I (23M) have been dating my girlfriend (21F) for just over 2 years now.
When we first started dating, we didn’t really intend on having sex. Nonetheless, after slightly over a month, one thing led to another and there we were. After the first few times I confirmed that she was comfortable and she kept saying that she wanted to explore more – and so we did.
Fast forward 9 months later, she suddenly says she wants to wait till marriage for religious reasons. I gave it a lot of thought,but given that she was the one I wanted to marry, I decided to continue with the relationship without any alterior motives.
5 months after this decision (so 14 months after dating), we’re on vacation and she’s getting turned on. She keeps asking me if we could break our abstinence from sex. I kept confirming that she’s sure about this, given it was for religious reasons, and she said she was sure. Then we were back at it for another 6 months.
Following this, she wanted to abstain again, so we did for a month or so, but then she said it “was unhealthy for a couple to constantly try abstaining”. But then after 3 months back at it, she’s wanting to stop again claiming “religious reasons”.
I can’t help but feel that something else is up. I’d like to hear a broader range of views though, potentially providing some personal experiences
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I have no idea. Maybe she feels God-fearing or something, or maybe it’s an excuse because she feels less connected to you. Very difficult to know from reading this post.
Can you ask her?
“Hey, this on and off thing with abstaining from sex kind of confuses me. To be honest, I get a feeling that something is up, but I could be completely wrong. Can you help me understand, what are your thoughts and feelings regarding all this?”
go cheat brother
Is she seeming to be struggling overall with her religious identity, or just in this area?
Is she still very hung up on her parents approval and struggling with guilt over that?
Is she showing signs of cheating like suddenly being much more sketchy about her phone privacy right around these “abstaining” time periods?
Honestly at her age, I don’t think it’s unusual.
Having been raised in a very religious and conservative environment, there are constant discussions around how premarital sex is wrong, that women are damaged or tainted, or that they are becoming stumbling blocks for men by giving in to lust. Years later and I still feel weird about it, if you know there’s a common phenomenon “Catholic guilt” among Catholics, but other religions have it as well, where you basically will carry a level of this discomfort for the rest of your life. I would advise your girlfriend to seek therapy, and for you to consider if this is something you are willing to work with her on.
I think this is one of those moments where the spoken word would help. You need to have a serious conversation with her.
If I were a gambling man, it’s because she wants to accelerate the process of getting married.
Sounds like she has a heathy sexual appetite, but really struggles with religious guilt.
I was in a similar place myself, long ago.
Now, I would never wait, because waiting actually got me married to someone it turns out I was not sexually compatible with. I also no longer have my religious beliefs. But even if I did, I would simply “sin”
That being said, back then my belief was so strong, nobody would have been able to sway me.
You just have to decide if waiting is a deal breaker for you or not. It’s ok if it’s not. It’s also ok if it is.
But if you stay, you can’t pressure her. And yes, it’s an odd dynamic if she herself is breaking her own rules constantly…but she’s gotta be the one to make that choice. You can’t push it.
It sounds like your girlfriend is having conflicted feelings between her commitment to her religious values, versus the normal biological urge to practice a healthy sex life with a committed partner. I’ve been there, done that.
Here’s what I’ll tell you: like how everything evolves with time, our understanding of religious values and practices has to evolve as well. I have so many friends who emotionally torture themselves with fighting their natural sexual urges all for the sake of religion. But they always fail to ask themselves: “WHY does abstinence from sex have to be a thing. Is it truly written in the Bible (or whatever religious text is applicable to you both here) that sex before marriage is a sin? And if it is written in the Bible, what do i ultimately believe?”
For me, people who adhere to the “no sex before marriage rule” are only doing a huge disservice to themselves. Because sexual incompatibility is honestly a huge thing that tears even the most strongest bonds apart. And there’s no way you can find out if you’re sexually compatible with a partner….without, you guessed it….HAVING SEX. Anyone who blindly marries a person without doing the work to figure out if they are even sexually compatible with their partner is equivalent to walking into a car dealership and signing the papers for the car, without even test driving the car…
But to your situation, you both obviously have had sex numerous times, but she keeps ping ponging back and forth between having sex, and abstaining. And i can tell you – it all stems from religious anxiety.
The best route for you to help convince her that having sex as commited partners is okay: bring up biblical verses that don’t make any sense in today’s context. For example, back in biblical times, it was considered a sin to eat pork, and also wear clothing made of different fabrics (it was a sin to wear cotton shirts, and linen pants for example), and anyone who did this should be stoned. Ask your gf: “in the context of today’s society, does that even make sense”. Just as times change, our understanding of the Bible and religious text must also evolve. That also includes the “no sex before marriage” pretext. God wants a healthy and loving relationship for us. What He doesn’t want is promiscuity, bc besides that being immoral, it also opens you up to higher chances of contracting STDs / STIs.
If your gf cannot do the internal work to resolve this herself, then you have an important question to ask yourself: you are young, and a healthy sex life is a very important part of a relationship. Would you be okay with abstaining until you are married to this girl? If not, then that’s okay. You both are just mismatched sexually, and in part, mismatched religiously. It’s up to you what you want to do about that.
If her reasoning isn’t due to religious anxiety, but she’s weaponizing her religious values in order to just “not have sex with you bc she doesn’t feel like it”, then that’s a whole entire different problem. But i don’t think it’s that. I think it all boils down to religious anxiety, and her internal conflict between honoring what she religiously believes, versus truly believing that having sex in a committed relationship is actually an okay thing, whether you’re married or not.
You don’t break abstinence to have sex then go back to abstinence. She needs ro decide what she’s doing with her life.
This whole thing is super weird. I would dump her and move on.
She is having very understandable conflicted feelings, especially for her age and involvement in a conservative religion.
Religion (while often having potential benefits for some) can really mess with women in particular. It certainly is often used to leverage both men and women’s sexuality against them, but it is particularly potent against women, with many layers that are discovered over time.
The problem and cause is the religion, the catalyst is both your sexual drives, and she has some sorting through and reconstructing values to do.
They are her values to reconstruct, though, and it’s your decision to make as to if you feel you have the capacity for the fluctuations and changes in her mind.
Don’t be an asshole, don’t pressure her, and don’t blame her (she didn’t ask for this baggage). Keep being sure there is clear consent. Be honest (but kind) with your concerns and capacity. Don’t expect her to be your therapist, and of you have your own stuff to work through, then do it. Take the opportunity to figure out your own baggage, and work through it. The only person you can really work on is yourself (says someone who often focused on supporting/waiting for others working on their more obvious issues, and only recently began working on my own stuff. You benefit a lot more working on your own stuff than by waiting for someone else to work on theirs)
Good luck. I imagine this can feel very disorienting.
This is irrational. She didn’t “save” her virginity for marriage. It’s already over. Her reasoning is nonsensical. Are you sure you want to marry this person? Does she just want to marry you so that she can justify to herself that she has only had sex with her future husband due to her religious guilt?