Marriage is a major life and relationship milestone—a decision worth taking seriously. While some people dream of tying the knot with their soulmate and fantasize about their future wedding from a young age, others take a more practical, or even cynical, approach to the long-term commitment. Wherever you fall on the spectrum, you likely understand the weight that marriage carries.
If you’re approaching that time in your life and relationship and feel ready to take the next steps and deepen your commitment, you’ll want to make sure you’re in the right place—with the right person—before jumping into a life together. Amie Leadingham, a Master Certified Relationship Coach with over 10+ of experience, shared four important questions to ask yourself before tying the knot with your partner.
1. Does Your Partner Meet Your Non-Negotiables?
Being in love is just one prerequisite of marriage. Before writing your vows, consider your non-negotiables and whether your partner actually meets them.
“These are the core values and needs you require to be aligned with your partner in order to have a happy relationship,” Leadingham explains. “They’re your must-haves, like: Do we want a family? Is our financial outlook the same?”
Being on the same page about your values and goals is crucial before making such a long-term, serious commitment.
2. Do You Share the Same Life Goals?
No matter how much you might love your partner, you can’t force compatibility. Before making the life-altering decision to get married, make sure your future goals align.
“It’s important to know that you both are on the same path in life,” says Leadingham. “So many people get married and years later discover that one person wanted a family and the other person didn’t.”
Unfortunately, this is often how resentment builds: one person gives up their dreams or life goals for the other, prioritizing their connection above their own happiness. Over time, that regret and bitterness can destroy even the healthiest of relationships.
3. How Well Do You Navigate Conflict and Repair?
Conflict is inevitable in relationships; what matters most is how you repair after it. If you and your partner can’t compromise, consider each other’s perspectives, or reconnect after an argument, you may want to pump the brakes on any long-term decisions.
“As much as we think relationships [are] all about love, it’s the difficult moments and how we repair them [that keep] a couple together,” says Leadingham.
4. Do You Feel Safe With Your Partner?
Safety is one of the most important facets of a relationship—but not just physical safety. Emotional safety, trust, stability, and security all point to a healthy, empowering connection.
“Your nervous system plays a big part in telling you whether the relationship is right for you,” says Leadingham. “If you are in constant fight, flight, or freeze and unable to share your real truths, that is a red flag sign that this might not be your person.”
Marry someone you can be your most authentic self with—someone who doesn’t expect you to perform all the time. Your spouse will likely see you through your darkest moments: sickness, financial insecurity, the loss of your parents, etc. Can you imagine your current partner showing up for you through that grief? If not, maybe it’s time to have some hard conversations.
Many long-term couples fall into a rut at some point in their relationship, believing their lack of a sex life means they’ve lost attraction to each other. But oftentimes, this isn’t actually the case—and even if it is, it’s usually more complex than “I no longer think they’re hot.” (Unless, of course, you’re only with your partner for shallow reasons.)
Love and attraction go far beyond the physical. For example, a deep emotional connection, safety, mystery, spontaneity, personal confidence…these all play into our ability to feel sexual toward another person.
If you’re feeling less attracted to your partner, it doesn’t mean your relationship is doomed.
Why You Suddenly Feel Unattracted to Your Partner
Losing attraction to your partner can feel like a death sentence for your relationship, but many factors play into attraction and chemistry.
“There are MANY reasons someone might lose attraction to their partner, and 99% of them pertain to the person themself as well as to changing dynamics in a relationship,” says Lauren Goldstein, an AASECT-certified sex therapist and relationship therapist.
For example, you may feel more stressed at work, insecure in your own body, or emotionally disconnected from your partner.
“All relationships change, and once you get out of the honeymoon phase of a relationship (which is about 6 months-2 years), you often find yourself managing big responsibilities together, navigating household duties and possibly coparenting,” Goldstein explains. “And suddenly you’re seeing each other in very unsexy ways, having breakfast in your ugly pajamas AGAIN and wishing for some excitement.”
As they say, relationships take work—and sometimes, so does attraction. It’s not always that you no longer find your partner to be handsome or beautiful, but rather that you’ve fallen into a mundane routine with them. Maybe they’ve lost the same passion and spontaneity they once had, or perhaps you’re slipping into a parenting role while they spend most of their time on the couch.
“Plenty of other things can chip away at attraction, too: attachment styles, your relationship with your body, mental health issues, not feeling sexy for any number of reasons, and dynamics in your partnership,” says Goldstein. “Usually it comes back to what’s going on inside the individual, not the partner.”
How to Navigate a Loss of Attraction in Relationships
If you fear you’ve lost attraction to your partner, this usually says more about your connection and relationship dynamic than about their physical appearance. Here’s how to address the issue.
1. Identify the Disconnect
Attraction can fade over time for several reasons, from personal insecurity to overemphasis on looks to emotional distance in the relationship.
“Start by figuring out the root cause, look inward rather than blaming your partner, and explore any issues that are causing stress because often stress or anxiety is one of the culprits,” says Goldstein. “Then get curious about what helps you feel attraction, what gets your juices flowing, and do more of that.”
2. Add Some Mystery to the Relationship
Many times, people assume they’ve lost attraction to their partner when really, their sex life is just falling into a rut. Anyone in a long-term relationship can experience this.
“A really solid relationship requires security and safety, but eroticism needs mystery and uncertainty in order to thrive,” says Goldstein. “So you have to figure out how to cultivate a balance between the two, and sometimes you become business partners first, and the sexiness falls [by] the wayside.”
3. Communicate Honestly and Gently
Of course, the best way to address any relationship issue is by communicating with your partner. However, talking about your apparent lack of attraction to them can feel uncomfortable and downright hurtful. Thankfully, there’s a better way to broach the subject.
“The best way to bring it up with your partner is to really understand it first, and then tell your partner you’re struggling with how to maintain desire in a relationship, that you’re working on understanding yourself better, and that you’d love to share what you learn and work on it together,” says Goldstein. “Provide reassurance to your partner that they didn’t suddenly become less desirable. Turning toward them instead of blaming them is always the way to go.”
First dates are still pretty much the same awkward round of questions they’ve always been. Where’d you grow up? What do you do for work? Have you watched anything good lately? Two drinks in, you know he works in finance and loves The Sopranos, but you have no idea whether he handles conflict like an adult or disappears for three days when he gets upset.
Dating coach and TikTok creator Sabrina Zohar thinks people should get a little nosier. In a video with over 534,000 views, she shared three questions she thinks everyone should ask on a first date. And if the thought of asking them makes you want to crawl under the table, she thinks you might have some emotional availability issues of your own.
1. “Who is the first person that you call when everything is either going right or going wrong?”
Zohar says someone who can’t name a person, or insists on handling everything themselves, may struggle to open up emotionally. Some people are perfectly comfortable handling things on their own. Others would rather jump off a cliff than admit they need emotional support. What you’re really listening for is how someone talks about the people they trust, if any.
2. “What is a belief that you’ve outgrown in the last few years?”
She’s looking for what she calls “self-reflection and ego flexibility.” In other words, can this person admit they’ve changed their mind? Can they recognize that their 25-year-old self was occasionally an idiot? You’d hope so. A guy who still thinks every opinion he’s ever had was correct is exhausting…and a big red flag.
3. “What is something that you’re working on within yourself right now that you’re proud of?”
And Zohar has little patience for generic self-improvement speeches. “I don’t want them to say, Oh, I’m just working on becoming a better person. Too f****** vague,” she said. She wants an actual example, like someone recognizing they used to shut down during arguments and are trying to handle difficult conversations without leaving the room.
The comments were split, with some people wondering who the hell wants to get into all of this with someone they met 20 minutes ago.
“Great questions. But too heavy for a first date,” one commenter wrote. Another commenter suggested asking, “Approximately how old is the Earth and what shape is it?” She’s joking, but that would honestly give you a solid idea if you’re on the same page about beliefs and life, in general.
People might be giving first-date strangers too little credit, though. In one study, researchers had strangers discuss personal topics and found that participants expected those conversations to be much more awkward than they turned out to be. They also underestimated how interested the other person would be in hearing their answers.
You probably don’t need to ask about childhood trauma before you’ve even ordered food. But tossing one of these questions into the usual work-and-how-much-you-hate-dating-apps conversation could make the evening way more productive—for both of you.
Besides, you’ve probably sat through enough first dates listening to a man explain his job in excruciating detail. You might as well find out if he can actually feel anything.
Ask any woman who’s been on hormonal birth control for half their life how it’s going, and you’ll probably get a long sigh before you get an answer. Meanwhile, the guys she’s sleeping with have the same two options their dads had. Condoms or a vasectomy. Quite the selection.
Men seem ready for something better, too. A survey published in Andrology found that 61% of men across seven countries would try a new male contraceptive within its first year on the market. In the U.S., interest jumped from 39% to 49% after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.
And for once, there are some promising candidates.
One of the more interesting developments comes from NEXT Life Sciences, which is working on a hormone-free pill called PausePill. Men would take it before sex, with the effects intended to last about 24 hours. The idea is to temporarily prevent sperm from coming out during ejaculation, leaving erections and orgasms alone.
Founder L.R. Fox even told the New York Post that “anecdotally, we’ve heard men say that they actually have increased pleasure.” Increased pleasure and no pregnancy? That’s a hell of a sales pitch.
The catch is that researchers still have to prove it works. The pill, also known as NLS-133, is being studied in a small Phase 2 trial involving 10 men. Its ability to reliably prevent pregnancy remains unproven.
Pills, Gels, and Injections: The Race to Give Men More Birth Control Options
NEXT is also developing Plan A, a hormone-free contraceptive for men who’d prefer to handle birth control with one procedure. It involves injecting a hydrogel into the tubes that carry sperm, preventing them from entering semen. The company wants the procedure to be reversible, although that still needs to be demonstrated in human trials.
Then there’s YCT-529, a daily hormone-free pill from YourChoice Therapeutics. Its first human safety trial involved 16 men who’d already had vasectomies. Researchers reported no adverse effects from the single doses tested, and longer trials are examining what happens to sperm production.
Another candidate, NES/T, is a hormonal gel men apply to their shoulders daily. In a Phase 2b trial involving 222 men, 86% reached the study’s sperm suppression target by week 15.
Of course, male birth control has been promising to arrive for years. Researchers still need larger trials, convincing safety data, and actual evidence that these products prevent pregnancy.
For now, women are still handling most of the contraceptive responsibility while men wait for something new. Hopefully, one of these products makes it to the pharmacy before another generation of guys has to make the same condom-or-vasectomy decision their dads did.
If there’s one thing I know about younger generations, it’s that they expect far too much of themselves and each other—especially in relationships. In dating, many people believe they should always feel connected to their partner, treating any disconnect as a threat to their bond.
But can we really stay connected to our partner every hour of every day?
“The age of social media and having all forms of communication right at our fingertips has increased [the] pressure to stay connected with your partner at all times,” says Leanna Stockard, a licensed marriage and family therapist at LifeStance Health. “This could look like texting consistently throughout the day, about everything or nothing, expecting your partner to reply immediately, checking their location when you are apart, etc. You may feel the pressure to stay in constant communication with your partner throughout the day to maintain a connection with them, but this is not necessarily the case, and could actually be harmful.”
Like with most issues in life, adding more pressure will likely only cause more harm. In other words, pushing for constant connection with your partner might actually sabotage its authenticity.
The Downsides of Constant Connection
While you might assume constant connection with your partner is positive, the pressure to stay in contact and emotionally engaged at all times can put unnecessary strain on your relationship.
“The pressure to be constantly connected to your partner can create a sense of obligation, frustration, or set an unhealthy expectation in the relationship,” Stockard says. “It’s important for partners to have space and freedom to maintain their individual lives, and feeling pressure to stay constantly connected can interfere with that space. It can keep them attached to their phones when with friends, feeling like they need to update their partner constantly, and overall it can impact their ability to stay present with other parts of their lives.”
Is Constant Connection Really Necessary?
While connection within a relationship is important to maintaining your bond, constant connection is simply unrealistic and unnecessary. Just because our partners are more accessible today through social media, texting, and other communication channels doesn’t mean we must stay in contact at all times—or that we will feel emotionally connected every day.
“Previous generations have been able to maintain an overall connection with one another despite not being constantly connected throughout the day,” says Stockard. “It’s similar to the way that we do not need to be constantly connected to friends or family members, but then when you do see one another to connect, it’s like no time has passed.”
Relationships go through different phases and seasons, just like friendships, and you might not always feel as connected as you’d like. However, this doesn’t necessarily raise a red flag.
A More Realistic Approach to Connection
While it’s natural to crave consistent communication and a strong bond with your partner, constant connection is not always attainable.
“A better approach to connecting with your partner is being intentional,” says Stockard. “Intentional connection can include doing an activity together, having a conversation without screens present, and/or talking about the ins and outs of your day at the end of the day instead of throughout.”
Intentional connection is far more important than constant connection. Quality over quantity.
“It is important to prioritize this intentional connection to maintain an overall genuine connection with one another,” Stockard adds. “This form of connection can improve trust, safety, and the quality of your relationship.”
The new moon in Libra will occur on Saturday, October 10, at 11:50 a.m. ET, when the moon reaches 0% illumination. From our view here on Earth, the moon will seem to “disappear” from the sky, but astrologically speaking, its impact will be hard to ignore.
About the Upcoming Libra New Moon
This new moon occurs in Libra, bringing an air of romance and harmony. Ruled by Venus, the planet of love and beauty, Libra focuses on dating, relationships, justice, and fairness. When the new moon falls in this sign, expect opportunities, clarity, and perhaps even closure in your closest relationships. This might look like deep, healing conversations, exciting meet-cutes, or much-needed breakups.
This new moon also falls during the powerful Venus retrograde in Scorpio. If you know anything about retrogrades, you know they’re thought to stir up chaos and conflict—so you can finally work through old wounds once and for all. But with the planet of love retrograding in Scorpio, a passionate, possessive water sign, you might feel more intensity in your love life. Think: exes resurfacing, misaligned partners calling it quits, insecurities popping up, etc.
This Libra new moon can help you clarify your wants and needs in relationships. Use it to ground you during an otherwise unstable period.
How to Work With the New Moon in Libra Energy
1. Find Ways to Bring Balance and Harmony to Your Life
The new moon in Libra is a great opportunity to find more balance in your life. Libra is all about harmony and fairness, so make sure you’re not giving more than you take—or vice versa—right now, especially in your closest relationships.
For example, if you’re in a relationship, do you feel you’re both investing equal effort, or is one person carrying more of the weight? Are certain parts of your life (work, school, chores) getting more attention than others (movement, health, and pleasure)? Be honest as you evaluate your priorities and relationships.
2. Get Clear on Your Must-Haves in Love
Because Libra deals heavily with love and romance, this new moon is the perfect time to write a relationship manifesto. In other words, define your ideal partner or relationship by writing down the qualities you’re seeking in a significant other: kindness, patience, empathy, passion, a good sense of humor, etc. Include details regarding how you’d like to feel within this connection. For example, you might want to feel safe, secure, and supported; or you might be seeking chemistry, excitement, and casual commitment. Whatever the case, get clear on what you want and how you want it to show up for you.
3. Prioritize Self-Care
Self-care is crucial during Libra season, as this air sign is known for over-giving. Sometimes, Libra forgets to set boundaries that protect their energy. Use this new moon to show yourself some extra love and care. Of course, this doesn’t mean you have to neglect your loved ones; however, make sure you’re not neglecting yourself, either. Make time for rest, pleasure, creativity, and romance—and treat yourself every once in a while.
For better and for worse, the topic of narcissism has become rather “trendy.” Awareness is fabulous; however, it’s horrible to know that abuse is so rampant, and there’s also the issue of the phenomenon of individuals haphazardly flinging the term “narcissist” around as a form of slander and devaluation. That said, those who cry wolf do not alter the indisputable fact that narcissists are a very real and persistent menace capable of eroding even the strongest souls in unimaginable ways.
These parasites, so we are told by the experts, don’t change; they age poorly; and those of the “malignant” variety just want to destroy us — every encounter, no matter how seemingly benign, is entered on their end with malevolent intentions. They will harm the hands that feed them, if only to feel a bit less powerless. They dwell in a fantasy land where they are infallible and all-powerful, and they try to trap us there too.
Casting a narcissist out of your life is complicated for many reasons. Yet, once you exorcise their disgusting spirit from your heart, there will almost certainly be divine rewards. In fact, a good portion of those who have experienced narcissistic abuse have stated that they wouldn’t go back and erase the experience, despite the immense pain endured. Nietzsche’s immortal words indeed apply: “What does not kill me, makes me stronger.”
Narcissists show us, by their outrageous example, the bitter people (Note: Some contend that they actually are not “people”…) we must never become; all too often, they meet their downfall, from which we can certainly extract moral stories.
In celebration of recovery, here are the 5 must-follow accounts to help you (or a friend who might be affected) heal from narcissistic abuse!
1. Richard Grannon
Sometimes, when we’ve been victimized, we fear appearing weak. In those cases, the truth may penetrate our thick skulls more easily if delivered by a large, tough guy like Richard Grannon, whose background includes both self-defense and psychology. Mr. Grannon is probably the first expert on narcissism you should turn toward during your recovery process; while he runs a coaching service, he also gives advice on how to find a fitting therapist — not everyone in mental health understands the complexities of narcissism.
His deep wisdom always seems compatible with common sense. This respected figure is very blunt about how narcissists weaponize love and empathy; the more you attempt to help them, the sicker they become. Going “no contact” is the only solution, as the others on this list agree.
I don’t say this lightly: Mr. Grannon’s videos can change lives. As this beacon of intellectual honesty says, the goal of narcissism videos is to make you stop watching narcissism videos and focus on other things. While such videos are addictive, Grannon can certainly enable you to break free of them.
Octavia, the woman behind Awakened Survivor, is my personal favorite narcissism expert. She boasts an impressive background in the arts and holistic wellness. She created the character Nelly the Narcissist because, as someone in entertainment, she rightly believes humor can aid recovery.
This outstanding creator bravely dives into the spiritual dimension of narcissistic abuse; in my opinion, it’s a sin to ignore it. By probing areas some might consider taboo (as well as more standard territory), Octavia has led her viewership on surprising yet rewarding journeys. She sometimes features guests with fascinating perspectives, adding variety.
Octavia radiates a gentle, empathic energy, which matters especially when she delivers crushing truths about energy vampires —trying to fathom the levels of malice behind the masks worn by sociopaths can understandably make a person furious, but Octavia has a superb grasp of how to relay disconcerting information. She places a special emphasis on encouraging followers to rekindle and protect that inner Light that the narcissists so desperately tried to snuff.
Mr. Bashir brings a unique set of insights, having grown up around narcissists and overcome their snares. I find he often has incredible observations that no one else does. With uncanny accuracy, Mr. Bashir will capture oddly specific behaviors that you thought were just individual to the narcissist who turned your life upside down — as many have remarked, narcissists are all cut from the same fabric.
He explores everything from the narcissists’ lack of table manners to their ability to completely destroy your health — a shocking yet concrete reality agreed upon by all experts I’ve heard thus far. While Bashir holds a master’s in clinical psychology, he also lets his spiritual understanding shine through. You can’t skip over this expert!
Ms. Wise is so ridiculously razor-sharp and to the point that she can explain in minutes, or often even in an instant, those mind games that have quite literally been driving you insane — the manipulative tactics that leave you either pale and speechless or red and rambling. In other words, she takes the source of all the mixed emotions boiling up inside you and boils them down into something perfectly palatable, turning your struggles into nourishing knowledge. Ms. Wise sees right through the inner workings of most self-aggrandizing and gaslighting creatures (who, she assures us, are just as pathetic and broken on the inside as we might like to believe) while encouraging listeners to take the Higher path.
Anoushka Marcin is another remarkable woman, with abundant gifts of intuition and insight. Her explanations are always clear; she offers amazing takeaways, avoids leaving her followers feeling bogged down by the heaviness that often follows psychological discussions, and is always a delight to listen to. The Zen she emanates is contagious.
As she has noted, she has blossomed as a creator; as she moved away from her abusive situation, she has beautifully come into herself, reclaimed her confidence and other gifts, and become a testament to the power of healing.
No romantic relationship is perfect. At some point, you will hurt your partner—and vice versa. What matters most is how well you repair after arguments or conflict. But one of the most important, and often overlooked, aspects of repair is validation.
When you acknowledge your partner’s experience, even if it differs from your own, you help them feel seen, heard, and supported in their pain. However, many people—often without realizing it—invalidate their partner’s emotions and perspective, creating a disorienting disconnect.
If you fear you do this to your partner, or are wondering whether they do it to you, you’re in the right place. Here are five signs you might be accidentally invalidating your partner, according to a therapist.
1. You Confuse Being Right With Being Heard
Look, I get it: We all want to be right—and acknowledged as so—in an argument. But being right doesn’t mean your partner’s experience or perspective is invalid.
“When the goal of a disagreement becomes proving your side is correct, it can unintentionally dismiss your partner’s feelings and experience,” says Andrea Wiggs, LPC, therapist at Serenium Therapy and Wellness. “This can trigger your partner into a defensive or self-protective state that halts open communication and prevents reaching a resolution.”
For example, you may have said something that hurt your partner’s feelings. Even though you know in your heart of hearts you didn’t mean to be mean or attack them, they might still feel that way. Rather than telling them they’re wrong and blaming their emotions on projection, try to understand and validate their feelings.
“Couples can shift the goal from determining who is ‘right’ to making sure both people feel heard and supported,” says Wiggs. “Your partner’s feelings are valid even when their perspective differs from your own. Taking the time to consider both perspectives can allow couples to create a deeper connection and foster trust, security, and healthy interdependence.”
2. You Think ‘I’m Sorry’ Is Enough
We all know someone who spews rude comments and acts shady, only to follow it up with a simple “I’m sorry.” You know what they say: “An apology without changed behavior is manipulation.”
“If your partner says they feel dismissed when you respond with, ‘Yeah, yeah, you told me that last week,’ simply apologizing may not resolve the underlying issue,” says Wiggs. “If you apologize yet continue to repeat the same behavior, you will end up causing your partner and your relationship additional harm.”
Instead of just apologizing, listen to your partner’s feelings, validate their experience, and then change your approach as you see fit.
“Couples should go beyond the apology and address the root of the issue by sharing what they will do differently moving forward,” says Wiggs. “Changing harmful behaviors will provide you and your partner the chance to be accountable for your actions and their impact. Taking full accountability will allow you and your partner to repair the damage that has been caused by creating tangible change through intentionality and consistency.”
3. You Trying to Fix the Problem Instead of Listening
One of the more well-intentioned forms of invalidation is trying to solve a problem instead of validating your partner’s feelings about it.
“I see this problem come up quite often with couples. One partner brings up a situation that has been troubling them, and the other responds immediately with solutions,” says Wiggs. “The partner [who] offers the solutions is often confused when their partner is upset by their response. What they do not realize is that their partner was reaching out to them for emotional support, and their response may have caused them to feel rushed to turn off their painful emotions.”
For example, maybe your significant other is venting to you about their chronic illness and the distressing symptoms it’s causing them, yet they’ve been to countless doctors and are not responding well to treatment. Instead of encouraging them to try a new fad diet or meditate every day, let them release their frustrations without adding more stress. Odds are, they’ve already considered every potential solution you’re throwing at them.
“Couples should take time to listen attentively and offer validation,” Wiggs says. “Serving as a sounding board for your partner will help them to feel understood and help to give them the creative energy they need to develop their own solutions.”
4. You Compare Their Pain to Your Own
Everyone experiences trauma and hardship differently. Don’t compare your experience to your partner’s to dismiss their pain.
“When your partner’s attempts to be vulnerable are met with comparison, it can turn emotional support into a competition instead of a safe space to share,” says Wiggs. “I find this dynamic can be very destructive, as one partner is left feeling like their emotions are of lesser importance or like they do not have the right to experience them.”
“Having their pain minimized in this way can deter them from reaching out altogether,” Wiggs adds. “Hearing your partner’s pain is an opportunity to be curious and attempt to gain a better understanding of their emotional tolerance and how it has been shaped by their own biology, background, and beliefs. This helps to create space for both partners’ emotions instead of one partner’s feelings overshadowing another’s.”
5. You Focus on the Details Without Acknowledging Their Experience
When you argue with your partner, do you get caught up in the minor details of the situation while ignoring their overall feelings and experience?
“Couples can often be so focused on agreeing on the details of a situation that they lose sight of reaching an understanding,” says Wiggs. “They become less emotionally present with one another, and their rhetoric can become harsh and critical and create an emotional disconnect.”
Rather than harping on the details, zoom out and get curious about your partner’s experience.
“The reality is two individuals cannot experience the same event in the exact same way,” Wiggs says. “We all have different past experiences, emotions, attention, and circumstances that help to shape our perception. Instead, couples can strive to look for deeper meaning. Each partner can shift the conversation by inquiring about what the situation means to the other.”
You can tell a guy his gym routine is paying off with a compliment, or you can climb on and grind on his bicep for your own pleasure. Men seem pretty excited about the second option.
A woman recently asked Reddit if it would be weird to grind on her friend-with-benefits’ freshly jacked arm during foreplay, and the replies were overwhelmingly supportive. “It’s weird as hell on the surface, but it’s something that, if it happened to me, I would literally never forget it,” one man wrote, according to Metro. Someone else coined “bicepsual,” while another woman chimed in that she prefers pecs and hips. The internet has spoken.
The arm obsession didn’t come out of nowhere. TikTok spent the summer obsessed with the “bicep trend,” where men stand around looking “normal” in a T-shirt before flexing and revealing their massive bulk. Women have always liked a good arm. Some are now looking at one and thinking, that could be fun.
This Unusual Sex Act Might Be the Ultimate Compliment for a Guy’s Biceps
Psychosexual therapist Becky Crepsley-Fox told Metro that grinding on a partner’s body comes up with her clients regularly. The technique is called broadening, where stimulation spreads across more of the vulva instead of concentrating on one small area. A flexed bicep just happens to be firm and conveniently shaped for the assignment.
From a purely anatomical standpoint, the bicep makes a pretty good “saddle” to hit all those good spots. Research from Indiana University found that only 18.4% of women said penetration alone was enough for orgasm. More than a third said they needed clitoral stimulation, while another large group said it made their orgasms better.
Sex therapist Laurie Mintz, author of Becoming Cliterate, has been arguing for years that penetration gets way too much credit. “When we equate intercourse and sex and call everything that comes before intercourse ‘foreplay,’ we are buying into the cultural script,” she told CNN.
Women who sleep with women also report higher orgasm rates than straight women. One study found that 86% of lesbians usually or always orgasmed during sex, compared with 65% of heterosexual women. For many women, the clitoris is the main event.
So if the bicep looks…inviting, ask first. Judging by the Reddit response, there’s a decent chance he’ll consider it the best compliment his arm has ever received.
Ever been twenty minutes into a first date and thought, yeah, this isn’t it? They’ve brought up their ex three times, and your drink is still mostly full. You want to go home, but you’d also rather not be the a**hole who bolts.
Chances are, you’ll stay anyway. A UK study found that people usually know if a date is going well within about 25 minutes, then hang around for an average of 51 minutes before finally making an excuse. More than a third said they didn’t feel comfortable saying they wanted to leave. That’s almost another half hour of your life spent talking to someone you know you won’t see again.
Ilay Shitov, chief growth officer at the dating app Fledge, thinks people are making this harder on themselves than they need to. “A first date is not a contract,” he told VICE. “You are meeting someone to find out whether you enjoy being around them and sometimes the answer is no, and there is nothing inherently rude about that.”
How to Leave a Bad Date Without Faking an Emergency
For him, the difference is in how you handle it. He defines being a jerk as “knowingly creating expectations you have no intention of fulfilling or disregarding another person’s feelings, dignity or boundaries when you could have treated them with more care.” Realizing over coffee that you have absolutely no interest in a second date doesn’t meet that bar.
It’s also completely normal to cut a date short if you’re not feeling it. In a DatingAdvice.com survey, 49% of Americans said they’d left early because of the other person’s behavior. The person you’re with would rather you be honest than grin and bear it. A Shane Co. survey found that 39% would rather hear the truth than sit through the rest of a date that clearly isn’t working.
Shitov recommends planning in an easy exit from the start. He suggests grabbing coffee and walking toward a restaurant, then deciding after 15 or 20 minutes whether you both want to keep going. He even recommends agreeing on a signal beforehand, like picking up your keys. “It may sound silly, but having the signal agreed in advance removes the awkwardness and gives both people a dignified way out,” he said.
If you didn’t build in an escape plan, you can still just say what’s happening. “I’ve enjoyed meeting you, but I don’t think we’re a match, so I’m going to head out” is enough. You don’t need to fake a sick roommate or suddenly remember that your oven is on.
Of course, safety is different. If someone makes you uncomfortable or something feels wrong, leave. Manners can sit this one out.
“You don’t owe someone chemistry,” Shitov said. “But you do owe them basic consideration.” A half-finished drink and a direct goodbye is better than another hour of pretending.
Take it from a hopeless romantic who’s had her heart shattered a few times throughout her 20s: breakups are brutal. They often bring out the worst in us, sometimes even triggering rash decisions or compulsive behavior, like ruminating or overspending.
Typically, this behavior doesn’t actually help us heal and operates more like a band-aid over a bullet wound. In fact, a Dating.com survey recently found that 59% of respondents spent money to feel better after their last breakup, but only 28% said it helped them heal.
According to Jaime Bronstein, LCSW, resident therapist at Dating.com, much healthier ways to cope with breakups exist—methods that won’t break the bank or send you spiraling into debt. Here are three ways to protect your mental health and wallet during a heartbreak.
1. Mute, Don’t Delete
After being dumped or betrayed by someone you thought was your soulmate, you might feel tempted to delete all evidence they ever existed. However, Bronstein warns that we might regret this quick, pain-driven decision.
“If you delete photos, messages, and physical memories of your ex, you might regret it later when you’re not as emotional,” Bronstein points out. “I recommend muting or archiving them for a period of time. It could be two weeks or a month; it’s up to you. This would help you decide without their interference and with a clearer mind, and would prevent you from second-guessing any rash decisions.”
2. Set a Time Limit for Rumination
As someone with OCD, I know how powerful the urge to ruminate can be. Unfortunately, I also know how toxic this habit can become, holding us back from healing and moving forward with our lives.
“Thoughts can get overwhelming quickly,” Bronstein says. “Set aside 15-30 minutes a day when you allow yourself to be flooded with thoughts of your ex, and if you feel like writing down your feelings in a journal, that can be helpful as you heal. After that time, do your best to be productive and carry on with your day while focusing on the positive and the present moment.”
3. Wait 48 Hours Before Making Breakup Purchases
A little retail therapy never hurt anybody…but a lot of it can definitely set you back financially. Not to mention, it likely won’t fill the void you’re feeling from your breakup.
“It makes sense to want to do something to make yourself feel better; however, before you make a purchase, wait a day or two, and then reflect on how you’re feeling, and ask yourself if it is to show off to your ex or if it’s something you genuinely would like to purchase regardless of the breakup,” Bronstein recommends. “If it’s for your ex, then skip it; however, if it’s for you, then go for it and enjoy your new purchase as long as it’s within your budget.”
At the end of the day, there’s no “perfect” way to handle a breakup. Be easy on yourself as you heal, and if you’d like to treat yourself to a new pair of shoes or a little black dress, don’t deprive yourself of that joy. But don’t expect it to mend your broken heart, either. Everything in moderation.
We’ve all heard the myths about when men and women supposedly hit their sexual peak. Men top out around 18, and women don’t hit their stride until they’re in their 30s. If that were true, it would create a seriously mismatched dating pool.
Those numbers go back to Alfred Kinsey, whose reports on male and female sexuality came out in 1948 and 1953. Men in his research reported the most orgasms around 17 or 18, while women reported more consistent orgasms after 30, according to MedicineNet.
The problem is that orgasm frequency is a pretty strange way to decide when somebody is having their best sex. A teenage guy can get there with a stiff breeze and a few spare minutes. Young women are more likely to need some trial and error first, plus a partner who’s actually paying attention.
The Truth About When Men and Women Actually Hit Their Sexual Peak
Age eventually catches up with everyone. Men lose testosterone a little at a time, and women can deal with dryness and lower desire around menopause. It’s a slow slide, with no single birthday where everything goes downhill.
And sexual satisfaction doesn’t exactly fall off a cliff later in life. In one survey of more than 1,300 older women, those over 80 reported some of the highest satisfaction levels in the group, social psychologist and Kinsey Institute research fellow Justin Lehmiller wrote in Psychology Today. He later wrote on his blog that older adults “care more about the thought and effort that goes into sex than they do about how often they’re doing it.”
A 2024 study of 556 people over 60 found that a third rated their recent sex as great. Seventy percent expected an unlimited number of orgasms in their future. That’s a lot of optimism for a group we’ve been told is well past its prime.
Feeling older than you are also seems to affect your sex life. Lehmiller has pointed to research linking feeling older than your actual age with lower sexual satisfaction, even after researchers accounted for physical health. That’s one more reason a single “sexual peak” age doesn’t make much sense.
So maybe the whole sexual-peak idea was bullsh*t to begin with. Being horny at 18 is not the same thing as being good at sex, and getting older doesn’t automatically make you bad at it. The older you get, the better chance you’ve had to figure out what actually feels good.
You’ve heard of your lifespan, but what about your sexspan—aka the length of time in which you can maintain an active sex life? This term highlights an often-neglected aspect of life as we get older.
As humans age, and for a variety of reasons, many individuals focus less on their sex lives or intimacy. From health conditions and stress to ageism and partner issues, countless influences affect our sex drives. However, a longer sexspan can benefit our overall health and well-being—and vice versa.
What Is a Sexspan?
According to Dr. Mohit Khera, a urologist at Baylor College of Medicine who coined the term, “your sexspan is the portion of your life in which you will have the ability and/or the desire to engage in sexual activity.”
Many people assume sex loses its importance and benefits with age, but that’s far from true. While sex certainly isn’t everything (especially for asexual individuals or others who aren’t interested in engaging), it can contribute to overall health and life satisfaction.
“Maintaining sexual intimacy as we age has a multitude of physiological and psychological health benefits,” says Ty David Lerman, PhD, clinical sexologist and AASECT-certified sex therapist. “Physically, we see improvement in heart health, lower blood pressure, [an] improved immune system, and lower levels of cortisol, the stress hormone, [which] helps us sleep better. For women, orgasms help strengthen the pelvic floor, [which] in turn helps with bladder control, a common issue that arises as we age. For men, regular ejaculation helps with prostate health.”
Of course, the benefits aren’t just physical either.
“The psychological benefits are also impacted by the endorphins and hormones released during orgasm that act as natural anti-depressants that often last days in our system,” Lerman continues. “Beyond the physical reactions, deepening connection with a partner as we age and fulfilling sexual satisfaction is a huge part of overall life satisfaction. Not to mention, feeling desired by our partners leads to a better self-image and just generally feeling good.”
How to Increase Your Sexspan
Unfortunately, societal judgments or stereotypes like ageism can stigmatize sex among the elderly. This often leads people to shame or neglect their own sexual health.
“In truth, folks are having sex far into older age; we just don’t like to talk about it,” Lerman shares. “The stigma is so prevalent that we often neglect to teach older folks about sexual health, which is sadly leading to an uprising in STIs in retirement homes!”
As they say: Your sex life does not have an expiration date. Regardless of whether you’ve gone through menopause, battle a chronic health condition, or have been with your spouse for 50+ years, you can still find ways to enjoy sex and intimacy.
“Bodies change, and real limitations arise as we age,” says Lerman. “Adaptability to our bodies changing over time is a huge factor in expanding our sexspan. Try to take it as a challenge to get creative to meet our physical needs and limitations while we still enjoy this part of our lives.”
And, of course, as you prioritize your general health, you might notice your sexual health improving.
“Think about taking care of your sexual health the same way you go for walks for your heart, or yoga/stretching for flexibility,” Lerman explains. “Expand your scope to include sex in our overall health considerations.”
As you take care of your body and fulfill its needs, you might find you have more energy for intimacy—and more of a hunger for it.
“The only two things needed for ‘good sex’ are to be connected to myself and my partner and to have fun!” Lerman adds. “That has nothing to do with sexual functioning or ‘performance.’ When we lower the bar of expectations and stop quantifying sex, we open the world of possibilities, increase our pleasure—and yes, extend our sexspan!
From girl dinners to protein-maxxed meals, we all have our different eating preferences. So when we enter a relationship or move in with a significant other, it can be challenging to merge our food choices and find common ground in the kitchen.
I often debate with my boyfriend: should we buy our own groceries and cook our own meals, or should we share the financial burden and kitchen tasks and enjoy the same meals together?
Since we’re often on the go, we tend to do quick, separate breakfasts and lunches during the week, but for dinner, one—or both!—of us will cook a meal we can share. This balance works for us.
However, when he’s away for the night or on a trip with friends, I don’t mind returning to my girl dinners of cheese, crackers, and pickles. In fact, some people crave a more permanent meal separation from their partner, also known as a “food divorce.”
Introducing ‘Food Divorce,’ the Relationship Trend for Couples Who Hate Eating the Same Things
Contrary to how it sounds, a food divorce is not an actual divorce. In other words, you’ll still remain married or coupled up with your partner. The only separation you’ll face is during mealtime.
According to Bruce Y. Lee, M.D., M.B.A., in his Psychology Today article on the topic, “A ‘food divorce’ is [a] term that’s being used on the internet to describe a situation where you and your partner no longer shop for groceries, cook, or eat together, even though you may be living together. Instead, each of you does the meal thing independently. You are essentially separated like oil and vinegar when it comes to food.”
Reasons for a Food Divorce
Couples may pursue a food divorce for many reasons, from conflicting schedules to different dietary preferences and restrictions. If you and your partner can’t agree on dinner most nights, you might be saving yourself from an argument by eating your own meals. With a food divorce, gone are the evenings spent asking your girlfriend or wife what they want for dinner and receiving no concrete decision. (I’m guilty of this…)
Additionally, if one person is gluten-free and the other is vegan, it can feel nearly impossible to find meals that accommodate both diets.
Benefits of a Food Divorce
While eating separate meals and buying separate groceries might feel counterintuitive to sharing a life, a food divorce can ease the stress of planning around each other’s schedules, agreeing on the same food choices, and coordinating meals.
“A couple doesn’t have to do everything together in a joined-at-the-hip manner,” Lee wrote in his article. “In fact, it can be natural and even healthier to do some things separately, especially things where you have divergent preferences and viewpoints.”
And, of course, if schedules allow, you can still eat your separate meals together. Just because you’re cooking or ordering different food doesn’t mean you can’t do so as a couple.
As Lee stated in his article: “A ‘food divorce’ could be an effective solution if the rest of your relationship is peachy keen—just not peach melba keen—and the only thing salty about your pairing is food-related. As long as your relationship already has plenty of other ways to bond and communicate and remain a great pair, then it may be fine that you are not having pears together.”
If you want to hear someone complain, one of your best bets is to ask one of your single friends what the dating landscape is like right now.
You’ll hear tales of first dates that lead nowhere, conversations that feel like they were ripped from a social media feed, and more and more people resigning themselves to partnerless existence. Even what once seemed like an ever-flowing fount of new romantic possibilities has now dried up: It feels like the days of meeting The One via a dating app are behind us.
We are officially in a romantic slump. As dating coach Lily Womble explains: “Dating can be so exhausting, depleting, demoralizing, and I only think dating apps have increased that experience for single folks.” Despite how discouraging it can be, though, a lot of people still desire partnership.
Womble is the author of Thank You, More Please: A Feminist Guide to Breaking Dumb Dating Rules and Finding Love, and she spoke with Vox about how to overcome dating fatigue. “If you do want to find love in a romantic partnership, there is a more healthful and empowering way to go about it that centers you as the main character,” she explains.
So how do you center yourself? How do you take your dating life off of your phone and into the real world? We answer those questions and more on the latest episode of Explain It to Me, Vox’s weekly call-in podcast.
Below is an excerpt of my conversation with Womble, edited for length and clarity. You can listen to the full episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. If you’d like to submit a question, send an email to askvox@vox.com or call 1-800-618-8545.
If you’re used to dating apps and you want to meet someone in person, how do you make that happen?
Dating in person is a lost art of social connection. I think that our reliance on dating apps has made us all sicker in some ways. These apps are built like slot machines. They’re designed to keep you sitting there with a gallon bag full of quarters and a Big Gulp, hoping to pull the triple cherry and get lucky.
It’s really important to reset your brain [from] dating apps, to get in-person to build new connections. It is as simple and as complicated as three steps.
What are the steps?
Number one: joy-building. Joy is connective. You need to exit your house, get off your couch, and go do something in your town or city that brings you some amount of joy with other people.
It could be something free or something paid. The point is not to be in proximity to hotties at this event. The point is to make a new friendship, to make a new connection, to say, “Hey, how’s it going?” From there, you’re expanding your social circle. The function of a dating app is purely to expand your social circle and expand your opportunity window to meet somebody. Same with expanding your social circle with joy-building.
You never know which 70-year-old you meet at your quilting night in your small town, whose son’s boyfriend’s cousin comes to a party and suddenly you’ve met the love of your life. I met my husband through joy-building. I went to an improv class, I made a friend that introduced me to her social circle, then I met Chris, my husband. Joy-building helps you meet the right people.
Second, you’ve got co-conspiratorship: helping your friends help you better. Now, your friend might say, “I don’t know any single people.” To that, you say, “I don’t either. So let’s co-create creative solutions. We’re both smart. You have a workplace, you have a work conference. Are you looking out for me there? Here’s the kind of person that I’m looking for. Here’s the questions I want you to ask somebody.”
Two of my clients were each other’s co-conspirators. They lived in different states. That didn’t matter because one of them visited the other, and in the airport met an eligible man, asked the qualifying and disqualifying questions, found out he was single, that he was eligible, that he was a good fit, and set them up. They literally started dating. So you need to have co-conspirators, you need to have friends looking out for you. Just like your friend asked you to be in their wedding, you need to ask them to support you in this way too.
Finally, we’ve got flirting, which is the most vomitous, nerve-wracking part of this plan. The good news is that it’s a buildable skill set. It’s not just something that your favorite friend who is so naturally flirty has and you don’t. I think that flirting is essentially a joyful, courageous connection.
People overcomplicate flirting to be this game. But I really believe, and have seen in my own experience, that flirting is just simply approaching somebody, asking a genuine question, and seeing if that person wants to co-create a conversation with you. To see if it’s romantic, you just ask, “Hey, random question. So are you single?” All of this requires 10 seconds of courage to go up to somebody and say, “Hey, you’re cute. I just wanted to come tell you that.” One of my clients did that on a crosswalk with a man that she found cute and they ended up dating.
You make it sound so easy, but that joy-building, that getting out and talking to people, that can be really hard. One, it’s hard to be joyful when it feels like the world is falling apart around us. Also, some of us are more shy than others. And there are people who lost a lot of valuable flirt skill-building time during the pandemic. I hear you, but how do you do it?
We have lost a lot of social skills. Those years that we were in lockdown were reps missed, especially for Gen Z, who literally were in school during that time. I’m a millennial, so I had already cut my teeth in New York circa 2015 with IRL flirting. It does require a rejection resilience plan.
I recommend that people have in the notes app on their phone a plan to be courageous and to know how they’re going to react and care for themselves after a hard moment. There are people, when you flirt or joy-build, who don’t want to be your friend, who don’t want to talk to you, who are uncomfortable themselves. That rejection resilience plan can really prepare you to be courageous and to know that no matter what, you’re going to be okay.
It’s as simple as understanding that your brain’s going to think it’s dying after an experience of rejection. Just say, “I think I’m going to die after rejection. It’s a thought, not a fact.” Then have a plan to be compassionate towards yourself. Self-compassion isn’t just a fluffy phrase. It is a science-backed tool that decreases cortisol, and increases resilience.
I also recommend a flirting ladder to increase your distress tolerance.
How does that work?
Start at the very basic level: I’m going to make eye contact with somebody for one second and then look away. Great, boom, done. That’s the first level on the flirting ladder.
Next level, I’m going to hold it for three seconds. It’s in small steps. Plan to do it in small, bite-sized steps so that you can increase your distress tolerance window. What flirting can be is a practice that you build up gradually towards. So wherever you are on the flirting ladder, if you’ve never made eye contact with somebody, you’re super shy, you’ve never gone up to a cute stranger and said hello, just literally write down five simple steps that you could do this week: eye contact, saying hello. One of my clients did a wink and run.
When you plan to do something courageous and say, “I’m going to do it for 10 seconds and then I can bail,” you’re more likely to do courageous things. You’re more likely to have more connections in your life and you’re more likely to meet the right people for you.
There are two scenes in Jane Schoenbrun‘s “Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma” that I hope will be among the first things to flash through my mind at the hour of my death, somewhere right after “oh sh*t,” and just before all of my dead pets and family members appear before me to take me back home.
In the first of these scenes, Kris Williams (Hannah Einbinder) runs through the woods at night, dressed only in a T-shirt and underwear, boobs bouncing and shoulder-length hair flowing side-to-side, in dreamy “final girl” form. Kris is a queer filmmaker taking on the task of reclaiming the slasher horror film-within-the-film, “Camp Miasma,” rebooting it for the queer community to no longer be appalled by. And she herself has, as of only recently, learned how to no longer be appalled by where her mind needs to travel in order to truly enjoy sex: villain-victim fantasies.
Lord, I’ve seen what you’ve done for others; please send me a beautiful woman who looks similar to these two characters, and please guide her to match my freak in the way that Kris and Billy match each other’s.
In the second scene that I hope to mentally revisit before it’s a wrap on principal photography for me on this mortal plane — seen at the very end of Schoenbrun’s latest film — Billy Presley (Gillian Anderson) walks hand in hand with Kris through a dreamscape of pleasure and gore as the most beautiful song I’ve ever heard in my life plays: “Satan,” by Andy Shauf. Billy is the star of the original “Camp Miasma” that Kris is rebooting, and she’s just given Kris permission to be as weird as she needs to be in order to come.
The theatrical burden of faking an orgasm because you don’t feel allowed to get into the headspace you need to be in in order to have a real one is gone. That looming first common, boring day after a few weeks of new bliss is gone. The habit of saying “I love you” with the same ease and banality as “can I have a napkin” is gone. Just two women being down for whatever it takes, for however long it lasts, encouraging each other to let go.
Lord, I’ve seen what you’ve done for others; please send me a beautiful woman who looks similar to these two characters, and please guide her to be compatible with me in the way that Kris and Billy are compatible with each other so that I, too, may have someone to hold hands with while slowly walking to the gas station in my underpants to buy snacks, covered head to toe in blood.
(MUBI) Hannah Einbinder in “Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma”
Schoenbrun, who directed, wrote and produced 2021’s fantastic “We’re All Going to the World’s Fair” and then cemented their name as a visionary with the release of “I Saw the TV Glow” in 2024 — which they also wrote and directed — described the somewhat hard-to-describe “Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma” to The New York Times as such: “In its simplest form, this is kind of a movie about two women matching each other’s freak.”
There’s a flame in my heart that wasn’t there before watching this movie, and that’s as great as a review can get.
Schoenbrun’s third major full-length release has received mixed reviews from professional critics and reactions from casual cinema-goers along the lines of “what the hell is this?” And you know what? I wish them all well. Whether this movie is a meta take on the problematic slasher genre, a delivery system for Hannah Einbinder to showcase that she has the best butt ever, or yet another chance for Gillian Anderson to give queer women what they want: Gillian Anderson; all I know is that when the credits rolled on this film, I walked to the parking lot with a twitterpated grin on my face, drove home listening to “Satan” on repeat, and then, once inside, immediately reactivated my Hinge profile and updated it to read: Looking for someone to share dipping sauces with — a reference to a scene in which Billy treats Kris to a feast of KFC, which I’m sure no one in my surrounding area will get. But if someone does . . . wedding bells!
Having recently gone from being a married woman to someone afraid of love and marriage, now that I’ve felt how quickly that can turn to vapor, I didn’t think I’d ever feel what this film made me feel again. There’s a flame in my heart that wasn’t there before watching this movie, and that’s as great as a review can get.
(MUBI) Gillian Anderson in “Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma”
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In the song “Satan,” which I will never shut up about and am acting like I personally discovered now, even though it was released as a single by Andy Shauf in 2022 and is featured on the soundtrack for “Camp Miasma” (available for pre-order now via Waxwork Records), he sings:
Don’t watch yourself, watch the movie
This only happens for a little while
Because Satan is waiting
Satan is waiting with Halloween candy
And while reading those lyrics, this may not seem like a romantic song; but in the context of the scene in which it plays, it very much is. Hearing this song after watching this movie, I felt like I was in love, even though I currently have no one to love — and didn’t think I wanted to. But the feeling was better than love, because it was just mine. Something pure. Something I could tap into just myself, or choose to share, but wasn’t attached to the memory of any of the real-life ouchy stuff.
This only happens for a little while.
Admittedly a recovering serial monogamist, maybe that “for a little while” part is a new lesson for me. Maybe that part would be OK?
(MUBI) Gillian Anderson and Hannah Einbinder in “Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma”
As a divorced lesbian who lives alone with her dog in a southern state she doesn’t feel attached to, a mix of slim-pickins and general heartache has led me to feeling like maybe I’ll just never meet the right woman for me — and working from home doesn’t make the whole situation any easier, in terms of putting myself out there, if I’d even ever wanted to.
Watching “Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma” changed my tune, immediately, because it made me feel something I hadn’t felt for a long, long time: passion. And more so, the exciting possibility of passion for passion’s sake, without rushing to mold it into anything more, unless it proves itself to actually be something more, which only time can tell.
The true gift of a film like this — films in general, really — is that even though what you’re watching isn’t real, how it makes you feel is.
I will likely not encounter my very own Kris Williams or Billy Presley on a dating app. There is no Camp Miasma to autofill as my location on Hinge. But passion is waiting . . . with Halloween candy. And like Billy says to Kris in the film, “If it gets too real, you can always turn it off.” But I like the feeling of leaving it on, for now, just to see what the next scene may bring.
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