Not sleeping with someone on a first date is the number one rule of dating, but why? Well, we’ve discovered there are are many, many reasons, so listen up, ladies.
In the new book, The 30-Day Love Detox, CNN Human Behavior expert and former co-host of The Doctors, Dr. Wendy Walsh, writes a research-supported prescription for slow-love. Her mission: to help single women compete for a narrowing market of men who will make a commitment in a high-supply sexual economy. Here’s why we, apparently, should not be getting it on after a first date.
1. It reduces chances for real love
Sex is lust over love but it’s still a hugely intimate act. It can be fumbling, awkward, and frankly, more than a little embarrassing when normal bodily functions happen in front of a stranger. The way the brain deals with this awkwardness is to disassociate a bit. It creates emotional distance keeping the physical intimacy in one tidy little box and the heart in another, safely under lock and key. Attempting to have both emotional and physical intimacy on a first date would be too much for our psyche’s to tolerate. And once you’ve set up the two-box system, it can be hard to break. Therefore, in one study, participants who moved fast sexually, had the worst relationship outcomes later.
2. It can bring feelings of regret
Think about it. Most women want sex for the first time with a new partner to be a mind-blowing special experience that brings them closer to a mate. And in one study called “the passion turning point” study, participants who expressed feelings of love and/or had conversations about commitment before that first-time sex, found the event to be positive passion turning point. The sex made them feel even more connected and secure. But if they didn’t have these conversations, sex became a negative turning point in their relationship, evoking feelings of regret and needs for apologies. And, who, on a first date is ready to talk about love and commitment?
3. You Can Get Really Sick
Oh yeah, that part. Most women wouldn’t give the keys to their apartment to a man they’d just met, to water her plants, yet plenty would expose their bloodstream and precious eggs to the same man. Let’s face it. Women’s unique biology makes us far more susceptible to STD’s than men. We, after all, are the ones who accept deposits. And if you think, using a condom is enough, think only about the new stat that the HPV virus one of the biggest causes of throat cancer.
4. Women don’t as often, ahem, get off
Yes, I must mention the big “O” here. Many women report that first date sex is so awkward and run on a man’s timeline, that her body doesn’t receive the necessary warm up time needed to reach climax. Men’s sexual arousal pattern is like a microwave oven. Women are more like a crock-pot. And way to put sex on slow boil is to move slowly and wait until you’ve grown close enough to have good sexual communication.
5. It can make a man run for the hills
Here’s a study I hated to read. Groundbreaking work by David Buss at the University of California, Los Angeles, showed that the more sexual partners a man has had, the more he perceives “diminished attractiveness” in each new mate. It’s a race to the bottom for him. Each new woman disappoints him more. It’s as if he is looking for some princess of a woman whose sex will tell him he’s in love. And you can be sure, if he’s pressuring for sex on the first date, this man has had many partners. But, real love, of course, is something that takes while to grow.