Adult Virgin

I am 25 years old. I have never had sex, kissed anyone, or been on a date. I hear how people talk about people with that kind of relationship history; when a man does something bad a lot of people say things like "I bet he's never touched a woman" and act like that if you haven't had success with women that that must mean there's something bad about you. It makes me feel humiliated and emasculated. People talk about having sex as "becoming a man" and at 25 I think I should be considered an adult and a man already.

My history with women has not been good. In High School I was a little shy with girls and was not overly interested in dating back then. I asked a girl out my freshman year in college. We had gotten along before then but in hindsight she didn't take me very seriously. She was a Junior. She made fun of me to other people after I asked her out and didn't want to be my friend anymore and seemed embarrassed of me. I asked two more girls out after that in college. They were both very nice about it, although one had been a good friend for about a year and didn't want to be my friend anymore afterward. The other one was a girl I met in a class who was very attractive who I got a bit friendly with. I just asked her because I thought I would regret it if I didn't and wasn't expecting her to say yes so I wasn't very sad when she didn't. Last year I got a little interested in a girl at graduate school who I got along with on a basic level and was always friendly with me. When I started going out of my way to talk to her a little more she basically ignored me and deleted me on facebook. I never touched her, made any sexually oriented comments, or did anything that would be considered harassment or stalking; I just made sure to say hello and ask how she was doing when I would see her in places we both regularly went. I sent her one message after the fact saying that I hope I hadn't done anything to offend her or make her uncomfortable. She did not respond. I don't know what I did to make her hate me so much that she can't even tolerate basic association with me.

I do not understand why girls dislike me so much. People tell me I am smart and funny and although I can be a bit shy most people think I have good social skills. I am insecure about how I look due to having a bit of a boyish face and being thin, but objectively I know I am probably average looking. I would have been fine being friends with most of these girls. With the last girl I would even take her just being indifferent towards me. People act like if a man doesn't want to keep being friends with a woman after she turns him down for a date that he is a jerk, but they can completely drop me after I ask them out. I probably take stuff like this a bit personally because of stuff with my mother.

I found out that it is quite abnormal for men my age to have not had sex (only 3%) and am starting to fear that I will be alone forever. Women will expect me to have sexual experience I do not have. I want to be mutually in love and get married more than just about anything. I am especially depressed about this lately and am getting to the point where I wish I didn't have to get out of bed in the morning. I am also living with my parents while I finish my thesis for graduate school which is also making me depressed due to my relationship with them and compounding my feelings of emasculation.

Hello Norseman: I don't really have any words of wisdom to offer here. I just wanted to leave a reply letting you know I read your post & I wish you well...

I am sad to hear you state that figure. I don't think it is accurate. I used to hang on another board where a lot of the guys are virgins and at one point I had access to medical records and I can tell you it was, shocking to me, to see how many people were virgins or weren't having sex.

But I do think you do need to get some sexual experience. Maybe just date someone and get it over with.

I actually do feel like I have a similar problem woman wise. There is just something about me that is a mismatch. I tend to be attractive to people I don't want and not attractive to people I do. I have often wondered if there some imperceptible smell or something that causes such problems. But I have definitely just settled in the past to get things over with so that I could move on.

Just a word of comfort ... I married at 25 ... and I was a virgin ... been married 35 years with two boys .... I was very shy around women and had a very strong miss guided religious fevor ... but the right woman came across my path ... I know expectations may be different today ... just be yourself ... relax ... age is not important ... I am in favor of waiting for love .... if this really concerns you how about seeing a therapist ... your school probably has someone ... peace my friend ...

I can empathize, I'm turning 24 in a couple days and I'm in a similar situation. Minus the thing with your mom I've had pretty similar experiences. My first, I guess you could say proto-girlfriend in middle school was an absolutely horrible human being, incredibly verbally abusive and controlling. I have aspergers too and can't tell when someone is flirting with me unless it is incredibly obvious. and when it is obvious I get this overwhelming anxiety that has made attempting to find a relationship extremely difficult.

I asked my university's therapist I've been going to for anxiety about it and she flat out told me she had no clue how to help, so I'm just kind of stuck and I don't know what to do about it anymore. Best of luck, hopefully both of us can get past this issue.

May I ask why do you think he needs experience just for the sake of it?

@OP: Again, why do you think women are not interested in you romantically? There must be something you can recognize and can be addressed, since it seems a pattern with you.

Well, I think part of the trouble is that people don't want to date me.

In the first case I think she thought I was too young, the second one may have thought we were too close friends to date and that my wanting to date her "ruined" our friendship, I may not have been attractive or masculine enough for the third, and I do not know why the most recent one disliked me so much.

I am worried that something about me seems weak or non-masculine. It may be just neuroticism.

OK, so take these things that you know into consideration for your next potential move, namely, choose someone who is close to your age, and make your move before you get into the friend zone. For your physical appearance, do you have male friends or anyone who can give you an honest feedback on that?

You stated in your original post that "people talk...". Who are these people & why are you listening to them? Yes people talk, but do you know how many of them lie! Stop listening to "other people" & listen to your core values & life pillars. Who you are.
Do you know how many "people" lose their virginity & regret it? Many! I did.
This 3% that you mention. Is this based on hard scientific facts, a long term study? Again how many people lied & said they had sex...when they didn't.
I think you need to change how you're viewing this thru societies eyes & their pressures. They are not your own.
You're 25yo. I think if you'd double your age & posted this then we'd have an issue to look at.

Sex does not make you a man.

I just thought it could become a psychological barrier to someone he does really want so by just finding someone and getting it over with... it could be helpful. Surely you can just go to a dating site and put out vibes that you are just looking for sex. I am on POF and there are plenty of guys-- good looking -- and not who are just honest about it... and they find women all the time that just don't want the hassle of a relationship.

In my experience it is more like 25% are still virgins by 25 and there could be about 10% more than had one experience that might have been super bad or like one thrust. I feel like Virginity is the last taboo that NO one admits.

I think experience is important and people don't realize it because most of the learning people do, happens organically starting in the formative years/up to early 20s.

It's not just about confidence or stigma and it's not about getting your rocks off, it's about having the experience of being in that situation, with everything it implies, adjusting and learning from it.

It's the same with general social interactions, where if you've done little socializing, especially some more intimate/deeper socializing(as in connecting, making friends, stuff that require vulnerability, sharing, keeping up a relationship), you're most likely to be clumsy and stiff at it, not just because of anxiety and the uncomfortable situation you're not used to but also because it's an aptitude you've practiced little.

Every aptitude needs practice to develop and so does this one. Without having ever been in a romantic/sexual situation ,of course you're not going to naturally send off all the right vibes and signals and use body language correctly, etc. By romantic/sexual situation I also don't mean it being a one sided attempt but a situation where there's mutual interest. We all learn everything together and from one another.

Also, I don't see what is so outrageous about the idea that yes, to get a good grip of yourself as a sexual/romantic being, you need to experience being seen as one and you need to be in such a situation where you can express and experience your sexuality with a partner. Knowing your body sexually, accepting your body, knowing you're a sexual person and all that, is not enough because shared sexuality is about more than that and it's a different facet of your own sexuality that comes into play.

The problem is,a majority of the population has at least a modicum of experience by the time they reach their mid 20s. I think people don't realize that even those laughable attempted flirts in school, the awkward hand holding, just going on a date, seeing/feeling someone is interested in you(even if you're not interested in them), all those small things actually do count and every failed relationship counts too, those good times and intimacy you've had while together doesn't go away. Now, most people start roughly at the same time so when they're inexperienced, so is everyone else, more or less. But then, if you reach your late 20s with no experience or very minimal, then the problem is not so much stigma(at least for me stigma is not an issue at all) but the fact that you're unlikely to find someone as inexperienced, everyone is at a different level, with different expectations, they're playing the game on advanced and you're at middle school level. Also, as an adult you catch up slower and the emotional suffering rejection, loneliness, unmet needs cause ,just piles up. When everyone is roughly as inexperienced, that inexperience isn't noticeable, but when most people have a significantly higher level of experience and you're inexperienced...then it sticks out(or you don't manage to stick out).

Thing is, you're not going to get experience(even just sexual) by having a super casual or paid encounter, because the problem isn't not knowing how to get undressed and move your hips, it's forming that connection that leads to it, sending the signals that convey you're sexually/romantically available and interested, allowing yourself to be vulnerable. So I don't think an online hook-up is going to do the trick either

Oh and I think all around it's probably like 5% of people who haven't had sex til their early 30s, 10% at most. It's higher or lower depending on the culture, of course, but all in all.... Sex/romance is probably the most important, predominant instinct/need we have as living creatures, apart from food/water/shelter, it's at the core of our social lives, we're biologically programmed that way for practical reasons. So it's something very common, it's not a luxury, u don't need education for it and most people do just get to it naturally.

So what would you recommend to people like me who just can't see those little body language cues that lead to that development? I can't speak to OP's experience but in my case it has to be incredibly obvious for it to even register for me and even then I'm not sure if I'm interpreting the other person correctly.

I've read a great deal about body language & I think this can be helpful, but also to see it in action. Go watch people. Maybe in a bar or social setting. What do you expect? What queues are people putting off? I love watching people & really listening to their body language bec most don't realize what they're saying.

You have not asked many girls out. Ask more out. On my first date with my husband, he took me on a double date. The activity was a motorcycle ride up into the mountains on a lovely Spring day. I thought his motorcycle was sexy and loved the sensation of the wind. He made sure I had a helmet and seemed like a safe driver. On our second date, I grabbed his hand as we were standing in line for a $1.00 movie matinee. It was something I did without any kind of forethought, there was just chemistry for some reason. Prior to that date, I had experienced plenty of dates where the chemistry was lacking. I rarely second guessed why? One of the reasons that I kept seeing him was that we enjoyed doing the same activities like drinking beer, camping under the stars, tubing down the river, etc. I think our sex drives are a part of our human nature so if you can find a girl who likes to spend time with you, it might happen naturally.