Maybe I should have posted these ideas before. I left this thread for a while, but came back today for a peek at what's cooking. I guess that makes me a "peeking duck".
Really sorry.
1- to TrYiNg (did I get the letters right?): While guys might be dogs, as they say, we aren't. We are addicts. We're the Pit Bulls of the "guy" world. Though some would argue that we are the Chihuahuas....
But seriously: the issues you bring up are killers. We can all agree that guys tend to become shallower and shallower when it comes to real relationship-building with a woman. Especially when we are distracted by looks.
But for addicts, the problem is more than shallowness. It's more like hopelessness.
We need a lot of help to make a relationship work.
So I wish "good luck" to the guys who don't share their addiction with their prospective kallas. If she breaks it off, it probably wouldn't have worked anyway, right? And if she sticks with him, he has yet another reason to be totally open and fearless with her. he has to, to maintain the kind of real relationship that he will need to stay sane and sober. Perhaps no one needs to live life as openly with their life partner as an addict does. And trust me: There's no other way to do marriage, period! For anyone! The non-addicts just can afford to remain shallow, if they wish. We are "doomed" to having true intimacy. What a curse. Ha.
(I'm a bit tired now, hope the "dovish" factor was bearable)
2- To anyone else in the beauty pageant discussion: The most powerful (and long-lasting) sexual attractant that I know of in a woman's looks, is seeing that she loves you for who you are, with no strings attached. And seeing that she is devoted to being for you in this short life and OK with the prospect of being with you in the hereafter, too. I'm serious.
And that can never, ever, ever happen if we are hiding from her. Cuz our hearts remind us all the time that "but she doesn't really know the real me"! Gotta pay the piper. No easy way out of the truth.
Sadly, it took me mashing things up quite horribly befpre I saw no other way out. I went to honesty kicking and screaming.
Dummy.