Back From the Dead

When I was 21 I fell in love with a beautiful 25-year-old escort; I became her regular and after five months we started unpaid dating.  We fell in love with each other and planned to marry; I had no objection to her work, and she appreciated my support.  But not very long after we moved in together, she was diagnosed with a virulent cancer and died nine hard months later.  As you can imagine, I was emotionally devastated and started to see a psychiatrist who helped me a lot.  Seven years later, I’m successful in my business but don’t feel anything for any of the women I’ve tried to date.  When one of them questioned my emotional distance I told her about my dead girlfriend; she mocked me and then left me.  So eventually I decided to start seeing escorts again; for the last six months I’ve regularly seen a wonderful girl.  I’m so comfortable with her; we can talk about anything, and she’s the first woman I’ve been able to actually have sex with since my girlfriend died.  I have very strong feelings for her, but I don’t know if she feels the same.  I don’t want to lose her; can you give me any advice?

Humans are creatures of habit, and sometimes we fall into destructive patterns of behavior without realizing that we’re doing it.  For example, a woman may get out of an abusive relationship, only to find she keeps unconsciously attracting or seeking other abusive men.  Or a man may keep dating women who all look eerily like his high school sweetheart.  It’s a well-known observation that people often marry partners who resemble (physically or behaviorally) their opposite-sex parent, and so on.  What it looks like to me is that you are unconsciously trying to bring your lost love back from the dead.  The two of you were so much in love and then she was suddenly snatched from you at a tragically-young age, so you haven’t really been able to accept that despite years of therapy; because of that and the bad experiences with amateurs, you seem to have convinced yourself that you can only be in love with another escort.  But while it may be true that escorts are easier to talk to than amateur women, and for most men we’re certainly less sexually intimidating, it is actually much harder for most men to have romantic relationships with us due to jealousy, stigma, cultural baggage and everything else.  Most escorts won’t even consider dating men they meet as clients, and though there are occasional exceptions your good luck in finding one in your first love may have blinded you to just how uncommon a situation it actually is.

It’s OK to keep seeing escorts for your sexual needs, but you mustn’t expect lightning to strike twice; it’s very unlikely that you’ll easily find another one to replace your lost love.  Do date amateur women, but do not under any circumstance tell them you even see sex workers, much less that you were emotionally involved with one; most amateurs are utterly clueless on this subject and will react like that one girl you tried to date, or maybe even worse.  And most of all, you need to return to therapy so you can get help in finally letting go of your beloved, so you’ll stop trying to replace her with someone who may share nothing in common with her except a profession.

(Have a question of your own?  Please consult this page to see if I’ve answered it in a previous column, and if not just click here to ask me via email.)