One Night Stands: Why They're Actually Shit

Young people like the idea of no-strings-attached sex. It's adventurous and spontaneous. You get to have good sex (and probably some bad mixed in there). And there's something empowering about a woman being able to say she wants a one night stand, with feminism and all that women are finally able to say YES we like sex and YES we're gonna take what we want. But I don't like one night stands.

I think that one night stands only serve to hurt our self-worth. If I give you my body and then in the morning you give me a high-five as I head out the door...well, what does that reduce my worth to? I want to wake up in the morning after sex and be told I'm loved and that I'm wonderful. I want to be made breakfast. I want to cuddle. I want to get up and use my toothbrush that I keep in his bathroom because I'm there often enough to keep one there. Nobody I've had sex with should rush me out the door or put his clothes on and sneak out while I'm sleeping without a goodbye.

Except for some nasty blackouts, we remember all of our one night stands. We remember if they were good or bad. We remember how we ended up going home together. The awkward goodbye the next morning. I don't want memories of you in my brain if I don't remember your first name or didn't care enough to ask your last. College and really all of your youth just flies by. I want to spend the time I have with my friends, and ideally, with someone really special who will be both a friend and a lover to me.

I've done the one night stand thing, and I'm not going to belabour myself with regrets because it's over. But I hope my little sister doesn't. I wish I could tell her that she'll feel her body has been used the next day. She'll wonder if she was good and if he's thinking about her, and he doesn't deserve to take up that space in her beautiful mind. She'll feel unclean even after her shower like she still smells like a stranger's bed. Only people who truly deeply care about her should get to touch her.

For myself, I had to stop playing the silly no-strings game because I got to thinking of the hardship I've endured in my life. I've battled anxiety and depression. I've dealt with body image issues. I've endured heartbreak, I've lost close friends. I've decided that if you don't understand what I've gone through, you shouldn't get to be with me, really be with me, as I am now. You have to get to know me and accept the good and the bad before you can sleep with me. I suggest you find someone who wakes up and wants to stay.