Married Man Sex Life

Reader Story: Let's Get Physical

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 03:39:00 +0000

Hi Athol,

I wanted to share 2 small,but significant, things that happened over the past couple of weeks. I send this to you because I you seem to be interested in real-world "field notes" and experiences of those of us who are trying to utilize the MAP.

Episode 1: As I'm changing after a shower following a hard-core workout...

Her out of the blue: "So how does it feel to be sexier than me?"

Me: A bit stunned. "What does that mean?"

Her: "Well now that you're ripped you are sexier than me. You used to be so skinny and I was pretty hot. Now you've got these muscles and I have some pounds to lose...you just look better and have become sexier than me..."

This blew me away because I never knew she actually perceived us in that way. Both in the past and now as well. And clearly she is feeling a sex rank shift...at least in a physical sense.

I can't agree more with what you have said many times before: if you do nothing else, start eating better and get into shape. That alone will give you so much confidence and make you "sexier".

Episode 2:

Me: Teasing my teenage daughter.....

Teenage daughter joking/teasing back: "Dad, I feel like I don't even know you anymore"

Me replying Game-ly: "Ha, I don't know who I am anymore either!"

Wife overhearing this conversation adding a bit cautiously: "I don't know who you are these days either!"

She said it jokingly but we both knew she meant it somewhat as well.

The first thing that struck me here was your post about destabilizing a relationship just a bit. Apparently, the changes I have been making really are getting through to her and she is just not sure what to make of it. I KNOW its making her a bit nervous. Its a bit scary to me also as the older (more beta) way was much more predictable - but full of all the usual negative consequences.

I will add that while the sex is getting better (not where I want it yet but improving), its actually our overall relationship that is getting much better and stronger. She's always been a very strong, almost dominant personality and my changes over the past few years (but especially over the last half a year or so) have SLOWLY been whittling that away. She is now deferring to me more, cozying into me (almost melting into me) as close as she can get at night, coming to me for virtually all decisions, etc... It has been a slow but tangible change. Often I'm scared shitless myself as we assume these new, different roles. But I'm also extremely excited about the future. They key so far has been slow steady change, patience, persistence and growing some balls.

Athol: Giggty giggty giggty, allllllright.

Check Out "The Red Pill Room"

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 03:35:00 +0000

If you're a long time reader, you know that I rarely link out to a new blog. So when I say go check a new blog out, you really should go check it out.

Ian Ironwood is a regular commenter here, and he's done some good posting at The Red Pill Room, but today's was exceptional. Go read Alpha Move Give Her Chocolate The Right Way

...I won't steal his thunder, but it's exactly what I'm talking about in Chapter 11 of the Primer.

Reader Story: MMSL For The Win

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 03:23:00 +0000

Reader story, not much else to add!

Hi Athol,

Just finished your 2011 primer. I found out about your blog through TAM, then found your book via your blog. Man, you nailed it with this one! Let me give you a quick run down on the last 10 years of my life.... and how things have changed!

We married 16 years ago, after a few years, children incoming.... 4 of them, so you can imagine that was a busy 10 years (and yep, we are DONE) talk about changing your life. The wife and I used to have sex EVERY night, except for those few "nasty" days each month. Bring on the kiddos, and the frequency didn't drop, it PLUMMETED. once a week was a feast, and sometimes it would literally be months between. After the youngest moved to her own bedroom, and we had our alone time again, I full expected things to pick up, and to be fair, occasionally they did... but most often, the schedule was like this- menses ends, sex begins... 3 nights of raw monkey sex, then a night or two off because she was tired, or a kid would get sick, or something would screw things up.... a couple nights of no sex, then another night or two of sex.... then several nights of no sex...... then after I whined and complained enough, or we got in a big enough fight about it, a night of "get on, get off, then get OFF" sex..... by that time we were usually into the PMS ramp up, and it was hands off for a week and a half until the cycle began again.

This went on for years my friend.... many. long. years....

Oh,I still got some great sex in there. We went from ONLY missionary, barely any touching, when we first were married, to fantastic, energetic, multi position, blow jobs and everything else.... when SHE was feeling horny, which was for the first few days after her cycle started again. What stumped me was that when she SHOULD have been most interested, during her ovulation time, we usually did NOT have sex. Red flag there. Now, I'm pretty savvy on biology and such, and just did not understand why it all did not add up. A few months ago, after some big blowouts, one of which I told her I was no longer sure our Marriage was worth the effort, I decided I was done. I started being very frank with her, and open about my feelings, and my expectations. I knew something was wrong, and the only thing it could be was that she had become bored in our relationship. I have been with her for 20 years, and there is no way she was having an physical affair, and I was 90% sure the same was true on an emotional affair. She just had shut down sexually towards me because I had BECOME HER HOUSE BITCH. Yep, I tanked MY own sex life by becoming too Beta!

After selling our business, and me starting to work from home at the age of 35, I took over as the primary house keeper, cook, etc. It just made sense, since I was home, and she was working, that I not make her deal with extra stuff, right? Nothing sexier than a man that turns down help and says "no hon, you had a long day, just relax, and I will get the homework with the kids, dinner done, served, cleaned updisheswashedkidsbathedbedroomspickedpupteethbrushedbackpacksreadyfortomorrowkidsinbedhousepickedup.... all while you sit and play on facebook, or watch tv..... Sexy, eh?

Well, you know exactly what happened, I figured it out a couple of months ago, and changed it. Reading your book was confirmation. I lost the Alpha. I became the beta housebitch. It was a matter of time, and my hot, wonderful wife would have been having fantastic monkey sex with some other dude... it's not like she would never have a chance. She started a new job in Athletics, and is around jock type guys constantly, sometimes late at night. (yes, I'm 100% sure it never happened, I gave myself ulcers checking) I know it would have, believe me, so that's why I changed. I am proud to say, I started changing before I read your book. I hope you take that as additional validation that you put in print what some guys know instinctively, and others NEED to know to keep their marriage!

So what is it like now? well, last month was the first time we have had that much sex in many years..... many, many years. Probably since we started having kids. Hot, mind blowing sex, body fluids all over sex, right up to the end of her cycle. So, I figure, "well, after it's been like this, I can handle almost a week without it" as you probably know, I didn't have to (insert big, shit eating grin here) to put it in your terms, I got "laid like tile" right on through! Neither of us are into vag during her cycle, and the first couple days she feels horrible bloated and her breasts are extremely tender, but after that.... WOW.... we were lying in bed, spooning, ( just undies on, another side bennie! she used to always sleep in heavy clothes) and I was very aroused... it had been three days after all! She could feel me pressing against her, and she would push back against me and move slightly, just to tease me. It was driving me crazy, so I reached around and started playing with the goodies up top, I gave a nipple a what I thought was a bit too hard of a pinch, and she came unglued! I have never realized she liked it a bit edgy and rough, but she started really reacting to what I was doing, and I figured it would get those hormones racing my way, so why not. I was totally willing to suffer a few days until her cycle was done and we could ravage each other. To my surprise, and FOR THE FIRST TIME IN OUR MARRIAGE, she turned over, kissed me, then started south.... Never would that have happened when she was in "her time of the month". Well, my friend, it didn't end there, but lets just say she let me know that there were other depths to plunge, and I was one very satisfied husband that night. The next night, after several teasing blow jobs, I took your advice, and covered her tits.... She was disappointed! It was so messy that I had covered the head and her tit with one hand so it stopped flying everywhere. She told me afterward that she wanted to see me do it. 45 minutes later, she goes down on me again, and this time she got her show.

Well, that last paragraph is pretty graphic, but I had to put things in perspective. At any time over the last several years, action like that would have only occurred in this house if it was on a porn video. Upping my game with my wife, being more Alpha with her, and working out has changed things so much. I go on the TAM website, as a lurker, and want to bitch slap some of these guys, as I wished I had been bitch slapped years ago! Finding your book showed me that I had started on the right path, and gave me more concrete avenues to approach in changing myself. I'm happy to say that the results have been very worth it. I gave my wife the book to read, I'm confident enough now that I don't care if she knows she has been gamed. I think she might enjoy it a bit. Last night after a bout of body fluid tsunami sex, we collapsed into sleep (she gets up very early for her work). At 3 am, we were awake again, and rocking the headboard against the wall- several positions, started with spooning, then her on top, then finished doggy style (this was NOT a wife-letting-the-husband-get-his-rocks-off-so-he-will-leave-her-alone bout of sex!). Another huge orgasm for her, then back to sleep for a bit before she had to get up for work. As she was leaving for work, I got a text with a nice tit picture.

Yep, I think I can handle this new life.

Athol, Men MUST read this book!

Athol: Thanks!

Sometimes the blog just writes itself!

Happy Valentines Lay

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 03:03:00 +0000

Texting...

Athol: Happy valentines day!

Jennifer: Lol happy valentines day. Love you so much

Athol: Want anything romantic giftage?

Athol: Whats for dinner?

Jennifer: No desire for romantic giftage really. It's Valentines day for us every day ;-)

Jennifer: Dinner is mac and cheese and the bottle of wine I'm going to buy later.

Athol: I'll bring my penis.

Jennifer: Lmao cool.

Valentine's Day for married couples is kind of like a final exam for her interest level in you. If you've done the whole Alpha Beta thing all semester, the exam is easy and you barely break a sweat passing it. If you've been falling asleep in class all year, even a monstrously huge effort right before the test may not be enough to pass.

We did a little acknowledgment of today being Valentine's Day, but really any of the days at work we get off together is more important romantically than Valentine's Day.

Anyway, Jennifer's having a long hot bath and two glasses of red wine. Expect the unexpected...

Jennifer: Grrrroooowl....

Functional, Productive and Happy

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 04:12:00 +0000

Occasionally I get a "Rubik's Cube" email. A Rubik's Cube email is an impossibly long rambling email about so many potential relationship issues that I want to set up an Excel file to track everything and sort it all out. Half the time there isn't even a clear question, just a "so what do you think?"

The answer to a Rubik's Cube is always to go back to basics and start solving the puzzle. If it's all a total jumble, everyone can figure out how to get one side of Rubik's Cube solved. Usually people already know exactly what it is they need to do, they just need to do it. After that they can come back for help with the tricky bits.

Hi Janet,

The purpose of marriage is to have a functional, productive and happy life... not to save another person.

To have a functional, productive and happy marriage, you need two functional, productive and happy people. I'm not saying two perfect people, just two people that are standard issue adults that can hold up their end of the marriage.

My advice is for you to figure out what the functional, productive and happy version of you looks like, and start heading yourself toward that end. As you head toward that end, he'll either (1) start calibrating himself to you and start becoming more functional, productive and happy, or (2) get worse.

If he starts calibrating to you and sorts himself out, then great! That's a win.

If he gets worse, you can move on as a functional, productive and happy person, and be in a much better place to find a new man that is also functional, productive and happy, and have a wonderful functional, productive and happy marriage together.

At the end of the day, no matter how much you love another person, the only person you can really control is you. You can't make them change, you can only make you be the sort of person that makes them want to change.

Hope that helps.

My Second Book Is Done And I'm Ready For Your Money

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 05:22:00 +0000

My second book is done! Available in print ($13.99) and Kindle ($5.99).

EDIT: The Paperback page on Amazon is getting synced to the Kindle one and is semi-AWOL. Find the paperback on Amazon here.

In retrospect writing the 2011 Primer was a little bit nutty. I had a bunch of great ideas, I could write, but I had this idea that I could just round up a bunch of the blog posts into some semblance of order, and push print and the book would be done. Turns out I was wrong. Writing a book is hard.

To be sure some of the original posts made it into the Primer partially intact, but there was a huge amount of rewriting to do. Plus it turns out that formatting a book is harder than it looks, and formatting a Kindle version of a book requires a "Merlin" level of skill while I was still struggling as "Sorcerers Apprentice." And 344 pages of book was idiotic for a first attempt as any mistake required far too much repairing.

But in the end it was done, and pushed out the door. Despite my technical shortcomings the 2011 Primer has sold very well, primarily based on it's strength of content and the loyalty of my fanbase spreading the word. If you'd asked me two years ago what having a fanbase would feel like, I would have told you it would feel awesome and egoistical. The reality is having a fanbase is a precious and rare thing. Most books don't sell at all, mine does and I'm grateful for that. Truly.

So to the second book...

This one really is a bunch of posts rounded up and put into book form. It's 101 of my best posts from Jan 2010 through October 2011. It's a mix of stuff that was too personal, too funny, too off topic or too whatever and didn't fit right for the Primer. Plus it's some of my most important posts that to me really matter in a historical sense. You see I have to write to think, and sometimes when I write I have mental breakthroughs where I discover my best thoughts.

Also this time around I got the formatting down much better, and finally got the Kindle stuff sorted out much better. Actually reading the book you probably aren't going to notice much of a difference, but I can assure you I got 5-10 times faster with setting things up between the Primer and the Pants book.

Plus it has a much nicer cover...

So now to the sales hype...

Important stuff this book tells you that you simply have to know:

The two types of men that women ping pong between. Page 9.

How to answer “Do these pants make my ass look fat?” and get laid like tile. Page 11.

Why the wedding vows aren’t the actual marriage agreement. Page 16.

Seventeen ways women reveal they are attracted to you. Page 25.

How to tell if a SAHM is going to be great, or spend half the day on Facebook. Page 27.

How to beat approach anxiety. Page 31.

What to do when your wife won’t have sex with you. Page 35.

How to lead your wife so that she wants to follow you. Page 40.

Why monogamy works best for most men. Page 50.

How the wrong college degree can ruin your sex life. Page 59.

How to spot when your wife is testing you. Page 69.

What it means when your wife says she’s bored. Page 71.

What she’s really saying when she says, “I love you, but I’m not in love with you.” Page 76.

Why you should never ask for marriage advice from your close friends. Page 79.

How submission really works for women. Page 85.

When you should rescue her and when you should let natural consequences just play out. Page 91.

Why everyone gets the male mid-life crisis wrong and what is really happening. Page 92.

What makes up the female mid-life crisis. Page 94.

How to hit her sexual “Big Red Easy Button.” Page 106.

What happens when you have sex at 87.3% of maximum roughness and why it drives her wild. Page 108.

What you should never do if she asks you to move out. Page 110.

The “Second Date Rule”. Page 116.

Why her gaining fifteen pounds means she’s into you. Page 117.

Why it’s not your job to cure their sexual dysfunction. Page 123.

What the female arm slap means. Page 125.

Learn what acts like Kryptonite to women. Page 131.

Why being an asshole secretly pleases women. Page 137.

Why being a White Knight is a bad idea, and being a Horny Knight is a great one. Page 150.

Why catering to women makes them like you less. Page 152.

How to get her to try something kinky. Page 154.

Why SAHM’s need to be SAHM’s “Plus Something.” Page 160.

How helping a friend out can accidentally make your wife attracted to him. Page 169.

What to say after she cooks dinner that will make her melt. Page 172.

How to tell the difference between your marriage sucking, and your life sucking. Page 176.

How a hot bedroom fantasy can turn into your wife cheating on you and refusing to stop. Page 178.

How polyamory and swinging really works. Page 180.

Why being playfully mean to girls turns them on. Page 182.

How female logic works when it comes to men. Page 196.

What to do if she offers you sex, but says she doesn’t want an orgasm. Page 197.

The best revenge possible to take against a cheating girlfriend. Page 201.

How to handle a drama queen. Page 204.

Why women should have long hair and ignore their friends telling them to go short. Page 208.

The #1 thing men crave women to do in the bedroom (It’s not a blowjob!) Page 213.

What to do when your friend starts trying to steal your girl. Page 217.

Learn just how many women fantasize about being used for sex. Page 224.

Assuming she’s into it, why you should only spank your wife when she’s being good. Page 228.

How to fall out of love as quickly as possible. Page 234.

Why a wife going on a Girl’s Night Out drives her husband batshit crazy. Page 240.

The only way to build self-esteem that works. Page 244.

Why the main complaint about monogamy is that it works. Page 254.

How to know if she is worth marrying. Page 264.

What people really mean when they tell you to “Just be yourself.” Page 267.

And...

"A collection of brilliant and hilariously true essays that everyone interested in love, sex and marriage needs to read. A fearless intellect coupled with a compassionate spirit, Athol ruthlessly tosses out the politically correct bath water but keeps the babies safe. At times controversial, at times wickedly funny, but always a powerful voice for love, marriage and hope."

Which I hope means you can give it as a gift and read it in public lol. It's only available as Kindle as an ebook because I'm seeing how the Kindle lending library works out and you can't offer it on competing ebook formats. The free Kindle download for the PC is pretty easy though and overall better than reading a PDF on a PC.

Anyway... go buy it on Amazon.

And for those waiting for the 2012 Primer. It's going to be late March when it's available.

If other bloggers/reviewers want copies for review, you're more than welcome to email me and I'll send you an Amazon gift card for a Kindle version which allows you to post a review on Amazon itself. Though if I have a choice between getting a Primer 2012 review or a Pants Book review on your blog, the Primer one is more important. I have a 40 copy budget, so be in to win.

Jennifer: YAY! BOOK! I mean...yes, I'm very proud of my author husband and it's a fabulous thing to see another book available after a lot of hard work.

Turkish Pasha: Challenge Accepted

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Sat, 11 Feb 2012 05:04:00 +0000

A random comment caught my eye...

mgwk: I don't think Athol would be very successful in advising somebody from another culture with different ideas about what marriage should be. Say, a Turkish pasha trying to figure out how to keep his #3 concubine from expressing jealousy towards his #1 wife.

Athol: Well I'm not quite sure what a Turkish Pasha is, but I would instruct the #1 Wife that it is up to her discretion how she keeps the concubines in order. As a suggestion, if concubine #3 is unhappy and would prefer to be a wife herself, perhaps she would be happier if she was married off to a pig farmer somewhere nice and quiet... and remote.

An actual harem isn't juggled by the male. You put a woman in charge and these things practically run themselves. First Officer for the win.

In any case, sexual biology is the same all over and all through history. There may be some unexpected quirks in certain time periods and cultures, but generally everything carries over pretty well. Women like strong men with money, men like perky tits and a 0.7 waist to hip ratio.

Anyway that's about it for today. I've had a lot of cold medicine recently. Time for a lie down.

Seperate Schedules, Next To No Sex

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 03:19:00 +0000

Reader: My wife works 3pm-11pm. I work 8am-5pm. She's been on this schedule for several years now, and it's unlikely to change anytime soon.

Her days off are "rotating". In other words she's off say Saturday and Sunday. Then she works Mon-Thurs and she's off Friday. Then she works Sat-Mon, then she's off Tues-Wed and works daylight hours on Thursday. Then she works Fri-Sun and she's off Monday. Works Tuesday-Friday then she's off that Sat and Sun, and then it all repeats again.

I know the biggest part of this is me, but I can't remember the last time we had sex on a night she worked. She doesn't get home and go right to sleep. She actually stays up awhile, she talks about she can't just "go to sleep" as soon as she gets home because she's wound up from work.

I'm going to approach her about sex tonight (she's working). But what's your take on this?

Focus on the days off mainly? I guess this is a rather stupid question...but after dealing with on average once a month sex (yeah, I know. But trust me it was WORSE than that years ago when she went through a bout of depression after the birth of our son) I'd be thrilled with sex on most of her days off...but other things can get in the way of course. (Not all her either).

So what's your take? How should I approach her? Nonchalant, gaming it up, or straight forward...mentioning how our sex revolves around her days off? Thanks.

Athol: Well the easy answer is to agree to make time to have sex with each other on a bit of a schedule. One late night a week, one early morning a week, and on the days she's off. But obviously sitting down and talking about it isn't going to actually work because she just isn't into you all that much, which you've already figured out. Doing "The Talk" now will get you one or two extra sessions, and then everything will revert to baseline again.

So... I have several thoughts here.

(1) The once a month sex is probably around the time she's ovulating. Basically 14-15 days after the start of her period.

(2) I get the feeling that the entire point of her working these shift patterns is to be sexually avoidant of you. Sexually motivated people do all kinds of crazy things to get to their person of interest and get it on. On days she works she's, "too wound up from work" and on days she isn't working she still does nothing. (Apart from once a month.) She could no doubt find a new job / shift pattern if she really wanted to be home with you every evening having sex.

(3) I would approach / game her more on the days she is off work, and not worry about it on days she does work. Don't try too hard to make it happen. Make random passes at her and don't apologize if they fail, just smile and keep going on with your day.

(4) On nights she is working, be in bed and heading off to sleep by the time she is home. Don't wait up for her like a puppy. If you have an exercise routine, it may work best to do it in the early morning before you go to work. The purpose being that you are starting to be unaffected by her avoidance of you. Work on the whole self-improvement / MAP process. The pattern of interaction is that she avoids you, and you chase her. If you stop chasing her, her avoidance routines become pointless, so she is likely to reduce doing them.

(5) On the Saturdays and Sundays you both have off together, plan something fun to do together. Ask her to come, if she does great, if she doesn't... then go anyway. Just go have fun. Come back a little later than you say you would be back. Come home in a good mood.

(6) Keep up the Beta stuff related to housework, cooking, child care. Be polite, sociable and fun with when she is with you and paying attention to you. Just start marching to the beat of your own drum more. This isn't giving her "The Silent Treatment." It's "I'm going to entertain myself and be in motion, wanna come?"

(7) Get in the habit of having playful flirting interactions with women in a general sense. Just play, you aren't looking for a sexual close here. You just want to have the general buzz of having fun with other women in your vibe. Your wife will pick up on it eventually.

(8) Anything else that is going to make you feel stronger, happier and more attractive to women in general.

(9) As you progress further down this route, as she starts sensing you are making changes that are sticking, you can try some direct approaches. For nights she's working, a very simple and direct request of, "I need you for five minutes." and essentially pumping and dumping her... if only dumping her back in the living room, may start working. Also making direct requests for specific sex acts on her days off could start getting better results. Don't just ask for "Sex?", tell her you want to "Doggystyle", "69 for a bit and then missionary", "Cum on your tits", "Tie you up and lick whipped cream off your nipples", or for the brave, "Let's do the thing with the jumper cables and the butter." (If you do the last one, make sure you have an ice pack handy and several towels)

I wouldn't bother talking with her about all this for the moment. Speak with your actions.

Also as an aside, you mentioned postpartum depression. Is she still on anti-depressants? That may be a factor in killing her libido as well.

Jennifer: Athol and I work opposite shifts several times in the first half of our marriage. We did lots of quickies and pretty much always found a way to stay connected. It doesn't have to be the traditional make love at bedtime thing...maybe she needs to be reminded of that. Does she shower when she gets home? Could that be an opportunity?

Unconditional Love And Being Taken Advantage Of

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 01:50:00 +0000

We have a newish reader at MMSL and her comments have been long (and good) so rather than quoting them all at length, I'll more selectively quote than usual and summarize her story and situation.

She's been married for 40 years, and I believe married at age 20, so she's 60. Recently her husband unleashed apparently out of the blue, an ultimatum that she loses the fat and trims down - or the marriage is over. The weight appears to have been gained from when she was 20 to 40, and stayed stable but high from 40 to 60.

She complied with the ultimatum, did manage to lose the weight, he's happier with her appearance and more into her, but she is so hurt by the ultimatum that she's no longer in love with him. She appears to be staying for the history of the relationship and not much else. Or put another way, she has all these sunk costs in him, so leaving now is hard.

The additional information is that through the marriage she cared from him "unconditionally" through two bouts of alcohol addiction and one of prescription pill addiction. He also lost a job through his own fault at some point, and then later quit his job and never returned to work. She's also had to increase her earnings to ensure they stay solvent, and his ability to earn an income is in her opinion lacking except at the very beginning of the marriage.

So... as I see it, our friend has two critical errors in her understanding of how marriage and male sexuality works, that have driven her to this point. Essentially she done the female version of the exact same things that a Nice Guy / Betaized Male does wrong.

The first mistake is not understanding what creates attraction (Alpha Traits) in the opposite sex, and wrongly believing that creating relationship comfort (Beta Traits), creates attraction. So for her, all that effort doing housework, caring for him, earning money, making dinner, raising the children etc, only create relationship comfort. Instead to her horror, she discovers what creates attraction in her husband for her, is simply her looking sexy.

Some quotes...

"I dressed well, wore appropriate makeup and my hair was professionally styled. I received compliments on my appearance frequently."

"Well, he had me. He didn't want ME, he wanted something that would satisfy his visual needs. He got that. He can (and now does) feel passionate about me because I am thin, not because I am a good person, a loving wife and the mother of his children."

"Athol, ironically, I came to your site as a result of the ultimatum. I wanted to learn more about what my husband had said to me and figure out why he was so totally unhappy. I found the link here as a result of reading on TAM.

I get the man's need for a visually hot wife. This was not something that I had any idea about prior to the ultimatum. I knew all men looked at other women, even to the point of the head snap and that overly long gaze bestowed on the young sales girl at Sears. I just did not realize that at 60 I was supposed to look that way, too. This was not covered in our premarital counseling 41 years ago. Just wasn't."

Believing female friends that you are attractive is a mistake, when it's the men that decide if you are attractive. You can see once the weight was lost, he did become attracted to her again. The way she looks is creating Alpha, and she gets no attraction points for being a good person.

That being said, she's obviously starting to get it, and trying to come to terms with having "done it all wrong for so long." Which is an extremely common experience for men who get the "I Love You But I'm Not In Love With You" speech from their bored wives. After forty years of marriage, it's got to be a bitter pill to swallow to accept that.

The second mistake is that just like a Nice Guy playing the White Knight savior to an entitlement princess, she's been playing a forty year game of Wendy taking care of Peter Pan and desperately hoping he grows up. He never does, and frankly the ultimatum of weight loss kinda seems like a husbandly tantrum from that perspective.

She has repeatedly allowed him to take serious advantage of her multiple times over the course of the marriage. Alcoholism twice, prescription pills once, a self-destructive job loss, and a flat-out refusal to work in the recent past until present day. Any one of these things could have been cause to bring things to a head in the marriage, but she's "unconditionally" just coped with them.

So from his perspective, it would be fairly rational to think, "She's put up with every other outrageous demand and bullshit I've put her through, so why shouldn't she just put up with the demand she lose a ton of weight?" So in a real sense, she has helped train him to treat her badly. She has trained him not to respect her. There would have been a fairly good chance that if she made a serious stink about the first major issue happening, that the others would never have happened.

Having a belief that unconditional love for another person is a requirement of marriage, can be a major factor in creating a horrible marriage. Unconditional love demands that you tolerate the intolerable.

If you actually love someone else, you don't demand unconditional love from them. You love them, so you would actively seek not to place intolerable demands on them.

Some quotes...

"He can go Beta all over my axx but bushels of roses and tons of words of affirmation won't erase my memory of what he said and how I was treated. My vision of marriage, the meaning of my marriage and the love and admiration I had for my husband were forever changed as a result of the ultimatum."

"I am or was guilty of believing in unconditional love. I took my marriage vows seriously. I took care of my husband through two bouts of alcohol addiction and one of prescription pill addiction. I stayed with him when he lost his job through his fault and when he quit his job and never returned to work. I stepped up my earnings to ensure our financial solvency. (Bear in mind financial security is very high on my list of emotional needs and he has never met that need except at the very beginning of our marriage. Kind of like the thin girl who gets married and then gets fat, thereby failing to meet the attractive spouse need of her new husband.) At any rate, I did not EVER threaten to end our marriage during any of these difficulties. I made sure he had the best care possible. That was my responsibility as a wife. It was easier to do because I truly was in love with him. It never occurred to me that it would be OK to use a threat of divorce to get him to sober up or to get a job or to stop spending money we did not have.

Perhaps I am disappointed in myself. I wasted many years taking my marriage seriously, doing the best I could for us and our family. And the whole thing boils down to I am not thin enough to suit his taste. It is more than unsettling to realize that giving unconditional love does not result in receiving unconditional love from your spouse and that my marriage was conditional all along.

I wish I had the feelings back that I had before the ultimatum. They are not gone because he hurt my feelings. They are gone because I am looking at marriage the way he does now, as a conditional contract. Setting love aside, he is not currently meeting and has not met my needs in quite a few years. The fact that I could be justified in issuing marriage ending ultimatums based on my unmet needs is something I am trying to process intellectually and emotionally."

I think you're confusing realising you have a "conditional" relationship with the end of your in love feelings. The veil may have lifted and you see the true picture, and it's the not liking what you see anymore that's killed your in love feelings off. Jennifer and I for example have a conditional relationship and are still in love with each other.

I'm sure you could imagine me reading Jennifer the riot act if she turned into an alcoholic. I'm sure you could imagine Jennifer trying to shove me out an airlock if I just quit my job to play computer games. Discovering the other cheating wouldn't be just tolerated either. Violence to each other or the children would be instantly addressed as well. We have conditions for each other, and we have respect for each other. Our marriage agreement is the agreement to met the conditions of marriage.

And there's a world of difference between caring for a spouse who is the victim of circumstance, instead of being the architect of circumstance. Jennifer would see me being injured in the process of being robbed as quite different than me being injured in a bar fight I started. I would see Jennifer having pneumonia differently than her having Chlamydia.

Furthermore, your actual marriage agreement is defined by your state's marriage law. Most states allow no fault divorce, so your actual agreement is "Until someone doesn't want to be married anymore." Which really isn't much of a promise to do anything, but there we go. I just report the news, I don't make it.

So from here....

I think you have a lot of reading and processing to do before deciding to do anything major. Meanwhile I think you can stop catering to him quite so much. Start doing the things that you like to do. Keep your appearance up, and I do mean your attractive to men appearance up. Shameless plug - buy the book. Chapters 10, 11, 12, 16 and 25 would seem to apply fairly well to you.

Hang in there. Welcome to the Red Pill club.

Attention Ladies...

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 13:17:00 +0000

Don't confuse "looking good" with "being attractive to the opposite sex."

1 Male checking you out = 100 Female friends telling you look great.

In fact women will tell you how good you look, when you aren't being attractive to the opposite sex. There's always a sexy pecking order, if you drop down a few places because of what you just did to your hair, "OMG I just love what you did with your hair!"

Winning The Ultimatum, But Losing Anyway

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 03:46:00 +0000

Reader: My wife used to be very touchy feely with me, but has stopped. If I touch her she'll move away after a moment. If I ask her for sex, 90% of the time she'll say yes, but she's stopped having orgasms. Not sure what to do.

She was overweight for a while, and I told her that I wasn't all that attracted to her and would leave her if she didn't lose the weight. I put up with her being fat for years and it was long enough. She cried and yelled at me for two days and after I held my ground, she started dieting and working out. She lost 40 pounds and is maybe 10 pounds away from what she weighed when we got married. She looks great. She started dressing better, wearing makeup, changed her hair. We still had sex while she was losing the weight, but she wasn't into it anymore. She'd say lets just have a quicky since you aren't really attracted to me. Well now I am very attracted to her and she's still not having an orgasm during sex and not interested in trying to have an orgasm with me. She does use her vibrator in the shower sometimes.

I'm not sure what to do next. The MAP and ultimatum worked to get her to lose weight, but she's basically giving me duty sex. She's not cold exactly. She's polite and distant and won't tell me what she's thinking. I can't find any evidence of an affair, but I bet if I asked her about her feelings she'd say that she loved me, but isn't in love with me.

Athol: Sometimes you can win a battle, but lose the war.

Having given her an ultimatum, and stuck to your guns that you're willing to actually end the relationship, you've given her a massive shock to her system. She's been wandering along through life believing all the Blue Pill rules about unconditional love and so on, and you shoved the Red Pill down her throat and held her nose until she swallowed it.

So she complied with your request, but she's still in shock and has near zero relationship comfort anymore. I think you might have it backwards on the "in love and love" front. She's probably in love with you, but determined not to love you. You've got an oversupply of Alpha and an empty tank on the Beta stuff.

The lack of orgasms, and the lack of desire to be touched, is very likely her Body Agenda being determined not to continue bonding to you, and not to continue to trust you. She complies with sex because she thinks without giving you sex, you'll just leave her. She likely thinks you don't love her and will probably just ditch her anyway. She may also think you were cheating on her around the time of the ultimatum, or at least had a backup woman to jump to if she didn't comply with the weight loss.

At this point you need to turn the Beta up, way up and quickly. Do whatever it is that she most likes as comfort building things. Flowers, cards, love notes, acts of service.... whatever it is that speaks to her best.

My advice is to do a combination of apologizing and reframing. The apology is for making the issue solely her weight. I'm completely serious that you should apologize for that. The reframing though is that you thought that her losing the weight was going to get you what you really wanted, and what you really wanted, was things to be how they were when you first got married. You wanted to feel passionate about her again, you wanted the energy between you both to be there again.

But now that she flinches when you touch her, and doesn't orgasm and obviously isn't into it anymore, you're even further away from what you really wanted than you were before. The weight loss has been a good thing and you're proud of her for doing it, but what you wanted was her. Express to her your grief for what you've lost. You don't want to feel passionate about anyone else, you want to feel it about her.

Apologize for making it "Me vs. You" when you really should have been trying to make it about "Us."

See what happens.

As a very serious note: The ultimatum is the tool of last resort and by giving an ultimatum you have to accept that the relationship may fail as a result; I offer no promises it will work. That being said, I've tended to express the results of ultimatums as resolving into "success" or "failure" outcomes, it's been somewhat of an oversight of mine to omit the "limping on together" outcome. In a sense though, you're still stuck in the matrix of the ultimatum and waiting to have it resolved one way of the other. The ultimatium itself is a massively powerful Alpha move, her compliance needs to be rewarded with a solid dose of Beta.

Is Physical Affection Beta?

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 03:44:00 +0000

Reader: One year ago, I took the red pill. I found your blog through Captain Capitalism, and started running the MAP. Actually ran it for awhile before buying your book. Also took up Latin dancing ala the captain. Huge DHV, and I tell my wife about all my dancing experiences...... Dread. Thank you very much - you, and several others in the manosphere have made a great difference in my life.

One question - I am incredibly affectionate. If there is a dog or cat in the house - they love me, because I will rub them for hours. Baby - I am holding it, walking it around, shushing it. My wife, unless we are actively fighting, I will automatically rub her back, legs, arms, hands head. I sometimes withhold my affection - but it takes a conscious effort. I am somewhat beta - but I am quite a bit alpha as well. Is being affectionate beta???

Athol: Physical touch is Alpha, Beta, or both depending on how you do it.

It sounds like you are doing lots of affectionate non-sexual touching, and very likely physical touch is your Love Language - you also love being touched in return right? That sort of touching is in fact Beta, by which I mean the good sort of Beta in that physically touching women creates a release of oxytocin in their bodies, which creates a sense of bonding and trust in you. It's not as strong as the oxytocin release from making her orgasm, but it's definitely a positive effect in building a huge stockpile of relationship comfort in your wife.

So if your wife likes it, it's a good thing. Beta is a good thing.

However the question is whether or not you have all that Beta balanced with enough Alpha. You can also do that with physical touch by touching her in more intimate areas of her body. You can rub her back for a while and then slide your hands around and cup her breasts. When you kiss her you can grab her ass and give it a couple little love slaps. You can playfully pounce on her from behind while she's at the kitchen sink and grind your crotch on her ass as you hug her from behind.

And of course stripping off her clothes, or getting your hands under her clothes is a more Alpha escalation as well.

This sort of thing is exactly what I do with Jennifer. I probably touch her in some way fifteen times in an evening in between coming home from work and going to bed. It's some of it is incidental touch, and some of it purposely seeking her out. It's a kiss, a hug, a squeeze and a fondle. It's the "Groping" part of my "Goofy and Groping" interaction with her. Just talk some playful sexy nonsense with her and physically touch her on and off.

Just mix it up like you're a cross between a labrador puppy and a sleazy octopus.

Warning: Do not attempt a "Breast Honk" move until things like pulling her hair, erotic spanking and totally forgetting to buy milk on the way home, make her smile.

Jennifer: Athol is constantly touching me, and it's a comforting, connecting thing...it doesn't have to be a nod-nod, wink-wink, meet me in the bedroom baby kind of thing every time. Sometimes, yes, but not every time.

Irresponsible Girlfriend Just Stops Going To Work

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 05:57:00 +0000

Reader: Athol, I'm coming to you because you are the most rational relationship guy I've found and I thought some of your past advice has been great. I'm wondering if you can help me out with a problem with my live-in girlfriend:

She pulled a flat-out irresponsible move and I don't know what to do next.

We started dating back in June. She moved in with me in November. It seemed fast, I know, but it was largely a matter of practicality than anything. See, when I met her, she had a fairly menial job, a lot of debts from when she was in school, no car, a landlord breathing down her neck for some back rent money (i.e. she was flat ass broke). I will also add that she was living in a different, much smaller and much more pathetic town where jobs are getting scarcer and scarcer.

I'm in about the opposite situation, a graduate degree, no debts, and a fairly good job, although I'm not that rich because I'm just starting out in my career.

For reasons that I am now doubting, there was a large misunderstanding with a customer where she worked and she got fired from her job. At this point, since she had no money, I had two options: 1) let her stay with me and try to find a job in my much bigger town, or 2) let her go back to her parent's place about 500 miles away, effectively ending the relationship.

Since I felt this one had so much promise, I choose option 1). Me and a buddy of mine even went a step further and used our connections to get her a job at the call center for the company we work at. Not a great job, mind you, but much better than the one she had and good considering she didn't finish her degree. I also got her a relatively cheap car because I knew there was no way she could get back on her feet without one (we live in a decent sized town, but not big enough to have a great public transportation system).

For the first two months and a half months, things were good and I felt that we had a very captain-first mate type of relationship. We had even started planning a trip to Vegas in April.

Then comes Wednesday of last week. I had gotten approval for several days off in April (for the trip mentioned above) and forwarded the approval email to her work email because she worked at the same company as I did. It bounced back. She was not in the email system. I then realized that just last week she had gotten a certified letter from the company, which she told me was some work related stuff. I had put two and two together and realized that she had gotten fired and didn't tell me about it.

I wanted to hear it from her and started asking a lot of questions about her work schedule (which was always screwy, and why, I figured, she was always off work when I got home), the not being in the system, and the certified letter. She lied quite a bit initially, but after a while she finally confessed that she actually stopped going about two weeks before and they had just now gotten around to officially terminating her.

I felt really betrayed. Not only that she just flat quit going to a job that me and my friend went out of our way to get for her, but also that she didn't tell me about it until I figured it out. She told me she was just afraid to tell me, which I don't doubt, but doesn't change the fact that she just quit going to a job we had worked to get her.

I know that I have more than a little bit of blame here. I made things way too easy for her and didn't really insist on her paying me for things like rent and the car, although we did have an informal agreement that she stuck to until just recently.

I don't know what to do. In the short-term, I did make a more formal, written agreement about what I expect from her as a roommate and she has been at least attempting to make amends, searching hard for jobs, and selling stuff to bring in some money, so I'm a little more inclined towards forgiveness than I probably should be. It's not like I don't have any cards of my own to play (I'm not a complete beta dope), her name isn't on the lease of the apartment we live in, so I could technically kick her out at any time, and the car is still registered to me until she pays for it.

Due to my beta past, I'm not too trusting of my instincts and need some guidance about what I should do. Should I stick out what has been, up to this point, a good relationship? Or should I just send her back to her folks and be done with it (which I would also have to pay for, mind you)?

Thanks

Athol: There's nothing to salvage here sadly. Either you've been used from the beginning of her moving in, or she's just completely incapable of holding anything together. Either way she's just going to be a sandbag to drag through life until you're rid of her.

I'd offer her $500 and a free moving truck. $500 (assuming you have it of course) seems generous I know, but throwing some cheese in front of her getting her to leave compliantly is very likely going to be quicker, easier and quite probably cheaper than any other solution.

Get the keys to the car, secure all your valuables.

Don't have sex with her again. Seriously, just do not have sex with her again. "Whoops I forgot my birth control pills" = $100,000 - $200,000 worth of child support over the next 18 years.

And head back and read Due Diligence Before You Marry.

Just for giggles... I suggest you also do a public record search to see if she has a criminal background. Most states have records that you can look at on their .gov website. In Connecticut for example it's under "Judicial" at http://www.ct.gov/ or directly at http://www.jud.ct.gov/ You may turn up some interesting things about your girlfriend that you wished you had known before you invited her in. You can also look up prior Housing and Small Claims things as well. Also if she has an outstanding arrest warrant for anything, you can probably scare her out for good within an hour. You'd be surprised how long it takes the police to get around to arresting people sometimes.

I've often said the purpose of marriage is to have a functional, productive and happy life, not to save a woman. A LTR is no different. If she's neither functional nor productive, you ain't never going to be happy.

Jennifer: A place to live, a decent job, a car, a guy with good career potential being really nice to you. How is that not enough? Oy.

If You Cannot Act Like My Wife, You Cannot Be My Wife

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Sun, 05 Feb 2012 03:08:00 +0000

Some comments on Overcoming Approach Anxiety...

Reader: And when she doesn't flinch, looks you straight in the eye and in a low, slow confident voice tells you: "Go take a flying fuck at a rolling doughnut."

You'll know SHE's for real too!

The Outsider left an excellent comment in response...

The Outsider: I know what you are describing, believe me, I've been there. You've laid a foundation of beta and that's no easy thing to undo. Especially not in an instant in the bedroom. The point is that every interaction you have with her is an opportunity to start changing it. If she reacts badly to a sexual demand your response is important. You can take it back and fall into the same pattern you've established. Or you can let it stand and start building a new pattern.

Listen, it's probably not going to work the first time. She's not used to taking you seriously. But hold your frame. You *are* are guy who acts this way. If you neglected brushing your teeth for years, you wouldn't expect to get everything ship-shape in one day. And the first time you floss it might get worse - your gums will bleed and it will hurt. But if you keep brushing every day pretty soon it will get better.

It's going to take time for her to adjust, too. But she will, and she'll be happier. Obviously I don't know your wife, but it's a safe bet that she doesn't really want the role she's got now. She doesn't want the responsibility, and she almost certainly harbors a certain amount of contempt for you because you've allowed her to take it. You're not doing your job!

That sex with a sense of obligation is the worst, isn't it. It makes you feel about this big. Have you considered turning it down? This may be delicate, you don't want to seem petulant. But it could send a strong signal that this isn't about her doing you a favor. "Listen, I can tell you're not into this. That's cool. Let's do it tomorrow instead." This does two things. First, it gives you some control over the situation and shows you're not just about begging her to ration it out. Second, it builds some anticipation for the next night, which is always good.

(I wonder what Athol's take is on that idea.)

....and the reply comment...

Reader: Outsider said...

"Listen, I can tell you're not into this. That's cool. Let's do it tomorrow instead."

And she says...

"The answer will be the same tomorrow, fuckwit, and the day after that..."

Athol: I agree with The Outsider's comment. It takes time, it's a process, but you can get there.

Barring medical issues, medications and past sexual trauma, everything I talk about in terms of getting your sex life back on track boils down to a few simple concepts.

(1) If she doesn't want to have sex with you, it's because she isn't attracted to you. Therefore the solution is to become attractive to her in the hope that sex will resume again. (If it's a medical issue, medication or past trauma, you have to deal with that as well, or you won't have much success.)

(2) If you have become fairly well maxed out in your attractiveness to women in general, and your wife is still not sexually responding to you, there's nothing else you can do to make her want to have sex with you. .

(3) If you wife does resume being sexually interested in you, that's great. If your wife does not become sexually interested in you, you are in a much better place to find a woman that is interested in you sexually. So either way, you're still better off for having committed to the process of self-improvement and becoming more attractive to women.

So when she tells you to "go take a flying fuck at a rolling doughnut," you're probably somewhere at the beginning of getting yourself together. In time she may change her mind and become more attracted to you. The correct response is "A simple 'no' will suffice," and to head off to the gym.

When she says "The answer will be the same tomorrow, fuckwit, and the day after that..." the correct response is, "You're assuming I'm going to keep asking you."

As unromantic as it sounds, marriage is an economic transaction. The woman sells "wife" and the man sells "husband". The woman buys "husband" and the man buys "wife". Part of the job description of "wife" is having sex with her husband. Part of the job description of "husband" is being someone a wife would want to have sex with.

If you keep up your self-improvement, you will arrive at a Zen-like moment where you are acutely aware that she's getting everything she wants from you, and you're getting nothing you want from her. Plus you'll know you're actually confident enough to leave her and find someone better than her with minimal effort. So it's an exploitative relationship, you're on the unhappy end of the exploiting and you can end the relationship at will.

Marriage is by definition a sexual relationship. Never apologize for wanting a sexual relationship with your wife.

MMSL isn't a magic love potion. I can't promise she will love you again, or your marriage will survive. I can promise you'll become more attractive and get your balls back though. At least enough to say when you're hotter than she is...

"If you cannot act like my wife, you cannot be my wife."

The Copulatory Gaze

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 04:00:00 +0000

Reader: 1) How do I overcome my wife's so-called cum aversion?

2) I find I'm much bolder over email when asking for exactly what I want than I am in person, any advice on that?

3) In the book you say to act indifferent when shot down for sex. Isn't that kind of playing the nice guy card consistently? (speaking in prisoner's dilemma terms)?

I got shot down this morning, I went in and told her I wanted to bend her over the sink as she was getting ready for work. She said she didn't want to be sticky with cum all day. So then I find myself sitting here writing her an email that I want to cum on her tits tonight (didn't send it thought it better to write this to you instead). I have a lot of trouble with saying that to her face. Obviously I am a natural beta (or at least society has beaten me into one).

Any advice would be appreciated.

Athol: If you want morning sex, you have to get to it before she has a shower / starts getting ready for work. What she really means when she says she doesn't want to be all sticky with cum all day is... "She really doesn't want to be sticky with cum all day." The cum would slowly run back out of her through the morning and that would make her have to wear a pad or something. Basically it all amounts to "Do not want." for the same reasons you wouldn't want to blow a load into your underwear and then wear the underwear all day. Jennifer: YES! It's really a practical thing...if he approaches me pre-shower, game on. Post-shower it's going to be a sticky day, which can be awkward at work...

Now if you can fuck her so well the night before that she still has some residual oozing out of her the next morning, that's perfectly fine. That's a turn on for her because it forces her to remember just how good you were.

I tend not to try morning sex on Jennifer during the week, but I do hit on her in the morning. If she's bending over the sink putting on make up, she's an easy target for feeling her up a little, or softly grinding on her ass, but not actually trying to convert to having sex right then. Also because I'm not trying to convert to sex right before she goes to work, she can relax and enjoy being felt up and played with. A Saturday or Sunday morning is a different story as there's actual possibility to get it on. Usually it's cuddling in spoons and lightly glazing her ass with pre-cum as my main tactic of stating intentions.

There's also very typically a point where she turns and gives me a direct eye contact look waiting on my decision to actually tell her I want sex. She does this when she's reached her most interested point in having sex herself. The look is a non-verbal, "So are you going to ask me for sex or not?" The same thing can happen with other female questions, "So are you going to ask me out or not?" "So are you going to kiss me or not?" She will stop what she is doing, look directly at you and give you her full attention, say nothing, and wait for a few seconds while she holds eye contact. Watch for it and immediately make your move. That's your window of opportunity.

In terms of acting indifferent to her refusals, no it's not the Nice Guy card. The Nice Guy card tends to escalate the being nice trying even harder to convince her to give up the pussy to him. The Nice Guys become more needy and supplicating. Walking away and being cool about it is the opposite of that. If you act like she has a Kryptonite vagina, then she has power over you. If you act unaffected by the refusal, the vagina loses it's power to control you.

After endless persistent refusals of course, you can start the consideration of getting your needs met by other vaginas. But if you're averaging sex 2-4 times a week, her declining on Tuesday isn't a big deal if you have a good likelihood of sex on Wednesday. Throwing a fit on Tuesday though, means Wednesday is less likely to happen.

There's no good solution to the in-person shyness thing with her. Just keep asking for what you want. Texting is great for stating intentions too. Once you ask for something via text, never take it back if she doesn't immediately respond to you. Just be patient. Never apologize for wanting to have sex with your wife.

So be playfully engaging constantly, but when she makes deep eye contact... make a move.

Overcoming Approach Anxiety

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 02:41:00 +0000

Reader: In your most recent blog post, you mention that men in general should make the first move. I agree with this about 90% of the time. Men really should be the pursuers. After reading your blog and some of the more men-centric blogs (namely Chateau Heartiste), I've come to realize more and more of myself that I need to either work on or emphasize.

That being said, I get significantly nervous when attempting to make a move on a woman I'm interested in. If I don't care too much about the outcome, then I'm loose enough and things actually work better. But when I care about the outcome, I get nervous and feel awkward and have a difficult time making the move. I know if the woman made a move, then my nerves would just melt away and then I'd be back in control . Time and time again I've had this happen to me. I know you're not necessarily in the business of giving advice to people out in the dating marketplace, but do you have any recommendations? Things that a 30/70 alpha/beta could actually do?

Thanks man. I appreciate it. While I got to your blog too late to save my previous marriage, I still value it immensely, especially as I go about finding the woman that will reap the benefits of my MMSL-induced improvements.

Athol: My advice to overcoming approach anxiety is:

(1) Approach any and all women you meet and engage them in conversation without any intent to convert that into a phone number / date / sweaty horizontal embrace. The goal is just to have an enjoyable interaction with them. Even if it's just a few seconds long, it's not a problem. Don't lurk places waiting for women to cross your path, just if one does, be engaging for a few moments and see where it goes.

(2) Understand that there is about a three second delay between considering approaching an attractive woman, and the anxiety kicking in. It takes time for your body to process the need to be anxious and actually start releasing the hormones to make you start panicking. Once you're actually engaged with her though, the anxiety doesn't tend to kick in. So you literally have a three second window between seeing the pretty girl, and starting to talk to her, before the anxiety starts So become impulsive about talking to women.

(1) and (2) work together very well. See a woman, say hi. Nice shoes...

Also (3), Work on your physical fitness and muscle mass. This doesn't sound like a direct method for dealing with approach anxiety, but it really is a useful thing. Approach Anxiety is basically the flight or fight reflex, the fear creating the anxiety isn't so much the potential of the her rejecting you, but your Body Agenda prepping for dealing with an Alpha Male making a beeline for you and giving you a warning off punch in the face. So you're prepping to either fight the guy, or run from him. Adding physical strength makes your Body Agenda feel more confident about winning a fight, so it feels calmer and more confident about approaching women. Women of course directly sense your confidence, and having confidence makes them evaluate you as more of an Alpha Male yourself. So it's a positive feedback thing.

Repeat approaches also build confidence.

All in all, you just have to approach, approach, approach.

Oh and don't underestimate this as a skill for husbands to have either. A fluid interaction with an attractive woman in front of your wife can go a long way with sparking your wife's interest in you. Note I said "fluid interaction," as opposed to "hit on her like a drunken idiot." If you need a basic techinque for this, compliment her on something, and then redirect your attention to someone else fairly quickly. Don't give the other woman her three seconds of attention lock-on after the compliment, that will put her shields up and your wifes too lol.

Girl Game: If He's Into You, He'll Ask You Out

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 03:55:00 +0000

A lot of interlinked questions...

Reader: Hi Athol, I had written to you awhile back about my high school daughter and future dating,etc in which you responded with the blog --the purpose of high school is to get an education not herpes!

Anyway, we felt you were right on with that one. You mentioned getting the book –The Rules—which we did. We (husband included) thought it was great and have been using the basic principles in day to day interactions with others too. What I was wondering, in the beginning on a relationship, the book stresses not approaching the guy/man first—not even looking at them, etc. How important do you think that is ? How into the woman will the man be long term (marriage, etc.) if she does the initial approach?

It seems like most problems with people have to do with a mismatched sex rank. How do prevent that from the very start? Also, I’m wondering how much of it has to do with deep down hormone levels that we aren’t even conscious of. I’ve read you can detect levels through smell. Maybe the mismatch comes from a mismatched hormone levels. I’ve read men’s testosterone levels drop with marriage and fatherhood. As the levels drop, maybe the woman subconsciously senses this and becomes less attracted. If the levels stay up with exercise, weight lifting, diet, etc. maybe the woman’s attraction stays up too?

You may have written about this already. My daughter has mentioned that one of her friends is on her third boyfriend this year and she herself has had none (good thing!) I wonder how much of it has to do with the way she smells. Very animalistic isn’t it? Thanks!

Athol: "The Rules" essentially boils down to a description of how women can display high value as a way of pulling male attention. High value women are approached by men, and with high frequently. When she approaches him, she's basically tipped her hand that she is interested in him, and the implication is that he's a higher Sex Rank than she is. Once that happens, the male is no longer in pursuit mode, and the dopamine shuts down because he no longer needs to make any risk taking moves to get her attention and gain her interest. Which essentially makes him react to her with "cool." (Which drives her crazier for him because of the hypergamy factor)

If all you're looking for is a hook-up, then it's no problem to make the first move. But in terms of getting to an actual relationship, it's not the greatest of ideas to make the first move if you're a female. You're better off displaying higher value and waiting it out.

However, I'm not convinced that not even looking at them is of value. That's running into the "cold distant bitch" zone. Be pleasant, engaging and fun, but he's the one that should be trying to escalate things - typically an isolation play. "Hey, you want to go get coffee?"

I'm not sure I have a firm answer to the mismatched Sex Rank thing. It's easy to turn things on for a short period, and then once the relationship is solidified, to go "Phew!" and relapse to your normal baseline. Some times people self-improve once they are in a relationship, or suddenly gain confidence "hey I can do this!" and so on. Some people lie their ass off too and purposely cover things up that their partner should know about.

Women can't smell male testosterone as far as I know, but they can through sense of smell unconsciously identify men that have a good immune system compatibility for creating a healthy baby. The major negative effect on her sense of smell is taking hormonal birth control as it tends to create a reversal effect in the men she is attracted to. So if a couple meets when she is off birth control pills, and then she starts on them, she can have a libido reduction from the birth control pills in a general sense and a reduction in her attraction to her partner in a specific sense. So for some couples it's a real downer.

The other way it works is if a couple meet and she is on birth control pills, once she's off them to try and have kids or use a different method, she can feel less attracted to her partner. Plus she may not be as genetically compatible with him as she could be, leading to poorer outcomes with pregnancy and the baby's health. Before anyone panics though, bear in mind that these are simply influences on the outcome and not destiny. Plus there's still a lot of science left to do on this stuff.

The volume of testosterone in men does take a two-step dip down after marriage and the arrival of a baby Primarily the male has a lot of testosterone to assist in engaging in risky mate finding behaviors, but having reached the Body Agenda goal of actually getting a mate and having a child, the Body Agenda turns to a more conservative strategy of defending what they have. Thus men tend to become more settled and calm after getting married and having children. Or put another way, men who have no offspring have from a Body Agenda perspective, have nothing to lose. While those that have offspring do have something to lose, so they play it safe.

Testosterone drop in aging men plays a role in diminished libido, energy levels, mood, impulsivity and a ton of other things that are generally sexy. So the results of lower testosterone levels can be an attraction killer for the women. And yes, exercise, diet and weights can increase the testosterone level in men, so generally a good thing for overall male health.

I don't know your daughter or her friend, so I have no idea why the difference is as it is. High school is an awkward age for some kids, and some peak early. You never know how people will turn out over the very long haul.

And yes, sex is very animalistic. It's a very humbling thing sometimes to have your body suddenly want to lurch itself toward someone you know isn't a good idea to be in a relationship with, and then become non-reactive with someone you know is a good idea to be in a relationship with. The trick is finding that person that is the balance that can do at least some of both.

Which brings us full circle to whether or not a woman should make the first move. If she has to make the first move, he's just not that into her enough on a Body Agenda level to be motivated to make the first move. That's not particularly fixable either, so she can waste her best years trying to get him to react like he's into her before she figures out it's just wasting her time. This is a driving force behind the thing where the long time girlfriend begs and pleads with her boyfriend to marry her, but he's "Just not interested in being married." So eventually she splits from him and then within a year he's getting married to his new girlfriend. Cue up, "He said he would never get married and now he's getting married to someone else, why didn't he marry me?!?!"

So the first move thing acts as a very basic screening tool for women. If he's into you, he'll ask you out.

Glorified Cave Art For The SAHM Issue

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 03:07:00 +0000

I've written several posts in recent days about the potential pitfalls of the SAHM option. Because so many people aren't actually reading what I'm writing and are leaving angry comments on what they think I might have written, I've been reduced to using my glorified cave art skills to communicate.

And yes, you can flip everything around for SAHDs as well.

And yes, these are broad strokes of the brush.

And to be explicitly clear - calling my own daughters "bright" isn't the same as calling you "stupid". Get the hell over yourself if you're offended by a father praising his own daughters.

All I'm saying is having a stay at home parent has major potential downsides that are NEVER talked about until it's too late and someone is all but destroyed.

I'm trying to help you.

SAHMs and Moral Hazard

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 04:26:00 +0000

Just in case anyone is confused by this post... I don't hate SAHMs. I'm just explaining some serious risks to the SAHM strategy that are typically glossed over with 50,000 odes to motherhood and won't you think of the children. Importantly the risks are to both the husband and the wife with this strategy.

The most important rule about imagining yourself in the past, is that you don't allow yourself to imagine being a member of the ruling class of the day. If you are imagining ancient Egypt, you're not Cleopatra, instead you're some poor sap being whipped to build the pyramids. If you are imagining the middle ages, you are not a lady handing out favors or a knight winning tournaments, you're actually a very hungry serf who dies of dysentery. So when you imagine yourself being a married woman in any point in time up to around 1950, you're frequently pregnant, surrounded by children and working your ass off from dusk until dawn. The phrase "Stay At Home Mother" doesn't exist until midway through the 20th century. Women have always, always, always worked.

Back in the day, men worked outside the home in typically dangerous, physical jobs. Women stayed home and raised the children. Unless you were a super-alpha, having sex meant getting married and having children. It was a fair exchange of male physical labor for female reproductive labor.

Around 1950 the golden age of the world started. Thanks to fridges, washing machines, dryers, dishwashers, vacuums and supermarkets, the household labor started getting easier and easier. Birth control came into vogue and was simple to use, so the pregnancy and kid overload eased off as well. Suddenly the job of "housewife" got easier than it had ever been at any point in human history. Women had "choices", to either work inside the home, or work outside the home.

And here we are sixty years later the end product of the most golden bubble of human history. So bear with me while I explain the rules and the strategy of the whole mess. At least as far as the whole SAHM vs Working Mother thing goes.

Loosely speaking, back in Marriage 1.0 times, men worked outside the home, women raised the kids and worked inside the home. The wife was economically dependant on the husband. Marriage ended by "fault". If a marriage ended by her fault, she was totally screwed, so women tended not to be... "faulty". If however the marriage ended by the man's fault, there was a quite justifiable reason to take him to court and ensure that he held up his end of the economic bargain. Thus alimony is created.

In a Marriage 1.0 world, alimony is a good and meaningful thing. A genuinely bad husband, should be forced to support his wife and children if she isn't the one at fault and he is.

But in a Marriage 2.0 world, there may be no fault whatsoever on the part of the husband, or even either party. But there may be fault on the part of the wife. Whereupon alimony - formerly a punishment for an at fault husband - turns into a reward for an at fault wife. Divorce is incentivized for women, and thus the divorce rate skyrockets.

The combination of an incentivized divorce plus the ease of a SAHM lifestyle creates a huge moral hazard for a husband. The wife may demand an easy SAHM life, or simply take him to the cleaners if he doesn't provide it for her. This level of threat makes her the default head of household in many cases and thanks to female hypergamy, that increasingly kills her attraction to her husband, further increasing the divorce rate.

To be sure, many SAHMs are diligent, productive and deeply intent on making their family happy. They really can work tirelessly and don't consider the moral hazard as a good option for even a moment. But some clearly suck, and let's be perfectly blunt that that threshold for failure as a SAHM is pathetically low. You're only a failure as a mother if the state removes your children from your care. Otherwise you're the holy Madonna.

The law does vary from state to state as well. In some states the alimony comes as a lifetime supply, and in other places it is very limited indeed. So depending where you are living, wives can be rewarded for divorce, or husbands can walk away from a marriage with minimal punishment. The stories of women who bewail having been SAHMs that are now divorced and have zero alimony, some minimal child support and no job skills in an economy with 10% unemployment rate are quite real, just as are the stories of husbands divorced without warning in an Eat Pray Love scenario.

The truth of the matter is... depending on your state's laws... you can be royally ass-fucked as either a husband or wife if the couple chooses the SAHM route and divorce happens. Usually both of you get ass-fucked to some degree. Unless you are a member of the ruling class, once you try and split one income over two households, the money will always run out somewhere for someone. If you're a $50 million dollar couple, divorce is annoying. If you're a $50,000 couple, divorce is game over.

If you want to go the SAHM route, I will say that it can work. You really can have a wonderful lifestyle from having a SAHM if she works productively in the role. But do understand that it's a luxury to be able to do it. The SAHM is a dependant and it is a very soft job because it doesn't create a paycheck. Not only is the golden age of the world over, it still needs to be paid for and to be perfectly blunt, soft jobs are going to become few and far between.

I totally get the need and idea to have someone watch the kids while they are pre-school age, seriously I get it, it makes good economic sense to do so. But after that, the longer she stays out of the real job market, the less self-reliant she becomes. Which makes her more and more economically dependent on him. If there is no clear economic need driving the SAHM setup, (like medically complex children) you may discover to your horror down the road that the economics come back to haunt you. (Either of you)

The whole thing of having an adult as a dependant is fraught with risk and moral hazard.

Jennifer: Being a stay at home parent to a pre-schooler makes financial sense, daycare costs being what they are, and having the ability to stay home and raise a baby/preschooler is fabulous for family bonding. Being a stay at home parent to children who are school-aged (and who aren't being home schooled, there aren't still little ones not in school, there aren't any children with severe medical/behavioral/developmental impairments, etc.) just leaves something lacking. Are you also raising a huge garden that feeds the family? Are you the one doing the home improvement construction projects? Are you in some way making a contribution to how the family runs while the kids are at school? I'd love to have a million bucks and be able to run errands and sit on the couch while the girls are at school...but really that would get boring after about a month lol. Raising children is important, but so many families do it and have both partners at least have part time jobs. I'm not abdicating the responsibility of raising my kids because I work. (and kudos to the single parents out there...those are the parents who really have to do it all) /gets down off of soap box

Blue Pill Regret, Red Pill Pain and An Encouraging Thought

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Sat, 28 Jan 2012 04:40:00 +0000

There were two similar comments on an earlier post, this is the shorter one and references the first.

Reader: ROI - my situation is similar to yours and I struggle with the same issues. I tolerated years of sex that swung between mediocre and nonexistent but finally started changing myself using the MAP techniques. The increased sex rank and destabilization has started working. My wife is initiating sex occasionally and her level of enthusiasm has increased somewhat. The dynamic of our relationship outside the bedroom has become better with more alpha on my part. But I'm just not excited about having sex with her anymore and it is troubling.

I don't think its about the difference in sex rank. It's not a matter of "I've lost 50 pounds and you haven't so now you're ugly". It's more about the sexual disconnect that I've created over the years. Wanting something I could hardly ever get was driving me to madness so I willed myself to not want it. My sex life became masturbation and porn and they never let me down during all those years she did. My instinctual reaction now when I think about having sex with my wife is anger.

Intellectually I understand the red pill idea that women are for the most part automatons when it comes to their sexual response. Intellectually I understand that it's irrational to be angry at my wife for not behaving the way I wanted - it was my failure for not evoking those behaviors. But it just fucking hurts. It's hard not to be resentful. It's like I'm stuck in these bad patterns of thought. The rage has worn a groove in my head and now it's difficult to accept improvement in things that I've bitched and moaned for the last decade. The recent articles here and at Ian's site about initiating have had me thinking a lot about this lately. I don't want to initiate anymore. Part of me doesn't trust her with my sexuality any more because she's used it to hurt and humiliate me in the past.

Athol - any ideas? We are starting to get what we said we wanted. Why can't we be happy about it?

And another reader in the same commenting thread...

Reader: I think your feelings are normal. I've had some of the same struggles in my head after running the map and changing 10+ year bad sexual and emotional relationship into a great one. The reality of the red pill has empowered my to change the relationship into what it should be, but I'm still mad about it at some level. I kind of feel cheated out of all those wasted years. And I sort of hate it at some level that I have to game my wife into loving me the way I think she should just love me anyway. But that part of my thinking is fading away, just taking some time.

Athol: The Red Pill does not taste of chocolate. In fact it's pretty damn bitter sometimes. The worse you've done things the Blue Pill way, the harsher the Red Pill tastes going down. It really sucks to realize you've wasted so much time and effort to work against your own interests.

Jennifer and I have always had a good sex life, but we've always struggled with money. One of the things that I realized around six years back was that instead of trying so hard to have an equal relationship, we would have been better off if I really had just pushed myself harder to advance my career goals. This point was hammered home when one of her friends got engaged to a dentist and Jennifer told me the news via excited verbal diarrhoea. The word "dentist" was repeated very five seconds with increasingly greater emphasis. The harder I tried to not listen, the louder Jennifer got. Dentist, dentist, dentist, dentist, dentist....

My response to her was simple. "I'm sorry I'm not a dentist." Which sounds weak, but my eye contact and tone was icy steel.

Jennifer immediately checked up and apologized and rattled off a long list of my good points and contributions to the family. Held me tight and kissed me deeply. She wasn't intentionally trying to hurt me, so easy to forgive her in that sense. It was the purely unintentional nature of it all that stung. For sure Jennifer liked me, loved me and wanted me, but she would have liked me, loved me and wanted me more if I was a dentist or whatever else similar I could have been. All those years of being superdad and Mr.Equal wasn't exactly as great as I thought they were.

And so I resolved to make something of myself, and immediately made things significantly worse by wasting eighteen months trying to sell real estate and basically suffering a massive loss of income. I tried very hard for far too long to make it work, and it all turned to crap on me. To her great credit, Jennifer did stick by me and frankly was too supportive for our own good, she should have chewed me out about it all not working rather than put up with it. I would have stopped trying so hard earlier.

I went back to nursing four years ago, and we've been digging out of the money hole slowly but steadily. 2011 was a very special year in that finally the book was out and the money situation shifted in our favor more. We've also slowly changed to me being more of the career minded one and Jennifer has picked up a lot of my housekeeping slack, and even started adding in some extra part time work as well. We're both responsible for getting into our mess and we're both working to get ourselves out.

But yeah... we could have done so much of this right from the beginning. So many wasted years that it's kind of sickening to think about in that sense. And I would be lying if I said that there haven't been times where it really doesn't seem fair that I have to work harder than she does. But I can say that the more I get things together, the less it all bothers me and it is what it is. Captain works harder than the First Officer. We're getting on better than ever and the sex in the last twelve months is amazing.

It's funny looking back too, my first serious girlfriend Mary Fitness Tested me hard over my career goals. I wanted to go into ministry work and help people, she thought I would be better off using my writing and humor skills doing something like marketing. One of the things I liked most about Jennifer was her idealism and that the social status thing didn't matter, but it is a factor after all. Doh!

I will say this though, without Jennifer and without all these endless missteps and dead ends along the way, I would not be were I am today. There would be no MMSL. Which is as Gandalf says, "Is an encouraging thought."

Because everything happens for a reason...

...but usually the reason is because someone was stupid. The Red Pill does not taste of chocolate, and frankly it's more like battlefield medicine than anything else, but it is excellent knowledge. Armed with that knowledge you, and I, and together, we can be less stupid and make significant changes to our lives.

It's okay to be angry. Just use it as motivation to propel things in the right direction.

Often things get worse before they get better. But they can get better. Give it some time, get into action and start making positive changes. In time things will feel more enjoyable. Feelings follow actions. If things are improving, things are improving.

"Even more dramatically, the researchers also found that two-thirds of unhappily married spouses who stayed married reported that their marriages were happy five years later. In addition, the most unhappy marriages reported the most dramatic turnarounds: among those who rated their marriages as very unhappy, almost eight out of 10 who avoided divorce were happily married five years later" Link

Daughters, Career Advice and the MILF Effect

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 04:35:00 +0000

Jack: Athol, I'm curious what you will teach your daughters. Will you teach them today's feminist line that they "can be anything they want"? This, to me, is a dangerous message. Yes, women can pursue their career and become uber-competitive, but there are tradeoffs. Women's hypergamy being what it is, if they become gung-ho careerists they will simultaneously shrink their dating market and turn off the best (alpha) males who are not attracted to women of higher success then them. This is all well documented.

Its not easy to raise girls if you go against the dominant Leftist/Feminist cultural programming.

Athol: We're generally teaching them they can be anything they want to be, but I agree that you can't be everything you want to be. We're also conscious about offering them a leg-up and using our moderate ability to effect nepotism to advance them as much as possible career-wise. Both of our girls are very bright and I doubt they would be content at all with a SAHM lifestyle.

One daughter is actually quite turned on by the idea of fast tracking to her RN and being able to earn a good wage by the time she is 20, and have flexibility in work schedules and being able to work part time around her family needs and so on. So we can help make that happen for her.

One daughter is quite gifted and she has a standing offer of having her fiction writing and/or drawings turned into full fledged books with our help. No requirement to be published for all the world to see, even one copy to hold in her hands being acceptable. She'll bite eventually lol.

I'm conscious of there being a fine line between pushing them in a certain direction and over riding what they might really want to do, and not offering them all that I could and having them turn out less than they could be. They are wonderfully good kids and I'm sure they will turn into wonderful women and the older they get the more interesting they become.

There are risks for women in advancing career at the expense of starting a family, and then finding out too late their use-by date has passed, but I don't think that will be the case with our girls. The apple does not fall far from the tree, and lets face it, Jennifer is about as good as advertising gets for "this is what you'll be married to in twenty years" for future boyfriends to take into consideration. Stable, loyal, sexy, fun, competent, healthy, charming, joyful. So I think they will have a high market value and plenty of options actively pursuing them.

I mean you gotta figure at some point the boyfriends are just going to go, "Your mom had sex with your dad HOW MUCH?!?!" and then look directly at Jennifer's ass until their name is forcefully called...

...and girls are going to get a +2 to their Sex Rank.

Something that I really learned with the passing of my father is how important family is, so I'm actually kinda looking forward to having sons-in-law to be honest.

Plus my girls will read everything I've written, so they'll have a fairly deep understanding of relationships and be conscious of whats going on. They will make mistakes no doubt, but unlikely to make critical failures. So I'm not really worried about them... but I do worry about them, they are after all my daughters.

Jennifer: Great... I feel like the display model in a store, though I guess that's the way it really does work. It is important for them to know that they can be whatever they want to be, but that they have to make decisions about what to do at what point in their lives because no one can do it all at the same time...high powered career and big family and pro-level sports and yada yada yada. Yeah, and I feel old just having two teenagers, so let's not skip ahead to be being the MOB just yet!

47 Years of Marriage, Still Buys Her Flowers Every Monday

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 05:22:00 +0000

Reader: Good idea or bad idea?

I ask because I read somewhere (I think from Roissy) that a man should only give his wife 1/2 of what she gives him (or something like that). Do you have an opinion?

Athol: The Roissy rule is 2 contacts for every 3 she gives you.

I'm in basic disagreement with Roissy in that he sees Alpha and Beta as being at two opposite ends of a scale of what creates or kills attraction in women. I see Alpha and Beta Traits as two separate and important elements of a relationship with a woman, which in no small part is pulled from the Mystery Method. The Mystery Method in twelve words or less is "Show Alpha first, then show Beta, isolate and touch her, suggest sex."

So anyway... back to Poppy with the flowers...

...it's a Beta move, which is completely fine as long as he has his Alpha stuff together as well. If she experiences receiving the flowers as a positive, it's a positive that he gives them.

But there's also an added element from the total reliability of his actions that have created a ritual of commitment and emotional engagement that steps it up beyond just a routine gift of flowers. He's really doing the whole Fireproof thing, minus the groveling and religious emesis. Which is to say it's not very much like the Fireproof thing at all. It's more like being the Cal Ripken of love.

The man is a rock of love and there's a genius in the way he checkmates her hamster. There's no possible way she could ever get away with denying he loves her, or isn't one of the good guys on the world. Can you imagine her trying to bad mouth him to her girlfriends? Everybody knows he loves her, has always loved her and will always love her. How do you spin that into an Eat Pray Love ending and not look like a worthless, ungrateful, stupid whore doing a good man wrong? The only viable option is to love him.

Ironically, the greatest effect may in fact be on him rather than on her. He's likely still experiencing feelings of being in love with her by his ritual of expressing romantic love. Feelings follow actions. But maybe that feeling of being in love with her changes what else he does for the better in their relationship.

He looks total old school. He looks like a Marriage 1.0 guy through and through, but the key to surviving marriage in a Marriage 2.0 world is that courtship never ends. So he's got it down like a boss.

I also have a strong hunch she puts some extra attention to her appearance on Mondays... anyway, for all we know, he doesn't even think of Monday's as "flower day", but as "blow job day."

Jennifer: Awwwwwwwwwwwww so romantic! (hmmmm...where's my flowers lol?)

How Do You Teach Kids This Stuff?

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 03:28:00 +0000

Reader: I have young sons. How can I teach them some of these points as they grow up, even prior to various sexual information they will need?

MMSL primer is too adult for them right now so need a primer for the primer so to speak.

Athol: You're a role model to your sons whether you want to be or not, so you're going to teach them expectations of what marriage / relationships / sex is all about anyway. So model what you want them to learn.

If you playfully swat your wife's ass and pull her in for a kiss, and she obviously likes it and likes you, your sons will notice. If your sons are mouthing off to their mother, and you back her up 100%, they will notice that. If you have a long discussion about a serious decision with your wife, and obviously pay attention to her input, they will notice that. The kids are always watching, always learning.

That being said, how young is too young to be directly taught MMSL is an interesting question. I was reading The Hite Report at age 10 and sneaking the Playboys long before I was allowed to buy them and it's not like I turned out obsessed about sex or anything and... oh... hmmm... it's not like my AIDS ravaged body was found dead in a ditch when I was 27 or anything.

But what's out there as sexually available to kids these days is staggering beyond all belief. I'm not shocked by nearly anything I see or read about sexually - I do say certain things like swinging probably isn't in your best interest, but it's not like I'm offended by swinging or dislike swingers or even close to it. But I do have an all purpose concern about the sheer volume of what kids are exposed to before they even get to having a first kiss with someone. So there's always going to be something they directly learn about sex anyway, so why not MMSL?

On a more personal level, I have two teenage daughters and there's always been in the back of my mind that someday they will read everything I've written, if they haven't already behind my back. So I feel like I'm writing a message in a bottle to them with every post. But I would feel shitty if a message in a bottle got to them after they were pregnant and dumped, riddled with herpes or wondering why no one wants to marry them. Or all three.

So at some point in the next year or so, I would like to write a "Teens Primer", but it's just an idea at this point. Not even a scribble on a napkin as yet. Until then though, Jennifer and I will just have to model a happy family and sex life. Which is fortunately quite enjoyable.

Only 30% Of What You Try In Bed Works

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 04:34:00 +0000

Reader: Athol, you said " Only about 30% of what you try in the bedroom together will work for you as a couple." You've said this before, IIRC. Two questions.

1 Where does this number come from? Is it a rule of thumb or is it more research-derived?

2 Does it actually mean that one woman in three will do pretty much anything and the other two will do missionary only?!

Right, I'll get my coat... ;_)

Athol: The figure of 30% is based on the personal experience of Jennifer and myself. We've found that an awful lot of things that sound good, simply don't work for us when we try them in reality. It's just as simple as "Ahh... I don't bend that way" for some things. Half the toys we've tried over the years got used once and tossed.

I know you all imagine Jennifer and I drenched in each others juices in a sweaty rythymic choreography each night, but some nights it really is exactly like this when I get a really good idea...

There's also some things that we do as a couple that simply won't work for many other couples. For example I'm 6' tall and fairly sizable, while Jennifer is 5' and fairly petite, so one position we like is a rear entry position with me lying on my back and Jennifer lying on top of me with her back on my chest. If Jennifer was 5'10" and fifty pounds heavier, it wouldn't work for us as a position. It's a great position in that it's really intense, but even with her so much smaller than me, as soon as I orgasm the "erotic intensity" immediately turns into "bitch get off me". There's a sort of a 1-2-3 move where I orgasm, ~~dump her ass on her side of the bed~~ gently roll her off me, and take a huge breath of air.

So the 30% figure is quite real to us as quite a lot of what we've tried in bed hasn't worked for us. Somethings only work once as well. The first time is really good, and then the second time it's just all kinda meh.

The 30% is important in that I think it's very helpful and encouraging to couples starting out with widening the things they do, to think that it's okay to have sexual failures. Most people have so much invested in sex that even a tiny handful of sexual failures can be viewed as a significant problem. The reality is pretty much everyone starts out pretty damn awful at having sex, and it's only with practice and trying out stuff that you get better and better.

Trying out new sexual things is like batting in baseball. You hope that you're going to hit a home run, but most times you aren't even going to get a clean hit that gets you to first base. If you quit after a few strike outs, you're not understanding the game. But if you just keep getting up to bat enough, at the end of the season you should have a decent record.

Or if makes you feel better... a symbolic interactionist based seventeen year longitudinal study involving the mating practices of a bonded dyad determined up to 70% of all novel breeding methodolgies initated by the male met with negative levels of reported enjoyment. This lack of enjoyment was slightly more typically reported by the female than the male.

So anyway, make a bucket list and just start trying new stuff out together. If it doesn't work, laugh about it. If it works, you've found something new to do together that's exciting and fun!

Jennifer: Don't see things that don't work as failures, see them as experiments. Sometimes we laugh, sometimes we just say "meh, tried that once, don't need to do it again" and sometimes we say "ow, never mind" and go with something tried and true. Your 30% of what works for you is going to be different than our 30% of what works for us. Also, things change over time...things that weren't in our 30% ten years ago are there now, and things that used to be there are not enjoyable any more.

10 Things About Rough Sex And Dominance (The Safeword is "Ow!")

noreply@blogger.com (Athol Kay) — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 03:11:00 +0000

I've had a few recent comments that basically assume I'm advising husbands to violently rape their wives without regard to consent or her injuries. Frankly I think I'm being trolled, but trolling or not, let me restate the facts plainly and clearly one more time.

(1) Many women enjoy rough sex, it's worth experimenting with that to see if your wife does. If she likes it, she likes it.

(2) Many women enjoy dominance, it's worth experimenting with that to see if your wife does. If she likes it, she likes it.

(3) Sex needs to be consensual. Forced sex is rape.

(4) Dominance needs to be consensual. Submissive women don't need to be forced anyway, if you're attractive enough you just need to lead them and they follow naturally.

(5) If sex hurts, you're doing it wrong and should stop, or there's a potential medical issue and you should stop. "Ow!" is a safeword.

(6) You should talk about rough sex and dominance attempts together before getting into it.

(7) Only about 30% of what you try in the bedroom together will work for you as a couple. Hair pulling may not work, spanking might not work, gentle biting may work. You need to try and evaluate each thing together.

(8) Trying out rough sex together is a process and you aren't going to leap to a cat-o-nine-tails and her wearing a collar with the word "Slut" on it on the first attempt. Or even do that ever.

(9) There is no requirement she likes any of it. If she actively dislikes some aspect of sex, don't force it on her as it's both unpleasant to her and counter-productive in terms of turning her into a more willing sex partner. The less she's into you, the less she'll be into trying any of this.

(10) Most of rough sex's erotic power comes from the intensity of the experience. A small amount of interpersonal frustration can add to the intensity of the experience, a lot of anger easily translates into a loss of control and increased possibility of trampling over her safety and consent... getting you into serious legal trouble.

In addition, let's review some of those exact same points I've made in earlier "rough sex" posts. The safeword is "Ow!"...

Sexy Move: Hair Pulling While On Top - "This is a very firmly held position even compared to her being tied up with low end bondage equipment. That she could probably break out of if she wanted to, but you on top of her holding her head turned to the side leaves her with zero leverage. Unless you let her go, she's... ahh... fucked. Which is the idea and the excitement, but also she may find it a little more than she expected. So a safeword may be in order. If you don't have a safeword, consider "stop" or "let me go" or even "ow my hair!" acceptable attempts at using a safeword."

"And like anything else rough, this is something to talk about before you do it."

Sexy Move: Pretend To Hold Her Against Her Will - "Then get a fair bit more vigorous in the thrusting department. As always, consider "ow!" or "stop" a safeword. Maybe not "no" though... talk about that first though."

"Just try it out together. If it works for you, then great. If not, at least you tried something new which is still a good thing."

Try A Rough Sex Experiment - "So give it a trial run if you haven't already. She may just like it. And if you haven't talked about a safeword, consider "ow!" the safeword for now."

Getting A Little More Sex From Your Husband - "Also I realize that this isn't exactly what you want, but you can ask him to chase you. It may feel awkward and slightly fake at first, but in time it can become more natural feeling. It can be as simple as texting him earlier in the day that you just want him to "just take you", or "tonight I'm going to say no but I don't want you to really believe that". You may want a safeword for that last one. (My wife's safeword is "Dershowitz and Feinstein" for example.)"

I hope that covers it.

Jennifer: There's a big difference between the "being into you" of firm/intense sex, and angry sex.