Top Five

...She has no kids and has told her husband she wants a divorce, which he won’t consent to. He doesn’t need to consent — she could divorce him anyway — but she’s leery to. The house is the only thing she owns with him, while everything else is in his name. Most of her friends, also Nepalese, have told her that white men can’t be trusted, which I can’t really disagree with, given our history as a nation. And they are telling her that having a baby with her husband will improve their relationship. I think that’s the worst possible reason to have a kid, especially when the dude in question is an emotionally abusive POS. I love this woman. She makes my heart flutter every time I see her. She’s kind, compassionate, intelligent, and hot. But after three years, she still can’t leave him. Which I can only imagine is difficult, as she has a lot to lose, but I love her and want to be fully with her. But I don’t want to push her to do anything she’s not ready to do or that she doesn’t want to do. That would make me no better than all the other men she’s had in her life. But I’m starting to feel like this isn’t going to happen. She sleeps in bed with him every night. He tracks everything she does and where she goes. I’m not sure how much longer I can be patient. I’m sick of being a shadow boyfriend while she just keeps playing wife, and we have to pretend we’re just friends. Should I leave this relationship? I’m I an idiot to think she’ll ever leave him?  Leaving Isn’t My Best Option I’m not sure what your whiteness or your girlfriend’s Nepalese-ness have to do with your question, LIMBO, which is one I get all the time. The genders are reversed — it’s usually a woman who’s getting strung along by a married man — but your predicament is a common one. And since you’re a regular reader of at least one advice column (that would be mine), you’ve most likely seen questions like yours in my column before, LIMBO, and you’re going to get the same answer everyone else gets: If she was gonna leave him for you — which she’s not gonna do — she would’ve left him already. I’m guessing you weren’t able to independently verify that your girlfriend asked her husband for a divorce, LIMBO, which means you only have her word to go on. And as commenters on this and every other advice column are quick to point out, the word of a cheater isn’t worth much. And the reasons she’s given for not leaving her husband — the house is the only asset that her name is on, her husband refused to consent to the divorce — sound more like excuses than reasons. If she lives in a marital property state, she’s entitled to half of everything, including assets that are in his name, and she doesn’t actually need her husband’s consent to divorce him. Now, it’s also possible that she’s afraid to leave him — she may have legitimate worries about violence or social consequences in her community — but even if her reasons for staying with her husband are understandable (if deeply sad), LIMBO, like all mistresses, whether you’re willing to settle for what she’s able to give you is a decision you get to make. If being her sidepiece insults your dignity, you need to break up with her. If you love her too much to ever leave her, you’ll have to make peace with being her sidepiece. My husband and I — straight, cis, and in our 30s — are very happy together, but our sex life has never really “clicked.” In our day-to-day lives, we’re best friends, and we’re prone to silliness. The sex feels like it should work out: we’re attracted to each other, and we have similar sexual fantasies, mostly related to Dom/sub stuff. We like the same porn, for example. The sex we have is usually pretty nice, but it’s also very vanilla. I have more experience with kinky sex than he does, but always as a sub with an experienced Dom. We have never really managed to bring our shared interest in D/s into our bedroom. I think part of this is us not knowing where to start. Part of it is also that it’s hard to distance ourselves from our reality. We played with bondage, for example, but I didn’t find it particularly hot because it was him tying me up, and since I knew he would never actually hurt me, it all felt like play. Any advice? Been Dithering Since Marrying Picture this, BDSM: you and your husband are tied up together — maybe you’re strapped to the bed, he’s strapped to a chair — while the pro-Dom you hired (or the amateur Dom you met at a munch) playfully but plausibly threatens to “hurt” you both. Finding a very special guest star who not only shares your love of Dom/sub stuff but really enjoys playing with couples will take effort, BDSM, but calling in the kink cavalry  — outsourcing the domination to someone who might (but wouldn’t) actually hurt you — could help you and your husband find a groove that makes kink feel more possible/plausible when it’s just the two of you. Or you might learn that bondage and D/s play don’t work for you in the context of a committed relationship, BDSM, and you’ll have to keep bringing in those special guest stars if you wanna keep that Dom/sub stuff coming. Straight guy here in his late forties married to a forty-year-old straight woman. We’ve been married for sixteen years and have two young children. Our sex life is not satisfying, to say the least. I do not anticipate it will improve, as my wife is not sexually driven and not open to much outside of weekly PIV, with one week off every month for her period. She is very vanilla, so the sex is always the same thing, at roughly the same time, and always in the same position. I’ve spent years trying to get her to open up, but she has given me one of two choices: I accept our sex life as-is, or we divorce and move on. I feel satisfied with the other aspects of our marriage — I truly love my wife — and I don’t want to live separately from my children or break up our family. Is wanting a fulfilling sex life enough to blow everything else up? Am I being an asshole? Should I suck it up for the sake of my family? Please help. Despairing In Maryland  It’s always the partner who wants more sex or more sexual variety who gets told — by their spouses, by the sex-negative couples’ counselors, and sometimes even by themselves — that asking for more sex or more varied sex risks “blowing everything else up.” But couldn’t the same be said to someone like Mrs. DIM? By refusing to consider adding anything to the rotation — by refusing to suck it up — isn’t she risking a blowing up too? Now, I don’t want anyone having sex under duress to save their marriages — of course not — but if my husband was so unhappy with our sex life that he was considering leaving and/or cheating, I would be motivated to make some changes. And if I didn’t wanna fuck my spouse more than once a week (or at all anymore), I would release my spouse from the monogamous commitment he made to me and give him permission to get some and/or all of his sexual needs met elsewhere — you know, to avoid blowing everything else up. Sadly, DIM, you’re not married to me, and so you face a choice between sucking it up or blowing it up. I’m a stay-at-home mom with three children, one of which is still a breastfeeding infant. I live semi-rural area with my husband and my mother-in-law, who is in decline and requires more and more care. My husband and I are great at co-parenting, home, family, and projects. But things aren’t great on the sex-and-romance side, and neither of us has made much of an effort to fix it. We’ve talked about it, and we’ve accepted that things probably aren’t going to change, as we’re both burnt-out caregivers hustling to pay the bills. Sometimes that feels like a cop-out — if we wanted to prioritize sex, we wouldn’t be co-sleeping with our toddlers — and we were non-monogamous before we had children. But I haven’t had sexual intimacy in over a year and am so bored with masturbation. I am ready to meet someone. I want to find a consistent lover who wants to date a little and fuck a couple of times a month. The dudes on the dating apps where we are cosplaying at CNM/poly, or they’re the same people I’ve been swiping left on for the past six years. I’d love to find a kinky feminist dad who is actually poly and up for a long-term thing. Any other ideas on how to find this unicorn? Do I stay on the apps and expand my range to include bigger cities two hours away? Or do I give up and accept my sexless life? Touched-Out Underfucked Cis Hets Stay on the apps (you never know who might move to town), expand your range a little (good dick is worth the drive), and remind yourself every morning (or every time you masturbate) that you’re playing a long game. Because whether the right guy turns up two miles or two time zones away, TOUCH, you’re not gonna have time to go jump on that feminist poly dick until after your youngest is no longer breastfeeding and/or your MIL is dead. Giving yourself permission to seize the opportunity when it comes along — when the planets all align — can make the wait a little more bearable. P.S. If you’re interested in reviving your sex life with your husband again, TOUCH, get those toddlers out of your bed. P.P.S. You should, of course, check in with your husband about your relationship and make sure your non-monogamous agreement is still in force. My relationship of twenty-seven years ended a few years ago in divorce. While I’m mostly over it, I am still a little bitter about my 57-year-old husband dumping me for some 19-year-old kid. Whatever. I got the house, the cars, and the dogs. I really am much happier now. Here’s my dilemma: while we were together, he was an amazing and loving doggy daddy and absolutely doted on our two pups. In the five years we’ve been apart, he’s never once asked to visit them (even though doggo visitation was written into the divorce settlement), and the few times I’d asked him to check in on them if I had to travel, he declined, citing plans with his new boyfriend (now husband). One of the dogs is getting very close to crossing the rainbow bridge. Do I do the right thing and offer him one last moment with her? Or do I just send him the vet bill when it’s done? Following Intensely Dan’s Opinion Do the right thing and tell your shit ex-husband your dog is dying. (I’m using the singular “your” in reference to your dog; your ex-husband may have a legal claim to the dog, per your divorce settlement, but he long ago forfeited any moral claim.) Based on the small amount of info you shared, FIDO, it sounds like you’ve behaved admirably since your husband left you for someone who may not have been able to legally drink champagne on his wedding night. If I were you, FIDO, I wouldn’t cede an inch of the moral high ground: I would let my ex-husband know “our” dog was dying, if only to deny my ex and his current the satisfaction of telling themselves I’m a shittier person than they are. Got problems? Yes, you do! Email your question for the column to mailbox@savage.love! Or record your question for the Savage Lovecast at savage.love/askdan! Podcasts, columns and more at Savage.Love