The user has been in a relationship with their boyfriend for nearly a year, and while the relationship is generally positive, they are facing difficulties related to sexual intimacy. The core issue is that the boyfriend has trouble reaching orgasm during sex, which he attributes to the user being overly lubricated, thus reducing his sensation.
The boyfriend suggested the user perform Kegel exercises to increase vaginal ‘grip,’ citing his own alleged ‘death grip’ developed from years of pornography use as a contributing factor. Initially, the user felt self-blame, but after the boyfriend became frustrated when she dismissed the idea of tightening exercises and blamed online feminist opinions for differing views, the user confronted him, leading to an argument and a subsequent silence between them. The user is now questioning whether their final response was too harsh.
AITAH for telling my bf that our sex issue is his problem, not mine?
As renowned relationship therapist Dr. Stan Tatkin notes regarding intimacy and responsibility, “When one person has an issue that affects the relationship, it becomes the relationship’s issue, but the responsibility for resolving it still rests primarily with the person who has the issue.”
The situation described involves a clear dynamic where the boyfriend is attempting to externalize responsibility for a performance issue onto his partner. His attribution of the problem to the user’s natural lubrication and his subsequent insistence that she perform corrective physical exercises (Kegels) shifts the focus away from his admitted issue of ‘death grip’ stemming from prolonged desensitization. Suggesting the partner research ways to ‘tighten up’ and dismissing contradictory information as ‘feminist stuff’ demonstrates a lack of accountability and an unwillingness to engage in self-exploration or behavior modification.
The user’s final statement, “This isn’t my problem. You’ve said yourself you have death grip from years of porn. So why are you putting it on me like I’m the issue? Maybe you’re the one who needs to do the work,” was direct and assertive. While the message itself was valid—placing responsibility back on the source of the problem—the intensity and timing likely triggered defensiveness, resulting in the boyfriend abruptly ending communication. The user’s actions were appropriate in setting a boundary against unfair blame, but for future conflicts, a constructive recommendation would be to preface such direct statements with ‘I’, focusing on feelings and needs rather than immediate accusation, such as: ‘I feel burdened when this issue is placed on me, because I understand your desensitization is linked to your past habits, and I need us to focus on solutions that involve you first.’
HERE’S HOW REDDIT BLEW UP AFTER HEARING THIS – PEOPLE COULDN’T BELIEVE IT.
The user is currently in a state of doubt regarding the communication of their boundaries after confronting their boyfriend about shifting the responsibility for his sexual difficulties onto them. The central conflict lies between the boyfriend’s expectation that the user modify her body to accommodate his perceived issue (‘death grip’) and the user’s belief that the responsibility for resolving the desensitization lies with him.
Given the boyfriend’s reaction to the user’s direct statement—hanging up the phone and refusing contact—the key question for consideration is whether the user was justified in firmly stating that the issue was his responsibility, or if their delivery was unnecessarily harsh and escalated the conflict beyond repair.
