I had a crush on a girl. She likes me too and wants me to take the initiative. But the problem is that our values don’t align. I’m someone who believes in physical and emotional exclusivity. I believe that some of our emotions, habits, love language, intimate body parts, fears, etc., should be private and exclusive only to our partner. There must be something that distinguishes a partner from the rest of the world. But I recently saw one of her pictures in which she was exposing her cleavage. I consider breasts to be an intimate body part.
Even though I don’t have breasts, I’ve never stepped out of the house shirtless or exposed my chest region or the area around it. I have never been shirtless even in front of house help. I always believed that only my future partner deserves to see me that way. Bodily exclusivity is one of the factors that I value in a relationship. I don’t want anyone else to see my partner’s intimate or arousing body parts like breasts, whether partly or fully. I don’t want my girl to have an exhibitionism disorder or to experience cheap thrills (or to gain confidence, in girls’ language) from the thought that other people can see parts of her breasts or other intimate areas.
One girl advised me that women want to be treated with love and respect, but men hold them to very high and impossible standards. But how is maintaining modesty and exclusivity impossible unless someone is really suffering from exhibitionism and publicly exposing intimate body parts becomes a source of cheap thrills or confidence for them? If this standard is impossible, how am I maintaining it? I’m not in favor of blurring, mitigating, or disrespecting the boundaries of bodily or emotional exclusivity.
Now I’m not sure about my feelings for her. I’m not able to respect her the way I did. Sometimes I think that I can forget that picture, but whenever I see it, I’m reminded that she doesn’t match my loyalty and exclusivity. Maybe she’s not the one. But what will I do if she proposes to me? I don’t want to hurt her by rejecting her, but now I don’t want her either.
Question:
Keeping in mind my standards of loyalty and exclusivity, do you think it was micro cheating?
Option 1: Yes
Option 2: No