The 1970s

Sexual Mores during the 1970s were in a state of transition. My experience with this was that I was 21 in 1969. I was basically a virgin until I was 21 because I was a gentleman. What this basically meant was that even though I might spend a night with a girlfriend between 15 and 21 there would be no intercourse in which she might get pregnant. Since I was raised a Christian gentleman I was raised to listen to women when they said, "No!" However, most young men were not like me and weren't the son of ministers in their church. By age 21 I had had my heart broken by someone (actually 2 someone's that I had intended to marry) (one since I was 6 years old). However, this was so emotionally complex that it took me years to figure everything out psychologically. This likely is true for many young men not only me.

So, in order to stay alive I almost had a girlfriend (about 25 in a sequential monogamous sense) that I was sexually intimate with from age 21 until I married and had a son starting when I was 25 and 26. My way of dealing with being suicidal from the two relationships with girls I had wanted to marry that didn't work out was to always have a girl friend so I had a reason to stay alive for her because she loved me.

Was this selfish of me? The way I see it I stayed alive. Did I love all these girls? Yes, to varying degrees I loved and cared about them all. Did I want to marry all these girls? No. That wouldn't have been practical. If there was anything I had learned from getting my heart broken to the point of wanting to kill myself for several years ongoing it was, "Life is just much more complicated than I ever thought it could be!"

Because I was tall and handsome I could use this method to survive those days. This method and writing my feelings down and traveling with friends as much as possible and climbing mountains and riding motorcycles and flying planes, skiing, surfing etc. is what kept me alive until I got married.

Then I could look at my son and say to myself, "So, this is what all that craziness was all about in my life." I noticed that people who weren't as intense as I often never became parents so I realized this is a part of it. If you aren't intensely interested in the opposite sex you never are going to have children likely either.

So, I came to understand myself at the point of becoming a father. Before this life was pretty confusing. But, at the point of becoming a father at 26 I was old enough to buckle down and take care of my family.

I worry about young men not old enough or mature enough to do this when their girlfriend gets pregnant worldwide.