did I wait too long for my mr. right?

[lilikoilulu]

Currently I have been with my boyfriend for over 6 years. He is everything I ever wanted in a partner (except for one thing) treats me well, is kind hearted, beautiful, etc. However, I have some issues from the past that are really making it hard for me to enjoy life.

 

Truth be told, I have never really been able to enjoy life. I was raised in a very strict religious family. My parents took me away most weekends. My mom went through my bookbag every night, even in high school. Basically, I followed my parents around, church, weekend house, home, school, church again. My parents are very loving and kind and I don't want to blame them, but for whatever reason, home, myself, Catholic school, I developed a huge fear of sex. I also had a teacher who was a nun who had formerly been left at the altar on her wedding day, who had lost her virginity to her fiance and she really made an impression on me as well.

 

If someone tried to kiss me, I turned away. If someone wanted to date me, after a few times out, I stopped returning calls, especially as soon as I learned he was not a virgin. I actually felt like I was having a panic attack. I didn't have my first kiss until I was 18, and I hated it. I didn't love the guy, I knew he didn't want to date me, it was just a "party thing" and I didn't want that at all. I wanted my first kiss, my first date, my first boyfriend to be special. Well, I waited TOO LONG and perfect never came. I didn't have a boyfriend until I was 21, my current one. I chose friends who were all virgins. I cried each time one lost hers/his. I strongly felt that everyone should wait until marriage.

 

Fast forward, my boyfriend is not a virgin.

 

I love him completely.

 

This is DESTROYING me.

 

I cannot imagine being with anyone else, but I am forced to imagine him with other girls. I have talked with him about it and he says he loves me, wishes he could change things, but it doesn't change his love for me. I try not to bring it up, but sometimes, I will just have to lock myself in the bathroom and cry it out, before coming back.

 

I could break up with him, date other people and try to come back to him, but that's pretty unfair, and pretty pointless. It won't change anything. SO what if I'll be able to say I had another boyfriend or some more "experience"? Plus I think it's using people. Plus I am too scared - and I don't really want to.

 

Am I sexually anorexic? "Love-shy" like Gilmartin assessed for men? I don't know, but I have a pretty strong sexual aversion/repression.

 

He wants to marry me and I want to marry him,but I just feel so heartbroken. Everytime I am with him, I tense up, don't want him to compare me to other people. I have a lot of anger because I feel that God betrayed me. I spent so many days in church, confession, stations of the cross, fasting, sacrificing, praying, lighting candles, and it all did me nothing. What I prayed for, for my whole life, or at least the majority of it, since I was 6 years old never materialized. I knew I wasnt' going to be a nun like my mom wanted. I always knew I wanted to be a wife and mother. That's why I was so picky. Even at age 13, I didn't want to date a guy who wouldn't be a good husband/father.

 

I feel like in the few years past, I have gained the love of a great human being, but I have also had my entire life disillusioned and shattered. Everything I believed about life, death, religion, sex, waiting for marriage, has been shaken to its core and I dont' know how to handle it.

 

If I could just find one other person who waited like me, but fell in love with a non-waiter, so to speak, I think I would feel better. But right now, I feel SO completely alone. I wanted to post just to see if I could find anyone else in this situation. At this point, that is all I want. To know I am not alone.

 

Thank you!

[KittenMoon]

Aw, your story is so heart-breaking. I feel like i can relate a little, though I am not a virgin, I waited for someone I truly loved (so did he). We're not together anymore, but I still long for a partner for whom sex is something that is only desireable in a real love situation. This is not as rare as what you've sought, but it's rare enough, given our society today.

 

I think it's wonderful you bf understands, and even wishes to some extent that he could change things. He could rebuff you, call you nuts, but he doesn't- he's compassionate.

 

Have you ever thought that God sent him to you to help you get past what was a sexually crippling upbringing, in order to learn to be a wife (and eventually a mother) comfortable in her own natural sexuality with her husband?

 

It's like that saying: "We can't always get what we want, but sometimes we get what we need."

[carhill]

Just so you know, if your BF has been with you six years and has been faithful, monogamous and abstinent, he's a saint.

 

I was him, and waited until I was 35, as marriage to the "right" person did not appear to be in the cards, to give myself to someone to whom I was attracted but not in love with. I don't regret waiting, but I must tell you that, if you're with the right person, waiting can hurt you as much as it can feel like the right thing.

 

IMO, from my experiences and psyche, sex is an expression of the essence of your connection with another human being. One of the nuns who taught me/us sex ed in grade school shared that bit of enlightenment with me. She didn't say wait until your married or that sex was only for making babies. She shared something I've found to be profoundly true for myself.

 

You must discover and embrace your own truth. I think, based on nearly 50 years of life experience, that you're doing yourself and your BF a disservice by distancing yourself from a very important part of your R. I you two love each other, get married and do it "your way". There's nothing wrong with being true to your ideals. If his "non-virginity" is a deal-breaker for you, do the honorable thing and break up with him. His happiness is important too.

 

Lastly, IME, sex with someone with whom you share a deep emotional connection is completely different than with someone you may just have the hots for or who is attractive to you. The whole process is different; the orgasms are different; everything is different. I think this may be the instinctive core of what you are feeling. Consider that your BF may never have had that deep emotional connection with anyone else before you. Think of it as being in a different spiritual place. IMO, it truly is. If you're still imagining the other women he's been with, you're not there yet.

 

Well, before I ramble on into another book, I'll offer my support. That's what we do here on LS It'll all work out...

[lilikoilulu]

Thank you so much for your posts. I really do appreciate it.

 

KittenMoon, I found your line

 

Have you ever thought that God sent him to you to help you get past what was a sexually crippling upbringing, in order to learn to be a wife (and eventually a mother) comfortable in her own natural sexuality with her husband?

 

It's like that saying: "We can't always get what we want, but sometimes we get what we need."

 

very meaningful. I was also a very materialistic person, spoiled with lots of clothes, etc. so I wouldn't mind being isolated. I wonder if it worked out this way to teach me that the spiritual and emotional are more important than physical. So, yes, it would make sense that we were brought together for a reason, to learn real intimacy.

 

Carhill, yes, he is a saint, lol. I won't say we've been completely abstinent, through many compliments, he has helped me lower my inhibitions somewhat, though not all the way. I have no doubts about trusting him. I see him almost every day and he is truly more patient and giving emotionally and sexually than I could imagine anyone being.

 

He actually says much of what you said- that it is completely different, that his experiences are not that much different than mine- quick, awkward and not satifying. He also told me he never told anyone else he loved them before and that I am the one he's been waiting for his whole life, too, he just didn't wait in the same way I did.

 

Really, we have a perfect relationship in every other way, I just have moments where I imagine him being with others, and it hurts me deeply. I just want to get it out my mind and not feel like I'm competing with ghosts of relationships past.

 

I used to rely on my religion and now without it, I don't know where to turn with my pain.

 

I really thank you for taking the time to talk to me. I have kept this bottled for years, never telling anyone (too embarrassing!) and it feels good to talk about it and not be called a freak!

[Karyyk]

Maybe a lot about what you were taught about life, death, religion, sex, waiting for marriage, etc. was false...or at least...not absolute. I'm not saying that to be anti-religious (or anti-Catholic), I was raised Catholic, but life is oftentimes a lot more complicated than the stark black and white portrayal handed down by the church. I grew up with a very religious upbringing, and had a lot of the hangups and overidealizations that you have. I had this idea of what I was looking for and I wasn't willing to settle for anything less. It took making some pretty big mistakes for me to see that I had basically been being self-righteous, and frankly, wrong.

 

Once you see the need for being forgiven for past wrongs in your own life, I guess then you see the need to be open about forgiving others for their mistakes. Forgiveness is one of the major points of Christianity, probably the most important one, so it really only helps you to forgive your boyfriend. The fact is, even if you break up with him and find another guy who meets this one mandatory ideal that you have, you're going to need to forgive the new guy sooner or later too. We all make mistakes, each and every one of us, and honestly, in the greater scheme of things, we all need forgiveness. If you really consider your current boyfriend to be a "great human being," it might be time to try to get over the preconceived notions you had. He sounds like a good guy, who's there for you no matter what, and has accepted you, the good as well as the bad. Relationships are reciprocal. Always remember that.

[carhill]

I really thank you for taking the time to talk to me. I have kept this bottled for years, never telling anyone (too embarrassing!) and it feels good to talk about it and not be called a freak!

 

OP, important life lesson. No matter how "different" you think you are, you are not and you are not alone.

 

From your further comments, if you two are serious about each other, perhaps couple's therapy, either within the church or with a secular therapist, might be helpful. Six years is a long time to be together and be confident about the relationship. I think having the help of a professional might get you where you apparently want to go.

[D-D]

I can share your experience in some ways. I too was raised in a strict Catholic home. For most of my life (and still to some extent) believe in saving sex for marriage. I grew up with the "sex is a sin" attitude and all the fire and brimstone Catholic view of God that came with that.

 

At the same time, being a 24 year old male virgin, I obviously realize that the odds of me finding a female virgin in this day and age are pretty well impossible. I too have never really dated anyone and have very limited dating/relationship experience. I feel pretty akward, if not embarrassed at times due to my social inexperience and sometimes wish in my head that I had not been brought up in a religious background as it can really conflict with life in the real world (or at least it feels so sometimes). I certainly would prefer meeting a virgin and both of us waiting until marriage to have sex, but obviously nothing is perfect in the real world. I too wory that I will let a future partner's past sexual history bother me as well.

 

From what I read in your post, it sounds like your boyfriend is a great man and that he truly loves you for who you are. I think you need to remember that your boyfriend, like yourself, like me and every other person in the world are not perfect and that we all make mistakes. I'm sure your boyfriend wishes that he was a virgin after meeting you so that he too could share that special first moment with you.

 

I really understand your point of view and share your thinking in many ways. You appear to have found a true love that so many of us search for and may never find. I think you need to concentrate on the fact that your boyfriend of 6+ years who loves you wants to spend the rest of his life with you. He is choosing you, not any of the previous women he has slept with. Like one of the posters mentioned above, I agree that you need to find a way to "forgive him", in a manner of speaking, and move beyond your fear/anger/resentment that you feel. Try thinking about all the wonderful things you have now and the fantastic future you and your boyfriend can have together instead of dwelling on the past which neither of you can change. Counselling as mentioned by the above poster may be a great tool to help resolve your feelings on the issue.

 

Life is never easy and things are never black and white. All we can do is try our best. I think you have found something great and I hope you are able to come to terms with this issue and move forward in your relationship. Best of luck to you and your future husband!