I'm an African-American gay woman in my mid-20s. I initially had relationships with men, but I'm just not attracted to or compelled by them. Women make me feel alive, exhilarated, connected, and challenged, and sex is the bomb. So, I know I truly love women...but most lesbians, including my current girlfriend, are crazy. I can't deal with their constant breakdowns because I didn't call enough, compliment enough, rub enough, or whatever else I should be doing but am not. Things felt more emotionally balanced with men (probably because I didn't really care). I feel stuck between engaging in meaningless relationships with men and living a life of passion and disappointment with women. What would you do if you were in my little gay pink slippers?
--Fed Up
I think you need to follow the Internet traffic. A substantial portion seems to be those forwarded lists -- from both men and women -- explaining why whichever sex they're dating compares unfavorably to dogs. Clearly, we should ditch these complicated human relationships for a simpler kind of love -- the one we'd share with a partner who's beyond happy as long as we keep throwing it a dirty tennis ball and dropping pieces of food on the floor.
The sad fact is, anyone who can't describe him or herself as "cocker spaniel-curious" has a problem. According to women, men's emotions run the gamut from H to H (Hungry to Horny), they think the correct place for a wet towel is "wherever it happens to fall when they're done drying off," and they leave the toilet seat up and still manage to miss the bowl. ("Why, why, why, when you have a pee device shaped like a pointer?")
Men find women naggy, controlling, and prone to verbal excess -- that is, when they aren't expressing themselves with pouting and drawer-slamming. The man's left to parse whether the acting out is just a fun feature of her monthly Mr. Toad's Wild Hormone Ride -- or indicative of some crime on his part, like the failure to celebrate their second weekiversary (that all-important two-week anniversary of their second date).
You've been dating women for what, 22 minutes, and a handful of emo chicks later, you're ready to pack it in for emotionally dead relationships with men? Women tend to be more emotionally demanding -- probably because they evolved to look for displays of commitment from a partner. But, women aren't your problem and men aren't the solution. Like a lot of people in their 20s, you're probably a crappy gatekeeper -- prone to rushing into a relationship because a woman's hot and fun. Before getting serious, you need to do the rationality and groundedness entrance exam: "What kind of circus are we entering into here? Will somebody be swinging from the chandelier because we got her the 'wrong' birthday card?"
That said, a healthy relationship involves taking pleasure in doing the little things that please your partner -- even if you find them somewhat silly. If you get tired from all the rubbing and complimenting or whatever, go to lunch with a bunch of straight women and you'll be reminded that anybody who dates anybody has it rough. People -- can't live with 'em, can't kill 'em and be absolutely sure you'll get off on a technicality.
My boyfriend still shares a weekend/vacation house with his ex-wife. He just framed a photo of me and put it on the nightstand next to his bed, the spot where he previously put unimportant photos -- ones of his dogs and trips with college friends. All the photos of his family members (and of his now-ex-wife) are along the stairway. Should I say something?
--Hurting
Are the throw pillows plotting against you? Has his trash been talking trash about you again? It seems you're a Couch Whisperer, blessed with the rare gift for understanding the secret language of household objects. You know better than to find it sweet that your picture is the last thing the guy'll look at before he falls asleep and the first thing he'll see upon waking up. If he really loved you, he'd have his ex's picture on his nightstand and stick yours between fat dead Uncle Joe and the fishing picture of his pimply cousins. Or, better yet, he could just forget that the house is a shared space -- shared with his ex-wife -- and post a picture of her replacement over the fireplace. Should you say something? Absolutely...to a therapist, before your toxic fear and festering insecurity drive your boyfriend to relocate your photo to a place many will see it -- if they remove the note taped over your face reading, "Yard Sale, everything on this table 50 cents or less."
June 21, 2011I'm 25, a singer in a band, and extremely motivated to make a career out of my music. In fact, I'm moving to LA this week for that purpose. I've been casually dating -- speedily dumping men who've gotten attached (not my fault, I make my intentions super-clear). I should be packing now, but I'm a mess. Last week, I got beyond wasted with our drummer, and we slept together. He's a guy I always knew I could fall for, but since relationships aren't my priority and he had a girlfriend until recently, I never gave him much thought. The morning after, he gave me a quick platonic hug and made it pretty clear he had no interest in anything more. Now, despite my total career focus, I'm having these weird thoughts -- like, if he asked me to stay and be with him, I probably would. I don't even believe in marriage, but if he proposed now, there's a good chance I'd say yes! Have I lost my mind?
--Unnerved
It takes a rock off the planet Krypton to disable Superman. For you, it's five Rolling Rocks and a drunken hookup. Suddenly, you're dreaming of that "most important day of a girl's life," which, just hours before, involved pledging to spend the rest of your next five years wedded to Def Jam.
While it must seem like aliens came down and swapped out your brain for Mrs. Cleaver's, it's possible that the culprit is the release, during sex, of oxytocin, a hormone nicknamed "the hug drug" and "the cuddle chemical." In "Why Women Have Sex," psychologists Cindy Meston and David Buss explain, "Oxytocin release has been associated with emotional bonding and might explain why some women experience an intense feeling of connectedness with their partners following orgasm." ("The biochemistry of attachment made me do it!")
This might explain why it's hard for many women to have casual sex. In men, testosterone slaps down the oxytocin, making it easier for them to roll over and be on to the next. But, in a study by psychologist John Townsend, even women with every intention of humping and dumping some guy tended to end up feeling all cuddlywuddly and vulnerable in the morning. But, wait! That isn't you. In fact, you've left a trail of broken men in your wake. ("Sorry, boys, but they don't call her Lady Gaga because she was hanging around her hometown making googly eyes at a string of aspiring Sir Gagas.")
How does a cool customer like you go from wanting to hop the fast track to a Grammy to the fast track to becoming somebody's grammy? Well, for starters, this guy wasn't some groupie you could flick off like a bug. He was your bandmate, your equal, and a guy you "always knew you could fall for." And maybe you had fallen for him but shoved your crush behind some amp somewhere because you were leaving and he had a girlfriend. Now, with big scary life changes looming, maybe it's tempting to find a reason to stay where you are. You need to decide who's the boss here -- your ambition or your feelings. It can't be a democracy. One of them has to be queen. If making it in music is still what you want, just pull yourself up by your bra straps and be that person you were before you rolled the drummer -- probably the last person who'd remix "Go west!" into "Or...maybe I'll just go nest."
My best buddy's about to propose to his girlfriend, and he's running some pretty crazy ideas by me. Basically, he wants to propose big -- do something public and outrageous. Am I wrong that this could be a bad idea?
--Crazy Dude's Bud
There are public people and then there are private people, like my boyfriend, who'd react to a surprise birthday party with the enthusiasm he'd have for a surprise prostate exam. Sometimes, a guy who's proposing gets so caught up in creating the spectacle of the century that he thinks of everything -- everything but how it might go over with his girlfriend. Help your buddy out by asking him some questions -- whether his girlfriend's really the propose-apalooza type and whether they've at least had a conversation or two that crept up around the subject of marriage. "Will you marry me?" is one of those questions a guy shouldn't be asking unless he's pretty sure he already knows the answer -- especially when that answer will come while he's kneeling in popcorn and beer before his girlfriend and 60,000 people watching on the JumboTron. It will give him something to tell his grandchildren -- as soon as they're old enough to ask, "Grampy, who's that crying lady who isn't Grandma who's running away from you in the YouTube video?"
June 14, 2011I met an amazing guy -- the kind I swore didn't exist: thoughtful, caring, and incredibly secure. He seemed to love me. We were together exactly nine months when he called and suggested we go dancing. Ten minutes after I arrived at the club, he broke up with me. He claimed he didn't know what had happened, but he just couldn't be with me anymore. I left, heartbroken -- a complete wreck. Two weeks later, he called to see how I was and said, "Everything about you is what I want, but for some reason, I just don't want you." I've had a history of going for men who treated me like crap, but he treated me incredibly well. The lesson I've gleaned? Even if a guy's really good to you, you can't trust him. Help! I don't want to become some bitter, jaded old woman.
--Devastated
Sometimes, treating a woman like crap comes with a substantial grace period. Sure, breakups happen, but a truly "thoughtful, caring" guy prepares you for what's to come with "We've gotta talk" -- not "Hey, Babe, put on your strappiest dress and meet me under the disco balls." (Considerate guy that he is, surely he told you how beautiful you looked when the colored lights reflected off the mascara streaking down your cheeks.)
What changed for him? Without drilling a hole into his brain and watching all the worker ants running around the factory, it's hard to say. Maybe his feelings just fizzled, or maybe he was only up for romancing you into a relationship and not the relationship itself. Whatever his reason for leaving, he sure didn't need to pop up again to reiterate that he doesn't want you -- just in case you missed that when he was teaching you his cool new dance move: twirl the girlfriend around and kick her to the curb.
Ask yourself whether it's actually out of character for Mr. Wonderful to rather cruelly and abruptly transform into Mr. I'll Be Wandering Off Now. Getting impatient in your search for a great guy can lead you to stick a bag over the head of a sorta-great guy or even a not-so-great guy and insist you've got your man. Your therapeutic professional would call this "confirmation bias" -- favoring information that confirms some belief you hold and shoving away any information that doesn't. So, maybe you tell yourself that a man's treated you really well when he just treated you to some romantic dinners and did some of those nice boyfriend things like bringing you flowers and repairing your garden hose.
Any guy can learn to do that sort of stuff by reading "10 Ways To Make A Woman Cross-Eyed With Lust For You" in any number of men's magazines. To figure out whether a man is more than the sum of his smooth moves, look at whether he's compassionate, whether he shows empathy -- for you and others -- and especially when he doesn't think anybody's looking. Of course, getting to the truth takes being okay with the truth -- even if it ends up setting you a lot freer than you wanted to be. Since it's always possible the candles and moonlight are a prelude to the track shoes, it's best to live with the hope that love will last but without the expectation that it will. That's probably the single best way to avoid becoming that "bitter, jaded old woman." Then again, somebody's got to take care of all the neighborhood's stray cats.
My best friend is a man for whom my feelings continue to grow. He's been stuck chasing his ex-girlfriend who lives four hours away. She sees him once a month for a booty call. I fall asleep thinking about him and daydream about him while on dates with other men. He's acknowledged that if his ex weren't in the picture, he'd explore a relationship with me. Please help.
--Longing
"IF his ex weren't in the picture...!" You can always find your way to an "if." It's fun to vacation in if-land for a moment or two -- like, if I had a TV show, I'd have a cook and a driver and a monkey to massage my feet under my desk. But, I don't have a TV show, and monkeys throw feces. And this guy doesn't want to explore a relationship with you or he'd be doing it instead of driving eight hours in hopes of servicing his ex back into a relationship with him. You can either live your life or sit around if-ing about what could be...his truck gets repossessed, and no bus lines go to ex-girlfriendville, so he looks deep into your general direction and says the words you've been waiting so long to hear: "Can I borrow your car for a coupla days?"
June 7, 2011Women always insist they're looking for a "nice guy," but they waste no time running past one to get to a jerk/bad boy. It really seems they're drawn to guys who treat them badly. My most egotistical friends score with women like crazy, and I'm a nice guy who's alone. If my experience is any indication, what women really want are domineering users who have sex with them and toss them aside.
--Nice And Tired Of It
Dateless guys like to blame their situation on how "nice" they are -- as if nothing zaps a guy's mojo like being the kind of fellow who'd bandage a bird's wing or drive an old lady to the store. Night after night, they rock themselves to sleep, whimpering, "Am I just too wonderful to be anyone's boyfriend?" when the question they probably should be asking is "Why doesn't the approval-starved, needy suckup get the girls?"
Self-proclaimed nice guys are often not nice at all but overly nice -- snakes in worm's clothing driven by crushing wimpiness, fear and desperation. Instead of taking the straightforward approach to hitting on a woman, the so-called nice guy offers to do a bunch of chores for her -- not out of the goodness of his wimpy little heart but to bribe her into wanting him. This guy not only finishes last, he gets left holding the broom.
"Nice" versus "jerk"/"bad boy" is actually an oversimplification. NYU personality psychologist Dr. Scott Barry Kaufman has been digging into the nuances, which he laid out in his talk at an evolutionary psychology conference I attended in April at SUNY-Binghamton.
Kaufman described the classic jerk as "narcissistic, selfish, thrill-seeking and chauvinistic." He focused on the narcissistic angle, noting that narcissists tend to be a bust in long-term relationships (they're all about being admired instead of being a partner), but they're "masters at first impressions." He cited research that suggests a whole lot of us find narcissists highly likeable at first. We're drawn to them thanks to four things: They tend to dress with personal style (flashy or expensive clothing), they have self-assured body language, they come off warm and charming, and they pepper their conversation with witty remarks. But, in the research, those who initially found the narcissists charismatic, well-adjusted, and fun saw their true colors upon further interaction (recognizing them for the self-obsessed, groupie-seeking, manipulative creeps they actually are).
While many women are drawn to bad boys, especially in their early 20s, there are three basic types who will put up with one: thrill-seekers, fling-seekers, and sad-sack gaping wounds. Regarding your contention that women want "domineering" men, Kaufman laid out research that shows they actually want men who are "assertive" as opposed to "dominant." What's the difference? Well, a guy who says to his date, "We've got to leave right now" as opposed to tying her up and throwing her in the trunk.
Kaufman summed up his talk by describing the ideal man as strong without being aggressive and demanding, and sensitive without being meek, wimpy, or submissive. He described this man as "the Prestigious Man," and gave George Clooney as an example. This sort of man is confident, achievement-oriented and extroverted while also being caring, generous and helpful. Kaufman emphasized that kindness and assertiveness aren't mutually exclusive, and having both in one man is especially important to women. He also noted that the Prestigious Man has genuine self-esteem, based on his accomplishments (as opposed to the blustery "Look at me!" self-esteem of the not-so-nice guy).
So, the answer for you and other nice guys is...become George Clooney? No, nor should you start hitting on women with "Hi! I'd like to have sex with you and throw you away like used Kleenex!" But, think about where a guy who might say that is coming from. He's having fun, shaking things up. He isn't living in fear of rejection. And he doesn't take rejection as a statement of his worth, just a sign that it's time to go offend the next girl.
What you need to do is borrow from the bad boy's successful tactics. You won't transform yourself overnight, but you can work on being more self-assured, and until you start to feel it, do your best to act self-assured. To ramp up your Prestigious Man/Clooneyness, Kaufman suggests you do something socially valuable, something to help humanity. As a bonus, if there's one place you're less likely to find narcissistic, self-serving jerks competing with you for the ladies, it's the volunteer world. In time, with practice, you just might convince some cute volunteer girl to come home with you to help you put Bactine on that rash you got from tucking your tail between your legs.