Happy Halloween, everybody--and here's hoping everyone's annual fright night full of ghosts, goblins, costumes, and treats kicks serious ass!

How common is uncomfortable PIV sex, as described in several comments above?
In my younger days, we would have PIV sex, I would recover my erection in a few minutes and we would repeat. My girlfriend never complained of soreness or discomfort. Sometimes we even went for a third try.

It changes with age Amos101. Succulent young pussy is well equiped for multiple copulations. Because ripe fertility.
Succulent older pussy can get sore, sooner. If you'd tried a fifth time , she might have found her limit.

Amos @106: It's not just number of entries that can cause soreness. Size, position, speed and fervency of the thrusting, total duration of the intercourse (three quickies won't cause much damage), how turned on she was before penetration, how turned on she remains throughout intercourse (did she spend the last hour willing you to hurry up and come already), her size, normal human variation in amount of lube produced, time elapsed since last intercourse, and, yes, age.

In other words, if your girlfriend didn't complain that she was sore, she probably wasn't.

Amos101; It's true, what Fan says. If you pump away for hours, a woman of any age can get mighty sore.

@97 SM - victim-blaming really isn't helpful. Pointing out he's gaslighting her, suggesting practical to getting out of this and staying out of this kind of thing in future, sure. Making people feel dumb for being ill-used is kicking them when they're down.
How did I victim blame? It's not clear to me that there's a victim here; when he's "making her" explain her plans, or explain her feelings, it's not clear he's twisting her arm or doing any more than asking about them. I don't understand how this dynamic works enough to suggest more than to leave if she wants. But I think she hasn't left because she doesn't want to leave, not enough to pack her shit and go. Seemed to me that she was looking for someone else to tell her to leave. Then she can just blame them for making her leave if she feels bad about it later.

I MADE her feel dumb? Lack of personal responsibility creeps me out about as much as abuse does, they seem to feed each other. The way she writes, she feels trapped and out of control of her own decisions.. sounds like she could use some therapy more than anything.

@66 BiDanFan, re: LavaGirl @54: Amen to Lava's and others' active roles in parenting and grandparenting so people like you and I don't have to!

I can't imagine engaging in PIV ever again at this point in my life.

Philo@111. I think you nailed it re not knowing enough about this dynamic. The D/s relationship looks fraught to me and ethical behaviour is very important. Human beings are not that ethical a lot of the time, so people, esp subs I believe, can get caught in this structure.

@111 Philophile, by "this dynamic" do you mean the gaslighting or the D/s? Safe same consensual D/s wouldn't have a victim issue to me, but gaslighting does.

Your comment at @96 sounded like you question if gaslighting is even possible: is that what you were questioning there?

Safe sane, not safe same

@114 SM - I don't see any talk of abusive or gaslighting behavior in the letter. Except for "packs a wallop" but that is in the pro category for STUCK. And listening is in the pro category.. but active listening... asking questions to better understand.. seems like her dealbreaker.. The sentence I quoted is most confusing to me. It's like STUCK and/or Mr STUCK don't understand what feelings are... People are not machines reasoning their way through life logically with inherently reasonable goals. There is no logical reason to do anything at all. Instead, we want things and reason out how to make it so. One person wants brocolli and one person wants dutch apple pie.. most people want to stay alive and create a family so our species has survived so far.. but feelings are not reasonable, they can simply be explained in terms of an individual's preferences. So he argues with me—about what my feelings are or should rationally be doesn't make sense from my viewpoint.. feelings aren't rational. Feelings are part of how we think, but not a directly observable part that he could correct her about, people are not mind readers... and part of self awareness is being able to identify how we feel, what we believe, what we want, and part of maturity is being able to communicate this to others effectively..

And in case she doesn't realize - she talks of Mr STUCK very condescendingly, he's a poor (taking advantage financially) insecure (demands endless reassurance) mother fucker (wants to DTMFA). She is likely not treating him well to his face either and should leave if she can't value her boyfriend. But she'll do what she wants.

@116 Philophile, you don't see gaslighting in the letter? And you see "packs a wallop" from someone who's happy about the wallop and consenting to and seeking that part as the closest to abusive behaviour? I think any elaborating I attempt would probably have to wait for those two points to be clear, or I'm not sure to go from here.

I'm also not getting the sense that she's the one who sees him as being somehow diminished by job/money issues, so that might be a factor too.

Also, the stark dichotomy you seem to be assuming between reason and emotion could be a factor here. I'd say at least if you know you need x to achieve preferred goal y and your current relationship delivers x exactly like that, it would be reasonable for both parties to recognize that.

Whether x giving you y fits with your other goals well or badly is also something evidence and reason can be relevant to.

So if Mr STUCK is bringing STUCK what she needs, like she needs it, and getting it makes her hit those goals so she'd be thriving if she'd only see it? Then yeah, he'd have a point there, and another point in claiming she just wasn't admitting the benefits he was giving her, financial struggles of his own and all. Or if he's blamelessly in need of her support and she can afford it and they both know and agree on that freely, then sure, fine.

But if he's a drain, maybe even by choice, on somebody who's already struggling, to keep himself going and at her expense, while gaslighting her about that so she won't make a free, informed decision about whether to stay? Then yes, STUCK, you're being victimized, and the person to blame is not you.

Dan wrote back, but this doesn't really clear it up:

"I was referring to that tingling feeling… you sometimes get… after you’ve been fucked, even if you come."

"Afterglow," perhaps? But afterglow is a pleasant feeling which one is unlikely to experience without coming. I remain in the dark about the concept of sexy tingles.