Q: Settle this for us, Dan. Which is the bigger ask: a one-time, once-in-a-lifetime threesome or regular (and pretty damn elaborate) bondage sessions?
Ruling On Private Enquiry Required
A: Let me guess: Your partner is into bondage, ROPER, and you’re not. But you’ve been doing the hard work of tying him/her/some-other-point-along-the-gender-spectrum up for months, years or decades … and the partner you’ve gone to great lengths to indulge (and restrain) regards your request for a once-in-a-lifetime/standard-issue-fantasy threesome as too much to ask of him/her/SOPATGS.
My ruling: Regular and intense bondage sessions are the bigger ask in terms of time and effort — particularly if I guessed wrong, ROPER, and you’re the person who’s getting tied up and bondage isn’t your thing — but a threesome, even just one, is going to be a bigger ask emotionally for most people. While the former requires patience and endurance, the latter requires revisiting feelings about monogamy, sharing your partner with another person, etc. It’s a smaller ask in terms of time and effort, certainly, but a higher hurdle in fee-fee terms.
Q: I am a single hetero male. I had a female FWB for several months. She started dating a new guy, and he asked that she stop talking to me. That seems like a red flag. If he’d asked that we stop having sex, that would be one thing, but asking her to completely end the friendship seems like a warning sign of a controller. Am I overreacting? Does that seem like a red flag to you? Should I say anything to her?
Can’t Understand Lover’s Loss
A: Isolating a romantic partner from her family and friends is a red flag — that’s a classic abuser move — but asking a girl you’ve just started dating to cut off a friend she’s been fucking for months isn’t necessarily an abuser move. If he’s asking her to cut non-FWB friends and family members in addition to you, CULL, then it’s a red flag and you should speak to her. But if it’s only you, CULL, then it’s just some garden-variety insecurity on the new BF’s part. Let your friend know that you hope you can reestablish your friendship once her new BF is feeling more secure or her BF is out of the picture — whichever comes first.
Q: I’m a 33-year-old lesbian. A year ago, my partner and I split up for five months. During that time, I dated a girl while my partner engaged in multiple sexual relationships — all with men. We ended up getting back together. One problem keeps me from moving on: I am the only woman my partner has ever been with, and I can’t stop thinking about the fact that she spent so much “quality time” with so many men while we were apart. I can’t help but wonder if she’s bi or straight! It also hurts that she feels like she can’t be honest with me about what she likes or wants or needs sexually. I should mention that we are a little over a year into our “new” relationship and we never have sex. I initiated sex a week ago — the first time we’ve had sex in four months! — and she came, I didn’t, and she didn’t care. Any time I try to talk to her about it, she gets defensive and tells me that she is attracted to me and insists she doesn’t like sex with guys. What do I do, Dan?
Fixing To Explode
A: Thought experiment: Let’s pretend your girlfriend is a lesbian. (And why not? Your girlfriend does.) What kind of a lesbian GF is she? The kind of lesbian GF who doesn’t fuck you much, sucks in bed on those rare occasions when she does fuck you, and manipulates you emotionally to keep you from calling her on her doesn’t-fuck-you-much/sucks-in-bed-when-she-does bullshit. So, FTE, your GF — lesbian or not — is selfish and inconsiderate and she’s making you miserable. End it.
This week on the “Savage Lovecast,” Dan speaks with porn-industry director, performer and producer Joanna Angel at savagelovecast.com.