Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to fret about the amount of sexual partner's I have had..?

131 replies

LoveIsTooHard · 19/07/2012 17:47

I have had twelve sexual experiences with men and two with women. I have been celibate for the past three and a half years because I was concerned about the number becoming 'too high'.

Do the old stereotypes about the number of sexual partners, still exist for men and women?

AIBU to worry that the fact I have had fourteen sexual partners and that number is 'too high'?

(I am 38 BTW)

OP posts:
Schrodingershamster · 19/07/2012 20:22

12 isnt exactly high you know. I hope not anyway !
Actually i couldnt give a fuck what people think.

Original poster
LoveIsTooHard · 19/07/2012 20:37

They did have small cocks Grin

I am better off single and celibate until I sort out my issues.

OP posts:
DeckSwabber · 19/07/2012 20:46

You don't have to tell people everything!

Original poster
LoveIsTooHard · 19/07/2012 21:00

I know bad habit I need to get out of. people expect so much. I am starting another thread about realtionships and endings in AIBU.

OP posts:
Alibabaandthe40nappies · 19/07/2012 21:05

Good god I don't think 12 is high, stop stressing!

conveniently forgets own total

musicmadness · 19/07/2012 21:25

12 is definitely not too high. I'm on more than that and I bet I'm considerably younger than you. Shock horror quite a lot of them were one night stands as well.

If a guy or girl cared about how many previous partners I had (I'm always safe and get checked regularly to make sure so I know I don't have any STDs for them to worry about) then I would take that as a good indication they weren't the right person for me anyway! I don't see why it matters what's happened in the past once you meet the right person.

tinkertitonk · 19/07/2012 21:33

I am another slut hedonist who has lost count. Future partners won't care how many people you've had (and you can lie if necessary; after all, a woman's hymen grows back each night*), they will care more about your skill.

*Doesn't it?

Original poster
LoveIsTooHard · 19/07/2012 21:42

I hope people whom disagree with sex before marriage or multiple partners haven't been scared away! I know they're out there somewhere ...

OP posts:
McHappyPants2012 · 19/07/2012 21:46

A little question up thread op said in sex the dickhead couldn't feel anything. The question is does sex distort vaginal muscles.

I have lost count how many time I have had sex so could it really make the muscles relax

Original poster
LoveIsTooHard · 19/07/2012 21:50

Yes I think the muscles do relax as much we feel relaxed within ourselves. My problems are weight related. Too relaxed and bad pelvic floor.

OP posts:
McHappyPants2012 · 19/07/2012 21:53

I am not going to comment on your weight, but if you look on dating websites there are sites for all people from skinny people to very overweight people.

MammaTJ · 19/07/2012 22:11

Not reading through the answers but YANBU. If I had had that few men and women by your age I would be proud. Luckily numbers have not increased since that age!!

MammaTJ · 19/07/2012 22:14

Weight should not be an issue!!
I am and always have been a 'fat bird'. I have never had any problems in attracting people to me, or keeping them. It is always more a case of whether they are good enough for me!! It is about confidence!!!

Eurostar · 19/07/2012 22:45

OP, you say you have been in therapy 18 months with an old fashioned therapist. Not sure what you mean by old fashioned but it sounds like you might do better with CBT where you challenge these beliefs about yourself and embark on structured exercises to help your self-esteem. Have a look at a book called, overcoming low self-esteem by Melanie Fennell and if you think it looks helpful, search out a therapist who works with this - NHS should be able to provide it if you are in England. Have a look at group personal development workshops too - that probably sounds like the most frightening thing to you, but as you see from this thread, there's nothing like sharing with others to get more perspective on the world.

I hope that your therapist has at least helped you see that you had a dreadful mix of parents for your self-esteem- a mother who forced on you a belief that sex is shameful and an unavailable father who wouldn't give you approval - it must confuse the hell out of you when you try to be with a man, with the voice that you are not good enough on one shoulder and the voice that you are a "slut" on the other.

If a man doesn't want you because you had a life before him, he is not worth having.

All the best to you - try to start by loving yourself and not judging yourself. You have the right to exist!

CogPsych · 19/07/2012 22:46

You need to consider why it is that you are even asking this question OP.

Men a judgemental about women having lots of sex because it is thought that women more commonly want sex for emotional reasons (to feel desired and sexy, amongst other things) than men who more commonly want sex just for physical reasons (drunk and horny). As such, a man who is promiscious is just seen as someone fufilling purely physical urges, whereas a woman who is promiscious is seen as someone who is indiscriminate with their emotional connections to strange men. At least that's what the research says, but there is obviously a lot of good old-fashioned sexism thrown in too.

Of course, it's all time specific, so these days a lot more women are having sex purely for physical reasons and it's a good thing that women feel they can if they want to.

Are you perhaps asking yourself this question because you feel you desire to have sex makes you emotionally promiscious? If your number of sexual partners was the result of fufilling your physical needs alone then i'd say keep it up because it's all good fun. If your number of sexual partners is what it is because you needed to feel sexy, desired or worthwhile... then i'd say that's unhealthy and you should stop.

12 is not so high anyway.

northeastmum89 · 27/07/2012 09:26

12 or 14 isn't a very high number these days, especially if you are 38.

I'm 23 and been with my OH just over 2 years. Not exactly sure how many there were before him but it's somewhere between 45 and 50.

My OH is 31 and he has been with about 30-35 people before me.

We had this conversation quite early on and neither of us were bothered by each others numbers.

Certainly in my group of friends 14 would be seen as low, and we're quite a bit younger.

Hope that helps

x

porcamiseria · 27/07/2012 11:43

are you joking??

12, you are almost a virgin in my books Grin

Spuddybean · 27/07/2012 11:57

I don't understand why anyone would care.

My DP said the other day that he'd been a bit of a stud before i met him - with 'loads' of one night stands etc. So out of interest i asked how many and he looked at me with a clearly 'i'm shagtastic' face and said 24. I laughed so much my tea came out my nose.

I told him my number was probably about 70 but i had stopped counting. That took the wind out of his sails for a bit - but he wasn't actually bothered.

There was a statistic in cosmo years back saying, in a shocked way, that up to 20% (or something similar) of women didn't know/remember the surnames of all their sexual partners. I thought, fuck me i don't know/remember a lot of mines first names!

Don't stress and don't tell if you don't want to.

I have one friend who enjoyed a lot of sexual partners and has now reinvented herself and totally lied to her H. She denies almost every memory i have of our wild youth. She gets very pissed off if anyone brings anything up and is very judgmental about other women. Which i find bizarre tbh.

TroublesomeEx · 27/07/2012 13:05

If people ask, you don't have to tell them, or be honest. So they won't be able to judge!

I did some stuff in my early twenties that would make my late 30s self blush if I thought about it!

I thought, fuck me i don't know/remember a lot of mines first names! ain't that the truth!

But that's not what I'm all about now. I just have some rather cheeky memories nowadays and a reminder that I wasn't always the squeaky clean mummy and respectable professional that I am today Wink

UnimaginitiveDadThemedUsername · 27/07/2012 13:28

OP:

I can't help but feel men still judge about this.

Some will care and some won't. Those that care won't necessarily be 'judging' you either - if it turned out you had slept with significantly more people than a prospective partner, he may feel inadequate compared to you and perhaps not as experienced.

It's all going to depend on the individual. Plus, you can always lie about the figure and give a lower number to any man that asks (which seems to be very common).

Tuppence2 · 28/07/2012 02:42

I'm another one in the "12 is not many" camp.
I am 26, had a couple of 2/3 year relation ships and have still somehow managed to have 30 odd experiences with men and 1 with a woman. And like someone else mentioned further back in the thread, I enjoyed it at the time, I practiced safe sex, and didn't put myself into dangerous situations.
My only regret is that I start too young, and looking back, I was technically taking advantage of... There is also 2 sexual assaults that I don't count above (for obvious reasons)
It is only really now that I'm almost 100% confident in myself with my DP, and I realise I was probably "looking for love and attention" as I was the classic only child brought up by single mother as biological dad didn't want to know... All I craved was his attention and love, so when I didn't get it, I found guys to flirt with, and then usually sleep with...

Kinda sad but true Blush

NurseBernard · 28/07/2012 04:01

You need to find a way to let these issues go. Sex doesn't define a person; it doesn't pigeon-hole you into a 'good' box or a 'bad' box.

It's just a recreational activity which is entirely personal and has nothing to do with anyone else and is no reflection on your morals or ethics or your likability or inherent decent-ness as a person. :)

I feel very sorry for the person on the first page who said that her DH and most men do judge women on this, as that's certainly not been my experience and I know a LOT of lovely men.

I have never asked my DH how may people he's slept with and he's never asked me how many I have. Why would we? Who cares...? We can't change it and it doesn't impact on us or our relationship anyway.

yellowraincoat · 28/07/2012 06:56

UnimaginativeDad: so what if some men judge? Some people judge women who don't cover their legs or their hair, some people judge people who don't go to church or mosque, some people judge people who don't wear fashionable clothes or are fat.

We shouldn't really pander to these kinds of people if they are judging things about us that are not important. We should be trying to gain the confidence that lets us shrug off these judgments.

Any man who thinks I'm a slag/slut/whore/idiot for sleeping with a ton of people can fuck off as far as I'm concerned. In fact, it's a bloody good way of weeding out the people I have zero interest in. Why would I want to give my time and energy to someone so utterly idiotic?

Jenny70 · 28/07/2012 07:13

In a week, that's too many and I would probably hoik my judgy pants high... for 38 it's no problem at all. If you were sexually active at 18 (say) that's 20 years - so 12 is less than one per year - hardly promiscous (however that should be spelt).

yellowraincoat · 28/07/2012 07:14

"In a week that's too many".

Really? How the hell do you come to that conclusion? If the OP slept with that many in a DAY because she wanted to and it made her happy, it wouldn't be too many.