Dear Miss U,
My boyfriend and I started dating 2 years ago during our freshmen year of college. Things have been great. Unfortunately, he must take a semester off due to family reasons and the following semester I will be studying abroad. So it looks like we won’t be together for at least a year and even then I don’t know what the plan is when I return from abroad.
The only reason I’m questioning our relationship is because I feel like everyone says to have a “college experience” and part of that, for lack of a better term, is to ‘play the field’. I want to be with him, but it’s difficult when everyone around me is hooking up. It’s not even that I want to hook up with different people, but that society is telling me that’s what I should be doing and that’s what everyone else does.
College is a once in a lifetime experience and I don’t want to miss it. I didn’t question my decisions when we were together, but now that he’s long distance, I don’t get the benefits of being in a relationship and I don’t get the benefits of being single. I love him very much but I’m stuck.
Is that part of the “college experience” really that important? In the future, will I regret not doing it? How can I talk to my boyfriend about this without making it seem like I want to break up?
Torn
Dear Torn,
I never went to college. Not being American, college isn’t a huge part of my culture.
For a while there I was headed to University. I qualified for early entry and everything. But there was this boy on the other side of the world that I cared very much about so I decided to close the distance first, get an education later. It would be easier for us as a couple to handle the expenses of my education without going into debt if I’d worked a throw-away job for a while and he was settled in a career. I could even study while I had babies, I decided. It was a solid plan.
And so, I never had that “college experience”. And I don’t regret it at all.
Not all people are the same. Some people are part of the flock and they want everything that everyone else seems to enjoy. There’s nothing wrong with that, but it wasn’t for me. I never liked parties. I don’t enjoy being smashed off my face while absurdly loud music shatters my reality. I didn’t desire the lack of control promised to me by the drug scene (because I’m a bit of a control freak, really.) And I felt the dangers of playing the field far outweighed the thrills. I wasn’t “normal”. I knew what I wanted, and it wasn’t that.
Your letter doesn’t tell me your gender identity, and I can’t speak for men, but I know as a woman there are a lot of risks. Women have a higher chance of catching an STI than men do, women have a far higher chance of falling pregnant than men do and of course women are at a greater risk of being raped. What if I stopped having fun? How likely is it that the random guy I picked up at a party is going to stop if I ask him to? What if it hurts? Is Mr. Random going to care when we are both there just to scratch an itch and have fun? Likely not. He doesn’t care about me, or at least isn’t particularly invested in my well-being. With that in mind, am I going to get enough foreplay to be satisfied? Who am I going to turn to if it all goes wrong? Will my friends support me or will they buy into the out-dated concept that I’m a slut?
There were just too many maybes, whilst this boy over the sea was a certainty.
I am a firm believer that you should be able to talk to your significant other about anything. If you can’t, I believe you’re not with the right person. And so, we discussed our sexual histories and fantasies early on.
As it turns out long term relationships, even marriages, don’t have to be the death of your sex life. You may still be able to do all your experimenting within the bounds of your relationship.
So, ask him! Talk about this college experience, ask him if he feels he is missing out and admit that sometimes you think you might be. Tell him you don’t want to break up, and no you’re not unfaithful, but committed, invested partners do discuss their sex lives. If you want your needs and desires met, you have to talk about them.
Maybe you’ll open up your relationship now, or you’ll watch an awful lot of Dan Savage and consider being monogamish. There’s the possibility you’ll use role-play with your partner to satisfy this curiosity, or you’ll wait until you’re older and more solidified in your relationship to start swinging together. Or perhaps you’ll discover that you’re not like “everyone else” and you’ll embrace that. It simply isn’t true that you have to sleep around a bit to be happy. Nor is it true that’s what college is about. I’m pretty sure the point of spending all that money is to set yourself up for the future, not to get all the fun out of the way because between the end of college and death is just hard work and misery. (It isn’t. These aren’t the best years of your life.)
A conversation opener could be: “How do you feel about threesomes?” or “Would you ever pretend to be a stranger so I could pick you up at a party?” or even “We’re going to be apart a year, do you want to discuss hall passes?” It doesn’t really matter how you start the conversation, it matters that you agree to hear each other out and respect whatever boundaries you put in place together. Tell him you want to put the long-term health of your relationship first, but because you’re in this together as a team some things need to be discussed so that neither of you feel regret or resentment later.
Personally, I’m still waiting a while. I think I’ll make a fantastic cougar. I don’t regret not playing the field because if I’d done it at that age I’d have given up everything that is making me happy now. I also rest soundly on the knowledge that my husband and I are in agreement that a time will come when we are going to want to have sex outside of our marriage, and when that time comes we will be there to support each other. This is what works for me. You need to find what works for you, and do that. Life is not a race or a competition. Nor is it a video game with achievements you need to earn, so to hell with what your peers are doing. Be yourself. There’s truly nothing more satisfying.
