Personal Relationship History

[Guest]

Squick's post on another thread prompted me to think back to all the relationships I have had in the past:

1) My first boyfriend asked me out out of pity.

2) My second boyfriend and I talked for just a few minutes. He asked if I had a boyfriend, I said no, and there you are.

3) My third boyfriend came up only minutes after #2 asked me out, intending to ask me out, but found out I was now with #2. After I broke up with him, I went after #3. I knew neither of these people well or really at all. I don't know why I do these things.

4) My fourth boyfriend was my bestest, closest friend for years. So no issues there.

5) One guy violated a major rule with me. I was at Denny's, reading. He and his friend were at another table. As they went to leave, he stopped by and sat down at my table. He introduced himself and gave me his pager number and said his friends had rented a boat for a boat party that weekend, and would I come? A pager. A drunken party on a boat with strangers. Wow. Can you say "date rape"? I knew you could!

SO here is MY relationship history summary!...

1) My first 'relationship' only lasted two weeks when I was 15. A girl at school had liked me for months and months, which my friends kept bugging me to act upon. The truth was that I didn't really like her the same way, but I felt that it was about time I had a girlfriend. Evetually she gave up waiting for me to ask her out and did it herself. She was the first girl I kissed. After two weeks, and having only spent a few hours together, she decided that we were better off as friends. I wasn't too bothered!

2) My second relationship lasted about 6 months between the last spring term of secondary school and the first half term of Sixth Form (I was 16). The attraction between us was mutual and we had actually met about 6 months before I eventually asked her out (after my friends had pressured me to do so constantly). The relationship consisted mainly of me going round her house each evening and spending hours getting off (making out) with each other. There was also some heavy petting going on - more me giving than receiving. It all ended when she told me that we didn't talk much anymore but I have my suspicions that it was actually all about sex -she wanted it but I wasn't aware of this because it wasn't something I had actually considered much. I found the break-up very hard to deal with, especially as we ended up kissing several times during the 6 months afterwards.

3) My third 'relationship' lasted about 5 weeks. This was during the summer break between my first and second years at Sixth Form (I was 17), and I was feeling increasing social pressure to lose my virginity. I pretty much targeted someone who I knew had a crush on me and turned up at her house one day, claiming that I was passing. We ended up kissing in her bedroom, and that was the unofficial start of our 'relationship'! I ended up spending a lot of nights in her bed during the summer but I could never bring myself to go beyond mutual masturbation. At the time I thought it was because I didn't really have any feelings towards her. I realised what a pig I was being and ended the relationship, though I didn't really give her a good reason, which messed with her head for a while... :oops:

4) My fourth relationship lasted about 8 months during the second year of Sixth Form (I was 17-18). The girl had liked me for months and had been flirting like crazy. Eventually, when we were out with a bunch of friends at a gig one night, we ended up kissing (another unofficial start to a relationship!). We spent nights at each other's houses and went as far as mutual masturbation. After about three months she 'confessed' that she had only had sex once, and that she really wanted to do it with me, but not yet. I surprised the hell out of her by saying that I was still a virgin - she had just assumed that I had had sex with all my previous girlfriends! Soon she started putting pressure on me to have sex, but I never really wanted to go that far. I appeased her by performing oral sex for her, which was a bit of a novelty for a while but soon became tiresome and uncomfortable. During a 2 week holiday with my mayes I met a celibate girl and we had a mini holiday romance, and I think that this is where I started to realise that sex just wasn't my thing, and that maybe, just maybe, I could happily live without it. I did, however, force myself to have penetratie sex with my girlfriend shortly after returning from holiday, just to 'make sure' and because I felt I owed it to her (crazy...). I ended the relationship with my girlfriend just a week after my holiday, but because of distance my holiday romance never panned out into being anything else. I foolishly continued to allow my ex-girlfriend to keep coming round my place under the understanding that we should remain friends and then consistently gave in to her sexual advances (though we never had penetrative sex again). That whole period messed with my mind somewhat, not least of all because she was seeing other guys at the same time! Eventually she went off to join the army, so that solved the problem...

5) My fifth relationship lasted about 3 months when I was 19. We met through mutual friends and there was a mutual attraction. I wouldn't have done anything about it unless one of the friends had set up a date between us on the sly (telling me that they would all meet us there and then leaving the two of us alone!). We got on OK and at the time I was living in a flat with another friend, so we ended up going back there when the pubs closed. When I asked her where she wanted to sleep she insisted on my bed, and then, when I hadn't made an sexual advances on her after lying together for a while, she came out with "So, are you going to jump on me or what?!". I laughed my ass off about that for quite some time! That night I only went as far as gently kissing her neck (though no doubt she wanted more!). The relationship was great for the first month or so as we took everything really slowly and she really appreciated the fact that I didn't intend to just use her for sex. And she didn't bug me about sex either - she was happy enough going as far as I wanted to. Eventually though, I started giving in to the social pressure that dictated that I SHOULD be having sex with her, but my attempts to go through with this were unsuccesful and I couldn't satisfactorily explain why at the time. I got caught up in my own confusion about the whole issue and a communication breakdown followed. She was off to Uni after the third month, and so I decided that it'd never work, that she'd find someone else who would have sex with her and that I'd be the one that got hurt. So I made it clear that when she left, the relationship was over. Of course, that really hurt her and the last month of the relationship was really awkward. Several months later I realised what a mistake I had made and confessed to her that I still loved her, but the damage was irrepairable by that point and I was having other problems that confused the issue and lead her to believe that my feelings weren't real. It literally took me a year to get over my mistakes emotionally.

And... thats about it! Turned out to be more of a blow-by-blow account than a summary, but reflecting on my history in the light of what I know now has been a very revealing and therapeutic experience for me. Thanks for reading (if you got this far!)