By Nikki Hollis, aged 34 and showing it
MY SPLIT from Tom eight months ago was hard for both of us. He’d become complacent and I wanted to find myself and explore new horizons, meaning I’d met someone hotter.
We both agreed it was for the best that he didn’t know about the other guy, him tacitly. But after that one fell through I discovered I was in fact exploring soul-destroying Tinder dates with men with profile pictures taken in 2008 who say ‘banter is life’ during foreplay.
Whether their passion is crypto or choking, it’s painful. A divorced dad told me mid-coitus that I climax like his ex-wife. A model railway enthusiast got stronger erections for a 1:76 scale signal box.
Around the 30th date, I realised two things. Firstly, everyone decent my age is taken or dead. Secondly, none of my relationships were working because I was still in love with Tom. In retrospect. Now I know what I didn’t know then.
Yes, that time on my own helped me realise how enduring my feelings for Tom are, and that a porn addiction isn’t ‘sometimes watching it’ but ‘having a six-terabyte collection striped to multiple hard drives with a robust indexing system’.
I was self-sabotaging my dates. I could have got a new relationship easily if I’d wanted. Instead, I met Tom for coffee and within minutes, we’d agreed to give it another shot. You can’t stand in the way of such powerful forces as fate and dwindling options. I can honestly say I couldn’t bear the thought of a second with another man.
It’s so romantic we’re back together. My friends were thrilled, once I’d explained he was no longer ‘a narcissistic gaslighting wanker who couldn’t find the clitoris if it was on a f**king Xbox controller’.
Love means different things at different times. Now I know what I want, like not dying alone. And Tom’s happy too. Well, unbothered.
