Friends With Benefits?

Friends with benefits became that millennium term for constant sex partner without the emotional attachment. You know, someone you can call up at moments notice for a hookup.

One relationship expert,Dannah Gresh, says it's impossible to achieve such sexual gratification without experiencing an emotional connection.

Scientifically, though, that’s impossible. We know that thanks to what neuroscientists have learned about a walnut-sized mass in the brain called the deep limbic system.
The deep limbic system stores and classifies odor, music, symbols and memory. In other words, it’s a place for romance, capable of processing a splash of cologne on your lover’s neck, a particular iPod playlist or a bouquet of red roses.


While many young people claim that they can have sex without feeling a personal connection to their partner, Gresh

says that’s impossible. This “hook up culture,” as she calls it, ignores the inherent connections sex creates and, as a result, can actually lead to emptiness and pain:

Here’s where the hookup culture starts to be a problem. What happens if you get caught up in the friends-with-benefits-game and have multiple partners? What happens when the partners you’ve become addicted and bonded to are gone?

You experience withdrawal symptoms in the emotional center of the brain.
According to Gresh, young women are particularly susceptible to depression when the “source of their addiction” no longer wants to have casual sex. According to The Heritage Foundation, “…25.3% of sexually active teenage girls experienced depression, compared to 7.7% of sexually abstinent girls.” The suicide rate is also much higher among sexually-active girls.

What do you think? Back in the day, I had a couple of friends who gave benefits, and the relationships were always more complicated than if we just stayed friends. Perhaps they used the whole friends with benefits in hopes of me delivering on the feelings they either already had or grew as the friendship progressed.

In the end, it was quite empty.