Q: I’m a 33-year-old woman from Melbourne, Australia, dating a 24-year-old man. We’ve been dating for about eight months; it is exclusive and official. He’s kind and sweet, caring and giving, and his penis is divine. The thing is, he confessed to me recently that he doesn’t really “feel.” The way he explained it is, the only emotions he feels are fear and anxiousness that he’ll disappoint the people he cares about. He says he’s never been in love. He said his dad is the same way. The only time I see him really “feel” are when he’s high, which he is semifrequently. He uses MDMA and he comes alive. He seems the way a “normal” person does when they’re in love, but when he’s sober, it’s like he’s trying to mimic the things a person in love would say or do. I confessed I am falling in love with him recently and told him I wasn’t saying this with any expectation of him feeling the same; I just wanted him to know. He responded that he cares for me a lot—but that’s it. I’m now worried that he’ll never love me. I don’t want kids, so time isn’t critical for me, but I don’t want to be with someone who won’t ever love me. —Lacking One Vaunted Emotion
My hunch is that your boyfriend’s problem isn’t an inability to feel love, LOVE, but an inability to recognize the feelings he’s having as love. (Or potentially love, as it’s only been eight months.) What is romantic love but a strong desire to be with someone? The urge to be sweet to them, to take care of them, to do for them? Maybe he’s just going through the motions with you—a conscious mimic-it-till-you-make-it strategy—or maybe the double whammy of a damaged dad and that toxic masculinity stuff sloshing around out there left him blocked, LOVE, or emotionally constipated. And while MDMA can definitely be abused—moderation in all things, kids, including moderation—the effect it has on him is a hopeful sign. MDMA is not an emotional hallucinogen; the drug has been used in couples counseling and to treat PTSD, not because it makes us feel things that aren’t there (in the way a hallucinogen makes us see things that aren’t there), but because it allows genuine feelings to surface and, for a few hours, to be felt intensely. So he can feel love—he just has to learn how to tap into those feelings and/or recognize them without an assist from MDMA.
A: Short answer: Sexual compatibility is important. It’s particularly important in a sexually exclusive relationship. You want a sexually exclusive relationship; your boyfriend doesn’t want a sexually exclusive relationship—so you two aren’t sexually compatible, BIGSIN, and you should break up.
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