SL Letter of the Day: Asshole Boyfriend Not Interested in Boyfriend's Asshole

I’m a 21-year-old gay man and have been with my boyfriend of the same age for 2 years now. I have an average-to-high sex drive and until now we have only had oral sex, which I should add has been amazing. I would like to try having anal with him as either the top or bottom, however he is totally uninterested. I love him loads but I spoke to him today about us having anal sex and he said he was fed up with being asked about it and that he didn’t want to talk about anything to do with anal sex anymore and that he felt emotionally blackmailed and harassed by the text messages I have sent him in the past about it and that he has no interest in having anal sex with me ever. He then said that he didn’t care if I did the anal stuff with someone else as long as I didn’t keep going on about it to him. He then said he loves me, so I asked him what he meant by that and he said he was romantically in love with me but not sexually in love with me. He then went on to say that lately he has been thinking about the future and more and more of his future plans have just involved him alone, even though he cannot imagine me not being in his life as he loves me and he doesn’t want to break up. I don’t know what to do, should I just let go of the whole anal thing as you have said that many gay men are very happy with sex lives without any penetrative sex and the oral sex is great. Should I stay with him but do the anal stuff with other people, which I don’t really want to do as I would much prefer to have sex with my boyfriend but he isn’t interested. Or is our relationship already over and we should just officially end it and become good friends? Perplexed Gay Boy

My response after the jump...

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Um... you've been dumped, PGB, but you've been dumped by an asshole who doesn't have the courage—or the decency—to be direct. But listen to what he's telling you: not in love with you sexually, not interested in the sex you're interested in, can't see himself with you in the future. It's over.

So why, after all that, would he add that he loves you and doesn't want to break up? Why the mixed signals? Because he wants you to break up with him, PGB, so that he can swan around, playing the victim, boohooing to all your mutual friends about what an asshole you are for leaving him over something as meaningless as buttsex.

DTMFA.

And going forward, PGB, you need to bear in mind that a significant percentage of gay men—roughly a quarter by some estimates—aren't interested in anal sex. (And, for the record, a significant chunk of straight men—and women—are.) So while your soon-to-be-ex may be a cowardly, manipulative jerk, he isn't necessarily sexually damaged or dysfunctional. He's just not interested in buttsex... or you.

And remember this going forward too: when you're with someone who sends mixed signals, disregard the signals that appeal to your vanity and/or hopes ("cannot imagine me not being in his life as he loves me and he doesn’t want to break up") and accept at face value the signals that break your heart ("he has been thinking about the future and more and more of his future plans have just involved him alone"). The upsetting signals are invariably the truth and the appealing signals almost always turn out to be an an inch of vanilla frosting spread over a big piece of shitcake.