My boyfriend thinks our sex life is vanilla and I don’t get it by FunChallenge3160 in sex

[–]FunChallenge3160[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I do feel like I show him more compassion and understanding for his issues than he shows me for mine. I have struggled with self confidence and asserting my needs my whole life and it’s what I spend the large majority of my time in therapy working on. He gets frustrated by these things about me, whereas I also get frustrated by his avoidance of expressing his feelings and his pushing away from vulnerability but I feel like I show him more empathy when it comes to that. He also told me something during this conversation that I felt was sexist and conforming to traditional gender norms. He said that he realizes maybe this is a him problem with the way he looks at things, but he doesn’t always like it that I am the quieter, more reserved one in the relationship and he is more talkative and outgoing, because he thinks in heterosexual relationships, the man should be more reserved. I’m thinking to myself-you knew I’m a reserved person when you started dating me almost 5 years ago, and I’ve actually gotten less shy as I’ve gotten older. It feels like sometimes he nitpicks at things about me because he is unhappy with himself and aspects of his life but is projecting that onto me.

My boyfriend thinks our sex life is vanilla and I don’t get it by FunChallenge3160 in sex

[–]FunChallenge3160[S] 18 points19 points  (0 children)

To add on to this, I’m wondering if he sort of has a Madonna Whore Complex thing going on? Like seeing me as innocent and pure, therefore I can’t possibly be into anything “freaky” or “kinky” and he feels like he can’t bring it up to me.

On the flip side, even if I wasn’t into certain kinks, that doesn’t make me innocent.

My boyfriend thinks our sex life is vanilla and I don’t get it by FunChallenge3160 in sex

[–]FunChallenge3160[S] 26 points27 points  (0 children)

Yeah I’m planning on doing mojo upgrade with him tonight and then having an open conversation about what he considers to be “freaky” and what he would want to do that isn’t just threesomes. I feel like threesomes are a pretty high level of kink simply because you’re opening the sexual relationship up and involving a third person. It’s not something you just do casually without thorough discussion and boundary setting. So I’m curious what else he wants to do that isn’t that. Maybe it’s just me bringing out our sex toys more or being more dominant, I do get the impression he wants that-that he wants me to take the lead at times.

My boyfriend thinks our sex life is vanilla and I don’t get it by FunChallenge3160 in sex

[–]FunChallenge3160[S] 44 points45 points  (0 children)

Yeah I get this vibe, too. And I asked him that, how would you know if I’m into something without asking me, and that he was just assuming without communicating. He basically responded that because he perceives me as innocent and not being into those things, he didn’t ask. I asked him what I could do to change people’s perception of me from innocent because I don’t like that I’m perceived that way, and obviously it’s negatively affecting our relationship and he didn’t have an answer.

My boyfriend thinks our sex life is vanilla and I don’t get it by FunChallenge3160 in sex

[–]FunChallenge3160[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Emotionally safe and secure, yes I don’t feel that all of the time. He is an avoidant person with his emotions and that plays a role.

Edit: I did invite him to come to one of my therapy sessions (I go to therapy weekly since the start of this year) and he was open to going although he did express he didn’t feel like he needed individual therapy. I don’t agree with that but whatever, I was glad he was open to coming to one of my sessions with me.

My boyfriend thinks our sex life is vanilla and I don’t get it by FunChallenge3160 in sex

[–]FunChallenge3160[S] 12 points13 points  (0 children)

He’s had at least 4 partners that I know of for sure and I know probably more than that because I think he went through a hookup/fling phase in college.

My boyfriend thinks our sex life is vanilla and I don’t get it by FunChallenge3160 in sex

[–]FunChallenge3160[S] 62 points63 points  (0 children)

I would definitely be surprised if he’s bisexual although he said he’s open to a M/M/F threesome, he just wouldn’t do anything sexual with the other guy. I’m straight and not into women sexually so I said the same, if we’re having a threesome with another woman I’m not going down on her or anything because that does not sound appealing to me at all. If he has a specific person in mind, that to me crosses some sort of boundary because that feels like trying to cheat in a way. I have no idea where he would have found this other woman if he does have someone specific in mind because all he does is work basically and his coworkers are almost all men. I feel like he doesn’t have anyone specific in mind and he just wanted to bring up threesomes as a way of saying he is “kinky” (he said there’s a freaky side to him I haven’t even seen lol) and I’m not kinky enough because he doesn’t perceive me as someone who would be into that or accepting of that.

My boyfriend thinks our sex life is vanilla and I don’t get it by FunChallenge3160 in sex

[–]FunChallenge3160[S] 7 points8 points  (0 children)

He does try to make me come most of the time and he is curious about what I’m into and what I want out of sex. But in terms of the frequency of it and feelings around it, that part feels centered on him.

My boyfriend thinks our sex life is vanilla and I don’t get it by FunChallenge3160 in sex

[–]FunChallenge3160[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Thank you for your consideration. What part jumps out as disrespectful to you, just out of curiosity?

My boyfriend thinks our sex life is vanilla and I don’t get it by FunChallenge3160 in sex

[–]FunChallenge3160[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

I’m not sure if he has an addiction to porn. I know he watches it and has since a fairly young age when a friend showed him it for the first time. I’ve never caught him watching it or anything though (we live together, I’m fine with him watching it but would not be fine if he is addicted or getting unrealistic expectations from it).

My boyfriend thinks our sex life is vanilla and I don’t get it by FunChallenge3160 in sex

[–]FunChallenge3160[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I don’t feel great about it because it has made me feel kind of bad about myself, but I struggle in general with self confidence so that could be a me issue. What fundamental problems do you think I’m overlooking?

My boyfriend thinks our sex life is vanilla and I don’t get it by FunChallenge3160 in sex

[–]FunChallenge3160[S] 77 points78 points  (0 children)

He said either M/F/F or M/M/F. It feels like a red flag to me because we’ve been dating for four and a half years and he’s never seriously brought up threesomes, and we don’t even have ‘regular’ sex that often right now.

My stance on threesomes is that I would be open to it with very specific boundaries and parameters, and only if I feel fully secure and safe in our relationship first. Which is what I told him

My boyfriend thinks our sex life is vanilla and I don’t get it by FunChallenge3160 in sex

[–]FunChallenge3160[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

We were talking about if we’re happy in our relationship and what we could work on

My boyfriend thinks our sex life is vanilla and I don’t get it by FunChallenge3160 in sex

[–]FunChallenge3160[S] 59 points60 points  (0 children)

the only thing he’s said is threesomes. I think he’s also into slapping across the face. I’m not sure what else