Dear Prudence,
I’m in a casual relationship with a guy that I don’t want to become a real relationship. He’s nice and fun, but I’m just not interested enough in him to become serious. For the most part, this works out for the both of us, except I think he might be really insecure about his body. He lost a lot of weight in the year before the pandemic and showed me before and after pictures saying he really hated how he looked before. I noticed almost no difference. He then gained the weight back during the pandemic. I think he’s become a bit self-conscious about it. Frankly, I’m not really that physically attracted to him, and I wasn’t even when he lost the weight. His body type is just not something I would find attractive even though I tend to like bigger guys.
The problem is, he keeps asking me what I like about him. I think this is coming out of his insecurity. I’ve tried to mention certain small things that I like and joke about liking a really weird thing, but I just can’t bring myself to say I’m attracted to him. He’s nice and caring and great in bed. I’m attracted to him because of those things, but physically he’s just not my type.
Lately, I feel like he’s getting frustrated with me not saying what I like about him physically. But I’m a terrible liar, I couldn’t get away with just saying I liked something that I didn’t. I don’t find him repulsive in any way, he’s just physically not my type. I want to say something along the lines of, “I wouldn’t be sleeping with you if I wasn’t attracted to you, but you constantly asking me to tell you what I like about your body is making me uncomfortable.” I’m worried that he’ll take this as a sign that I’m not attracted to him at all, but there are so many things I like about him beyond his physique. I’m worried mentioning that would be a bad idea too. Do you have any advice?
— Kindness Over Physique