You're listening to the Savage Lovecast, Dan Savage's sex and relationship show for grown-ups. If you're under 18, get out of here, young'un. If you're stuck in a relationship quandary Or if you're looking for sexual harmony In the grand scheme of things, what I'm about to talk about is trivial. I've also talked about it before.
But unlike, say, ordering a drink with ice in Europe and getting a single, sad, tiny, half-melted cube of ice at the bottom of your glass, another pet peeve of mine and a very trivial one, this particular peeve... intersects with my portfolio here at the Savage Lovecast, which is helping people strengthen relationships that are good but could be better and exit relationships that are not so good and won't get better.
Yes, I am going to play whack-a-mole with another credulous piece about the non-trend that is micro-cheating. This one at CBS News written by Sarah. Moniosco. Forgive me, Sarah. I am sure I just mispronounced your last name. The piece is headlined, What is Microcheating? Relationship experts share what to know and how to prevent it.
My first objection is the story's placement. Why is it in the health section? Micro-cheating, which is not a thing, does not cause cancer or cavities or cataracts. There's not an unhelpful bullshit section at the CBS News website. But unless and until some poor woman is rushed to the ER because her boyfriend was a little too nice to a barista, that's where a story like this belongs. Sarah asks the experts to define micro-cheating for her.
Quoting from the piece, micro-cheating is the small behaviors that can sometimes be hard to pinpoint or prove that indicate there are boundary violations in a relationship, said Molly Buritz, a clinical psychologist specializing in couples therapy. The piece goes on. Micro cheating can involve liking photos of attractive people on social media or interactions on a day-to-day basis with people in real life.
For example, Birds continued, revealing too much personal information to someone that you see regularly or intense flirting with someone at work but never quite acting on it. Okay, so. Revealing personal information to someone you see regularly, not okay. If you must blurt out your social security number to someone, blurt it out to the person sitting next to you on the bus that you're never going to see again. And remember,
When your partner flirts without acting on it, you should regard that as cheating, as a violation of your monogamous commitment. Or, hear me out, you could regard that...
That thing your partner did not do as something your partner did not do. And then instead of interpreting what your partner did not do as proof that your partner... did do that terrible thing you could interpret it as proof that your partner i don't know honored the monogamous commitment they made to you and honoring that commitment mattered most
when they were tempted, when they could have violated it, but didn't. Look, I get it. Flirting can be risky and it can make a person anxious to think about their partner flirting with other people behind their back. And that anxiety is...
Not irrational. If you're married and monogamous and you flirt with someone and you know it's wrong and you don't intend it to go any farther, you may wind up accidentally flirting with someone who doesn't care that you're unavailable or with someone who's turned on.
by the fact that you're unavailable. And that person could wind up throwing themselves at you, making it even harder for you to resist the temptation they already represent. In general, if you have a hard time resisting temptation, do not lead yourself into temptation. And obviously flirting with someone else in front of your partner, if you know that annoys your partner, that's not good. That's inconsiderate at best, cruel assholery at worst.
And I would argue that if you're with someone who demonstrates how little your feelings matter to them by flirting with other people in front of you, Which does not mean looking at. Looking at is not flirting. If you're with someone who demonstrates how little your feelings matter to them by flirting with other people in front of you and they know that you hate that.
Which not everybody does. Some people like it when they're partnered with other people in front of them. But if you hate it, eh. But when there's cruelty and inconsideration, yeah, you should exit that relationship before that person has a chance to finally, actually, really... cheat on you. Zooming out for a second, reading this piece, I smell a racket, a grift, a con. CBS News talks to a bunch of couples counselors who seem to be drumming up business.
For couples counselors? Hey, there's nothing wrong with your relationship yet, but I can fix that. Yeah, no. We don't buy fire extinguishers from arsonists because it encourages them.
In the same spirit, don't take relationship advice from experts who... seem to want to convince you that when something hasn't happened, that something not happening somehow proves that something did happen and that therefore not happening is a problem in your relationship where that thing that didn't happen isn't allowed.
Finally, I want to say, I just want to beg lifestyle reporters who are assigned stories about micro-cheating, please, please talk to at least one expert who thinks it's bullshit. We are out here and we are not hard to find. Okay, a couple other quick things before we get to the calls. Loving the protests at Tesla dealerships. And they're obviously having an impact. Just look at Tesla's cratering stock price and the whining about it. But people, please do not vandalize Tesla's.
The person whose car you're thinking about keying or setting on fire may have purchased that car before Elon went full 70s Bond villain, and that car owner may not be in a position right now, financially, to get themselves a new car. And it turns out there's no need to vandalize one of those in-cell Caminos. Literally every Cybertruck ever sold was recalled last week because they're falling the fuck apart on their own.
No assistance required. You don't have to vandalize something that is self-vandalizing. And if you're looking for a really good outlet for your... anger and rage about what is being done to our country and our planet and our democracy. There are going to be protests all over the United States on April 5th to find out about the protest planned in your community or to create a protest and plan one. For your community, go to handsoff2025.com.
All right, a little business before we start the show. Hump, my amateur porn film festival, playing this weekend in Vancouver, BC, at the Rio Theater. Tickets for the 2025 event are going fast at the Rio. Get yours now, Vancouver, at humpfilmfest.com. And we have Fuck First shirts in our merch store to match your Fuck First coffee mugs. Check out all the shirts, hats, mugs, and more.
at savage.love slash merch. All right, coming up on today's show, on the micro, tons of your Q's, lots of my A's, and on the magnum, actor, author, comedian Jeffrey Self is here to talk with me about his new book. self-sabotage, and to try his hand or his mouth at giving a little sex advice with me. All that coming up on today's show. This episode is brought to you by Dame Products, sex toys designed by women for women.
For 20% off your first order, go to dame.com and use offer code savage20. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com slash savage and get on your way to being your best self. This episode is brought to you by Beam's Dream Cocoa Powder, a delicious drink packed with all natural ingredients. that help improve sleep. For a limited time, Beam is offering my listeners up to 40% off. Go to shopbeam.com slash savage and use code savage at checkout. Hiya, Dan.
So the other day, I was home with my two sick kids, and in an effort to try to keep busy, I decided to clean and organize a closet where I came across some of my wife's old journals. And against my better judgment, I cracked one open just randomly and started reading. And I was absolutely enthralled with it. And I proceeded to read the whole thing and actually read one more.
And I know that this is a terrible breach of trust and an invasion of her privacy, which I really feel bad about. The thing is, is it really gave me a deeper understanding of her. And honestly, I fell in love with her in a deeper way. And my desire for her actually just skyrocketed. It's almost like this new relationship energy.
even though we've now been together for about 16 years. The thing is, is we've never had the greatest communication, and especially around sex. She's had a lot of hang-ups around that. So in this journal, she's able to just let it all go. And I was able to really see a glimpse into her mind that I've never gotten to before. and it just it's crazy yeah it made me really appreciate her more yeah really just have a crazy new desire for her
So it sucks because obviously it's not a good way to go about it. I know she's got a bunch of other ones and I'm dying to read them, but I'm not. Should I tell her that I... snooped and found some of these and read them and that i do appreciate the things i found do i let it be do i i mean how do i turn this into a more positive that I think this really can be for our relationship and our communication and for...
especially our sex life. There's even one part where it almost felt like it was written straight to me about some of her sexual desires, about what she would want done, which she's never told me before. And it was just this... New insight that I just loved, and I don't know. I'm grappling with the shame of me snooping and doing this, but also with the positive that's come from it. Yeah, I don't know. What do you think I should do?
You say these were old journals. So, there's no guarantee that she feels now the same way she felt then. If she wrote these things down... in her erotic life, about her erotic imagination, things about you and her attraction and her desire, 14 years ago, it's possible she doesn't feel that way anymore about you.
or about anything she could feel very differently now than she did. She could be a very different person now than she was when she wrote these things down. There is only one way for you to find out. which is to tell her. Now, in most cases, when people come to me and they've discovered something because they snooped intentionally or stumbled over something.
It can be hard to pretend not to know something that you know, but in most of those cases where somebody is in a position where they have to. pretend not to know something that they know or go confront the person that they know this thing about now that they didn't know before they snooped. It's a bad thing. Somebody finds out somebody was cheating. Somebody finds out about a bunch of credit card debt or something.
that was being actively or passively hidden from them. And it's a huge negative. And what's interesting about your question and your predicament is this is potentially a huge positive. She may be angry at first. I think most people would, but I think most people who can be honest with themselves and would be able to project themselves into your experience.
stumbling over these journals should be able to wrap their heads around how tempting it would be to read those journals and admit that they probably would have read them had they found them themselves. And if your wife can get there, then maybe you can have a conversation about what it is you read, what it awakened in you, the desires it stirred in you, and maybe good will come of this.
It's also possible that something awful will come of this, that bad will come of this, that you will have read this and it would have been true 14 years ago, or it was true 14 years ago, or a decade ago. five years ago and it isn't true now. So it's hardly possible that your hopes have been raised and other things have been raised reading these journals that your wife isn't.
in the same place, feeling the same things, wanting the same things from sex or from you now that she did that when she wrote these things down. So there's danger here, not just the danger of your wife. feeling violated by this invasion of her privacy, which is exactly what this was, but also your expectations, your hopes having been raised, and then potentially being dashed.
But I think the risk is worth it. I really do. Even if there's pain on her side at the privacy violation, even if then there's potentially pain on your side, because... You hope to reconnect with your wife sexually after having read these things, and that may not be possible. The upside of having a radically honest conversation with each other about what you mean to each other.
including the things you might need to apologize to each other about, not just this privacy violation, but other things that you guys may have stepped around in your marriage over the last 16 years that a conversation like this could open the floodgates to that sort of... conversation where it's not escalating conflict, but it's moving on from acknowledging other things that have been problems that you're sad about and diffusing or unpacking them together in a constructive way.
There's upsides here, even if you don't wind up fucking the shit out of each other as a result of reading your wife's fantasies from however many years ago, your wife's innermost erotic thoughts from however many years ago. Even if you don't reconnect in the way you might hope right now that you could reconnect, there's still potential here for you and your wife to connect. And I think the risk is worth the potential reward.
Whether there's a lot of fucking or not. Hey Dan, I am a 23 year old pan trans woman living in Madison, Wisconsin. calling to ask about solving things with a trans guy that I ghosted about a year ago. We were childhood friends, and he came out as trans in poly in college. After ending a long-term relationship and starting my transition, I confided in him about my struggles with gender identity. We slept together soon after and he suggested that we could be friends with benefits.
I agreed, but I made it clear that I couldn't commit to a serious relationship due to my job and just how I was emotionally after my breakup. over time he started to cross my boundaries um he was pushing for more frequent phone calls watching movies online together at one point he drunkenly called me and
tried to, and I guess did, convince me to be his primary partner in polyamory when I did not understand what that meant or what it would entail. The way he described it just felt like an extension of our current friends with benefits situation he kept doing things that made me more and more uncomfortable he would introduce me as his quote trans girlfriend in public and it didn't really seem like
He understood my struggles with dysphoria or internalized transphobia, or he didn't want to talk about it at the very least. He made me feel like... I was being trans wrong or he wanted me to fit in some certain stereotype that I just wasn't. Things came to a head when I had a panic attack at his place. and his reaction felt very selfish to me. He was more concerned about our plans than me, and he made, I guess, intimate advances despite my obvious distress in the moment.
I left that night as soon as I could, got a bus ticket home, and I ghosted him. I know that ghosting isn't the right thing to do. And I think if I could go back and change things I would, but in the moment I felt so taken advantage of and overwhelmed, I felt like he tricked me into a relationship that I never wanted to have. Now a mutual friend has reached out, someone who I also ghosted, and they shared some mean words with me.
And I'm wondering, should I reach out to this trans guy and apologize? Was this just a messy young person experience? What do I do? First, a book recommendation. Conflict is not abuse, overstating harm, community responsibility. and the Duty of Repair by Sarah Schulman. I recommend that you pick that book up and that you read it and maybe you send copies to all of your friends or at least all of the friends that you've ghosted and who ghosted you.
And I recommend the book because I don't understand how you've been abused or taken advantage of here. Your ex-boyfriend asked you to be his primary partner in a polyamorous... relationship. He had one understanding of what that meant or the obligations that that brought. And you had another understanding of what primary partner meant and the obligations.
that it brought. And of course being somebody's primary partner doesn't obligate you to have sex with them whenever they want, especially if you're having a panic attack. that they somehow aren't reacting to appropriately. That's not an obligation of being anybody's primary partner. But what you cite as evidence of not quite abuse, you say tricked. Tricked is the word that you used.
that there's malice there, that he was being malicious or manipulating you into being whatever his idea of a primary partner was, of his girlfriend being his girlfriend. And that there was something underhanded about this. And you also say later, maybe you could just chalk this up to.
Being young, all of you and inexperienced. And that's what I would do. Let go of the word tricked. And maybe I need to let go of the word tricked too. Maybe I'm putting too much weight and emphasis on that. He wasn't right for you. His expectations. Weren't expectations that made you feel comfortable or safe in this relationship. And you exited the relationship. Not in the best way. You ghosted. Ghosting ain't great. You can at least.
send somebody a text message saying that it's out, it's over, you're done. And you can still send that text message. And if it would make you feel better about how this relationship ended, you can send that apology. If you feel an apology is appropriate. You can also say your piece. I was having a panic attack. Did you not realize that you wanted suddenly to have sex with me while I was having a panic attack? That made me feel...
unsafe in the relationship, unsafe with you made me feel not seen in the way I want to be seen by a partner primary or otherwise. And that's why. That's why I left the way that I did. And I'm sorry about how I left, but I hope you can see that I needed to. And then you can send, I guess, an apology text to the person that you ghosted who contacted you about ghosting.
this person as well. And then I think you should all mutually retroactively ghost each other. You should all exit each other's life and you should read conflict is not abuse by Sarah Shulman. Everybody should read it. This episode is brought to you by Dame Products. Dame is a company founded by women for women. Their products are designed by real people and rigorously tested for comfort, innovation, and inclusivity.
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of the trucks and they will send you a free, free vibrator. And my listeners get 20% off your first order at dame.com using code savage 20. Go treat yourself or treat someone you love. And show your support for the Lovecast while you're at it. That's dame.com, code SAVAGE20. Hey, Dan. I have a question that kind of falls under, am I normal? So for the first time. My husband put a blindfold on me. I thought it would be fun. He did too. I was anticipating that what the...
that the fun factor was going to be the anticipation and the mystery of what he was going to forward and what we were going to do together. And that was super fun. But what really surprised me and like knocked my socks off, like emotionally and physically, was when he took the blindfold off while he was fucking me, I had this.
huge wave of emotion I can feel it a little bit just talking about it now just seeing his face suddenly even though I knew the whole time it was him added a dimension of intimacy that I wasn't It pulled the rug out from under me in a really beautiful way, but I was just dumbfounded, like struck. struck with awe. He just looked so beautiful. He looked so gorgeous. I sound so sappy, but he just looked like this king, this prince, this god, this wonderful being.
and formed a great orgasm. But like, is this normal to suddenly feel like you're having a transcendental experience just because you took a blindfold off to see somebody that you've known for years and years? There's a fancy name for the kink that you and your husband just experimented with for the first time, and that's sensory deprivation. To deprive someone of one of their senses, the sense that you were deprived of was sight.
Sensory deprivation can really turn you inside yourself. It can direct focus inward. It can increase your perception of other senses that may be being stimulated well. One sense or many senses are removed from you, taken off the table. Sometimes when people wear blindfolds, their sense of hearing is heightened. Sometimes the sense of touch is heightened.
And that's often what people are after, trying to manipulate their height in other senses by depriving somebody playfully and consensually and temporarily. of different senses, or just one other sense in your case, the sense of sight, there is sometimes a reaction that people have when their sense of whatever that they've been deprived of is restored to them, where there's kind of this rush.
This rush of reconnection, whether it's hearing your partner's voice again or feeling their touch, if you were deprived of the sense of touch, or sight being restored to you, seeing your partner again. that sense being restored to you and it being suddenly filled, you know, sight rushing back in all that light playing off your optic nerves and shooting into your brain.
What you were looking at was this person that the sight of is not rare to you and normal when you had sex almost every other time you've ever had sex with him for. the sight of him to be a continuous feature of the sex. And then suddenly you're having sex and you can't see him. And it's all about how he feels or tastes or what the way he's touching you feels like.
The sensitivity of your skin is your skin rubs against his skin and you're just not focused on sight and you're not in control of your sense of sight. And then he. The man who put the blindfold on you, this man that you love, this man that you take for granted in almost all cases, almost all moments that you spend with him, you take for granted the sight of him. Removes the blindfold and there he is. You can see him again. Now, for a lot of people.
You know, I don't want to say that your experience was not normative. It was normal for you, at least for that first time, for that side of your husband, this man that you love to create this kind of emotional. where it just felt transcendent, this experience, re-experiencing him as a visual object in that moment after enjoying him as a smell.
taste, touch object and being enjoyed by him without him depriving himself of the sense of sight at that moment in the same way. Yeah, it was, it was a big feeling. It gave you big feels and you. got a little weepy and teary. And isn't that great? And I don't think that's something that is going to scale or replicate. I don't think it's anything that everyone is going to feel every time that they do this or the first time that they do this with somebody that they love, but it is a possibility.
And it did it in this particular way for you. Will it do it again in this particular way for you? Will it work this way for you every time? I don't know. Maybe this was one of those. first time experiences where it is intense in part because This reaction was unexpected. And now you may anticipate this reaction, which could take the air out of it. You may even experience, if you try this again, a little disappointment that you don't have.
the exact same reaction or as intense a reaction as you did that very first time. But my God, if you don't, I think that's a sign, not that you should stop incorporating. blindfolds into sex play if it turns you on to do so, but that you should keep experimenting because this was an unexpected benefit of this really junior varsity.
kink exploration play that you and your husband engaged in and wow it kind of you know it blew your mind maybe blindfolds in the future will be pleasurable and enjoyable but not blow your mind quite to the same extent But it proves that you and your husband, after all these years together, can have a new experience together, can try something, can experiment, and wind up.
blowing each other's minds or one of you blowing the other's mind, that is still possible for you to have new experiences and intense experiences in the context of your loving, committed, I assume, because most... relationships are sexually exclusive, sexually exclusive relationship, that there are surprises in store and new places you can go and new experiences that you can have with a long established partner. If you just.
tweak things. So yeah, thanks for calling and thanks for sharing that amazing experience. And I hope you and your husband continue to have amazing experiences, whether this amazing experience can be recreated. Or you have to continue to play and experiment and find new ways to have amazing experiences together. Thanks for the call. This show is sponsored by BetterHelp.
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Hey Dan, 30s cis bi woman calling from the Northeast. So my college ex and I have stayed in contact and friends over the years despite us breaking up when we graduated over 10 years ago. Admittedly, most of this contact has been initiated by him either in the form of an out-of-the-blue phone call after not hearing from him for over six months or a cute postcard sent from wherever he was in the world at the time.
We've had a lot in common over the years and have even lived in a lot of the same places, although always at different times. Last winter, I was out of the country in a country that he used to live in and it got me thinking about him fairly often. I've always felt like he's one of the better partners I've had. Friends and family agree. And there's always been a little hope there when we get back in touch after not talking for a long period of time.
So after thinking about him a lot while I was in this other country and texting him a bit, I decided to give him a call when I got back to the States last spring. Our mutual friend was getting married in the fall and I had come up with a cute scheme for me to fly to where he was living so that he and I could road trip together to this friend's wedding and possibly rekindle something.
So we're catching up on the phone because at this point we hadn't actually talked on the phone for over a year and he tells me about how depressed he was a couple years ago, which I had kind of heard about through mutual friends but didn't really know about.
He ends up telling me that he ended up having a full mental breakdown and admitting to me that it was spurred by him losing a USB stick that he'd had for many years that contained photos and videos from various sex partners that he'd either taken or made with them over the years. and that I was included on this USB. He had been using this USB as a spank bank for a long time.
Turns out he ended up finding it, and because of the legitimate mental breakdown it caused him, thinking he had lost it, he decided it wasn't worth it and deleted all the footage off of it and threw it away. He also admitted to me that he frequently re-watched a video with me in it.
in which I was apparently denying him sex, but he was trying anyway because this video really turned him on. I have no memory of making this video, although I believe it happened because I know I've made sex videos with partners over the years. So my questions for you, Dan, are A, how normal is it for men specifically to hoard sexual content that they have from exes and not only collect it, but also rewatch it as a type of spanking even years after the footage was captured?
And B, I have to admit that while I was initially pretty freaked out and shocked by him admitting the story to me, I've forgiven him and we're in more touch now than we have been in a long time. There's something special about him and I want him in my life. But every time I remember this story, I really don't know what to think. Am I crazy for wanting to keep this guy in my life and even thinking that maybe we should rekindle something?
Part of me really appreciates that he was fully honest with me about the situation, and part of me thinks I might just be ignoring a massive red flag for the sake of romance. Spank banks are not a new thing. Spank banks used to be... A figure of speech used to be not a thing that actually existed, not a digitized thing, but people held on to memories of past sexual partners, of favorite sexual encounters.
And while some people prefer pornography when they're going to jack off, some people like to lean back and flip through the spank bank and recall. Past sexual partners, past sexual encounters, and have an in-memoriam wank about those past sexual encounters and past sexual partners. Now, the days. With people swapping sex messages, creating consensual dirty content with and for their sex partners.
It's not uncommon for people to hold on to not just men people, but people people and not just straight men, but gay and bi men too. To not proactively dive into their phones to. delete old files if you've swapped a bunch of sex messages sent videos flirted sent pictures created pictures together and videos together with an ex-lover and
the relationship ends and you would like them to delete all of that content, you should tell them to. And if they're a good and decent person, they will. But you have no... Way of knowing for sure, unless they hand their phone over to you, that they have. And even if they hand their phone over to you, they could have it on a USB stick. They could have backed it up. The pictures that you share.
you should expect that they might be held on to by an ex lover, by the person that you shared them with, by the stranger that you were swapping dirty pics with after meeting them on. an app or whatever, the pictures that you put out there in the world are highly likely to remain out there in the world. Now, there is something I think about maleness.
men's brains the male brain where there is this for many men you know there are female stamp collectors out there there are women out there who are model train enthusiasts but there does seem to be something about men and the capacity or the willingness or the interest in collecting and then endlessly sorting and filing and cross-referencing and then
pouring over their stamp collections only with dirty pictures and images and videos. It's a different kind of collection and a collection that if an ex has asked you to delete things and you haven't deleted them. involves a consent violation and that's not okay. But again, you can't control when you share and create dirty pics and videos.
Whether the person you shared them with ultimately is going to honor your wishes if you've asked them to delete them and delete them. So, yeah. Is it normal for men to hold on to old pics and videos? I think, yeah. Is it normal for men, even just passively? Because again, if somebody sent you a bunch of dirty images and videos, they could just exist in an old text thread without you even realizing you still possess them. You may still.
have them? Is it normal for men to sort them and collect them, file them and carry them around on USB sticks and hopefully hard drives with security filters and passwords? I don't want to say all men do that, but I think that is something we can infer just from stamp collectors that some men will do. All that said, you really like this guy.
I don't think misplacing this USB stick is the reason he had a breakdown. It sounds like he went through a period of where he was struggling, perhaps the mental illness. He was feeling depressed or he had clinical depression. And the loss of the USB stick may have been, I'm inferring from how he shared this with you, the straw that broke the camel's back. He was in a bad place. This happened.
And he lost it because of this. And maybe there was some self-loathing or self-recrimination in the loss of the USB stick because of the potential that it would wind up harming. You know, if somebody... found the usb stick and it didn't have a password on it there was anybody could have then discovered these photos of his exes of you and uploaded them and you may be able to read into
Why that freaked him out so much. Something good about his character? You should maybe discuss this with him more. He raised the subject. He opened the door to further discussions about why this moment was so distressing for him.
And it's possible what really distressed him about it was not that, oh, I'll never get to see this bank bank material ever again. But, oh, because of my carelessness, perhaps that had something to do with my depression at the time and I wasn't taking care of myself. I didn't take care of this thing either.
I could have wound up hurting a bunch of people that I didn't want to hurt, including you, Collar, his significant ex that he may still have feelings for. If I were in your shoes, I would not let this, the fact that... My ex that I've carried a torch for for so long struggled with depression. The fact that my ex, like some men, doesn't just not delete old pictures of old lovers, but.
sorts them and files them in a kind of stamp slash coin collector model train enthusiast way. I wouldn't let that stop me from exploring the possibilities of basically getting back into a relationship with this person. If I still had. feelings for them. Obviously you have some concerns that you'd like to have him address and maybe together in conversation you could feel more comfortable with what he was doing and why he was doing it.
But in answer to your question, is this a thing that men do? Hold on to old pics and videos? Yeah, absolutely. It is definitely a thing men do. Is sorting them and filing them and jacking off over them again a thing that men do? Yeah, absolutely. That is a thing that men do. And hashtag not all men and hashtag not just men and hashtag not just straight men.
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Hey, Dan. My boyfriend and I of a year and some months are extremely sexually active and we are in a very loving, caring relationship. And we are very open to trying new experiences together, and it's completely amazing. However, he has this hang-up where he's not used to... having oral sex performed on him and finds it somewhat demeaning when he jams his cock into my mouth, which I absolutely love.
For a while in the beginning, he wasn't coming because of the hangups in his mind about it being forceful and demeaning and all this other stuff that I tell him is not an issue with me. I am... Far beyond consenting. I absolutely love it. And now he is coming. And he thinks he's coming because of the forcefulness and the gagging.
the what have you's that come with that, and he's not happy about it. So how do I get him to get over this feeling of it? Because regardless of how much I tell him, I absolutely love it. It's still something that's heavy on his mind. So it turns out your boyfriend is the kind of guy who gets off on fucking a woman's face on the gagging and joking, but he doesn't.
want to be that guy so at least for now he has the decency to feel bad about being that kind of guy there's some conflict in your boyfriend because he's probably always believed and been told maybe by other girls or he's gotten cultural messaging that the kind of guy who would fuck a woman's face is not a good guy, not a nice guy. And so the fact that fucking your face the way you like to have your face fucked.
works for his dick is putting him into a kind of place of cognitive or cognitive dissonance where What he believes about himself or believes he should want or what he's been told a good guy would want or a good guy would enjoy is definitely in conflict with what it is that his dick self enjoys or what his dick enjoys. And I think the way you resolve this for him is by asking him to engage in a little bit higher level thought about what it is that you two are doing together. Yeah, this sex act.
Fucking your face the way you like to have your face fucked. If he was doing it to a woman selfishly because he enjoyed it and she did not. That would definitely be not okay. That would be demeaning, but he's not demeaning you. He's pleasuring you and pleasuring you in part, perhaps with the pantomime of. demeaning sexual behavior that you get off on what is essentially a kind of low stakes, low demand role play that you want your boyfriend.
Not to demean you, but you want your boyfriend to pretend that he's doing something that could be interpreted by others or erotically in the moment may feel for you in an erotic, affirming. Sexy way, demeaning. It's just like people are into degradation or verbal abuse. They're getting off on the degradation and verbal abuse, being called names during sex. They're not.
being harmed. Their needs are being met. They're being seen through not the slut that they are, the whore, the faggot they are in that moment by that person who's verbally degrading them. Their needs are being seen and recognized and met. by a partner who cares about them. That's what your boyfriend's doing. Yeah. Fucking somebody's face in a pantomime of selfish, malentitled behavior who didn't want their face fucked.
That would make him a bad guy. He doesn't want to be a bad guy. And something about the orgasms he's having right now when he's fucking your face, leave him worried that he's a bad guy. And all you got to do is tell him, like, look. So long as you're doing this bad guy thing with somebody who enjoys this kind of bad guy role playing, cops and robbers with your pants off. You're not a bad guy. You're pretending to be a bad guy for a moment. And it's fine that that game, that pretense.
arouses you. It's also possible that it's just the physical sensations of that kind of face fucking, that kind of choking, retching, that it's the physical sensations that are arousing you and not the psychological dimension of it, not the degradation demeaning, that that's not what's turning you on and you're attributing.
physical sensation turn-ons to some sort of moral failing, or he is attributing the effect the physical sensations are having on him to a moral failing, and he just needs to tease those things apart. There's something about doing this that turns him on because he is getting to demean his girlfriend.
That's okay too. Just like there's some part of you that's turned on by being demeaned in this way. You're not demeaning each other. You're playing with and toying with demeaningness, demeaning sexual. play it's theater theater for two with your pants off and his dick in your mouth and you get to step into it and step out of it and there's something about playing with you know this is all dom sub stuff there's something about playing with dom sub stuff
where when you step into these exaggerated roles of dominance and submission, you're more aware of the equals that you are when you step back out of them. And so in this moment, having your permission.
to disrespect you in this way, may ultimately, so long as it's contained to sex in moments when it's consensual, make... who you are to each other and how he treats you and what you expect of him the treatment you expect of him the rest of the time may throw that into starker relief for both of you and so allowing yourself to play in this way doesn't
put you on some, the top of some slippery slope that ends with him being a sexist, entitled, monstrously abusive boyfriend, but puts you in a place where when you're not. playing with these things, he's more respectful, more acutely aware of how it is that he is supposed to treat you and does treat you when he's being... The good guy he is 99.99% of the time, you know, when his dick isn't down your throat and you're not choking on it.
All right, time for listener feedback. First up, some of the comments left on last week's show in the very lively comment threads at savage.love. Says Steve McLean, for the woman who wondered if she should go into her dead brother's phone. Given his history of childhood abuse, mental illness, drug addiction, and the sexual charges she mentioned being leveled against him, my first thought was that his phone may contain evidence of active sexual abuse that could be stopped.
Perhaps you should reach out to someplace like Center for Missing and Exploited Children for some guidance. Sarah in the comments also suggested NAMI.org, the National Alliance for Mental Illness, as a potential resource for that caller.
Last week's show featured our first after-action report. The reviews are in, says Mudflap33. I'm definitely interested to hear more after-action reports, whether positive or negative. Sometimes I think there's just as much to be gleaned by accounts where things... Ted the Bellhop also loved our first after-action report, saying, Dawn complicated the celebrations by commenting, sponsors are one thing, but a sponsored segment? Are these Dan's thoughts or the thoughts that Field paid him to think?
kind of a buzzkill. I realize this is supposed to be entertainment, but the sponsored format undermines the thoughtful discourse that brings me back each week. Thank you Don for your comment. Just want to say they're my thoughts. Also, I came up with the segment idea for After Action Report long before Field, which was already a sponsor of the show, signed on to sponsor that segment.
So we'd be doing that segment even if Field wasn't a sponsor. For the record, Field doesn't get to hear the segment in advance or approve the content. Just like our other sponsors who sponsor the whole show don't get to hear the whole show in advance. or approve what it is I say on the show. And Ted, most of the people who've asked to come on the segment, and there's tons of interest.
Want to come on to talk about positive experiences, but we are planning to talk to people who've had good, bad, and meh experiences with... Things they wanted to try for the very first time on future after action reports. All right. For more listener comments, for more feedback, dive into the comment sections every week at savage.love. And for more back and forth, for more of my longer responses to reader and listener.
Be sure to check out Struggle Session. Goes up almost every Thursday, sometimes Friday morning at savage.love. And now everybody's favorite part of the show, the part of the show where I shut my big gay mouth and let my listeners have the last word. Hey Dan, this is a response to the caller who wanted to live an adventure and go live the van life. I think the part that you might have missed, caller, is that he's in a caretaker role with you.
And he can't go on that kind of adventure because he knows he has to figure out how to provide for you. And that's something that I think you're not even figuring out for yourself right now. probably because he's been taking care of you. You need to do like Dan said and get to a place where you can actually be financially dependent on yourself.
Another thing to be aware of is that cities are cracking down on the van life. They are... impounding vehicles or pulling people over giving them tickets so you have that added problem of trying to figure out places to stay because many many many places don't allow camping with vans within city limits So definitely watch out for that as well. The homestead and living abroad might be more realistic.
problems and arrests and things. One other thing I thought of also is if there are illegal pornographic images or videos on that phone, Hey, Dan. One idea for the woman who's concerned about her friends reacting to the uncanny resemblance of her new boyfriend to one of her exes is to get right out in front of it. Casually tell them, hey guys, when you meet Russ tonight, you might notice how much he looks like Ross.
pretty funny i guess i have a type and then the worst thing they can say is yep he looks like him all right and we're gonna leave it there Got a question for me? Go to savage.love slash askdan to record your question directly onto our website. Or you can make a voice memo on your very own phone.
and email us your question or your comment by sending it to q at savage.love. Or you can call us at 206-302-2064 and leave us a message on our answering machine. Hump 2025 Part 1 is coming soon to a theater in a city. near you. Go to humpfilmfest.com for more information, to get your tickets, and to watch the Hump 2025 Part 1 trailer. now on filmfest.com we have savage lovecast merch for sale fuck first mugs and t-shirts ggg mugs savage lovecast black hoodies
Come and get them. Support the show and look cool doing it. Go to savage.love slash shop to get your merch now. Follow me at bluesky at dansavage. Follow me on Instagram. and threads at Dan Savage. You can follow Jeffrey Self on Instagram and threads at Jeffrey Self. His new book, Self-Sabotage, is great, it's hilarious, and it's out now.
Savage Lovecast is produced every week by Nancy Hartunian and me and Nancy and the tech savvy at rescues. We will all be back at you next week. Another installment of the Savage Lovecast. Thank you for downloading.