A divorced male friend and I recently became “friends with benefits.” However, I’m not receiving the same, uh, level of benefits as he is. He isn’t giving me orgasms from intercourse, and his pleasuring of me is measured in seconds rather than minutes, despite my telling him that this is a problem. He also keeps reminding me that he doesn’t want any kind of commitment. I get that, and I keep telling him so, but he’s persisted with the warnings. I’ve known him since we were 8, and he isn’t a player. Part of me thinks he isn’t attracted to me. He’s fit and I’m — less-than-fit and have big boobs, and I think they freak him out. However, out of bed, we laugh and have fun and connect. Oh, what to do?
— Bothered
This guy treats pleasuring you like it’s something on a chore wheel.
Bizarrely, you’re in “friends with benefits” relationship that’s short on benefits, which is like buying a blender that doesn’t blend, a Cuisinart that doesn’t cuise. Unfortunately, the elusive female orgasm is especially persnickety when one’s partner sets up a sexual ambience reminiscent of one of those movies where Bruce Willis and Samuel L. Jackson are staring down a ticking time bomb.
Sure, poor Booboo might have niggling fears you’ll get attached, but it isn’t like you’re buying baby clothes and leaving wedding magazines around. Yep, this boy toy of yours is a real animal in bed — a rat gnawing away at your self-confidence. Why are you still involved with him? Well, there’s a tendency to try to fix a thing instead of just bailing and to get so caught up in the momentum of your efforts that you neglect to consider whether the thing should just be put out on the curb.
In continuing to get in bed with a man who can keep his hands off you and pretty much does, you’re a co-conspirator in your feeling like crap.
Even in an FWB situation, you need a man who finds you hot — or at least is enough of a friend to give you the sense that he’s undressing you with his eyes, not using them to drop a refrigerator box over you.

Epic Frail

I’ve had a crush on a guy who’s been flirting with me at my neighborhood coffeehouse. Today, he sat by the door, watching as four elderly people struggled to go out — a couple pushing walkers and, about five minutes later, a couple who were all hunched over and using canes. I was seated in the back, but when I saw nobody was helping them, I ran over and held the door. Is his behavior a clear sign that he’d be bad boyfriend material?
— Door Closing

Sometimes it’s hard to know what to do when you see somebody in need. A person falls down on the sidewalk in front of you. Do you just step over him? Or do you stop and take his wallet and then step over him? I personally don’t know how you sit back and enjoy the view as a parade of infirm elderly people struggle out a door, but I do know that things aren’t always as they seem. Maybe it looked like he was looking but he was in some sort of fugue state. Maybe he has a cranky, independent granny who sees any help as an insult. If you end up going out with him, do what you should with any guy you date: Look closely at his behavior, especially when he thinks nobody’s watching.
Be honest with yourself if it seems a fundamental lack of empathy kept him in his seat — much as you’d like to believe that there’s a rash of pranksters going around to coffeehouses and gluing all the hot guys’ feet to the floor.

Blister Wonderful

I’m starting to have feelings for this guy friend I’ve been fooling around with, but I’m worried he isn’t feeling the same way. He’s stopped short of having full-blown intercourse with me, which I find odd, although I don’t want to have sex yet because I have genital herpes and I’m not ready to tell him. (I take an antiviral drug for this daily, and I’d have him wear protection during intercourse.) Do you think he knows I have herpes? Maybe he just isn’t interested in me romantically and doesn’t want me getting too attached.
— Puzzled

When you start to care about somebody, it’s nice to give him little romantic gifts — flowers, a gourmet cupcake, a sweet card, weeping genital sores.

Surely you’d tell the guy pronto if you had a cold: “Hey, don’t get too close, because you could catch this and have an unpleasant few days.” But colds go away. Herpes is forever. Yeah, I know, so are diamonds. But, unlike a mammoth rock on a girl’s finger, a big genital pustule isn’t anything you want to be showing off to the crew at the office: “Look at it gleam under the fluorescents!”

Genital herpes hasn’t always been such a big stigmatized deal — to the point where it’s led to the tanking of countless potential relationships. Until the late ’70s, it was seen as “cold sores down there” and often not even worthy of a visit to the doctor. Except in rare cases, the physical symptoms are relatively minor. At the first outbreak, especially, it feels a bit like the flu, with fever, headache and muscle aches. There’s also tingling and itching, and there can be pain, burning during urination (and don’t forget the yucky sores!).
So, what led to all the stigma? The sexual revolution, for starters. In the mid-’70s, with lots of people having lots of sex, genital herpes spread (as probably did the common cold). In 1979, the CDC, seeing the herpes stats rising, got a little hysterical and announced an “epidemic” (of cold sores!), and the media ran with it. In 1980, Time magazine declared herpes “The New Sexual Leprosy,” and in 1982, The Miami Herald called it a “cruel disease.” Cruel disease? Multiple sclerosis is a cruel disease. But, an infection that gives you the itchies and makes you walk funny for a few days? As herpes simplex expert Dr. Adrian Mindel told The Independent in 1987,

“For the majority of people herpes is … nothing more than an occasional nuisance.”

The thing is, if you’re having an outbreak of your “occasional nuisance” and your naked parts are rubbing against somebody else’s naked parts, you could infect him. The risk of transmission may be reduced by daily antiviral treatment and condom use — provided there are no contagious areas outside the condom zone. But, you can be in a contagious stage and not know it.

Of the 1 in 6 U.S. adults ages 14 to 48 who have genital herpes, 80 percent don’t show visible symptoms, said Dr. Anna Wald, a herpes researcher. Research by Wald and her colleagues found that even when herpes carriers showed no symptoms, they were contagious 10 percent of the time. Of course, that’s on average. Wald explained to me there’s a range: “Some people may be contagious one percent of the time, and others 30 percent, but we don’t have a good way to predict who is who.”

Putting this guy at risk for herpes without giving him any choice in the matter was not only unfair but pretty dumb. For many people, the betrayal is the biggest problem. If you tell somebody before he fools around with you and maybe pull a fact sheet off the Internet to allay his fears, he’ll be less likely to ditch you, and he won’t have the rage he would at being unwittingly exposed.

To launch the conversation, maybe say something like “Ever gotten a cold sore? I get them sometimes … but not on my lip!” And then, as DatingWithHerpes.org advises, don’t say “I have herpes,” which makes you sound like you’re having an outbreak right then. Instead, say “I carry the virus for herpes” and explain how often you have outbreaks, which should make it sound more like a manageable annoyance than the guy’s ticket to a lifetime of Crusty Pustules Anonymous meetings.

NOTE: There are press reports, tracing back to the respected Herpes Viruses Association of the U.K., that drug company Burroughs Wellcome caused the initial stigmatization of people with herpes by marketing the stigma to sell its drug. The association could provide me no evidence supporting its accusation, nor could I find any in 51 years of newspaper and journal articles (from 1960 to 2011). I’m very much for going after drug companies for malfeasance, but not in the absence of evidence they’ve committed any.

Past Wife Regression

Two years ago, my man left his 22-year marriage to be with me, but he told me he loved his former wife and would always want a friendship with her. I accepted that (I’m friends with my ex), but I’m bothered by the amount of contact they have. They do have two adult children and own property together. But, although she’s living with a new partner, she sometimes wants to borrow his car, have him pick up the dogs or drop off some paperwork. They phone about every other day, and not a week goes by without his stopping over — occasionally for a family dinner. I get plenty of his time, energy and affection, and I know their relationship isn’t romantic. The issue is split loyalty — all the effort he’s putting into remaining “loving friends” with a woman who’d love to see our relationship fail. Am I being petty and jealous? It feels like she’s clinging hard — and so is he.
— The One Who Stole Her Man

Once you get to a certain age, there’s no starting a relationship with a clean slate.
You meet somebody and it’s never “Hi, here I am, just me and this little suitcase!” — unless his entire family disappeared into a giant sinkhole or went back in time while on vacation and was caught in the volcanic eruption at Pompeii.

There is much to be said for having a mature attitude about one’s divorce. Friends of the divorced encourage it by emailing inspirational quotes such as “When one door closes, another door opens.”

Annoyingly, in this case, that quote continues, “And then that first door opens back up and a woman leans out and asks what time your man’ll be coming over to take the dog to the vet.”
Jealousy is the guard dog of human relationships, an evolutionary adaptation that helps us defend ourselves against mate-swiping.

As cognitive psychologist Dr. Nando Pelusi and I discussed recently on my weekly radio show (blogtalkradio.com/amyalkon), jealousy is productive when there’s a real threat that your partner might fall for someone else and leave you for them.

Jealousy is counterproductive when you know he’s going to leave you for someone else — but just for a few hours a week to drop off some paperwork and deworm the dog.

Of course, to be human is to be small and petty. (To be successfully small and petty is to not let it show.) Lashing out, snapping, “Excuse me, but wasn’t she supposed to get her husband privileges revoked in the divorce?” will just make him defensive.

Instead, use your vulnerability in a powerful way.

Evoke his sympathy by saying something like “Listen, I understand that you two have kids and property and a friendship, but I’m feeling a little insecure about all the time and attention you’re devoting to her.”

Chances are he’ll reassure you by explaining why you have nothing to worry about, and maybe even consider dialing it back a little.

On the bright side, you’re with a guy who isn’t one to drop-kick his obligations the moment some husband-stealing hussy comes along.

Maybe try to laugh at how happy endings are sometimes the messiest.

Speaking Ill Of The Dud

One of my coolest girlfriends is in love with a total dud. He gets wasted at every party, talks in front of her about how hot other women are, and is generally pretty disrespectful of her. I keep wanting to yank him aside and ask him whether he knows how lucky he is. Now I’m thinking I need to yank my friend aside and tell her she can do better.
— Disgusted

It’s considered an act of friendship to tell a girlfriend that she’s got a piece of spinach stuck between her teeth.

You’d think she’d be equally appreciative when you point out that she’s got a soulmate stuck in some other woman’s cleavage.

But, her ego is probably all tied up in her belief that she’s found love, and she’d probably just get combative.

Instead of telling her she’s making a mistake, try to get her to come to that conclusion by borrowing from an addiction therapy technique called “motivational interviewing.”
Get her to talk about what she wants (all the wonderful qualities she’s seeking in a man), and then gently ask her how that stacks up against what she has.

By drawing the discrepancies out of her, you’re leading her to do the math: She hasn’t so much fallen in love as she’s slipped in a pile of something somebody should’ve picked up with a plastic bag.

I’ve been with my boyfriend for three years. The first year was rocky. He was selling drugs, got addicted and went to prison. Three months after getting out, he relapsed. I persuaded his mother to send him to rehab, and afterward I found us an apartment, where we’ve been for six months. He has remained drug-free, helps with cooking and cleaning, and pays half the rent and bills. His job just got cut back to 16 hours a week. He has applied for a handful of positions but isn’t consistently looking, and he spends lots of time fishing. Meanwhile, I’m paying for groceries, dinners out and any puny vacations, and I’ve bought him new clothes so he’ll look his confident best. When I say I’m exhausted pulling this much weight, he uses his sobriety as a tool, saying, “Look how much better I am; I did this all for you.” My last relationship was much more equal, and I ended it because I felt like I didn’t matter. I do like feeling important to this person, and I do like the love, affection and kindness he shows me.

— Weary

It must have been hell for you in your previous relationship when stopping your boyfriend’s self-destructive behavior only involved putting out messages like “Just say no to chicken-fried steak and the occasional cigar.”

Some women do volunteer work; some women date it. You and your boyfriend are a classic combination, the drug addict and the enabler. Addict behavior is immature brat behavior — throwing over tomorrow to get your rocks off (or snort some rock) today. These days, your boyfriend’s nose might not be powdered, but he’s leaving you “gone fishing” notes instead of going looking for “help wanted” signs. Then again, why should he man up when he can always count on you to mommy up?

Welcome to “the well-intentioned path to hell,” as Dr. Barbara Oakley puts it. Oakley, author of the fascinating book “Cold-Blooded Kindness,” studies “pathological altruism,” help that actually ends up hurting — sometimes both the helper and the person she’s supposed to be helping. Oakley explains that your boyfriend may not be the only one in the relationship who’s been getting a buzz on: “Part of our sense of altruism — of wanting to care for others at cost to ourselves — is related to the positive feelings we get from our nucleus accumbens and related areas (the brain’s pleasure center — the same areas that are activated when we get high on drugs or gambling.”

You have a choice: Keep pressing your paw on the little lever for your do-gooder’s high, or accept the risk of seeking real love with the sort of man who can live without you but would really rather not. Real love means having a crush on a man as a human — respecting and admiring who he is, as opposed to pitying him for what he’s done to himself. A man who really loves you wants the best for you; he doesn’t guilt-trip you (“I did this all for you!”) into ignoring your own needs so you can better meet his. Should you decide to stay with your help object, inform him that you’ll bail if he doesn’t start putting out more than a clean urine sample. If he doesn’t come through, either accept your fate as Mommy II or finally act on what you’ve spent three years pretending not to know: that a woman without an addict is like a fish without a Smart car.