Dear Dan: I’ve been spending a lot of time lately thinking about myself and my sexuality and my romantic self. I can log on and easily find someone to fuck. I’m a bear-built top guy. There are ladies in my life who choose to share their beds with me. I can find subs to tie up and torture. (I’m kinky and bi.) What I can’t find is a long-term partner. The problem is that after I fuck/sleep with/torture someone, my brain stops seeing them as sexual and moves them into the friend category. I have friends that I used to fuck regularly, that now it’s a chore to get it up for. Sure, the sex still feels good, but it’s not passionate. And when it’s all said and done, they’re still in the “friend” category in my brain. Some of them have suggested being more, but I’ve recoiled. There’s nothing wrong with them, but they’re friends, not potential partners. I’m 32, and my siblings are married and having kids, and the people I grew up with are married and having kids. And here I am not able to find a long-term significant other. Am I broken? Should I just accept that, at least for me, sexual partners and domestic/romantic partners will always be separate categories?
—Always Alone
Dear AA: What if you’re not like most everyone else? What if this is just how your sexuality works? What if you’re wired — emotionally, romantically, sexually — for intense but brief sexual connections that blossom into wonderful friendships? And what if you’ve been tricked into thinking you’re broken because the kind of successful long-term relationships your siblings and friends have are celebrated and the kind of successful short-term relationships you have are stigmatized?
If your siblings and friends want to have the kinds of relationships they’re having — and it’s possible some do not — they will feel no inner conflict about their choices while simultaneously being showered with praise for their choices. But what are they really doing? They’re doing what they want, they’re doing what makes them happy, they’re doing what works for them romantically, emotionally and sexually. And what are you doing? Maybe you’re doing what you want, AA, maybe you’re doing what could make you happy. So why doesn’t it make you happy? Maybe because you’ve been made to feel broken by a culture that holds up one relationship model — the partnered and preferably monogamous pair — and insists that this model is the only healthy and whole option, and that anyone who goes a different way, fucks a different way, or relates a different way is broken.
Now, it’s possible you are broken, of course, but anyone could be broken. You could be broken, I could be broken, your married siblings and friends could be broken. (Regarding your siblings and friends: Not everyone who marries and has kids wanted marriage and kids. Some no doubt wanted it, AA, but others succumbed to what was expected of them.) But here’s a suggestion for something I want you to try, something that might make you feel better because it could very well be true: Try to accept that, for you, sexual partners and domestic/romantic partners might always be separate, and that doesn’t mean you’re broken. If that self-acceptance makes you feel whole, AA, then you have your answer.
I might make a different suggestion if your brief-but-intense sexual encounters left a lot of hurt feelings in their wake. But that’s not the case. You hook up with someone a few times, you share an intense sexual experience and you feel a brief romantic connection to them. And when those sexual and romantic feelings subside, you’re not left with a string of bitter exes and enemies, but with a large and growing circle of good friends. Which leads me to believe that even if you aren’t doing what everyone else is doing, AA, you’re clearly doing something right.
P.S.: Another option if you do want to get married someday: a companionate marriage to one of your most intimate friends — someone like you, AA, who also sees potential life partners and potential sex partners as two distinct categories with no overlap — and all the Grindr hookups and BDSM sessions you like with one-offs who become good friends.
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