Why Is My Boyfriend Choosing Porn Over Me?

Hi Doctor,

My apologies as I’m new here but I do need some advice. Recently I had a cyst near my vaginal area and had it drained and due to this I wasn’t able to have sexual intercourse for a short amount of time, as it was suggested by my OBGYN. During that time my boyfriend started watching porn, (he informed me) and I was ok at first as I wasn’t able to have sex at the time. During this stage our sexual relationship has decreased drastically.

When I first tried to have intercourse after my wait time was up, it’s like he didn’t want to as there was little to no effort to even try, but he was complaining prior that he wanted to.

Time passes by and we finally start having sex again but over and over again he is unable to ejaculate. I notice he closes the door to “use the bathroom” for a long period of time. And obviously I can tell it’s to watch porn. I can feel the relationship deteriorating.. what should I do..?

Feeling Left Out

I get a lot of letters from folks who worry about their partners’ porn habits and who want to draw a line between watching porn to changes in their sex lives, and… well, honestly, more often than not, the problem isn’t porn. A lot of times, it’s not even a symptom, so much as just being the most visible and obvious thing, and one that’s easy to latch onto as the cause.

But more often than not, the issues lie elsewhere, and it’s hard to say for sure without digging into the problem.

There’re a lot of possible causes here that could explain the changes in your sex life and your boyfriend’s behavior, and they may not all be entirely obvious.

Before we get into it, I want to be clear: none of this means that this is your “fault” or that you’re somehow to blame. A lot of these possibilities are more about his issues, not something that you’ve done wrong. So don’t take any of this as me assigning blame as much as just trying to run down potential causes or contributing factors.

One potential cause – something that comes up fairly often with new parents, in fact – is that some guys get squicked out about issues surrounding their partners vaginas or vulvas. A lot of men, for example, find it hard to be sexual with their partners for a period of time after witnessing them give birth. It doesn’t matter that hey, that’s all part of the mammalian-sex-having aspect of the human experience – in their minds, making the switch from “mostly used for mutual sexual pleasure” to “place my child came from” does a whammy on their heads and they find it hard to switch back.

This could well be an issue for him. Having a cyst – and the medical intervention required to treat it – could have messed with his mental image of your body and of sex with you and now he can’t quite make the image of having to drain the cyst out of his head.

Another possibility is that the timing of your having the cyst and having to abstain from sex was coincidental and unrelated. It’s possible that his feelings or sexual attraction to you have been changing and the period of abstinence from sex was an opportunity for him to not have to wrestle with it. Now that you’re back in action, he’s forced to deal with the lack of interest but without wanting to talk to you about it.

It could be that right now what he wants isn’t sex ­– that is, the holistic sexual experience of intimacy, arousal, foreplay, etc. – but just orgasm. Depending on how long you two had to avoid sexual contact, he may have decided that the simplicity of “wham, bam, thank you glans” is what he wants and he doesn’t think about how this affects you.

Or it may be that the kinds of sex you’re having wasn’t or isn’t the kind of sex he prefers, and the time off made that gulf much more evident.

Now, I’d have a lot of questions about what happened during that period of enforced abstinence and what’s going on now, especially regarding his behavior. Is sex the only change, or has the level of all forms of intimacy between you changed? Are you not having other forms of affectionate contact, other forms of intimacy and expression of love or connection with each other?

While you were having to take a break from sex, were you still cuddling, engaging in non-sexual forms of touch (like massage, hugging, curling up together on the couch, and so on)? Did you, or he, or both of you decide to pull back on physical intimacy so as to not create a situation where either he felt “lead on” with no “payoff”? Or perhaps you felt like any sort of physical intimacy would lead to his making a fuss about how he couldn’t get off and that made you (rather understandably) feel like shit?

Knowing the answer to these could help provide insight and context to what’s been happening and why.

I’m also curious if you’ve talked with him about this and asked about where his head’s at. Has it come up at all? Has he avoided the topic all together, given you ambivalent answers or doesn’t seem to know why? Has he been acting like this is something that bothers him too? Has he been at all empathetic and understanding about how this is making you feel? What, if anything, has he done to try to change things?

The only person who can really know what’s up is your boyfriend and if he’s not telling… well, that’s an issue.

At the end of the day, this isn’t a sex issue so much as a communication issue; you’re feeling hurt and like you’re being abandoned and he’s feeling… however he’s feeling. If you two aren’t able to communicate things and work towards a mutually satisfactory resolution, that’s going to create more stress points and fractures in your relationship – even more than it’s creating now.

I think there are two things you should do right now. The first is to carve out time with your boyfriend and have an Awkward Conversation about this. Talk about how this is making you feel, about how this is affecting your feelings of connection and intimacy with your boyfriend and how, in an ideal situation, you could see this being fixed and why this would make things better. Then, after you’ve finished, let him have his turn to express how he’s been feeling and what’s been going on with him. If he has some idea of how things could be resolved or addressed, how does he see those happening and how would they change things for the better?

It’s entirely possible that he may not know, or he may not feel like he can be honest about it with you. If you two can’t make the Awkward Conversation work or it’s not helping the situation, it could be worth your time to see a sex-positive couple’s counselor. Having a third party to help mediate and facilitate the conversation can be helpful, especially if you or he can’t find the words to express how either of you are feeling. It may also be useful if you have separate sessions as well, if he feels like there’re things he can’t say to your face or with you in the room.

Getting to the bottom of the issue ­– especially from his perspective – is going to be important. Once you two can at least understand where the other is coming from, you can either work towards fixing this and repairing your connection… or you can decide if this relationship no longer meets your needs.

Hopefully this is going to be the former, and this will just be a speed-bump on an otherwise fulfilling and satisfying relationship. But if it’s something that you and he can’t (or won’t) fix? Then it’s better for the both of you to wind things down and move on to partners who are a better fit for your needs.

Good luck.

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Dear Dr. NerdLove:

I have a girlfriend whom I’m not sure if I’m in love with but I really like her. One of our mutual friends told her I am in love with her and she likes me but she is not ready for that commitment. Neither am I. I don’t know how to take this back because we’ve only been dating for a month. How do I talk to her about it or take the ‘I love you’ back? –

Very Confused and Anxious

Honestly, VCA, I want to commend you for knowing how you feel and also recognizing that it’s too early for you to make any declarations of love. That’s some pretty solid self-awareness and emotional intelligence. At one month in, you don’t know each other well enough to say if this is love or just the rush and excitement of a new relationship. Even when you’re dealing with someone you’ve known for a while, there’s a difference between knowing them as a friend and knowing them in the context of a romantic relationship. So hey, good on you for being aware of this.

But here’s the thing: there’s nothing for you to take back here, VCA, because you didn’t say anything. Your friend – for whatever reason – took it upon themselves to say it in your name. You didn’t ask them to do this, and it sounds like you didn’t express that you were in love with your girlfriend to them.

Quite frankly, it sounds to me like your friend was out of line for doing so, inserting themselves in your relationship where they had no business being. I don’t know if they thought they were being helpful and trying to facilitate something, if they’re just a busybody or they’re a habitual line-stepper but this was not cool of them and you should say so.

But first, you’d better to clear things up with your girlfriend. I’d recommend that you get together with her (in person, preferably) and clear the air. Tell her “Hey, I understand $MUTUAL went and told you I said I was in love with you. I really like you, I love what we have right now and I could see myself getting there eventually, but I’m not there yet. I don’t know why $MUTUAL did that, but I think you and I are both on the same page about it being too soon for that… how are you feeling about this?”

Meanwhile, I’d also say it’s a good time to take your friend aside and read them the riot act. Whether they had good intentions or not, they didn’t have the right to act on your behalf like that or to get involved in your relationship the way they did – especially since it wasn’t true and had the potential of messing things up by giving your girlfriend the wrong idea.

If they want to keep being your friend, they need to back off and chill the fuck out and not be so “helpful” without your direct and specific request for their assistance. They definitely shouldn’t take it upon themselves to get involved without running it by you first, especially with a relationship as new as this one.

If they apologize, then they can also go to your girlfriend and apologize to her for sticking their nose in. If they don’t… well, that’s a problem, and it may be time to reconsider how much you want them in your life.

Because at the end of the day? This isn’t on you, this is on them, and if they’re going to go fucking around in other people’s relationships, then they no longer get the privilege of having access to you or your friendship.

Good luck.

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This post was previously published on Doctornerdlove.com and is republished on Medium.

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