DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: I just want to say I really enjoy your content. It’s great that the self-help advice you give to guys like me isn’t toxic, like most of the other stuff you find online.

I just want a bit of clarification about something you have said numerous times throughout your work. You explain how women enjoy sex as much as men do and that is helpful to you guys struggling to date or be sexually active. But how can that be helpful for a guy like me? If women want enjoyable sex then they will go with the guys that are very attractive and good at sex. I’m sure women take one look at me and can tell I’d be trash in bed. I mean, if women enjoy sex, they are sure to go after experienced studs.

I’m not ugly but I am still not super hot. I don’t radiate hyper masculine virility. I am also not particularly experienced sexually. I’m not a virgin, but I have had sex only about six times with maybe 4 partners since I lost my virginity about years ago at age 27.

Why would any woman on Earth want me as a sexual partner when there is little change I can satisfy them in bed? Average looking inexperienced guys like me can’t make women cum like pornstars. I do want to establish that I have no problem with the fact women enjoy sex, they have every right to. I feel no resentment, just sadness. I don’t see what a sexually liberated woman who knows what see wants would want with me when they could find a much more masculine guy that has been with many more partners than me.

I’m not trying to whine here, I genuinely want to understand why the fact that women love sex as men is good for a guy like me and lead me to having a much happier love and sex life.

Thank you for your time,

Les Manly

DEAR LES MANLY: Um, you haven’t just missed the point, LM, you’ve missed a galaxy of points when it comes to women’s sexual agency and pleasure. And a lot of what you’re saying simply isn’t true; it’s a combination of self-limiting beliefs and mistaken ideas about what women are looking for in a partner… or what makes someone a good lover, for that matter.

The first is that numbers don’t mean much when it comes to skill. There’re folks I know who have racked up truly insane numbers of partners… but will never manage to sleep with the same person twice. They can attract ’em, but they’re so awful in bed that they’ll never get a repeat performance. Meanwhile, there’re friends of mine who can count the number of partners they’ve had on the fingers of one hand with plenty to spare, and yet their partners will swear on a stack of bibles that those are the best lovers they’ve ever had, ever.

The next is that “attractive” is a huge moving target. You’re treating attraction as being purely physical, and a very narrow idea of physicality at that. But not only does attraction mean far more than just physical good looks, but “good looks” are a matter of presentation more than anything else. Don’t believe me? Do a search for “celebrities without makeup” or “Instagram vs. Reality”. Or just look up pictures of what Brad Pitt looks like when he’s not shooting movies.

But by the same token, what women consider physically attractive is going to vary drastically. Part of the problem is that you’re buying into an idea about what women are into… but that’s what guys think women are into. If you ask women, you’re going to get vastly different responses. Guys convince themselves that dudes need to look like Henry Caville in The Witcher in order to have half a chance, while scores of women would commit any number of crimes for a chance to lick frosting off Paul Hollywood. And of course, there’s always Serge Gainsbourg — a man who looked like his mother spent too much time in Innsmouth, and yet got ass like he was in a car chase, drove over an ass cart and crashed through a plate-ass window.

But then there’s also the fact that women are attracted to more than just the physical. Guys made fun of the idea that, say, Jon Favreau’s character in Chef could ever hook up with Scarlett Johansson or Sofia Vergara without ever seeing what chef culture is actually like or the men and women who’re into them. A guy who can cook AND treats sex like eating a gourmet meal? That is a dude who is never gonna have a Saturday night alone if he doesn’t want to.

Then there’s the idea that you have to f

k like a porn star to be a great lover. First: you need to realize that porn sex is bad sex; it’s bears as much resemblance to real sex as The Fast and the Furious resembles to driving. It’s all done to look good for the camera, not to actually get someone off.

But more importantly, sex isn’t just about experience or technique. Being a great lover isn’t about knowing how to do the swirly-go-round, the Rusty Venture or the Transylvanian Twist, it’s about connecting with your partner. It’s about communication. Sex is incredibly individualistic; what gets one person off like a rocket is going to make other people’s skin crawl. Just because one person liked it when their lovers would get elbow-deep in them, that doesn’t mean everyone else will too. A big part of being a great lover is simply having a willingness to pay attention, an ability to take direction without letting the ego get in the way and a can-do attitude. Another big part? Being able to use your words and to encourage your partner to use theirs. The more they feel that they can ask for what they want — or better yet, show you — the better a lover you’ll be, because you’ll be able to provide them exactly what it is they need.

Nor are women just looking at you and assuming that you can’t f

k. I can tell you from experience: you can’t predict sexual skill by somebody’s looks. The worst sexual experiences I’ve had have been with women who had bodies that would make a priest kick in a stain-glass window… and they had all of the sexuality of a dead fish. Some of the most amazing, freak-nasty lovers I’ve ever had, on the other hand, had been people you would never suspect. 

Now, if you want to work on your visual appeal, then there are things you can do. Working on your presentation is a start. Learning how to dance is another thing that can help; a strong sense of rhythm, an ability to move your hips as well as to lead and follow? That’ll all help. But those are supplements, not requirements. The surest way to be someone that women will want to take home is simply to work on learning how to connect with them. Sexual attraction is as much in the brain and the heart as it is in the groin; if you want to get into someone’s pants, being able to get into their head. If they can’t get you off their mind, they’ll want you getting them off later.

Good luck.

Please send your questions to Dr. NerdLove at his website (www.doctornerdlove.com/contact); or to his email, doc@doctornerdlove.com

DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: I don’t know if you’ve touched on this specific question before and I’m super embarrassed to even ask anyone about it but I’m at the end of my rope and I hope I can at least get pointed in a direction. Sorry if this message gets a little raunchy, I’m going to try my best to keep it as clean as I can given the subject.

A little backstory, I’m a cis male and had a very active sex life in college as most people do and it was good, great even. When I graduated I slowed down considerably, but it was never a huge issue. Well, a few years ago for a plethora of reasons I went through a very DEEP depression, I had a s

t job, I had no real relationship, I gained A LOT of weight, it was tough. Working on myself I can say I’m doing better today but still dealing with it. Lost a little weight, though I’m still much bigger than I used to be, got a much better job, and even ended up dating someone who I’ve known for a while, let’s call her T.

T and I got along well enough as friends before dating, we had similar interest both pretty nerdy, it was good. Then came the worst night of my life…

We were getting pretty hot and heavy, but I felt a little off, I was so excited and enjoying myself… but my body was not responding. I thought maybe it was just nerves and I’d shake it off once we hit my bedroom. NOPE! When I was pleasuring her I couldn’t get completely hard and when she worked on me I went completely soft. I was mortified, it’s never happened before and I didn’t know what to do. She tried to reassure me and said it was something we can work on. We tried and were able to have sex but a few times I still couldn’t get hard and the few times I could it was maybe a half-y, hard to maintain, and super quick. I’m definitely not saying I was God’s gift to women but it was at least good for both of us back in my prime. I’ve never been impotent or a minute-man and now I’m somehow both…

She dumped me a few weeks later saying that the sex was bad and I wasn’t attractive to her and I honestly don’t even blame her. I spiraled back down into depression.

I don’t know what to do, I’m 28 and terrified that this is just how it’ll be from now on. I feel I’m too young to have to rely on a little blue pill or only last 2 minutes before I pop. Google doesn’t help, you see all these fake solutions and pills and it’s all so confusing. I have no confidence anymore, I’m trying my hardest to talk to someone right now and in the back of my head I’m terrified that if we get that far my body will fail on me again. What can I do? Who can I talk to that will actually help? Or am I just doomed to have a bad sex life, if I have any at all… I could really use some guidance. Any help at all would be much appreciated.

No Mojo and All Depression

DEAR NO MOJO AND ALL DEPRESSION: Hoo boy, FNMAD: I feel for you. There’s nothing quite as panic-inducing as the time when it seems like you’re finally gonna hook up with someone you’ve had a thing for all this time… and then your body goes “LOL NOPE!” and now you’re the guy trying to convince agents and theater goers that your frog really DOES dance and sing “Hello My Baby”.

…ok maybe that metaphor got away from me.

But before we get to what you can do about this, let’s talk a little about dicks and their drawbacks. See, the problem with penises is that they’re divas. They’re the genital equivalent of Luciano Pavarotti; if everything’s not perfect, they’re not gonna perform. Or if they do, they’re going to put on a performance so half-assed that it seems almost contemptuous to have even bothered in the first place. There are so many ways that things can go wrong and that can just leave your junk in the wrong mood. Sometimes you’ll be oversensitive or so turned on that you can’t control yourself and you go off like a series of roman candles. Other times you won’t be able to climax for love nor money nor concert tickets. And then of course, there’re times you’re softer than a super-soft birthday party and trying to do anything with it is like trying to shoot pool with a rope.

And the potential causes are seemingly endless. Poor circulation, smoking, pot use, alcohol, weight gain, lack of sleep… all of these can make your junk decide to take a vacation until things get better. But one of the most common causes for failing in the moment — especially when you’re able to get erections or climax when you’re by yourself — is anxiety. And anxiety is one of the most insidious triggers for a semi (or non-existent) stiffy because anxiety is a vicious self-fulfilling prophecy. When you’re worried that you can’t perform, well, that’s gonna actually cause performance issues. You start worrying that your dick is going to betray you at the worst possible moment and you increase the odds that it will… which then just means that you’re going to be even more worried, next time, locking you into a cycle that’s really difficult to break out of.

Even the use of medications, like Cialis or Viagra can just make things worse. In this case — when the issue is psychological, rather than physiological — the pills are just the boner equivalent of Dumbo’s magic feather; all they’re doing is giving you permission to do the thing you should already be able to do. And that word, “should”, is the mind-killer. It’s the thing that’s going to screw you over faster than a loan shark named Jimmy The Fish. Sure, you’ve ensured that things will rise to the occasion, but there’s this nagging voice in the back of your head that you shouldn’t have to do this. You’re a strapping young man; you should be getting boners that’re so hard you could break concrete. Having any sort of erectile dysfunction just means there’s something wrong with you as a man. And so the cycle continues; yeah, you can get it up, but at the cost of your pride and existential identity as a man.

(Don’t get me wrong: there’s absolutely nothing wrong with taking the pills… but when the issue is psychological, sometimes all you’re doing is giving yourself a crutch instead of dealing with the underlying issue.)

And that’s what’s happened here, FNMAD; you’ve had a series of deeply s

tty experiences, capped off with your girlfriend telling you that you suck in the sack. No goddamn wonder you feel like a loser; here you are having an existential crisis and your girlfriend dumps you because of that crisis. It’s entirely understandable that now it seems like you’re stuck being a s

t lay for the rest of your life.

Now someone get on the phone to Sir Mixx-A-Lot because there’s a huge “but” coming…

BUT.

That ain’t the case. You can stop this. You can break this curse and get your sex-life back on track. The trick to breaking the curse is to break the cycle of self-reinforcement, and the way you do that is that you take your penis off the table. Er, as it were.

See, part of the issue you’re having here is that you — like a lot of folks — equate sex with penetration. Your idea about sex, especially good sex, is centered around your penis, which is actually the issue. See, despite what we’re taught, PIV penetration is actually a lousy way to get our partners off; less than 35% of women can get off from vaginal penetration. For the majority of folks who’ve got a vagina, penetration simply doesn’t stimulate the clitoris the way they need for orgasm… and that’s actually good news for you. See, what you have here is a prime opportunity to start making sex less peen-centric and more of a holistic experience with your partner. Yeah, your junk may not be getting harder than Chinese trigonometry, but that doesn’t mean that you’re doomed to be lousy in bed. What it means is that you’re going to remind yourself that there’s so much else you have available to you that never goes soft. You have your fingers. You have your tongue. You have sex toys. You’ve got your brain. You have an entire arsenal of tools to give pleasure to your partners that never fail you at the most inconvenient time. So for right now, sex is going to be less about receiving and a lot more about giving, for you. Get ready to start mastering oral sex and eating your partner like a cupcake. Get used to using your hands — and for more than just insert tab-a-into-slot-b; instead of focusing on the vaginal canal or directly on the clitoris, learn about other ways to incorporate the entire vulva into sex play, whether through gentle pressure on the whole public mound, light touch on sensitive areas… the possibilities are endless. Get comfortable with sex toys; they’re not a replacement for your penis, they’re another tool to use. A vibrator or a dildo isn’t what’s getting her off any more than a hammer is building a house by itself. It’s all about the person who’s using it.

The more you break the idea that you need to have a steely-hard erection to be a great lover and focus on the ways that you can give pleasure to a partner that have nothing to do with your dick, the better of a lover you will be over all. And as you shift that mindset away from your groin to your whole body, the less you’ll be worried about whether or not you’ll be able to get hard. It’ll be a secondary concern… which takes the pressure off you to perform. Taking away that source of anxiety will help you get your mojo back. But once you do get your mojo back — and you will —  don’t forget everything you’ve learned. Sex with you should be a full-body experience… and one that’ll have your partners swearing up and down that you’re the best thing that happened to them since the detachable shower-head.

Good luck.

Please send your questions to Dr. NerdLove at his website (www.doctornerdlove.com/contact); or to his email, doc@doctornerdlove.com

DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: My girlfriend says she was emotionally abused by her ex boyfriend. He had anger and jealousy issues. He would isolate her and dictate the activities they would do together. He would even say hurtful things to her like that she’s not marriage material or that she’ll be alone forever. They dated for about two years and then she broke up with him. He tried desperately to get her back. He would write long elaborate love notes and even drive 4 hours to show up at her front door unannounced. This went on for about a year. She started to date other people and she slowly cut him out of her life.

About a year ago, she received a job offer at the same job that he works at. This would mean they would work in the same city and the same building. This was her dream job so she said yes. When she moved down here for the new job, they began communicating again. Deep feelings for him began to resurface. She discovered that he had a new girlfriend and it really hurt her. She cried for days when she found out. She was confused why she felt like this after the way he treated her in the past. She tried to get back into a relationship with him but he refused because of his new girlfriend. This hurt her even more.

She decided to just try to maintain a professional working relationship. She began dating again and a few months later, she started dating me. She told me the whole story of their relationship. As we began to become serious in our relationship, she decided it was a good idea to keep our relationship a secret so that he does not cause drama at work. I also work in the same building as them.

The next few months was a struggle. He would call her almost every day and she would pick up the phone every time. He would send long texts apologizing for the past and saying that he would like to get back together. She was very transparent with me about these conversations. She said it was important to maintain a professional relationship with him because they work together but it was clear that he wanted more than just a professional relationship. She said she was working on cutting him out of her life but she needed time and to do it her own way. I obliged and allowed the communication to continue between them. They would speak almost daily.

Our relationship continues to progress and by this point, we are serious about each other. We are saying “I love you”, meeting each other’s parents and even talking about the future. Yet, during this same period of time, I would catch her lurking on the new girlfriends social media page. If the ex would post a new photo with his girlfriend, she would see it and her mood would immediately be ruined. They would have phone conversations where they would argue and cry about the past for hours. She said what she was feeling has nothing to do with romantic feelings and everything to do with the aftermath of the emotional abuse she received. I was very confused by this but she confidently said that she was never in love with him. It still hurt when I would see her continue to have these conversations with her ex and see how bothered she was by his new girlfriend.

I did not like how she was handling the situation but I also tried to remain empathetic. I urged her not to text back or answer his calls but she simply could not. She knew that their communication made me uncomfortable. I was often frustrated and it would lead to arguments. When she couldn’t go no contact, I felt that she cared about his feelings more than mine. It seemed that she had this attachment to him. I began to feel like I was being emotionally cheated on. Yet, she always remained very adamant that she was in love with me and not him. She attributes her feelings and tears to the emotional abuse. She knows he wasn’t the one for her.

I told her that he it is unhealthy for them to be in contact and it would be best if she blocked him from everything. It took quite a bit of convincing but she eventually did. We’ve now been together for 6 months and she hasn’t been in contact with him for about three months.

We are still in love and she firmly maintains that she never felt the same love for him. I believe her but I wonder if there are feelings that she can’t fully understand because of the pain she went through?

I know that it can be very hard to detach from a manipulative ex and I admit that I don’t fully understand the effects of an emotionally abusive relationship. I write this because I want to understand how a past emotionally abusive relationship can affect a current loving relationship and how to navigate those difficulties.

I worry that her ex was like a drug, responsible for her highs and lows, and she was going through withdrawals while dating me. I worry that she has been so conditioned by the emotional abuse that she has come to expect it. I want to be assured that I was not emotionally cheated on. I think that is my biggest fear.

Is it possible that she simply did not have enough time to heal from him? I feel like I had to push her to make the decision to block his number. If she was truly over him and healed, wouldn’t she have willingly blocked him for the betterment of our relationship? I recently asked her to unblock him because I felt that blocking him was just an easy way of not having to confront the problem. I never seen her not text back or not pick up his calls and that is still the one thing that makes me believe she was not over him. Unblocking him was my way of testing her to see how she would react if he does reach out again. Was this a bad idea to unblock him? It seemed to be working but I always wonder how far the communication would have gotten if I didn’t push her to block him.

I feel stuck and don’t want to question her anymore. I don’t want to smother her in pursuit of this clarity and understanding that I crave. Please help me understand all of this.

Stuck In 3rd

DEAR STUCK IN 3RD: There’s a lot to unpack here, but I think it may actually be better to toss the entire suitcase out.

I’m going to give you some advice which is going to save you and your girlfriend a lot of pain and conflict in the future: you need to ditch the whole “she was cheating on me emotionally” angle. Like, right the hell now.  There’re a whole host of things wrong with this outlook, not the least of which is that it’s centering her struggle — and it is a struggle — around you and your feelings. I mean, Jesus f

k dude, you’re “testing” her to see if she’s over him? You don’t “test” a relationship like that, especially when it means putting her in contact with her abuser.

But the bigger issue is very simple: you don’t understand how abuse f

ks with someone’s head. It can be very hard for people to process what’s been happening to them and even harder untangle the whammy that it’s put on them.

Let’s start with the “go away, come back” game that her ex plays. You may have noticed that whenever it seems that she was going to leave him for good, suddenly he’s sorry for everything, he’s on his best behavior and swearing up and down that he’s going to love her until the end of time. He’s deluging her with affection and attention to such a level that it’s hard to resist. This is known as “love bombing”; he’s doing all of this positive behavior because it floods her brain with oxytocin and makes her feel almost high from it. It feels so good that it’s very easy to forget that, oh, right, he’s King F

kstain of S

t Mountain. After all, it’s very easy to cast doubt on our own memories and think “well, maybe it wasn’t that bad after all,” especially when he’s making such huge gestures and promising her the sun, moon and stars.

And your girlfriend wants to believe that he’s better, that he’s not this hideously toxic person. Not because she still has a thing for him but because people in general don’t like to think that they’re the sort of person who’d get stuck in a toxic, abusive relationship. It’s more reassuring to see the abuser’s behavior as a glitch in the Matrix, rather than a genuine part of who he is. Otherwise how else can she reconcile her having dated him, the good memories she has (and yes, survivors of abusive relationships can have good memories of the relationship… these almost always come from the start of the relationship) and the complicated feelings she still has for him. And, yeah, those feelings are real, they’re legit and they’re completely understandable… and perversely, they’re because of the abuse.

One of the things that a lot of abusers do — some unconsciously, some deliberately — is called “intermittent reinforcement”. This involves a seemingly random system of rewards or punishments that don’t conform to any particular response or stimulus. Those rare moments of getting the reward gives such an endorphin rush that you get hooked on it and want to figure out how to trigger it again. That pattern of anxiety and pain and random rewards (and the accompanying endorphin rush) are how casinos and game publishers convince you to keep throwing money into slot machines or loot boxes in games; the rush that comes from even those minor rewards is insanely powerful and it creates a pattern that is very hard to break.

And part of why it’s been so damn hard for your girlfriend to break that pattern with her ex? It’s because she can’t get away from him. He’s part of her life at work, he still has access to her through social media and her phone… he’s able to keep performing that pattern of anxiety and relief that f

ks with her head.

So yeah, she still has feelings for him. That’s not surprising. But that doesn’t mean she’s happy about having those feelings. I mean, imagine if you still found yourself attracted to someone who you knew, intellectually, would only hurt you. Imagine how f

ked up you would feel if there was this thing that you knew did nothing but cause you pain and you still wanted it. That would tear you up inside because you’d feel torn between the guilt and self-recrimination for feeling this way and still wanting it. 

And here you are, getting pissy with her because she’s got scars from a toxic relationship.

Look dude, she ain’t cheating on you, she’s not holding onto a relationship because she wants to get back into it and she’s not thinking about this guy because she’s just not over him yet. She’s dealing with the aftermath of an abusive relationship and those are incredibly difficult to leave.

Also: holy hopping sheep s

t Charlie, telling her to unblock him after she finally blocked him was the wrong f

king move. She doesn’t need to “confront the problem”, she needs to excise him out of her life like cancer. She also needs to talk to a therapist, preferably one who has a lot of experience and training in helping people who’ve been in abusive relationships. What she needs right now is support, healing and distance. What she doesn’t need is a guy who’s pushing her one way (block him!) and then the other (UNblock him!) because he’s trying to prove a point to himself.

Now in an ideal world, she wouldn’t just cut him out of her life, she’d find a better job or, at the very least, arrange things so that he had no contact and no access to her at work. That doesn’t seem to be in the cards at the moment, which means that she’s going to need Team Her in her corner to prop her up and run interference, both when she’s having moments of weakness and when this dude starts trying to replay the old patterns. And if you care about her and want her to be happy, you’ll do that without worrying about “what this says about her feelings for you.” She needs a lot of love and support right now, not people questioning her motives, her feelings or trying to test her.

And if you can’t let go of the question of whether she was “emotionally cheating” on you, then you need to let go of her, so she can be with someone who can support her in the way she needs.

Please send your questions to Dr. NerdLove at his website (www.doctornerdlove.com/contact); or to his email, doc@doctornerdlove.com