Beware of (Horny) Men Bearing (Empty) Promises

Men like having sex much more than they like responsibility. And women don’t mind and even like sex, but they can’t stand empty promises by men to get it from them.
I don’t know how often this occurs, but there is a not infrequent situation where a man is sure about wanting sex and may wax and wane eloquently about a wondrous future filled with romantic vacations to a woman he is pursuing in order to land her in bed. Once he has her, those promises can often fade and if the woman asks about his fulfilling what he promised, he accuses her of pressuring him and tells her to stop nagging. To compound the problem there are few things that take away a man’s desire to spend his life with a woman than her pressuring him to make good on what he promised.
However even as he resists and can become petulant about it, he may nevertheless be building an emotional dependency on her underneath. If she reaches the point, especially after her friends and family insist that he is toying with her, of delivering an ultimatum of either get engaged/married or break up and if it is not a bluff, the fear of losing her can cause that man to accede to her insistence for all the wrong reasons — not wanting to lose her vs. wanting to be with her.
Also not infrequently if the man under pressure agrees to the marriage, but feels he didn’t choose it, he can respond by withholding love and attention. And if the woman is oblivious as she becomes consumed with planning the wedding with her friends and family while the man feels like a unengaged Ken doll onlooker, he can further react by becoming even less loving.
Sadly I have seen such a switching off of desire last for decades in the man as a reaction to feeling he didn’t choose the marriage but was forced even as the couple produces children, buys a homes, etc.
Here is the real rub.  One of the worst feelings a woman can have is to feel coldness, contempt or nothing in the part of her where she is supposed to feel warmth.  Women have confided in me that a woman without warmth is not a woman (alternatively men have confided in me that a man without courage is not a man).  When men withdraw or withhold caring towards a woman or worse act sullen, petulant or complaining (since they have lost that loving feeling), it can cause a woman to lose her warm feelings towards that man.  And underneath the anger a woman may feel toward a non-loving or unloving man is a unconscious fear that she has lost her warmth, is no longer a woman and is trapped.
What’s a woman to do to prevent this very sad fate?
At any given moment when the man’s desire is waning you can tell him he is “free to leave” and that you don’t want to be with him unless he wants to be with you. Ironically, if you do that, the men worth keeping may then rediscover their desire. In fact a woman who is wise enough to never let the man feel so sure of her may have a man always desiring her. We call this being coy and it is not game playing, but rather knowing that a man feels better when he is pursuing a prize than when he is being told to do something.
What’s a man to do if he has lost that loving feeling because she “pressured” him to get married?
Realize that she didn’t put a gun to your head.  You’re the one who made the promises that you didn’t intend on keeping or did until you realized that it meant living up to a lot of responsibilities, which may have intimidated you.  Instead of pulling away and emotionally disengaging for  years or even the entirety of your marriage, tell your girl friend/fiance that the fear of not living up to those responsibilities mixed with her excitement about getting married and planning the wedding is very upsetting.  That will hopefully give her the opportunity to say to you, “I understand that and I think we can figure out and meet those responsibilities together. If you don’t want to get married or if you can’t decide until that fear goes away, I don’t think it will.  However I think every couple and every husband to be goes through this, but at least we’re talking about it.”  Just that understanding can cause you to realize why you love and want to marry to her.
I remember years ago a very touching scene when a woman was by the bed of her dying husband after being married for sixty years. In an unforgettable moment she whispered to him, “I’ve been lying to you for over sixty years.”
Half conscious he looked confused and said, “What?” whereupon she said, “Yes, for our entire life together, I’ve been mad about you and sexually crazy about you, but I never told you, because I knew you liked the chase.”
At that point he reached over to her and smiled weakly and said, “That’s one of the things I loved you for.”

How Women Fantasize About Sex

men and women both think about sex, but women go farther

Everyone's happy when the sex is good! But if the sex isn't that great, does that ruin everything? Not if you keep the big picture in mind!Do you think this cartoon is right? Do men judge their own performance more critically than women do, and are women able to enjoy sex, yet still remember what's most important in the relationship, and why she might go for him anyway?
Personally, I hope he's great in bed, and out of bed: a perfect storm.
Here's another Psych Today cartoon about dating you might like. A dog is included.

Are You with the Right Mate?

A Critical Difference

There's a difference between fighting for what you want in your relationship and being in direct control of your partner, demanding that he or she change, says Real.

Firmly stand up for your wants and needs in a relationship. "Most people don't have the skill to speak up for and fight for what they want in a relationship," he observes. "They don't speak up, which preserves the love but builds resentment. Resentment is a choice; living resentfully means living unhappily. Or they speak up—but are not very loving." Or they just complain.

The art to speaking up, he says, is to transform a complaint into a request. Not "I don't like how you're talking to me," but  "Can you please lower your voice so I can hear you better?" If you're trying to get what you want in a relationship, notes Real, it's best to keep it positive and future-focused.

Son of gay parents, Obama comedy speech, Perry campaign ad top YouTube 2011 political videos

NEW YORK — A young Iowa man’s plea for marriage rights for his lesbian parents drew 18.3 million views to become the most-watched political video of the year, according to YouTube’s ranking of viral political videos.
President Barack Obama’s speech to the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner in April was second on the list, while Republican presidential candidate Rick Perry’s ad criticizing gays in the military placed third and was the year’s most-watched campaign commercial.
YouTube, the popular video-sharing site, released its 2011 list Tuesday. The company based its rankings on videos uploaded by users to the site’s news and politics category.
Rounding out the top five: Obama’s announcement of the death of Osama bin Laden on May 1, and “Brother Can You Spare a Trillion?” by Florida Republican activist Blaise Ingoglia, warning of the mounting federal debt.
Together, the top 10 political videos drew about 50 million views from January to mid-December 2011.
To be sure, the political offerings were much less popular than those on YouTube’s Top 10 overall list, which was also released Tuesday.
“Friday,” Rebecca Black’s sing-songy paean to the weekend, was the most-watched video of the year with nearly 180 million views, YouTube announced. Even “Cat Mom Hugs Baby Kitten,” which placed 10th on the overall list, had a whopping 37 million views.
But Ramya Raghavan, news and politics manager for YouTube, said public interest in political videos was already strong and would grow more so as the 2012 presidential campaign intensifies.
“A roller-skating baby is always going to get a lot of views,” Raghavan said. “But the audience is also showing a big appetite for political news and content, and there is so much more of this presidential race to go.”
A hearing in the Iowa House Judiciary Committee over a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage last winter generated the most-viewed political video of the year.
Zach Wahls, a student at the University of Iowa, stood before the panel to describe growing up as the son of two women. A handsome Eagle Scout, Wahls described a childhood similar to that of other Iowa families.
“In my 19 years not once have I ever been confronted by an individual who realized independently that I was raised by a gay couple,” Wahls told the committee. “And you know why? Because the sexual orientation of my parents has had zero effect on the content of my character.”
Iowa’s state Supreme Court legalized gay marriage in April 2009. The proposed amendment would have revoked marriage rights.
The Iowa House passed the amendment despite Wahls’ plea. But state Senate leaders decided against bringing up the matter, effectively killing it for the time being. Many gay rights activists credited the Wahls video for helping draw attention to the issue.
Obama appears twice on YouTube’s list. His remarks at the April 30 correspondents’ dinner, where he skewered real estate mogul Donald Trump for raising questions about his birth certificate, drew 9.1 million views.
Obama’s speech announcing the U.S. mission that killed bin Laden came a day later, drawing 6.2 million views.
Campaign commercials for Perry, the Texas governor, appear twice on YouTube’s list.
In “Stronger,” which placed third on the political list, Perry vows action against Obama’s “war on religion.”
Perry says, “There’s something wrong in this country when gays can serve openly in the military but our kids can’t openly celebrate Christmas or pray in schools.”
The ad drew 7 million views in less than two weeks. It also provoked controversy and sparked several parodies.
Perry’s debut presidential campaign ad, “Proven Leadership,” also made the list with 2.1 million views.
Other videos on YouTube’s top 10: comedian Seth Myers’ remarks to the White House Correspondents’ Dinner; Jon Stewart of “The Daily Show” appearing on Fox News Channel with host Bill O’Reilly; Herman Cain’s campaign ad featuring his chief of staff, Mark Block, smoking a cigarette; and a mock Obama campaign ad produced by the National Republican Senatorial Committee.

Obama camp says Romney’s layoff record makes him an easier target than Gingrich on jobs front

WASHINGTON — Conventional wisdom, supported by polls, maintains that Mitt Romney would be a tougher opponent than Newt Gingrich against President Barack Obama.
But one factor keeps Democrats from salivating over Gingrich’s rise in the Republican presidential race: Romney may present a fatter target on jobs, the issue expected to dominate the 2012 contest.

Romney, the former Massachusetts governor, says his greatest asset is his understanding of business and job creation. Obama’s team has compiled a thick file to rebut that claim, based mainly on Romney’s time as head of the private equity firm Bain Capital in the 1980s and 1990s. Bain made hefty profits for Romney and other officials and investors. But hundreds of workers sometimes lost their jobs in the process.
Considerable research already exists for Obama. When Romney unsuccessfully challenged Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass., in 1994, Democrats ran attack ads featuring laid-off workers from American Pad & Paper, or Ampad. After Bain acquired the company in 1992, it cut 385 jobs and closed two U.S. plants. Ampad sought bankruptcy protection in 2000, shortly after Romney had left Bain.
A few other Bain reorganization projects met similar fates, although some prospered and grew.
The Obama camp has no comparable jobs “opposition research” on Gingrich. The former House speaker spent his career as a college instructor, lawmaker and Washington-based consultant, none of which involved hiring or firing large numbers of people.
“Romney’s record is a target-rich environment, since he threw people out of jobs to make a lot of money,” said Doug Hattaway, a Democratic strategist. “Gingrich is harder to paint as a job-destroyer.”
In some ways, it would make sense for Obama supporters to root for Gingrich. He has charmed and alienated people about equally, at best, during his long up-and-down career.
The latest Associated Press-GfK poll found Romney and Obama essentially tied when Americans were asked their voting intentions for 2012. But Obama led Gingrich, 51 percent to 42 percent.
Nonetheless, some Obama advisers seem eager to take on Romney, saying the line of attack on jobs is much clearer than it is for Gingrich.
When Romney was endorsed by Delaware tea party activist Christine O’Donnell — she once declared “I’m not a witch” in a Senate race ad — Obama strategist David Axelrod jumped in. “If Christine O’Donnell really wants to help Mitt, maybe she can cast a spell and make his MA and Bain records disappear,” Axelrod said via Twitter.
Romney is trying to inoculate himself.
During last Thursday’s GOP debate in Iowa, Romney predicted Obama will “go after me and say: ‘You know, in businesses that you’ve invested in, they didn’t all succeed. Some failed. Some laid people off.’ And he’ll be absolutely right. But if you look at all the businesses we invested in, over a hundred different businesses, they added tens of thousands of jobs.”
Reviews of Bain’s history by the Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post and others have concluded it’s difficult to prove or disprove the thrust of Romney’s claim. There’s ample evidence of jobs lost, and jobs gained, by companies reorganized by Bain during Romney’s leadership.