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My Man Went To A Prostitute In Amsterdam – Should I Be Upset?

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My boyfriend had sex with a prostitute when he went to Amsterdam. It happened before we were together, but I’m still shocked and disappointed. What should I do?

She Said:

I’d say let the past be the past, as long as that past includes having been tested for AIDS and other STD’s. Your boyfriend made a choice before you two met; at least he was honest with you about his sexual history with a prostitute. Thumbs up for that!

He Confided In You

He’s revealed something to you that most guys probably wouldn’t share with their girlfriends. You might want to consider making him feel safe, instead of judged, now that he’s confided in you. I can understand feelings of being shocked – I’m sure it was the last thing you expected to hear. However, he can’t change what he’s done so making him feel bad is not going to get you anywhere.

Of course, your feelings need to be respected as well. If it’s too difficult for you to hear about, thank him for confiding in you and close the subject. P.S. – once the subject is closed, that means you have to drop it. However, if you’re curious, consider asking him about his sex experience with the prostitute.

He did bring up something that easily could have been kept a secret. Perhaps there were portions of the experience he had that you might find titillating. You can explore these things in a safe place, between the two of you.

Whatever you choose, please act respectful of each other. And I’m serious about making sure he was tested after his experience. Prostitution is legal and regulated in the Netherlands, but extra precautions regarding health would be extremely wise.

He Said:

I don’t know how to tell you this, but your boyfriend is an idiot. Unless he caught something from her there (and if he has an STD there may be a chance he got it from someone else), I can’t see any logical reason for him to tell you this.

He Should Have Kept It Confidential

It’s like if he were to ask you your number of partners. There is no way to win that argument, regardless of relationship status. It’s a lose-lose-lose situation.  He doesn’t need to know how many people you have been with and you don’t need to know how many people he has been with,  plain and simple. The exception is if he has some sort of STD, then of course the person with the condition would need to disclose it. I’m assuming you have already been intimate with him, so presumably you have already had this conversation.

Testing should happen after every partner, be they professional sex worker or not. And I wouldn’t necessarily freak out because he was with a professional. Typically, in a highly regulated scenario like Amsterdam, a prostitute is regularly tested and they are highly aware of the risks involved and more importantly, how to minimize them – usually by using a condom. Some girl he met at a bar in the states may not know how to do that.

Yes, you could explore the situation since he brought it up, but what do you have to gain by this? Pandora’s box was opened by your boyfriend. If I were you, I would slam the box shut, nail it closed and then bury it somewhere, never to be seen again.

Married Life: My Wife Says I’m Not Emotionally Available?

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For a woman to say that her husband is emotionally unavailable in a marriage is not at all uncommon – in fact, most women aren’t sure if their husbands have any emotions at all! Fortunately, this is not a sign that he doesn’t enjoy being married to you or wants to be someone else. What it is a sign of is that he’s a man and wasn’t taught how to talk about his emotions or express them growing up. Guys, if you’re in a marriage, it’s time to grow up and learn what being emotionally available means. Ladies, here’s how you can help your man learn the language of emotion.

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What Does Being Emotionally Available Mean?

Being emotionally available to your partner in a marriage is a very essential component to making the relationship work. Guys, you have to be at least willing to share a little bit of emotion with your partner. You need to be able to respond to your partner’s emotional needs and meet them without trying to “fix” them. Instead of trying to “fix” a sad partner, try to share a little bit with them and listen to them express why they’re sad and what made them upset. Most of the time, listening to your partner express what they’ve got going on and what they’re feeling will help them to get it out and get over it. Guys, most women can’t stand trying to be “fixed” or being told that they shouldn’t feel a certain way because it’s not logical. Women are going to feel whatever they feel whenever they feel it! Listen to her and allow her to express her feelings without being critical and without trying to offer a solution. She just needs you to hear her out.

For The Ladies: It’s Not His Fault

Ladies, you need to realize that men weren’t born and raised in an emotional environment like women were. Men were taught to hide their emotions – if they were sad, they didn’t talk about it. Dads didn’t teach their little boys how to talk about their feelings. Instead, they were taught how to hunt, fish, bowl, etc. to deal with their emotions. Men usually have two emotions that they express freely – happiness and anger. Any other emotions that crop up get pushed deep down or get dealt with by his retreating to whatever activity helps him to relieve stress and not talking about it. This can frustrate women to no end, but it’s not his fault! It’s just how men have been programmed to deal with what is going on in their lives and how they feel about certain things. They don’t know how to be emotionally available or how to talk about what they’re feeling. They literally don’t know the language. They don’t know what words to use to express how they’re feeling inside, so they usually just put it away.

For The Ladies: Help Him Learn The Language Of Emotion

It’s up to the ladies to help their male partners to learn the language of emotion. Guys, you have to be open to it though, or her efforts are going to fall on deaf ears.Emotions are a many layered thing, and it’s possible to feel many different things at once. This is usually what overwhelms a man and causes them to retreat – they’re not sure how to deal with that many different emotions at one time, or even one really strong emotion. Offer to listen to your partner and encourage him to talk about how he feels if something comes up that makes him upset or sad. Did he get frustrated at work? Why? How did what happened make him feel? You can offer up how you felt in similar situations without being critical so he can begin to understand how different situations can make people feel many different emotions. Don’t criticize him if he can’t think of how to express what he’s going through – instead, gently prompt him on the words to use to illustrate what he’s feeling inside. Guys, try not to shut your partners out when you’re feeling upset, sad, frustrated, angry or all of the above. Instead, allow them to be there for you. Allow them to listen to you and be there for you. She just needs to hear you out. This will make a huge difference in your relationship, whether you’re just in a long term relationship or you’re married.

When You Have to Move Out

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We live in an age of cohabitation. It’s fairly common for boyfriends and girlfriends to move in together prior to marriage, especially in cities where rent is expensive and living alone proves financially impractical. That’s all fine and well as long the relationship is going great, but when a break up occurs, living together can make things that much more painful. Yet it would be crazy to stay in a bad relationship just to save on rent or avoid dividing up your things. Follow the advice ahead and the process will be as pain free as reasonably possible.

Who Will Be Moving Out?

The first very important thing to decide when a break up happens is who will be moving out from the house or apartment. Will one of you be staying and the other one leaving, or are you both going to move out to other places? If you decide that only one of you is leaving, the person at fault for the breakup needs to be the one to move to a new place. That means that the dumper should go, because the dump-ee may not have seen this coming. They don’t deserve to have their entire life thrown into upheaval, unless the dump-ee is truly at fault because they cheated or did something else equally as terrible. Then they should definitely be kicked out of the apartment or home. The other exception would be if the dumper owns the house solely in their name, in which case the dump-ee should move out. In that scenario, the dumper should take action to help the dump-ee find a place before making them leave the shared living space.

Divide Shared Possessions

Once you’ve decided who is staying and who has to go, you need to divide up anything that’s shared by both parties. This can be tough and lead to lot of arguing and fighting, but it is a completely necessary step. The best thing that you can do, especially if you’re the dumper or cause of the break up, is try to be as amicable as is possible. If there are items in your home that you both use, but only one of you paid for, the buyer should get first dibs on that item. If there are shared items that you paid for together, things get significantly more complex. The best solution here is to attempt to balance out the value of what you both end up with. If you and your significant other bought both the couch and the bed together, one of you should get the couch and the other the bed. If you know your now-ex really wants the bed, be the bigger person and take the couch. Even if you’re mad at each other, you’ll feel better about it in the end (and avoiding yet another argument doesn’t hurt, either).

What About Shared Friends And Shared Pets?

What if the shared item isn’t an item so much as an entity? If you have a pet together and can remain somewhat amicable, you can try to share the pet. Perhaps you can switch off who keeps it every other week or so, not unlike a divorced couple shares custody of their children. If the break up was too sour, and you can’t stand the idea of having an on-going link to your ex, then the person who was at fault needs to let the other person keep the pet. Ditto for shared friends. If you aren’t okay with seeing each other at group events that mutual friends are involved in, you either need to rotate events for awhile, or decide who gets to see which friends. That could easily be the most difficult discussion of your entire relationship, but it can prevent a lot of future drama (and you can still see these friends one-on-one as often as you wish).

In the end, if you make every effort to be the biggest person and think somewhat rationally during an otherwise emotional experience, you will greatly reduce the amount of drama involved with moving out after a breakup.

How To Know When To Move In Together

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Moving in together prior to marriage, a.k.a. cohabiting, is more and more common these days. If you live in a fairly expensive city, it can be particularly tempting to combine forces with your significant other. Better to live with your girlfriend or boyfriend than some random roommate, right? The problem is, that isn’t necessarily true. Though it may seem more fun at first, if things start to go sour, breaking up with someone you live with can be extra disastrous. That means that this is a fairly weighty decision. Living with your boyfriend or girlfriend is effectively like being married, minus the marriage license and the shared bank account. Keep that in mind, and you’re more apt to give this decision the consideration it deserves.

Questions To Ask Before Asking Your Partner To Move In

If you are thinking about asking your S.O. to move in, what questions should you be asking yourself? First and foremost, do you really love this person? If you’re not at the point in your relationship where you can say, “I love you,” you’re not ready to live together. That doesn’t mean that you need to wait a year before you call the moving company. It just means that you need to know that you have strong feelings for each other. Secondly, you need to consider your compatibility with them. Imagine that they’re a stranger. What criteria would you want in a roommate that wasn’t your significant other? If your S.O. wouldn’t live up to any of them, you may need to question the logic of living together. If you wouldn’t reside with a roommate who was sloppy and made erratic rent payments, just being able to sleep with your S.O. probably won’t smooth over those problems.

Thinking About Situations That May Come Up When Living Together

Yet another major point to consider is how you’d handle bad situations together as cohabiters. The economy is rough out there. If one of you loses your job, will the other person be able to shoulder the rent for two for a while? That can be a high pressure situation, but if you love someone you’ll make it work. If you feel that you would, you’re probably ready to live together. If you disagree about levels of cleanliness or the balance of chore handling, will that ruin your relationship? If you think you’d be able to compromise and work around it, you’re golden. If you think you’d blow a gasket, then you probably shouldn’t sign the lease just yet. If any of the pressures of living together would likely ruin the relationship that you two have going, hold off for the time being.

What Happens If You Break Up?

The final point to consider is a biggie. If you eventually break up, are you prepared to deal with how much harder living together will make it? If you care about your significant other so much that you’d rather risk a more complex future breakup than live alone without them, then you’re ready to go. However, if the thought of divvying up your books and furniture in the future makes you cringe, think twice. That means that you better know that you intend on marrying or staying with this person forever before you move in with them.

Living together can be a really wonderful thing, or it can turn out to be surprisingly bad. That’s why it is important to treat it with an appropriate level of gravitas. If you wouldn’t rush into marrying someone, you shouldn’t rush into signing a lease with them. Just because it isn’t the ultimate form of commitment, doesn’t mean it’s not a big form of it. Keep that in mind, and ponder the aforementioned points before you make your decision. Taking a moment to clearly think things through will pay off in the end.

How To Cope With Being In An Interracial Relationship

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We live in a modern age and consider ourselves to be quite evolved, but backward things like racism still exist in our world. If you’re currently in an interracial relationship, you’re probably very aware of this fact. You can’t let other people’s bigotry keep you from being with the person that you love. How, then, can you cope with the additional problems of interracial romance?

How Being In An Interracial Relationship Can Affect You

You will most likely meet with varying levels of judgment over the course of your relationship. You may get stares on the street, or overhear disapproving remarks from random passersby. Terrible as that is, the passing of time will increase your ability to ignore the ignorance of these strangers. If you find that friends, family or co-workers feel the need to show you their inner racist side, that’s a whole other story. When facing bigotry from familiar sources, you must first and foremost remind yourself that you are both happily in love and a good person. Hard as it may be, this is your chance to be the bigger man or woman. Don’t go into hysterics or make a scene when your great uncle makes a crack. Take a deep breath, look him in the eye and calmly say, “Uncle, that may be your opinion, but it doesn’t make it right. I don’t want to hear talk like that about someone I love.” If this unsavory individual’s behavior continues, politely announce that you don’t want to be around someone who feels the need to spew hate speech. Then leave the event. Inform other friends and family that you don’t desire to be around this individual again unless they can control themselves. Remain calm, don’t stoop to name-calling, and provide a unified front with your significant other. It may be difficult, but it will get results.

Problems That May Come Up Within The Relationship

Cultural differences can also cause some problems. Religion can become an issue, particularly when you start to think about marriage or kids. You need to address this issue early on, and then again once you decide things are becoming truly serious. It’s important to establish whether or not one of you values religion more than the other, whether there’s an expectation that you convert or raise your possible children within a certain religion, etc. This is the sort of thing that could prove to be a deal breaker for many couples, so don’t wait until it’s too late to talk about it. It’s also important to learn about your partner’s cultural background in general. Showing your knowledge of common customs in their culture can impress your mate’s family. It also shows your partner that their background is important to you.

How To Keep Your Relationship Strong

The best thing that you can do for your relationship is be open with each other. Whether that means discussing how to handle a problematic relative or talking about what parts of your heritage are most important to you, you’ll be glad that your partner knows where you stand. There may be times when you or your significant other feel that you can’t understand each other because of a cultural difference. In moments like these, the openness you’ve established can save your relationship from falling apart. If you can feel comfortable saying that you don’t understand this particular aspect of your partner’s personal beliefs, but would love to have it explained to you, the situation may soon be resolved. Likewise, your partner needs to be understanding when you can’t relate to something due to your own background. Be honest, be supportive, and be open to the new learning experiences that your differences will provide. If you can do all of that, you will be able to get through the specific trials and tribulations of interracial romance and come out the better for it.