I’m usually pretty timid when it comes to my sex life, preferring to stick to what many would consider “vanilla” bedroom activities. Yet after a few months of dating my boyfriend, I somehow found the courage to turn the heat up with some sexy lingerie. To my surprise, he wasn’t into it.
- I’d never done anything like this before. Let the record show that I’ve never been anything but satisfied with my sex life, but after a while, it became a bit… routine. What’s a girl to do? I decided to get out of my comfort zone and bring something quite new—a lacy black bodysuit, to be exact—to the table.
- We’d been together for a while when I branched out. Hence the desire to spice things up. It’s not that I didn’t enjoy what we’d been doing, but there’s nothing I fear more than a stagnant relationship. I’m a firm believer that both partners need to put in 100% effort to make a relationship work. Sometimes that means doing the dishes at 2 a.m.; sometimes that means dropping $70 at Victoria’s Secret.
- I’m a huge fan of surprises so I thought he would be too. Roses on my birthday, impromptu sunset drives on our anniversary, my favorite dessert just because—I‘m easily won over by unexpected romantic gestures. I’m a sucker for sweet surprises, which is why I assumed my guy would be too.
- Turns out, I couldn’t have been more wrong. I wore that damn bodysuit for a solid three hours before having the opportunity to toss off my jeans and sweater and reveal it to my boyfriend. Instead of falling to his knees (or even dragging me onto the bed), he stared wide-eyed, confused, before uttering the words, “Oh, I didn’t expect that.”
- He told me I didn’t need lingerie to be sexy. Once he recovered from the apparent shock of seeing me in ribbons and lace, he told me I was sexier when I kept things simple. I had a hard time believing him, seeing as all my friends had told me their partners were crazy about lingerie and I’d thought I had a pretty good idea of how the male mind worked. I took this line as a weak way of climbing himself out of the massive hole he’d dug.
- I took it really personally when he wasn’t into it. It’s hard not to be sensitive to less-than-positive comments regarding your ensemble when said ensemble hugs your curves, boosts your breasts and squeezes your ass. I’d been a bit self-conscious when I tried it on in the store, but I’d hoped my boyfriend’s reaction would restore my confidence. It didn’t.
- On the plus side, I was forced to reevaluate our relationship. Maybe the fact that I felt like I needed to spend money to improve my relationship should have been a red flag, but the reception of the lingerie made it even more obvious that my partner and I were overdue for a serious talk. Apparently we didn’t know each other as well as we thought we did.
- My friends told me his reaction wasn’t a good sign. Of course, I brought this issue to my girlfriends—the very people who’d advised the lingerie in the first place—who told me my boyfriend should have reacted differently. Even if he wasn’t into this change of pace, he should have pretended, seeing as I clearly spent money on improving our sex life and was in a very vulnerable position.
- My inner goddess confirmed their suspicions. I’d felt pretty damn hot when I tried that bodysuit on for the first time, but didn’t I deserve someone who thought so too? It’s not like I’d gotten a tramp stamp or died my hair. But if I had, shouldn’t the right guy be supportive of those decisions? I wasn’t going to let my boyfriend’s hesitation affect my own body image.
- Unsurprisingly, we’re no longer together. What has henceforth been referred to as “the lingerie incident” wasn’t the reason for our breakup, although it was one of the larger bumps in what was ultimately a dead-end road. We’d gotten so comfortable together that we’d stopped trying to know each other, relying on habit and routine instead of tough but important conversations.
- The lingerie couldn’t save our relationship but I saved the lingerie. Like I said, wearing that lingerie had initially made me feel hella empowered and that wasn’t about to change because some guy was afraid of trying something new. I refuse to think of that incident as my bodysuit’s “test drive” because of the way it made me feel the first time I tried it on. So I’m keeping it, optimistic that it will come in handy one day.
