My boyfriend and I make each other happy and I want to continue thus, but our socioeconomic roles are blurry. Both of us bring money to the table and I’m thinking about becoming an escort, which he has assured me he’s OK with because he understands it’s just a job. Because of his fear that he would chase me away by being too aggressive, I at first had to initiate most intimate contact (though now he initiates it plenty). He’s discussed getting married once our financial situations improve, and thanks to your advice and that of some friends, I’ve held my tongue on proposing. Could a long-term relationship work between the two of us when both of us bring money and sex to the table?
The single most important factor in a long-term relationship, outweighing all others, is compatibility. It’s totally possible for a marriage which flies in the face of many of the “rules” to succeed, as long as everyone involved is really OK with that. Now, the trick is that they really have to be OK with it; they can’t just say they are in order to make their partners (or themselves) comfortable. It’s possible to believe one is OK with an unusual condition – say, a husband who doesn’t bring money in – only to find later that it was not actually so, deep down. Most of us will mentally downplay potential trouble-factors because we’ve been told such concerns are “shallow” in comparison with “true love”. But the truth is that erotic feelings arise from a mysterious and subtle alchemy that is very hard to predict, and even small factors might over time change that alchemy so one no longer feels “in love” with a partner. Many a relationship – some of mine included – has ended to the awful sound of the words, “I love you, but I’m not in love with you any more.” And conventional people find that absurd statement to be reason enough for breaking up, mostly because they think that being “in love” was enough to base a relationship on in the first place.
What this boils down to is this: you need to figure out what it is that attracts you to your boyfriend, and ask yourself whether it would change if you felt that you were supporting him (which could very well happen if you’re good at escorting and he’s not making a good bit more than you are right now). Then ask yourself if you could continue a relationship with a man that you loved, but weren’t especially attracted to any more. And finally, you need to ask if the two of you could part amicably if things do eventually go wrong; despite the fairy tale formula, not everybody lives “happily ever after” with the first person he or she tries to live with, and paradoxically a relationship has a better chance of success if neither person tries to keep the other one locked in a cage…unless you’re both into that, of course.
(Have a question of your own? Please consult this page to see if I’ve answered it in a previous column, and if not just click here to ask me via email.)
What am I missing here?
I completely do not understand her question.
Well … it works better than NO money and NO sex!
And why is the boyfriend’s sexual aggressiveness relevant to the question?
She’s asking if the relationship will be endangered by her boyfriend’s not fulfilling traditionally masculine conditions like supporting her and being sexually aggressive.
Ohhhhhh …
I once had a Sailor who worked for me who had a husband like that. She was very feminine though – and extremely attractive (and she still is in her 40’s). She was the real “bread-winner”. He did the “Mr. Mom” thing … worked small jobs for base MWR … ran the kids around. She was REALLY in love with him and he appeared to be likewise with her. But – it all ended when she caught him cheating and she divorced him.
Top it off … in the divorce proceedings … she was treated by the courts LIKE A MAN. She paid alimony TO HIM … and child support. She attempted to get custody of the kids and the judge told her … “Your re-enlistment in the Navy is the strongest indicator that these kids are of secondary importance to you.” She called me crying after she got out of the courtroom. I wanted to kill that judge – literally, he has no place breathing oxygen on this planet. She was a great Mother and loved those kids and spent a lot of time with them. And she invested a lot of years in that slacker husband of hers. This was a girl that ran the physical readiness test only two weeks after she gave birth to one of her children – when she was waived and didn’t have to run it. And she finished it only 30 seconds behind me and that is only because I was determined to DIE before I let a woman fresh out of the maternity ward beat me on a prt. I finished that run and then went home and DIED!!
Fortunately she found a really good guy a few years later who earned as much money as she did – and they ‘re still happily married.
How did the children turn out from that situation?
They’re awesome. I don’t really subscribe to the theory that it’s parenting that is really the primary factor in how a child turns out. In this case – both the parents were very calm and intelligent people who weren’t prone to problems with anger or substance abuse.
The kids turned out likewise. My kids are mostly grown up and they’re awesome. I don’t think I was an especially good parent though. It’s DNA, I think, that plays the heaviest role.
I’m glad to hear there’s at least one divorce court judge who isn’t a female supremacist.
Good point, about thinking you might be OK with something before it happens, and finding out that you’re not OK with it *after* it happens.
When my wife and I opened up our marriage, I could give my wife accurate feedback about how I would feel because:
(1) we had been married for more than 20 years and we had been communicating fairly well during those decades, and
(2) we had spent the previous several *years* discussing this, putting our toes in the water, finding out how we actually felt when we did, and discussing *that*.
Clearly this couple doesn’t have 20 years of marriage behind them. It also doesn’t sound (to me) like they have been discussing this topic without mental filters.
In addition, it sounds like she might be the talkative one in the relationship, and he might be the quiet one. (Perhaps his experience before he met her had led him to believe that it was usually dangerous to speak up?)
So he might be reticent about saying “Nay.” It is conceivable that the only way he might know *how* to say “Nay” might be to say, “Goodbye.” At this time, at least.
So …
… if he *says* he’s OK with it, perhaps they might try a test run? They might limit it to a certain number of dates (such as one, or three, or five), or a certain span of time (such as a week, or two weeks).
(I would suggest “number of dates,” because I dunno how many dates a brand-new provider would actually have in her very first week. It seems that this would depend on a lot of things that we folks here won’t know.)
With the agreement that if either of them discovers they have unexpected feelings about what’s happening, then they will have a face to face conversation before she has any more dates.
And that — if they don’t notice unexpected feelings at the end of the test run, they will still have that face to face conversation before she would have any additional dates. Because sometimes feelings can crystallize *during* the conversation that you hadn’t been consciously aware of *before* the conversation.
If they can, it would also be good to agree that either one of them has “permission” to have that conversation *after* the test run is finished, *if* either of them discovers the emergence of those unexpected feelings.
Because you don’t always know … until you know.
From my 35-years-married/first-marriage, open-married for over the past decade perspective, I offer *ditto, ditto, ditto*.
Knowledge of self, honest with self and with partner, willing vulnerability toward partner, ongoing, painfully frank communication (especially about feelings and parameters) with partner, good communication skills, genuine concern for one’s partner’s happiness, a desire to understand (though not necessarily agree with) one’s partner’s viewpoint and needs, and willing adaptability — all essential qualities. Developing to that level in a relationship typically requires more than three or four years together (whether married or not), especially for people under age thirty.
“Because you don’t always know … until you know.” And, regrettably for humans, knowledge about self and relationships require experiences in order to actually “know”.