The previous post on Discussing sexual past history with women was about how to talk about past sexual sin. This one is on things to look for when a woman confesses her past to you.
The commenter writes:
I’m also wondering, what should a woman’s attitude be in confessing her sin? What should a man look for when she confesses? Should a man resist the urge to fish for details as well?
There’s several things you want to look for here.
- Genuine contrition. The modern liberal feminist women are proud about their past sexual history. A Christian should be ashamed about theirs, much like Paul was about his prior persecution and murder of Christians. In fact, it made Paul work all the harder than the disciples since he had ‘more to be forgiven for.’
- Beware the woman who looks fondly remembering past sin. Similar to the above, but you can generally tell this from her body language, facial expressions, and so on, especially if she was with someone she found to be a ‘Chad’ or very attractive in the past. You don’t want to be plan B (or plan C, D, E, F, etc.).
- A distinct pattern of good behavior with no ‘continual mistakes.’ I’ve said before on this blog that I’d rather be with a woman who has had sex prior to becoming a Christian and has been celibate since her conversion than with a “Christian” virgin who has done everything but sex while still being a Christian. One shows they understand the gravity of their faith and the other is flirting with sin.
- Additionally, just an overall pattern of fruit of the Spirit and maturity in Christ especially in regard to discussing sensitive. If a woman is getting upset about you asking then that tends to be a bad sign. The past is one of best predictors of future behavior, and it’s important to know what you are going to be dealing with even if things in the past have changed since becoming a Christian. If a woman is consistently dismissive, changing topics, and obfuscating that right there shows a lack of respect for you as a man who wants to talk about important things and shows she probably has something to hide or insecurities.
Should a man resist the urge to fish for details?
This is something every man must discern for themselves. Will they get more upset the more they know, especially if she has some things in her past? Some men will, but some men won’t. Will it do something irreparable to the relationship to know that? Is it that important to know specific details? Sure, knowing if she had sex with some men in the past is important, but you don’t necessarily need to know the details about what positions they did or anything.
What may be important is potential triggers that got her into that situation — drinking, bad persuasion from ‘friends,’ and other things like that. Can give more of a background on how she is influenced in certain situations.
I think it was one of the writers at Sigma Frame who mentioned that his wife enjoys rough sex, including slapping. How in the world does a couple, let alone a Christian couple , come to discover this kind of compatibility? Before or after getting married?
If before, how do you go about communicating this sort of thing to your girlfriend in a Godly way (if that’s possible). If after, what happens if you reveal a sexual desire to a wife and it scares her or disgusts her? Especially if you had confessed to past porn use. She could play that card “you learned that from porn, no way, what’s wrong with you,” etc.
I’m sympathetic to the woman’s perspective here. It’s also entirely possible a wife might want to try something that the husband would hate or that would give him pause as to his wife’s feelings for him. There’s the possibility that the desire for a particular fetish or sex act might come from a place of trauma as well, man or woman.
I don’t know if the biblical principle of not denying sex to one another would apply here. It seems a stretch to say “sorry honey, the Bible says you have to do that for me, our bodies belong to each other.” To be clear, vanilla sex can be passionate and fulfilling. I’m not talking about a wife being totally lifeless in the bedroom, I’m wondering if a less adventurous wife is something that just has to be dealt with (with love and understanding).
The 1 Corinthians 7 conversation doesn’t need to happen early, but it should happen sometime mid-to late relationship and definitely before engagement. The sexual preferences conversation usually should happen around late-relationship prior to engagement or during engagement.
Presumably by engagement you trust her since you want her to become your wife, so I tend to prefer pre-engagement but usually late relationship as if she wanted only vanilla sex and you wanted more then that could be a big issue.
Like the study I’ve referenced before, most women actually prefer rough sex. Hard and fast over slow and intimate. This is clearly also seen in most of women’s porn — 50 Shades where the charming, muscular, dominant, successful leader ravishes the woman. Yes, this even includes virgins. Maybe not wedding night, but usually after. The exceptions are usually sexual trauma (e.g. rape, molestation, etc.) in past history which is important to find out.
In regard to figuring these things out, the obvious is talking. But that doesn’t always reveal everything. While some couples don’t kiss until marriage, most do including Christians. You can generally see some things in regard to this if you pull her in to ‘take’ a kiss usually the response is positive then she will tend to like the ‘ravishing’ nature of a man being dominant in the bedroom.
In some sex talks during engagement you can just get a list of different kinks and go through them together. See what the other wants to try, is intrigued by, or definitely doesn’t want to do. Throw it out as a no judgement zone. In most cases, if you think one is particularly sensitive such as some form of slapping (whether that’s on the butt, or other places), you can throw it out as an ‘intrigued by’ and not a ‘want to try’ and gauge her reaction.
I’m not saying my marriage is perfect or anything like that but we’ve generally been open to trying out things the other wants to do. You’d hopefully expect that from both Christian men and women, but it’s true that many can have hangups for whatever reason. Sometimes discussing the hangups and understanding where they come from (such as parents or Church) can help resolve them too, but trauma is harder and may need counseling.
Overall, though, it probably depends a lot on case-by-case scenarios. Not everything always works out perfectly, but if you can find a wife willing to do things where you are happy enough and not deny you much if ever then you are in a better spot than the vast majority of marriages.