SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

No. But realize the reality of the situation, especially when you enter into relationships where the reality is so obvious as to be blinding. No, your AP didn't love you, he probably didn't even like you, you were "easy sex" to him. No, Mick Jagger isn't going to call you in the morning, that's just what he says on his way out the door. Be realistic to the world around you, yes, a whole lot of men want to sleep with you every day, and very few of those men care about your hopes/dreams/interests anymore than you care about the size of their penis, it's just not what they are after in the relationship. Some are, and some do want that, and that's also rather obvious by their behavior (or at least it was with my behavior).

I'm not suggesting that I think a ONS should call me the next day. I likely don't care whether he does or not. I may value him for the sex he brings to the table, but I also recognize his humanity and wouldn't treat him with disrespect. It's not that complicated. Now if this ONS asked me what my plans were for the following weekend and suggested some things we should get together and do and asked a lot of personal questions about my life and acted like he wanted to get to know me, I am not an idiot for being confused by being dropped like a hot potato after sex. I am not the one to blame for being naive. He is the one to blame for being dishonest. We cannot read one another's minds. My first marriage was founded upon what I intended to be a ONS. He and I truly enjoyed hanging out and it turned into more. Neither of us pretended we wanted more initially. There was no dishonesty there. I've had other ONS where it really was just one night and I had no trouble with that. We women do understand words. We are not responsible for assuming that a man is lying every time he opens his mouth.

I'm not sure where this "loss of humanity" occurs. Does my car salesman example not view me as a person? No, I'm pretty sure he views me as a person, he just wants a particular action from me to get something that he wants. But that doesn't mean I'm less than human to him, just that I'm a means to an end for him to get something else that he wants. And that, frankly, is just life. Does my work keep paying me because I'm a person, or because I make them lots of money. I can tell you, as someone who's been in the position of firing their friend (person) over another employee I happened to manage (but made more money for the company), well.. You're a person, but the results are what matters. Your "personhood" isn't under assault though, you have just as much right to that, and I don't take that away from anyone, it's just that most people in my life "serve a role" beyond just their humanity. It's nice to believe I'm loved just for breathing air and eating food, but, that's not the case. If I want love, I have to take actions to get it, if I want money, actions, if I want sex, actions. But I don't feel less a person because of any of that, just that life is transactional because.. Well, in many/most ways, it is.

I'm talking about a simple basic thing. Honesty. That's it. If you have to fire someone, be honest about why. If you want to have sex with someone, be honest about that. It's not that difficult. My humanity is not degraded because a man doesn't want to date me. My humanity is degraded by a man who views me as nothing more than a collection of body parts he wants to use and doesn't give a shit about being honest with me. Speaking of car salesmen...there are reasons that people use "used car salesman" as an insult. There are a lot of very successful extremely dishonest car salesmen. They sell more cars and screw people over, quite often poor people who cannot afford what they are manipulated into buying. There are a lot of lying liars who have a lot more sexual partners than an honest man. Is that a justification for lying? I don't think so. I am not naive nor am I idealistic. I know that there are assholes everywhere and in every scenario. Lord knows I've met enough of them in life. I object to being misled and lied to and will continute to object to it because I have dignity.

You can expect whatever you want. But I'd say my worldview is that you're very likely to get the desperate hard dick, especially if you're attractive. Look, like it or not; right or wrong, it's either the highest, or close to the highest value thing that most people bring to the table. Oh great, you're smart as hell. Wonderful, I know 1000 people who fit that criteria. That's not to say it doesn't have value, it does, especially to employers, but it's not valuable to me because it's so common. But flip that around, your hot as hell and can't get enough of me in bed? Well, I know 1 person like that, and I'm not sure she's being honest (my wife). That's immensely valuable to me because of it's scarcity. It's not a statement to your lack of humanity though, it's only a statement about the things that I attribute value to.

If I am doing nothing with a person but having sex with him, I expect that is what he enjoys about me and that is totally okay. I have had that be all that I enjoyed about a man and still respected his humanity. Not that hard to do, RIO. I'm not sure what we're arguing about. You do respect your wife's humanity.

True, and yes, I'm talking about dating. It's entirely different in a LTR or marriage, I fully concede that point. But affairs are much more "dating scene" than LTR/marriage. And, at least for me, my marriage started as an offshoot from the dating scene; I think that most LTR's/marriages probably follow a similar course.

I think that is a fallacy. A's are not anything like dating. I can understand why a BS might interpret it that way, but it's not like the dating scene you compare it to.

I also think that either your wife's version or your version hasn't evolved past it was a need for words. Yes, people have a love language of words of affirmation. What your wife had a need for was to fill a black hole within herself. There was something going on in her life she couldn't cope with so she escaped the coping with a fanstasy. I know why it's hard for you to believe she believed this fantasy. But, the truth is - she was so unhappy within herself she was clinging to it with a grip that's hard for me to describe and hard for you to fathom.

The dating scene - yes, I think to some extent most women are conditioned to believe or suspect a man's intentions in a bar, or wherever. We are told our whole lives to wait and make sure that the man's intentions are good. So, as a woman, I have ran the gammit of not caring because mine weren't pure either (NSA), to waiting until it seemed like he was interested in me more deeply. But, it's not like that in an affair at all.

So much is not purposely not conscious. To have an affair, you have to kind of suspend having your hands on the wheel and applying logic. The other person is usually an equal piece of shit that they are cheating on their wife. That type of person I never had any respect for. So, you put lipstick on the pig so to speak. I was coming from a place that is hard for you to understand. Most of what was happening was all in my head. There were redflags after redflags, all ignored. It's nothing like the dating scene where everything is above board for the most part there is little cognitive dissonance or justification. There are no real victims, just free will and bad decisions on the dating scene. In an affair, there are real victims and while you are exercising free will you are doing so over things that are not free.

You remain stuck in comparing it to the dating world, or the experience of getting new P. But, many, many of the men who have affairs have performance issues with the AP. I would garner a guess that many women never or rarely experience an O during the A. The AP really isn't who they are in real life to you, they are a figment of your imagination of what you wish life was like. A fairy tale. You don't raise the mask because it is the only good feelings you have had for so very long that you don't want anything to compromise that. You compartmentalize, self-brainwash, and project.

Often the AP is in a convenient vicinity, and there is an opportunity. As much as you think women understand that we can go fuck any joe blow in a bar, that's not the way we think. Instead, I didn't take responsibility for my own happiness, and something felt good so I kept doing it (talking). The AP is always going to be a dirtbag, in both directions. I was a dirtbag too, I made my own manipulations to keep esculating the situation. So did your wife.

[This message edited by hikingout at 12:51 PM, November 19th (Tuesday)]

Coco -

I dated my share of assholes when I was young. And, that's it. I was young and inexperienced and was looking for fun. I got an ego boost when the hottest guy in the room was attracted to me. I didn't think about the fact that he was an asshole. I didn't know any better.

Do you see? You were drawn to the stupid assholes. You just changed later in life.

I think some men are. Some men don't mind being used and abused.

Notice how you switched things here. All women, but only some men.

See, I think men are all attracted to the dumb playmate at some time. Not to the asshole woman or slut. We want the girl who all the guys turn their head for and all the girls defer to. She isn't always a slut or asshole, but it is common. She is always fake and good at the Mean Girls/popularity game.

But come on, I remember my female family members getting "the talk" about men at like 12 years old, how they are only out for one thing and will lie to you to get you in bed. This really comes as a shock to some people? But, sadly, I can answer my own question, because, that's exactly what my W's AP did, and yes, it came as quite a shock to her that she was only there for sex. IDK how or why she was so out of touch, but, she was.

RIO and right there is one of the big problems with teaching kids that. It's a disservice to both men and women.

Because no, MOST men aren't like that. Maybe you are. But genuinely good human beings do not look at other human beings as target practice, period. They are not sport. They are not prey. They're PEOPLE with thoughts and feelings and desires of their own.

By the way, Dee- you are awesome.

But genuinely good human beings do not look at other human beings as target practice, period.

I'd tend to agree with you, but, I'd also say that given that criteria, there aren't many "good humans" out there. A whole lot of men I knew/know today fell into the "target practice" mentality. No, not all. And some were "good guys" until they got married, then went all "target practice" on women. And some never did, but that's a much smaller subset of the men I know.

They are not prey. They're PEOPLE with thoughts and feelings and desires of their own.

Yes, they are, but their thoughts, feelings and desires frankly, aren't my problem. It's up to them to fulfill them. However, leaving that aside, have you ever worked in sales? If not, I'd offer, yes, I view my clients as people, sure. But their thoughts/dreams/desires, well, those are just the things I use to help sell my products. Again, not my problem, except as how I can use them to enable me to succeed at work. Does the "dime store salesman" still exist? Yes, I'm sure he/she does. Are they wildly successful at selling? I'd guess that most aren't (mostly because I know a LOT of people who work in sales, and not a single one of them sits around and thinks about the hopes/dreams/goals of their client except as how it relates to helping them sell their products).

Much of human interaction comes down predator/prey. Not all of it, family dynamics (children) come to mind immediately, but there are other situations, for sure, where this dynamic doesn't apply. I'd argue that marriage, in many ways, is supposed to have the "other" dynamic (and often does, right until an A or a D, in which case you realize the predator/prey dynamic has actually been governing your marriage all along and you've been blind to it).

The dating scene - yes, I think to some extent most women are conditioned to believe or suspect a man's intentions in a bar, or wherever.

Why doesn't this conditioning extend to affairs? And if women know/knew my intention in the bar, did I do anything wrong? Was I wrong to play the game, or were they wrong to believe the game? That's why I used the car salesman example, you SHOULD know his/her intentions, if you choose to ignore it and see him/her as a friend, well.. Don't be surprised when you're paying 1000/mo on a used Camary. It's an adversarial relationship, they want the most money for the car, you want to pay the least possible. And sex, very often, is the same, or at least it was for me; I wanted sex with the least possible effort, they wanted to extract maximum commitment from me before sex. The better I was as my job, the less "price" I'd have to pay for it. But if we all know the nature of the relationship going in, well, big sigh here, because that certainly makes me feel better; we were all playing the same game, see how much we can get for the least possible investment, and I was just "good at" the game.

As much as you think women understand that we can go fuck any joe blow in a bar, that's not the way we think.

Might not be how many or most women think, but it doesn't change the fact that it's true. The sexual access afforded women is something that most men, frankly, almost all men, can never even dream of.

I have had that be all that I enjoyed about a man and still respected his humanity. Not that hard to do, RIO. I'm not sure what we're arguing about. You do respect your wife's humanity.

Perhaps it would be helpful to define what "respecting humanity" looks like. What is an example of NOT respecting someone's humanity that could occur in standard dating (not rape, that's obvious) and what's an example of a similar thing where you are respecting their humanity? Yes, I feel I do respect my wife's humanity, but I also feel like I respected the humanity of the women I "gamed" into bed too, so what the heck do I know, maybe I don't respect either's!

Perhaps it would be helpful to define what "respecting humanity" looks like. What is an example of NOT respecting someone's humanity that could occur in standard dating (not rape, that's obvious) and what's an example of a similar thing where you are respecting their humanity? Yes, I feel I do respect my wife's humanity, but I also feel like I respected the humanity of the women I "gamed" into bed too, so what the heck do I know, maybe I don't respect either's!

Meaning I'm honest. For example, if I were having a casual relationship with a guy who was more into me than I was into him and he happened to notice some repairs that needed to be made to my house and he offered to do them, I wouldn't take him up on it because that would be taking advantage of him if I knew that he was doing it to try and get me to like him more. I wouldn't make a fool of him that way. Does that make sense? Or let a guy whom I am never going to have any physical or emotional relationship with buy me something in an attempt to change my mind. I don't like treating people that way.

Meaning I'm honest.

Yeah, that's what I thought you meant. But, I just don't see how that would have or could work out for me. I never would have married my wife if I was honest with her. When I first met her, "wow, you're hot, I'd love to have sex with you" was the thought in my head. LTR material? Not even a little bit. I wasn't interested in that at all. And marriage? I would have run out the door without opening it. My "honest" intention was to get her into bed. Once there, I found that more feelings started to develop.

And I were to D, saying "you have to be honest" dating would effectively be like saying "don't bother" to me. I've tried "honest" in the past, it didn't work out at all for me. Thing is, most women really don't appreciate a man saying "I'd just really like to go to bed with you", no matter how honest, it's just not high on the list for things women like to hear. It would be like telling a woman "You can date, but you can only tell men "I just want to find a good man to have my baby and take care of me and him/her" (because that's what she's really looking for in a man). Might be true, in fact, I know of some instances where it's almost certainly true, but.. Good luck with that level of honesty!

Why doesn't this conditioning extend to affairs?

Because when you have an affair it's out of desperation to escape your circumstances. When you are dating, you have clear intentions of "I would like some NSA, or I would like to meet someone to potentially build a relationship". You probably are discerning, and you are not having to justify to yourself what you want. A lot of ignoring, justifying, and seeing what you want to see so you can feel what you want to feel (high).

It's like when someone starts drinking or using drugs. They don't really care what damage they are doing, they ignore all that to get away from themselves. That's what an affair is. You don't have that when you are dating.

Who the AP is or what they want generally doesn't matter, that's why you hear so much "they affaired down". It's about self-adulation, distraction, self-medication. Avoiding your reality. The last thing you can do is avoid your reality with having reality with the AP! You are never going to find someone quality to have an affair with, who doesn't have their own separate set of motivations!

Down deep even people who have an exit affair like your wife, or me, they have the stable thing at home. To get high, the destabilization almost has to occur - the risks for the escape. None of this mindfuckery happens in the dating world.

We are not responsible for assuming that a man is lying every time he opens his mouth.

This, so much! Women are not responsible for men's behaviour. People who are honest expect honesty. People who are dishonest expect dishonesty. It's human nature to expect people to be like you. That's not naive. That how everyone is. You have demonstrated that, RIO, by admitting you were dishonest and that you assume others are dishonest (except for all those cheating men you know who are, apparently, the only people who are honest about their sexcapades.

DoinBttr, the question is, "Do women prefer assholes?", not girls. I was a young, inexperienced girl. I didn't know the guys were assholes until it was too late. Once I realized it, I didn't stick around. I learned my lesson relatively quickly, I think.

On a funny note, I married the opposite of those guys and still ended up with a cheater, an asshole. 🤷‍♀️ If you ask anyone who knows him who doesn't know he's a cheater, they would say he's an amazing person. When we were dating, the other women in my office would jokingly ask if he had any brothers. I guess it is reasonable for me to conclude that, deep down, all men are assholes.

Some of us legitimately don't have a problem finding people with "that level" of honesty.

And I were to D, saying "you have to be honest" dating would effectively be like saying "don't bother" to me. I've tried "honest" in the past, it didn't work out at all for me. Thing is, most women really don't appreciate a man saying "I'd just really like to go to bed with you", no matter how honest, it's just not high on the list for things women like to hear. It would be like telling a woman "You can date, but you can only tell men "I just want to find a good man to have my baby and take care of me and him/her" (because that's what she's really looking for in a man). Might be true, in fact, I know of some instances where it's almost certainly true, but.. Good luck with that level of honesty!

Haha, I can debunk that one for you. Do you know how H and I got together? We were FWB. We hung out a lot, but neither of us were interested in a relationship. He had another situation that he was sourcing for sex, but he felt like the woman was catching feelings and it was time to move on from that because he didn't want a relationship with her.

So, one night after we had been to a pub, he said, "Hey, let me ask you a question. But, let me just tell you that no matter how you answer, we can still continue being friends. Do you want to have sex? See about having a FWB situation". I wasn't sure at first, but we had a whole hour or more long conversation about boundaries, thoughts about it, etc. And, I agreed and we had sex that very night. A little awkward at first, but we got together a couple times a week after that. Eventually, I did start seeing someone else and broke off our arrangement, because my rule was I didn't want to be intimate with others at the same time frame and the time had emerged that I was invested enough in the other person to pursue sex... but that situation didn't last long and I went back and re-engaged. It was a good six months of that before I ever even considered a romantic relationship with him. For the longest time I dismissed that as a possibility due to age difference.

That honesty led to a lot of different arrangements until we eventually became monogamous.

[This message edited by hikingout at 3:45 PM, November 19th (Tuesday)]

Yeah, that's what I thought you meant. But, I just don't see how that would have or could work out for me. I never would have married my wife if I was honest with her. When I first met her, "wow, you're hot, I'd love to have sex with you" was the thought in my head. LTR material? Not even a little bit. I wasn't interested in that at all. And marriage? I would have run out the door without opening it. My "honest" intention was to get her into bed. Once there, I found that more feelings started to develop.

And I were to D, saying "you have to be honest" dating would effectively be like saying "don't bother" to me. I've tried "honest" in the past, it didn't work out at all for me. Thing is, most women really don't appreciate a man saying "I'd just really like to go to bed with you", no matter how honest, it's just not high on the list for things women like to hear. It would be like telling a woman "You can date, but you can only tell men "I just want to find a good man to have my baby and take care of me and him/her" (because that's what she's really looking for in a man). Might be true, in fact, I know of some instances where it's almost certainly true, but.. Good luck with that level of honesty!

It's just...not like that out there once we're a bit older, in my experience. Just judging from the women and men I know, it just isn't. A bar hookup is not seen as the first step to marriage by any woman I know. And honestly, the VAST majority of us 40+ have absolutely zero interest in a man to have babies with. We shudder at the thought if we already have children at home. You're talking about women who have been taking care of themselves just fine for quite a while. We have already been there/done that with marriage and babies and gooey first love stuff. We're more practical. We don't need a man to survive. We know what players are and are bored with their games. If you stepped out into the dating world now with women in your age-range, you would turn off a lot of them if you tried the stuff you tried in your 20s. Single women in their 40s are much much more likely to hear "I think you're hot and I'd like to sleep with you" as a positive thing and be down for it. See...lots of us are dealing with demanding jobs, older kids, an idiot ex-husband or two, and we don't have time for the games and sometimes don't have the emotional energy for a relationship and all the drama that can entail. We want to get laid. Lots of women want to fall in love too, but that doesn't mean we'll turn down the opportunity to just get laid in the meantime. Obviously not all women, but a whole bunch of women I know fall into this category. A good number of us were all on dating sites at the same time in our 30s and we used to have a blast sharing our adventures with one another. I cannot tell you how many times I got a text from a girlfriend on a first date saying stuff like "God, he's boring, but I am so gonna hit that. He's looking good." We did check-ins for safety so that someone else would know where we were, but we also shared a bunch of amusing commentary.

Being honest would do you more favors than playing games if you wound up single now.

Single women in their 40s are much much more likely to hear "I think you're hot and I'd like to sleep with you" as a positive thing and be down for it.

Well, can't speak from any personal experience here, but, if I D, I certainly would LOVE to be able to date like this, and, shoot, plenty of fish in the sea, I'll give it a shot and report back. I'd like to think you're right, and, for all I know, you are, but that's also completely counter to my experience in teens/twenties dating.

Edited to add:

And also completely counter to what my wife "fell for" from the OM. Let me tell you, it sounded nearly word for word like shit I would spin as a younger man. And she was into the "40's" category too (and he was even older). So, again, coloring my opinion here, but the same game I kicked at 20 seemed to work just great on my 40yo wife in an affair.

[This message edited by Rideitout at 4:32 PM, November 19th (Tuesday)]

So, generally, as a rule, I don't really engage a lot of WW or WH on here, because I know that my anger and resentment of that entire class of person is powerful, and I am more than capable of being cruel with my words. However, hikingout, you said this, and it intrigued me;

You remain stuck in comparing it to the dating world, or the experience of getting new P. But, many, many of the men who have affairs have performance issues with the AP. I would garner a guess that many women never or rarely experience an O during the A. The AP really isn't who they are in real life to you, they are a figment of your imagination of what you wish life was like. A fairy tale. You don't raise the mask because it is the only good feelings you have had for so very long that you don't want anything to compromise that. You compartmentalize, self-brainwash, and project.

I realize that no single statement by any one person can be applied to an entire group of people. However, would you apply this to an exit affair? My STBXW is almost 1 year in to her current APs, both OM and OW (the couple she left me for), and has been out-ish about it for three months and five days to date (August 14th was DDay for this one). She talks to them every day for hours. They live 2,000 miles and four states away. They are the majority of her emotional support. They make plans together (even if they fall through because she can't count on me for support with finances or childcare during those times any more (hahaha fuck her)), they even synchronize watching movies together at times over the internet while they're on call or camera. She has claimed that they gave her more orgasms in a week than I did in 17 years (while not true, the pictoral evidence that I've seen supports that she did orgasm during her week of hedonism with them).

It seems that your statement is more apt for those who are in in-person, local affairs that end up breaking off eventually because of mutual toxicity and the dissolving of the unicorn la-la-land vacation. But what about exit affairs? The ones that are used to shatter relationships (and the betrayed partner) and move on with and into? Do you feel the same about those?

And as an aside, to the rest of you, reading this discourse on how men and women view finding a partner is incredibly fucking intimidating.

I used to be a high climber in the redwoods. I've worked forges hot enough to melt my flesh if I slip. I've put on medieval armor and fought full force with metal weaponry. I've stepped into an octagon and fought other men who were intent on beating me into submission. I bend and shape steel and wood and stone to my will. I take on 20 volume epic fantasy sagas, and I pump out books at the rate of two a year.

And yet, trying to find a mate for the first time in my adult life is terrifying. I've spoken to women honestly; it's all I know. I couldn't be dishonest if I wanted to. I am clear about my relationships status, I am clear about my wants and desires (get to know people and see what happens), I do my best to engage and relate... and I get shut the fuck down -hard-. The -one- time I had a bite, I got ghosted and, while our conversations were fun and flirty and a nice ego boost, as time goes by, that ghosting hurts a little more. What is wrong with me? Am I not attractive enough? Am I too fat? Are my standards too high? Am I looking for women that are the equivalent of being out of my weight class? Am I punching up too far? Do I have too many kids (I haven't even gotten that far yet in conversation with women, so I doubt it's that)? Am I too intense?

Not knowing is worse than knowing I'm deficient.

[This message edited by Incarnate at 4:46 PM, November 19th (Tuesday)]

And also completely counter to what my wife "fell for" from the OM. Let me tell you, it sounded nearly word for word like shit I would spin as a younger man. And she was into the "40's" category too (and he was even older). So, again, coloring my opinion here, but the same game I kicked at 20 seemed to work just great on my 40yo wife in an affair.

I do think that affairs are different from actual dating. No one is being honest with themselves, much less anyone else. It's a whole bucketload of mindfuckery.

A caveat...you will find women in their 40s and above who are damaged and desperate for any bit of affection and nice words whom you could still pick up with those lines, if that's what you want. To do so is a bit abusive, if you ask me. There's just no need to take advantage of someone else's pain when you have plenty of women whom you wouldn't be harming if you were honest with them.

Incarnate- I had an exit affair and it was from 1000 miles apart. So that still aligns with my perspective. It just didn’t exit. And the space between us made it easier to project what I wanted to see on that person.

And yet, trying to find a mate for the first time in my adult life is terrifying. I've spoken to women honestly; it's all I know. I couldn't be dishonest if I wanted to. I am clear about my relationships status, I am clear about my wants and desires (get to know people and see what happens), I do my best to engage and relate... and I get shut the fuck down -hard-. The -one- time I had a bite, I got ghosted and, while our conversations were fun and flirty and a nice ego boost, as time goes by, that ghosting hurts a little more. What is wrong with me? Am I not attractive enough? Am I too fat? Are my standards too high? Am I looking for women that are the equivalent of being out of my weight class? Am I punching up too far? Do I have too many kids (I haven't even gotten that far yet in conversation with women, so I doubt it's that)? Am I too intense?

This is a time of painful exploration for you, but you will have highs to balance out the lows. So you're on dating sites, right? Being ghosted is not unusual. I've been ghosted plenty on dating sites. As for punching too high or too low, I don't know without knowing more about the women you're into. I saw a picture of you somewhere on this site, so I can look at you and say that you are not ugly and you are not "too fat". Beyond that, you are an artist and are very gifted with words. You are clearly very intelligent. You have a great deal to offer in the dating world. You will find that there is a pretty significant range of women you can attract.

Online dating is tough, though. You have to grow thicker skin to survive it. It has a lot of positives, but the downfall in my opinion is that people have so many options that they get distracted by the next shiny object in their inbox and don't take the time to focus on one person at a time. And there are the droughts...you may have several people to talk to one week and then no one for a month.

Real honest talk, though...it may be the women you're trying to meet. I have a very good male friend who wound up having a lot more dates once he stopped chasing women who were a great deal more attractive than he was. He has dated very attractive women, but he also had to stop making them his 100% focus in order to date others. The woman he has been in a relationship with for the past 4 years is nowhere near the best-looking woman he dated, but she is the one he wanted. Had he kept trying for exceptionally hot women, he'd probably still be single. I mean him no harm with that statement. Hey, I think I'm attractive, but I know my limits.