Antioch California Living

I was dating a guy I really liked who played in a popular local band. After a few weeks of dating he told me that he slept with some girl after one of his gigs. Sadly, a few years ago I probably would have been so into dating a guy in a band that I would have just pretended it had never happened and forgotten he had ever told me about it. This time, I told him that it was cool; he’s allowed to do whatever he wants. He just won’t be seeing me ever again. It felt great!

IF YOU DON’T BELIEVE GREG
100% of guys polled said they have never accidentally slept with anyone. (But many of them wanted to know how this accident could occur, and how they can get involved in such an accident.)

What You Should Have Learned in This Chapter
l There is no excuse for cheating. Let me say it again. There is no excuse for cheating. Now you say it. There is no excuse for cheating.
l Your only responsibility in someone else’s lapse in judgment is to yourself. l Cheating is cheating. It doesn’t matter whom it was with or how many times it happened. l Cheating gets easier every time it’s done. It’s only hard the first time, when one feels the sting of morality and the guilt of betraying someone’s trust. l Cheaters never prosper. (Because they suck.) l A cheater only cheats himself, because he doesn’t get to be with you.

Our Super-Good Really Helpful Workbook
Here are our five suggestions on what your man could have done if he was unsatisfied in your relationship. (You’ll notice, none of them include sleeping with someone else.)
1. Talk about it.
2. Write about it.
3. Sing about it.
4. E-mail about it.
5. Even put on a puppet show about it.
Now think of five of your own. (We know we took the easiest ones, but we still think there’s at least five more you can come up with.) Read them, have a laugh, dump the cheater. Of course I can’t tell you what to do. But dump him.

Taken From: He’s Just Not That Into You

In my life, I have had two men tell me that they had slept with someone else, in the beginning stages of our relationship. (In one case, it came to me in a dream, literally, and I confronted him. That really freaked him out.) Anyway, both times what I got from it was that these men wanted me to know that they could never be trusted. They were barely in the relationship and had already pulled the escape hatch.

The beginning of two people getting together is such a fragile, tender time. There’s nothing like a big pail of Sleeping with Someone Else to put out the fires of a budding relationship. I personally would never be able to overcome that. So this isn’t really a tough one for me. Now, if I use my imagination, I could see that in the beginning, the lines are not that clearly drawn, the rules aren’t that firmly in place yet. Maybe it is the last fling before the final commitment. If it’s early in the relationship, it can be hard to know if the guy is just getting something out of his system and it’s a one-time thing, or if it’s a guy who’s just a big jerk. That’s the thing about dating—you’re having intimate experiences with someone who, at the end of the day, you don’t know very well. You don’t know his personal code of honor, you don’t have his dating rap sheet. You have to go by instinct, how much you care about him, and what he has to say for himself about it. All I can think is, how sad to be having that conversation in the beginning of things, when everything is supposed to be cozy and snugly and people are usually on their best behavior. If nothing else, I wish better for us all. I really do.

This is What It Should Look Like, by Liz
A friend of mine told a story about a date with a guy she was really excited about: He stood her up. He then called her, begging her forgiveness and giving some excuse. She told him to get lost, telling him that he only gets one shot with her, and he blew it. Imagine what this woman would have done with a boyfriend who cheated on her?
P.S.: One could say she cleared the path for the next guy, who didn’t blow it and is now married to her and treats her like a queen.

Taken From: He’s Just Not That Into You

Who decided to put the “ex” in “sex”? You’re telling me that the “get out of her vagina free” card is that he used to be married to her? Does that mean he can also sleep with the woman who cleans his teeth? How about the lady who develops his photos? Hope he’s not going to his high school reunion. Again, it doesn’t really matter if he’s still in love with you.
He’s given you a pretty big clue about how he feels about your relationship. The bigger question is, can you still be in love with him?

You can’t blame a guy for having feelings. You love someone, you break up, you still have feelings. Thank God for that really. But having feelings doesn’t mean you have to have sex. That required him to take his feelings and use them to be somewhere alone with his beloved, undress her, kiss her, and do all the other things involved with having sexual intercourse with someone. Hooray for feelings. Just keep them in your pants.

It’s So Simple
If you are in a mutually established monogamous relationship, then when someone cheats on you, they have decided to blatantly disrespect a very important decision you two made together. They’ve chosen to do this without your knowledge, thereby adding lies and secrecy to your relationship.

Let’s call cheating what it is: a complete betrayal of trust. Cheaters are people who have a lot of stuff to work out and they’re working it out on your time and with your heart. Some cheaters might give you an excuse, some might not have one at all, some might even blame you. No one can tell you exactly what to do when faced with this very complicated and painful situation. But the bottom line is, is this what you
had hoped for in a relationship?

Taken From: He’s Just Not That Into You

The only thing you should be putting out is any of his clothes that are still in your house. There is no excuse for him sleeping around. Period. There are so many ways to deal with the truly common problem of differing sex drives within a relationship. Usually one would start with an adult conversation wherein a discussion ensues that hopefully resolves with the two parties agreeing to work on it—not him jumping in the sack with someone you know! Not only does he not respect you or the relationship, he doesn’t respect himself enough to be in a meaningful relationship. This isn’t even a question of “he’s just not that into you.” In this situation, if you like yourself at all, you should definitely not be into him.

These last two guys are good. They’ve betrayed their relationships and humiliated their girlfriends. Then they tell them that it’s their fault, knowing that they have just done something that has so demoralized
them that they will be their most inclined to believe a load of horse crap. If something is wrong in a relationship, here’s a bright, mature idea: talk about it. Don’t let any man blame you for their infidelity. Ever.

The “But at Least He Knew Her” Excuse
Dear Greg,
I’ve been going out with a guy for about a year. We are in love and get along great. Recently he met with his ex-wife who he hasn’t seen in about a year. (She had left him because she met someone else.) They have been divorced about two years. They slept together. I am very upset and want to break up with him. He wants me to forgive him because it wasn’t like it was someone new; it was his ex-wife. He promises me that it will never happen again—just old feelings came up and he couldn’t control himself. I want to forgive him—it was only once—but it feels like everything is ruined. Can he really be in love with me and do this to me? Joyce

Taken From: He’s Just Not That Into You

Dear Greg,
I had been dating a guy for about two years, and I thought things were going really well. After he came home from a family visit, he told me he slept with someone he met at a bar. I was devastated and asked him why he did it. He told me I had put on some weight and therefore he wasn’t that attracted to me anymore. I’m confused. He’s right. I have put on about twenty pounds. Should I break up with him or start going to the gym? Beth

Dear Twenty Pounds,
I definitely think you should lose 175 pounds—in the form of your loser boyfriend—not the twenty that you’re talking about. He just cheated on you and called you fat. How many lowself- esteem protein shakes can one person drink? Using your weight as an excuse for his cheating is not only mean, but simply not valid. If he has a problem with anything in your
relationship, he’s supposed to talk to you about it, not put-his-penis-in-a-strange-vagina about it. And by the way, how’s he going to react if you ever get pregnant or grow older and get a few wrinkles? Or wear a color he doesn’t like? Get rid of this loser or I’m going to come to your house and get rid of him for you.

The “He Has a Stronger Sex Drive Than I” Excuse
Dear Greg,
I have been dating a guy for a year. I found out through a friend that he has been sleeping with someone I sort of know. I confronted him, and he told me that I don’t give him enough sex and that’s why he’s been sleeping around. He’s right. Sometimes I don’t want to have sex when he wants to. It’s not all the time, but he definitely does want sex more often than I do. So, in a way, he’s right. Should I just forgive him and try to put out more? Lorraine

Taken From: He’s Just Not That Into You

There’s Never Going to Be a Good Excuse for Cheating
If he cheats on you, throw the deadbeat out. Just kidding. I know things aren’t that simple. This is a very complicated subject, I’ll admit. Some will argue, “It’s just sex, what does it matter?” Some will argue
that you shouldn’t throw away a meaningful relationship just because of one indiscretion. This all may be true. But this is what I know: Whatever problems you may have been having in your relationship, they didn’t merit him having sex with someone else. Don’t ask what you did wrong. Don’t share the blame. And in case he tells you that it just “happened,” please remember, cheating doesn’t just “happen.” It’s not an accident as in, “Oops, I just slipped and fell into a sexual relationship with someone else.” It was planned and executed with the full knowledge that it could end your relationship. Know this: If he’s sleeping with someone else without your knowledge or encouragement, he is not only behaving like a man who’s just not that into you, he’s behaving like a man who doesn’t even like you all that much.

The “He’s Got No Excuse and He Knows It” Excuse
Dear Greg,
I have been living with my boyfriend for a year. I recently found out that about a month ago he slept with someone he worked with, twice. (The girl told me at a party!) I confronted my boyfriend and he confessed. I packed my things and moved to a friend’s. He’s now calling me constantly, begging me to give him a second chance. He says he doesn’t know why he did it, but promises he’ll never do it again. He really feels bad about it. What should I do? Fiona

Dear A Month Ago,
Let’s see. He slept with someone else while he was living with you, and you only found out because the girl told you about it. Sounds like a winner. When’s the wedding? Seriously, let’s talk about that special month in your home. In that month, he had sex with someone else twice, came back, and slept in the same bed with you. He was actively hiding this secret from you every time he looked into your eyes. And let’s remember, this gentleman didn’t confess by his own volition— kanky the Homewrecker did it for him. So, if he had his way, this lovely month of dishonesty would have turned into two months, three months…forever. Do all his apologies count for something? Well, you can choose to believe he is sorry. You can choose to believe he will change. But in my book, lying, cheating, hiding is the exact opposite of the behavior of a man who’s really into you.

Cheating is bad. Not knowing why you cheated is even worse. If one red flag isn’t enough for you, how about two? Don’t date any man who doesn’t know why he does things.

Taken From: He’s Just Not That Into You

Don’t ask me how I know, because I don’t want to tell you, but I can assure you that my parents, who are in their seventies, after children, illnesses, aging, stressful jobs, and daily annoyances (read: life), are still
having sex. If my parents can do it, so can you and your boyfriend.

Greg, I Get It! by Dorrie, Age 32
I was dating a guy I met on a job. We had to spend a lot of time together and it was really romantic getting to know him and working with him. After the job ended, we’d still get together and go on dates and kiss good night. This went on for two months. He would never take it any farther. But in the meantime I met his family, went to big functions with him, made plans with him. It was like we were seriously dating, but without the sex. I knew he hadn’t been in a relationship for a long time, so I thought he was just taking it slow. But then I realized, Greg, after the third month, that he was getting to feel intimate with me without actually being intimate with me. I got up the nerve to ask him if this was how it was going to continue, and he started blubbering and stammering about relationships and how scary they are and whatever. I got out of there and fast, because I realized, no matter how nice he was to me, and how intimate we were pretending to be, he was just not that into me and I wanted more.

IF YOU DON’T BELIEVE GREG
Twenty out of the twenty men polled said, without hesitation (well, it was all done by e-mail, but they all seemed really sure about it), that they have never been really into a woman who they didn’t want to have sex with. One man wrote in, “What?! Excuse me?! And the point is?!”

What You Should Have Learned in This Chapter
l People tell you who they are all the time. When a man says he can’t be monogamous, you should believe him.
l Companionship is wonderful, but companionship with sex is even better. Call a spade a spade or, more fittingly, a friend a friend, and go find yourself a friend that can’t keep his hands off you.
l Your lost self-esteem may take longer to find than a new boyfriend, so prioritize accordingly.
l If you’re tempted to spend countless nights just cuddling with someone, buy a puppy.
l There’s someone out there that does want to have sex with you, hot stuff.

Our Super-Good Really Helpful Workbook
Get a bright red crayon. Color in this flag. You’ve just made a big red flag. Good, because that’s what a man not wanting to have sex with you is. Now put down the crayon and go get yourself some good loving.

Taken From: He’s Just Not That Into You

Learn it, live it, like it, love it: If a man likes you, he’s going to want to have sex with you. Sure, things may slow down in a long-term relationship, but even then, it’s a joy, a gift, and your right to have a
fantastic sex life.

Here’s Why This One is Hard, by Liz
Well, duh. It’s about sex. Talking about sex. Asking about sex. Asking for sex. Jeez. That’s really fun. And I don’t know about you, but I would much rather believe, any day of the week, that a man is too scared, too stressed, too sad, too spiritual, too angry, too fat, too crazy, too in love with his ex-girlfriend, too scared, too sensitive, too sunburned, too in love with his mother, too homicidal, too anything, than find out that he’s really just not attracted to me. Or that he doesn’t want to have sex with me because then it will mean we’re in a real relationship, and actually he doesn’t really like me that much. It’s extra confusing because we’re talking about sex (embarrassing) mixed with emotions (mortifying) mixed with our own insecurities (nightmare). And in the case of long-term relationships, people always tell you the sex goes away anyway, so what does it really matter if it goes away a little sooner than you wanted it to? Isn’t the other stuff much more important, like being compatible and him being a good person and
potentially a great father?

Because it’s such a psychologically complex issue and talking about it is so excruciating, I would almost be able to settle for the relationship with the guy who only likes sleepovers, or the boyfriend with the presumed low sex drive. I mean, he still enjoys my company. I might be able to sleep next to the guy who has stopped wanting to have sex with me, without saying a peep. Or keep dating the guy who seems to want to be my boyfriend but doesn’t seem to have any interest in ever seeing me naked. I might even be able to exist in a peaceful marriage with a wonderful man who is more like a best friend than a husband. If it wasn’t for those goddamn happy couples I know.

And I’m not talking about the ones you see on the streets slobbering all over each other. Who knows what they’re like behind closed doors. I’m talking about my friends who I know quite well, who manage to juggle work, careers, intimacy, even kids, and still manage to have sexy, loving relationships. I could easily settle for less if I happened to be the type of person, upon seeing these couples, just thought, What’s the big deal about that? But I’m not that person. I’m the type of person who looks at them and says, “Damn. That’s what I want.” It’s really a bitch. That means I have to be the type of girl who is going to ask the guys the mortifying questions, and worse, who might break up with a really great guy if he just doesn’t want to have sex with me enough or at all. But all I can say is that I suffer from the affliction of believing I can have a wonderful man love me and be wildly attracted to me. I also believe that when that wanes, as it naturally will, we can both make it a priority to try to stay wildly attracted to each other. If you suffer from that affliction as well, you better pull the pillow out from under Mr. Sleepover and take away his cookies and milk. We deserve more than a slumber party.

Taken From: He’s Just Not That Into You

Dear Greg,
My boyfriend of a year and a half doesn’t seem attracted to me. He doesn’t want to have sex that often, maybe once every other week. Often I have to initiate it. When I ask him about it, he tells me that he’s really stressed about work, but that he really is attracted to me. Before that he told me it was because his mother had recently died and he was too depressed. But when I really think about it, it’s been pretty much like this ever since we met. Maybe for the first couple of weeks I felt like he thought I was hot, but since then he has never really seemed that into me physically. I love him, and it’s the most loving and healthy relationship in every other way, but now I spend a lot of time feeling frustrated and unattractive. My friends say I should believe what he’s saying. But I’m starting to feel like he’s just not that into me, physically.
Dara

Dear Let’s Get Physical,
If I’m really into somebody, I want to put it in them. And then take it out. And then put it back in them later on. So when we’re picking someone who we want to spend a lot of time with, even perhaps the rest of our lives, we generally try to pick someone who likes to do the things we like to do. Including, if not especially, sex. You can accept his excuses all you want, but you have to ask yourself, is this the relationship you want to be in? Is this how you want to live the rest of your sex life? He may be into you, he may not, but the only thing you have to answer is, is this how you want to feel, perhaps forever?

The Egyptians painted pots about it, the yogis write books about it, the Jews have made religious laws about it. They all believe that one of the strongest ingredients to a healthy union is sex. One of the great joys in life is that you get to have sex. The last person who should be stopping you from enjoying that is the person you’re dating.

Taken From: He’s Just Not That Into You

Dear Greg,
I’m dating this guy who told me after the first date that he can’t be monogamous. He doesn’t believe in it. I slept with him anyway. Then I realized it would be bad to date him, so I told him I couldn’t go out with him. But then I missed him. So now we’re doing this weird thing where we hang out, go on dates, and then have these little “sleepovers.” I sleep over at his house and we just cuddle. It’s so nice, Greg. We make dinner, watch television, laugh. It’s really sweet and I feel so close to him. He doesn’t try anything and we just enjoy each other’s company. I know I’m not supposed to expect anything more, but I’m feeling like his girlfriend, and you never know where this could lead. It feels so great to stay over and wake up with him! Is there anything wrong with this? Pat

Dear Slumber Party,
Let me see. It wasn’t hard enough for you to hear that the person you are dating doesn’t want to be monogamous. But then you slathered on the extra hurt by continuing to see him while he may be sleeping with other people. So now you’re feeling like his girlfriend, but without any of the perks. Not even sex. What kind of weird science experiment are you
doing with your emotions? Don’t get me wrong, Madame Curie—I know it’s nice to have companionship and wake up with somebody that you really like, but that’s what pets are for. Pets are God’s way of saying, “Don’t lower the bar because you’re lonely.” Clearly you know yourself well enough to know that you aren’t cool with sharing your man, and by the way…you shouldn’t be cool with it! You deserve a boyfriend of your very own who you feel safe enough to have sex with.

The old-fashioned idea is that women withhold sex when they want power. It seems like men can play that game too. Why buy the cow when you can get the intimacy for free? Oh, it’s so simple. If a guy is
happy lying around in bed with you eating cookies and watching old movies, and he’s not gay, then he’s just not that into you.

Taken From: He’s Just Not That Into You