The effects of being a Complete Relationship Failure (CRF)

I'm a Complete Relationship Failure. I know this because I've dated girls for the last 17 years and yet the longest relationship I sustained was just over 4 years and even that I managed to screw up. My shortest relationship was three months and everything else including flings that never got off the starting block, have been something in between.

12 of those 17 years of failed relationships have been in Brighton and most of my exes are scattered about the city. I've noticed that my exes get rather friendly with each other once we've split up. It's not uncommon to discover that they are now BFF. I had a mate I was due to meet up with once, call me from 'The Marly' the local Brighton lesbian hangout,

"Susan, you may not want to come here this evening, there's enough of your exes in here to have their own party!"

As a result of being a CRF it means I'm now quite insecure which doesn't help my prospects much. This insecurity might be age, but I also think it's because I have come to believe from experience that it's only a matter of time before the person I'm with has had enough, my faults (as long as your supermarket till receipt) too much to bare and leave just like all the others with blame firmly placed at my door.

I find it amazing when I meet anyone who's had a relationship longer than five years wondering how they did it. As a child I always said I would marry the person I made it to five years with. Now 36 I'm still waiting for that to happen and question whether it ever will. At least marriage will be an option in law by the time and if it were to ever happen.

I've noticed increasingly the adverts of lesbian nest building activities as brands begin to target the 'pink pound'. Flick through any Diva or G3 these days and it's full of adverts for home purchasing and articles about having babies with the images of lesbians all coupled up in love-you-forever-after situations, enough to make you vomit into the nearest container you can find. I almost can't bare to look at them any more, giving me about the first five of 30 pages to read, before I toss them asside.

The portrayal of lesbians that we like to believe is real, is that which we are fed as a child by Walt Disney, the reality is that civil-partnership dissolvement is at 3.3% and not every lesbian is in a nest building situation. As we increasingly gain equal rights and acceptance for our relationships and families, it means that we are now provided with ideals by the media that for some are realised, for others remain a longing dream and for others a desire they are completely uninterested in. I have enough exes across Brighton reminding me that I'm a CRF, I don't need a further reminder from the media. 

One-night-stands are pure ego? The Girlfriend starts a debate

Quite a bit of wine had already been consumed by the party of four sat together in the pub. This included me, The Girlfriend (luckily Cupids arrow was not laced! See 'Why Lesbians Should Celebrate Valentine's Day' if you've no idea what I'm on about!) and a couple of mates.

As happens when large quantities of alcohol are consumed when trying to have a rather calm and civil evening, someone drops a deep and meaningful topic into conversation towards the end of the evening. A debate that's rather challenging with brains not fully functioning and with slightly less brain cells than we started the evening with.

It's normally me that gets the drunken heated debate's going, so was rather surprised when The Girlfriend who openly self declares on a frequent basis that 'she has no opinion on anything (dog shit on city streets being the exception to the rule) and is happy to drift along whilst the likes of me try and change the world, decided to start a debate!

The conversation went something like this:

"One-night-stands are all about ego"

Two of us at the table immediately questioned this statement, stating that one-night-stands are not just ego, some times they were about self-harm, distress, frustration, low self-esteem and heart-break.

The Girlfriend and other friend at the table were adament, whether pain or pleasure, one-night-stands are about fulfilling your needs, wants and desires, to make you feel better, to make something in your life feel less. It was all still ego.

The conversation then shifted to what the definition of ego was, with me saying that ego implied selfish super-inflated behaviour and self-image and that not all one-night-stands came from this.

I went on to express that ego regardless of official meaning could not be used so sweepingly to describe one-night-stands because of the connotations associated with the word. That it was negative and insinuated a selfish act. Can one-night-stands really all be described as such? It seems so harsh to me.

This brought the conversation back to the definiton of ego and where we started the debate, that one-night-stands are all ego regardless of why we do them.

The debate remains unresolved.

What do you think?

Pulling Power: The Dating Etiquette of Lesbians

My straight mate has started dating again and during our latest get together I got to hear all about her Saturday night getting chatted up by a 'cute' guy she really 'sparked' with. He flirted at her, and she flirted back and it all sounds great and I am expecting the story to go on to tell me about how amazing he was in bed and how kind and considerate he is and how it's all been blossoming ever since like a fairytale in the 21st Century. But instead the story ends rather abruptly as she tells me they didn't exchange numbers at the end of the night and therefore have no means of seeing each other again.

"Oh", I exclaim in a surprised and somewhat disappointed tone. "Did you not ask him for his phone number or something?" I perplexedly question, this seeming the logical action I would have taken in the same circumstance.

"Ohhhh noooo", she goes on to explain shaking her head at me, "boys must ask girls. If they don't it means they are not interested enough. I would 'never' ask a guy for his phone number!"
So there was her logic, he appeared interested but obviously not enough, end of fairytale story.

It left me thinking about the dating etiquette in the lesbian world where gender roles do not define behaviour and dating protocols and there's a level playing field. In the same situation as my straight mate I would have asked for the phone number.

A few years back I had been single for about eight months, my longest period as a single girl and I desperately wanted to meet someone, even if just for a bit of TLC fun. Pouring my sexually frustrated lonely heart out over a pint, a mate offered me advice that I still believe to be incredibly effective when it comes to dating women.

'You need to make yourself seem available Susan. You are not vulnerable enough. Women want someone who needs them and you give the vibe that you don't need anyone".

The confidence I was giving out in a bid to make me seem more attractive was actually turning girls off! Taking up the advice I dropped the confidence, (which was for show anyway - I'm quite naturally shy) and I changed my body language to be more open and approachable (further tips on this which I've since mastered, can be found on a previous post 'On The Pull At the GO.GO Festival'). It wasn't long before it started to pay off and I was busy with more than one girl eager to ease my frustrations!

Fundamentally though, as lesbians we are not bounded by gender conformities. If I like a girl, I won't let the opportunity pass and unlike my straight mate would ask for a phone number, preferring to push away feelings of possible humiliation that might follow, rather than drive myself crazy with regret for an opportunity I didn't take with a girl I really liked.

Nearly every girl I've ever asked who said yes, has gone on to tell me how much they appreciated me being bold enough to ask them. It seems that nearly all girls are shy but without gender protocol to dictate who, if someone doesn't do the asking there won't be any lesbian dating or loving going on. Just make sure you're giving the right vibe as available and vulnerable enough!

GO.GO Women's Festival Line Up & Arrival of Candy Bar Girls For 2012

Last year I went along to the GO.GO women's festival along with 200 other women from Brighton & Hove to join thousands of females from across the UK. We genuinely had a great time and the moment the dates were announced for 2012 myself, the girlfriend and the same friends that went together last year booked the time off from work without hesitation.

Me, having a good time last year at GO.GO

For those that didn't go to the festival , you may have got a taster of the GO.GO style if you attended Brighton Pride in 2011 where GO.GO and Zhoosh, the LGBT Brighton Network I run teamed up together to run the Women's Performance Tent where GO.GO showcased their abilities at attracting the best (and sexiest!) of UK female talent for their stage line-ups, It was a huge success and the tent packed the whole day.

Why Lesbians Should Celebrate Valentine's Day

The shops are brimming with hearts, roses and sickly sweet sentiment reminding us that Valentine's day is nearly upon us and providing plenty of reminders to where I was a year ago with the ending of yet another relationship. Far from Cupid firing his bow to bring romance it seems his bow is laced with something far more toxic when in my direction, for Valentine's has become synonymous with heartache and the anniversary of my relationships ending.

The new girlfriend announced pretty soon after anything red started appearing in the shops that she "doesn't do Valentine's" in a disdainful tone that said this was not up for debate and booked herself a holiday skiing for the week. So I've had little option but to settle for the fact that I won't be celebrating Valentine's this year either.

It's a hallmark holiday that fills me with a certain foreboding dread, but yet as a soppy romantic I enjoy having a day devoted to love, spending time making a lovey-dovey card and doing something special with your partner - just a shame it falls in February when we're all suffering from SAD and on a come down from Christmas and New Year.

The new girlfriend is not the first in my life to say it's all nonsense and I've equally had girlfriends with whom I've not celebrated our annual anniversary (the philosophy being, why celebrate like it's an achievement to reach X years together if you plan on staying together forever). I've also known couple's that do not buy each other gifts for Christmas and birthdays, pooling money instead to complete home improvements and renovations or to save up for large items such as cars, holidays and entertainment systems.

Lesbian bed death is not just a myth for lesbians in long term relationships. It is well recorded just from conversations with mates that lesbians have less sexual intimacy as relationships progress and (research showing) less than other types of relationships. Figures for the last five years for civil-partnership dissolvement in the UK show lesbian couples are twice as likely as gay men to separate (1.6% of formalised gay male relationships have been dissolved, compared with a dissolution rate of 3.3% for lesbian partnerships)

Cynics say that Valentine's Day is artificial and we should be taking time to do something special for our loved ones throughout the year, not just on these 'commercially' created days. But they can also act as a reminder to put our troubles and busyness aside and dedicate time to the person that we can often take most for granted. If that means using Valentine's as an opportunity to buy a new 'toy' to maintain or re-ignite intimacy or doing something to keep the spark there, then that for me is reason enough to celebrate and not be cynical - that's if Cupid hasn't laced his bow again!

Shit Straight Girls Say.... to Lesbians

Doing the rounds around my les-bi friends on Facebook is the following video that I just have to share as I couldn't stop laughing.

Put together by Laura Catlow, singer, writer and musician from Blackpool, this is a parody of Shit White Girls Say to Black Girls, which was a parody of Shit Black Girls Say, which was a parody of Shit Girls Say!

I think this tickled my funny bone as I have a number of lovely straight female friends, but have heard just about all the following innocently and naively spoken from their lips!

You can find more information about Laura Catlow on her website http://flavors.me/lauracatlow and follow her on Twitter @catlowman.

Dyke Drama - There's No Avoiding It In A Lesbian World

Love it or hate it, they can’t be avoided. Dyke dramas are part of the lesbian world and culture, and we seem to thrive on them. The urban dictionary describes it as ‘the constant challenges and sometimes strife affecting lesbians, due to affairs and gossip’. 

Walk into the lesbian pub, club night or party and you are confronted with girls having heated arguments and bystanders caught in the middle. Being able to keep out of dyke drama is the biggest challenge as when they happen they act like a tornado sucking everyone and everything into their path.

I’ve been embroiled in my own fair share as a result of friendship disputes, relationship break-ups, affairs, jealousy, group dynamics, over zealous loyalty, drug use and alcohol consumption.  It doesn’t matter where you go either: Brighton, London, Sydney or New York, town or village, within an hour of meeting a group of gay girls you will know who’s welcome to the party and who’s not, who’d ‘better not show up’, who’s the outcaste of the moment, who’s sleeping with who, who’s got a drink problem and who you should avoid getting close too. 

At the last party I went to, upon mentioning who I had my candy-eyes upon, I was told in no uncertain terms to ‘back-off’; it seemed I wasn’t the only one interested. The same individual then challenged me in a competition-like challenge, but I declined saying I was not into duelling over a girl and swiftly moved my attention elsewhere. I was seeking an easy drama-less one night stand, not the opposite.

Party in full swing and beneath all the joviality was a can of worms waiting to be unleashed. Someone’s stormed off feeling intimidated – something to do with having come onto the (ex) wife of someone else, behaviour that wasn’t welcomed. Meanwhile the civil partnered couple are coming onto others and one is caught snogging my best mate. It wasn’t long before all hell had broken loose and dyke drama's were exploding everywhere! 

Out celebrating New Years Eve’s with 200 women in the same venue, it was inevitable that at least one dyke drama was never going to be far away as the celebrations took place.  I had a great time, but at midnight there were fireworks not just in the sky overhead. A friend of a friend has kissed a girl that wasn’t her girlfriend. Witnessed, tears and arguments now follow and the friends who should be toasting the start of 2012 are instead now caught in the middle as they are left to console, support and unravel events.  I’m relieved to not be involved, though disappointed my friend (understandably) has to leave to attend to her distraught friend. 

Regardless of the reasons for them, dyke drama is part and parcel of my world. It’s about being a woman and it’s about being a lesbian, it’s about the friendships we share and the relationships we have.  There is no avoiding it if you're in the lesbian world.