Does no-strings-attached sex spoil our chances of finding authentic intimacy, asks Danny J. Photography by Tony Veloz.

By Danny J

I’m not sure if it was a result of being sexually isolated by the covid-19 quarantine, but for some reason I woke up sweating in the middle of the night.

This used to be the hour when someone I met at a bar, but usually online, would arrive at my place for sex. It was 3am, I was aroused and overcome with how drunk I felt, high again, and in that moment – insanely horny. The feeling was so certain that, for a split second, I sat up in my bed and waited to hear a knock on my door or buzz from my phone telling me someone was parked and waiting outside. When neither occurred, I half smiled, closed my eyes and fell asleep.

Some therapists call this “euphoric recall”, where we remember and exaggerate memories of past chemical episodes in a positive light. Friends of mine call it a “free-lapse” because if you’re sober, you get to maintain your sobriety while still feeling what it’s like to drink or use again.

Whatever you want to call it, I was reminded of the times I’d stay home and set my alarm to wake up as the bars were closing so that I could check my Grindr messages and see who was online and looking. On the nights I went out (which was often), nine out of the ten guys I met up with were from Scruff or Grindr. Since I tend to be a little shy outside of the bedroom, it was rare for me to approach my potential hook-ups in person. The only times I approached men was when we engaged in mutual and prolonged eye contact. Grindr was much easier because it did the dirty work for me. All I had to do was open the app between 1:00am and 2:30am, sometimes even earlier, and there were handfuls of intoxicated men, horny and looking.