I went without sleeping with anyone for six straight months and it was the best decision I’ve ever made. Before you jump to the conclusion that I stopped because no one wanted to sleep with me, I should say that wasn’t the case at all. I had plenty of opportunities to do it if that’s what I wanted, but it was my choice to take a break. I wanted to see what would happen in my relationships if I took love-making off the table and frankly, I’m glad I did it. Here’s what I learned:
- Guys are actually okay with not being intimate. Let me rephrase: DECENT guys are okay with no intimacy, at least temporarily — the ones I dated were. I don’t know if I just got lucky or what, but the guys I dated during my months of no intimacy seemed perfectly content with keeping things PG-13. Personality actually seemed to matter… unless they were playing me while secretly hoping I’d change my mind and sleep with them. If so, the joke was on them because I never did.
- Fantasies can replace love-making. For whatever reason, I just couldn’t jump on video train. Watching other people do it just isn’t for me. Luckily, I have a very creative mind and my fantasies turned out to be a pretty decent substitute for the real thing! Not making love only helped prove that I didn’t HAVE to have it! Don’t get me wrong — I love making love, but I could easily hit up my naughty fantasy world if need be. I don’t want to do that for the rest of my life, but I could go at least six months.
- You can cuddle without making love. There’s something crazy emotional about cuddling right after sleeping with someone. Am I wrong? You’re undressed, spooning, and your breath matches perfectly with his — bliss! I thought cuddle love-making was something I’d miss out on, but it turns out, you can have cuddles without the love-making part. Granted, cuddling makes it very tempting to rip off each other’s clothes and go at it — but still, it can be done.
- You gain some serious perspective. Not sleeping with anyone makes you way more observant, mainly because you have to be! Intimacy can seriously cloud your judgment. I can’t tell you how many jerks I’ve confused for saints just because of how good the intimacy was. When you take this off the table, you’re forced to focus completely on the important things. I learned what kind of personalities I’m attracted to and what personalities I’m not.
- Sometimes satisfying yourself is better than making love. You don’t need to make love to someone else to experience ecstasy, honestly — I can please myself far better than a majority of the guys I’ve slept with. All I’ve got to do is dim the lights and put on some Rihanna and it’s on (kidding, but mostly serious.) I always knew that satisfying yourself was a good thing but I never realized how good it could be without man parts involved.
- One person always wants to make love more. In every relationship I had during my hiatus, one of us always wanted to do it more than the other — and it wasn’t always the guy. Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure some of the guys I went out with were more than ready to jump into bed. They never said it, but I was thinking it enough for both of us! The longer I didn’t have it, the more I wanted it — I didn’t know how into intimacy I was until I stopped having it.
- Celibacy makes you confident AF. High key — celibacy makes you feel like the absolute garbage! Your personality is the only thing a guy has to go off of and it feels great to know that’s the only thing people are focusing on. I didn’t have to worry about guy’s using me for intimacy — I made it very clear that it wasn’t an option and if that’s what they wanted, they could get to steppin’. Some did, and some didn’t.
- Everyone’s intimate life is different. This might be the most important thing I learned — no one’s intimate life is the same. The only people who knew that I was taking a break from love-making were the guys I dated. But people naturally assumed I was hooking up with them. My friends would ask about my intimate life and make comments about their own. The fact that I wasn’t doing it didn’t even cross their minds — they assumed we were all in the same boat when in actuality, that couldn’t have been further from the truth.
- Intimacy is actually a big deal. Not everyone’s going to agree, but intimacy should be valued. By not having it, I learned how important it actually is! That’s not to say I was running around buck wild before, but I never thought sex was a crazy big deal. I was wrong. Not sleeping with guys made me see love-making in a different way — who you sleep with actually matters. The next guy I slept with after my six-month pause was someone I really loved. And guess what? It was the best intimacy of my life, purely because we had real feelings for each other.
