Love, Sex, and Long Distance

For me, personally, the title can be misleading. I had a relationship for two months. I thought I was in love, I sort of had sex, and it was pretty long distance. What did I learn? Shame, anger, and hurt. But that's a pretty bland summary. Let me start from the beginning.

I was fresh out of high school and had no romantic experience. I avoided making any connections with men; I was (and still am, to an extent) extremely shy, and clammed up completely around them. But one day I met a man online, and we began to speak daily. I was open around him, and he seemed open around me.

Too open, really, for someone like me, which is something I didn't quite catch right then. He had no problems talking about sex and his conquests or his past girlfriends, no problems asking me intimate details about myself.

"Sex," he told me in one of our first conversations, not even three days after we first began speaking, "is very important to me." I remember staring at the sentence, confused. I told him that I agreed sex was important to relationships-- after marriage, of course, which is how I had been raised. He'd laughed, and called me a prude. "Just kidding," he said, "But you know I'm here if you ever want to experiment or something." Absolutely not, I told him. I wasn't going to go that far. Not in a million years. Not without a ring, anyway. And he agreed to be patient with me.

When he said he'd be patient, I expected things. That, for example, our relationship would travel down a conventional road, that we would talk and get to know each other, that we would make some kind of deep-rooted emotional attachment, before sex was even considered.

But for some reason, I was already head-over-heels for the man. I had been since the first time we spoke. I suddenly couldn't imagine my life without him. I needed him with me, no matter what that took; even if it was just having him around online.

For the first month, I gave him nothing. He, however, brought sex up daily, to remind me of how important it was to him. Every time that I told him "No, I won't cyber with you." or "No, I will not sext you." he pouted. He'd clam up, throw me some guilt-trip, and then go to sleep. It was the same, every day, and every day, I was left feeling horrible. Did he really need me to do that? Was talking to me not enough?

Then, one day, at the end of the month, my world completely changed. "My love is a battery," he explained, "I'm drained, giving you all that I am without you giving me anything back. I can't do this." I was shocked. Emotionally, I had given him everything that I could. I had confided in him, told him things I hadn't told anybody else. I had poured my heart out to him, in every way. But it wasn't enough? I panicked. I didn't want to lose him. I needed him in my life, and later that night, we did the one thing I insisted I would absolutely not do.

I woke up feeling awful, but comforted myself by saying that because the entire encounter was online, it wasn't real. My purity was in tact, I told myself; I hadn't done anything wrong. But I still felt awful and shameful. He, however, was very happy. Over the course of the following month, I continued doing things with him. I still felt awful every time, but it made him happy. I was in love with him, I needed him to be happy. I needed him to stay with me, whatever that took. And, it wasn't real, at least that was what I kept telling myself. Those pictures didn't count. The things I said didn't count. The things he said didn't count. None of it was real. It was all okay.

So why did I feel so badly?

I realized why one week before I ended our contact. I was laying in bed, staring at the ceiling, after having a long discussion with family members over the importance of abstinence. With everyone gone, I cried in bed; how could I be so hypocritical?

My younger cousin had asked me, "My friend told me that oral sex isn't the same as sex, so it's okay, right?" And I had said, "You have to remember, sex is still sex. If you aren't ready for it, it's not going to be what you want it to be."

I felt pathetic. My own advice: sex was sex, and I wasn't ready. I couldn't pretend anymore. It was all real. I had given myself to somebody that I hadn't even met, several times. In essence, I felt like I'd given my virginity to a stranger. And the more my eyes opened that night in bed, the feelings of desperation and love that I had for this man dissipated. I felt manipulated. Hurt. Angry that he could tell me he loved me, but not understand how I felt, despite the many times I told him no.

Shortly afterwards, we "broke up," if you can call it that. He clung, but I felt empowered. A weight was lifted off my shoulders, and for the first time in those two months, I felt happy again.

It's been a year since I ended contact with him. Every now and then, I still think about what I did-- what he talked me into doing. There are lingering feelings of shame and anger, but I know as I continue to grow that they will fade.

The experience has made me into a stronger person. I can now say with absolute certainty that I am stronger in my convictions, and also, more than anything, that I have more self-love. I know now that it's not worth degrading myself just to have someone in my life.

And my only wish is to pass the wisdom on to any other women who are in a similar situation.