The Intimacy Crisis

We are all aware that the modernised world we inhabit is fast-paced, hectic and massively dominated by technology. Seismic changes in the way we communicate and interact with each other (think Grindr, Facebook etc.) are having an untold effect on how we deal with each other and how we have relationships.

This is not breaking news, but something that’s gaining more and more traction as the months pass. These days it is difficult to speak about relationships and sex without recognising the all-pervasive nature of technology in our daily lives.

For this article, I took the opportunity to Facetime with my friend, Fi Connors, a natural medicine clinician, educator and author of the emotional sexual health book, When Love is A Drug, who currently resides stateside. We have an appointment to discuss some of the recurring themes that have emerged in our individual practices, in the areas of emotional and sexual wellbeing – the real-time, real life effects that we are both witnessing with our clients on a weekly basis.

And so, breaking news, the biggest commonality on both sides of the pond? You guessed it. The rise of the challenge of the relationship and of course the increasing challenge of being single. The questions we hear our clients asking are becoming ever more critical. Do I want to be single? Do I want to be out there playing the field? Have I chosen to be single? Or is too difficult to get into a relationship, and even when I manage to, is it impossible to sustain?

Having difficulty in emotional relationships is never fun. When we are out there struggling on our own, it makes it almost impossible to make the vital changes needed to succeed. How do we succeed in relationship, if we don’t even know the parameters of emotional and sexual success? Working in clinical practice, Fi and I are starting to see that it is becoming extremely common that people are increasingly unhappy with their lives, and in particular their primary relationships.

A huge amount of pain is wrought from looking around social media and thinking that everyone is extremely happy and ‘perfect’. This social comparison is causing a self-harming and self-hurting behaviour that a lot of the time people can’t even identify.

As opposed to feeling connected and free through the use of social media, people are often becoming more isolated, disillusioned and lost. There is a growing pernicious unhappiness that is happening between comparison with others and the curating of selves, our beloved ‘personalities’ on social media sites. Of course, this comparison is poisonous for emotional balance, happiness and contentment.

THE RISE OF CHOICE

The next most difficult thing to contend with, in terms of the rise of technology and its effect on our relationships, is choice. We have choice at our fingertips 24/7, and we are paralysed by it. We think, ‘why do we have to deal with our partners, like their shitty humours, or the fact they are upset or the fact they won’t have sex tonight? There are a hundred thousand people that can give me what I need, so why would I bother doing the hard work with this person?’ With so much choice in the ether, people think that if they’re not happy, then the right action is to move on immediately.

That’s what all the popular psychology gurus seem to be saying, the Instagram mantras of ‘be your best self,’ ‘live your best life’. The quick-snap solution is often to get rid of anything perceived to be standing in the way of deserved ‘happiness’.

With the advent of apps like Tinder, Grindr and others, access to people and sex is instantaneous and we have commodified ourselves more dramatically than ever before. We flip through catalogues of faces and bodies, seeking attraction but not pausing to see how we actually feel. We all want everything, and we want it now. There is little concept of waiting or working through the deeper stuff; it’s all instantaneous, instant gratification. Of course, this is a very hollow, deep place to be digging ourselves into and the result is that people increasingly lack the attention and patience to stick around and nurture fledgling relationships.

There are many who may read this and say, ‘Sure I’m grand. I’m delighted with life, ‘I’ve got the things I want, I’ve got a boyfriend or girlfriend, or I‘ve got many. I can have sex whenever I want; I have mates and we go out and have the lols. Don’t be annoyin’ me with this emotional stuff.’

Then there are many that will read this and deep down will know they are struggling with these exact issues.

If these themes sound familiar it is because they are. These exact currents are endemic within the queer community, and because “everyone else is doing it” means it is more likely to be more and more difficult to get out of particular patterns of behaviour.

THE CULTURE OF LOOKING GOOD

There are very obvious but rarely spoken about polarisations of sexual behaviour in the lives of gay men and women that Fi and I are seeing over and over in our practices. Gay and queer men have polarised towards sex – sex with multiple partners, open relationships, ‘fun’ superficiality, sex for sport.

On the outside, gay male culture is very good at making itself look good. Gay men are fun, fast-paced and cultured; they’re on hook-up apps, attending sex parties or in open relationships, while also holding down great jobs, looking fantastic and having great friendship circles. It really looks like gay men are getting away with it so brilliantly.

What appears however are that gay men are increasingly propping themselves up with darker behaviours and sexualising the feeling of wanting an intimate, connected relationship. The ‘big-upping’ of being a hot, in-demand gay man can of course help to counterbalance the shame of not reaching our relationship wishes for yourself, but only in the very short-term.

Shame is an emotion that nobody chooses, or wants to feel. The shame of not reaching our relationship wishes for ourselves is usually what drives us into seeking help.

With gay and bisexual women, we see the opposite behaviour. Women tend to seek deep underpinning emotions through relationship intensity, dropping into deep emotional states with partners very quickly. Often the sexual connection is secondary. For gay women, emotional and sexual intimacy are two sides of the same coin. If the sexual balance is overtaken by the emotional, sex often leaves the relationship.

“ Gay men are increasingly sexualising the feeling of wanting an intimate, connected relationship .

In either instance, too much or too little does not make for a balance. Eating constantly offthe table of what we want, versus the table of what we need, eventually makes us unwell.

It’s really important clarify that sexual behaviour is absolutely fantastic. But if we want truly meaningful connections, sex has to have the underpinning of the emotions associated with what is, in reality, going on. We all may want to have mind-blowing sex, but sometimes we need to begin with something as simple and intimate as the gentle touch of another’s hand.

WHAT DOES A HAPPY RELATIONSHIP LOOK LIKE?

Whatever way you look at relationships, they are hard work, but the rewards of doing the work are extraordinary. When you stick with something, work through it, and work it out, it connects to directly to your self-esteem. On the other hand, if we just bail every time it gets hard and jump onto our iPhones, onto porn sites, or into new relationships, we will never get to experience true intimacy with ourselves, let alone with another.

A happy relationship is what everyone is looking for, right? But what does being happy in a relationship actually look like? Being happy with something means you get to experience the whole kit and caboodle, not just the parts that suit.

Deeper emotion is harder to access, and can be frightening to engage with initially, but the rewards are so much greater. Take seeking the feeling of joy, for example. Joy is an expression of contentment, but the underpinning of that one elusive emotion is a feeling of safety and security in the world where there is constancy. Without feeling safe and secure, it is hard to get to an experience of real joy. The deeper layers have to be in place; the others don’t appear out of nowhere.

Laughing, Connors says that being your best self doesn’t always mean you will be tripping down the road in Prada, going to the best party in town with the hottest yoke on your arm, though it can be that. Being your best self can also mean being curled up in the fetal position, bawling your eyes out, snot running down your face.

It’s incredible how much the average person spends, both in time and money, on a monthly basis, to look fantastic from the skin out. It would do us all much better in the long run, to invest some of that time and money on emotional and sexual health, which will keep us fit long after our physical body starts to wear. A gym that will build our self-connection and self-esteem.

There are lots of support and constructs around sexual health, but up to now, not for sexual emotional health. In this rapidly changing social environment, it’s time to open up a framework where people can start to talk about, understand and develop their sexual emotional connection. After all we’ve been through, we know what the LGBT+ community deserves more than anything is big love and healing. A big love that begins from the inside out.

Sarah Gilligan MSc. MIAHIP, and Fi Connors MA, ISHOM will be holding a day conference on sexual and emotional health in Dublin, early 2018. Email: info@capablemindsppc.ie for details