking out barflies, but the “hit rate” has to be higher for individual-directed dating efforts. There’s still a human race, right? But my point was, depressing statistics or not, you’re going to have a much more fulfilling life if you forget the statistics and live like a human, not a computer. If everyone consulted an economist to guide them through every aspect of their lives, most of us would never get out of bed. The odds of leading a perfectly happy life are so slim, and the odds of catastrophe so large. But somehow we all do it, and when it comes to sex, most of us do that too.
Just try talking to a woman–any woman, available or not–and see how it goes. Get some practice about how to talk to the “opposite” gender so you can lose your fear of women. It really bothers me that you and others here have so many hang-ups about my gender, and are so scared of us that you’d cloister yourself away just because of something some economist said. (Most) women DO like sex. (Most) women DO want relationships. This skewed goddess/whore power dynamic is the cause of so many problems in the world, one of which is forty-year-old virgins. God, I will never understand men who can’t relate to women, or act like we’re another species (and many of the men in this thread are doing that), since I don’t do that to them. I’m painfully shy, but this isn’t shyness, it’s gender-based neuroticism.
You sure about that? Maybe fewer women do the casual sex thing, but within the confines of a relationship, many of us can be just as feisty as men. But you’ve basically proved my point; you don’t seem interested in forging a relationship with a woman, you just care about how often we do it, and why we do it, etc. This is why me and a lot of women have red flags when it comes to guys without female friends. It shows that they only see us as sex objects and not as equals, no matter how they say they see us.
Is there another thread on this topic that I haven’t seen yet? I really don’t know where you’re getting that from.
Let me give you an example of what I’m talking about. About 10 years ago, I had just moved across the country and started a new job. Being the newcomer, everyone went a little out of their way to show me around and such. There was one woman I got to know a little bit (lunch a few times, went to a small museum, that sort of thing), and I wanted to ask her out. Now, I’ve said my history is to go somewhat unnoticed, so I wanted to do something a little bit bold and utterly unmistakeable. Rejection is one thing, but it’s even worse to just be dismissed. I invited her to lunch on Valentine’s day. I was going to surprise her, she wound up a little to busy and had to cancel the lunch, so I took the flowers to her office and invited her to a play. She said yes; I was very happy.
A day or two later, she sent me an e-mail asking if I could get a third ticket so she could bring a date. She genuinely had no idea that I had any romantic interest at all, and was probably the only person in the company who didn’t.
And until about two months ago, we were still friends.
I really don’t think it’s a matter of hangups or practice. What seems perfectly clear and straightforward to me goes unnoticed by the women I’m interested in. And if there are any women who have been after me, they’re probably on another message board right now talking about my cluelessness.
**Robot Arm **, we aren’t psychic. I naturally assume that male friends asking me to do stuff are doing so because we are friends. If you want something more, you need to SAY SO. “You know, as I’ve gotten to know you as a friend, I’ve realized that you are really wonderful. I’d love it if we could go on a few dates and see if anything comes of it.” THAT is sweet and obvious.
Sheesh, the same goes for women who want flowers or whatever from their boyfriends, drop silly, cryptic hints, and then get PISSED when they don’t get whatever they wanted. NONE OF US ARE PSYCHIC. If you want something, SAY SO.
And I haven’t had sex since. . . eh, Thanksgiving. I can’t see myself being celibate for long periods of time, because there are always a few, decent people around who I have some interest in (so, if I want to have sex, I can).
I’m not trying to be mean, but this is a sore spot for me. I regularly have guys tell me, “Ya know, I really liked you and you kept rejecting me.” DUDE, you NEVER ASKED ME OUT OR MADE YOUR INTENTIONS CLEAR! Argh. I cannot read minds. My default is to assume that you are just being friendly, unless you say otherwise. (In one case, he’d ask me to run errands with him or go to lunch or go to movies, but he never made a move or said anything to make me think he had anything but friendly feelings).
