The First Time I Had Sex After My Divorce I Cried. And You Might, Too.

My heart was pounding as soon as my clothes hit the floor. We were in my bedroom. It was late and dark.

After sharing Chinese food, on our second date, a man I knew back in high school invited himself to come over to my house. And I wanted him to. I didn’t hate how forward he was. In fact, I think I needed it. After having sex with the same man for over 21 years and birthing three kids, I wasn’t sure where to begin.

He made it easy. Not because I knew him from way back when before my sweet babies stretched my belly and my boobs. But because he had been in a passionless marriage too, and we were both craving it. Needing it.

He was hovering over me, his arms were thicker than my ex-husband's, his scent was more arousing. After exactly two minutes of him touching me, I came undone.

We had sex. It was good. No, that’s a lie. It was fucking fantastic and exactly what I needed. It was the scratch to my itch. What I had been craving for so long. The newness, the excitement, the endorphins.

He fell asleep really fast, and I lay there awake. I wasn’t even sure if I wanted him to stay. But I would’ve been sad if he just gathered his clothes and left.

Yet the fact remained: he was lying on my ex-husband’s side of the bed in the bedroom that we shared for so long in the house that we built together. It was so unsettling.

It was a slow stab at first. Then the pain grew by the minute.

I didn’t sleep at all that night. Instead, I got up and paced my kitchen and living room, wondering how my life had turned into this.

It was so strange to have another man in the house that I had raised my kids in with my ex-husband. And as much as my ex and I both wanted a fresh start, and gave each other blessings to date and figure out together how we would explain it to our kids, nothing about this felt right.

The high from my orgasm had worn off. I wanted to wash him away in the shower, and curl up in bed by myself. I wanted to sort through my thoughts and hopefully make sense of them.

I wasn’t healed from my divorce but damn I wanted connection. Passion.

I wanted to be touched. I wanted to be seen by a man after feeling invisible for so long. So why was I crying after an amazing night of very quick, but very memorable, sex?

That was eight years ago, and looking back now I know.

I felt guilty. Shame. I missed my ex-husband, but I also didn’t miss him and that was confusing as hell. I felt like I was doing something wrong even though I wasn’t. I was separated; the man lying next to me knew that, and he understood exactly what I needed; exactly the way I needed to be touched.

But what I learned is that nobody can speed up the healing process for you. We all move at a different pace. Some people get separated and feel like they have arrived. They love the freedom; they love experimenting with different people or with a new partner, and they feel good and settled. Like they’re exactly where they need to be.

And some of us have mixed feelings about it all.

Honestly, I thought that having sex with a new man would solve everything.

It didn’t though, and so what I felt while I was coming down from the high of my first sexual encounter after my divorce was disappointment that a man couldn’t fix me in one night. With one orgasm.

Sure, maybe I was ready to have sex, but I wasn’t ready to connect with someone on such a deep level. I wasn’t ready to have someone in my bed for an entire night. And I certainly wasn’t ready to invite a man over into my home.

So I cried, and let myself feel all the feelings.

And you might too, and that’s perfectly OK.

For me, I couldn’t have any blurred lines. I couldn’t just invite anyone over. And as much as I craved intimacy. I didn’t want it from just anyone.

I am a relationship person. Sex means something. And as much as I’ve tried to deny it, I need more of a commitment to really let myself go. That just takes time, and I hadn’t given myself enough time.

I wanted that night to be the end of mourning my marriage. The end of my guilt. And the start of something new and exciting. But my feelings weren’t ready. My head and my heart we’re playing ping-pong. If I had to do it over again, I never would’ve invited him over that night.

We don’t get do-overs though. All we can do is take care of ourselves after divorce and sometimes that will mean having meaning sex with a stranger, or someone we know.

And sometimes that will mean being alone.

Either way, I can promise you this: you will be absolutely fine. Just give yourself some time, because all the feelings you have after divorce, no matter how it ended, are yours.

And you get to deal with it how you see fit. Even if that means crying your eyes out after the first time you have sex with another man.