Are there benefits to waiting for months before you have sex?

[Ilovepastafortea]

OK, I lay my cards on the table. Met DH in the early 1980's been married since 1988. Neither of us were virgins - him less so than me as he was a randy good-looking bloke. 😂

Never occurred to me to have sex on our first or even 6th date. Well, probably occurred to him, but I was 'good girl' & we first had sex after about 6 months together. He says that was the longest any girl had 'kept him waiting', but he always knew that I was 'the one' & rather liked it that I wasn't like other girlfriends he'd had who had sex on 1st or 2nd dates & the quick shags that he had. He always says that I was worth waiting for & the fact that I didn't have sex with him until I was sure of him made it all the better.

Just posting for opinions having only had sex with the same man for more than 40 years & still I love spending an afternoon in bed with him. He's the best & I love & fancy the very bones of that man. I'm one lucky woman. 😍

Guess what I've been doing today - that man still does it for me! 😉

Why do his parents need to know he’s sexually active? He’s 17

yes sleeping with 20 woman at that age is a huge amount and not something to be proud of imo

eso if waited till 16 so 20 in a year and a bit

but as long as being careful that’s up to him

equally if you granddaughter said to you at same age she had slept with 20 men what would your response be

as you seem proud that grandson has done this as he’s good looking

I have a feeling that OP's reaction would be very different if he was a girl and claimed he had slept with 20 boys. Very different.

He’s probably lying. Not like 17 year old boys don’t talk sexual nonsense sometimes, is it.

Who on planet earth is talking to their grandma about porn as well. Absolutely no thank you.

My views as well

granny would be horrified

Yes because then she wouldn’t be a ‘good girl’ or get a man who thinks she’s ‘the one’ apparently, but it’s all good for dgs to sleep around.

Very weird attitude generally, really plays into the virgin/whore trope. Also a whole post just to brag that your DH still loves you because you played hard to get 40 years ago 🤔

My point is that you need to have had quite a lot of 'conquests' and a large variation to be able to clearly determine 'good sex' and 'bad sex'. I wouldn't say that's a good starting point for any relationship. Let's put the emotional toll it likely takes to one side for the moment. Rates of HPV amongst women is at an all time high of up to 50% which equals an increase in cervical cancer. Married women are the lowest group for cervical cancer for obvious reasons. Every new sexual partner you have sex with is a roll of the dice when it comes to contracting genital warts, herpes, syphilis, and more recently the highly contagious Monkey pox, which I believe will be an epidemic in this country before long. None of these diseases can be protected against with a condom. If these were the only issues with multiple sexual partners I'd say that's enough for me to consider it a negative thing to do. Whether you like it or because it's pleasurable is the most selfish, narcissistic response I've come to expect from such posters. Its not the values I'd associate with strong independant virtuous women. That would be obvious to most people I would expect.

If you delve in a bit deeper and look into the research done concerning prostitutes and sex workers, the results are very similar across countries that show 2 of every 3 prostitutes were abused by a father of father figure as child. It regognises to emotional trauma and negative mental health issues faced by these women and added that most of the factors that these women deal with day to day have a negative outcome whether that be drugs, shoplifting, abusive relationships, risky sexual behaviour etc. I only included prostitutes in this post due to the fact people don't see high numbers of sexual partners as a negative thing so I knew it wouldn't be taken in an offensive way.

Personally I believe there is nothing good or positive about women having multiple sexual partners and even the women who do it the best argument seems to be only 'that it feels good'. Other things with that descriptor include heroine and cocaine. I think it's clear where I'm going with this....

It’s probably silly to object to your using ‘virtuous’ as the ideal adjective for a woman, but still, it leaps out at one a bit!
I can’t understand why you regard sex as something done TO a woman (as opposed to WITH) You’ve clearly delved into loads of statistics on your pet subject and handily, they can be presented as proof that engaging in sex is simply too risky a deal for a woman. Best reserve it for marriage, preferably one entered into in a virginal state.
But do your stats never address themselves to men? Do penises not become mangled and gnarled through overuse, along with all these knackered vulvas cluttering up the VD clinics? (Are you sure that condoms are no use against syphilis, by the way?)
Nah, isn’t it more likely that beneath all this here research there’s a very tenacious and superannuated belief that a woman’s sexuality is a dark and fearsome thing, needing stern control through rigid social convention (no longer employed in the real world, where all the fears which once shackled a sexually mature woman were banished years ago) But such controls are still necessary, according to carefully ‘presented’ statistics. For the good of ‘females’ (bet they use this word as a noun)
Dear oh dear, the depths to which women-haters will sink.

Really, all this fear and loathing of an eager and joyous fanny evokes 18th century engravings of personified Sin or Death, habitually a naked woman with exaggerated sex characteristics observed through a lens of generalised misogyny even Lear himself would have shunned, and she’ll have a demon or two nearby. All hovering above a flaming pit. (And then there’ll be Satan himself, looking fabulous and triumphant, as usual. There’s no justice!)

Shagging a different bloke every week isn’t the road to ruin, unless it exhausts you. What if you are a one man woman, safely married, yet HE puts it about? You’ll be just as pustulating and haggard from something you catch from him, if all this penicillin- and latex-resistant punishment is the direct result of going into double figures, man or woman.
So you may as well say ‘Sod it, I’m off down the Masonic Arms on Friday, and I’m going to bloody well pull’. You’ll be rattling with antibiotics and well-meant scapulas within the month if all this alarmism is true, but at least you’ll get toned thighs and the odd free drink.

What a load of misogynistic tripe. If you'd had daughters, instead of sons, would you have been encouraging them to have lots of casual sex? If your gorgeous handsome grandson was a beautiful 17yo woman, would be be bragging about her multiple sexual partners?

As for being a cool mum, where all the kids liked to hang out, you sure about that? The teenagers I know enjoy a secret swig of cider not a can of Tizer.

Yeah, I really think that we should be past the era of thinking that sex is something positive for men that they should go for whilst at the same time being something that ruins women. Let people figure out what their sexual preferences are. If ONS make you feel crap the next day, male or female, then you don't have to to keep having them.

Point of order, Madam Chair. ‘Tis them wans the NUNS who’ve the lowest rates of monkey pox, general paralysis of the insane, and reefer madness (and whatever you’re having yourself.)
‘Married women’ qua category is too broad a church, surely. Any fule/good time gal can marry and then fib about all those she has loved and left behind, so I fail to see how mere marriage acts absolutely as a prophylactic as reasoned by your personal science.

Hee hee! I’m picturing my dear old 19th century granma contemplating pornography. (Not that she’d have been able to, lacking a pornograph. Boom, tish!)
She used to be so affronted by Coronation Street when it first hit our screens that she’d make me and my brother stand out in the hall while she watched it with an air of martyred decency. (I’m sure they modelled Ena Sharples on her)
A pub! Women in it! Milk bottles! Then she’d happily fume for hours.

The idea of sharing anything remotely salacious with her would have buggered up some important element of reality. My goodness, how times have changed.

I don't for a second see how any bit of what I said I misogynistic, unless human nature and biology is misogynistic then fair enough. People always claim misogyny as a weapon of choice when they feel someone may be calling out their in appropriate behaviour and tenancy to do what they want when they want, devoid of consequences.

I have never once stated, nor do I believe it OK for men to sleep around OR to be anything other than 100% faithful. So those with the counter argument that these diseases and ailments can and do affect men is totally true. I actually hold the same beliefs for men that a good, true and virtuous man, isn't one that sleeps around and uses women however his sexual desire sees fit, so the claim this is a male vs female argument and that I think its somehow OK for men is just plain wrong and a complete misunderstanding of what I've said.

What I've said about casual sex and women paying a higher price was a fact of biology not one of opinion. Unfortunately as women there are certain aspects of our biology that we can escape from. It is unequal and in many ways unfair, it doesn't make it misogynistic to point out these very real facts of reality no matter how much they're disliked.

Fwiw I have 2 sons and a daughter but the facts of life and innate biology don't change no matter what sex my children are.

Woman pay a higher price for the endeavours of casual sexual relationships in almost every way. Now you can throw every single toy you have out of your pram but the same barriers will never be there for men. We pay a higher price emotionally and physically and for an extended time period.

Why those with a more feminist agenda would push women to form more casual, more risky sexual behaviours, on top of claiming that it's not bad to do this absolutely perplexes me. Theyre doing nothing but rewarding the very behaviour in men that they claim aversion to. It's so self defeating. These men only view woman as sexual objects available for their pleasure as that's precisely the behaviour they're enacting out.

No one is pushing women (or men) to have casual sex if they don't want to. I wanted to and have no regrets, I didn't pay any price either emotionally or physically.

If you don't enjoy casual sex, don't have it. Other people are perfectly capable of deciding if it is for them.

That's just it though I think there are many people, and it is for obvious reasons usually women, who aren't capable of deciding for themselves and who mistakenly believe that it's just a meaningless transaction. Then they struggle to understand why they're leading such a miserable life with a suffering mental health. I am open to believing there are a minority of women who have the ability to shut themselves emotionally when sex is involved. This can and is often due to childhood abuse and a coping strategy although that's not exclusively the case and seems to occur naturally in some cases too.

Young women especially are particularly vulnerable to this trap and we have a devastating mental health crisis in the early stages which is too much of a coincidence not to be directly connected to the modern dating culture and relationships.

Women certainly connect on a far greater emotional level when it comes to sex than men do. We know all about this yet we still encourage women to behave like men and to expect them to act emotionless with casual sexual encounters. Confusion, worthlessnes, objectifification, negative body image, lack of self worth, low self confidence are all well known and common feelings troubling many young women as we speak. They don't understand why it's making them feel this way as the feminists tell them they're strong and independent women who are enjoying themselves in the era of sex without consequences.

This scenario is happening all over where they embark on an encounter, this amazing experience they feel with a man and this strong close bond they felt with hormones rushing around her body due to this growing connection only to find out in fact she was the easiest 'thing' to empty himself into in that moment and he thought she felt no attachment either as she'd had a sexual encounter with his friend the week before so thought it was 'just a shag' kind of thing. I don't know any women, except those that are damaged, who see sex as 'just a shag', and I don't think anyone realises just how damaging our modern lifestyles have become, especially to women. We're all seeking a closer connection, otherwise a toy would bring equally good results, especially with all these men around who 'aren't good in bed'.

I’d willingly accept genuine concern for the wellbeing of women, but you give yourself away pretty glaringly. There’s a nasty, prurient streak right through your argument, wanting to deny sexual experimentation and expression to (unmarried) women. It’s mere begrudgery, masquerading as concern.

Fundamentally you appear to be blaming Feminism for the ills that beset women. (I think you may have your spy glass round the wrong way.)

We know how much of the liberation the Pill brought us was mostly a gift to predatory men way back when, but since those days of free love on demand in San Francisco, for example, we’ve educated ourselves about our rights and freedoms.
I bet you’d have been one trying to ban ‘Our Bodies, Ourselves’.

Of course women are capable of deciding for themselves. Some may have regrets or live an unhappy life but you could say the same for some men too.

Women are not all the same, we are very different. You can't put us all in a box regarding anything and that also includes sex.

What you describe doesn't sound anything like me. No childhood trauma, no low self esteem etc and I'm now happily married. No regrets and plenty of good times.

I think that just suggest a good, open relationship. I was a similar age when I asked my grandma what age do people stop having sex. And she didn’t go into a flap, we were having a conversation.

The longest relationship I had began with sex on the first date.

I'm not lumping all women in a group together. But what I am doing is generalising based on what evidence we have and what known studies and literature there is. Its one thing for a muture minded woman to have a bit of fun and have the odd sexual encounter before settling down and getting married. Unfortunately there's a younger generation of hyper sexualised women who view the subject from a purely selfish perspective and putting their happiness and feelings above ALL else.

I also accept you are genuine in your attitude and views towards your own sexual experimentation. Some people are well grounded enough for casual sexual encounters. That doesn't detract from the fact that women, in general, are not built for multiple sexual partners. We have a single egg and our best strategy for reproduction is to be choosy with who we decide to mate with in order that our offspring have the best chance of survival and long term flourishing. Men on the other hand have more or less unlimited egg, or sperm so their mating strategy would logically be to spread them as far out as possible in the hopes that one of those sperm was successful.

Even down to the acquiring a sexual partner is so different. Most women would find it easy to sleep with a range of the men in a bar. Even a 60 year old woman of moderate attractiveness could go home with any number of 20 year old on a give night. Switch that around and it's not the same. A moderately attractive 60 year old bloke could not under barely any circumstances have the chance of taking aany 20 year old girl home for a brief sexual encounter. Therefore if this was to happen it shouldn't go as a surprise that he would get congratulated and be seen amongst others as a 'Jack the lad' type figure. It's not any sort of a achievement for a woman to do that so it's nothing to do with misogyny the fact men are often championed its a normal response and reaction.

Ive never been about belittling woman I just want to set a reality check in place as it's easy to discuss casual sexual encounters and dismiss them as just good fun when others could see that and mistakenly believe that it's entirely without consequences for everyone who does it. I think if your ultimate goal is a genuinely happy lifelong relationship but you have to odd but of fun along the way then more power to you. I'm just all to aware that for many woman the casual sex and dating market has brought them nothing but misery and dispair and I can assure you there are so many young women out there in a world where father figures in families are at a all type low who go out with a very naive view of male traits and behaviour and end up crushed because of it, usually going about replacing genuine love with intimate touch and sex from the man they encounter.

Where's your evidence of all this? Also, I have seen far, far more 60 year old men with 20 something women rather than the other way around.

Pop science evolutionary psychology is so reductionist.

Exactly.

I think just do whatever you want! I had sex with my partner on the first date - we’ve been happily together for 6 years, married for 3. I would find it seriously off putting if someone judged my character on whether or not I slept with them within a certain time frame.

Oh, man. I’d bet you find all your research material in the bookshelves of some fundamentalist Christian-type reading room, if, having read ‘all’ the available science and literature, this antediluvian tosh is your conclusion.
You need to know, as you clearly do not, that paternalism (regardless of the sex of the speaker/author) as a vehicle for advising women is doomed to failure and ridicule, and your insistence that we are here solely to serve as incubators, sexual pleasure being a trifling bonus, is very offensive.
You credit women with no aptitude for decision-making, declaring that we need direction and stern warnings, lest we each fail as a wife and mother.

I almost suspect you are one of those people who lurk around certain other online forums blathering on about your ideal woman, whose most important quality will be her being box-fresh, and not ‘second hand goods’.
Your regretful description of supposed female insistence on nothing but He-Man muscle bound executives is a bit of a hint, anyway.
Basement-dwelling bloke or not, the strictures you insist upon are essentially the same in spirit.

Your bleeding heart about the unhappiness of young women would have more credibility if you were instead to address the reasons behind the hyper-sexualised visions you describe.
I too deplore the pressures weighing on young women and girls, but my first target for blame there is contemporary male behaviour and its demands. If young women truly are the frightful jades and Jezebels of your thesis, might it be traceable to (perceived or actual) ‘market value’, so to speak?

I was a sexually active young teen in the early 1970s, and my crowd dressed like Thomas Hardy gals working as farm labourers in a very cruel winter. Still, we were fighting off eager boys we didn’t fancy.
My point being, a hypersexualised appearance doesn’t necessarily mean it’s ’Free ‘Ludes’ night at Studio 54.
We all looked like walking tents, in the opinion of our paramours, and we were at it like rabbits. You never can tell.
So the vogue for maximum exposure/display all around us now isn’t always a declaration about activity, it’s more about signalling permanent availability, the most highly prized specification a young woman can offer to a certain type of man.
I think it’s sad and depressing too, as I say, but for very different reasons from yours. I see the oppression of a sex by means of the demand for performative gender expression and through general objectification, where you see inappropriate self-determination in (apparently) actively engaging in sex.

** this affects guys too, as you mention. It’s a side effect of the renewed repression of women whereby the sexes had to be once again polarised in terms of gender expectations. Nevertheless, the grand plan was as always the crushing of female freedom, and any suffering endured by non-combatant men was probably written into the ‘Friendly fire’ column.
(Worth remembering with misty eyes that old school Feminism acknowledged that the liberation of men would be an inevitable and happy ‘side effect’ of the movement.)

Anyway. I’ve ranted and waffled far too much here and earlier . If I’ve misjudged, and been too strident, I apologise. Not only have I deafening bees in my bonnet on these matters, I’ve very likely also got bats in my belfry by now. :-)

Yes you do see it on occasion. I know of a number of 60 odd year old men with younger 20 something women and they've all got very large bank balances. I don't know of any 20 something year old women who'd want a partner 3x her own age unless there was a significant benefit to it. Thats likely the reason they get the name trophy wives. It's not difficult for a 60 year old women to more or less sleep with who she wants.

Women value commitment whearas man value sex as a general rule. Woman can more or less sleep with who they like but can't get the commitment. Often times they'll assume because a man of a higher status than them will sleep with her that he'll also commit to her which more often than not is not the case. However men can usually be certain that a woman who will sleep with him will also commit to him. This is a vast generalisation as obviously it varies to a large degree but on the whole it seems true.

It seems foolish to date someone for six months and to consciously wait to have sex just because you’re a “good girl”. He could have still dumped you after that first shag and then you’ve wasted six months of your life on a guy and be emotionally invested. But I also doubt he was celibate for them six months. More than likely he was shagging around, especially if he was a randy going looking bloke. But sad that internalised misogyny made you feel like you couldn’t have sex.