Is it possible to have a shomer negiya relationship?

pause

Thu, Jul 31 2014, 6:13 pm

amother wrote:

To return to the original question...

Yes, it is possible. I'm MO. My DH and I were friends for about a year before we started dating. I'm a giyoret, he is BT (became frum in high school). I had had secular dating experiences before becoming Jewish. We met in our early 20s. We got engaged a couple months after we started formally dating, so I guess we weren't "boyfriend/girlfriend" for that long, but our engagement was 8 months long. We were shomer negiah. There were a few times we slipped up, along the lines of briefly holding hands or not being careful about yichud, but otherwise, we didn't touch till we were married. It was hard, but we survived.

Quite a contradiction there... Confused

ValleyMom

Thu, Jul 31 2014, 6:18 pm

I had a best friend in college whom I met while on a summer program in Israel. The only thing we ever did was hug goodbye but we were very good friends.

Two years later I invited him to accompany me to another friends home for Friday night meal. My friends were furious as this was supposed to be a GIRLS ONLY Shabbos meal but I insisted he is like my best friend too.

They begrudgingly included him.

Eighteen months later he married my BFF, the hostess of the meal--and I was a bridesmaid.

So, the answer is yes it is absolutely possible to have a shomer negiya relationship.

amother

Thu, Jul 31 2014, 6:29 pm

amother wrote:

ug I responded to Freidasima and then I saw the nasty amother. (and this is why you should read the whole thread before answering someone)

fyi im not the same person. I just was making a point that teens dont discuss their sx lives with their moms.

I was going to say the same thing. fs it is very possible your singles are virgins. But it is also possible they are not and just never told you. but its not the end of the world. so what if they are or are not??
I was a perfect ultra frum chassidish older single girl who noone would have ever dreamed I was not a virgin at my wedding. Least of all my parents. I never told them, never told anyone. I was a virgin until I was 26 and got married at 28. But my frumkeit level always outwardly stayed the same. Just saying, you shouldnt assume anything. espc if they are in their 30's. in NO WAY do I mean that the reason they are still single is because they are virgins as amother said. What I meant was the possibility of being non virgins is higher if they are older and that is OK! whatever the case whether they are or are not makes no difference. so dont assume anything but dont obsess over it either! They are still the same lovely children you know. That doesnt change.
Praying for the safety of your relatives in gaza.

amother

Thu, Jul 31 2014, 7:16 pm

Quote:

amother wrote:

There were a few times we slipped up, along the lines of briefly holding hands or not being careful about yichud, but otherwise, we didn't touch till we were married. It was hard, but we survived.

Pause wrote:

Quote:

Quite a contradiction there...

I'm the Amother above. Really? I don't see any huge contradiction here. We didn't give up being shomer negiah entirely--not even vaguely close. There's a BIG difference between touching hands briefly, knowing it's not allowed, and not being shomer negiah in the full sense of what that means. But what do I know.

pause

Thu, Jul 31 2014, 7:29 pm

amother wrote:

Quote:

Pause wrote:

Quote:

Quite a contradiction there...

I hate to break it to you but shomer negiyah means not touching - - - at all.

causemommysaid

Thu, Jul 31 2014, 8:43 pm

pause wrote:

I hate to break it to you but shomer negiyah means not touching - - - at all.

I think its more a mindset.

the mindset and status quo is no touching.

slipping up cause your human is something to work on but it doesn't change the status quo of we dont touch.

so just because you slip up on Monday doesn't give you a free pass for Tuesday

amother

Thu, Jul 31 2014, 9:58 pm

Quote:

I hate to break it to you but shomer negiyah means not touching - - - at all.

Yes, I know. Hence I wrote "a few times we *slipped up*," etc. I didn't say "We were shomer negiah, but we held hands all the time."

So, I suppose, by your definition a couple who touch one time are categorically NOT shomer negiah?

Or if I pull off a hangnail on Shabbos, I'm not shomer Shabbos? Hmm.

Tablepoetry

Fri, Aug 01 2014, 12:22 am

I will side with those who say that once kids are teens and young adults, in MOST cases you can't be 100% sure of what they're doing in their personal life.
This has nothing to do with FS or her kids. She specifically may know what they're up to. But MOST young adults don't share every single private thing with mom.
And that's OK.
Personally, I wouldn't make any assumptions as a mom of older children.

Ruchel

Fri, Aug 01 2014, 5:50 am

Catholics don't do shomer negia but they also don't do (aren't meant to) have relations. Yes, especially once upon a time, there woudl be tons of couples not shomer negia but no relations.

I would have a hard time calling "bad" a couple holding hands or whatever- but it's not allowed for Jews. And it can lead progressively to worse. A big thing was that OUAT these couples didn't have a real occasion to be left alone, no one around, in a comfy situation to "get worse". The Sunday stroll or the movie isn't conducive to "much worse".

That said if they put gedarim and are motivated that it never happens, it will never happen.

Outside of halacha/hashkafa a big problem I see with "not shomer negia" is that if you don't end up with this person (married or otherwise making your life together) you don't get to discover all this with your loved one. The further you go the less you have to discover together- and there's something special to this for sure, outside of any religion "they say" you never forget your first. This is what I mention to secular friends much before any frum thing and they do understand it even if they don't do it.

amother

Fri, Aug 01 2014, 6:10 am

There are 2 mindsets. Shomer negiya is quite different from self-respect. One is a gate around zexual encounters and the other is a moral standard of wanting to build a relationship based on a person's values.

While it's quite possible to be in a relationship and be shomer negiya, it is also quite possible to remain a virgin and not be shomer negiya.

It's also a huge error in assuming that every Josh, Rick and Avi who encounter the many Sarahs, Chayas and Yentas will automatically be engaging in zexual encounters. That is simply not the case.

My personal experience is that many boys have turned away from my own dd to those girls that would shell out. But it only makes her stronger in her conviction of self-respect and preservation.

pause

Fri, Aug 01 2014, 8:31 am

causemommysaid wrote:

I agree with this.

I am not judging the amother for having slipped up. It's a very difficult temptation to resist and I'm glad I wasn't tested. ( I am chassidish and did not meet up privately with my chosson.) It takes tremendous strength to be shomer negiyah.

However, I did feel it necessary to clarify that shomer negiyah doesn't mean avoiding only s-xual touch. Even something as "simple" as holding hands is assur for those who are shomer negiyah. And hilchos yichud definitely applies, perhaps even more so in the case of a boyfriend/girlfriend relationship.

MaBelleVie

Fri, Aug 01 2014, 9:25 am

amother wrote:

Ok but let's be real: many yeshivish couples who only date a few months before marriage end up slipping up too. Being human isn't limited to teenagers.

Exactly. It's much much harder for a teen, who doesn't have quite the same level of self control, and for whom marriage is not just around the corner.

saw50st8

Fri, Aug 01 2014, 9:40 am

pause wrote:

Quite a contradiction there... Confused

I can quite confidently say that you probably spoke lashon hara at some point. Does that mean that you "don't keep" that anymore? (feel free to insert any halacha you've broken over your lifetime)

supty

Fri, Aug 01 2014, 10:12 am

I find it hard to believe that there are couples (especially teenagers) that are in a relationship for an extended period of time AND seeing each other regularly, that are able to remain 100% shomer negiah with NO slip ups. Maybe I'm wrong, but something sounds off to me.

Ruchel

Fri, Aug 01 2014, 11:14 am

Are they seeing each other outside or with a chaperone (official or not lol)? on contrary are they going on vacay together same hotel room or even room mates?
How long is long?
How committed are they?

Bottom line, there are surprises both way. My MO friend confided to me she was the one who struggled and he was saying "no" (older teens), I have yeshivishe friends who slipped (young adults), I have read of testimonies of all kinds of people sticking to their beliefs or not in all circles.

amother

Fri, Aug 01 2014, 11:19 am

saw50st8 wrote:

I can quite confidently say that you probably spoke lashon hara at some point. Does that mean that you "don't keep" that anymore? (feel free to insert any halacha you've broken over your lifetime)

So analogy: I'm vegan, yet I have been known--VERY OCCASIONALLY--to snag a teeny piece of cheese when we're at a party. Does this make me no longer vegan.

(To my point: giving up cheese is sad.)

amother

Fri, Aug 01 2014, 1:28 pm

When I was a teenager (14-16) I dated a cousin off and on for 2 years. We were completely shomer negiyah and never slipped up once. This, I think, is because we kept the laws of yichud which are there to protect from these types of things. We were both committed to being shomer and our families cooperated by letting us have "dates" in the living room or taking us out of family field trips, etc.our parents felt that it would be healthy outlet and that when we got old enough we might marry and then we would have grown up together. We didn't, but we didn't lose anything by dating either. I just wonder if maybe it created too much pressure to marry young in general tho. But that is how they used to do things. People used to marry young and date for a year or more. And there was probably some fooling around but probably not everyone.

pesek zman

Fri, Aug 01 2014, 2:41 pm

amother wrote:

I got stuck on 'I dated a cousin'