Hard to know if I'm a big softie

JUST how hard is a penis supposed to get?

My erection is never exactly like a rock, although I have normal orgasms and can make love without any problems.

TRACEY SAYS: There's a plethora of reasons why your erection's not Hollywood-hero-hard (would James Bond ever only be semi-erect?).

Physical factors include your age, how tired you are, what medication you're on, whether you've had too much to drink or indulged in drugs and how often you recently had sex.

Then there are emotional influences like stress and performance anxiety (I bet you haven't lost a wink of sleep worrying about this, have you? Course not).

Fact is, erections are as fickle and individual as their owners.

Some men's penises are so hard you could hammer nails with them. Others could finally bed the woman of their dreams and still only fly half-mast.

The rest hover somewhere in between - sort of where it sounds that you are really.

Nothing to worry about.

Slap in the face

I MET a really attractive and intelligent woman at a party a few weeks ago.

We'd been talking for a good half hour and really seemed to be hitting it off. We even made tentative plans to meet for coffee sometime.

Then, things suddenly went downhill. I commented that she had a "nice, full, hourglass figure".

I thought she would take it as a compliment but instead she became deeply offended.

She said: "Oh really . . . well perhaps I should do some plus size modeling!" I tried to clarify my comments but I think only exacerbated things when I used the term "healthy".

With a look of disgust, she slapped my face and left.

She had the classic figure of a 50s pin-up - large bust, narrow waist, shapely hips/legs. I guess she had interpreted "hourglass" as meaning big or overweight. I just thought it meant shapely and well proportioned. When I told a female friend about this she said it was never a good idea to comment on a woman's figure, even if I thought it was complimentary. What do you think?

TRACEY SAYS: I think this woman in particular has a chip on her shoulder about her weight!

Being told you have an "hour-glass figure" and look "healthy" are hardly insults deserving of a slap in the face.

It was an over-the-top, outrageous response to well-meant compliments and you're well rid of her!

Having said that, in an age where androgynous size-zero, shapeless bodies are seen as the ideal, telling a girl she has a full figure is a risky statement.

If you' re ever inclined to give another girl a compliment (and I wouldn't blame you if you never do after that reaction!), why not opt for saying something like this:

"I hope you don't mind me saying but you've got a gorgeous figure." She can interpret that to mean what she likes!

His ex is a nightmare

MY partner's ex-wife treats him really badly. They have a child together so he has to maintain contact but every time he sees her to collect his daughter, he comes home really upset. This upsets me. She's verbally abusive, threatens and belittles him and his self-confidence is shattered.

I tell him how I think he should handle her but he's too scared to do it. I'm considering calling her to try to sort things out on his behalf. She doesn't frighten me and I'm sick of putting up with her bad behaviour.

I don't know whether to tell my partner I'm going to do this or just have it out with her, woman to woman, without involving him.

TRACEY SAYS: How about a third option of not interfering at all? Look, I appreciate you're frustrated and find it genuinely painful to watch your partner being continually hurt. But you'll make things much, much worse rather than better by organizing a pistols- at-dawn confrontation. She's already got him by the proverbials, and if you step in to fight his battle, you'll effectively castrate him.

He's already feeling emasculated, stepping in to do his dirty work will make him feel even more helpless.

Instead, try doing this: Step back! The relationship they have is their business, not yours. Telling him what he should have said or done isn't accomplishing anything, so stop.

Change your tactic from trying to protect him to trying to support him. At the moment, he returns from one battle scene to another - from a dressing down from her to you telling him what he's done wrong.

Instead, be someone he knows will make him feel better, not worse. Give him a cuddle, a cup of tea and listen without judgement, gently helping him come to his own conclusions about how to make the relationship with his ex more amicable for the sake of his child.

Your plan of meeting up with her to "sort things out" is bonkers. She's clearly in pain, angry, irrational and out to cause as much harm as possible. What on earth makes you think she's going to talk calmly and rationally to you, the new woman in his life?

null

This article has 0 comments