When I Fall in Love Again: A New Study on Finding and Keeping the Love of Your Life PDF
Preview When I Fall in Love Again: A New Study on Finding and Keeping the Love of Your Life
WHEN I FALL IN LOVE AGAIN A New Study on Finding and Keeping the Love of Your Life Jane Merrill and David Knox P RAEGER AnImprintofABC-CLIO,LLC Copyright2010byJaneMerrillandDavidKnox Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthispublicationmaybereproduced, storedinaretrievalsystem,ortransmitted,inanyformorbyany means,electronic,mechanical,photocopying,recording,orotherwise, exceptfortheinclusionofbriefquotationsinareview,withoutprior permissioninwritingfromthepublisher. LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData Merrill,Jane. WhenIfallinloveagain:anewstudyonfindingandkeepingthe loveofyourlife/JaneMerrillandDavidKnox. p.cm. ISBN 978-0-313-38086-0 (hard copy : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-0-313-38087-7 (ebook) 1. Love. 2. Interpersonalrelations. I. Knox,David. II.Title. BF575.L8M375 2010 306.7’3–dc22 2009028807 ISBN: 978-0-313-38086-0 EISBN:978-0-313-38087-7 14 13 12 11 10 1 2 3 4 5 ThisbookisalsoavailableontheWorldWideWebasaneBook. Visitwww.abc-clio.comfordetails. Praeger AnImprintofABC-CLIO,LLC ABC-CLIO,LLC 130CremonaDrive,P.O.Box1911 SantaBarbara,California93116-1911 Thisbookisprintedonacid-freepaper ManufacturedintheUnitedStatesofAmerica Contents Preface v Acknowledgments vii Chapter1. SexualRegrets:Surveyof429Respondents 1 Chapter2. SexualSecrets:SixtyWomenTalkaboutSex andRelationships 13 Chapter3. RecoveringOne’sBalance:MovingOn 29 Chapter4. PlaytheGameorLose:ManagingtheDouble Standard 45 Chapter5. Self-Esteem:ItsImportanceandHowtoAchieveIt 63 Chapter6. Mama:WhatSheDidn’tTellYouaboutSexandMen 69 Chapter7. Daddy:WhatHeWouldn’tTellYouaboutSex 83 Chapter8. Infidelity:RelationshipPoison 93 Chapter9. FindingYourMan:He’sLookingforYouToo 113 Chapter10.Connecting:CommunicationBasics 131 Chapter11.BeingintheMoment:There’sNoPlaceElse 141 Chapter12.SexualMakeover:TheNewSexualYou 147 Chapter13.YourWeddingNight:ANighttoRemember 157 Chapter14.KeepingSexAlive:It’sAllaboutYourRelationship 171 Chapter15.SexSelf-Tests:TenofThem 185 Chapter16.RelationshipSelf-Tests:TwelveofThem 197 Index 211 AbouttheAuthors 215 Preface H ow a relationship ends is the most demanding of all episodes in the romantic repertoire. From a woman’s point of view, it is that turn that you do on figure skates. You’ve put your hope and heart, your life story and devotion into being with a man. Then, poof, you realize it’s over or you’retold it’sover. Youcan’t fall down escalators or throw yourself off a bridge. You may be in a context where you have children or a very demanding job where you have to keep up a serene demeanor. And because you have the desire to live and be happy, perhaps buried in you like a seed, you muse, ‘‘Maybe I’ll get it right with the next man.’’ Making thatturn in ahealthy, successful wayisthefocusof thisbook. I (Jane—the first author), who have had a romantic life with as many ups and downs as a seismograph, judge this turning of one’s love to a new man most difficult. Yet, the transition may also be like a rebirth, invigorating depending on circumstances. You may be at that stage where you want to settle down and have a child and are thinking about a man as the potential father of your children. Or, if your parenting questions are at rest and you seek a loving, companionable mate, these issues present very differently. While it may be refreshing for some women to goto a newman (‘‘Am Iever glad Iam flying freeand trying somebody new!’’), for others, it is like a death experience. Thus the turn of the skate on the ice, although I can hear it with every fiber of my being, hasmanyconfigurations. I’vemademorelifestylechangesthananactresschangescostumesina repertorycompany—movingaroundnearlyasmuchtoo.Raisedbygrand- motherswhowerelatter-dayVictorians,Iimbibedtheirviewofthegentle, goodnurturingwoman,yetsawthemleftontheirownfromtheirforties. It’sbeenafullcirclebutnotaclosedcircle.Ihavethoughtabouteverymove awayfromthelifeIexpected,toaveryunconventionallife,andamnowliv- ing with a quiet country man, gardening and cooking and walking with himasifitweretwocenturiesago.Yes,Ithought,maybeIknowsomething vi Preface aboutmakingthatturn.Theexperiencesincludebeingabandoned,having anout-of-wedlockchildbyamanwhospurnedme,beingtemptedbyval- uesnotmyown,beingconfusedbymaleattentionandbeingdeprivedofit, adapting,andmovingforward... My first husband decided he didn’t want to be married—‘‘a philo- sophical decision,’’ he said—while I was in Europe studying, when I wondered why his daily letters had ceased. My big immediate problem as I got a job and survived was crying without warning on the train. I have surely felt like a widow. I thought, ‘‘Well, I guess I don’t know what it’s like to have suffered abuse and go on.’’ Yet twice a man beat me up, once so badly I went to the hospital and the police insisted on my assailant being taken to court. Prostitution? On my birthday, after we had sex, one man left money. Someone else (wealthy no less) said he’d like to lift my burden as a single mother. He gave me a $50,000 checkonourthirddate,which Icutupandstuckinananthologyofpo- etry,toperplex a forebear ina centuryto come. ‘‘There are two types of people.’’ That is such familiar rhetoric, isn’t it? Certainly from the angle of learning life lessons there are those who have to make all the mistakes and those who can deduce the right pre- cepts from watching others hit the potholes. One winter day one of my daughters wondered how it felt to be one of the ducks still on the lake. She jumped off the boardwalk into the icy water. I should have known Julia would, like me, have to learn by trial and error. Yet her older brotherandsister would never haveconsidered a caperlikethis. In my coming of age, a period of feminist intensification in America, Iexperimented,asweliketosay,orwentwild,asisthetruth.Doesthat mean it’s less a marvel to go to bed with my life partner? Certainly it’s still a wonder. When I was shy and with a man of considerably more sexual experience, I remember thinking I didn’t know how to kiss, or what to do with my hands and feet. You may forget later but at first you feel all thumbs in bed. This man said with warmth and kindness, ‘‘Butthere aren’t anyexperts when itcomes to sex.’’ As a woman who has experienced the relationship landscape, I care about other women who are evolving in life and love—to move from poor choices and regret to a place in the sun. How can we execute the skater’s turn so we don’t fall down and suffer cuts and bruises, but skate on with improved balance toward a fulfilling happy life? I have teamed with a sociologist who specializes in relationships (he has also been through a divorce, so he’s learning, too), and these are the ques- tions through surveys, interviews, and reflection that we attempt to an- swerinthisbook.Join us. Acknowledgments A ll books are a collaborative effort. We are indebted to Anthony Chiffolo (director of Praeger Publishers) for his quick response to our proposal (submitted by agent Stan Wakefield) on sexual regret and his encouragement to move forward. We also acknowledge Tracie Gardner (California) and Corie Hammers (South Carolina) for assisting us in collecting the data and express appreciation to the 429 Internet respondents (who completed the extensive Sexual Regret question- naire). Leia Cain-Davenport analyzed the data. Finally we are apprecia- tive to the seventy individuals who shared their regret and relationship stories during detailed interviews. To protect their identity we have used false first names, no last names, and altered aspects of their demo- graphics so that they would be recognized by no one. 1 Sexual Regrets: Survey of 429 Respondents Toregretdeeply istolive afresh. —Henry David Thoreau W ho has not experienced some level of sexual regret? This book is a contemporary guide for women who regret their timing of sex in previ- ous relationships (they may have given sex too quickly) and who are committed to making wiser sexual choices in their current or new rela- tionship. They want to feel good about themselves and to ensure that sex (this time) becomes part of a relationship that is going somewhere. This chapter features new research about sexual regret, the emotions experienced by both women and men over the course of the relation- ship, and the various relationship issues individuals and couples strug- gle with. Four hundred and twenty-nine university students in California and North and South Carolina completed an anonymous Internet questionnaire on sexual and relationship regret. Over three- fourths (76 percent) were female; 24 percent were male. Six in ten were ‘‘emotionally involved with one person,’’ engaged, or married; 23 per- cent were between relationships in that they were not dating or involved with anyone; and 15 percent were casually dating different people. Mostallof therespondents wererelationship experienced. TIMING OFSEXUAL INVOLVEMENT ‘‘The only things one never regrets are one’s mistakes,’’ wrote Oscar Wilde in The Picture of Dorian Gray, yet coulda and shoulda plague us all. Most of us have some regrets and wish we had done something dif- ferent. Sexual regret is no exception. Table 1 reflects the percentage who reported feeling regret for engaging ‘‘too soon’’ or ‘‘too late’’ in various behaviors in thecurrent orlast relationship.
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