I have a strong desire to fall in love again. But I’m also frustrated by the status quo where it feels like everyone is in couples or has families?

I’m in my mid-twenties and I guess it’s starting to feel scarier to be a single woman in society. Kind of like a social transgression. Reminds me of Sex and the City, haha. How as women grow up it feels like our main goal is to find a man. But it’s also not just about cultural programming. I also just don’t want to feel alone; I really desire close companionship and love. I also value sexual intimacy with someone I trust. I was raised in a home of religious purity culture and I’ve done a lot of healing from that. I used to have vaginismus — which is a pelvic floor condition where your pelvis is chronically stressed, making physical intimacy painful. However, with my last boyfriend, I worked through that and learned to trust and relax and enjoy sex, which was really transformative and healing for me. It was a big life moment. Thus, when we broke up (almost 2 yrs ago now) I think it was really painful for me to lose that kind of loving intimacy because it represented that progress for me from the physical pain of my past into a state of relaxation and self-connection. I felt so empty after that relationship ended. Like I lost a way of expressing myself that felt essential and beautiful to who I am. I’ve had a few sexual partners since and I’ve dated again in the last couple years, but nothing has evolved into love or with anyone I truly see a future with.

I have never been someone who rushes into relationships or sex, but I find myself really desiring to fall in love again in a real way, and then super hopeless about that ever happening again. Most of my social circles are made up of women (which isn’t a bad thing, I love women and friendship is super important to me). But I feel afraid that I’m never going to meet a man who gets me or who can share my soul. Not that a relationship is all about me.

I have never felt like I truly belong in the city I live in. But I am also trying to grow my career and finances so I can stand on my own as a young woman. So I don’t know where else I would go right now. Part of me wants to work abroad, like teaching English abroad or doing Educational Tours or a Work-Exchange program or something, but I’m scared to do so as well. I have things tying me here, like family and I’m finishing up a masters degree this next year for my job. But part of me feels like I should just leave everything and figure out how to get out of here. Like maybe I can’t fall in love until I leave my city and everything I know? I moved around a lot as a kid, so it’s not like I have been in this one place my whole life, but it’s just been years now here, and I’ve never been too far from my family.

Either way, I’d still move back here, though, to be near my family and support my sibling’s pregnancy journey. Overall, I feel really grateful for my life, but I have this persistent desire for physical intimacy and love that I feel frustrated by in a way that I can’t shake or express. It feels like I can’t move forward or feel brave or alive until I find a connection where I can share love and physical intimacy with. I don’t feel a need to date around again, since that felt exhausting for my heart. I am just really craving deep friendship with a man to fall in love with, but I don’t know where to find that? Or how it happens organically? Especially in the age of technology.

Maybe I’m asking for comfort or permission for something. Really what I secretly hope is for a companion to find me. Or just for this feeling to stop plaguing me so much. Sometimes I just want a hug. I like being centered in myself, but I don’t like being single, either. It doesn’t always get to me, but sometimes it does hurt too much. I think things would be easier if it didn’t feel like a lot of the people around me were in romantic partnerships. I kind of secretly wish singleness on everyone, because I just don’t want to be alone in this feeling anymore.