Should your boyfriend sleep over?
“So, are you and Sean getting together tonight?” Mia asked me as she, Sara and I trudged up the Matt Davis trail.
“Nah, The Kid’s with me tonight.”
“So?” Sara asked.
“So, he doesn’t sleep over when Trent’s with me. You know that.”
Sara stopped abruptly. “Still? Are you kidding me?”
“No, why?”
“Haven’t you guys been together for, like, years?” Mia asked.
“Yeah, about three or four, I guess.”
“So why can’t he sleep over?”
“Well, he could but he doesn’t
feel comfortable with it, and
I want to respect that.” 
“Kat, that’s crazy!” Sara insisted. “You guys are in a committed, monogamous relationship. You know Trent knows you guys are having sex! Why not be out in the open about it?”
I have no problem being open about a lot about sex with The Kid — just not about my personal sex life.
And, really, what kid even wants to think about his
or her parents having sex?
It’s just one big eww!! Most kids think they’re parents stopped having sex when the last kid was born, and they didn’t enjoy it anyway. So if I were still married, my sex life most likely even be an issue.
But when you’re a divorced parent and dating, it’s hard to hide what’s going on, beyond just the noisy sex thing. Having a man who’s not quite our dad, but more than a family friend shuffling over to the breakfast table in his jammies, bed-hair and morning woody — or that look on a guy’s face that only comes from having taken care of that — feels a little too in your face. And there’s always the chance that a kid’s going to accidentally see a boyfriend or girlfriend naked.
Of course, Trent knows what’s going on. But, I don’t feel like I have to fill in the details for him
- Is it OK for a boyfriend/girlfriend to sleep over when you have kids?
- Does it matter how long you’ve been together or how old the kids are?
- If one of your parents did that while you were young, how did you feel about it?
Photo © Angelika Bentin – Fotolia.com
The best kind of marriage
“It’s disgusting,” Sara said as she walked in my door to join Sean, The Kid and me for a bowl of New Year’s Day hopping John.
“What’s disgusting?”
“Hef’s engaged to a 24-year-old. I mean,
c’mon people — what kind of marriage is that?”
she huffed. 
“An honest one,” I countered.
“You must be kidding!”
But, I’m not. Hey, I’m not saying that a 60-year
age difference is a good thing; if I believed that, well, I’d be checking out guys who are waaaay
past 100. But unless I’m missing something about the Hugh Hefner-Crystal Harris wedding to be, it seems like they both know what they’re doing.
Sure, there really can’t be to much in common between an 84-year-old and a 24-year-old. Even if they both love sex, which I’m sure they do. Because, you know, well, because Hef’s 84 — how good can he be, Viagra or not?
Still, I don’t want to get too cynical about their engagement because at least they both know what they’re getting married for and it probably isn’t just “love.” And that’s a lot more than the rest of us can say.
If unrealistic expectations trip up a lot of newlyweds, marrying with very real, clearly defined expectations isn’t all that bad. And, honestly, I think the lovebirds have it all figured out: Crystal is counting on Hef to give her a certain lifestyle, even if it’s for just a few years, and Hef is counting on her to be the babe on his arm and in
his bed. I can pretty much bet she won’t pack on the pounds once they get hitched.
People get married for all sorts of reasons, and many of them aren’t the “right” reason, whatever “right” means anyway. Who are we to say which is better or worse given that about half end up in divorce, anyway?
- So, did you marry for the “right” reason (and please define “right”)?
- And, is a (pending) marriage like Crystal’s and Hef’s more honest than a marriage based on anything else, including “love”?
photo © Francois du Plessis – Fotolia.com
What went wrong in your marriage?
“Mom?” Trent calls from the bathroom, a habit he’s had since he was a toddler.
“Yeah?” I shout back from the living room, where I’m sorting through the Christmas decorations.
“Why did you and dad murgfht?”
“Huh?” I said, coming closer to the bathroom so I decipher the muffled words.
“Why did you and dad divorce?” 
“Honey, you already know why.”
“No, not dad’s affair. I mean, what went wrong?”
Wow, good question, one he hadn’t asked before. Because it wasn’t really the affair that made my marriage implode; affairs are just symptoms of other
crap going on.
And I wasn’t sure that I could answer that fully for him. Well, I know what I did wrong and what Rob did wrong; I’m not really sure what Rob thinks.
I can tell The Kid what you should do to make a good marriage — be a present, loving partner; communicate well; have a lot of sex (not sure he’d want to hear that from me) …
I certainly wouldn’t advise him to settle.
Because marriage is, well, complicated.
And as much as studies say hubbies benefit from marriage more that the lil’ missus, a lot of men feel like this, courtesy of MGTOW, Men Going Their Own Way:
Marriage is like serving time in prison with a big fat cellmate who DOESN’T want to have sex with you.
Don’t want The Kid to feel like that!
Another gem:
The bottom line is this: Women don’t know what the f— they really want.
Guys are so f–king simple. We know EXACTLY what we want: Sex or blow jobs about 3 or 4 times a week, a good pizza or burger every now and then, and about one day a week that we can go do stuff that we like, whether it’s poker or golf or what have you. How hard is that to understand? Women, on the other hand, have NO CLUE what they want. They’ve been told they can have it all, that they need to be this or that, that they need to do this or that. I don’t think may of them honestly know what it is they want. They only know what it is they don’t have.
I’m have no idea how many guys feel like that, but I guess enough do. Yet to read the latest Pew study that announces the decline of marriage, more men than women think marriage brings happiness, and more widowers/divorced guys say they’d get hitched again. (Oddly, more think it brings a more fulfilling sex life, too; those guys really should talk to the MGTOW guys!)
If guys are so miserable in marriage, why would they want do it again and again?
But, back to the question Trent asked me — what went wrong?
My version of the story — two people got so caught up in parenting that they forgot to put as much energy into their relationship. We were conflict-avoidant, so although we didn’t argue, we still had a lot of stuff we kept under the surface. And, I didn’t speak up and address things, important things, when I should have. But it wasn’t until after the affair was unearthed that I did the soul-searching to understand all that, plus know the issues I brought to the relationship.
It’s important to know what went wrong so you don’t repeat your bad stuff again with someone new.
- So, I ask you — what went wrong?
Photo © starush – Fotolia.com
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