Head over heels? Or heels over head? I guess there is no such thing as casual sex.

Dopamine=love? You’re a dope if you believe that. Fall in lust, yes. Fall in love, no. Doc Yvonne is a sex educator, as it says in her short bio, but her idea of love is far from love truly is. She’s talking out of her speciality when she ventures into what constitutes love. I don’t see any credentials offered that makes her an expert in matters of love. Casual sex WEAKENS (if not totally rips) the fabric of what love is made of.

My main problem with casual sex, is that I think it makes a cheap act out of sex.

Maybe I am old fashion or something but I believe sex should be the ultimate expression of intimacy and feeling for each other. It should be the complete surrendering of your body physically, mentally, and spiritually to another person. I was taught that during sex the two people become one flesh and how this cannot be completely understood since it is a mystery.

Case in point, my girlfriend and I have been together throughout our college careers. It took a long time for us to develop all the intimacy we have between us. It takes awhile to get to the point where you can share anything and everything with your partner, the amount of trust where there are no secrets between the two of you will not happen overnight. It also involves having the deepest respect for your partner and putting their needs above your own. I remember one time after getting a promotion at work I really wanted to be intimate, but she wasn’t feeling well that day. To get rid of the excess energy I had I whipped up a chocolate dessert from scratch (her favourite btw), and we went to a movie together.

I just don’t see how you can share yourself at the levels I described above in just a casual little “fling”, this is why I see casual sex as cheap.

Drandel-

So let me get this straight, you attack her credentials in regards to love, then make your own statement about sex and love, without providing any credentials of your own? What qualifies you to make the comments you have? Also, you offer an unsubstantiated assertion. Where’s your proof that casual sex weakens love?

It’s very true. Unless the woman has more than one partner, she is very likely to eventually fall in love with the guy. Women desire the intimate setting that ‘love’ provides, and being so close to a man (i.e. having sex) only increases the odds that she will find her love and grow attached. Unless she is some freak or a hooker from Craigslist, it’s less likely she’ll be attached to you guys. Just make sure you use protection! BJack

The primary purpose of sex is bonding. Procreation is secondary. To suggest that bonding during casual sex is not a general rule shows a lack of basic understanding about sex and should make people wary when someone, no matter how educated, touts themselves as a “Sex Expert”.

People who engage in casual sex often feel a sense of emptiness after and have trouble bonding in committed relationships due to the fact they have bonded over and over again with different partners. This is true no matter what some would have you believe.

I guess it depends on how “casual” the sex is.

From experience I can say it IS possible to fall in love from what was once intended to be no-strings-attached fun.

When I first met my boyfriend of (now) nearly two years we were both fresh out of bad relationships looking to get our kicks and be gone. After an unintentionally LONG night of sex and talking (nine hours to be exact, more sex than talking) I laughed when he offered to buy me breakfast because my roommate told me to have him make me eggs in the morning if I was staying there.

I was nicely supprised when he called a few days later to ask if I would like to “hook up” again.

After a few more weekend hook ups we had the “exclusive” talk and the rest is history.

I’m not saying all casual sex leads to love, but it is possible.

love…lust…I do know lusty feeling can somehow feel like love and sometimes turn into it.I have had plenty of so called casual sex in my days,ahmm.Of course most happening with someone that i thought was awesome in one way or another before hand. Having a big O during some amazing sex can obviously screw with your mind and emotions sometimes and yes…It may just be lust and desire.However I have had a few meaningful relationships stem from casual sex which started as a lusty encounter and obvious chemistry to actually feeling real love and of course awesome sex.
So…Casual sex can be just that but sometimes it leads to more.

Drandel, Im curious why you say “Casual sex WEAKENS (if not totally rips) the fabric of what love is made of.” sex and love are two totally different things even though they both feel good.
Are you by chance a expert in matters of love? I suppose even if you think you are we all have our unique opinions due to experience.Im sure DR.Fullbright is giving her opinion and its just that…as yours,mine ect.Cut her some slack,at least she has the balls to address issues like this whether you agree with what she writes or not;)

What is the basis of your comment/thought drandel?

“Dopamine=love? You’re a dope if you believe that. Fall in lust, yes. Fall in love, no. Doc Yvonne is a sex educator, as it says in her short bio, but her idea of love is far from love truly is. She’s talking out of her speciality when she ventures into what constitutes love. I don’t see any credentials offered that makes her an expert in matters of love. Casual sex WEAKENS (if not totally rips) the fabric of what love is made of.” – drandel

What is the basis of your comment? I think she is on the right track as dopamine plays a major role in the human body by contributing to many different functions with in the brain.

I don’t know guys…to be fair, I fall a little in love every time my eyes roll back in my head! heehee

she’s giving you a scientific example, get off her case. It is a scientific fact that the neurotransitters released during sexual encounters increase feelings towards one another, which people can think of as love. Drandel, you can distinguish between love and lust, many people cannot

Men think they do too! Women may ‘fall’ more often, but I recently had a guy friend get too attached when we were just having ‘fun’. It all comes down to the fact that sex should NOT be casual, it should be something special and we are treating it like it’s just as casual as saying hi. Sex is emotional as much as physical.

The feeling that you have when you are in love is only the result of chemicals that are released into your brain. Without those chemicals you do not have those feelings, not matter how much you care about that person. That is also why it is possible to just fall out of love because the opposite is also true when the chemicals are not present in your brain: you will not have the same feelings as when you are in love with someone. It doesn’t sound very romantic, but it’s the truth.

Sex should not be casual. And I have had experience first hand where men have gotten emotionally attached before I did because sex was brought into the equation way too soon.

My comment goes to drandel. Dr Fulbright never said that dopamine=love. Her statement was “Dopamine spikes with orgasm, changing the threshold of your ability to falling in love.” This means that increased dopamine sets the stage, and makes it easier for emotional bonds to form. It does not mean that those bonds will form. Take your moral and religious dogma elsewhere. We need more open, honest and most importantly accurate information on sex, even if it doesn’t neatly fit into someone’s definition of moral activity. I am a regular reader of Dr. Fulbright’s columns. I do not remember her ever advocating or suggesting people engage in casual sex. She has also warned of the dangers of doing so as well.

I’ve heard before that sex triggers chemicals in women that make them fall in love/lust. But I have yet to experience those feelings from casual sex. I limit my casual sex partners to friends, friends that I’ve known for years and continue to stay close to through the experience and on. I still have not wanted to be more than friends with them and it seems to all work out. I admit I do tend to feel closer to them, because I now know them in a different way, but this new intimacy in a friendship usually just brings about more respect, never a romantic love. And it’s never ruined a friendship yet.

Maybe I am old fashion or something but I believe sex should be the ultimate expression of intimacy and feeling for each other. It should be the complete surrendering of your body physically, mentally, and spiritually to another person. I was taught that during sex the two people become one flesh and how this cannot be completely understood since it is a mystery.

I just don’t see how you can share yourself at the levels I described above in just a casual little “fling”, this is why I see casual sex as cheap.

Wow. You are so gay, dude.

risk of falling in love? Since when is love a risk? Love is life.

JUST having casual sex? Casual sex is a big risk, starting with HIV and the list is long. And condoms fail. Casual sex is Russian roulette. Casual sex is not life, it is avoiding intimacy and commitment, avoiding life. See a mental health professional. You need help.

“JUST having casual sex? Casual sex is a big risk, starting with HIV and the list is long. And condoms fail. Casual sex is Russian roulette. Casual sex is not life, it is avoiding intimacy and commitment, avoiding life. See a mental health professional. You need help.” –John

Take a chill pill, John. You’re making an assumption of this guy’s lifestyle based on a very vague question. Maybe the guy’s just worried about a Fatal Attraction type of scenario. It doesn’t mean his whole intimate life is one meaningless fling after another. From the sounds of it, he sounds like a kid just getting into the game so cut him some slack.

Jenny, right on! I’m a girl and that crap made me want to gag.

Casual sex is just that, casual, until one or both partners decide otherwise. It is not as though there is some switch that gets hit in the process. Can casual sex lead to love, of course. It doesn’t take a scientist to tell you that. People grow to love one another in many different ways. What about all those that fall in love PRIOR to ever having sex? Why would it be surprising then that when adding sex into the equation that people would eventually fall in love?
Whatever your reason for having sex, be it for pleasure with someone you love, pleasure from someone you don’t love, expressing your love to someone who doesn’t love you, fulfilling some animalistic need, a warm body next to you every now and then, etc, enjoy it for what you think it is and go from there. How cool would it be if it lead to mutual long lasting love? If it doesn’t so be it, it remains casual, probably right where you wanted it to remain in the first place.

SO why don’t we just all say what we’re really thinking and what we’ve learned from experience anyway, which is that casual sex leads WOMEN to fall in love with men much more frequently than the other way around….

Here is the part that suprises me and I haven’t seen it addressed in the previous posts.

“if a man is depositing his seminal fluid in a female partner, he’s giving her a dose of the chemicals needed for sex drive, attachment and romantic love. This increases her chance of falling head over heels”.

Now that is a powerful statement, be careful with that one guys, one would think that wearing a condom might prevent the attachment as the dosage should be hindered. Or, on the other hand,
would the dosage be more powerful if it were delivered orally, I personally think it might, but that is probably a nutrition question, perhaps another contributer (from above), “Tanya Zuckerbrot, MS, RD is a nutritionist and the creator of “The F-Factor Diet”, might care to comment. I’ve heard it is a great source for protien, but I never knew it had such emotional power.

One probably ought to be careful to differentiate truly loving someone, and just becoming emotionally “bonded” to them. The two concepts are different, and sex really leads to mostly the latter.

Moreover, I would doubt that it’s just the mixtures of body fluids that cause this. Reality is that certain mental/emotional/spiritual barriers need to be crossed before one exposes one’s private parts to another adult, and I would have to guess that this would also play a part in bonding.

Which is a long way of saying that no, condoms don’t make sex “safe” this way. The NIH even found that they’re not a terribly good way of stopping the transmission of any STD besides AIDS. Maybe it’s time to take sex seriously–it’s not a “game” that a person can walk away from, whether you consider it physically, emotionally, or spiritually.

This is in response to Brian’s comment: “Casual sex is just that, casual, until one or both partners decide otherwise. It is not as though there is some switch that gets hit in the process. Can casual sex lead to love, of course. It doesn’t take a scientist to tell you that. People grow to love one another in many different ways. What about all those that fall in love PRIOR to ever having sex? Why would it be surprising then that when adding sex into the equation that people would eventually fall in love?
Whatever your reason for having sex, be it for pleasure with someone you love, pleasure from someone you don’t love, expressing your love to someone who doesn’t love you, fulfilling some animalistic need, a warm body next to you every now and then, etc, enjoy it for what you think it is and go from there. How cool would it be if it lead to mutual long lasting love? If it doesn’t so be it, it remains casual, probably right where you wanted it to remain in the first place.”

This is one of the truest statements and I agree with you. You have summed it ip perfectly. Love is one of the topics that you cannot put science behind to try and figure it out, like faith. People will believe what they want to. As long as you are enjoying yourself great. Casual sex can lead to great love or friendship if that is the way you want things to go. It’s all about living life on your terms!

The ultimate satisfaction in sex comes when the act is an expression of the whole relationship–an exclusive, permanent, trusting, giving, and utter oneness. By its very nature, sex expresses that. Without marriage, it becomes a lie. The Bellamy Brothers put it this way: “Your body is making promises your heart will not keep.” The chemical bonding of sex goes with marriage. Sex enhances marriage; marriage enhances sex. My, the extreme intimacy lovemaking can have in this context! Eroticism with the significance it is due. When my future husband and I come together physically, we open ourselves to the ultimate vulnerability: I invite him into my body. I’m showing him I accept the total man; he wants me as I am.

Imagine the expression possible between a man and woman, without words, and how that physical expression illustrates, not just any love, but specifically the marriage union: man with the initiative, the powerful drive, received and enveloped by woman; two becoming a part of one another, creating a mystical and permanent bond. We’re of one mind, one body, giving every part of ourselves with full abandon. Just the two of us. I trust you; you have proven by taking life-long responsibility for me that you have my best interest at heart; you’ll be here tomorrow; I am safe, free to devote myself to you without fear that I have given too much.

This is intimacy–knowing the lives intertwined by day are the bodies intertwined by night. This is good sex.

I could indulge now and enjoy counterfeit intimacy to a degree. But to the extent I partake of the substitute, I dilute the real thing. I’ll hold out for the BEST, and no regrets.

“Comment by drandel
August 18th, 2008 at 11:23 am
Dopamine=love? You’re a dope if you believe that. Fall in lust, yes. Fall in love, no. Doc Yvonne is a sex educator, as it says in her short bio, but her idea of love is far from love truly is. She’s talking out of her speciality when she ventures into what constitutes love. I don’t see any credentials offered that makes her an expert in matters of love. Casual sex WEAKENS (if not totally rips) the fabric of what love is made of.”

I think you may have failed reading comprehension. Dr. Yvonne is a sex educator and the question asked was about sex and whether they risk having someone possibly fall in love with them from having sex. Now I’m guessing Marty is a guy and like most guys not ready for a commitment, they would like to have casual sex without risk of that person falling in love with them.

No where does Dr. Yvonne state emphatically as well as conclusively that dopamine = love. What she is stating is a scientific fact. Increased levels of dopamine, oxytocin, vasopressin and seminal fluid MAY increase the chance of a person feeling more attached and romantic towards that partner.

In no way does she state this is a guarantee and in no way did she confuse being “in love” with loving someone. Everyone should know that being “in love” and “in lust” are really no different; but loving someone is also in no way related to being in love/lust.

Can sex cause someone to be in love whether they intend to or not? YES. Can sex actually cause someone to actually love someone else? NO

Being “in love” involves an ideal that people tend to nurse and in turn expect from another even if it goes beyond all rationality. Loving someone involves deeper emotions and connections that cannot be put into mere words but have to be expressed in conjuntion with everyday and continuing actions.

The simplest and the most general way to put it, is being only in love is fantasy, actually loving someone is reality.

Comment by Robert Hall
August 18th, 2008 at 6:53 pm

“People who engage in casual sex often feel a sense of emptiness”

If you feel empty after having sex just because you do not love that person or that person does not love you, then you need therapy. Sex is not repressive only our history has been so no one should feel bad about the natural body functions and needs. Do you feel depressed after deficating or unrinating? If you do then again you need therapy.

Sex has been demonized by society, politics and religion. If you are in your right mind and do not have any emotional issues tied up in your past due to your upbringing or for whatever repressive reason, then casual sex will not hurt you emotionally. If you buy into all that repressive BS about human sexuality, then you will have issues with casual sex and it can damage your life.

I’m not necessarily disagreeing with you, Robert. I just think that if you are going to say that people “often feel a sense of emptiness” due to casual sex, you should also explain that these people tend to feel that emptiness due to lack of any fullfillment in their life in general. They are unhappy with their upbringing, their lot in life, their children, their ex-husband/wife. If their life is empty, so will they be and no amount of casual sex is going to fix it. But for those of us healthy enough to be able to not confuse reality with fantasy or confuse someone else’s ideals or moral for our own, are healthy and happy enough to have casual sex without the “emptiness” that a few (not many) feel.

And again those who feel that way, please get some therapy. It will help you grow, take responsibility for your own life and lead your own destiny.

Now I know that I´ve been right to use fake names when picking up these needy and insecure women. Thanks for the proof that women use casual sex to ensnare unsuspecting guys who thought they were giving the customer what she wanted…. SEX.

My finance and I started out as casual lovers almost 5 years ago. To be honest when we first met, I had little interest in him at all. Then we had sex, and it was TOTALLY limited to our bedroom encounters. After a few months, he persuaded me to begin seeing him socially, and although it took a little while a very deep and passionate bond developed. We now have 2 beautiful children and a wonderful life together, and I could never imagine my life without him. Although I must admit it’s different that he was the one that was initially smitten, I’m thankful every day that he continued pursuing me.