Savage Lovecast

Savage Lovecast Episode 997

53 min
Dec 18, 20256 months ago
Listen to Episode
Summary

Dan Savage addresses relationship and sexual questions from callers, including workplace dating ethics, grief and libido after loss, infidelity within ethically non-monogamous relationships, and sexual compatibility issues. The episode explores how cultural norms around workplace relationships have shifted and how to navigate trust after betrayal.

Insights
  • Workplace dating taboos may have overcorrected; consensual relationships between non-reporting colleagues can be ethical if power dynamics are absent and both parties are informed
  • Grief responses vary dramatically—increased libido after loss is a valid coping mechanism and doesn't indicate disrespect to a deceased partner, especially after prolonged caregiving
  • Emotional affairs within consensually non-monogamous relationships represent a deeper betrayal than physical infidelity because they involve fantasy about alternative timelines without the partner
  • Sexual incompatibility (e.g., one partner unable to enjoy penetration) may be physiological rather than psychological and shouldn't be forced; acceptance and alternative pleasure sources are healthier
  • Brief intense connections (10 days) ending via rejection is not ghosting; distinguishing between dumping and ghosting helps process rejection with less bitterness
Trends
Shifting cultural acceptance of workplace relationships among peers without power imbalances, moving away from blanket prohibitionsIncreased openness about grief-related sexuality and non-traditional grief responses in mainstream discourseGrowing awareness that ethical non-monogamy requires emotional honesty, not just sexual transparency; emotional affairs are recognized as serious violationsSexual diversity acceptance expanding to include people who don't fit traditional sexual role expectations (e.g., tops who don't bottom)Emergence of micro-identity labels (e.g., 'Barbie-Bi') for specific sexual preferences and orientations among younger demographics
Topics
Workplace dating ethics and power dynamicsGrief and libido changes after spousal deathInfidelity in ethically non-monogamous relationshipsEmotional affairs vs. physical affairsSexual role compatibility and acceptanceRejection processing and ghosting vs. dumpingSexual identity labels and terminologyPolyamory communication failuresProstate pleasure and sexual wiringVirtual intimacy as grief coping mechanismTrust rebuilding after betrayalOrgasm gaps in same-sex relationshipsNo-reciprocal oral sex preferences
Companies
Squarespace
Website building platform sponsor offering domain registration, e-commerce, and design tools with drag-and-drop editing
Hims
Telehealth platform providing online access to ED treatment, hair loss, weight loss medications and personalized care
Beggicated
Sex education platform offering 100+ online courses on pleasure, intimacy, and sexual communication for all orientations
Load Boost
Supplement brand designed to improve semen taste, volume, and health; NSF certified and FDA facility produced
People
Dan Savage
Host providing relationship and sexual advice to callers throughout the episode
Kelly Foster Lundquist
Author of memoir 'Beard' about marriage to closeted gay man; featured in Magnum segment conversation
Nancy Hartoonian
Producer of the Savage Lovecast alongside Dan Savage
Daniel Riobotti
Co-author of 'Does It Fart: The Definitive Field Guide to Animal Flatulence' referenced in opening segment
Nick Caruso
Co-author of 'Does It Fart: The Definitive Field Guide to Animal Flatulence' referenced in opening segment
Quotes
"Your coincidence would be if you responded to his ad and you met up, he would go, I know you, don't we work together? And then you would have a laugh, you would order a Pina Colada, and then if he's happy that it was you who responded to his ad, and you're still into him after that first meetup, you can finally, finally fuck the shit out of this man"
Dan SavageWorkplace dating question
"Grief is funny and weird and traumatizing and distressing and very, very subjective, particularly when it comes to libido. Some people, in the throes of grief, find themselves horny as fuck. Desire, eroticism can be a distraction from their grief. It can be a coping mechanism."
Dan SavageWidow caller segment
"He has it in him to cheat on you like this. And if you take him back, that's part of what you're taking back, not the certainty that he will, not him having permission to, but that he might."
Dan SavagePolyamory infidelity question
"You are a top and you are a prize. Most gay men are bottoms. And this is who you are really. And rather than grieve it or fight it, I think that you should embrace it."
Dan SavageBottoming pleasure question
"You were not ghosted. She had the decency to tell you face to face that she didn't want to date, and go out there and date other women, and try to remember her fondly, and when you speak of her and you will, don't be bitter and shitty about it."
Dan Savage10-day romance rejection question
Full Transcript
One thing I've learned about people's sex lives after talking to them for over 11 years on my show, the Strictly Anonymous Confessions podcast, is that their sex lives are way more interesting than they let on. On my show, I talk to real people about what they're really doing behind closed doors. I talk to hot wives and swingers and men and women with secret lives and secret fetishes and so much more. The anonymous conversations are real, raw, fun, and funny, and spicy, and educational too. So if you're super curious and want to hear all about the wild lives that regular people are really living, then go check out the Strictly Anonymous Confessions podcast, wherever you get podcasts. That's Strictly Anonymous Confessions podcast. I post new episodes daily so there's always something new to explore. You're listening to the Savage Love Cast, Dan Savage's Sex and Relationship show for grownups. If you're under 18, get out of here, Yannick. If you're stuck in a relationship quandary or if you're looking for a sexual harmony, while there's nothing you can't cast on the Savage Love Cast. The news cycle we're in, the news cycle we have all been trapped in together since Trump came down that golden escalator, is nuts. Stories that would have been huge a decade ago, barely registered today. They don't make the front pages. They don't come up on the Sunday news shows. They don't break through on social media. And then you're at a party. I was at a party, guys. Yes, me, Dan Savage, at a party. It happens. And someone casually mentions a news story and assumes I must have heard about it because I'm an informed person. I read The New Yorker, The Atlantic, The New York Times. I doom scroll myself to sleep every night and wake up dooms growing every morning. So I'm at a party, which is unlike me. I'm an introvert, but I am at a party and this person, the science person, a tech person, a STEM person, starts talking to me about a news story, a huge news story. And she assumes I know what she's talking about. And I nod along, pretending I'd heard the big news because I don't want her to think I'm an idiot. I tell myself, I reassure myself that the news must have broken after I got to the party. She arrived after I did. She heard the news before I could. And then I got home and I googled the story and it turns out it didn't break last night. It broke six months ago. And I didn't hear about it because of this hellish news cycle. Now, it is the holiday season. You're probably going to be going to some parties yourself where you'll be putting feast of the ass hats and t-shirts and fuck first mugs under the tree. Get them at savage.love slash shop. And I don't want you to find yourself in the same position I found myself in. People talking about the news while you stand there like an idiot because you hadn't heard. So I'm going to spare you that embarrassment by sharing this big news story here so you are up to speed too. Take it away, popular science news website, IFL science. For years, it was believed that sloths didn't fart. Now this new video has dispelled the myths and proved that actually sloths are incredibly gassy. Sloths can fart, you guys. Scientists used to think sloths couldn't fart or didn't fart because they have really slow metabolisms. They digest just as slowly as they move. And scientists believed the gas produced in the gut of a sloth was reabsorbed into the bloodstream of that sloth and then the sloth breathed it out, which when you think about it, yuck. First thought, who would want to make out with a sloth? But then you remember you eat ass so maybe you shouldn't be so judgy about people who want to make out with sloths. Anyway, since Europeans first encountered sloths in the 1700s, sloths are native to tropical rainforests in Central America. Scientists just assumed sloths couldn't fart for nearly 300 years. We just accepted what the scientists had to say about this. But then someone, a scientist, had the genius idea to hold a sloth underwater. Just the bottom half of the sloth. No sloths were harmed in the conducting of this experiment. They held the bottom half of a sloth underwater and tiny bubbles in the brine. Tiny bubbles, big news. So it looks like Daniel Riobotti and Nick Caruso, authors of Does It Fart, the definitive field guide to animal flatulence, are going to have to update that book, which came out in 2017, long before we all found out sloths could fart. All right, you guys. Full disclosure, I am vamping here. I am pulling shit out of my ass. I'm not making shit up. This happened. All of it. The party. Somebody deciding to hold a sloth underwater. All of it happened. But I am flying home today. I am in the air as you listen. I'll be home for Christmas. And I had to record an intro days in advance. And sloth flatulence is what you're getting at the top of the show as a consequence. And coming up on today's show, we have a couple of questions about dating or just fucking your coworkers, some classic three-way drama that offers a roadmap on how not to do polyamory. And a man can't get over the end of a 10-day romance. And I try to help him put that 10-day romance into perspective. And on the magnum, I have a delightful conversation with Kelly Foster Lundquist, author of the new memoir Beard, which is about her experience having married a closeted gay man. One last item of business before we start the show. For the month of December, when you buy a magnum subscription as a gift, you get it half off. That's $24 for the longer and stronger Savage Love Cast with more guests and no ads, bonus Savage Love questions, invites to Savage Love Live and more. And while you're on our site, be sure to visit our merch store for holiday gifts that don't suck, including ITMFA t-shirts and Peach the Motherfucker already t-shirts, GGG and Fuck First mugs, Feast of the Ass t-shirts, and hats. You're going to love the gear, the merch over at Savage.Love, all of it, including the show makes a great gift. All right, let's get to the first call. And when you're ready to launch, use the offer code SAVAGE to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. This episode is sponsored by HIMS, affordable access to ED treatment, all online. Start your free online visit today at HIMS.com slash Savage. This episode is brought to you by Beggicaded, the leading platform for pleasure-based sex education for adults. Right now, go to Beggicaded.com and use the code SAVAGE for 50% off a yearly pass. Beggicaded.com, enter code SAVAGE. Hey, Dan, Nancy, and the tech savvy at Rescuth, late 30s female here. I have a question about casual sexual relationships and the workplace. There is this guy that I work with sort of regularly, but inconsistently and more peripherally. There's not really a power imbalance, so there wouldn't be any ethical concerns. And to be quite honest, I'm in a place where I'm looking for more of a casual fuck buddy situation. And the emotional stakes wouldn't be super high for me. I don't think there'd be a huge fallout if it went sideways. So for whatever reason, I just got this vibe when I first met this dude that he was probably a freak. And there's been just little things. I don't know why I got this vibe, but I found him on field a while ago. He was married at the time, confirmed my suspicions. I was in Cognito. I never interacted with him or matched with him on the app. And then life happened a couple years later. Found out he's divorced. I'm in a place where I'm still kind of looking for a more casual friends with benefit situation. And this is a big assumption on my part, but it seems like he potentially could also be looking for that. And I just wanted to know the best way to broach that subject. I'm pretty sure he'd be down. I just don't feel like I could do it at work. We're not close enough where we talk outside of work. But yeah, there's just less platforms and avenues for broaching a more casual connection, topic of conversation than there would be in gay culture from what I've heard from you. Everyone needs to listen to the Pina Colada song, Escape. It's actually its name, but everybody calls it the Pina Colada song and really internalize its message, especially you, caller. Respond to the ad. And then have that meetup. And if it turns out you already know each other in the Pina Colada song, dude takes out a personal ad because he's bored in his marriage, seeking an affair partner. Somebody responds to his ad, they meet up, turns out it's his wife who responded to his ad. She's bored in their marriage too and was seeking an affair partner. And they have a laugh, they order another Pina Colada, and then they go home and fuck the shit out of each other. And they're less bored. Your coincidence would be if you responded to his ad and you met up, he would go, I know you, don't we work together? And then you would have a laugh, you would order a Pina Colada, and then if he's happy that it was you who responded to his ad, and you're still into him after that first meetup, you can finally, finally fuck the shit out of this man that you've been into for years. How many years are you going to let go by before you fuck the shit out of this guy? You know, for a long time, one of the places people were likelyest to meet their romantic partners, their spouses, even their successful short-term relationship partners at work. This had an upside, people got partners, people found partners at work and a downside. It meant a lot of people treated work like it was some big dating app and felt entitled to run around the office hitting on people. And that of course, empowered people who were bad people, shitty people, people who didn't take no for an answer, not just to hit on somebody at work, but to keep hitting on that person at work, who said no to them. And we looked at that decade or two ago and said, yeah, that's not good. So not okay. We created a new cultural norm, a taboo around anybody asking anybody out at work. Some companies made it a firing offense for colleagues, even colleagues who didn't report to each other to date each other. Others just required, if it was a big enough company, the people who were thinking about dating to go to HR and involve HR in their early relationship negotiations. And I feel like that was a little bit of an overcorrection, not okay, never okay to ask anybody out at work. And we're having a little bit of a swing back, the pendulum swinging back a little bit, where people who have been sensitized to the issues, power imbalances in the workplace, and not to exploit a power imbalance and to be conscious of them as more people are now, that allows for someone in your position to go ahead and make a pass at this guy that you know through work, who doesn't report to you, and you don't report to and you don't work together that often to respond to his ad that you saw on field and go on that date and have that laugh and have that second, third, fourth round of pina coladas and then finally fuck the shit out of each other. Hey, Dan, this is a 45 year old cis woman from Northwestern, British Columbia, Canada. And I was compelled to send in a question just about my experience as a recent widow and what it's like. It's a wild ride in every respect. But the one thing I was not anticipating is my sex drive has just shot into orbit, like it's astronomically high. Of course, things aren't on your radar until they're on your radar through circumstances. And I always assumed that grief caused like a dip in libido. But yeah, my husband died at the end of July, and it was a long road leading up to that. I haven't had sex in three years, so I was having horny for a very long time. And I thought, you know, after he died, because it was an expected death, I just didn't really think much about it, to be honest. Didn't give him much thought. But it is something else. I feel like half the time I'm crawling out of my skin, I'm so horny, thinking of all sorts of fantasies and really getting into it. But it's still frustrating because I haven't found a partner yet. I'm not ready. But I have got into virtual romps, and it's a lovely thing. I'd love to hear you talk about grief and libido. First, I'm so sorry for your loss, the death of your husband. My heart goes out to you. Grief, man. Grief is funny and weird and traumatizing and distressing and very, very subjective, particularly when it comes to libido. Some people, in the throes of grief, find themselves horny as fuck. Desire, eroticism can be a distraction from their grief. It can be a coping mechanism. It can remind you why being alive is such a pleasure and a joy. Some people however, in the throes of grief in its grip, have no libido, and neither reaction is the wrong answer. Neither should be pathologized. You just have to grieve. Each of us has to grieve. Major losses, like yours of your husband, and again, I am so sorry for your loss, in our own way. We do need to be thoughtful. It is possible, especially when it comes to sex, to spin out of control a little bit. But man, if there's ever a time in your life when you're allowed to go a little nuts, I think the expected death after three years of a long illness and decline, during which you had no sex, when your relationship shifted from lovers and partners to you being your dying husband's caregiver, it makes perfect sense to me that your reaction might be a wild spike in your libido and your desire to get out there and just tons of horniness. On some level, while your husband was in decline, you were processing already and grieving in advance his death. Your erotic and sexual life with your husband pre-deceased your husband by three years, and you were loyal and you were committed to him and committed to sickness and health being his caregiver and caretaker and loving him differently at the end of his life, being the lover that he needed you to be those last three years, which was not a lover in the sexual sense, but very much a lover in the transcendent and perhaps most important sense. But behind the scenes, in your reptile brain, you were processing some significant part of your grief because his death was expected. So it may be that you feel a little weird that others might judge you for how ready you were to have sex after the death of your husband because it was so soon and sudden or would be judged to be so soon and sudden by others who did not have your experience, who were not grieving the loss of your husband in pieces the way you had already grieved the loss of your husband in pieces during his decline. And the significant piece of the loss of your husband that you grieved in advance of his death was the loss of who he was to you sexually. So yeah, you're ready and you shouldn't feel bad about it. And if getting out there, having virtual sex feels right and safe to you right now, and it could be helping you cope with your grief, it could be masking your grief, it could be distracting you from your grief, or it could just be time, you could just be ready. Don't get in your own way. Let your libido in this instance lead and enjoy yourself. You deserve it. You deserve it. And I'm sure your husband would want this for you and would be glad that you're able to access and enjoy sexual pleasure again. So my heart goes out to you. I'm sorry for your loss. And don't feel guilty in the wake of your husband's death about what you've gained, which is a new sense of sexual possibility and an erotic future. Enjoy. You deserve it. Stand out and succeed online. Whether you're just starting out or scaling your business, Squarespace gives you everything you need to claim your domain, showcase your offerings with a professional website, grow your brand and get paid all in one place. With Squarespace's collection of cutting edge design tools, anyone, even you can build a bespoke online presence that perfectly fits your brand or business. Squarespace also offers a complete library of professionally designed and award winning website templates with options for every use and category. No matter where you start, your website is flexible to what you need with intuitive drag and drop editing, beautiful styling options, unrivaled design effects, on brand AI content, commerce tools, calendar solutions and more. They also offer so many back end features that make running your business or project work the way you want it to fundraising, e-commerce, appointment setting, email campaigns. The list of helpful products goes on and on. Head on over to Squarespace.com slash Savage for a free trial. And when you're ready to launch, use the offer code Savage to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. That's Squarespace.com slash Savage and use the offer code Savage. Hi, Dan. My boyfriend and I have been together for five years. We're monogamous except for the occasional threesome. Recently, I brought up my fantasy of watching him have sex with another woman. I'm not into being humiliated or cuckolded. The turn on is getting to see my hot sexy man pleasure someone else and to see her be as turned on by him as I am. We got on field and found someone and we all hit it off immediately. Because getting STI testing was taking a long time, I told them that the two of them could get together for two quick make out sessions to keep the tension alive until we could make the big night happen. Everything was above board and communicated thoroughly. I knew I would have emotions come up throughout this experience and I trusted that he would help me through them and he did. For instance, after their first make out session, I wanted to have sex, but he could not get hard. His dick is totally reliable 99% of the time. He held me and console me that his dick just wasn't cooperating. The night we got a hotel was an incredible experience. It went better than any of us expected. Even though the plan was for me to watch, I ended up doing a combination of watching and participating. After we got home, I told him that my cup was full. The experience was overwhelmingly positive and I didn't feel the need to do it again, but that he was free to have sex with her one more time. He told her this and then told me he thought it may have offended her. I said I wanted to contact her to explain, but he asked that I give it a couple days. After a couple days, I insisted that I contact her. I couldn't just ghost her like that. This is when he told me everything that leading up to the big night, they had gotten together many more times than I knew about, had oral sex and had exchanged romantic texts. I contacted her and asked her to send me those texts and she did. I found out that they had talked about how deep and intense their connection felt, wanting to fantasize about a future together, and she brought up several times that she wanted me to know about all of this and he replied that I couldn't know. I've never been more humiliated and devastated in my life. Not only was he cheating on me, but then he watched me fuck his lover and let me watch him fuck his lover and all the time they knew what was happening and I didn't know what I was doing. It's so sick and twisted and my trust and self-esteem feel irrevocably broken. We both say we were extremely happy in our relationship. We had sex all the time and there was nothing lacking. Their affair is over and he and I want to stay together. My question is basically how do I learn to trust him again? I can't find any resources on cheating within an already ethically non-monogamous relationship with excellent communication, hot and frequent sex, and a very happy life. If you had to get the text messages, screenshots of the text messages from her, that means your boyfriend deleted the text messages. You couldn't see them on his phone. He knew enough to delete them. He didn't want you to see them. Because they were incriminating. It's going to be really hard for you to trust this guy again. You say that you've never been more humiliated, never been more devastated, that your trust and self-esteem are shattered. Then you ask me, how you trust this guy again? Here's how you trust this guy again. You tell yourself that he has it in you or has it in him, not just to have a sexual affair with someone, but an emotional affair with that person too. When you think about what an emotional affair means, what it usually entails, it's your partner who has a life with you fantasizing with somebody else about the life they could have had or might be able to have with them. It's a fantasy about an alternative timeline where you, the partner, don't exist or disappear or evaporate. That's hard to hear about or hard to read about if you're the partner, hard to come back from. Even though we all kind of understand that that's what an emotional affair is, it's a fantasy about an alternative timeline where your partner, who may be very happy with you and not wanting to exit the relationship or end the relationship or disappear or evaporate you in any way, loses themselves in a shared fantasy with another person about what could have been, about the life they could have together if a life together for them was a possibility, which of course, if your partner doesn't want to leave you and doesn't want out, isn't a possibility. But to know that in the abstract is one thing, to read the text messages, and I'm not scolding you for wanting to read the text messages, but to read them is to know it not in the abstract but in the particular. And man, that'll fuck you up. All that said, sounds like you're inclined to take your boyfriend back. You wouldn't be calling, you literally are asking me how you can trust him again, and I'm not sure that you can trust him. It's easy for me to project myself into his, to wrap my head around the kind of rationalizations that he made as he did this. This was a person that you had already agreed that he could have sex with, and he was just jumping the gun a little bit, having a little bit of sex with her in advance of the sex with her that he was gonna be allowed to have with her. Yeah, obviously after he met up with her for the make out session that you approved in advance, and then suddenly his dick couldn't get hard for you, that was one of those times they had oral sex in the run up to when he was allowed to have oral sex with her, and he couldn't get it up for you because he was in his refractory period. It all makes sense now, and if you can't extend a kind of retroactive blessing to the way he cheated on you with the person, you kind of sort of wanted him, although not in a cocky way, to cheat on you with and bring this in from the gold. If you can't do that, there's only one way you can trust him again, and that's to trust that he will probably do something like this to you again. And also, maybe in a manipulative way, toy with the affections of another human being, have an emotional affair with a woman that he has no intention of ever leaving you for. Maybe that's why she's so butth sort, maybe that's why she was so thrilled to share those text messages, those screenshots with you because she felt damaged and used by him, by you, and knew that seeing those screenshots would leave you feeling damaged. But if you take him back because you've already invested five years, because you do love him, because the D is that good, I think the only way you can be in this relationship and not lose your mind is to know that he has this in him, and that it could happen again. Not that it should, not that he shouldn't promise you it won't, but if it happens again, I don't want you to be devastated. If it doesn't happen again, I'd rather you were slightly pleasantly surprised you get through the next five or six decades with him, and he doesn't pull this kind of shit on you again. But he has it in him to cheat on you like this. And if you take him back, that's part of what you're taking back, not the certainty that he will, not him having permission to, but that he might. And if you can't live with that uncertainty, you can't live with that, sort of damically is dangling over your head, then you can't and shouldn't live with him. This episode of the Savage Love Cast is brought to you by Hymns. 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Featured products include compounded drug products, which the FDA does not approve or verify for safety, effectiveness, or quality. Prescription required. See website for details, restrictions, and important safety information. Hey, Dan. I've been atop since I came out with limited bottoming experiences that either never felt good or just didn't have much pleasure. I'm in a relationship now where my guy wants to top me every now and then. It doesn't hurt, but it also doesn't feel good either. I want that roll back eyes of the head feeling that I see other bottoms get when I have topped them. Am I doing something wrong? Is there something I should try to get that pleasure? Let's think about all the reasons some gay men are tops. Some gay men, people will argue, are tops because they associate the bottom role with being feminine, passive, and they're too caught up in their own self-conception as mask or masculine to relax and enjoy being penetrated. Those guys are out there. Some guys are tops though because they enjoy the penetrator role. They enjoy fucking. It gives them more pleasure to be on top, to be the penetrator. And good for those guys, the gay universe is full of bottoms and verse bottoms who are desperately searching for those guys. Not guys who top because they are too anxious or too insecure to bottom, but guys who top because they love it. And it's what works for them. It's what works for them erotically and their erotic imaginations, but also physically. And it sounds to me like you're one of the latter guys. There's nothing about getting fucked that you can't understand. You have a desire to enjoy getting fucked the way guys that you fucked have enjoyed being fucked by you, but it just doesn't work for you. It doesn't work for your butt. Maybe your butt's not wired. Some people's tits aren't wired. Some people's prostate glands aren't wired. And there's also that whole, you know, the biggest sex organ is the one between your ears thing. And for some guys, being fucked really does fuck them, not just in their butts, but in that biggest sex organ, the one between their ears. And it's not just about the sensations of being fucked and filled up in that way, but what it means to be fucked. And that can transport a guy that plus the physical sensations and having a wired prostate gland can transport a guy to that eyes rolling back in his head place that you've seen guys go when your dick has been in those guys. All right, so what are you going to do about it? You've tried, you've tried. I assume you've tried maybe poppers, but it doesn't sound like you need poppers. And most people who need poppers to make anal work or being penetrated work for them need it to overcome the pain or the discomfort. And you don't experience pain or discomfort. It just doesn't turn you on as much at certain points in our lives. We have to accept that this is what we like and how our bodies work. And we've given things a try and we've experimented with different roles and positions. And some things just aren't for us. Some things that others enjoy in eyes rolling back in the head kind of ways, we're never going to enjoy in that exact same way. And we're going to have to look for other things that give us that feeling that eyes rolling back in our head feeling that aren't getting fucked. And I assume there have been times when you've been fucking a guy and it felt so amazing. Your dick, that guy wrapped around your dick inside that guy and you were just vibing and clicking and your eyes were rolling back in your head as you topped. And that's no small consolation prize. It's not a consolation prize at all. That is the prize, the top prize. And you are a top and you are a prize. Most gay men are bottoms. And this is who you are really. And rather than grieve it or fight it, I think that you should embrace it. While still bottoming for your boyfriend every once in a while, who wants to fuck you, who wants to top you too. But just embrace it and let it go. Let it go. The idea that it will ever feel as amazing for you as it does for guys who are bottoms, not just in their bottoms, but bottoms between their ears. It's never going to feel for you the way it feels for them. This episode of the Savage Lovecast is brought to you by Beggicated, the world's biggest platform for sex education you never had but always wanted. It's the gift you always wanted but we're afraid to ask for. Beggicated brings pleasure-based sex education right to your bedroom with over 100 online courses from the world's top experts. Whether you're single in a relationship or exploring your own desires, Beggicated is a safe space for everyone regardless of your sexual orientation or gender. Their courses empower you to enjoy sex more, build confidence, and communicate better with your partner or partners. It's time to take control of your pleasure journey with Beggicated. Beggicated will help you unlock new levels of pleasure and help you explore desires in a judgment-free environment. One of the standout features of Beggicated is the variety of courses they offer, from passionate intimacy to adventurous play, from tontra to kink, there's something for everyone. You can choose to learn on your own or with your partner and Beggicated's content is inclusive, embracing all races, sexual orientations, and gender identities. Join Beggicated now for 50% off a yearly pass that's only $69 a year. Go to Beggicated.com and enter code SAVAGE for 50% off that's Beggicated.com enter code SAVAGE. Hey Dan, this is a street white male in a south eastern city. I just spent 10 days with a woman who checked all of my boxes and seemed to feel the same way about me. We were spending every day together. We were texting, we were sending memes back and forth on Instagram, we were doing all the things. And the last week, if she stopped texting me and then I saw her that night and I was like, oh, it would have been nice to hear from you more today. That really isn't anything serious is a side comment really. And then she basically was like, hey, I'm just not sure if I'm ready to date. And you know, if you want time to think about it, you can think about it, but maybe we should just be like friends going forward. And I was like, okay, I'm heading out of town. Let me think about it. We were messaging for a couple of days, and then all of a sudden on Sunday, starting around 12, she just ghosted me has an answer. Two of my texts, I called her day, didn't answer, and so my message are basically being like, hey, I'm sorry if I did anything weird, I'm sorry if I crossed any lines. I don't know what I did wrong, but I'm here if you want to talk. I'm trying to go over this person, but for some reason, it was like wrecking me. It was like wrecking me that I had this experience with this person, and I really felt so good about it. And then all of a sudden she's just like ghosting me. I've never been ghosted before, to be quite honest. So I don't know if anyone's asked you about getting over ghosting, or if there's something I did, I just don't know. Or if it's been, I didn't think about it that way, but I'm just, I'm very confused. My feelings are very hard. And I just can't get over it. I can't stop thinking about it. So any help would be great. I don't want to invalidate your experience. And you're experiencing this as a ghosting, ghosted for the first time. But were you ghosted? You spent 10 days with this woman, and you clicked, and you were texting all the time and swapping memes as people do. And then you met up with her face to face, and she told you that she just wasn't ready to date right now. Which is from the, it's not you, it's me, Ben, of things you say, comforting little white lies that you tell someone that you dated and fucked around with for a little bit, but have discovered during that dating and fucking around phase, during that discovery phase, you've discovered that you're not interested in pursuing things with further for reasons that I don't know what those reasons are, and they may have nothing to do with you or anything that you did or said, only she knows what those reasons are. And she's not telling you, but she didn't ghost you. She dumped you, and that's different. She said she wasn't ready to date. And then you texted for a little bit, you said maybe we could be friends, and she said, yeah, we could be friends, which is also a lie. People tell people when they're breaking up with them. And then she went silent. And so now what do you do? Well, you tell yourself that you had a really great 10 days with this woman, and that if you'd been run over by a bus on day nine and a half, it would have been a wonderful, final week and a half of your life. And the fact that you didn't wind up with this person forever, this person that you fantasized about having a future with because those 10 days were so great, doesn't mean you can't have a great 10 days or 10 months or 10 years with someone else. You have it in you to connect with someone in the way that you connected with her, but you can't force a connection with someone who doesn't want to continue to connect with you in that way. And you only knew her 10 days. You know what's going on? She could have an ex-fiancé that just came back into her life, and she's getting back together with that person. Shit could be going down that you have no idea about. You know, maybe she's dying of leukemia. Who the fuck knows? You can be angry. You can choose to be angry and invite into your soul the kind of anger and resentment that can make someone repulsive to future potential partners, or you can find it in yourself to extend some grace to this woman. And as painful as the end of this brief thing was for you, and as painful as the way that it ended was, you can just tell yourself, I probably will never know what it was or why, but I'm grateful to her for those 10 fun days, and I'm not going to be angry about it. And so, I am going to take this energy and this attention and this capacity that I know that I have to connect with someone because I just did it. I just connected with this woman and get out there and connect with somebody else. Don't be angry, and don't lie to yourself and tell yourself that you were ghosted. You were not ghosted. She had the decency to tell you face to face that she didn't want to date, and go out there and date other women, and try to remember her fondly, and when you speak of her and you will, don't be bitter and shitty about it. Because that will make you, like anger and resentment, if they welcome that into your soul, that will make you repulsive to people that you might think about dating in the future. Hey, Dan, cis woman here who has often had a hard time putting a label on my sexuality. I'm mostly straight, but I've enjoyed having sex with women as long as I don't have to go down on them. I love making out, I love titties, I'm just not interested in vaginas, but I am happy to be on the receiving end. I talked to my friends about this, and one of my friends came up with the term Barbie-Bi, which is that I love women just not interested in their genitals. Is this a good name in your opinion, as someone who likes to pick out new nomenclature for things? Do you have another name for someone like me? I'd love to hear either your approval or another suggestion. I mean, Barbie-Bi kind of sort of works for me. I mean, it wouldn't work for me. I wouldn't want to be with somebody who wanted me to go down on them, but who wouldn't go down on me or wanted me to enjoy their junk, but didn't enjoy my junk, or wanted to pretend that my junk wasn't even in the room. So in that sense, it wouldn't work for me. But Barbie-Bi as a term for a woman like you kind of makes sense, but in a way it doesn't, because you're not the Barbie. You're the Barbie-Bi, but you're not the Barbie. You have genitals. You want to be with somebody who doesn't, or doesn't want you to pay any attention to the genitals that they do have. Basically, you are the female equivalent of all of those guys on Grindr and Scruff and Sniffy's and Craigslist back in the days looking for no-recip oral. You want to be gone down on, but you are not going down. Luckily enough for those guys and no-recip oral, there are a lot of gay and bi men out there that just want to suck dick. Sucking dick is what they're all about. It's their primary pleasure, and they don't care if they get their dicks sucked in return. I imagine there are fewer lesbian and bi women out there who are into no-recip oral, who just want to eat pussy. Of course, there are butchers and bull-diggers out there who don't want their genitals paid attention to, but I just think they're far, far fewer in number than the kinds of gay guys who live to suck a cock and don't care whether their cocks get sucked in return. There is a reason there isn't an orgasm gap when it comes to lesbian or same-sex girl-on-girl relationships or hookups or action in the way there is an orgasm gap when it comes to women sleeping with straight men. One of the reasons there isn't an orgasm gap when it comes to lesbian sex is that women come through for each other, but also women go into an experience with another woman expecting to be pleased and pleasure. But if you can find Barbie buys or you are a Barbie buy or you can identify as a Barbie buy and the women that you're getting with are content to eat your pussy until you are having your 10th or 11th orgasm and don't care whether you touch their pussies or not. I'm 100% behind this identity and if this term helps you identify yourself and then helps women who are into servicing a pillow princess like you find you, I'm all for it. That's what all these terms are for. Not only does it help women who would be into buying what you're selling find you, it also lets women who wouldn't be interested in buying what you're selling avoid you. So yeah, Barbie buy, Barbie buy has my endorsement. You want to be serviced by a woman who for all intents and purposes has no vagina. All right, time for listener feedback. First up, a few comments. Lovecast listeners left in the comment thread about last week's show. Says the red aft, thinking about Trimax, which is the injectable ED medication that you inject directly into your dick when you want to get hard. Shouldn't penile injection of anything soon followed by sex require the use of condoms? I'm sure the porn stars Dan mentions using Trimax are all on prep, but a fresh injection site must make a number of blood-borne infections other than HIV far more likely. Says red blonde to the caller whose husband cheated 10 years ago while struggling with addiction. I wouldn't leave if you're happy otherwise. It sounds like the cheating was at least part of the impetus for him to get sober. And I wouldn't say anything to the other woman. For all she knows, you weren't exclusive at the time. She knows you guys are together now and that's enough. Finally says no cute name for the woman who can only orgasm by her own hand. I have lots of thoughts. First, it's great that you can orgasm. At your age, 37, I was still a year or so out and would have been thrilled to know I was able to orgasm. You can do it, which is wonderful and encouraging. I think you should adopt a combination of this is how my body works and the attitude that your body and its sexual responses may morph and change over time. There's a lot more to no cute names comment. More great advice from no cute name and other commenters for that particular caller. So if you're that particular caller or you're a woman struggling to have your first orgasm or trying to have orgasms in different ways, jump into the comment thread and read no cute names entire comment and the comments of other savage love cast listeners who have some great advice for you. We love our commenters around here. Our community really has made savage love the one and only place on the internet where you should read the comments. And now savage love cast listeners who left voicemails on our answering machine about last week's show get to have the last word on this week's show. Hey there, this is a comment for the question from a caller who said that she loves anal sex so much that she comes almost in anticipation sometimes in anticipation. I think we're forgetting that she also has the vagina. So I would suggest that they start first, no mention of anal sex, that her first orgasm comes from her pussy and that she enjoys all of that and then maybe while that's happening he starts talking about anal so that ramp up to then a second orgasm. But as someone who sometimes can keep going and have multiple orgasms, that's great but there are some times where the minute the orgasm happens you just want out. So that 30 second waiting period afterwards, I don't think it's going to float for her. It might but you know she's got another hole, yay for a vagina. Hey Dan, the caller whose husband cheated on her a decade ago with a woman who's now in her social circle should not approach the other woman. It's a lose lose scenario. If she knows who you are she's already being discreet and doesn't want to bring it up and if she doesn't you're going to really get off on the wrong foot with her. I do have to question the wisdom of the caller's desire to keep her husband away from this woman though. I don't imagine the situation can move forward until he gets in the room with her and they lock eyes and have that silent conversation humans are so good at. He'll instantly ascertain whether she remembers the incident. That gives him the opportunity to do the heavy lifting that his wife is struggling with. Smile at her, say hello warmly and at the appropriate moment discreetly say look everything's cool, my wife knows all about what happened, we're working through it etc etc and he can tell her if it's not awkward for both of you I think you'll really get along well and we can all stuff what happened a decade ago down the memory hole. That'll get everybody involved over the entry comp that is preventing this situation from being somewhat resolved. Hi I'm calling for the woman who said she can only orgasm through her hand. So I'm calling from the late 50s and your body changes and one of the real blessings hidden in the frustration of menopause is that you kind of get to redefine what pleasure is and how orgasms are. So while I was in my 30s I had a single way to come and orgasms always felt the same somewhere in my late 40s that started to change and then in my 50s I really kind of like I've been exploring all of these different ways to come and I now have like I don't know like half a dozen different sorts of orgasms and they aren't all as intense as those orgasms in the 30s but they're all really really awesome and in some ways like better because there's more variety and I just think that maybe if you stop focusing on the orgasm so much and focus on pleasure and kind of like opened up different ways to get to pleasure you might with time and really support a partner which sounds like you have come up with things that would be considered an orgasm but that are different than the orgasm that you're having now or that you've always had so give it a try. And we are going to leave it there. Got a sex question? Got a relationship problem? at savage.love.slash ask dan you can record and upload your question to the comment directly on our website or you can make a voice memo on your very own phone and email us your question or your comment 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 is making the very last stop of the 2025 tour in my hometown of Chicago on Thursday December 11th at the Music Box Theater. You can't make it to Chicago and you didn't make it to a theater to see hump this year and seeing hump in a theater is the best way to experience why not get a group of friends together and stream both hump 2025 shows in your own living room to stream hump and to get discounted tickets to the hump 2026 spring lineup coming soon to theaters near you go to humpfilmfest.com follow me up blue sky at dan savage follow me on instagram at dan savage follow kelly foster lundquist on instagram at kelly foster lundquist and for all things kelly foster lundquist check out her website kelly foster lundquist.com. The Savage Lovecast is produced every week by Nancy Hartoonian and me and Nancy and the tech savvy at rescue. We'll all be back at you next week with another installment of the Savage Lovecast. Thank you as ever for joining us. you This episode of the Savage Lovecast is brought to you by Load Boost by VB Health. 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