Can I ask something from people who has had multiple partners?

[CantAskAnyoneElse]

If you have been with quite a few people (just to be clear this isin’t about ”shaming” anyone about ”numbers! this is not about that at all) does that make people less important to you?
Like you have had this person and that person, this person was like this and that person was like that .
Does it just becomes kind of a blur of people?
As in ”okey I’m not with this person, whatever, been there done that”.

I know I’m not coming off very clear.
It’s just that I’m late to dating, I actually had a thread about a guy some weeks ago and people encouraged me to go on a date with him and we’ve now been on a few date, nothing serious, but I know he’s been with quite a lot of women (fair enough) and I’m just worried that I’ll just be a number.

Do people / (possible) relationships become meaningless to those who have a pretty long list of exes or other kinds of ”partners”?

A few partners meant something at the time but you move on and feel less attached until you feel nothing.

Some sexual experiences were just that and never evolved into anything meaningful some I have completely forgotten about unless I really try and think I back.

Nowhere in that post did you ask about love or relationships. ‘Multiple partners’ and talk of ‘numbers’ and ‘shaming’ are generally used to refer to sex. If that’s not what you meant, you should have said so. The reason people are responding about sex is because that’s how it reads.

Are you going to answer my question? What are you hoping to gain from this thread if you’re refusing to take on board what most of us are saying?

Is this more along the lines of another person having an extensive list of past relationships leading to feelings of not being particularly special to that person? That while you may be special to them in that you are not anyone else but you, that it doesn't take anything in particular to turn the other persons head? That while in the moment, they really like you, that you may be special in the moment, that you also feel as if you could have been anyone else in the moment, and they would feel the same way? That you feel as if you are ultimately an interchangeable part?

Well... I don't value any of the actual past romantic partners I have had less highly just because the relationship didn't work out (unless they did something such as behave abusively or cheat). On the whole, they were nice men, just not quite right for me long term.

I have also been on a lot of online dates that went nowhere and have had quite a few sexual partners. Honestly? Unless we hit it off particularly well or there was something memorable about the date or their circumstances then a lot of these are a blur. I'm not great with names anyway. Nothing personal to them, it has just taken me a while to find someone I think is hopefully the right one and I've met a lot of men along the way.

The man I have now met and mutually fallen for, who I have high hopes for a potential future with? I feel like a teenager about him. Nothing about my past experience dims this or diminishes it. It's rare to meet someone I really feel a connection with and it doesn't matter that there have been a few 'maybes' hitherto.

No, I meant more do the relationship or people even hold any value anymore?
Or is it just more going through emotions, thinking relationships are something you’re just supposed to do / never learned to be on your own?

Like you take a romantic walk, hold hands whatever - how many times can that actually have any meaning?
Is it just like actors going theough a script?
Has it any value when you call them babe, after you already called others that?

I actually think your posts are pretty offensive, OP.

Like you take a romantic walk, hold hands whatever - how many times can that actually have any meaning?
Is it just like actors going theough a script?
Has it any value when you call them babe, after you already called others that

If I have loved someone, then it has had meaning every single time , whether they were my 1st , 12th or 150th partner.

No, I meant more do the relationship or people even hold any value anymore?

For almost every person on this thread at least, yes they do.

Like you take a romantic walk, hold hands whatever - how many times can that actually have any meaning?

However many times you do this things willingly, whether with 2 people or 20 or 200.

Is it just like actors going theough a script?

No.

Has it any value when you call them babe, after you already called others that?

Yes.

Almost every single person replying has said they start a relationship with a new partner independently of their previous relationships, with just as much potential for emotional investment and affection, even if they've had many previous relationships.

Is this answer not valid to you? I ask as you keep asking the same questions and getting the same answers.

How old are you op ?

Drunken one night stands were meaningless/forgettable. But anyone I went on a date with, and definitely several dates, I remember them all that I slept with and I liked them at the time.
Just because someone has slept with a lot of people, you don't know if that's from one night stands or lots of short relationships that didn't work out. I was single in my late twenties for a long time so dated around a lot, but I took all of them seriously as potential partners as I was looking for something more.

You could reverse this question (being equally offensive) and ponder how someone who's had no relationships genuinely knows that this is the one for them.

If you've no benchmark or spectrum of experience and feeling to compare it against, you could think yourself completely in love (as many of us do with our first partners) and then realise further down the line that you weren't at all, you just didn't know how true romantic love actually felt because you had no frame of reference.

Your partner is taking just as much of a gamble on your strength of feeling as you are on his OP. In fact more, I think.

You could reverse this question (being equally offensive) and ponder how someone who's had no relationships genuinely knows that this is the one for them.

And that would be fair.
I don’t find that offensive at all.
And of course I, or they couldn’t KNOW anything.
No one ever does. It last if it last or not.
That’s not what I have been asking.

He’s not my partner - only been little over month since he asked me out and seeing what this is
And I don’t think he’s taking any gambles.
He’s a friend of a friend, I’ve seen him around here and there, he bounces back just fine.
What gamble is he taking? How is his even more?

What gamble is he taking? How is his even more?

Well say hypothetically he comes to feel more about you than he has anyone else, he knows this is different, he falls for you and sees a future with you.

Meanwhile you could be caught up in the first rush of your first relationship and feeding all those same feelings back to him. But then you come realise it's actually burnt out for you a bit, and maybe you weren't actually that into him, you just didn't know any different at the time.

I think his gamble is more because he'll know the strength of his own feelings in relationships and what feels right or wrong based on his experience, and you could still be exploring your own feelings, expectations and boundaries for a while.

@QueSyrahSyrah
But at least he knows that he can and how to bounce back and get over it and that there will always be a next person.
So, he’s in a better position.
I wouldn’t have a clue how to handle it and have to learn it for the first time.
If we really have to dive into this.

Reading with intrigue, although to me, higher numbers in theory means more experienced.

Op , how old are you?

Someone who was very experienced in relationships wouldn't be so seriously considering an entire future when they barely know someone.

I've had god knows how many boyfriends now. It sounds to me like you've got a crush, TBH. Get to know him, rather than look for justifications for problems with him you've invented.

Humans don't mate for life, unlike some other mammals. Yes, they can love again. They're not tortured vampires.

For me once someone was gone they were gone. I had lots of meaningless sex with people who meant nothing to me. I have also loved some men who I have also forgotten the sex with.

What does my age have to do with this?

I just wondered how old you are

OP you’re reading far too much into things. Others have given you good analogies - you don’t love your current pet less than the pets before it. You don’t enjoy a holiday less because you’ve been away loads of times.

Every relationship is different, but you’re going to drive yourself mad and drive them away being this intense.

29

There's always risk with any relationship. But you are equally able to be resilient if it doesn't work out. You must have had disappointments and difficulties in your life before, even losses? Being Miss Haversham or something if it failed would be a choice.

As your first relationship, it's scary, no doubt, but everyone's been there. And most people's first relationships don't last. It may, it may not for you.

It’s about future. i’ve seen so many people who just grap the nearest person so they don’t have to be alone or just play them.

I don't think you can generalize about this stuff at all OP. Yes I've had a lot of partners over some periods (I have bipolar) but there were 8 years in my 30s where I had no partners at all.

Just because someone might've happened to have a lot of partners doesn't mean they were grasping the nearest person so as not to be alone, or anything.

I'm trying to hold my tongue after some prosecco. 😂 What you're saying makes a lot of insulting assumptions.

in first sentence I said that this is not about numbers.

That is what you are saying though OP. You've just tried to change your tune a bit now people are saying you're being insulting.