Friday, January 28, 2011

5 Things Single Women Hate To Hear


"Every time she hung out with her single female friends, the same gripes surfaced. Enough already with the how-to-snag-a-guy advice streaming from anyone and everyone as soon as status single was announced, they said.
Suddenly, Karin Anderson, Ph.D., assistant professor of psychology at Concordia University Chicago, found herself keeping track of what these single women were saying, replacing the strict academic research techniques she was used to with more informal polling.
What she found was a deluge of well-meaning advice being issued to singles that, while offered with the best of intentions, not only wasn't working but was making singles' skin crawl."
This article was written by Julie D. Andrews. Read the full article at http://www.yourtango.com/200914986/5-things-single-women-hate-hear

Tuesday, January 25, 2011

10 Things You Need To Know About Bad Boyfriends-- At Any Age



"For many reasons (let the evolutionary psychologists have a party tonight explaining why) women are attracted to Bad Boyfriends the way moths are attracted to the electric bug zapper. And they end up in pretty much the same condition: burnt out."

This article was written by Gina Barreca, PHD - Read the rest of this article at 
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/snow-white-doesnt-live-here-anymore/201101/10-things-you-need-know-about-bad-boyfriends-any-age

Friday, January 21, 2011

How To Spot A Single Woman

Imagine a world where all the singletons had an "S" etched onto their foreheads and all the unavailable people had a "T" (for taken) on theirs. Wouldn't that make the world a happier place? Well, it would surely become uncomplicated, especially for all the woman-hungry men venturing out to find an equally eager woman.

Yes, the pickup world would be an easier place in which to survive; but let's face it, part of the challenge (and fun) is knowing who to target and discovering whether they'll take the bait.

You'll still have to brush up on your pickup techniques, charm and smooth moves, but in the large pool of fish that is the female world, I'll help you determine if she's ready for the taking or swimming with some bigger sharks. It's then up to you to throw her the line and reel her in.

Available Or Not?

Unfortunately, we don't live in a world where our dating availability is conveniently marked on our foreheads. (If you've been single all your life, this should make you breathe a huge sigh of relief.) Figuring out whether or not she's single takes more detective work, and it may not be determined in just one sitting.

Remember that there is no one giveaway to whether or not she's single -- you'll need to look for several hints to determine the truth.

Affirmative: She's Single

She's full of eye contact
There's a difference between a single woman and a serial flirt (the serial flirt may have a boyfriend, but she teases every man that comes within range). Unless she's a chronic people-watcher, if her eye contact is darting all over the room as if looking for potential mates, you may be able to checkmate her.

Women who are already attached usually don't bother looking around the club (unless they're looking for someone they know in particular), as they go to bars with no intention of meeting men and don't need to check out the merchandise.

She's making eye contact with you and smiling 
Eye contact is usually one of the first signs of interest, and if she's making intense eye contact with you from across the bar, then chances are she wants you to head on over and give her a try.

She's talking to every guy in the bar
If you see her talking to many guys from a distance, it may mean that she's open to conversation, therefore, it's your cue to go up to her and find out all about her ways.

She looks at other couples with sadness
If you're observing her from afar and you notice her looking at other couples, she could be longing for the days when she was once also attached. That's where you come in.

Her body language says it all
If you're familiar with the dating game, then you surely know that body language can say a lot about a person, and if she has a boyfriend, then chances are she won't be twirling her hair and touching other men ever so casually. If you muster up enough courage to approach her, try to observe what her body language is saying:

  • Arms crossed, standing back: "Get away or I'll kick my heel in your face."
  • Touches your arm or leg subtly, or her own arm (she wants you to touch her): "Let's keep talking."
She's a chatterbox
If you start talking to a woman you work with, for example, and in one conversation she tells you that she has a dog named Max, does a lot of cooking, goes to the gym every week, and takes art lessons, chances are she doesn't have a man to come home to. The two tip-offs? She has a lot of time on her hands and does a lot to keep herself busy. And she's very open and friendly when it comes to you.

More Signals She's Single

It's more difficult to know whether a woman is single in only one meeting; it can take several encounters to figure it out on your own. With these tips, you'll eventually be able to put two and two together.

Out with the girls... again
Unavailable women do go out and have fun with their girlfriends, but they have to make some time for the men in their lives. If you see the same girl out with her friends more than once at the same bar, within a short period of time, chances are she's flying solo.

She dances with other men
If the two of you frequent the same club and she's often seen dancing with different men (but you know she came with the same group of female friends she always comes with), it's likely that she's dancing to her own tune, unless her and her boyfriend have a very "open" relationship.

Single women who are actively looking for a man are more likely to branch away from their friends and remain open to romantic possibilities. When you catch her on her own or back with her group of female friends, make your move.

She's overly friendly
Don't get us wrong, but attached women tend to be less friendly with other men; they give off a more standoffish attitude when approached. Whether you're at a bar or at the gym, and you notice that a woman is very sweet and friendly with most men she encounters, it's possible that she's single. Her attitude can be an indication of her status.

Spot A Single Woman With Stealth

You don't need to run through this list mentally to establish whether or not she's single; you can always find out for yourself by approaching her and asking for her number; she may say she already has a boyfriend, and whether or not that's true is a tossup -- but it's always worth a try.

If she says she's already taken, ask her how her boyfriend could bear to let her go out when all the guys must be after her -- you can always see if she's telling the truth by her reaction to this one.

This becomes more complicated when dealing with a female colleague or someone you see often, since you don't want to come right out and ask if she's romantically involved or not. In this case, you can use the aforementioned hints as clues to her status.

So if the signs point to her being single, then gather up all your courage, head her way and work your magic. And if she rejects you, just assume she's already taken -- you have bigger fish to fry.

Thursday, January 20, 2011

The Perils of Playing House




Living together before marriage seems like a smart way to road test the relationship. But cohabitation may lead you to wed for all the wrong reasons -- or turn into a one-way trip to splitsville.


Forget undying love or shared hopes and dreams -- my boyfriend and I moved in together, a year after meeting, because of a potential subway strike. He lived in Manhattan, and I across the river in Brooklyn. Given New York City taxi rates, we'd have been separated for who knows how long. And so, the day before the threatened strike, he picked me up along with two yowling cats and drove us home. Six years, one wedding and one daughter later, we still haven't left.

Actually, if the strike threat hadn't spurred us to set up housekeeping, something else would have. By then, we were 99 percent sure we'd marry some day -- just not without living together first. I couldn't imagine getting hitched to anyone I hadn't taken on a test-spin as a roommate. Conjoin with someone before sharing a bathroom? Not likely!

With our decision to cohabit, we joined the mushrooming ranks of Americans who choose at some point in their lives to inhabit a gray zone -- more than dating, less than marriage, largely without legal protections. Thirty or 40 years ago, cohabitation was relatively rare, mainly the province of artists and other questionable types, and still thought of as "living in sin." In 1970 only about 500,000 couples lived together in unwedded bliss.

Now, nearly 5 million opposite-sex couples in the United States live together outside of marriage; millions more have done it at some point. Some couples do choose to live together as a permanent alternative to marriage, but their numbers are only a tiny fraction: More than 50 percent of couples who marry today have lived together beforehand. (At least 600,000 same-sex couples also cohabit, but their situation is different, since most don't have the choice to marry.)

"It's not this bad little thing only a few people are doing," says University of Michigan sociologist Pamela Smock. "It's not going away. It's going to become part of our normal, typical life course -- it already is for younger people. They think it would be idiotic not to live with someone before marriage. They don't want to end up the way their parents or older relatives did, which is divorced."

In my and my husband's case, the pre-matrimonial experiment seems to have worked out well. But according to recent research, our year of shacking up could have doomed our relationship. Couples who move in together before marriage have up to two times the odds of divorce, as compared with couples who marry before living together. Moreover, married couples who have lived together before exchanging vows tend to have poorer-quality marriages than couples who moved in after the wedding. Those who cohabited first report less satisfaction, more arguing, poorer communication and lower levels of commitment.

Many researchers now argue that our penchant for combining households before taking vows is undermining our ability to commit. Meaning, the precautions we take to ensure marriage is right for us may wind up working against us.

From toothbrush to registry
Why would something that seems so sensible potentially be so damaging? Probably the reigning explanation is the inertia hypothesis, the idea that many of us slide into marriage without ever making an explicit decision to commit. We move in together, we get comfortable, and pretty soon marriage starts to seem like the path of least resistance. Even if the relationship is only tolerable, the next stage starts to seem inevitable.

Because we have different standards for living partners than for life partners, we may end up married to someone we never would have originally considered for the long haul. "People are much fussier about whom they marry than whom they cohabitate with," explains Paul Amato, a sociologist at Penn State University and one of the theory's originators. "A lot of people cohabit because it seems like a good idea to share expenses and have some security and companionship, without a lot of commitment."

Couples may wind up living together almost by accident. "People move in their toothbrush, their underwear, pretty soon a whole dresser," says Marshall Miller, coauthor with his partner, Dorian Solot, of Unmarried to Each Other: The Essential Guide to Living Together as an Unmarried Couple. "Then someone's lease is up and since they're spending all their time together anyhow... "

Or, two people may move in together without a firm future plan because one partner isn't sure the other is good marriage material: He drinks too much; she gets really nasty during fights. Rather than commit, they take a trial run. Once they've shacked up, relatives start noodging: "So when are you going to get married already?" At friends' weddings, people ask, "When will it be your turn?"

"There's an inevitable pressure that creates momentum toward marriage," says Amato. "I've talked to so many cohabiting couples, and they'll say, 'My mother was so unhappy until I told her we were getting married -- then she was so relieved.'" On top of the social pressure, Amato points out, couples naturally start making investments together: a couch, a pet -- even a kid. Accidental pregnancies are more common among cohabiting couples than among couples who don't live together.

Once their lives are thoroughly entangled, some couples may decide to wed more out of guilt or fearthan love. "I know a lot of men who've been living with women for a couple of years, and they're very ambivalent about marrying them," says John Jacobs, a New York City psychiatrist and author of All You Need Is Love and Other Lies About Marriage. "What sways them is a feeling they owe it to her. She'll be back on the market and she's older. He's taken up a lot of her time." Women in particular may be afraid to leave an unhappy cohabiting relationship and confront the dating game at an older age. "If you're 36, it's hard to take the risk of going back into the single world to look for another relationship," says Jacobs.

Charles, a 44-year-old New Yorker (who asked that his name be changed), admits that in his 30s, he almost married a live-in girlfriend of three years for reasons having little to do with love. The two moved in together six months after meeting when his sublet came to an end. "I thought it probably wasn't the best idea, but it was so much easier than looking for an apartment," Charles says. "I told myself: 'Keep trying, and maybe it will work.'"

Eventually his girlfriend insisted they either marry or break up, and he couldn't find the strength to leave. The two got engaged. Weeks before the date, Charles realized he couldn't go through with it and broke off the engagement. "Her father told me, 'I'm sorry horsewhips are a thing of the past,'" Charles recalls, still pained by the memory. Even now, he regrets moving in with her. "It was a terrible idea," he says. "You get entwined in each other's lives. If you're not sure you want to be entwined, you shouldn't put yourself in a position where it's definitely going to happen."

Some evidence indicates that women have less control over the progress of the cohabiting relationship. She may assume they're on the road to marriage, but he may think they're just saving on rent and enjoying each other's company. Research by sociologist Susan Brown at Bowling Green State University in Ohio has shown there's a greater chance cohabiting couples will marry if the man wants to do so. The woman's feelings don't have as much influence, she found: "The guy has got to be on board. What the woman wants seems to be less pivotal."

Cohabiting men may carry their uncertainty forward into marriage, with destructive consequences. A 2004 study by psychologist Scott Stanley, based on a national phone survey of nearly 1,000 people, found that men who had lived with their spouse premaritally were on average less committed to their marriages than those who hadn't. By contrast, cohabitation didn't seem to change how women felt about their partners.

Based on this finding and others, Stanley, director of the Center for Marital and Family Studies at the University of Denver and another originator of the inertia theory, believes women should be especially wary of moving in before getting engaged. "There are plenty of young men who will say, 'I'm living with a woman but I'm still looking for my soul mate,'" he says. "But how many women know the guy is thinking that way? How many women are living with a guy thinking he's off the market, and he's not?" Men also get trapped in troubled relationships, admits Stanley, but women are more likely to bear the brunt of ill-considered cohabitation decisions for the simplest reason -- they are the ones who have the babies.

The cohabiting type
The inertia theory is not the only way to explain why couples who move in before marriage are less likely to stick it out for the long haul. There may also be something specific about the experience that actually changes people's minds about marriage, making it seem less sacrosanct. "A couple of studies show that when couples cohabit, they tend to adopt less conventional beliefs about marriage and divorce, and it tends to make them less religious," says Amato. That could translate, once married, to a greater willingness to consider options that are traditionally frowned upon -- like saying "so long" to an ailing marriage.

Nonetheless, there's a heated debate among social scientists about whether the research to date has been interpreted properly or overplayed to some extent. Having a family income below $25,000, for example, is a stronger predictor of divorce in the first 15 years of marriage than having shared a premarital address. "Having money, a sense of an economically stable future, good communication skills, living in a safe community -- all of those things are more important," says Smock.

Because it's impossible to directly compare the effects of marriage and cohabitation, there's just no way to prove cohabiters' higher divorce rates aren't a side effect of their other characteristics, says psychologist William Pinsof, president of the Family Institute at Northwestern University. They may just be less traditional people -- less likely to stay in an unhappy marriage in observance of religious beliefs or for the sake of appearances. "Those who choose to live together before getting married have a different attitude about marriage to begin with. I think cohabiting is a reflection of that, not a cause of higher divorce rates," he says. One population of cohabiters also tends to have less money and lower levels of education, which in itself can strain a relationship.

In short, not everyone buys the idea that cohabitation itself is hazardous to your relationship. For some couples, it may serve a useful purpose -- even when it lacks a happy ending. About half of all cohabiters split up rather than marry, and many of those splits save the parties involved from rocky marriages, miserable divorces or both.

That's the attitude Amy Muscoplat, 34, a children's librarian who lives in Santa Monica, California, now has about the man she lived with several years ago. She and Mr. X had dated for nine months when they got engaged; a few months later she gave up her rent-controlled apartment by the beach, sold most of her furniture, and the two moved in together. "We moved in in August, and by early September he flipped out," she says. "We were supposed to get married in early November. The invitations had gone out, and then he changed his mind. Living together was the reality check for him, the mirror that made him go, 'Gosh, this might not really work for me.'"

Though she and her family lost thousands of dollars when the wedding was called off, Muscoplat is grateful things fell apart when they did. If they hadn't moved in together, she says, "I think he might have been pushed to the same place at some later point, maybe some day down the road when I was pregnant. I have a religious take on it -- God was really watching out for me and I dodged a bullet."
The debate over cohabitation is partly a rehash of the values and morals conflicts that tend to become political footballs in America today. But on one point, virtually all researchers agree: We need to understand the effects of cohabitation on children. Some 40 percent of all cohabiting households include kids -- that's somewhere close to 3.5 million children living in homes with two unmarried opposite-sex grown-ups.

Cohabiting relationships, by their nature, appear to be less fulfilling than marital relationships. People who cohabit say they are less satisfied and more likely to feel depressed, Susan Brown has found. While the precarious finances of many cohabiters has something to do with it, Brown also points to the inherent lack of stability. Long-term cohabitation is rare: most couples either break up or marry within five years. 

"Cohabiters are uncertain about the future of their relationship and that's distressing to them," she says.
As a result, cohabitation is not an ideal living arrangement for children. Emotionally or academically, the children of cohabiters just don't do as well, on average, as those with two married parents, and money doesn't fully explain the difference. The stress of parenting in a shakier living situation may be part of the problem, says Brown. "Stability matters. It matters for the well-being of children and adults alike," she adds. "We're better off with commitment, a sense that we're in it for the long haul."

The must-have discussion
Cohabitation rates may be skyrocketing, but Americans are still entirely enchanted with marriage. That's a sharp contrast with some Western societies -- Sweden, France or the Canadian province of Quebec, for example -- where cohabitation is beginning to replace marriage . In the United States, 90 percent of young people are still expected to tie the knot at some point.

Since most Americans are destined for marriage -- and a majority will live together beforehand -- how can we protect against the potentially undermining effects of cohabitation? Follow the lead of one subgroup of cohabiters: Those who make a permanent commitment to each other first. One study that tracked 136 couples through the initial months of marriage found that early intentions seem to make a big difference. About 60 of the couples in the study lived together before getting engaged, while the rest waited either until after they were engaged or after they were married to set up housekeeping. Ten months after the wedding, the group that had cohabited before being engaged had more negative interactions, less confidence about the relationship and weaker feelings of commitment than the other two groups. But the marriages of couples who had moved in together after getting engaged seemed just as strong as those who had moved in together after marrying.

Among other things, couples who get engaged before cohabiting probably have a clearer understanding of each other's expectations before they combine households. On that point, Mia Dunleavey, a 39-year-old online financial columnist living in Brooklyn, New York, can speak with the sadder-but-wiser voice of experience. In her late 20s, Dunleavey was involved with a man she hoped to marry. He reluctantly agreed to move in with her, spurred by the fact that his lease was running out, but he vacillated for so long about setting a wedding date that she finally ended the relationship. Soon after, she relocated across the country to move in with a new man she'd fallen in love with, only to find their living styles were utterly incompatible.

Back in New York again, she took stock. "I was terribly disappointed," Dunleavey says. "You have this faith that you're moving in with someone in order to deepen the commitment, and it doesn't necessarily happen at all. Those two things are not correlated.

"At that point, I said, 'Never ever, ever again,'" she continues. "Living together is a waste of time and energy. The piece of china you'd gotten from your mother gets broken in the move. My living-together experience was a catalog of lost and broken things, never mind my heart."

When she fell in love again, she did things differently. She moved in with her intended just two weeks before the wedding -- because by that point, there was no question about their future together. "There was no take-it or leave-it," she says. "The commitment was the foundation of the marriage. Alas, my only experience of living with someone is that when you leave the door open for quasi-commitment, quasi-commitment is what you get."

Miller and Solot don't advise against cohabitation for couples without immediate plans to marry. But they do believe each partner needs to understand clearly what the other is thinking. "The most important thing is for people to treat moving in together as a serious decision, a major life choice," Miller says. "What does it mean to you both for the long and short term? If one person thinks living together means a quick path towards marriage and the other thinks it's just saving on rent and having a friend with benefits, there could be trouble. The important thing is to be on the same page."

As for my husband and me, we had this much going for us when we moved in together: We'd already discussed a lot of the important issues. We knew we wanted similar things: a family; a "for better or worse" kind of commitment; a partner who knew life had to stop on Sundays, when Six Feet Under or The Sopranos was on. Even before the ring, it was clear to me I'd found someone who'd be willing to work things through. And he has been.

Perhaps there's hope for us after all.
This article was written by Nancy Wartick, Phd and was taken from Psychologytoday.com

Wednesday, January 19, 2011

10 Relationship Red Flags and Bad Girlfriend Warning Signs


Wondering if you're dating Ms. Wrong? Not quite sure if your girlfriend is the one for you? Are you searching for relationship warning signs? Just curious if your girlfriend isn't a good catch?

Is so, you're not alone. Some common searches on
 Google are "is my girlfriend right for me", "warning signs of a bad girlfriend", "signs of a bad relationship", and "relationship red flags."

Here are a few warning signs that your girlfriend isn't right for you.

Relationship Warning Sign #1She is constantly complaining.
Is your girlfriend constantly criticizing other people? Does she complain about her family, roommate, or random people at the grocery story? If so, that is a big red flag.

Do you really want to spend the rest of your life with a grouchy 'ole lady? It will only get worse as she gets older. Chances are, if she is complaining to other people about you frequently, more than likely she complains about you to others.

Now, there are some situations, say a bullying coworker, where it is understandable. But if she is constantly complaining about other people and life in general, she probably isn't for you. This is especially true if she complains about your family and friends.

Relationship Warning Sign #2She has lied to you.
Lying is a big red flag. It is not healthy for anyone to lie in a relationship. I'm not saying you should definitely call it quits if she has lied to you, but you should take this very seriously. This is especially true if she has lied about her background, age, or health situation.

Relationship Warning Sign #3She doesn't share your religious beliefs.
One of the biggest relationship mistakes is to date someone who does not share your religious beliefs. While it may seem to work, this can cause serious problems in a marriage. It is best to find a girl who shares your religious beliefs. In a relationship where the religious beliefs are not shared, someone usually will have to give in and leave their religious background.

Relationship Warning Sign #4She is trying to change you.
Okay, this one is flexible. If she's trying to get you to quit smoking or stop drinking, that is understandable. But if she is trying to change you in other ways, and is nagging you, 
you might need to think twice about the relationship. If she's not happy with you now, imagine how she might being thirty years or so when you're going bald.

Relationship Warning Sign #5She doesn't get along well with others.
Does she not have many friends? Is the constantly fighting with her roommate, family and other people? If she doesn't get along well with others, it might be a sign the relationship won't last long.

Relationship Warning Sign #6She criticizes you in front of other people.
Does your girlfriend criticize you in front of others over things like the way you hold your fork and are dressed? Does she point out your flaws to friends and family? If so, this is a big red flag she is not the one for you.

Relationship Warning Sign #7: She's very, very insecure.
Does she incessantly put herself down? Is she very insecure with the way she looks? This is not the best sign in a good girlfriend. While it is possible she can change, it is toxic to be dating someone who is very insecure.

Relationship Warning Sign #8
She uses illegal drugs.
This one is pretty self-explanatory. Do you really want someone who uses drugs to be the mother of your children? Will she be a positive influence on you? Think about it.

Relationship Warning Sign #9
She doesn't seem very interested in you. 
If she doesn't seem to be very interested in you, it might be time to talk to her about it. She's either very shy, or she's just not the one for you.

Relationship Warning Sign #10She doesn't seem to like your children.If you have kids, and she complains about, or doesn't seem interested in your children, she is definitely not the one for you. And, if your kids have expressed that they don't like her, she is just not a good catch. It is very unhealthy to marry someone who won't be a mentor and positive role model to your children. You need to put your kids first. If you really feel she is the one for you, then wait until your kids are grown.

These are just ten red flags that your girlfriend is not a good catch. These signs don't necessarily mean it's time to end the relationship. Counseling might be beneficial. If you are wondering what are some of the bad relationship signs for men are, please read "20 Signs You're Dating Mr. Wrong." Best wishes!



This article was written by Rachel Carpenter and was taken from associatedcontent.com

Tuesday, January 18, 2011

How Long Did She Wait To Have Sex?



Some girls give it up on the first date, others wait until your penis is so clogged with sperm that your brain can no longer concentrate on anything but. Whatever the case, how long she waits could be the "make it or break it" aspect of a relationship.


Now please keep in mind that certain circumstances cause couples to become closer or break further apart despite how long they wait to have sex. Not everyone is hung up on waiting for a specific time frame or rather, any time at all.

How about yourself and your significant other? Did she make you beg for it, or was she donning high leather boots and a whip off the bat? Well, if you've been in this situation before, what I'm about to reveal will likely come as no shock.

Here Comes The Bride

Some girls will wait until their wedding night (although that seems to be happening less and less nowadays) to give up the goods. And although I must admit that this is quite admirable, couples who put off having sex for too long could be in for a huge disappointment.

First off, just as healthy communication and common interests are important in a relationship, so is sexual compatibility. Imagine sleeping with her only to discover that her behavior in bed mimics that of an embalmed corpse. Or worse yet, a violent cavewoman.

If she waits until your wedding night to give it to you, she's a respectable woman and hopefully, a virgin. Yeah, and what's up with that "secondary virginity" crap anyway? Hey, once that cherry's gone, it's gone for good.

As The Months Went By

There you were, you poor goof, waiting, wondering when that day would finally come that she would flash her garden your way and give you an open invitation to a private buffet. For months, all you were getting were some wet kisses and an occasional grope of a booby or two. 

Finally, after 181 days (you know because you've been marking the days down on the calendar), or six months, she finally welcomes you into her pleasure palace. And it's the best you've ever had. But if anyone has ever listened to Eddie Murphy's stand-up comedy, Delirious , they'll know it's like "crackers."

If you're starving, and someone throws you a cracker, it'll probably be the most scrumptious cracker you've ever tasted -- the caviar of crackers if you will. But after months of the same thing, they begin to taste like ordinary soda crackers. So always keep in mind that creativity is key and it's up to both of you to keep the fire burning.

Remember that this one's a keeper and she's a rational being who doesn't jump into things impulsively.

The Three-Month Mark

If your woman waits a couple of months or so, she's probably a very sharp woman who got to know you and felt that you and she were compatible on every level, thus sex will likely be excellent.

Keep in mind that if you only went on two dates in two months, and she gave it up on the second date, then that doesn't mean she waited 2 months that means she waited two dates -- there's a huge difference.

I figure that in two months you have probably gone out on about 8 dates and therefore got to know one another somewhat. This is probably the greatest amount of time to wait because you get to know each other enough to realize whether or not there's long-term compatibility and yet, there remains an element of mystery between the two of you.

There's a good chance that this kind of gal has a great sex drive. And it's great that she took the time to get to know you, and let you get to know her -- outside the bedroom.

What if it takes 3 dates... or less?

One, Two, Three

If a gal waited about three dates or so before she bedded you, it's a little too iffy to predict. A whole lot can happen in only a few dates, depending on what you did. If, for example, you went out to movies or loud dance clubs on all the dates, then chances are you probably don't know much about one another.

It's quite easy to predict when a sexual relationship is purely about lust and infatuation rather than a genuine desire to get to know that person.

On the other hand, if you went out to dinner, or for coffee or drinks together, then chances are that the two of you have communicated certain personal things to one another, and there may be more than just sexual heat stirring.

First Night Fling

Although there are a rare few who have had first date sex and then a successful relationship, the majority of players who engage in this little game of sex tag right away are usually doomed from the get go. Perhaps most women are still labeled negatively when they engage in such acts, but it's hard for all of society, including women, to rid itself of this negative stereotype.

A woman who beds you before you even discover that she has a cat named Bubbles and a huge crush on Adam Sandler is probably not going to end up being the ball to your chain.

The obvious questions come into play: how many other guys did she do this with? How can she take sex so lightly? And then the usual "this was way too easy." Be careful, though, because nowadays women have become the aggressors, and it is quite possible that you'll end up being the one who feels cast-off.

Everything But The Hole

What about those women who refuse to let you insert, but will basically do everything else under the sun? The kind of women who think that if they let you smack it up, flip it and rub it down without penetrating her vagina, then she's still pure. My goodness, some people really have a distorted definition of "virginity."

So you get to stick it in everything but the garden is she worth planning a wedding for? Bloody unlikely. She's a horny girl, obviously, but isn't anything more than a kiss a little too much on a first date?

If You Wait, They Will Come

If you're dating a woman, why not take the high road and do the holding out yourself? I know, I know, that would require nothing short of dirty magazines and lots of lube, but she'll end up wanting you more than ever.

Anticipation is the greatest aphrodisiac, and if you continuously give her small doses of the good stuff, she'll be hooked for good.

It's obvious that there is no "right time" to wait before having sex because we're all different beings and our situations, as well, may also be dissimilar. But whatever the case, your best bet would be to wait and get to know your potential bedmate somewhat.

After all, the last time I checked, sex was still a sacred experience.

This article was written by Vanessa Burton and taken from askmen.com.