Are my boyfriend's sexual urges normal/acceptable?

I think it's important not to react too rashly to this. I know the whole "Men are sexual beings" this is a typical guy excuse, but it's rooted in some degree of scientific reality. A guy's brain is a lot quicker to respond to visual stimuli, and in general they need a lot less to get them going so to speak. Retaining an addictive mindset after years of porn addiction can make this natural aspect of a man's psyche worse.

I think him being honest about this is a positive thing to some extent, he could have easily lied to save your feelings but he didn't. The next step for me would be to talk at length and try to get a better answer than the one he gave you, because it is rather vague. Ultimately it is up to you to make the decision on where to progress with the relationship based on this.

 

To put it on a more specific terms, those "urges", if there is no visual stimulation, like seeing an attractive woman, are, basically, intrusive thoughts, he doesn't call for them, he doesn't probably even want them, they are a remanent of the addiction, and it may take a bit longer to go away.

That's more likely what he means when he says that they are a subsconcious thing, as they spurt from the subsconcious level into the conscious level, in an uncalled and intrusive way.

This, should be the least of your concerns.

Now, I would consider very safe to say, that any man, that walks on the street, and sees a very attractive woman, it will get it's attention, that's what, attraction and being attractive is, basically, now, does he dwell on fantasizing? does it quickly brush it off? does it even cross his mind to actually try to do anything? Those are far more important points.

I can bet and say, that at a physical level, he will obviously find other women attractive, if you truly expect at any point from him to only find you attractive or to not have to resist looking at other women, I have very bad news for you, that's not ever going to happen.

If he is with you, and loves you, all that is not going to matter, at all, because he is committed to you, there is more than just physical attraction, between both of you, and we men also value that, and foolish is the one that put a good relationship at risk, thinking the grass may be greener at the other side, guided by lust and looks, you cannot suppress is sexuality and attraction, it will be there, but if he is committed to you, and doesn't ever acts upon it, does it even matter?

I mean, having "urges" for other women more than for yourself, sorry if I'm blunt, but well, they outnumber you, still, does not mean a thing if he also has them for you, and is committed to you.

Truly consider, if you want him to have eyes and attraction solely for yourself, because that's something no man will bring you without being a liar, and he seems quite the honest guy, something you should appreciate, and that as long as he loves you and is with you, whatever happens in his head, matters very very little.

 

As Priest said, that could be his old thought patterns bubbling up to the surface. If he's been falling in pseudo love with multiple women every day for years, it has probably left its mark. It happens to me that I miss pornstars the way you would miss an actual lost love. So it could be this sort of romantic attachment to imaginary partners. Or it could be a narcissistic fantasy in which he used to picture himself sleeping with every woman he meets, wallowed in it so much he almost believed it to be actually true, and now it's so ingrained he can't shake it off.

 

Pentatonic, below, said it very well. I am also a sex addict in recovery and I would suggest you both check out the SAA Sex Addicts Anonymous website and encourage him to take the short quiz to see if he may be a sex addict.

 

It says the post was Wednesday.

 

An issue is that men are biologically designed to spread their seed and get with as many women as possible for a higher chance of an offspring. That’s the natural instinct, which makes porn so addictive to men usually, I was watching a YouTube video explaining about the coolage effect, which explains this situation. And I’d recommend everyone here learning about to better our understanding of the addiction.

In the past I have found regular sex to be very healing of addiction and pied. Best of luck with your bf

 

If he's actively checking out other girls in public, honestly I begin to question whether he's actually overcome porn addiction: that implies either no will-power for chastity or no desire for chastity.

But I on the other hand, if he merely notices another woman appears attractive and unintentionally finds his eyes glance at her and then refuses to look back,
in that case you can't hold it against him. Rather, you ought to praise his commitment to you.

Why should you, after 3 years be a constant source of sexual urges for him? Craving novelty isn't a PMO-induced thing. PMO addiction merely caches in on novelty craving and amplifies it to extremes. All men naturally crave novelty, because men are biologically wired to do so. This probably happens because biologically, men can father new children multiple times a day. Whereas women gets pregnant and needs a nine month gestation before she can become a mother again. So biologically speaking, women have more interest in stability over novelty.

Ask yourself, what are you yourself doing on a daily basis to make him feel sexual urges towards you? Don't answer that, but if the answer is "not much," then how is it fair to expect him to feel sexual urges for you all the time? Love is a lot more than random sexual urges.

And that may be all he's feeling and unintentionally so towards those other random women, which doesn't amount to much compared to real committed love. If I tied him down and showed him some porn footage, the natural male reaction would be sexual urges, but that doesn't mean he loves other women or that he's uncommitted to you.

Real love is about active commitment for someone, not getting constant sexual urges. You are not likely to ever find a guy who feels that way around you after living together 3 years, and as you said, your looks are likely declining soon, so securing such a guy (if one exists) would be increasingly more difficult.

I'd be searching for a husband, someone who actually commits himself, by law, to you. If this guy's got to have all of you for three years and isn't ready to make that commitment, then I guess it makes sense you feel like you said

 

Is there any reason why you two are not married yet? You have been together for 3 years and are now living together... seems like more than enough time has passed to make a truly serious commitment.

Have you dropped any hints to him about marriage? Or are you both sort of just not ready to make that next step yet? Kinda seems like you might be concerned that he isn't fully committed to you. And you may be thinking his lack of commitment is why he is checking out other girls and having sexual attraction towards them. And this is completely reasonable to think this way, especially after three years of dating.

 

I was just saying a general comment, not directed to the particular passage I quoted. Sorry for the confusion, you're right that didn't make sense. I should have just replied to the whole post, wasn't thinking

I guess I am just confused as well. I know for me, I wouldn't stay together with a girl for 3 years and move in with her if I wasn't fully committed and fully sexually committed to her as well. So in my opinion, his overall behavior seems strange to me.

So in conclusion, I would say his overall behavior is abnormal. But I also don't think he is cheating on you.

 

Well, honestly I’ve never had a long term relationship before, so I haven’t experienced a long term, deep connection before.

However… I think a guys sexuality might work differently than yours. I’m not a neurosurgeon or a psychologist, but guys may compartmentalize their sexuality more than girls. Like their sexuality doesn’t make them love or like a girl any more or any less. Also a reason why guys might be more likely to get prostitutes and stuff - sex and love are more separated than with women.

you mentioned that because you loved your bf so much, that you are most sexually attracted to him out of all men. Your love for your bf seems to completely overtake your mental concept of sexuality.

With guys though, I don’t think this is necessarily the case. When you said that your bf is not physically the best looking man on the planet, you are basically saying the exact same thing as your boyfriend is saying to you. You both are saying to each other that, from a purely physical level, you both are not the highest attractive person in the world.

Your boyfriend is just too honest. That is his “sin”. Maybe even too honest to his own detriment.

 

In the original post though, I think you only mentioned that the sum total of all urges was larger, not that they were more intense on average.

What I'm saying is, imagine he crosses paths with 100 girls and finds you more attractive than every one of them. Even so, the simple novelty of 100 people might add up to a bigger number, despite all of them being weaker.

And if both of you commit to a certain diet, his mouth would probably water when he walked by a this or that food vendor. It's pointless to blame anyone for that. It's not something humans can control. All we control is what we do about temptation. Maybe that's sad, but that's life.

 

Looking past the other stuff, failing to find each other marriagiable after 3 years of dating plus living together, that's a good reason to be concerned. You can say that's all just fake outdated social constructs and things have changed now, yet here you are. Why have sex with a guy who you'd refuse to marry?

 

@trying33 I read everything. I wish you the best for you and for your boyfriend as well. No one deserves to pass through such problems.

From what I've read, these thoughts he has are invasive, he doesn't want them, he could even hate them, but they appear nonetheless. It's like attraction itself became an enemy. I'd give some help if I could, but I'm 18 and inexperienced with relationships.

 

Those urges are normal. As a recovering addict myself, I never had a specific kink when it came to porn. I watched whatever was the flavor of the day for me. I would also check out other women and imagine what sex with them would be like etc. This is all part of an addict mindset. If he is truly quitting PMO, this should go away eventually.

So this also sounds similar to my addiction. I was triggered by boredom. I would be working, get bored and without having any visual triggers, would actually pick up my phone, open Instagram and look for visual triggers or decide there and then, today I want to look at this type of porn.

This is the thing about porn - the porn industry, more often than not, uses beautiful and seemingly flawless individuals in the industry. In reality, most of us have beer bellies, skin conditions and cellulite because that's just the way it is. He is so used to seeing all these people who society deems "perfect" in the porn that he watches that it completely skews his views on what is "beautiful/attractive" and what is real.

Quitting porn will fix that - a lot of the things you have mentioned about his addiction are so similar to mine that I had to check to make sure it was not my wife who started this thread

Support him as much as you can and become his accountability partner. He needs support because this addiction is hard to kick. I have been addicted for 24 years and I am only now changing this because I owe it to myself and I owe it to my wife.

 

Without intending to be rude, in this point, on a very strictly physical attraction sense, yes, you are off base.

He might find you really REALLY attractive, but he might just find another woman more attractive in that sense, but that shouldn't make you feel bad, or insecure, because although looks are important, if he sticks with you is not just for the looks, but for the whole of you as a person.

You simply cannot control the extent of purely and merely physical attraction someone has for other people, you have this idea that you should be one he is attracted the most to, well, he is certainly attracted to you, but unless you are a goddess and the most beautiful and attractive woman on the planet above any personal preference of any man, it just never gonna happen.

The fact that he is attracted to you on ways that vastly outweight physical attraction and he is commited to you, is something you shouldn't just disregard, as it is more important.

He is still physically attracted to you, he is just being VERY honest, by saying there is obviously some other women out there that he finds more physically attractive.

 

@trying33 Just my thoughts and experience:
Is it normal? Yes. Is it acceptable? That’s up to you.
We all have to reign in our sexual behavior to some degree (or face consequences) and we get to decide what we accept in a partner.
Is he masturbating??
For me, I just don’t think that masturbation and a relationship can coexist without big challenges. I like the idea of only having sexual pleasure with my partner (not my hand!), but having masturbated daily for many years, I think that even having the odd wank every few months could really set me back and reignite that old behavior. Many years of masturbating will take many years to rewire. I haven’t done it for 4+ months and “rarely” in the last few years, but when I think of sexual relief my first thought is still my hand rather than my partner

 

Ok so I just have to say this thought process is so toxic. "Real love is about active commitment for someone, not getting constant sexual urges. You are not likely to ever find a guy who feels that way around you after living together 3 years, and as you said, your looks are likely declining soon, so securing such a guy (if one exists) would be increasingly more difficult."

I have been married for 13yrs and living with my husband for 15yrs. He absolutely finds me extremely sexually attractive and he constantly has "sexual urges" for me. I just turned 36 and he (38) tells me often I just get sexier and more beautiful every year.

Do NOT get married just to have him "committed by law" to you. Don't get married because your "clock is ticking" to have kids! Do NOT get married because "your looks are declining" (puke)! Marry because you love him and do not want to live without him. I also say do not marry him until he has his addiction under control. You are in a good spot right now to at least know about his addiction before committing to marrying him. He also sounds like he is trying to be very honest with you which I believe is one of the hardest parts of the addiction for many men. Most of us spouses weren't so lucky and didn't find out until years into our marriage. Don't get me wrong I would still have married my husband had I known about his addiction BUT I would have liked to have had the opportunity to make that choice knowing the authentic him. This addiction is a long and hard (no pun intended) road to recovery. It is not a straight path and it will take many turns and there will (most likely) be relapses along the way. BUT it's worth it! I would not change this chapter of our story. It has brought us closer than we ever could have imagined. It has made us both really dig deep and find ourselves and each other. We are fighting together and that is so powerful. I love my husband with all my heart and I know how much he loves me by his actions and words.

Please take marriage seriously and don't jump in because of some imaginary clock. If you don't marry for the right reasons you will only grow to resent one another. Bringing children into it will only exacerbate that resentment. Know in heart that you want that man for the rest of your life. Believe that you can trust him. Believe that he is safe and that he is all in with you. If you feel you have concerns you need addressed then seek professional help that can help you two communicate what is holding you back.

Good luck and I wish you both the best!