I Told My Boyfriend How Many People I’d Slept with…and He Didn’t Like the Answer

“My boyfriend can’t get over how many people I’ve slept with. I shouldn’t have told him, but he pressed me for the info. He was 'nerdy’ for most of high school and college, and just started coming into his own in his mid to late 20s. I have been dating consistently for years, and have had my fair share of hookups and relationships. And while I don’t think my number is crazy at all, he can’t deal with the discrepancy. We’ve been dating for two years and we’re serious. I don’t want to break up. How can I handle this?”

I agree that you probably shouldn’t have told him, but lots of people fall into the trap of discussing their sexual history with their current partner, and I get it. If you trust someone, it’s natural to want to talk about what you’ve learned from past relationships and sexual experiences. That said, numbers really aren’t necessary, and rarely do anything aside from making one person feel bad.

But you can’t go back, and his reaction may have provoked an important conversation. After all (and as you well know), this isn’t an issue of who has slept with more people. It’s about his comfort with his past, and it’s about both of you establishing that your needs are being met by this relationship.

First, you have to figure out the problem you’re tackling, because it will change the course of action.

If his grandmothers had someone co-sign for them, it just proves your point anyway. Given that they probably got them before he was born, he wouldn’t know either way.

It also does not prove they were "denied" access to credit, so what point are you claiming it "proves?"

So your point is that because a woman could not go to any school she wanted women were denied an education?

It would definitely be more difficult for her than for a man.

It also does not prove they were "denied" access to credit, so what point are you claiming it "proves?"

They could be denied if no man in their family would help them, so the men had the power. Rather like in Saudi Arabia, a woman can't go anywhere or do much of anything unless a man in her family is with her. A Muslim would insist that this doesn't mean women are disadvantaged, because of course the men take care of their women. A woman's point is, she must be very careful to stay on the men's good side, and don't try to get anything they don't want her to get. She certainly cannot just break free and live her life, with access to what she needs, the way men could.

And that is why I say that our own culture wasn't so much different, not so long ago. Indeed, your attitude is perfectly in line with the prevalent attitudes of the day: women could go to SOME colleges, under SOME circumstances, if her family helped her. She could get credit in SOME banks, as long as a man allowed her to, so what had she to complain about? You don't understand at all why women weren't content. And you never will.

The point was that women were NEVER "forced" to remain in abusive circumstances due to an inability to provide for themselves and their children.

Oh, you are crazy. They certainly were. In fact, if I didn't think you'd dismiss it as "a woman wrote that so I'm not reading it," I'd link you to a paper by Caroline B. Ramsey of the University of Colorado Law School, 2011 on Domestic Violence and State Intervention in the American West and Australia, 1860–1930.

But you would undoubtedly dismiss it as feminist claptrap even though the point of the paper is in DEFENSE of the men of the legal profession, who have often been accused by modern-day feminists of not caring about domestic abuse. The paper shows that the police and court systems in fact tried very hard to address the abuse. But anyone reading it cannot help but notice, there was a veritable tsunami of stories of trapped women getting the crap beat out of them, and a judicial system at loss as to how to stop it.

But I won't weary you with the link. You'll never click on it. Of course, with the information I've posted here you could find it yourself, but you know and I know you'd never do that either. As long as you can remember a grandmother who seemed happy enough, you know all you need to know about everything. Don'tcha? LOL!

But you would undoubtedly dismiss it as feminist claptrap...

Why shouldn't I; you dismissed Van Creveld in nearly the same way.

Face it, you are a chauvinist and a demagogue who spends more time disputing what you want me to say than addressing what I actually say.

As the article states, in the old days, many banks required men to cosign.

Men, or someone with credit worthiness?

Newsflash! They still often require someone to cosign if you don't have a demonstrated income or a credit record..

BTW, your “summation” of Van Creveld is criminally incorrect. Did you actually read the book? His case is quite comprehensive.

No, I actually had no idea you expected me to run out and buy his book and read it. But I just did a search for it, and... correct me if I'm wrong, but it looks like it's just a self-published book, and not peer-reviewed at all. That's what he seems to say in his blog on October 8, 2015. Is this what you are offering as your proof that women have never been trapped in abusive situations?

I've found a couple excerpts and I see a list of complaints about men working longer hours and women getting more medical attention (I suppose he forgets that pregnancy tends to require medical attention.) I see he complains that women get more welfare benefits (I suppose he forgets it's because they usually have the children when a marriage breaks up.) I'm not seeing much to impress me. I mean... as I said, it's a self-published book on a subject outside of his area of expertise. And it does indeed sound like he's talking about social issues, and I am talking about legal issues.

So who were these "woman-hunters" forcing wives home like escaped slaves?

No, what we are saying is that if a woman didn't have an education and a job, she couldn't leave an abusive relationship because she would not be able to pay her own rent. Are you really not understanding this?

Although now that you say that, I started searching and found this in the Georgetown University Law Center, 1991 Marital Exits and Marital Expectations in Nineteenth Century America by Hendrik A. Hartog University of Wisconsin Law School

If a woman wanted to separate from her husband, She needed a property settlement, or, at minimum, the use of the property she had brought to the marriage. (Usually, she would need a trust device and trustees to give effect to either of these.) She needed his clear agreement that she could use her own earnings. She needed his permission to live apart from him. She needed him to promise not to advertise her as a runaway, so that merchants and others would trust her and grant her credit...

Do you know what the word COVERTURE means?

According to Consumer Finance, Oct 31, 2016, the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (ECOA) was passed at a time (1974) when "discrimination against women applying for credit was common. For example, mortgage lenders often discounted a married woman’s income, especially if she was of childbearing age. Things weren’t much better for single women, either. Organizations that lobbied for the passage of ECOA also claimed that mortgage lenders were more likely to deny credit to single women relative to other applicants."

For the record, although we're talking about credit cards, "credit" is also about loans, mortgages, and so on.

Men, or someone with credit worthiness?

Here are some of the reasons lenders considered women riskier investments:

* Lenders figured a married woman of childbearing age might leave the workforce if she became pregnant.
* Lenders figured a single woman might leave the workforce if she married.
* Men overall were considered more likely to stay in the workforce.

Do you get it now? Is it so difficult to believe that lenders wanted men to cosign back then?

In fact, someone could argue that the lender's policies were fine. After all, shouldn't lenders determine who to offer credit to? Someone could argue that maybe women were riskier investments at that time.

I'm not making an argument either way. I'm just explaining why most (but not all) women had difficulty obtaining credit on their own in those days.

I say "not all" women because one in my grandparents' generation became very wealthy in her own right.