“Can you fuck me twice?”

He didn’t respond.

I broke it down over crab cakes at the Lakeview, when Becca said it frankly, “Well Sarah, maybe you’re not having sex with the right person then.”

Fuck. She was right.

One important thing I realized after we settled the brunch bill was that if I was having sex with the wrong person, I had never truly had sex with the right person. Spawned from pleasure-seeking impulsion and mixed drinks, sex felt fantastic up until now. I attracted the type I was familiar with: usually older, charming and distant. I held tight to him because it was a reflection of my foolish insecurity and the familiarity of the relaxed, affectionate person I wanted to read The Sunday Times with. But we never did, and I regularly read the newspaper alone. He was wrong for me; somehow I led myself romantically astray.

What I found interesting was that, for the first and definitely not the last time in my life, I’m starting over again; sort of like a divorce without any legal papers. Just last week, prior to a ten-day fling that reversed my role into the needed instead of needy, I thought I had my romantic needs all sorted out. I knew what (I thought) I liked. I recognized what kind of person (I thought) I was attracted to and the actions that (I thought) led to intimate security.

Feeling confident in the wrong person, it didn’t necessarily mean having a serious or healthy relationship; it meant knowing what attributes made for a “satisfying” lover between writing, work and friends. Good foreplay was the front-runner. If he ate me out like a melting scoop of ice cream, I was into it. But after sex, I felt distracted, restless, and a little more confused than I did before the urge hit me in the first place. It circled into a routine of texting the wrong person, thinking about the wrong person and making love to the wrong person. Why did I ask him to fuck me twice? If he was the right person, he would only have to fuck me once and that would be enough.

If I’m having sex with the wrong person, then I need to have sex with the right person. My physical attraction won’t change, and I’m not going to look for someone I’m not genuinely attracted to. I’m predisposed to certain things, like a woodsy scent, confident posture and hair type. It’s not the physical look of a man that I’m interested in changing, it’s the attraction. Attraction, like the Internet informed me, is dynamic. It’s a combination of feelings, behaviours and actions. Up until now, I chased after the shitty high school boyfriend; someone who would provide me with a level of abuse (not physical, rest assured) that packaged itself in the form of a no-reservation line-up outside a restaurant. A man that made me wait was a man I would wait for. Happily, at that, because it felt rewarding to get it when I finally did. I was Pavlov’s dog, and sex was my dog food. I needed to re-condition myself to snap out of it. What ever happened to Pavlov’s dog anyways?

To find the answer to my dilemma, I went to the Internet.

Jezebel Blames the Beauty Myth

Lindy West grabs a revolver and blasts it into the air in her article, “For Chrissakes, There’s Nothing Wrong With You: A Dating Manifesto.” From early womanhood, we’re told that we’re too this or too that in relation to men. It started with being too fat, too flat, too whatever, then it became too interesting, too outspoken, too confident. Even the positive turned into negative. We rely so heavily on what we think men will consider attractive and it’s bullshit, West says. It’s a total beauty myth. We chase after people who don’t need us, because we love to chase things that are unavailable. Best advice by far: start hanging out with good people, be a good person and do what you want to get what you want in return. Lindy West is on it.

Huffington Post Blames Bad Energy

Amanda Slavin, the CEO of Catalyst Creative in New York explains that men and women use a series of filters to let respective partners into their lives. We complain that there are no “good” people to date in Toronto, because they apparently don’t exist. Everyone is too busy, too unavailable, too needy, too distant, and too emotionally messy. Then she talks about asking the right questions. The type of questions that burn through the bullshit. Stop asking where they work, what neighbourhood they live in or what bars they frequent. Ask about what they’re passionate about or what they love doing right now. I’m not 100% convinced, but I think she’s got a point about energy. If I’m giving off the energy that I don’t genuinely care about the person I’m sleeping with, then I’m going to get the same energy in return. Makes sense. And maybe I’m the one who’s too needy, too unavailable and too distant: I’m a reflection of the annoying person I keep running into. Shit. Thanks Amanda.

Psychology Today Blames Sensitivity

According to Psychology Today, I’m a very sensitive person and I’m attracting narcissists. Highly sensitive people, like me, fall into relationships that are familiar. I guess I agree with that. I’m familiar with the wrong type of person, because I’ve seen this behaviour before and find comfort in assholes behaving like assholes. Or needy partners behaving needy. I encourage it, and stand by it, because in the end I’m left with no surprises to let me down. Because it’s familiar, I stay. I stay for the sex, and leave after. I asked him to fuck me twice, because having sex once wasn’t enough. The second fuck was a demand for emotional attachment. Holy shit. I’m totally figuring this out!

Ask Polly (Heather Havrilesky) Blames Impatience and Defence Mechanisms

Ask Polly is the best advice writer, ever. She’s straight up, smart, with no bullshit. And so, in the heat of my Googling, I stumbled upon a fast advice column written by her, which opened my eyes to the complaints of other women, very similar to mine. Havrilesky says that if people are repeatedly falling for a certain type of wrong, it’s because they’re dating in a defensive stance. I’m not making enough room for interesting people and experiences in my life because I’m too busy being cynical. I’m spending too much time looking for the right person in the first impression. It’s impossible. Havrilesky explains that people have more layers than that. It takes time, patience and an open-heart to get to know the real people we’re craving to understand and love. Flashback to my ten-day fling, I couldn’t agree more. I quickly judged him, for being needy, too this, too that, because I wasn’t willing to give him more time and attention. Damn, it’s a full circle. Thanks Polly.

Greatist Blames Hormones

Women are more attracted to men who physically exhibit strong reproductive traits. Those traits include big chest, chiselled neck line, muscular body etc. When ovulating, women have a higher likelihood of attracting jerk bags. Why? Because hormones convince us that even the most financially unstable, short-term, d-bag is worth it if he’s really handsome and strong. Note: STOP looking for prospective long-term partners during ovulation week.

Whatever the reason for having sex with the wrong person – human nature, ovulation, familiarity – I think I’ve found the answer in my self-rhetorical question. I asked the wrong person to fuck me twice, and he didn’t respond. There’s the answer, right in front of me.