[relationshipa1]

I am in an extremely happy two year relationship with a phenomenal man. We are in our early 20s and not thinking about marriage any time soon, but we have both discussed that we are headed that way. However, I’m the first and only girl he ever had sex with (though he’s had girlfriends and did the college things and such). I have slept with two of my previous college boyfriends. We are very open about this. He’s said that he had times where he worried he could be missing out on something. He says he spent a lot of time really thinking about this and has talked with male mentors in his life and really came to the conclusion that sex is sex and that it’s about who it’s with. He says he’s completely comfortable with the idea of us long term. I believe him, he is very strong in his convictions, but in others opinion and experience, are there consequences to unbalance? Is this something that could very severely effect a relationship down the road, even if we both sincerely want it to work?

[April Masini]

There isn’t a rule about how much sex you should have before marriage in order to make a marriage work or to wreck it. I’m sure that if you were to conduct or read a study on this subject, there would be virgins who married and stayed married to death and people who slept with lots of other people prior to marriage who married and stayed married to death. So, it’s not really about the number of people you do or don’t sleep with before marrying that guarantees satisfaction.

The real question is about personal character. If your boyfriend is at peace with his life and his relationship with you, then that will weigh much more heavily on the success of your relationship than the number of people he has or hasn’t slept with. However, if he’s worried about missing out on sexual experiences with other women, and other relationships, then that’s definitely going to be a problem.

One of the keys to success in relationships is have what I like to call “matching luggage” with your partner, or similar emotional baggage. For instance, someone who’s married, had children, then divorced, and is now dating and looking for Mr. Right 2.0, may be more compatible with someone else who’s also divorced and a single parent because the understandings and expectations of what’s to come are often similar. The same is true with singles who have similar education, socio-economic goals or backgrounds, and social experiences.

But the crux of your question really lies within your boyfriend, not you, because even if you both “sincerely want the relationship to work” if he is unsettled, there will be a rocky road.

I hope this helps.

[Author]

Posts