One sort of "pre-answer" to this kind of question (there are lots of changes that one might suddenly have to deal with in a marriage), is to begin by figuring out whether you got married honestly or not. And what your vows were.

I like the traditional Christian vows, despite not being a Christian, because they go to the central most important reason and commitment that a real marriage must be.

"To have and to hold, from this day forward, for rich or for poor, in sickness and in health," and so on.

Some people forget, or are never asked to make such a vow, and actually only married at all, with the idea that they were exchanging their skill sets for guaranteed "services" of various kinds. Including sex.

And lots of people without realizing it, are so fundamentally certain that sex and love are confirmations of each other, that if sex falls off, it means that love is dead.

Those considerations are part of what a good therapist will review with you, as a starting point to helping you to decide what to do.

If a person in such a situation decides to reach out to others in an effort to get the version of love they expected, from someone else, that will mean they've decided to put SOMEONE ELSE in charge of their own life and of their own beliefs.

One of the ways I think of this, is that trust is one of the three legs of a solid three-legged stool. The other two are faith, and dedication.

The most successful relationships must have all three. Trust, based on willingness and belief in honesty; faith, which is the overall belief in love and in the rightness of loving; and dedication, as in the true commitment to BE in the relationship with each other.

Collectively, this could be A definition of Real Love.

As with a stool, take any of those three away, and the stool will fall, no matter how solid the other two are.

I hope these results will at least get the focus of som many actual and wannabe "pundits" off the nonsense about "waves."

All of the so-called "waves" I've seen in 65 years, when they did seem to happen, were NOT what I would call the "logical" kind.

That is, they were NOT a matter of one party finding a set of goals which caused a large majority of Americans to enthusiastically and positively support them. The kind of "waves" I've seen, have been negative "waves."

One oft repeated error in US political history, has been an exceptionally large election victory, making the winners believe that they have a blank check from the voters to do anything they ever wanted. In common politician's parlance, this is called a "mandate."

REAL "mandates" almost NEVER happen. And when people in power THINK they have them, they do anything from get careless and waste our tax money self-congratulatory indulgences, to ignoring the Constitution.

The most repeated problem I've seen recently, has been that of Anti-ism getting confused with positive support. Both by the people using voter anger to get their way, and by the voters themselves, who think that because a politician is as angry at someone they hate as they are, that the politician will actually fix the problem involved in the way they want or need it fixed.

I didn't see where anyone mentioned a core, very important truth about abusers and abusive people of all kinds.

That is, that they don't commit abuse because they can't find a willing "normal" partner.

They abuse others, because THEY WANT TO ABUSE OTHERS.

No amount of available voluntary sexual partners, even free ones, will result in abusers choosing to behave well.

accidental double post.

One particular exception to the "sex for money" definition, is professional porn actors. They have sex for pay, but it's not prostitution. By legal definition.

And it's very easy to set off the kind of guys that klc described early on, if you define prostitution as simply as exchanging sex or company of any kind, for wealth. Because, toody, yes, it is LEGALLY considered prostitution to accept ANY financially significant "favors" in exchange for sex.

I've seen a fair number of women in online sites like this one, saying in their profiles or in commentary, that they expect the GUY to pay the full cost of any dates they go on, from the start. That is NOT prostitution, but it sure does come close to the border, despite old-fashioned, male-dominant-society traditions favoring the women.

Bottom line, though, anyone who accuses a woman of being a prostitute, had better have a TON more evidence than "she wanted me to pay for stuff."

I suspect that a lot of the complaints and accusations, come from the people who thought they should pay nothing at all. And then made things worse, but "saving money" on lawyers.

Anyone who complains that they lost MORE THAN ONE HOUSE to ex's, doesn't get any sympathy from me.

"Honesty & Loyalty Vs Good Looks & Money"

An oft repeated question.
The answer is, as always, you can't buy love with anything.

Not with money, not with good looks, not with honesty, and not with loyalty.

Forget about formulas, tricks, procedures, and all the rest.

Either someone who you like and attracted to is compatible with you, and you with them, and they like and are attracted to you...

..or not.

That's it.

Yep. As I said earlier, this is what marriage was originally conceived as.

Couple of points: the ceremony is actually NOT primarily or just about showing off wealth, or about state control. Those things were added on later. The primary purpose of the ceremony was originally twofold: first, to make the decision to join lives feel real to the people doing it, and the second was to engage the rest of the community in supporting their decision.

Ever experienced a situation where in you head, you think that you'd like to try something, or do something, but then in the actual event, you realize that it only seemed "fun" when you were imagining it?

Marriage is like that. The ceremony, saying your commitment words out loud, helps a lot of people to finally feel that what they are doing is real. Same reason for all vows that we take.

I approve of your correction/addendum completely. Thanks!

Objectifying people happens in many forms.

I personally don't enjoy being an object, and I work not to objectify others. Mainly, because I'm too easily aware that I'm doing it, and I'm always angered by it.

If a guy goes after an older woman, BECAUSE she's an older woman, then he's objectifying her. He doesn't care about her, the individual, he only cares that she represents whatever it is that thrills him about older women.

That doesn't mean that all younger people who get romantically involved with older ones are doing that, of course. Some people just love each other.

In my experience, there are two main definitions for "bad girl" or "bad boy."

The most common ones, are simultaneously considered positive and negative at the same time.

The first one is the simple and obvious: "functionally damaging to others." As in criminals, killers, thieves, and so on.

The more common use of the labels, is for people who are found to be extremely desirable, in spite of as well as because they don't behave the way that "officially good" people behave.

Now. Again, from personal experience, I have seen that some people who are said to be "bad" in this way, are the way they are, in ways that are compatible with being in a committed relationship, and some are not. Just as is so with "good girls" and "good boys."

I'm very interested in the ones who are. I have no interest in the ones who are not, save as friends and acquaintances.

I'm closer to Justbehonest on this.

There are different degrees of "still married."

I myself had to spend almost a decade in Legally Separated status, due to the absurd insistence of Virginia on requiring that all divorces require thousands of dollars to go to both the state coffers, and the private lawyers pockets.

So I understand that not all "separated" people are alike. There are certainly some who fit the descriptions and negative assumptions that most people make about them, but there are also some who deserve the same genuine respect as divorced people and widows and widowers. Some deserve more.

No one deserves to be insulted or declared duplicitous in a flat generalization.

"Implants are going to be painful and expensive."

Teeth, folks, teeth.

If those are the thoughts of a GOOD single man, I fear to ask what the thoughts of a BAD one are. Excluding serial killers, for example.

If what you are rhetorically asking is how people can be seeking unity, while starting or joining a political party, I can answer that.

While it is true that the current day Republican Party bases the bulk of its activities around declaring half of all Americans to be inherently defective and/or purposefully destructive of American values, it is not true that the entire concept of forming political parties in general, is based on that approach.

The goal of "normal" political parties, is supposed to be to advocate for the particular approach to solving problems that their supporters believe are best for everyone, and the hope for achieving unity, is based on trying to persuade those who disagree, to see the logic of your view. Not simply to form up large groups, and try to frighten or abuse everyone else into going along with you.

Those kinds of parties are formed as a sort of organizational tool, rather than as an army of antagonists.

You are quite correct, that the Modern Republican party, consciously decided about forty years ago now, to discard, rather than to try to answer the concerns of anyone who disagrees with their approach to everything. That party has been directly opposed to unifying the nation, ever since Nixon resigned, although an occasional single leader within their group, did try to follow the older traditions. George Bush Senior was one such, as was John Mccain. So far as I have seen, there is no one left in a high position there now, who wants unity through any means other than what would most accurately be called "Democratic Dictatorship."

The trouble is, that it doesn't matter what Trump does or doesn't want, or whether he is right about what will happen if he gets his way. The Republican Party, which currently controls all three branches of the US federal government, are opposed to the bulk of what Trump wants. This is why the ONLY major legislation they have passed in Congress since his election, was the huge tax cut for rich people and large corporations.

Maybe, but the problem here is that if a President commits an unconstitutional act, and the Supreme Court backs them on it because they like the idea, they will have effectively overturned the Constitution and their own role in supporting Constitutional governing.

For what you want to see happen, the correct process is to propose a Constitutional Amendment to change the existing rules to what you prefer.

The only thing that I think is easier about online stuff, is that people online openly CLAIM to be unmarried and looking for mates.

In the "real world," I have to GUESS.

I suspect that the "under the jurisdiction of the United States" part, was directed at making sure that we weren't declaring the children of foreign ambassadors to be automatic Americans. Foreign dignitaries and representatives are not "under US jurisdiction."

This is just my guess, however.

But yes, dodo_David, I think you are correct that Trump can't legally do as he proposes.

My guess, is either that this is yet another example of how much Trump doesn't know about the US Constitution, or it is yet another example of how he is "negotiating" for additional votes for the GOP next week, by making yet another promise that he is not empowered to keep.