DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: I am a straight, cisgendered 23 year old woman with strong hetero-romantic inclinations towards men, particularly men of color. I am Dominican-American, meaning, I was U.S. born and am a product of Dominican parents. I grew up in a single parent household where my mother was my caregiver and because of that I never really grew up around me or even knew anything about men until I started dating and befriending them some time around high-school.

To get to the point of my issue: I have only had one very real relationship. It was with a Brazilian guy that I met at my University. We hit it off so well that I went on to meeting his family in Brazil and had a 2 year long relationship. Come to find that he was actually just in it for the visa. I should have seen the red flags coming when our first day doing long distance (me in the States and him in Brazil) he was obsessively trying to calculate how to make his way back to the U.S. by coming up with the craziest conclusions. And before you say it was because he wanted to be with me, once that boy got a student visa to come do his masters in the U.S. that was it for our relationship. A week before his student visa coming in the mail and a month away from flying to the states to be exact. Anyway the details as to why I believed he was interested in me for the visa are long-winded and extremely painful to discuss.

Due to my cultural background I know these type of tricks exist. There is even a Dominican hit called “Pa manga’ mi Visa” which is about a two men who delineate specifics as to how and why he wants to date a “gringa” –to get his visa. Over and over I see this happening. Either an actual business like transaction where both parties involved know it’s a fake relationship with the means of receiving real marriage visas in exchange for money OR the worst one where the other person doesn’t know they are being deceived.

As you can imagine, this experience was really traumatic. As a woman that considers she has daddy issues and has started out life with a very low notion of self worth with an enormous amount of frustration towards myself and constant resurgence of imposter syndrome throughout my academic career –this was a blow to my person. I hit an all time low where I underwent chronic depression and even went through a period of suicidal ideation. Because I gave him everything and loved him unconditionally. Needless to say, he broke my heart.

My first boyfriend was Saudi and all he wanted was to get it in because he clearly couldn’t do that in his hometown without facing some hurdles. He used me for sex and took my virginity.

Present day, I feel pretty healed from that experience and am in the search for new experiences with genuine people. I feel I can speak for all women when I say that it is as though I am constantly hitting a brick wall. Just a few months ago it happened yet again, another Brazilian ( Idk wtf right?). This time it was short lived because I knew to look for the signs. As soon as he said “I have a court case coming up that will determine my status in this country” I knew that that “I love you” one month into the relationship was total love bombing and BS.

Just last week I ended up dating a guy from Venezuela. He has refugee status and is set on that front but due to my past experiences I decided to lie to him by telling him I was born in the DR. But come to find that we had sex 5 times in a row literally a night ago and he already broke the “call the night after having sex rule” where he was texting me every morning for the last week and just right after having sex he completely goes missing. I want to give him the benefit of the doubt and assume that he just didn’t want to come off as clingy BUT like dude…c’mon. I feel so used right now!!

So at 23 I have reached the conclusion that dating men is hard. Especially when you don’t know much about men. I want to find someone genuine but through my 6 experiences thus far I only get the ones that are horny and only want sex or the kind that want a visa. I know that my easy fix is not dating men that have weird immigration statuses and that I should focus on dating men that already have that documented status secured. But I can’t help but wonder if I am just a means for someone’s ends all the time? Like, I get that people are highly self interested and that being selfish is part of human nature. But I feel like I am a good girl trying to date a good guy. I consider myself tender, humble, open minded, caring and overall really loving. I’m just really pessimistic of the future and what it holds for me. And if maybe I should just remain single. I just find that it is so hard to get caught up in thinking that my self worth is measured by a guy’s attractions towards me and if all life has been handing me thus far is an absent father, a couple visa-seekers, and douchebags that only want sex, it’s hard to believe yourself as someone worthy of love and affection. I just seem to suffer more than most people and get my heart broken too easily. Something that may take someone 1 month to get over literally takes me an entire year. And I don’t want this for myself anymore. I’m done crying and suffering over this and I just want to make peace with myself… I look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

Free Lunch

DEAR FREE LUNCH: Whenever somebody keeps running into the same problems in their relationships over and over again, one of the most important things they can do is start looking for the common denominator in those relationships and see if that’s the problem. In your case, you have two major commonalities, and they’re about as tangled up as a drawer full of charging cables. The first is that you have dated a number of guys from foreign countries that have cultures with fairly sexist outlooks or cults of machismo. The second is… well, you.

Now that’s not judgement. What this means is that you need to examine just what it is about these types of guys that is so appealing to you and why you fall for them. It could be because they tend to be the aggressive, dominant type and that just makes all the right parts of you tingle. It could be that the relative novelty of their having grown up outside the US makes them stand out from the guys you know from around the way. Alternately, it could be as simple as the fact that it sounds like you’re a people pleaser and caregiver and these guys were happy to take advantage of it.

If it’s the latter, then part of what you need to do is examine just what motivates you to be a giver. A lot of people-pleasers tend to find that their generosity comes from a place of low self-esteem; they don’t feel that they have much value on their own and compensate by doing things for others… even if it comes at the expense of themselves. At the same time, you’re going to find plenty of people out there who’ll gravitate towards people-pleasers, because they tend to have poor boundaries and won’t advocate for themselves as firmly or strongly as someone else might. Mix poor boundaries with a desire to please and love-bombing – showering someone with excessive amounts of compliments, attention and affection out of proportion to the stage of the relationship – and you’ve got somebody who looks like free money and smells like free lunch.

To be perfectly blunt: dating is a numbers game and a

holes are overrepresented in pretty much every population sample you’re like to encounter. You’re going to find plenty of dudes who’re looking to just get to that first lay and vanish and they’ll say or do any old line of s

t to get there. But the good thing is that a

holes are fairly easy to avoid and even easier to chase off if need be.

The first thing you need to do is hone your bulls

t detector. You’ve already started to be more aware of when folks are feeding you a line; love-bombing and overly attentive too early on are pretty good warning signs. So too are the guys who seem to be telling you exactly what you’re hoping to hear. The more perfect they seem, the more skeptical you have a right to be.

But if they seem perfect, wouldn’t you want to avoid chasing them off? Yes and no. See the next thing you need to do is start being willing to date on your terms, not theirs. Developing strong boundaries, having standards that you won’t budge on, makes you that much harder to manipulate. This may mean that you’ll want to hold off sex until you feel like they’re sufficient trust and comfort built up. It may mean that you’ll be less receptive to pleas of hardship or less-giving to people who haven’t necessarily earned your trust yet. It may mean prioritizing your comfort, your schedule and your sense of security over theirs… even if it feels like this may chase them off. Because, honestly? The guys who balk or get upset when they hit a boundary of yours? Those are guys who’re letting you know that they’re the most likely to screw you AND screw you over.

Now finding the strength to tell folks “no”, especially folks you like and want to like you can be hard. Doubly so if you don’t feel like you have much self-worth. But the truth of the matter is that you have far too much value and worth to let douchebags work you over and con you out of it. You have a lot to give a partner – love, generosity of spirit, caring and so on. The last thing you need is someone who isn’t going to appreciate it or you and who is only trying to take advantage of you. So you need to start recognizing that your worth doesn’t come from being in a relationship, nor from pleasing a

holes who wouldn’t do a third as much for you as you would do for them. The last thing you need to do is set yourself on fire just because someone else says they’re chilly.

And don’t forget: “no” is a full sentence. If you feel like establishing a boundary, the fact that you decided to set one is the only rationale you need. Anyone who’s going to try to move it or argue you into letting it down for them is a dude who needs to be kicked to the curb with the quickness.

You’ve done enough to prove your worth to folks who couldn’t give a damn about you. It’s time to let folks prove their worth to you.

Good luck.

DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: I started dating in my late 20s – 28 to be exact. I fell in love (or what I believe to be love) with the first person I dated. Our relationship is going great but as it has become more serious and we’ve had conversations about moving in together and even potentially getting married, I’m starting to have a FOMO on casual dating and casual sex. My girlfriend has had those experiences and I find that I am a bit jealous of her getting to do that (I have described as having your cake, casual stuff, and eating it too, falling in love). That’s not really fair to her at all though and I acknowledge that I made my decision – I could have put myself out more in my 20s. But now I fear that I am just latching on to the first thing and am unsure if I’m in love and this desire for casual sex is my mind telling me this may not be right. What do you think / do you have any advice?

First Time For Everything

DEAR FIRST TIME FOR EVERYTHING: Here’s the thing, FTFE: you’re always gonna want to bang other people. That’s not a sign that there’s something wrong with your relationship, that’s a sign that you’re a human with a sex drive. Love doesn’t turn off your libido and committing to a relationship doesn’t mean you no longer find other people attractive. As I often say: monogamy doesn’t mean you won’t WANT to bang other folks, it just means you choose not to. And to be perfectly blunt: any relationship – even ethically non-monogamous ones – mean that you’re closing off potential avenues to different experiences and different partners. You will always be “missing out” – for suitably insignificant values of “missing” – when you date someone.

But here’s what I need you to do right now, FTFE: I need you to be bluntly honest. Not with me, but with yourself. What, exactly, is it about casual sex and casual dating that you feel that you’d be getting that you’re not getting from this relationship? Is it strictly the novelty of seeing other folks naked? Well, I like I said: that’s something that you’re going to end up closing off with any monogamous relationship — and many open ones too. Is it because you feel like you could do better and you worry that you’ve settled for too little? Because any relationship is going to be settling; every relationship means giving up some things that you want because there are no perfect people out there. The key is whether you feel like you have is worth more to you than whatever you may be giving up as the cost of being in that relationship. Or maybe it’s because what you want isn’t the sex per se, but the validation – the feeling that you’re somebody that women would choose to sleep with and thus you’re worth more than others. If that’s the case, then I can tell you now that you will never fill that particular hole. As I’ve said elsewhere, women aren’t Mjolnir and only sleep with the worthy; there’re any number of reasons why women choose to sleep with someone that has absolutely nothing to do with him.

Because honestly dude? I think you’ve got a fantasy version of what casual dating and casual sex is like, and I suspect that if you’d done more dating, you might be more relieved to have found someone awesome. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m all in favor of casual sex and dating. I’ve done plenty and I encourage people to pursue that if that’s what they enjoy… but throwing over the metaphorical bird in the hand for two that may not even be in the bush is goddamn idiotic.

I think your better option would be to slow your roll with your relationship. I’m willing to bet that part of your panic here is the feeling that this is going to become more than you may want just now. So appreciate what you have, learn all about you and your partner and savor every moment… but don’t rush towards moving in or marriage just yet. Give yourself time to learn about being in a relationship and see where that leads you. Maybe it will lead you down the aisle after all. Or you may find that this isn’t going to be your last relationship and you’ll have your chance to date around after all.

But to quote a wise man: “You know, there’s a million fine looking women in the world, dude. But they don’t all bring you lasagna at work.” Don’t end a good thing because you want to roll the dice on your idea of casual sex.

Good luck.

Please send your questions to Dr. NerdLove at his website (www.doctornerdlove.com/contact); or to his email, doc@doctornerdlove.com)

DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: I got myself into a little bit of a pickle. I’ve been married 4 years and about a year in, at 30 years old, was diagnosed with bipolar depression. It took us about a year to get the meds figured out but it has been life changing to finally have some relief. The only issue is a severe decrease in libido. I don’t have any interest at all. I stopped masturbating, my husband and I have mechanical sex MAYBE once a week that is a literal chore for me. Sex just kind of grosses me out these days. I’ve talked to my psychiatrist about it, and he didn’t seem concerned since I can still reach climax, plus it took us so long to get the right combination of pills I’m terrified to change anything up. From what I understand this is kind of a common side effect, so who’s to say this wouldn’t happen with any other medication we try.

I’ve talked to my husband a little about it, I asked him to turn on the charm a little more (his idea of foreplay is “wanna do it?”) to see if that would help but he didn’t really come back with anything. I offered an open relationship (something I’ve always been open to), but he says he just wants to have sex with his wife. I’m not really sure where to go from here. Do I just keep doing my weekly chore for all of eternity? I don’t want to pressure him into the open relationship but should I talk to him about how much I dislike sex and offer that avenue again? I feel like that’s just hurting his feelings and breaking a lot of wifely expectations. I just don’t know where else to go from here. Any advice you have is appreciated.

-Disinterested

DEAR DISINTERESTED: You’re dealing with a really common problem Disinterested, and one that a lot of people with mental health issues face. First, there’s the fact that it took you time to find a combination of therapies that work. That is, possibly the most frustrating part about getting help; it can be stupidly difficult to find the right medication and the right dosage of that medication in order to get the results that you want. That means a lot of folks are stuck with the question of “is this actually working or do I need to wait longer?” and “do I dare risk trying something different?”  Then there’s the question of the side-effects those medications have and whether the cure ends up being worse than the disease. A lot of medications for issues like depression, for example, have “lowered libido” as a side-effect. Hell, when I was on Zoloft to help manage my depression, it killed my sex-drive deader than disco.

So I totally understand where you’re coming from. So let’s talk about what you can do about this.

My biggest concern in this case is your psychiatrist and their lack of concern with your concerns. One of the things that we don’t often talk about is how profoundly sex negative the medical and mental health field can be. While doctors get plenty of training, that doesn’t mean that they’re without their biases… including a lack of concern – or even interest – in women’s sexual health. It’s not uncommon for doctors to dismiss women’s concerns about their sex lives – especially their libido – because… well, how important could that be? I mean, when a proposed male medical contraceptive turned out to have side-effects, it was yanked from studies with a quickness.

Plot twist: those were the same side-effects women face with birth-control pills.

So I’m not terribly surprised that your psychiatrist brushed off your concerns, with a “well, you technically can still orgasm, so what do you want?” Which may be true… but that doesn’t solve your problem.

Now to be fair: your husband does sound like he could step up his game too. The fact that he’s not exactly putting in effort into your sex life certainly isn’t helping with the issues surrounding your libido. In fact, for many women, the reason why their libidos crater is, frankly, that they’re bored. I suspect that this is, at the very least, a compounding complication to your lack of a sex-drive. But seeing as your libido’s death came along with the new medicines, it’s best to start there.

The first thing I suggest is that you advocate for your needs with your psychiatrist. Those side-effects are having a detrimental impact on your quality of life and you can tell your doctor that the “cure” is causing you problems that you aren’t willing to tolerate.  Tell them that you want to try other medications and that you want to prioritize ones that won’t destroy your love life in the process. Yes, I get that it can be terrifying to try another medicine or combination of meds, especially when this one seems to be working. I get that it can be intimidating to confront your psychiatrist – someone with years of medical training – over this. But ultimately this is your life. What good is it going to do to get your bipolar depression under control if it’s going to cost you your happiness and your marriage in the process?

If they balk? Well… it may not be the worst idea to consider the possibility of a different psychiatrist. In that case, you may want to visit the American Association of Sexuality Educators,Counselors, and Therapists website; they have a referral directory that can help you find a sex-positive mental health professional in your area who can hopefully connect you with a psychiatrist who won’t dismiss your concerns about what your medications do to your sex life.

But I also think you need to sit down and have an Awkward Conversation with your husband and lay out exactly what’s going on. He deserves to know that sex for you has become a chore and one that you dread. Were I him, I’d want to know if my wife was dreading the idea of sex with me because good-god-damn, I would not want to be subjecting her to something she hates. Knowing that you’re having to lay back, grit your teeth and think of England may be the kick in the pants that he needs to actually listen when you tell him you need him to put in more of an effort to seduce you and please you.

And if that doesn’t work, if his putting more effort in doesn’t help ease the way sex squicks you out right now? Then knowing how it makes you feel may mean that he’ll be willing to discuss alternatives for the two of you while you adjust your medication.

Good luck.

DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: I’ll get right to the problem, I’m a 22 year old guy dating a 20 year old woman, and it’s going well. We really admire and respect each other, have great physical chemistry, and have healthy communication and boundaries. I just have one problem: she smokes, and I want her to quit.

Now this may seem like a pretty normal, bog-standard problem, but there’s a bit of wrinkle in the context of our relationship specifically. See, I have a kink that involves seeing women I’m attracted to smoke, and because we’re pretty open about that kind of thing with each other, she is aware of this. She likes the fact that I have this kink, because she assumes (semi-correctly) that this makes her more attractive to me. The thing is, as we’ve grown closer, I’m realizing more and more that I don’t actually want to indulge this kink, because I am much more worried about her health, and I ultimately feel that it’s inappropriate for me to make such a request.

Moreover, I’m getting a bit anxious over the whole thing, I’ve had a few nightmares over the thought of having to bury her in 20 years or so, and the thought of having to see her waste away.

The problem with my asking is I think she’d take it very poorly. As mentioned before, she specifically said that she was glad that I have this kink, and I don’t know how she’d feel about me suddenly not wanting to do anything with it, not to mention that she’s mentioned being a bit resistant to the idea of quitting.

In turn, I’m not sure if I want to break up over this or not. Everything else is fine, and I’d further be worried that she’d try to dig in and find some “other” reason besides that for the breakup, and that I’d put more self doubt than she already has on her shoulders.

I guess my questions are the following: Should I ask her to quit? Should I consider breaking up? and finally, if I do decide to end things, how should I explain why?

-Scared To See Her Leave

DEAR SCARED TO SEE HER LEAVE: Y’know, my dude, I think you may have jumped several steps here. There’s a world of space between “talk to her about quitting” and “now she’s going to leave me” but you seem to have decided that this is the inevitable end result. Without, y’know. Actually talking to her. Yeah, you have your kink – it’s actually a surprisingly common one – and she gets spun up by how hot it gets you… but presumably you’re into her even when she’s not smoking. And honestly, there’re ways you can indulge that kink without nicotine. I mean, vaping is a thing. So, for that matter, is weed. Hell you could combine the two…

But the issue here isn’t the smoking or the alternatives to smoking. Not really. The issue here is that you have a concern and you’re afraid to bring things up to her. That is your bigger problem and the one that you need to work on.

You don’t say how long you two have been together, but it sounds like it hasn’t been for that long. If the two of you have only been together for a couple of months… yeah, it’s gonna be a pretty big ask. It’s a little presumptive to say “hey, I know when we got together I was really into this thing that you do, but now I feel weird about it and I want you stop doing that thing for me right now.” While you may have the best of intentions at heart – hey, not wanting to see your lover die from a horrible disease is pretty understandable – it’s kind of presumptive to make demands of somebody you haven’t known for that long.

Not to mention “yes, we’ve only been together for a little while, but I’m getting anxious about something that may happen 20 years down the line, at a time when we may or may not still be together” is… well, that’s kind of an example of what I mean when I talk about people investing too much, too quickly in a relationship.

But even if we allow that you’ve been together for long enough that this isn’t a big ask or that it’s reasonable to make plans for 20 years down the line, you have more options than “ask her to quit smoking” and “leave her right now”.

What you should do instead is – as I just told Disinterested – is sit down and have an Awkward Conversation. In this case, you want to bring up that you’ve been hesitant to indulge your kink because of the potential health effects and it feels weird to be getting a boner when you also keep thinking about cancer and tumors. While you don’t necessarily want to tell her to quit, you do want to at least let her know that this is a concern for you and the dissonance between your kink and the side effects it could have on her are causing you anxiety.

(I would leave out the part about getting worried that you’ll be burying her in 20 years.)

Now I stress: the point of this conversation isn’t to get her to quit. It’s to simply lay the groundwork for you to be able to actually talk with her about your concerns instead of assuming that you only have two, mutually exclusive possibilities. Because I can guarantee you: there will be other, more immediately pressing concerns in your relationship. And if you can’t talk to her about how you feel? Well, your relationship’s going to fall apart sooner, rather than later.

And seriously: it’s admirable that you’re thinking 20 years down the line, but focus on your immediate future for now… like, maybe 3 months down the line instead. Take some time to make sure this relationship’s got legs before you start borrowing trouble from a potential future.

Good luck.

Please send your questions to Dr. NerdLove at his website (www.doctornerdlove.com/contact); or to his email, doc@doctornerdlove.com)

DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: Thanks for all the hard work and great articles, lots of great advice which has helped in the past –  your book New Game+ has been a huge benefit to me. My question is a quick one, around how sexual desire changes when you get older.

I’ll hold my hands up and say from the get-go that I myself am very young, only 26! However, I’ve have usually been in relationships with older women (10+ years older than me). Recently, I have been in a wonderful, loving relationship with an older women over the past year or so. However, in my day to day life, I come across lots of other interesting and attractive women, many of whom are young (18-26, I work at a college). Understandably, I find many of them sexually attractive – but I struggle on a somewhat daily basis with feelings of guilt and lust, as I am noticing the age-related differences between the younger girls and my partner more frequently.

Concurrently, I was listening to podcast by Russell Brand recently, and he mentioned how he has gotten to the point of having such a rich spiritual and emotional connection with his wife that he doesn’t feel the need to put another person in between that space anymore. This got me thinking – as you age (50+, 60+, 70+), your lusts for nubile flesh and younger women (or men) must be increasingly harder to fulfill. Instead, you will need to prioritize experiencing the whole emotional and spiritual connection with another person in its entirety (rather than just wanting them for their hot ass!). I am also aware of your other blog post about how society fetishizes younger women of a certain demographic, and we are living in an Instagram and porn-addicted world where our standards of sex are enormously warped.

So, tell me Doc, can you successfully lust after young, nubile partners as you age – will it make you happy, and sexually satisfied? Or should we instead prioritize only valuing the spiritual connection with another person during sex? Or can you have both? 

Benjamin Button

DEAR BENJAMIN BUTTON: Most of the time when someone writes to me with questions about something that’s years – or decades – down the line, the problem is that they’re borrowing unhappiness from the future. A future that, in fact, may never come to pass.

You, on the other hand BB, aren’t borrowing trouble so much as just making crap up to get worried about. Worrying about whether you’re going to be able to be a dirty old man – or, y’know, the male lead in most Hollywood movies – in 40 years isn’t just missing the point, it’s managing to miss the entire planet the point resided on and sending things out past the Van Allen Belt.

So let’s break this down a little, shall we?

First, you’re assuming a whole lot of facts not in evidence – starting with the question of whether you’re even going to be into the same type of women as you get older. As easy as it is to think that you’re gonna want nothing but jailbait and women in their early 20s, you may find that your tastes have changed drastically as you get older. There’re plenty of folks who hit their 30s and 40s and realize that while that young flesh may be hot to look at… a lot of times, that’s all there is. They’re great eye-candy but you can’t have a conversation with them, nor are they nearly as good in bed as women who’re more age-appropriate.

(Seriously: the reason why we used to say that women hit their sexual peak at 35 is because by 35, women tend to have run out of f

ks to give and are shucking off the sex-shame-y bulls

t society has thrown on them. A woman with no f

ks, who’s come into her own sexuality is a glorious and terrifying thing to behold.)

Second, let’s be real here: this is less about whether or not it’s generally possible for an older man to get with a younger woman – clearly it is. This is about whether or not you’ll be the kind of man who can hook up with a woman young enough to be his granddaughter. In other words: this isn’t about whether your desire gets harder to fulfill and far more about your ego and a desire for validation. After all, young women are seen as having a certain value and cachet, so clearly someone who can manage to date or sleep with one (or two or three) is clearly of high status.

Except for the part where that’s not how this works. Yeah, Hef had his rotating stable of girlfriends… but he was Hugh Hefner. Basing your assumptions on how dating will work in your later years on Hef is like basing your career trajectory on Mark Zuckerberg’s.

Plus, beyond the allegations of mistreatment and sexual misconduct, do you honestly think that those were a relationship of mutual respect and interest? Dude wanted arm candy to show off and to put on shows for him while his girlfriends liked the advantages that being Hef’s girlfriend gave them. There may have been affection, but this was a one-sided relationship at best and – going by many of the books and stories that’ve come out since – kinda horrific.

Women, as a general rule, don’t date someone for value or status, they date someone who they have a legitimate attraction and connection with. Much of that connection is built on mutual respect, shared experiences and commonalities. The wider the gap you have between two people – especially in age – the harder it is to have those commonalities. Try talking to someone who’s 18 years old. You two will have fewer points of commonality or cultural touchstones than someone who’s 24-28 – never mind the differences in where the two of you are in your life.

So being an old guy with a young girlfriend… it’ll be theoretically possible, but unlikely, and the odds of it lasting is even more unlikely.

Third: I’m glad that Russell Brand has a close and passionate relationship with his wife, but I think you tried to put 2 and 2 together and got “moops” instead. Nothing that he said has anything to do with whether or not you’ll want young chicks as you got older.

Now if you’re asking whether you’ll want other people despite being in love with your partner… yes. Yes you will. So will your partner. We’re a species designed to seek out novelty, including sexual novelty. As I’m so often saying, a monogamous commitment says that you choose to not sleep with anyone else, not that you won’t want to. Similarly, passion fades over time with a partner. The newness and novelty inevitably goes away as you get to know somebody. That’s just part of being in a long-term relationship – that closeness and intimacy means that you know them in ways that you didn’t at first. The way that you keep the spark alive and vibrant is by recognizing that you can’t re-experience the novelty of getting to know your partner, but you can inject novelty and excitement into your lives… which will also bleed into your sexual connection. So part of keeping that spark alive is to not let your lives – sexual or otherwise – fall into a rut.

So yeah: you’re asking the wrong questions and inventing problems to get worried about that have absolutely nothing to do with your life now. Instead of worrying about whether you’re going to be the old guy in the club instead of the Most Interesting Man in the World, try focusing on the relationships you have now. You’re better off learning how to build, maintain and nurture what you have now – a practice that will serve you over your entire life time –  rather than worrying about whether  your future self will be able to score with young women.

DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: I recently reconnected with two friends over spring break, after having not seen them for years. We talked and had a lot of fun, but we were at a diner and my one friend, J (f, currently 20), was revealed that she’d had a problem. She told me about a crush that she had on an underclassman at her school, K (f, currently 19), and how they were best friends but never in a relationship. J asked K out to prom one night, and K couldn’t say no. But once they got to prom, J spent most of the time dancing and flirting with other guys instead of spending time with K. K felt incredibly betrayed, even though they were never really “dating”. Smaller moments, such as ditching a group cosplay at a convention and J dating other people that both she and K knew – people that H didn’t like –  further splintered the relationship. K eventually went so far as to ask whether J saw her as a friend or girlfriend, and J wanted nothing but more but to stay best friends. Currently, the two of them rarely talk.

While she told me about this, I tried my best to comfort her. I asked her questions about how she felt, what she was and wasn’t okay with in the relationship, gave suggestions on what I would’ve done, and gave timid “I’m sorry J”s during the hard parts of her story. But after that discussion I could still feel that she was gloomy and unsatisfied. I thought her talking about it would make her feel a little better, but that didn’t seem to be the case. It made me feel that somewhere in the conversation I may have said something wrong or may have not said something right.

My question is how should I have a conversation like this again? How do I comfort a friend who is going through a rough break up or still stuck on something that never was? When someone comes to me with something like this again, I want to know how to go about it so that they feel like they have a better grasp on their own emotions.

Thanks,

Friend Indeed

DEAR FRIEND INDEED: Not gonna lie, FI… I’m not exactly sure what your friend was expecting. J seems to have gone out of her way to be awful to someone that she supposedly had a crush on and who clearly had feelings for her. There’s only so many times you can dropkick someone’s heart before they say “f

k this noise” and bail.

(Frankly, I’m amazed it took  as long as it did for K to decide to peace out of the entire relationship.)

As a general rule, when somebody’s hurting, most of the time, what they want is comfort. Sometimes that means somebody to listen and let them unload all of the pent-up emotions they’ve been feeling. They may want a neutral party to listen – someone who won’t cast judgement or who wasn’t involved – so they can open up and get an answer to “am I the asshole?” Sometimes it means someone who can be there physically for them – a warm body to cling to and cry on so that they don’t feel alone or abandoned or lost. Other times, they want somebody who will tell them that it’ll all be ok and that as bad as this is, it’ll all fade in time and they’ll feel normal again. Still other times, they want somebody who can divert and distract them, to take their mind off their pain, if only for a little bit.

What they usually don’t want is someone to solve their problem for them or to suggest solutions. This is a problem a lot of guys have; we’re socialized to believe our value is in doing things and solving problems, so we try to throw out solutions when what most people want is to be heard. This is why it can be good to ask whether someone wants action and solutions or tea and sympathy; it makes it easier to know what emotional protocols to engage.

Now not being there, I can’t tell you exactly what J was needing. The cynical side of me suggests that she was hoping that you’d reassure her that she wasn’t a bad person and didn’t blow up a relationship out of… I dunno, undergad drama, I guess. If – and that’s a mighty big if – that was the case, I’m not surprised that she went away unsatisfied.

But the thing you need to keep in mind is that you’re not magic. You can do all the right things and offer somebody the kind of comfort they want or need and not fix them or make them feel better. A lot of times, people will still go away sad and that’s ok. That’s not a failure on your part to comfort properly, it’s just that they still have to feel the hell out of their feels. But while you may not have cured them, you did offer them comfort and solace for a little while, when they needed it.

And most of the time, that’s exactly what they need.

Good luck.

Please send your questions to Dr. NerdLove at his website (www.doctornerdlove.com/contact); or to his email, doc@doctornerdlove.com)