A
male
age
36-40,
anonymous
writes:Out of curiosity, how many a) romantic relationships (i.e. dated for a while, no sex) b) full-on-committed relationships (i.e. with sex) and c) sexual relationships did you have by the time you were 22/23? This question is both for men and women.I'm 22 and have only been in 1 relationship and it wasn't even much to begin with (went out for a little while, mostly on dates, essentially 'hung out', but then school/work got in the way and called it off before any 'I love you's or sex). You see, I've never really been a 'relationship'-type person. While I'm social, I don't have this burning NEED to be latched on to someone just for the sake of it (which seems to be highly prevalent with people my age nowadays). Nor do I have this desire to be a horndog, chasing women for 1 night stands and risking getting an STD.My views on relationships are similar to Arthur Schopenhauer's views on marriage. He once wrote, "Marrying means to halve one's rights and double one's duties." While he's talking about marriage, perhaps in a legal sense, it seems to hold weight with today's take on relationships (speaking for those in their early 20s). Everywhere I look I see this almost unsatisfied need to be in a relationship and as a result people lose their identity by always merging in to some pseudo-relationship. People around my age just bounce around from one 'committed' relationship to the next and when people are single it's like they can't operate or function properly; thus, they have to find another person ASAP, even if its clearly not in their best interest. I understand the concept of 1-night stands - people looking for sex get together. I also understand the committed long-term-type relationships that, in my opinion, are predicated typically on REAL love. But what I can't understand is the middle ground - people meet, then flip the page to the "I love you-I love you-I love you-You're-my-only-one"-stage as fast as possible, then a bunch of tension is inevitably created, and as fast as it started it ends....then the whole process repeats itself again and again. It's as if the concept of 'love' and 'relationships' have become meaningless commodities that you can 'buy,' 'use,' and 'toss out'. In my view, for real love to happen all the elements need to come together in unison that make each person almost, if not, perfect for each other - and I have met a few couples like that and their response is typically "you just know". If it doesn't come together, don't waste you're time stringing someone along in some delusional world of 'love' if in the end you're just going to break up in a few months. And thus, I haven't been in many relationships - While I've met many people, I've yet to see someone realistically who could suffice outside of a friendship and turn into something more. On top of that, I'm fairly content being me as an individual entity. If the right person came along, then sure I'd run with it, but until then I'm not going to be chasing false realities. Now the reason I'm asking this question on here, as a poll of sorts, is to just get a sense of proportion. I've seen tons of people in these middle ground express-relationships and when speaking to single people my age, they seem to have gone through a whole lot of them. I'm just wondering if this is the norm, or have I just been pondering modern human nature too much? If you have any views on any of this, please contribute.
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male
reader, anonymous, writes (8 October 2011): Male 42. By the time I was 23, I had:
3 romantic only (no sex)
2 serious, committed relationships with sex
2 sex only, or perhaps FWB
FOr me, it wasn't like a repetitive cycle, like you describe. It was more like a gauge...sometimes the needle fell toward the friend zone and no sex or love was had, other times it fell toward the other extreme and sex was the driver. THe times it fell in the middle, where love or commitment existed were the best.
A
male
reader, anonymous, writes (8 October 2011): "What is do the numbers signify? What's normal for you? Is more sex with more people success? Or is more relationship with one person more?"Well, for the numbers1. 12. 2 - The first one was also one of these3. 2What do the numbers signify?Well, I'm now over twice the age you indicate. My total number is 3.First one wanted to marry me...wasn't going to work out because she wasn't my type in the end, and I wasn't her type either.Second one married me...didn't work out because of religious issues.Third one married me...and still is sleeping next to me after children and nearly 20 years of time together.So, again, what do the numbers signify?Depends upon the goal. My goal was to have a long term lifelong relationship with someone who wanted the same with me, who was compatible with me at multiple levels. My goal was to also make sure that the sexual life was satisfying for both of us. I achieved that after two false starts, and for a non-religious person, I think that is a pretty good record. I will admit that the first one was a really terrible first attempt. The second one was rather traumatic in the end.My current spouse had more partners than she could count after a while, probably over 200 and possibly as many as 300, came from a very different background than I did, and longed terribly for someone who would treat her like I did when I met her. She tells me that she loves me every day, and I know that I don't know what she means by this because I simply cannot understand nor would I ever want to experience that void that she had, which was filled when I came into her life (her words, no mine). I didn't have that void. She tells me that I'm like nobody she has ever known in her life, but I don't see myself as particularly special in general, although she means the world to me.So, perhaps the numbers do mean something. From what I've read, trying to understand my spouse, the numbers may represent the void that people have, and their attempts to fill it in some manner, my wife admits that this was what she was attempting to do in her youth.We all have it at some degree, but when the numbers are extremely high it may indicate that the person who eventually fills that void (hopefully) some day may have to have something unique about them.Sex with more people is only success if that was the goal to begin with.
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A
female
reader, janniepeg +, writes (7 October 2011):
 (1) 1
(2) 2
(3) 2
I had quite a few after 23 but I guess you just want to compare with other people because you are probably 22, 23.
Numbers signify nothing. What's normal is that you find out what you like and who you are through interacting with others. Being with more people can help you find the right one.
The purpose of a relationship is not to get comfortable, happily ever after. If you are seeking that you are not in the right place. You have 70 or 80 years more to go on earth. Without challenges one won't grow. Society always see marriage as a failure. A man or woman contemplating divorce or a break up would be hated, questioned by family members. They would have to have a good reason. Feelings don't count. It's this reason that creates the fear of commitment in people. I would rather have a person who has the courage and the vulnerability to love than to have one person who waits and waits. I find the former more attractive. There are also the type of people who are independent only when they are single and once they get attached to someone, they turn into froth and get insecure and jealous. There are people who are genuinely happy being single, while the others who choose to be single because they create this "adjustment formation" when they look around people who are miserable in relationships.
I think giving to a man completely is the greatest feeling ever. It may or may not last. Intimacy can be a rare thing and it has to be cherished.
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A
female
reader, tennisstar88  +, writes (7 October 2011):
 A.) Several, lost count..these were mainly in high school and some in college.
B.) 3 serious relationships
C.) 16
You're never going to have accurate statistics, it just varies from person to person.
Dating in general is something that we have to do in order to find what we want in a mate, and weeding the bad ones from the good one. Most of us aren't lucky enough to meet them at the beginning of dating expedition. I thought of it as legwork in order to find what I really want. Eventually it paid off and I married my husband at 25.
As far as the sex, to me it's just an added bonus.
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A
male
reader, idoneitagain  +, writes (7 October 2011):
By the time I was 23 I had a few romantic relationships, had one sexual relationship and was in the middle of one full on committed relationship. The stats you get from this site probably won't match the stats for the average population. All 3 types of relationships are considered normal and they say more about the type of person you are than whether you are normal or not. Some people equate success as having sex with more people, and some equate it more with having deeper relationships, both can be considered normal too and are more significant in describing the kind of person you are or what's important to you than whether one is more normal than the other. To me a healthy sex life is important but a healthy relationships life is more important. I would never choose sex over a good relationship, but I wouldn't have a partner I didn't have a good sexual relationship with for a full on committed relationship.
You mention you aren't a relationship-type person and don't NEED to be in a relationship, and you see a lot of people who can't function when they are single, so they bounce from one suedo-committed relationship to the next. This encapsulates a much broader discussion which is hard to simplify but I will do my best.
Unfortunately it is rare to find people who are emotionally well balanced and who are comfortable on their own without the NEED to be in relationships. This is the result of living as part of an emotionally dysfunctional species.
Humans are continually developing at the social level from being an emotionally dysfunctional group to becoming a better functioning group. This process has been going on since villages became towns, and cities, and city-states, large tribes, and then countries and regions. You can find instances of functional groups, but these are isolated pockets in a broader context which is still developing, the same way you can find instances of emotionally functional individuals amoungst the majority of people who aren't emotionally well functioning. What this translates into is that the average person is born into a family where the parents aren't fully emotionally functional, because they were born to parents who weren't fully emotionally functional, etc, and our emotional dysfuction is passed on from generation to generation. At the same time we are learning and growing as a species, but it takes time. In general, the average person on the planet is dysfuctional. We assume that the level of emotional functioning that is the norm is actually functional, but it isn't. This is reflected on a social level by various symptoms of dysfunction such as high divorce rate and a moderate rate of unhappiness in marriages and long term realtionships that don't end, rampant alcoholism and drug abuse in many societies, political failings and the flaws of capitalism resulting in socail failings as homelessness and poverty, widespread mental health issues such as depression and anxiety, high stress, and of course perpetual war, our inability to live sustainably in an intelligent way, and our inability to intelligently manage systems such as law, the environment, etc. If the average person was emotionally well functioning, the world would look very different.
Having this perspective, it is easy to see that the average person has not inhereted the emotional tools to be emotionally functional outside of a relationship, the relationships people get into help people manage their dysfunctions. It also explains why people hop from one relationship to another, because whilst they 'need" the relationship, it also reflects their dysfunction at the same time, so they feel the "need" to end the relationship to end the dysfunction. This is what happens when people megre their identities into a pseudo-relationship. Often, they end up finishing one relationship and starting a new relationship where the same dysfunction then manifests, in a variation based on the variation that a new partner brings. Until a person can develop their emotional functioning, the relationship is considered a pseudo-relationship. Of course, a person's emotional development is never complete, so all relationships are at least in part "pseudo-relationships" but there is a difference between relationships which are dominated by dysfunction and the pseudo-identites of people, and relationships which are dominated by good functioning and a person's genuine identity.
Interestingly and importantly, relationships are also a VEHICLE for emotional growth and development, and this is a very important point. It is not enough to reach a point of being emotinoally functional on your own. Humans are relational beings, we don't exist in isolation, we only exist in a context, and emotionally our context is relationships. Emotionally speaking, our goal is to learn to be able to be fully ourselves within the context of our closest relationships. It is insufficient to be yourself alone in your room and think of yourself as emotionally functional. The true test of emotional functioning and wellbeing is in the context an important person or group of people, most importantly our families and our romantic partners. It is most difficult to be emotionally functional in the context of our most significant relationships. It is through these relationships that we are given the opportunity to develop, to grow, to become more functional if we can see the dysfunction that exists in them and work to change it. This is not how most people view relationships, and it is most often very difficult work, but it is some of the most important work we have to do in our lifetimes.
"In my view, for real love to happen all the elements need to come together in unison that make each person almost, if not, perfect for each other..."
It does happen that sometimes two people meet and they are perfect for one another, but that isn't always the case, and I would say it is probably a minority, even when it comes to successful lasting relationships. There have to be certain things thre in order for a relationship to work, and for love and attraction to be present, but they don't have to be perfect straight away. They just need to have a pretty good start, and then over time, two people work at it and at their own emotional functioning to create something amazing. Great relationships are created. Relationships that start out perfect can very quickly die out if the two people don't know how to nurture it. Relationships and love are both like plants, they have to be continually cared for in order to grow and blossom into something wonderful.
You sound like you are on the right track as a person, but waiting for the perfect person to come along, and I don't think that is really the point. The perfect person changes over time, as does the relationship, so even if it starts perfectly, or they are perfect when you meet them, it doesn't stay like that. You have to work, and create. Also, there is a big difference between people hopping from one pseudo-relationship to the next, and two genuine, functional people trying and failing, and trying again with someone else. It is ok to give a relationship that has good potential a go, even if it fails, and to try again. You don't have to have any kind of committment before you are ready, and you don't have to bring sex into it until you are ready, but it is good for your own growth as a human and for the other person to get in there, give it a go, and do your best.
Being good at being on your own is also a convenient excuse to avoid your fears, and the challenges of relationships. It is true you need to find the right partner, but don't wait for perfect. Find someone who a pretty good match in the areas that are most important, and give it a go, see what you can create and how it can change. You might surprise yourself. All relationships are risks, build up your courage and take a chance.
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A
female
reader, anonymous, writes (6 October 2011): By the time I was 23 I was at: 1) 52) 0 3) 1I've never been that worried about relationships and sex either to be honest, I'm too busy with everything else in life, and I don't want to settle for just anyone. Most of my friend group are about the same, on average everyone has had maybe one proper long term relationship, 1-3 sexual partners and 3-4 dating type relationships. Anyway, I'm sure we will all meet the right person eventually! :)
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A
female
reader, So_Very_Confused +, writes (6 October 2011):
 I got married at 21 the first time but my husband was NOT my first. I had been dating him from the time I was 18 or so. However, growing up in the 70s I was a full blown adherent to the free love movement having been on BCP since age 14 and not having the threat of HIV in my face...
So let's see
age 14 one partner... one time... we don't talk about it
age 15.5 started dating a boy I dated for 2 years and was sexual with.... ended that relationship at 17
had several (3) casual relationships before I met my husband to be...
so 6 partners by age 19 but again it was a different time.
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A
female
reader, anonymous, writes (6 October 2011): You are very mature for your age, and when you find that women who stops you in your tracks, she is going to be one lucky lady :-)I believe finding love, a partner, being in a monogamous relationship comes in time.... and one needs to get through trial and error, including hurt/loss, experience and mature to really understand what it is and what it means to find it. And to understand that love grows with time. Some people are raised to grow up and find a partner, they can't be alone, they are not strong enough to stand on their own so they grab onto anything they can get, which often leads to a failed relationship. The mistake many make when they think they are looking for a long term relationship, is treating the beginning of it the same as their one night stands, their lose carefree lifestyle...they have sex with the person the same night they meet them or shortly thereafter and then can't figure out why they can't find anyone who wants to make a committment. You have to get to know the person first and real intimacy will follow naturally. Any sooner, it's simply just sex.I can't answer a lot of your questions because I am old enough to be your mother lol and have already had many life experiences and relationships. What I can tell you is, I had lots of fun at your age, I lived on my own, I dated lots of guys, I had sex with some in those short term relationships and then one day, I grew up and I was done. I wanted to settle down with one person, buy a home, start a family and put it all behind me. That day came and I never regreted it for a minute, never felt like I missed out on something, never felt like I needed it back. I did find myself divorced years later, and in a way had to start that process all over again, which I did not seek out for almost two years after...very different when you are in your thirties then when you are in your 20's....Now I am in my 40's and it's taken me this long to find a man who actually gets what real love is all about :-)
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A
male
reader, olderthandirt  +, writes (6 October 2011):
 At ages 17&18(in high school) just "heavy petting" no real sex,then [email address blocked] the way. Post marraige,2 times with other than wife. It's NEVER enough!
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A
female
reader, anonymous, writes (6 October 2011): Female, 25,
By the time I was 22/23 I have had:
a) 2
b) 3
c)13
Now married so I guess I'll be stuck on lucky no 13 for life :)
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A
reader, anonymous, writes (6 October 2011): My answer is zero, I figured that the right person would come along when they were meant to. That didn't happen until I was 24 years old, it didn't last, but was worthwhile as I learnt a lot from it. I also know that it is true for a number of my friends and also for my boyfriend. Some people need to be in relationships, for whatever reasons while others are comfortable with being alone until they meet someone who they think are truly special.
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