to care about peoples sexual history?

[Relicfromspace]

To give a bit of background, I'm a single dad, 31 and have been single for four years. Previous to this I've been in two relationships, and those are the only women I've slept with.

Now I've recently tried the whole internet dating thing, and more often than not ex's come up (mainly because they're trying to understand why I'm a single dad and where the mum is).. I realise that in my early 30's having only slept with two people is lower than the average. I'm not too concerned about the number, just the whole idea of them doing one night stands/casual stuff. I've tried steering clear from the conversation, and did so successfully with one women who I went on a date with. Ended up adding each other on Facebook, she did some random quiz about how many sexual partners she had and it predicted 24, she and her friends commented on how that's probably a bit low. I know it's wrong, but I just couldn't see her after that.

How do I get over the fact that I'm the odd one out, and people have much more experience than me? Struggling here!

The question I would ask the Op too, is whether he is looking for a long term relationship where he doesn't have sex for a good while, or if he is looking for sex now.

If he wants a quick, fun relationship with sex now, then I can't understand his attitude towards these women who have had more sexual partners....it doesn't just seem to be worry about his own inexperience, but being put off by the fact they have had casual sex....which is what he now wants to do himself.

If he is looking for another serious long term relationship, where sex isn't involved for a good while, then I can see that he might just think that someone it a significantly different sexual past to himself, simply has different sexual values to himself and like any other differences, just wants someone more similar to himself.

He himself says, that generally he tries to avoid talking about past sexual partners - good move, I would say. Sounds like he unwittingly found out about one of his dates on facebook and the info made him uncomfortable. It's a good reasons why it's best not to know, or not to know until further into a relationship. If the woman was only interested in sex, this would have become clear early on in their dating and if he didn't want that, he could get out then. However, if she was interested in a longer term relationship, and was willing to wait a while like him, their relationship could have become serious and the past not mattered at all.

It's interesting how many people on this thread say their DH or partner doesn't know their sexual past and they don't know their partners, nor care. This seems a good position to take......and will work for most people, but perhaps not for those who want to wait a long while until having sex, or even until they are married.....because discussions about waiting for sex and sexual past is bound to come up then, although lots of detail might still not be needed or helpful. Most people are not in this situation - they have slept with some people and in a new relationship will probably have sex fairly quickly. The relationship will or will not progress due to a number of factors, one of which might be CURRENT sexual behaviour (ie the other person wants to have sex with lots of people, the relationship might break down) but is unlikely to be due to past sexual behaviour, because for most people it doesn't matter.

Just don't ask and don't tell . Nobody's business but your own. You don't need to judge or be judged.

If it makes you feel better i just turned 27 and am still batting a zero on kisses never mind sex!
I completely understand the sex thing though. I could handle 3 or 4 previous partners for someone round about my age, but only if those were proper relationship partners. 5 is my cut off point as even at 27 thats going to be 5 over 10ish years since they were legally old enough, and a serious loving relationship takes time to establish and move on to the sex part. Taking in to account the time they'd be signle in between too, more than one per roughly 2 years is a bit too "casual" for my liking.
I know i'm biased by my upbringing though, parents got together at 15, eachothers first and only, together for 33 years and only separated by my mums death.

I'm going to give my experience, when I was young I had quite a few casual relationships and one night stands, I enjoyed it, I had no intention of settling down, I didn't see why I shouldn't to be honest. Always safe, always respectful, never with more promise than delivered. Then I fell in love, settled down, have been with the same man for nearly 20 years. Post children I wouldn't behave as I had when I was young, me in my 30's is very different to me in my teens. I wouldn't assume past behaviour is an indication of future. I'd be much more interested in how someone conducts themselves now, how they treat people around them, how they behave towards you. Lots of past partners means nothing.

YANBU OP.

It's a personal preference.

Many of the women and men in my circle who have been long-term single have been actively looking for a serious partner. And along the way they've slept with some of the people they dated. The way they tell it, they knew a relationship wasn't going to be the result with this person but they fancied each other, fancied shagging each other, no-one was lied to, hurt or used and on they continued with their search for long-term love.

Not everyone does meet a real partner at the point they want it to happen, there can be years of unwanted singledom in between so what's wrong with enjoying sex that both parties are happy with?

As far as STIs go, a clean bill of health from the clinic and a responsible adult attitude to buying, carrying and insisting on using condoms is a better indicator of sexual good health than number of partners - you can be infected on your first time in just the same way as on your 100th. Or sadly, as was the case for a couple of my friends, getting an infection was the way they found out their long-term partners had been unfaithful.

You're basing this on a bullshit Facebook quiz that uses random algorithms to generate 'results' and her friends' jokey replies?! Are you new to the internet?

It's absolutely nothing to do with you who your current partner has or hasn't slept with, as long as they are clean. Someone who sleeps with 100 clean people catch nothing, but someone who sleeps with one infected person could catch something. 'Promiscuous' doesn't mean 'dirty', and shaming someone for their sexual history is pretty fucking low.

Get off your high horse and mind your own business.

Cross post with Happy, sorry! I only refreshed the page after posting the comment I started half an hour ago and forgot about!

YANBU to like what you like.

I don't actually think it's about thinking they're bad people for sleeping with other people, it's that they have different ideals to you. I think you see a low number of sexual partners as someone who is extremely faithful or open to commitment and someone who sleeps around as someone who is flighty and bad relationship material because they prefer being "free".

What I think you need to do is remember that the sexual past doesn't necessarily mean that they are still like that and that they're bad relationship material. I'm all for giving people a chance to show you the kind of person they are NOW and not judging them for their past mistakes (depending what those mistakes are of course).

FWIW the public FB post would have put me off as well simply because I don't agree with broadcasting your business online and doing a quiz about sexual partners tells you the kind of person she is (still).

Meh, it's nothing to do with you. Her sex life becomes your business when you're in a monogamous relationship. And that is it. If you don't think you'll like the answer don't ask the question. It's a weird thing to get hung up on imo.

FWIW the public FB post would have put me off as well simply because I don't agree with broadcasting your business online and doing a quiz about sexual partners tells you the kind of person she is (still).

Whaaaaaaatt? Liking silly Facebook quizzes proves that you are the kind of person who likes doing silly Facebook quizzes!

Their results are always wildly wrong anyway! I'm near enough crying with laughter at the idea of being able to tell anything about a person from them.

How is your ex now OP? I seem to remember you saying she was hospitalised frequently and you were having problems with childcare. I expect that's been resolved now your child is older. Anyway don't take any notice of silly Facebook quizzes people never answer them truthfully

The absolute number of people someone has slept with probably isn't important, but it says something about their attitude.

I wouldn't want a relationship with someone who routinely slept with people they weren't in a relationship with. That strikes me as someone who probably doesn't care that much about others and just wants sex. There are bound to be some unhappy sexual partners that were hoping for more etc. I wouldn't rule someone out for an occasional fling, but having an attitude that a different girl every weekend was normal, would make me run in the opposite direction.

Plus, although I'd discuss it privately, anyone who boasts publicly on facebook about having slept with 24 people (or any number of people) is not going to be to my taste as I believe in discretion around these matters. Maybe old fashioned, but really it's not nice!

Amongst my friends the average number is pretty low (we are in our thirties and I reckon I have more than most at about 6 - my current partner also thought this was a lot and had trouble coming to terms with it). There are still a few with none at all, and many with just the one they are married to. Not religious either - just middle class???

Op, everyone is entitled to a past & people of both sexes, will be economical with the truth to suit their own agenda. Somebody who enjoyed casual sex in their 20's, might not like it in their 40's

Not judgemental about people's sexual history. It doesn't tell you anything about a person. I would be interested in their previous relationships and how they spoke about their exes. I think this will tell you everything you need to know.

in my youth i had a fair few ons. i liked sex, cba with being attached so they scratched an itch. i was seen as a slag, the boys were clapped on the back, i shrugged this off as silly blokes who simply cant handle a girl was using THEM not the other way round.

im a different person now. people change. if you cant handle someone with a colourful sexual history then you may struggle tbh. i think youre being daft personally.

im a much different person now

I don't really get what the OP was hoping to get out of this thread. Saying he wanted to change his preference for women who've had less partners, but then saying he was perfectly entitled to the preference...! Err ok, so if you think that preference is fine then what's the issue? Bit of a GF imo, a very unappealing trait in a potential partner all things considered.

carefreeeee - seriously? Having sex isn't a middle class thing to do??

Roffle at the MC comment.

most of the MC i know would be happy to have sex in public with a stranger while snorting coke off a dildo let alone have a few ONS!

HappyAxolotl Obviously not the results of the quiz (as you said, they're often wildly wrong) but the choice to take a quiz to guess the number of sexual partners and then post those results and say "it's a bit low".

There are so many different kinds of quizzes, ones about your spirit animal, or political preference, or how well do you know Disney movies, but she chose to do one about sexual partners and broadcast the results and then contradict those results with a statement about it being "too low"... that shows you what kind of person she is, the kind of person whose okay with broadcasting that information. That doesn't make her a bad person, but if you're the kind of person who doesn't sleep around (like the OP) or the kind of person who doesn't broadcast that information, then it DOES indicate that she's not your kind of person (or you hers).

FB is very revealing. You suddenly know people's religious or political preferences. You see their shitty spelling, or bad life choices or propensity to vague-book. Familiarity breeds contempt.

If it makes you feel better i just turned 27 and am still batting a zero on kisses never mind sex! I completely understand the sex thing though. I could handle 3 or 4 previous partners for someone round about my age, but only if those were proper relationship partners. 5 is my cut off point as even at 27 thats going to be 5 over 10ish years since they were legally old enough, and a serious loving relationship takes time to establish and move on to the sex part. Taking in to account the time they'd be signle in between too, more than one per roughly 2 years is a bit too "casual" for my liking. I know i'm biased by my upbringing though, parents got together at 15, eachothers first and only, together for 33 years and only separated by my mums death.

Well, my parents got together at 20, and DH's got together at 17 and 18, and have been entirely monogamous for fifty plus years in both cases, and DH and I also got together in our teens and have been monogamous for over 20 BUT that's simply three sets of couples' circumstances, rather than my recipe for How Things Should Be.

Obviously, you are absolutely entitled to your preferences, but they do sound very restrictive - not just your upper limit on how many sexual partners a 27 year old is allowed to have had being 5, but that you think any more than one partner every two years is too much because of your personal template of how long a 'serious loving relationship' takes to establish before you 'move on to the sex part', and clearly also have strong ideas about how long should be left between relationships?

Given that you say you have never kissed someone, far less had sex, at 27, can I ask whether you're entirely happy with that - which is obviously perfectly reasonable, if you're content with the status quo -- or whether you're considering moving your goalposts? I do wonder how you elicit the information, too, and how you'd feel if an otherwise suitable partner told you he'd stayed a virgin until 25 and had then had his allowed number of five partners in two years? And if you start seeing a 37 year old, is he allowed to have had ten partners?

Oh, and I meant to say that my sisters, despite having the same 'married young and monogamous' parents as I have, have had quite a few sexual partners. Neither would have passed your '5 partners maximum at 27' rule.

Well ... of course, you don't have to justify not wanting to be in a relationship with a woman. Whether you dislike her because of her sexual history or because she isn't a Harry Potter fan, or whatever, isn't really important.

You have a right to be choosy. However, you are going to have to live with the consequences. I.e. remaining single.

I am also choosy. But I don't start threads about it. Things are how they are, and unless you want advice on how to change, you will just do what you want to do, and live with the consequences.

I think it's really distasteful to talk about how many previous partners people have had , I've never asked anyone and I wouldn't tell either !

Like many on here, I racked up most of my double digits partners at Uni and beyond. Met XH and only had the one partner for very many years and then met DP.

If DP had an issue with the number of partners I've had he'd be an idiot, because he would be making a judgement on 21 year old me, not 42 year old me. I can't imagine I would have been very enamoured with him at age 21 either - a shaven headed stoner - however, he is now a lovely sensible dad with a full head of hair who doesn't smoke, drink or do anything else vaguely dodgy. And I don't shag around either.

Fwiw I haven't ever told him my number although we are both aware that it is probably higher than his. I find it more off putting that he was a serial monogamist, falling in love and settling down with all his GFs - makes me feel less special than if he'd been searching for the perfect person to settle down with while showing his wild oats.