<story><title>The Need for Touch</title><url>https://aeon.co/essays/touch-is-a-language-we-cannot-afford-to-forget</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>nxc18</author><text>I don&amp;#x27;t know how common this is, but I was raised to see intimate touch as reserved exclusively for family and sexual&amp;#x2F;romantic partners. There&amp;#x27;s a pretty big mental block when it comes to touch, and I think that&amp;#x27;s made my life materially worse. Do others experience that? I grew up in New England for context.&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;m somewhat fortunate that if I get particularly lonely or touch deprived, I can hop on grindr&amp;#x2F;scruff&amp;#x2F;hornet and resolve that situation pretty quickly in most cases. I hear the situation for single heterosexual men is significantly worse, but I&amp;#x27;d like to hear others thoughts. Are there outlets for straight lonely people in need of touch?&lt;p&gt;Gay dating apps have a reputation for being very sex focused, but many of the profiles I see are specifically seeking out touch&amp;#x2F;cuddling as a primary or even exclusive goal.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>throwawi</author><text>Heterosexual male here. I think the last time I touched anyone was when I hugged my mom when she visited me 3 months ago, and before that I don&amp;#x27;t think I touched anyone for the 6 months since I broke up with my gf.&lt;p&gt;After finishing college I moved to basically the middle of nowhere for my tech job without knowing anyone in the area. Wasn&amp;#x27;t proactive enough making friends, and because of my gf at the time I didn&amp;#x27;t seek out any women. We broke up right as the pandemic started, which may have been the worst possible time.&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;m not sure if it&amp;#x27;s because it&amp;#x27;s been so long that I touched anyone, but I don&amp;#x27;t get touch deprived as often as I would have expected. Sure there are times occasionally where I feel really lonely, but so far it&amp;#x27;s been pretty easy to brush that off. However, taking care of my mental health has been nearly a full time job. I make sure to exercise daily, I picked up guitar and mountain biking, and I blocked all social media I see as toxic (reddit, youtube, facebook. HN is okay in moderation). I my sleep schedule in check with targeted melatonin and bluelight filters. Keeping up with old friends and family is also essential.&lt;p&gt;My running theory is that touch is certainly a positive, but it isn&amp;#x27;t essential if the other parts of your life are kept in shape. Although shortening that list of mental health tasks to something more manageable does sound enticing. I&amp;#x27;ve never been good at dating though, and with the double whammy of it being quarantine and not having a local friend group I&amp;#x27;m not really sure how to solve that problem. Dating advice might be a bit off topic for HN though, considering temporarily unblocking reddit.</text></comment>
<story><title>The Need for Touch</title><url>https://aeon.co/essays/touch-is-a-language-we-cannot-afford-to-forget</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>nxc18</author><text>I don&amp;#x27;t know how common this is, but I was raised to see intimate touch as reserved exclusively for family and sexual&amp;#x2F;romantic partners. There&amp;#x27;s a pretty big mental block when it comes to touch, and I think that&amp;#x27;s made my life materially worse. Do others experience that? I grew up in New England for context.&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;m somewhat fortunate that if I get particularly lonely or touch deprived, I can hop on grindr&amp;#x2F;scruff&amp;#x2F;hornet and resolve that situation pretty quickly in most cases. I hear the situation for single heterosexual men is significantly worse, but I&amp;#x27;d like to hear others thoughts. Are there outlets for straight lonely people in need of touch?&lt;p&gt;Gay dating apps have a reputation for being very sex focused, but many of the profiles I see are specifically seeking out touch&amp;#x2F;cuddling as a primary or even exclusive goal.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>shybutnotshy</author><text>You have to be ok with casual sex. I&amp;#x27;m mostly not.&lt;p&gt;First I don&amp;#x27;t want to catch something (aids, chlamydia, herpes, ...) so a few minutes of sex doesn&amp;#x27;t seem worth the risk. I know, at least according to popular media that puts me in the minority. If my attitude is common it&amp;#x27;s probably not easy to spot.&lt;p&gt;Second, I don&amp;#x27;t want to hurt people. I know they exist but 9 times out of 10 people I meet want a serious relationship and would be hurt if we slept together than then I called it quits. I wouldn&amp;#x27;t lie to them directly but they&amp;#x27;d feel like I was lying to them if I say, slept with them 2-3 times and then stopped seeing them. So, I basically don&amp;#x27;t get into it in the first place unless I believe that I&amp;#x27;d like to be with them longer term. Of those people that could be more casual usually issue 1 comes up. They sleep around so they are more likely to have something and plus I don&amp;#x27;t want my heart broken.&lt;p&gt;Third, I&amp;#x27;m also someone who just wants one person not just for sex but for love and companionship so my attitude is bad when meeting &amp;#x2F; looking for people. My attitude is &amp;quot;can I see myself being with this person long term&amp;quot; instead of &amp;quot;would it be fun to be with this person for the moment&amp;quot;. That answer is quite often &amp;quot;no, I can&amp;#x27;t see myself being with this person long term&amp;quot;. I don&amp;#x27;t think that&amp;#x27;s that strange of a thought. A stereotype of a story is the person that doesn&amp;#x27;t think this way and has lots of failed relationships for choosing superficial qualities of attractiveness as their reason for getting into a relationship. But, at least they had a relationship.&lt;p&gt;Anyway, the sum of those 3 things and possibly some bad luck being in jobs which have few members of the opposite sex and friends that have few friends of the opposite sex means I haven&amp;#x27;t had a relationship for ~17 years. I hope every day that will change, I frequent 5 dating sites. I have matches. But getting something started seems really hard. I would do much better if I went to church (I&amp;#x27;m atheist) or did some activity where I got to know people over time and become friends first. I&amp;#x27;ve gone to several meetups but if they are truly about something I care about they usually have few members of the opposite sex. I&amp;#x27;ve been to a few otherwise but it&amp;#x27;s been the same bad luck I guess. No one I&amp;#x27;m interested in or no one that shows interest.</text></comment>