I Warned My Girlfriend About How Her Side Hustle Would Change Our Sex Life. Well, I Was Right.

How to Do It Photo illustration by Slate. Photo by sibway /iStock/Getty Images Plus. Sign up for the Slatest to get the most insightful analysis, criticism, and advice out there, delivered to your inbox daily. How to Do It is Slate’s sex advice column. Have a question? Send it to Jessica and Rich here. It’s anonymous! Dear How to Do It, My serious girlfriend of four years lost her project management job. So she decided to start stripping to pay off her credit card debt that, unbeknownst to me, had exceeded $40,000. Originally, she wasn’t thrilled at the idea but thought the money was good. I expressed my concerns immediately about how this could/may affect our relationship. After discussing it, she started stripping, and ever since, I have felt no sexual desire from her, whereas before she started stripping, we had an amazing sex life. I have tried to talk to her, but she gets angry every time I start to bring up how I feel. How can I fix this? —Can We Get What We Had Back? Dear Can We Get What We Had Back, I believe the story you’ve told here is accurate according to what you paid attention to and perceived. I’m also certain that you’re missing a lot of important information, and you’re going to need some of that information to shift the state your relationship is in. Where did the credit card debt come from? Whether the main source was stress shopping, medical bills, helping family, using credit cards to keep up with student loans, or using them to keep up with a shared lifestyle that didn’t quite fit in your girlfriend’s budget, the answer is probably pointing to a big stressor on either her, your relationship, or both. What was the rest of the context of your girlfriend’s decision to work as a stripper? What did she previously know about stripping, and what beliefs was she exposed to and had herself about that profession before entering it? And what was your girlfriend initially not thrilled by, and what exactly do you mean by that phrase? Did she come into the conversation expressing anxiety about aspects of the job she anticipated finding irritating or challenging? Unpredictable earnings, physical toll, schedule, constant negotiation and defense of boundaries, and increased safety procedures all come to mind. Does stripping conflict with her own values and morals, or simply ideas of how her career was going to progress, in a way that felt necessary but chafes at her? Or was this more of a response to a strongly negative initial reaction on your part, along the lines of a “I’m not thrilled about it either”? Any of the things I’m asking about could be a big part of why a person might feel significantly reduced sexual desire in this scenario. If you skipped over talking through them, she probably feels unheard and resentful for good reason, and that can absolutely shut down all sexual and romantic desire. The subject you immediately jumped to was fears about how this might affect your relationship (I’m trying so hard to be charitable here and err on the side of assuming that you were referring to aspects in addition to amorousness), and what you keep trying to broach is your feelings around a change in your sex life and the amount of desire you feel from her. To put it really bluntly, do you see your girlfriend as a whole, complex person who is your partner in life? Or as a source of emotional and sexual gratification? If it’s the latter, break up—not just to set her free, but to spare yourself the long process of her realizing, and becoming more and more fed up with being asked to perform the same tasks she is compensated for at work in a more fraught and unpaid environment. Because she will experience those realizations, and she is now in a professional community that has seen five thousand versions of this story and will share every horror story ending and warning sign that showed up along the way for her protection. If you see her as a partner, apologize for your own actions here and start doing the work of understanding all the things you’re frustrated by yourself that go beyond what you’ve laid out in your letter. Accruing $40,000 of debt without the other half of a four-year-long significant relationship knowing is a problem. You can’t build a stable life with someone who hides financial issues of that magnitude. There’s a big issue with how the two of you communicate with each other. And I have a hunch that you have some very different perspectives on women’s bodies, sexuality, and labor that need to be at least mutually understood. These things may be resolvable. Getting there will not be easy. You might find that you’re unable to find enough overlap in one or more areas to make the relationship work. To make the attempt, you’re going to have to get past all of the reasons that your initial focus was how your girlfriend’s stripping is ruining your super sexy sex life. Please keep questions short (<150 words), and don‘t submit the same question to multiple columns. We are unable to edit or remove questions after publication. Use pseudonyms to maintain anonymity. Your submission may be used in other Slate advice columns and may be edited for publication. Dear How to Do It, I have what I believe is called a champagne problem. My boyfriend is incredibly generous and giving, and as a result, I’m having just a fabulous time! However, due to a cocktail of antidepressants and absurd amounts of life stress, he often has challenges getting things going and maintaining his erection. He’s been taking medication for it, but it hasn’t consistently worked, and this is a source of distress for him. He’s a great communicator, and I want to be as reassuring as possible without being patronizing because, believe me when I say this, there is nothing to be patronizing about. My concern is I’ve started to get in my own head a little bit about my attractiveness or lack thereof, and that is the opposite of reassuring. What are some of your favorite solutions for getting out of your head so I don’t let my own issues keep me from empathizing and being present to an unquestionably good time? —Champagne Supernova (she/her) Dear Champagne Supernova, If your boyfriend is open to sexual interaction that focuses on all the possibilities that don’t require an erect penis, that’s an area that the two of you can explore, which might smooth the path to erotic engagement and enable both of you to receive and express sexual desire for each other more often. Given that the medication he’s taking isn’t always effective, and you suspect significant amounts of stress are a major factor, he may still have a hard time being in the moment and feeling that desire at all. So this is very much worth a try, but by no means guaranteed, and looking at ways you can support your confidence in your attractiveness by yourself is also important. When you’re questioning your attractiveness, consider what exactly it is you’re questioning. If there’s an aesthetic component, put effort into what you appreciate in yourself when you look in the mirror. Regularly take a few seconds to notice the parts of your body that you feel best about. Keep dressing, accessorizing, or doing your makeup in the ways that support you feeling good about how you look. It’s easy to the point of oversimplification to tell you to dress for yourself—we all live in societies where how we present ourselves is part of how others perceive us, and most of us care at least a little bit about whether our partners are happy with our general appearance—but the more your foundation of knowing you look nice comes from your own evaluation and your own tastes, the more you can be the main source of that feeling. Look beyond appearances, too. All the other qualities that add up to attractiveness are far more durable in the grand scheme of a lifetime. The kindness, compassion, and gratitude that you demonstrate extending to your partner in what you’ve written here are widely attractive, and I encourage you to extend each of those to yourself. What of your personality and mind do you love about yourself? What do you know your boyfriend loves? What are the specifics of what you’ve accomplished, worked to build within yourself, and exhibit in how you move through the world and interact with others that you’re proud of? Spend time noticing those aspects, as well—when someone comments positively on them, let yourself feel your reaction as you thank them. When you have downtime, and are thinking back on your day, let yourself acknowledge your own value. It may also help to consider what, other than sex appeal, you find attractive in others as a way to broaden your idea of what attractive means when applied to yourself. If you find yourself feeling stuck, a therapist can support you with this as well. As difficult as erectile dysfunction can be for the person who is experiencing it, there’s also often an effect on partners, and there’s no shame in seeking out a place to talk it through. These subjects can be delicate, but if you have friends who you trust to maintain your (and your boyfriend’s) privacy, it can be really helpful to share these difficulties. Hearing how other people have dealt with similar feelings usually helps underline how common it is to doubt something about ourselves, and might point you toward more practical tips. Share Your Story With How to Do It! Readers often have great suggestions for our letter writers, occasionally disagree with a point our How to Do It writers make, or simply want to provide some additional advice. Each month, Jessica and Rich will be replying to some of these comments and suggestions from readers. Write to us! Dear How to Do It, I am 19 and heading into my sophomore year of college. I have never had sex or even kissed someone. I’m quite OK with that, because I am on the asexual and aromantic spectrum, and I haven’t really been interested in sex or dating. However, during my first year of college, I met someone that I’ll call “Lily.” Lily and I hung out for several hours at a party during the first semester of last year, and I really enjoyed talking to her! We’ve spent a fair amount of time together since then, and I think I’ve developed a crush on her. I know for a fact that my feelings for her are different than what I feel for my best friend back home. Lily and I have also had very heavy conversations about mental health. I have found this to be very cathartic, and she has been the one to initiate each time, so I think she feels the same way. But now I’m worried about exploring my crush further. I don’t want her to feel like she’s just an experiment or a phase for me. I want to make her feel loved and happy! But as I said, I have zero experience with sex or dating, and I also have no idea how long these feelings will even last. There’s a lot I would need to figure out for the first time if we entered into a relationship like that, and I feel like it’s unfair to put all of that on her. Is it? I’ve been happy without sex and romance up until now, and I like being her friend. Would it just be better to wait for the crush to go away? —Should Have Messed Around in High School (they/them) Dear Should Have Messed Around in High School, A lot of people your age are or would be figuring out sexuality and dating for the first time. Presuming that Lily is close to your age, I’m confident that there are aspects of both that she is still figuring out, as well. You would be muddling through it together, which is such a common experience that it’s simply a part of life. You can express a crush, and while the other person might have no interest, or reciprocate and hope it leads to the two of you having a sexually active, long-term romantic relationship, neither of you has to sign up for anything you don’t want to. You can each broach the subject of taking things further, or of stopping what you’re currently doing, at any time. Think of sex and dating as a pair of dimmer switches where you can set the intensity of each according to what you’re both OK with and want. Your crush might fade, and it might remain or increase. You get to choose whether you want to wait and see whether it decreases, or speak up now. You can also start a conversation with something like, “You know I’m on the ace and aro spectrums. I like being your friend, and want to make you feel loved and happy. Part of my feelings involve a crush, which I have no idea what to think, much less do about,” and see how she responds. This sentiment is common: to express that you’re having a feeling and are curious about where it might go. We meet people, we see how things develop, we find out how they feel about us. Sometimes this leads us to fantastic, lifelong friendships. Other times this leads to life-changing flings we lose touch with. Still more, it leads to romantic relationships. And, yes, sometimes expressing our emotions changes the relationship in a way that ends what we had without presenting an opportunity to grow into more. What none of us will ever know with any certainty is what would have happened if we’d done something differently. This question—what if I’d made a different choice?—and the impossibility of knowing the answer are as much a part of human life as having bones or a brain. To decide what would be the better choice here, it’s usually helpful to weigh what amount of regret you’d feel about losing the friendship against what amount of wondering you’d do if you never speak up. If you get to a point where that choice is clear, which might be related to the intensity of your crush going down to a level that isn’t relevant or up to a degree that means you’d be, left with a lot of what-ifs or the crush itself is interfering with your friendship, I’d broach the subject. And there’s plenty of possible outcomes where your feelings aren’t reciprocated, an open talk clears the air, and your friendship continues as it was or sturdier than before. —Jessica More Advice From Slate This might sound odd, but I’m a 35-year-old woman, and I just found out that the female screaming orgasms you see in movies aren’t actually typical… That’s because I’m lucky enough to orgasm in that way. Occasionally, I’ll have an enjoyable orgasm that’s a little more restrained. Advice Sex