January 2, 2013

More than a thousand people showed up for a recent Savage Love Live event at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. It goes without saying that the students at UW submitted more questions than I could answer in 90 minutes. As promised, Madison, here are some bonus answers to questions that I didn’t get to during our time together…

Can an open relationship work if it’s this type: dating two people, separately, both serious, neither relationship is the “primary” one?

Define “work.”

Most people define “work”—in the context of a relationship—as “a loving, lasting, long-term relationship that ends only with the death of one or both parties.” But I define “work” as “a loving relationship that makes the people in it happy, whether that relationship lasts for the rest of their lives or whether both parties—or all parties, if we’re talking about a poly or open scenario—decide at some point to end the relationship amicably.” So yes, I do think the relationship you’ve described can work. Whether you’ll be in this relationship—or these relationships—for the rest of your life remains to be seen. You may wind up getting more serious about one person, or you may move on from both and find someone else—or a couple of someone elses—but if you’re happy right now, and if they’re happy right now, then your relationship is working.

Savage Love got its start in Madison: I wrote my first columns on a computer in the back office of Four Star Fiction and Video, where I worked as a night manager/VHS-tape-slingin’ clerk. I did other things—after-hours things—in the storeroom of Four Star. Those things are known only to me, an insanely sexy guy named Roger, and one of the bartenders at the Plaza who one night overheard us talking about the things we’d just done to each other in that storeroom.

Parental rejection of a gay child (which doubles a gay kid’s already quadrupled risk for suicide), the implication that adoptive parents are less emotionally invested in their children, and that adopted children are loved conditionally—only Ann Coulter could pack so much hatred, malice, and emotional violence into a single “quip.” I’m not sure what I would say to Coulter—I’ve never had the pleasure of meeting her—but I can’t imagine that any child of Coulter’s, gay or straight, would be on speaking terms with her anyway, so I’d probably tell her that her feelings about her hypothetical children are irrelevant.

Something bad is going to happen—believe it. Sooner or later, your new squeeze will do something bad and you’ll get hurt. Hopefully the bad that happens won’t be as bad as the bad you experienced in the past relationships—no physical or emotional violence, no unforgivable betrayals, nothing that requires you to end this relationship—but your new partner will behave badly toward you at some point. And you will behave badly toward your new partner. There’s some bad even in the best relationships. You’ll experience less dread if you can accept that.

Anyone who’s ever been in a successful long-term relationship knows that both parties have to be able to admit that they’re wrong—sometimes you have to admit you’re wrong even when you know you’re not. So the answer is “no.”

We’ve covered this before: Whipped cream is NOT A SEX TOY. Two minutes after you put it on your nipples—or two minutes after you fill your belly button or ass-crack or armpits with it—you begin to smell like baby puke. It’s not sexy. And it’s not like you’re not getting enough dairy in your diets, Wisconsinites. Save the whipped cream for your ice cream, and if you want to lick something off your partner, work up a sweat and lick that off ’em.

Remote-control vibrating butt plugs, of course, each one set to go off at a different time.

Yes. (Sometimes both at once!)

“Dan has bisexual friends, and I am one of them,” says Eric Olalde, a yogi, a hottie, and a close friend who happens to be bisexual. “He has seen me shift between male and female partners at different stages of my life and has even made brunch for me and my ex-girlfriend. Dan has never shown me anything but support and true friendship.”

Withholding information at your request—holding that info back until you’re ready for it—doesn’t make your partner a liar. It makes him a considerate partner. Tell him to do what he needs to do, but to spare you the details.

Okay! Thanks for a great event, Madison, and I hope to come back soon. We have one more letter this week. It wasn’t a question asked at the talk I gave in Madison, but it does have a Madison connection…

Now for a quick medical comment: I agree with your suggestion that doctors give “flared-base” advice to patients who use anal toys. But there’s a simple way for a person who didn’t get that advice to remove an object that is stuck in the rectum. They should squat—do a deep knee bend—stay still, relax, breathe, and voila! The item will pop out onto the floor. No probing or uncomfortable procedure necessary. After learning about this technique from a very wise woman physician (who recalled the history of women giving birth in that position and applied the same principle to relaxing the rectal muscles), I used this with young-adult patients who would come to my clinic in an embarrassing predicament. The result was simple and comfortable for both patient and physician. Feel free to pass this advice on to others who might benefit!
Best Advice Simplifies Exit

Thanks for sharing, BASE!