Have Too Many Other Guys Seen Your Boyfriend’s Naked Pics?

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What do you do when more than 100 randoms have seen your boyfriend naked?

This week Slate advice columnist “Dear Prudence” fielded a letter from a 22-year-old guy in a five-month relationship with a 24-year-old former sexter.

“I need advice on how to get over/get my mind off of something that my boyfriend did before we were dating,” the young man writes. “He just recently told me that he has sent nudes (pictures and videos) to over 100 people. This is in a span of a few years before we have been together, up to right before we started getting serious. He told me this less than a week ago, and it’s something that I have not been able to stop thinking about. It is changing the way I view him and act toward him.”

“I trust that he is not sending nudes anymore,” he explains. “What bothers me most is that 1) so many people have seen such a sensitive part of him; 2) if he sent it to that many people, odds are that there is some content of him online and still in the hands of many people; and 3) these people still follow him on social media, know who I am from his posts, and know that we are together.”

“I have never been one to openly send nudes to people, so I just don’t understand why he would want to do that to so many, even when single,” he continues. “He makes me happy, he is patient and understanding with me, and I believe I can trust him. I want to continue this relationship, but I don’t want to keep being miserable and keep thinking about how many people he has sent nudes to.”

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“Dear Prudence” author Danny M. Lavery had some thoughts:

Before you and your boyfriend got serious, he was a single adult who enjoyed sharing photos of his body with other adults. I can understand how relationships can bring up fears and insecurities for anyone, and I don’t want to suggest the only possible response to your feelings is to berate yourself and get over it. But yes, strangers have seen your boyfriend’s naked body, and you cannot wipe their memories just because you are dating him now. It is also likely true that some of these strangers do not know he has a boyfriend. Some of those strangers may go on to post pictures of their own nude bodies. None of the people in question are doing anything wrong or seeking to get in the middle of your relationship. If you need to set stricter boundaries for your own Twitter/Instagram use in order to keep yourself from spiraling, please do so. If you want to tell your boyfriend that sometimes you feel insecure and that you need attention from him, please do so. But trying to resolve your own insecurities by attempting to clean-wipe his sexual history will never work; it won’t actually make you feel any safer, and it will only make him resent you. My fear here is that you believe your boyfriend has “too many” sexual options and as a result can’t really want you, and that your best course of action is to try to make him feel guilty for having enjoyed sending nudes so that he’s less likely to leave or cheat on you.

If the thing that bothers you the most is that “so many” people have seen him naked, I’m curious—what number of people that have seen him naked would have made you feel comfortable? What’s the correct number of people he should have sent nudes to? And what’s wrong with the number just above that? How is it changing the way you “view and act” toward him, and what are you hoping to get out of this new, changed behavior? Talk to him about your fears, certainly. But you’ll need to find a way to let go of your desire to control his past.

Fair enough.

Do you care about your partner’s sexting history?

Celebrity interviewer. Foodie and Broadway buff in Manhattan. Hates writing bios.

@brandonvoss

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