20 & Involuntarily Celibate

[DerekB]

Hey everybody, so for those of you who didn't read or don't remember my previous thread, here's the (very) short version:

I'm turning twenty years old next month. I've never had sex, kissed a girl, been on a date, or even held hands with a girl.

Its incredibly depressing. I was interested in girls from a very early age. It was never a matter of not being interested. Before I go any further into this, I'd like to tell you all a little bit about myself. For starters, my personality type is ENTJ. I am considered by those who know me to be very intelligent and highly intellectual. The lowest I've ever tested in any part of a standardized test is the 95th percentile. I am an excellent speaker, and am very comfortable in front of large groups. I have been a little overweight my whole life (207lbs, 5"10", waist size 36). People tell me they think I'm a really nice guy, and as a rule they enjoy being around me. Also, I come from (some) money; I'm not super-rich but my parents are worth a bit more than two million currently (age 50). I'm Jewish, though I'm about as non-religious as people can be, and am perfectly happy making jokes about it with my friends.

My mom and dad were, I think its fair to say, somewhat strict when I was growing up. My dad is a very straight shooter, and would not tolerate mischief or misbehavior. Not that this was an issue for me. I've never been in trouble my whole life. No detentions, no calls home from the office, not even a speeding ticket. My dad used to tell me the same thing every day as I left the house on my way to the bus stop with my brother: "have fun and be confident". Its quite ironic, because I can honestly say that I don't know what its like to have fun, or how it feels to be confident. I cant remember the last time I was legitimately happy, and its been that way since long before even my Bar Mitzvah.

The first time I asked a girl to dance, I was thirteen. We were at a week long sleep-away summer camp. I figured since nobody there knew me very well, it wouldn't be a big deal to get rejected. She said no, and when I walked away I heard her laughing at me with her friends. I waited two years after that before trying again, this time when my class was on a 2 day trip to D.C. I asked the second girl at a dance my school held for us while we were down there. She said yes! Which is great, right? Well, it would've been, if she didn't say that she was just going to take a break for a while, and we'd dance later. She never came back, nor did she ever intend to. I brought it up a while later and jokingly told her she "owed me a dance", to which she laughed and agreed. The next dance I went to was a few months later, I saw her across the room (keep in mind that I don't dance, I've never felt comfortable doing it, so I was one of the losers who stays outside of the dance hall or stands on the outskirts of it. I've never danced in my entire life, I just don't have that innate "goofiness" in me that others seem to) and when a slow song came on I started to go over to where she was, but before I got there she started dancing with somebody else, so I stopped and went back. The next slow song I went over, but before I got to where she had been, she had moved to the other side. The next thing I knew, my best friend Alex came over and whispered in my ear that one of her friends had asked him to ask me to stop "following" the girl around the dance. I was equal parts mortified, upset, and enraged, and I left immediately. I cried myself to sleep that night, and I never went to another dance.

Throughout this time in my life, my parents had only an inkling of how bad things really were for me. My dad was a ladies man growing up, and was very popular in general. He would ask me most nights at dinner (we ate dinner together as a family every night) if there were "any girls at school". I didn't have the heart to tell him, so I would usually either ignore him or say something jokingly such as "like I'd tell you". He eventually put some of the pieces together, though he misunderstood the problem and thought that I just didn't have must interest in chasing girls. My dad would often make one way bets with my brother or I (score a goal in a hockey game and he'd pay $50 per). One night when I was fifteen he offered me $100 if I went out with a girl. Eventually he turned it into $500 and he'd pay for the date. Finally, as a senior in high school it became "if you bring home a girl I'll give you the Jaguar (Jaguar XKR Supercharged Convertible). Despite these offers, I never did (and believe me, I liked that car).

When I got to college, I had hoped that things would change, but alas, they did not. I did, at the behest of my father, join a fraternity. He felt it would be a good way to force me into social situations and parties, and I agreed. So now, despite being a full-fledged brother in whats considered the top fraternity on campus for over a year, I've never even so much as danced with a girl at one of our parties (or ever). My fraternity brothers, despite not fully comprehending how deep this problem is, have practically begged me to go dance with some girls on the dance floor.

I have never, not in my whole life, felt "loose" or "silly" or whatever you'd call it (you probably know what I mean). I physically can't bring myself to do it. Here's an example: We throw a lot of parties, some of which are whats known as "socials". Socials are when brothers are assigned big sisters (sisters in the sorority we're having the social with) and it is their job to basically get us drunk and make sure we have a good time. Now, I was going to avoid the whole dancing part of the party all together, planning to just stay by the pong tables all night, but at one point a pledgemaster (this was back when I was pledging) came over and told me he wanted all the pledges to ask their bigs to dance with them. I did, and she said yes. But when we got out onto the floor, it was...well...brutal. I really just couldn't do anything that would even resemble dancing. She really tried to get me to dance, she brought over two drinks which were equivalent to four beers and had me down them, hoping it'd loosen me up. It didn't, at all. Then she took my hands and tried to sort of teach me how to move them when dancing. I just couldn't do it, they might as well have been limp noodles because the second she let go they went straight back down. I honestly felt bad. At one point she told me she 'wasn't looking for a relationship or anything serious and just wanted to have some fun dancing with me', because she had inferred that I was expressing a disinterest in her or that I thought she was coming on to me or something.

When it comes to things like parties, I am extremely uncomfortable, and am invariably subjected to a constant barrage of people asking me things such as "are you having fun", "are you ok" etc. I just never really learned how to act in this type of situation. I never went to a single party before college. I had some "friends" that I would talk to at school and be friendly to, but Alex was really my only true friend. He was very much my polar opposite. Where I was reserved, he was exceptionally outgoing. He would go to all the parties, drink, smoke marijuana, dance with girls. He'd had sex before he was sixteen. Right now, he's relocated to Miami, where he's more popular with the ladies than ever. In contrast, I'm nineteen, and have never even held a girls hand. He's told me countless times that its all in my head, that I'm reasonably good-looking and just need to get out there, but I can't. I've never been able to.

The worst part is, my inability to have a relationship with a girl is causing a myriad of problems outside of my "lovelife" (or lack thereof). I can't spend more than thirty minutes without thinking about the fact that I'm alone and seemingly always will be. It distracts me from a lot of things I should be doing instead. Heck, its 5:00am here at the time of this writing, and despite the fact that I have a macroeconomics final at 2:00pm I'm here writing this. I feel depressed all day long, every day. I pretend to be happy for the sake of those close to me, and they have no idea what kind of emotional toll all of this has taken on me. I've even (on a purely theoretical level) contemplated suicide. Frankly, there's only two reasons I haven't seriously considered it (and never will). The first is the dwindling hope that someday things will get better for me. The second is that I don't believe that there is an afterlife, and the only thing I can think of worse than continuing to exist this way is ceasing to exist at all. But make no mistake, I have a hard time justifying getting out of bed each day, because the last 7,300 times I've done it, it hasn't been worth it.

At this point I've essentially given up. I don't believe that I will ever have any type of relationship for any duration with a girl. Even though they all love me to death, I feel like I've broken my parent's hearts, let down my little brother as a role model, and most of all let down myself as a person. I've lived through most of my youth without enjoying a second of it. I'm so behind in terms of life experiences that it seems virtually impossible to catch up or even begin on the path to catching up. I feel bitter towards the world and everybody in it. I'm not sure what I'm looking for here in the way of replies. Advice, I suppose, though frankly I don't expect it will do me much good at this point.

[Brutha]

Dancing is something that you can learn in a fairly straightforward way. You take dancing classes.

If you don't have a girl who wants to take the class with you, you simply call local dance schools and ask whether you can come without a partner.
Often they have more girls than guys and are happy to welcome you.

I would recommend some non standardized pair dance like Salsa but Standard/Latin has also it's advantages.

[Artelus]

You have a lot to be proud of yourself. Don't worry, you're not screwed. Have some faith in yourself. The more power you give to that pain the more it will hurt.

[Acting Like Godot]

How strange you Americans are.

Sex is an exam or dental check-up to you. When you reach a certain age and haven't passed the "test", you get all worried and nervous.

[cheesedip1]

Originally Posted by Acting Like Godot

How strange you Americans are.

Sex is an exam or dental check-up to you. When you reach a certain age and haven't passed the "test", you get all worried and nervous.

ROFL, Yeah American social conditioning is wierd.

[RonSouther]

I never could let go in dancing like you're saying. Parties aren't my thing. For me they are too superficial and my joy is to go deep. If I'm not lost in the environment of the party, how can I get lost in dancing?

I'm too aware of what's going on.

I read this the other day....there's another side to this which is that you sound like you were raised to follow the rules, not of your heart but of your culture....

To be Jewish has nothing to do with any race. It is an attitude. To be Jewish means to be calculating, to be under the world of law and not love. To be Jewish means not to be poetic, but to be arithmetical. To be Jewish means not to be in awe of the wonder that surrounds you.

It is not just accidental that this whole century has been dominated by three Jews – Marx, Freud and Einstein – because the world is materialistic. It has never been as materialistic as it is now. One Jew, Marx, invented the idea that life is nothing but economics. That’s what I mean by calculation. Even religion is economics, even poetry is economics. Marx says that even consciousness depends on economic situations, it is a by-product: consciousness is a by-product of economic situations, the structure of the society. Marx is the perfect Jew: you cannot find a better specimen!

Then Freud, who tried to invent the idea that the whole of life moves according to unconscious laws, instincts: there is no conscious event in human life; everything is dominated by the unconscious. He was a fatalist.

Fatalism is also an idea that the world is run by dead rules. To Marx, it is economics that rules everything. To Freud, it is unconscious instinct that rules everything. Then Einstein tried to invent the idea that the whole of life is nothing but a combination of atoms. All three are calculators.

To be a Jew has nothing to do with the Jewish race. There are Jews who are Hindus, there are Jews who are Jainas, there are Jews who are Buddhists. The Jew is an attitude.

Christ has not succeeded: Christians are Jews! Christ can succeed only when law is defeated by love, when matter is defeated by spirit, when language is defeated by silence, when prose is defeated by poetry, when life is not ruled by economic, instinctive, historical laws, but life is ruled by grace. Then Jesus succeeds.

So don’t think that you are not Jews. Out of a hundred people, ninety-nine percent are Jews. Only sometimes one person is not Jewish. That person lives a life of love. He has nothing to force his life into, no pattern. He lives moment to moment; he flows from one moment to another moment – with no idea of where he is going, with no goal.

[moonrambler]

It sounds like you're really forcing yourself to do stuff you don't like doing because you're thinking that's the only way you can get together with girls. Parties and dancing. Maybe you need to approach this in a quieter way.

Also, I think what your dad did with the Jaguar offer was really detrimental. It leaves you thinking, "Geez, I was offered a Jaguar and even then I couldn't get a girl to come home with me!" When maybe you simply weren't emotionally ready.

What do you like doing? What can you see yourself doing on a date with a girl that would be fun? It doesn't have to be parties and dancing.

[Acting Like Godot]

I was going to add that the courtship rituals of the Americans are rather limited in range - dancing and parties.

Birds are more imaginative. Song, plumage, dance, aerobatics, nest construction ....

[moonrambler]

Oh, ALG, we are not limited in courtship rituals at all

The thing is, if you don't like parties and dancing all that much, but you're trying to meet girls through parties and dancing, you're going to wind up meeting girls who like parties and dancing!

[Mariana Trench]

Originally Posted by Acting Like Godot

How strange you Americans are.

Sex is an exam or dental check-up to you. When you reach a certain age and haven't passed the "test", you get all worried and nervous.

This is hilarious. And also a very messed up part of American culture.

Originally Posted by Acting Like Godot

I was going to add that the courtship rituals of the Americans are rather limited in range - dancing and parties.

Birds are more imaginative. Song, plumage, dance, aerobatics, nest construction ....

Nuh-uh! Long, drawn out philosophical conversations are the best courtship rituals ever.

[Tok]

Don't give up. When I was in my late teens I had mostly the same problems as you have. Though my father was never interested in this sphere of my life (probably, he was, but didn't show that).

I would recommend seeing a good psychotherapist - the one, who won't calm you down, but rather give you objective thoughts on your issues. My mistake was that I asked the psychotherapist for help only in my mid-twenties. I wish I did it earlier.

[fooka]

Originally Posted by DerekB

I'm turning twenty years old next month. I've never had sex, kissed a girl, been on a date, or even held hands with a girl.

Somehow when I read that first line I realized you were either an INTJ or an ENTJ who is struggling with relationships and that a long story was to follow.

Well as an INTJ I can tell you my perspective on this.

If you go out to a club then you can for instance right away make an assumption that 30% of people there are completely non compatible with you (ugly, dumb, unavailable etc.), 30% of people are not your type, 30% are your type but wouldn't have sex with you - and 10% are the ones that you have a good chance bedding - sexually compatible, emotionally available and generally looking for GUYS JUST LIKE YOU.

So all you have to do is find these 10%.

How do you find them? You have to probe the field. When you are in a club - APPROACH people. Talk to people and try to reach out. No connection - then just approach someone else - and so on. Once you hit upon a person who is available and perfect then you two will absolutely find a way..

The hardest thing seems to be the approach part and here I have a very good piece of advice for you that will make your approaches a lot easier.

There are two parts to the approach. One: approach is simple when you OFFER things to the other person. Two: you have to ask questions and let them show you what they want, so that you can figure out what to offer them in the first place.

These are two parts to a single whole - when you don't find out what they might like being offered then you will most likely hit it wrong and get rejected - and if you forget to "offer" first, then it's really hard to get something from them.

But if you can offer them something first, they would be far more inclined to give things to you in return.

As for the sex thing, offering works best with physical contact - not with words. When you offer a girl sex, you touch her and get her excited about it - then you kiss her. If she wants what you are offering then she will respond by kissing you back - maybe even grab you with her both hands and kiss you wildly.

But you have to offer her an opportunity first - and the start to that is approaching her and figuring out for yourself what she is looking for.

[fooka]

Funny how 2 out of 3 of Derek's pictures are of him close to a woman

Nothing wrong with your looks Derek. You just need to approach more girls and touch them more often.

[DerekB]

Some of you have asked if I think I’m “supposed to have lost my virginity by now”. My reply is I believe society expects me to have lost my virginity by now. Having said that, personally, I’d be thrilled just having an intimate relationship with a woman period, even without sex. But it is something I absolutely, 100% genuinely want. I'm the type of guy that would have valued this type of relationship immensely even if I'd always had one (think flowers sent just because its Tuesday and that sort of thing). I feel like I’m incomplete, like I’ve been robbed of a piece of me that was supposed to be there but isn’t. I suppose empty is the best word, I feel empty. Like I said earlier, the only reason I get out of bed in the morning is the hope that I find a better reason.

It bothers me to no end that practically everybody takes this wonderful thing that they have for granted. When I hear people complain about relationship problems, and especially when they’re complaining to me, I want to punch them right in the face. I imagine I feel much the same way a wheelchair bound person would if somebody came up to them and complained how sore their legs were after their morning run.

Rejections to me are not steppingstones on the path to success; they are brick walls that I inevitably hit every single time I set out on that path. The only times I’ve tried have ended in disaster. There is nothing to gain from being laughed at and humiliated, and I just cannot deal with that again. I am at the point where I would never ask a girl out unless I know absolutely and beyond a shadow of a doubt that she likes me and would say yes. Since there is essentially no way to know this, my prospects look rather grim.

[Brutha]

I am at the point where I would never ask a girl out unless I know absolutely and beyond a shadow of a doubt that she likes me and would say yes. Since there is essentially no way to know this, my prospects look rather grim.

An inability to ask out a girl makes things harder.
It doesn't make it impossible.

If a girl develops emotions for you and understands the fact that you have a mental block when it comes to asking her out, she might ask you.

As long as you have your emotional shields active it's however difficult for a girl to develop feelings for you.

Taking dancing lessons will remove a bunch of those shields.

I started taking dancing lessons after a girl who felt something for me invited herself over to my house. I just couldn't make any physical contact with her because I was anxious to touch her.

This experience made my realize that I have to do something. I went to dance lessons and eliminated the issue.

Last week a guy who's new to dancing judged something that I do as groping girls. I didn't know what he meant. In hindsight he probably meant that a dance move that includes leading the girl by touching her hip.
The move get's taught at normal dance lessons. It's not unreasonable when I dance it in the club. Today it's something that I don't even think about.

Before I started dancing I would however also have had a hard time touching a girl at her hip.

But it is something I absolutely, 100% genuinely want.

I don't think that's the case. You don't seem to be willing to do anything to change.

At the beginning it will be painful for you to take dance lessons. It will be outside of your comfort zone.
On the other hand it's less painful then going out and asking 50 girls for their phone number and getting rejected by all of them.

Take your pick. You can also avoid to choose. That would reveal that you aren't really motivated to do something about your problem.

If my rhetoric is a bit too blunt I'm sorry. As the forum closes down this might be my last post on your threads. I have to say everything that's to be said.