‘I’m a 40-year-old woman. How do I tell a man I’m a virgin?’

Dear Roe,

When I was young, I had romantic notions of losing my virginity with “The One”. I found him, or so I thought but he couldn’t be trusted. I loved him but I knew I couldn’t do it with him. When that relationship ended, I went from one untrustworthy man to another. There was love with some, passion with others but there was still no virginity losing. I began to think I had hung on to it for this long I should wait until someone truly trustworthy came along. I waited but time flew by and now I am a 40-year-old virgin. Now, I know my taste in men has been questionable, and I have worked on the reasons why, but my question is if I do actually find a decent, trustworthy guy how on Earth do I tell him I am a virgin? Will a man want a 40-year-old virgin? Do 40-year-old female virgins even exist in Ireland, other than me, and those who have waited on religious grounds? How has my life become a Steve Carell movie?

Allow me to share some insider knowledge about advice columns. As well as getting a lot of richly varied and wonderfully surprising questions, I also get sent a lot of questions on the same theme. In order not to make the column repetitive for readers, and because there are only so many ways I can rephrase the same advice, I space these questions out. The most common questions are a variant of “How do my partner and I navigate having different libidos?”, “What do I do about this crush?”, and “I’m X years old and have never had sex, am I the only virgin in Ireland?” I’ve received the last question from a range of people, from their 20s to their 60s, each one convinced they are utterly alone. They are not. You are not. So please do not worry about that – a lot of people have had no sex, or a limited amount of sex, and even more people are just decent and kind and won’t judge you for a lack of experience.

It’s interesting that you’ve repeatedly chosen men who you say aren’t trustworthy, when that’s what you value the most. You were right to not have sex with these men who didn’t make you feel safe and respected – but I’m curious as to why you were so emotionally available to these men, when you knew they didn’t have the qualities you needed to be physically intimate. You knew they weren’t trustworthy, so knew you wouldn’t have sex with them, and on some level you know that most committed adult relationships include sex. You were simultaneously protecting yourself from getting too involved with them, while also hurting yourself by letting them hurt you and, on some level, keeping one foot out the door at all times.

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You may have been right not to trust these men, as they may have been untrustworthy from the get-go. But I also wonder how much you trust yourself. It takes trust in yourself and a healthy sense of self-worth to choose kind, loving partners; partners who are worthy of your love and commitment. You have to trust your judgment; you have to trust that you deserve to be treated well; you have to trust that you will recognise and appreciate and accept real, respectful love when it comes along – and then, you have to choose to trust that person, wholly. Because, simply, there are no guarantees. And that’s scary.

Consistently choosing men you know are untrustworthy is a great way of having to avoid all of that. If you choose untrustworthy people, you never have to try trust anyone. And you never have to trust yourself.

You say that you have worked on this – I hope that includes working with a therapist. It can be easy to intellectually recognise our patterns, and harder to change deeply-ingrained behaviours. It seems illogical, but as humans we are attracted to what is familiar, even when it’s bad for us. After years of becoming accustomed to not trusting the people you’re involved with, you may need help recognising and appreciating healthier dynamics.

One active step would be to accept yourself, and demand that others do, too. This means that, in your romantic life, there is no such thing as a “decent, trustworthy guy” who wouldn’t be kind and supportive and non-judgmental about your lack of sexual experience. If you continue believing that men can be “decent, trustworthy guys” while judging you and being unkind about your life and choices, you are continuing to choose men who are unworthy of you, and who you will never trust.

If you do meet a lovely man and want to become close with him – emotionally, romantically, sexually, any combination of the three – tell him who you are. Including your level of sexual experience. Not as an excuse or an apology, but as a way of actively cultivating trust, by being honest and vulnerable with someone by sharing with them. Also tell him what trust means to you, and why it’s so important. Tell him what you need from someone to trust them, and how you see trust as a shared, active part of a relationship. Offer him the chance to be trustworthy, by first trusting him with your definition of what that means.

Did you actually watch The 40-Year-Old Virgin? It's a slapstick comedy filled with ridiculous confusion and absurd posturing and disastrous interactions – until literally the last five minutes. That's when Carrell and Catherine Keener start being honest with each other, abandoning their defence mechanisms and their shame. They finally start trusting themselves, each other and their relationship. Then it becomes a happy-ever-after romance with some laughs, some sex, and a sense of relief and contentment so euphoric it literally causes them to break out into song.

You ask how your life has become a Steve Carell movie. The truth is that you’re only letting your life be the first half of a Steve Carell movie. Trust yourself enough to know you deserve the romantic ending, too.