>My (24M) girlfriend (25F) of 6 months is having trouble accepting me having casual sex despite consent. What should I do? submitted by Snoo_88809

>I work as a stock broker, highly stressful job, and one of the ways I relieve my stress, that i feel works best for me, is casual sex. Especially since I try to avoid drinking alcohol as much as possible.

>Now, about 6 months back, I met this incredible woman at a party and as we got to talking we somehow clicked. Like telepathic communication clicked, if you know what I mean. Anyway we exchanged numbers, and after a couple weeks of texting back and forth, I think the attraction we both felt for each other increased even further as we got to know each other. I could talk to her about anything. We soon started dating.

>It was on the 5th or 6th date, I remember setting up a dinner date at my apartment, hoping one thing would lead to another. She arrived as ravishing as ever. I cooked. She watched me she found a man who could cook incredibly sexy (I chose to take that as consent). Anyway, we had an enjoyable dinner followed by a late night movie, we even made out a little. But as things started to heat up, she paused the movie, looked me seriously in the eye and said that she's not ready to take that last step yet. Now, remember I haven't had any sex since I met her. I was like fine, if you're not ready, you're not ready (gently ofc), and told her to take her time and there was no rush.

>Fast forward 5 months and she says she's still not ready. Now I have tried to be as patient as I can with her, but with my stress piling up, I was getting kind of irritable and it was affecting my job as well, so I decided to finally confront her about it. I asked what's really going on, is there something that's bothering her and what not. But for the first time, I felt she wasn't being completely honest with me. She said her first time was really bad and she's suffering from the trauma, and while that felt like it was the truth, I knew there was something more to it.

>But seeing how uncomfortable she was getting about the topic I decided to let it be for the time being and told her about my difficulties and my lifestyle before I met her. She said she was sorry, she had no idea she was causing me stress. And I was surprised when she brought up the idea of me getting back to having casual sex, just as long as it's strictly physical, and I told her about it after, whenever it happened. I was startled at how comfortable she seemed at the idea.

>Turns out she wasn't, it's been a couple weeks since then and I hooked up a couple times and, as she requested, told her about it. But I'm starting to notice she's been getting a bit more distant and less intimate lately. It's nowhere near that I think she's not interested in this relationship anymore but not as much as before I started hooking up.

>Now, I want to really make this relationship work but I have absolutely no idea how. I realise my job may be a problem, but I'm still hesitant on quitting over a relationship. Any advice is appreciated. I'd really like to know what's going on with her without making her uncomfortable.

She is not ready for sexual intimacy with you. That's fine, she's allowed. You get to decide if you want to wait or not.

You want to keep having sex with other people. That's fine, you're allowed. She gets to decide if she's OK with it or not.

Not sure what your job has to do with any of this - or how "having casual sex" is going to work for you as a stress relief mechanism if/when you get into an exclusive relationship.

>It was on the 5th or 6th date, I remember setting up a dinner date at my apartment, hoping one thing would lead to another. She arrived as ravishing as ever. I cooked. She watched me she found a man who could cook incredibly sexy (I chose to take that as consent). Anyway, we had an enjoyable dinner followed by a late night movie, we even made out a little. But as things started to heat up, she paused the movie, looked me seriously in the eye and said that she's not ready to take that last step yet.

I'm not sure you understand consent - calling someone's cooking ability sexy is not even remotely consent for PIV intercourse or anything else.

Here's some reading for you: https://www.scarleteen.com/article/abuse_assault/drivers_ed_for_the_sexual_superhighway_navigating_consent