Photo by my lovely wife mb. Just imagine this is me trying to decide whether to take you home after a date or send you on your way…
Have you ever heard of the “three-date rule,” i.e. the idea that you should wait until the third date to have sex with a new person? I think I first encountered it in some hackneyed sitcom or rom-com, and I remember feeling confused by the very notion. How could you standardize that decision, I wondered, to the point of being able to put it on a calendar? Wasn’t it person-dependent and situation-dependent? Shouldn’t sex progress at the pace of both people’s comfort, whether that’s fast or slow or anywhere in between?
Admittedly, I wasn’t sexually active yet, so I was pondering these questions in a theoretical way, without any real-world experience to inform my thinking. But when I did start having sex, that was indeed how I approached it: no set timeline for when it should or shouldn’t happen, aside from “when we both want it to.” I’ve had sex on first dates when the vibes were right, and I’ve also waited months to have sex with someone, either due to logistical factors like distance, or because it took that long to build the amount of comfort and rapport that one or both of us needed. The timing of first times is as variable as sex itself, and I think most people would benefit from flexibility in this regard, rather than clinging to rigid rules.
That being said, I think there are some interesting arguments on all sides of this debate, so today I thought I’d explore some of the pros and cons of waiting a while to have sex with a new person. Let’s dive in (or tiptoe in slowly, if you prefer)!
Pro: More time to develop a sense of comfort & safety
For some of us, sexual arousal and excitement can’t really exist until comfort and safety have been established. Hell, I don’t even feel able to be authentically me until those things are established. Early dates can easily put me into a performative, “customer service”-y frame of mind, because I haven’t yet determined whether this is a person I can safely relax and be myself around. When I’m in that headspace, I have so little awareness of my own desires and bodily sensations that I can’t even effectively determine if I’m attracted to someone or not, let alone whether I want to have sex with them. But once I’ve spent some time waiting for intimacy to develop, my anxiety starts to lift, and I feel more able to discern what I want, and to ask for it without (much) fear of it going awry.
Con: Sex is great & you shouldn’t have to deny yourself sexually
A lot of the arguments against having sex “too early” are extremely gender-essentialist, heteronormative, and (dare I say it) heteropessimistic. Dating guides for women often say something like, “Making a man wait for sex is a good way to test whether he actually likes you and is in it for the long haul.” I take issue with the core assertion underlying this advice, which is that men care about sex and women don’t, so women can gain power over men by denying them sex.
You know what you actually get when you deny men sex? Zero sex! (Or at least, zero sex with those men…) That’s okay if you don’t care about sex, or if you’re sufficiently satisfied by your solo sex life that you don’t particularly crave partnered sex at the moment – but if you like sex, and want it, and hope that it’ll be a significant aspect of any relationship(s) you get into, then it makes no sense to withhold that from yourself. What could be less feminist, in fact, than denying yourself pleasure because of how men might perceive it?
Pro: More time for attraction to build
Some of us – myself definitely included – develop attractions slowly over time, rather than instantaneously on sight. This is one of the reasons one-night stands don’t work for me (and trust me, I’ve tried): while sex without attraction can sometimes be fun, it’s not hot for me, and it’s not what I want at this point in my life. So I need to know someone decently well before I’ll want to have sex with them. These days I’d always rather wait than risk rushing into sex that ends up making me feel uncomfortable or grossed out.
Con: You should assess sexual compatibility ASAP to avoid wasting time
Picture this: You let a fun flirtation simmer for weeks, or even months, until the yearning hits critical mass and you just have to fuck… but then you do, and it becomes immediately clear that they’re a submissive and you hate domming. Or they refuse to give oral sex and it’s the only way you can get off with a partner. Or they’re uncomfortable with you using your favorite vibrator during sex. Or the way their kisses taste is off-putting to you on a pheromonal/gut level. I could keep listing potential sexual mismatches forever, but you get the idea!
Early dating is largely about assessing compatibility, and for most of us, sex is a fairly important thing to be aligned on. So I completely understand why some people prefer to have sex sooner rather than later, so as not to risk the heartbreak and disappointment of becoming emotionally invested in a round peg that’ll never fit your square hole.
Pro: More time for STI testing & important pre-sex conversations
Depending on your safer sex boundaries and when each of you was last tested, either or both of you might want to get a panel done before you start having sex. That can take time – in my city, you can often get results back within a few days or less, but that’s assuming you’re able to get an appointment quickly (if needed) and have enough spare time in your schedule to go ASAP, which may not always be the case.
Aside from discussing STI status/testing, you may also want to discuss other matters of relevance before having sex for the first time, such as your kinks, fantasies, limits, and triggers. These conversations are important and I prefer to be able to take my time with them, instead of feeling rushed.
Con: Sex makes you feel more attached to each other
Contrary to the popular (and problematic) belief that a man will only develop romantic desire for a woman if she makes him wait for sex, the neurochemicals released during and after sex actually help a lot with bonding and intimacy. (And not just for straight people, either – for everyone!) So if you’re dating someone new and it’s going well, you might be able to take things to the next level emotionally by taking things to the next level physically.
Pro: …Sex makes you feel more attached to each other
Yep, it’s both a pro and a con! Sparkly sex neurochemicals can make you view your new paramour through cum-colored glasses. If you want to stay as level-headed as possible while riding the infamous New Relationship Energy wave, you may prefer to postpone sex until the initial romantic reverie has dissipated a bit. Otherwise you could end up smitten with someone who, it turns out, doesn’t treat you well or isn’t a good match.
Dear readers, what do you think of all this? Do you have any personal policies about when to have sex with a new person, or do you just play it by ear? Feel free to let me know in the comments!
This post was sponsored. As always, all writing and opinions are my own.
Yep, I’m doing a Girly Juice throwback post and sharing 10 of my actual journal entries from my actual journals this year… Here’s some juicy stuff about my sex life, love life, romantic philosophies, creative adventures, etc. in 2025!
March 11th
One of the ways I know these [musical improv] classes actually WORK is that I literally didn’t feel nervous at all for the entire show tonight. At no point was I less than certain that I could make something up in the moment. That’s so fucking crazy, considering that I was pretty damn nervous for my first beginner CLASS, let alone the showcase. I felt in control tonight. I felt like there was time to think of what I wanted to sing next and how to sing it. Whatever neural re-wiring happens when you start to practice improv regularly, it literally changes the way you experience the passage of time.
The things giving me the most joy and comfort in these bleak times all have to do with creativity and connection. Part of me still doubts as to whether I “deserve” to or “should” spend time, energy and money on these classes. But they feel like church and the gym and high school and university all rolled into one; they feel like where I go to be my bravest, best, most open self; they feel like a direct pipeline into connection, fun and laughter with people who somehow just understand me, despite barely knowing me, because we share this passionate, goofy interest in making up songs together on stage.
May 3rd
In any case, this feels notable: When I think about what I would do if I found out that I had [a terminal disease], the things that immediately come to mind are that I would sign up for as many musical improv classes/troupes as possible (and probably even some non-musical ones) and I would tell all my crushes that I think they’re cute, because WHO CARES.
I would also want to organize a concert where I could play all my favorite songs of mine and/or have my loved ones cover songs of mine. I would dress weird every day, unless I didn’t feel like it. I would go see comedy and theatre and live music any nights I was free. I would haunt Civil Liberties (…meant that in the alive-haunt way, but also it would be fun to dead-haunt Civ Lib too). Might give some money to Rosedale if I had any. Or for CB Pro scholarships. And I’d kiss as many cuties as I felt like (with their consent, of course) and masturbate and have sex up until I couldn’t anymore, and still try to find pleasures even after that. Cura te libitum; memento mori. Both.
May 17th
…Anyway, idk idk idk, but it kinda seems like my improv crushes might be into me, which is CRAZY. It really speaks to the way that this art form makes me into my best self. I remember the wild sense of transformation around grade 10-11 when Rosedale helped me come out of my shell in a big way, and how it suddenly seemed that everyone and their mother was attracted to me and was secretly confessing their limerence via Honesty Box or broadcasting it with their big gushy eyes. It was not just that so many people were into me, but that I could see/tell and usually even BELIEVE they were into me. I was so regularly and deeply in touch with the best and most attractive aspects of my me-ness (not to be confused with “penis”) that it seemed plausible that folks could like me. I liked myself. Hell, I finally WAS myself, period, and not an amalgamation of all the shy-meek-sweet-good-girl things I had terrifiedly striven to be until then.
I feel similarly now, like I have rediscovered the parts of myself I like most and am wearing those parts on the surface of my skin every day like glitter body paint. It’s interesting that so much of improv training is about learning to “get out of your own way” mentally – which I largely take to mean, reduce your anxiety/self-criticism/self-censorship to a point that your improv flows directly from your weird brain and is thus more organic and just better overall – and I am feeling similarly about my own attractiveness-or-lack-thereof lately, in that I actually MAKE myself less hot and more invisible when I let myself act like an anxious shy little kid in the corner – whereas, even though I have the same face and body (well, more or less) as the times when I act more confident and gregarious, people respond to me TOTALLY differently in those two states.
I used to think it was like, if maybe 20% of the population would find me attractive based on my looks alone, then maybe another 5-10% might start to find me attractive as they got to know my personality. But I think it’s significantly more than that, actually, especially the older we get. Conventional physical hotness fades, and also it just isn’t enduringly interesting (at least not to me). I want to know if we can make each other laugh until 3 a.m.
May 30th
Kind of beautiful to show up in a new setting as the best, brightest, most new-and-improved version of yourself, and to get to be witnessed and noticed and liked by someone who is similarly in their newest and most exciting form yet, and you see each other the way you each most yearn to be seen, which just adds to the eroticism and safety of the connection, and you’re both obsessed with and committed to this shared crazy art form which cleansed you both alive again from the inside out, and the wonderment and gratitude you both carry about that still burns within you and sometimes gets messily (but not inaccurately) aimed at each other, and you are exploring a body that’s new to you from WITHIN a body that’s new to you, and you are still learning to pilot a brain drunk on dopamine fumes, and you carry middle school like concrete in your bones and high school like glitter in your blood, and you know how you used to kiss and you know how you want to kiss now, and you know how you used to fuck and you think you know how you want to fuck now, and having a crush in your improv class is like finding a diamond tiara mixed into your lottery winnings: you quite literally cannot believe your luck, and you didn’t know this was a possibility, because why dream of delights beyond those that already saved your life?
Strange to fly away from Toronto feeling sad to be away from improv friends and my mom for 10 days, as if that were my “real” life, only to be welcomed open-armed by New York City once again… [Most] pressingly to me currently is the date I went on last night with the person I refer to by the moniker “hot they/them Q___” when talking to mb about them. They are this devastatingly hot nonbinary heartthrob from L.A. who is a long-time listener of The Dildorks and a big D&D nerd… They were wearing a red velvet/corduroy blazer that they’d just gotten recently for a friend’s wedding, and I was in a red dress (also incidentally bought for a wedding), so we matched, which I remarked on: “We look cute together!”
We had good conversations for hours, about all kinds of nerdy shit – Mel Brooks, the Adventure Zone, comics, musical improv, etc. They were touching my leg a lot under the table (and earlier at the bar, stepping closer to me every so often) and I suspected it was starting to make me wet – which honestly has been hard for me lately… [Some experiences] had made me feel so enduringly “meh” about the prospect of sex with anyone other than mb. It just didn’t seem appealing/exciting/like it would be any good. But this self-described dom and top (as per when they filled out my Date Me form about a year ago) was touching me under the table and it was turning me on.
Eventually I asked if we should find somewhere to go make out… [Then, outside on the sidewalk] they suddenly stopped, shoved me against a wall, and kissed me right there. Once again, I felt myself getting so turned on. It really is strange how much self-doubt/impostor syndrome I still feel about being a bottomy submissive, as if it’s a fake identity that just disguises fundamental sexual selfishness/laziness or something, but it is laughably obvious how submissive I am when the ways doms kiss me, touch me and talk to me make me so goddamn wet.
Anyway, they were a really good kisser. Like I was moaning and melting and sighing and starting to drop into subspace already… [Later they fingered me and] they gave me a lot of pleasure and made me feel a lot of things… Then they sucked their fingers clean and said, re: my flavor, “I’ve been wondering about that for a while,” which made me blush harder than I’ve blushed on any date in a long time. I asked them if they’d maybe wanna leave a mark on me, which is like… pretty damn romantic, from my perspective. They said they would’ve liked to bite my ass, but in the position and location we were in, it was easier for them to just bite my neck where it meets the shoulder, one of my favorite spots. (OMG, I am getting wet as I’m writing this!! Yikes!) They gave me a mark that I love, a wine-dark hickey right in the spot where my bag strap sits, so I was reminded of them for much of today.
Then they walked me to the subway, holding my hand for some of that time and guiding me with their hand around my waist for some of it, as I teetered in and out of subspace. I felt really taken care of and safe. Never once did I get that cold stab of adrenaline like “Oh god, I’m in a compromised state, alone, with a stranger.” I just wanted to stay longer, to keep kissing them, but I was getting tired. So eventually we just made out in front of the subway like horny teenagers. It was really kind of wild. It is so rare that I feel this kind of attraction for someone these days. And it wasn’t just sexual but romantic too. I felt close to them and it felt safe to open up and let my walls down, which has been so hard for me lately. I felt nervous and starry-eyed on the subway home, and the whole next day, feeling (as I sometimes do after an important first time with a new person) that somehow my body was all new, renewed, remade afresh by the experience. Like my own body felt unfamiliar to me because it had been transformed by the way they touched it, the way they wanted it. Oh god. I might be in trouble, huh.
October 9th
Oh hi, it’s me again, the pain slut who gets fingered on park benches. I am crush-brain garbage today and yesterday, meaning I felt hassled and haunted by my own intrusive romantic fantasies. It’s tough sometimes being both a chronic romanticizer who aims to find delight wherever and whenever possible, and a pragmatic bitch with a kintsugi‘ed heart who believes it’s a dumb waste of time to fixate on, as one random example, a nerdy nonbinary heartthrob who lives across a continent from me.
I mean, both can be true. It can be dumb and potentially painful while also being fun and worth doing, like drinking too hard on a school night at your buddy’s going-away party, or dancing for 3 hours at a wedding even though you have fibromyalgia. There is no “right way” that things are “supposed” to go. I can have a big dumb long-distance crush if I want to, dammit!
November 26th
Me: Just really wanting you to leave so many painful marks all over me and fuck the shit out of me but in a romantic n cute way, ya know Them: Oh absolutely. brutally but romantically Me: I want that so bad 🙁 Them: Meeeee toooo
Thinking a lot lately about what “romantic sex” even is to me, because it sure ain’t vanilla missionary in the dark or what [my dommy ex-boyfriend] F___ referred to as “slow stuff & eye-looking,” and yet some of that stuff is at least somewhat appealing with the right person…
I think to me, romantic sex is sex where you both bare some of your soul by pursuing and reacting to the things you authentically desire with each other… sex where you feel absorbed/immersed in sensation and connection and it gets you out of your own head and into someone else’s… sex where you feel strong sensations both physically and emotionally and it feels safe and celebrated for you to feel those feelings… sex where you feel able to truly be yourself (or at least a significant part of yourself), and you know you are not judged or disliked for that but in fact desired for it… sex where your partner seems focused on your pleasure not just because they find it hot but also because they think you deserve a more pleasurable existence because of who you are as a human being… sex where trust acts as an aphrodisiac… sex where effort is a currency of caring… sex where you are both on the same page about what it means and what it feels like… sex without the need to censor yourself, your desires, or your reactions… sex that feels deeply informed by the non-sexual knowledge you have about each other… sex that feels like a shared playspace where your souls can touch and merge for a time… sex that encourages play, fun, and getting what you really, really want… sex that feels like a great conversation… sex that helps you remember you deserve pleasure and are hot… sex that is intentionally scheduled, skilfully practiced, and consistently prioritized… sex that scares you a little with the heights it takes you to… sex that leaves you wanting to say “I love you” when the pleasure overflows out your mouth.
Gotta put stickers on the back covers too! My favorite one here is the Pokémon-inspired one from Namesake.
December 9th
I put up a carefully crafted but admittedly lengthy personal ad on the [redacted] subreddit, honestly probably because all these sweet polite shy Canadian monogamous boys are making me feel frustrated, lol. I think I got about 20 responses, with maybe 5-8 being so short/low-effort that I deleted them immediately, 4-5 being decent but not compatible with me in some key way (e.g. they’re not dominant, or they really want me to sit on their face – I am seeking the pillow princess treatment in this case!), 3-5 being good enough that I’d consider messaging back (and I did message some back)… and the remainder were very obviously ChatGPT-generated, at least partially if not in full.
What is UP with men and outsourcing delicate, intimate human connection to a fucking LLM! It makes me blindingly angry! Part of me feels compassion for their struggle, especially the neurodivergent ones, because men really don’t have social skills drilled into them from birth in the same ways… I would understand if they wanted to consult the robot for advice on how to approach a particular piece of tricky communiqué (and I have even done that myself before), but to copy-&-paste the hollow words of a text generator into your texting app and hit ‘send’… I don’t know how they live with themselves. If you’re that desperate to avoid human connection, why are you nonetheless play-acting at pursuing it?
Some women would vehemently argue that the reason is simple: men only want sex from women, and will do everything they can think of in service of that goal, including lying, misrepresenting themselves, and even stupider shit like expecting women to be too dumb to notice these men are not nearly as articulate or sensitive IRL as they are in their suspiciously verbose messages. I don’t think I believe that the average man is that simple-minded and singularly focused, however. I am of the controversial opinion that men have feelings, longings, and needs in relationships which go beyond the sexual, and that sex is often at least partially the outlet and analogue for their deeper emotional desire for connection and closeness. But one also wonders why these men are constantly shooting themselves in the foot by refusing to learn basic conversational skills and lazily allowing a famously shitty robot to pick up their slack, which it doesn’t do believably or well.
December 15th
I’m low-key disappointed that I probably won’t get to make out with any of my comedy crushes before I leave, because it’s honestly a demisexual’s wet dream to suddenly/finally get sexual with someone you’ve done one zillion improv shows with. Like, I’m hard-pressed to come up with something I’d find hotter and more exciting, both emotionally and sexually. They’ve seen your most embarrassing blunders and your most thunderous successes. They’ve co-created silly art with you night after night, both contributing in total earnestness to this shared ship we all sail together. They’ve seen you when you get dolled up and when you’re just bumming around. They know what makes you laugh and maybe even what makes you scream. They still like you even though they’ve seen you laugh so hard you snort.
To then add the layer on top of that that they additionally want to kiss you, that they have indeed broached that line despite it being unprecedented in your connection, despite the fear that you’ll mess up this thing you really value… It’s just such a sexy proposition to me. There haven’t been many times in my life when someone kissed me for the first time AFTER they already knew me decently well, knew me enough to know they really liked me and wanted me, specifically me. It’s such a hot and validating thought.
And it doesn’t hurt that I’m sure some anxiety and dissociation would be prevented by doing these things with someone you already feel safe with, someone you can relax around, someone your body has a lot of practice feeling relaxed around. I wonder if the kissing would accordingly feel different temporally, in the way that improv scenes seem to give you more time to think of your next line the more that you practice, because your bloodstream is no longer pumping with breakneck adrenaline every time you step on stage. Would kissing T___ or C___ have a certain naturalistic slowness to it, unlike the frantic and forgettable nervous-AF kisses I’ve had on first dates etc.? Would I have time and space, mentally, to marvel at who I was kissing – perhaps even to smile and laugh about it together? Would that laughter be sexy in its own way because it’s an expression of intimacy, of both being simultaneously shocked and delighted by the same thing, almost like the intimacy of watching (or doing) a great improv scene together?
December 20th
Current baseline requirements for a romantic partner:
Treats me well and respectfully, always.
We make each other laugh a lot.
Asks me questions, is intrinsically curious about me, and inspires that same type of curiosity in me. Can carry a conversation.
Feminist, leftist, vehemently pro-LGBTQ+ rights.
Kinky, communicative about sex, into a lot of the same things I’m into, entirely chill about sex toys and period sex and sometimes having non-penetrative sex.
Nerdy and enthusiastic.
A good flirt. Makes me feel liked and desired.
We share an undeniable mutual attraction on every level that matters to us.
Good manners, good hygiene, basic life skills.
Smart enough to keep up with me.
Polyamory-competent, emotionally intelligent, and in therapy if they need to be.
Entirely chill about my line of work, including being written/talked about publicly (anonymized is fine).
Creative-minded and interested in the arts.
Part of me thinks these requirements are too stringent. Another part of me thinks they’re not stringent enough.
A blurry still from a porn scene I once performed in for Spit
One of the most striking changes in my sexuality as I’ve grown older is how much more demisexual I’ve gotten. I went from being a horny, flirty 23-year-old who could spot my next fuck from across a crowded swimming pool, to being a grizzled, grumpy 30-year-old who needs to have a 3-hour conversation with someone before deciding whether she wants to hold their hand. (That’s a slight exaggeration… maybe…)
I’ve seen the question of demisexuals’ porn consumption come up in a few of the online sex discussion spaces I participate in, and I think it’s an interesting one. If the primary purpose of pornography is to arouse the viewer, and the viewer is someone who is far more aroused by brains than bodies, and far more interested in intimacy than insertions, can porn really do its job? I have a few points I’d like to make in response to this question.
Quick refresher before we hop in: Demisexuality is an identity on the asexuality spectrum. Demisexuals find it difficult or impossible to experience sexual attraction until and unless they’ve developed an emotional connection to, or at least an emotional familiarity with, the subject of that attraction.
Point 1: Sexual attraction and sexual arousal are not the same thing.
Sexual attraction, generally speaking, is the visceral pull you feel toward someone you want to kiss, touch, and/or fuck. It is aimed at particular people; if someone said to me, “Do you feel like having sex right now?” my answer would be rather different than if someone said to me, “Do you feel like having sex with James Dean circa 1955 right now?” (My answers at the moment, respectively, are “Ehh, not really, ask me again after I’ve had my coffee” and “OMG, yes, give me 10 minutes to throw on some red lipstick for him to mess up.”)
Sexual arousal, on the other hand, is the physical (and, arguably, also mental) state of being horny. It can involve noticeable changes in your physiology, like engorged genital tissue and a quickening heartbeat, as well as more psychological effects, like the pressing desire to be imminently touched by yourself and/or by someone else.
These two things are different. Certainly one can facilitate the other – and for many demisexuals, sexual attraction precedes sexual arousal and is itself preceded by emotional attraction – but fundamentally, they are separate, and don’t always occur at the same time, in the same situations.
Without trying to speak for other demisexuals on this matter, I’ll say that I can become sexually aroused by porn without feeling sexually attracted to the people in it. It certainly helps if I’m attracted to the people in it (more on that below), but just witnessing certain sexual acts can rev me up, especially if they’re acts I’m already intimately familiar with and/or acts I already fetishize to some extent. And so, yes, I can jerk off to porn, and often find that it adds measurably to my arousal and pleasure, just as it does for many allosexual people (i.e. people who are not on the asexual spectrum).
Point 2: Porn can become familiar.
In an age of OnlyFans feeds and live sex cams, it’s easier than ever to follow the careers of porn performers you enjoy. Whether you become a fan of theirs because you think they’re cute, because they remind you of someone you used to date, or because your favorite sex acts and kinks are fairly aligned with theirs (or all three!), you can definitely develop an “emotional connection” – albeit a one-sided, parasocial one – to certain performers over time.
This noticeably increases my enjoyment of porn, as a demisexual person. Of the porn performers whose work I follow closely, what they all have in common is that there’s a lot of personality infused into their work, so that I get a sense of who they are (or at least, who their porn persona is) on a deeper level than I would if I’d just watched them get fucked once. This creates a sense of heightened connection and therefore generates heightened sexual attraction on my end.
I’ve noticed that this effect can also occur even if I’ve just seen a particular porn clip several times. It’s like the raunchier version of how I feel more attracted to Jennifer Beals every time I re-watch one of her sex scenes from The L Word…
If you’re not sure where to even find porn performers you might develop a fondness for, I’d suggest scrolling through clip sites like ManyVids, or flipping through the pages of free adult webcams listings, and clicking on anyone whose aesthetic or vibe provokes a positive response in you. Follow that little glimmer of potential attraction and see where it leads you.
Point 3: You can make porn that’s familiar.
Now, granted, not everyone wants to set up a camera to film themselves while fucking. You may have concerns about this related to cybersecurity, future employment, etc. and that’s fine.
But if you are willing to make your own porn, I think this can be one of the best solutions for demisexuals who want wank fodder but don’t connect with much/any of the porn they see online. After all, what could be more demisexual than jerking off to the sight of a person you know IRL and already have a deep connection with?
I’ve made amateur porn with a few partners over the years, and it’s always served me well when incorporated into my spank bank. It reminds me of hot sex I’ve had, because it depicts… hot sex I’ve actually had! And it’s therefore a lot easier for me to get turned on by it and get off to it.
Fellow demisexuals, what’s your experience with porn? Does it turn you on? Bore you? Or does it depend?
This post contains sponsored links. As always, all writing and opinions are my own.
I’m demisexual, meaning that I don’t have the capacity to feel sexually attracted to someone until I have some kind of emotional connection with them and have a good sense of who they are as a person.
Mostly I’m fine with being this way – my demisexuality fits nicely into my introverted lifestyle – but sometimes I wish I were capable of developing sexual attractions quicker, especially since that seems to be very much the norm on dating sites/apps. It can be hard to navigate these fast-paced online hubs of sex ‘n’ romance when you’re slow-moving in these realms. Sometimes it’s difficult enough to make a person want to give up altogether.
I’ve found a few strategies that help me in this regard, though. Here are some online dating tips for demisexuals. As per usual, take ’em with a grain of salt, because we’re all different – but I hope they help you, if indeed you need/want help with this issue.
1. Choose the right site/app to begin with
It’s easy to get intimidated when you look through a list of dating sites or apps and don’t even know where to start. But many apps and sites designed to facilitate human connection are geared toward a certain type of human connection – and likewise, there are some apps and sites that don’t explicitly try to be hookup-focused, or queer-focused, or kink-focused, or whatever, but may attract certain demographics anyway for various reasons.
In my experience, for instance, Tinder is not always the best choice for someone who wants a long-term relationship, or a relationship where sex is of minimal or no importance. On the flipside, I wouldn’t typically recommend Match.com for someone who just wanted a hookup. Do some research (including “field research” if need be) to get a sense of which sites and apps are most aligned with what you’re looking for, and use those.
Some of these services are more demisexual-friendly than others. I like the text-forward interface of Lex, for example, because it allows me to get to know someone’s communication style and a little bit about how their brain works, before seeing what they even look like. OkCupid can also be good for demisexuals because its filtering tools and compatibility questions are powerful and can help you narrow down your dating pool to people you’re mostly aligned with.
2. State your hopes and expectations in your profile
I often include a line in my online dating bios that’s something like “More into fun dates than hookups” and “I like to take things slow and get to know people.” I think a statement like this can do a lot of heavy lifting in terms of attracting people who have similar desires and repelling people who don’t.
I’ve also seen people say they were looking for “friends, and maybe more eventually,” which I think can be a good approach for demisexuals. If you do become friends with someone you met on a dating site/app, then at least you’ll still have a friend even if an attraction doesn’t end up developing between you.
An important thing to keep in mind here is that there’s absolutely no need to shame people who are more interested in casual sex than you are. We all have different needs, wants, and preferences. Yours isn’t more ethical, good or “respectable” just because you like to get to know people before potentially boning them.
3. Ask questions whose answers you might find hot
I know myself well enough, at this point in my dating life, to know that I find it attractive when people are highly enthusiastic about a particular passion of theirs, whether that be movies, music, cocktails, video games, or just about anything else. So I’ll often ask people about their passions, or about activities in their life that light them up, because the answers to these questions can awaken a spark of attraction to me that is sometimes later fanned into a proper flame as I get to know them better.
Consider what questions you could ask to take the fastest (or funnest) possible route to info that might stir your interest, and ask those more often when you’re chatting with potential dates online. In doing this, you’re helping them out and helping yourself have a better time.
4. Consider limiting initial dates to the daytime
I have a hard time saying no to sex when I have a strong sense that the person I’m on a date with is expecting or hoping for sex to happen. Most of the people I’ve been on dates with have been kind, considerate, and non-pressure-y, so I’m aware that this is a problem that exists largely in my own head and that it’s okay to have boundaries. But, for this reason, I often find it easiest to go on first dates (or second or third dates) in the daytime, because there tends to be less of an expectation that sex will happen at the end of the date.
Afternoon coffee dates, weekend brunch dates, and walking-through-a-park dates can all be good for this. If I want to be extra sure that sex won’t be expected, I might let the person know about what I’ll be doing afterward, e.g. that I have to get back to work or that I have plans with a friend.
It’s not that I couldn’t have consensual, enjoyable sex if I went home with someone on a first date. It’s definitely happened. But for me, sex on a first date is almost always sex without sexual attraction, because I usually simply haven’t had enough time to develop an attraction at that point. And personally, I’d rather wait until I really want to have sex with someone before having it.
5. Remember, above all, that your boundaries are valid
It’s okay to want to wait a while to have sex. Hell, it’d be okay if you never wanted to have sex. It might mean that you’re not compatible with some of the people you go on dates with, but that’d be true no matter what your deal was. Sometimes people just aren’t compatible with each other, and that’s okay. Either one or both of them can compromise, if they’re comfortable doing so, or they can go their separate ways.
An important caveat there is that you never have to compromise if you don’t want to have sex. “No” is a complete sentence, as the saying goes. It can trigger a lot of shame and self-doubt when someone pressures you into moving faster than you want to, especially if they start making claims like “Other people I’ve dated haven’t wanted to wait this long to have sex” or “The way you feel about sex isn’t normal.” But please try to remember, if you can, that anyone worth dating (or fucking!) will respect your boundaries.
Sure, they might end up saying, “You know what? This isn’t working for me, so I think we should stop seeing each other.” That’s a normal part of the dating process, for anyone. But never forget that you are well within your rights to say no, or even to get up and leave. You don’t owe anyone sex. You don’t even owe anyone an explanation for why you don’t feel like having sex. And the more you can internalize that knowledge, and the more you practice setting and holding your boundaries, the more delicious it’ll feel when an attraction finally develops and you find yourself wanting to have sex with a particular person.
A true “yes” can’t exist in an environment where a “no” is shamed, dismissed or belittled. I hope that you find your true “yes,” because it feels so damn good.
This post contains a sponsored link. As always, all writing and opinions are my own.
It’s weird when a thing that’s been a part of your life for a long time suddenly gains mainstream popularity. I remember feeling this way when the Fifty Shades novels and movies went viral, popularizing kink and BDSM among people who previously might have sneered at it or not known it existed at all. It reminded me, oddly enough, of when Pokémon Go became a hit game in 2016 and it instantly seemed as if everyone I knew was obsessed with the same game franchise I used to get bullied for liking when I was 8. Cognitive dissonance, man.
In moments like those, an internal war always erupts between the snobby, snarky part of me that loves to gatekeep, and the more mature and compassionate part of me that just wants everyone to be happy. Like, is it really that big a deal that way more people can recognize a flogger (or a Mewtwo) on sight now than they could a decade ago? Is it actually helping anyone when I roll my eyes at these people and dismiss them as “not real fans” or “not real kinksters,” or is it just enabling me to feel high and mighty, like an indie-rock snob whose old-school fave just hit the Billboard Top 50?
I feel especially conflicted about this when there are smart people making good points on both sides of the argument – as with the debates this past year about the “gentrification of OnlyFans.” Porn performers who’ve made their livings on the site for years are understandably upset that controversial celebrities like Bella Thorne and Caroline Calloway can sweep in at any moment, earning a fortune in a single day, while long-time sex workers still have to struggle against the stigma and logistical hurdles placed in their way by our sex-negative culture. On the other hand, I also understand why so many people during this pandemic went, “Wait, how much money do pornstars make?!” and created an OnlyFans page to help make ends meet during this tough time. Granted, those folks don’t have nearly as much of an economic impact on other sex workers as celebrities do, nor do they have nearly the same amount of institutional power to sway public opinion about sex work, but it can be hard nonetheless to turn off the judgmental, elitist, self-protective voice whispering in my ear about people “jumping on bandwagons.”
I’m not an OnlyFans user, as either a creator or a fan, so I can’t really speak to the politics and ethics of that site and the people on it. But I’ve been thinking about this type of gatekeeping lately because it seems to be coming up in a lot of different areas right now. I recently heard a rumor that a guy I used to know had come out as demisexual, like me, and I found myself reflexively rolling my eyes. “I don’t know if that’s true,” I scoffed derisively. “I knew him for years and he never seemed that demi to me. I think he’s just jumping onto the bandwagon.” But as soon as those words left my mouth, I could hear how horrible they sounded – and how much they actually sounded exactly like my own self-judgments when I came out as demisexual. I know, of course, that not all demisexual people “seem demisexual,” that a person’s sexual behavior doesn’t always match their sexual identity perfectly, that sexual identities can shift over time, and that people have the right to self-identify however they choose. I realized in that moment that I was 100% just projecting my own insecurity and self-doubt onto this guy who hadn’t even done anything wrong, and who is almost certainly just as demisexual as he says he is.
The farther back I peer into my own sexual history, the more of this type of gatekeeping I can remember. I was frequently gatekept when I came out as bisexual at age 15; friends and internet strangers insisted I was actually gay, or actually straight, or would grow out of my identity. My long-time volunteering gig at a queer organization became untenable when a new coordinator was hired and noticeably treated the femme queers (myself included) worse than everyone else, in a way that felt like she low-key didn’t believe we were really queer. Some random person booed me when I kissed my (queer ally) boyfriend at a Pride event, as if they’d never heard of bisexuality.
Thinking about these incidents makes me deeply sad, because each and every one of them was invalidating beyond measure. Queer and trans people are already at higher risk of social ostracization, stigmatization, and suicidality than straight cis people; is it really necessary for us to perpetuate these forces against people in our own communities? Who does it actually help when we boo a bisexual, or insist asexuals have no place at Pride, or tell a newly-out enby that they’re “not trans enough”? Aren’t we just picking up the same weapons that’ve been used on us forever, and turning them on the people who most need our love and acceptance?
Let me be clear: it’s not that I think gatekeeping is never appropriate. Those OnlyFans celebs demonstrably made life harder for sex workers on the site; likewise, I don’t think it’s always appropriate for straight cis allosexual people to be in LGBTQ+ spaces, I don’t think white folks have any right to infiltrate POC-specific events, and I don’t think anti-trans bigots get to call themselves feminists. But these are extreme cases, and most gatekeeping in the queer community seems to target people who it makes no sense to target.
Next time you find yourself thinking, “That person doesn’t seem like they belong here,” or “What a poser,” or “Are they really who they say they are?” maybe you’ll think twice, and instead ask yourself: Does it really help anybody when I gatekeep? Or does it just isolate and invalidate someone who could really use the support of a loving, accepting community?
This post was sponsored. As always, all writing and opinions are my own.
