Every so often someone will tell me about a relationship from their past where the sex was great, but the relationship is no more.
I’ve never had this experience. I got married pretty young and the relationships I had prior to my marriage had good sex, and very good sex, and occasionally great sex, but by the time they ended the sex was down to either good sex or no sex. So it’s hard for me to understand how someone walks away from a relationship where the sex is still great.
Why did these relationships end? Here are some possibilities but feel free to respond in your own way:
The sex was great, but only for a while, then it became not so great.
The other person was incompatible for the long run: values, ambition, life goals, etc.
The other person was pretty awful and it took some time for me to realize this.
It wasn’t my choice; the other person rejected me.
I wasn’t getting other needs met in the relationship.
I went back to an ex where I felt I could have a better relationship.
Basically for me, in the couple of relationships I can think of that fit this situation, it was options 2, 3 and 5.
One guy was abusive. He’s beat the shit out of me, but then when he told me he loved me and was sorry (yeah, I fell for that once upon a time), we would have amazing “make up sex.” (That’s what I thought make up sex was at the time.) So he was totally 3 and 5.
Another guy was an amazing lover, totally mind blowing sex up until the day we broke up. But he wasn’t looking for anything serious. I wanted to get married and have kids.
One girl I was dating was amazing. She kind of ruined me for oral sex. She knew what she was doing down there and I could have had her buried in my thighs forever. But she was catty and jealous. She knew I was bi, so if I even looked at ANYONE, she’d throw a fit. I couldn’t handle her controlling my life like that.
The sex was great, and only got better during the ~three months we were together. But our values were different, and she was far crazier than I initially realized. There quickly came a point when her craziness just wasn’t worth putting up with, no matter how great the sex was.
Just had that. I had no business being in a relationship–this was something that I knew, but Things Happened–and afterwards, I felt as though I should give it a try. And, hey–the sex was really fucking amazing; that should be cure enough, right?
Nope. Still not ready; I’m still getting over the fallout of a divorce and patching my life together. And he was rebounding from an LTR anyway. It would’ve gone very, very badly; and so, I ended it, because it’s better to go out on top. Especially since the guy was my friend before (and still is).
Damned if I don’t sorta regret it, but I’m sticking to my guns.
I’ve said it before but me and my ex would “pretend” to make up just so we could have sex. Once we were done having sex we would go right back to argueing about whatever it was we were argueing about in the first place.
That kind of batshit insanity gets old after a while.
Also, this wasn’t a factor in my decision making process when I decided to leave my ex but I forgot that we had chemistry. We had been together so long that I thought I was just an awesome lover and that sex would be like this with anyone.
Mainly #3 for me and it still pisses me off that it took so long to see it because of the great sex. She was a liar and a cheat and horribly controlling but damn if it still wasn’t the best sex I’ve ever had with someone.
And the worst part is that if she called me tomorrow and wanted to do it for old times sake or something, I would say yes.
Oh well. Great sex > My principles. I can live with that.
The best partners that I had would be mostly classified as either “crazy”, “batshit crazy” or “possibly crazy but it was just a three night stand since she was going to school far away so we never got to find out”.
Okay, probably not batshit crazy, but didn’t want to find out. Anyway, great sex is only part of the package. There are plenty of opportunities for great sex.
The sex was great but I was being limited in my growth inside the relationship and he really didn’t see us being together in the long run but it took me a couple of years to understand it.
(2) for me. I was in a relationship with the best sex imaginable, or at least the best sexual partner; she was horny whenever I was, horny when I wasn’t but was perfectly happy to oblige, and perfectly understanding when I wasn’t in the mood.
She was also into all the same stuff I am (mostly light D/s and bondage), and terrific in bed in pretty much every way you can think of.
Anytime I suggested something new, she was game… anytime she suggested something, it was invariably something that I liked the idea of trying.
We were also extremely emotionally compatible; same sense of humor, similar intellects, and so on.
The one big dump in our punch bowl was her mother- she was a very fundamentalist Christian, and her brand of fundamentalism maintained a healthy distrust of miscegenation. She accused me of stalking her daughter because I brought her breakfast at work after we’d dated a few times, of brainwashing her because she registered as a Democrat, and of being a Satan worshipper because she saw a copy of The Satanic Verses in my bookcase after basically forcing her way into my apartment when I wasn’t home (she drove from Arkansas to Florida to see if she could get rid of me!)
I guess in hindsight we could have made it work but I just couldn’t countenance the idea of her mother becoming family (and she, for obvious reasons, was loath to cut off her mother even though she was horrified at her attitude toward me). I wound up basically pushing her away.
Doesn’t matter now- I’m blissfully engaged. For a long time she was the one that got away, though.
Replace “her” with “his” for me, and “crazy” with “mentally ill but basically functional.” Also, he was borderline homeless, and I didn’t want the responsibility of taking him in if / when his current situation changed. I did love him, though, and I often wonder what happened. I hope you’re doing okay, Bart.
*IME,*I’ve found that they don’t end with abruptness, they might leave, but they inevitably come back. I just feel sorry for the dumb bastard in front of me. She’s slurping my dick, while he’s stuck with the bag… I told ya.
My last “ex” before my current (permanent) relationship:
I knew when we met that there were certain fundamental differences that would never be resolved, and that I wouldn’t be getting everything I needed. But we did have enough in common to make a short relationship worthwhile. And the sex was great. The relationship actually lasted three years - much longer than I had predicted. But it finally got to the point where it just wasn’t worth it for either of us.
I’m so glad that relationship ended when it did, because very soon thereafter I met my current partner.
Because the relationship was making me crazy, and he had fidelity issues. What’s interesting is years later we became friends with benefits and he was a much changed guy, much more self-aware. I liked him as a person alot more. But the sex became meh!
