It always starts at night.

Not because I’m necessarily lonelier at night. Or maybe exactly because I am.

There’s something about nighttime that makes every unresolved feeling louder. The sunlight disappears, distractions dry up, the world gets quieter, and suddenly there you are. Just you. And your thoughts. And whatever version of yourself you successfully outran all day finally catching up.

Maybe I worked. Maybe I cleaned. Maybe I texted friends, folded laundry, scrolled TikTok until my thumb hurt, or let some mindless show play in the background while pretending I was relaxed. Maybe I successfully kept myself occupied from sunrise to sunset.

But eventually, the sun goes down.

And there I am. In bed. Phone glowing against my face. The television talking to itself in the background. Silence somehow still winning.

And then the thought arrives so casually it almost feels like my own idea.

I wonder what Cameron is doing.

Not because Cameron is the love of my life. Let’s not romanticize this.

Cameron is not some epic love story. He is not my soulmate. He is not a tortured “right person, wrong time.” Cameron is familiar. Cameron is accessible. Cameron is a known dopamine source. Cameron is the emotional equivalent of knowing exactly where the liquor cabinet is.

And if Cameron doesn’t answer?

Fine.

Because addiction is resourceful.

Maybe Daniel’s awake. Maybe Nate. Maybe James.

Let’s scroll. Let’s assess availability. Let’s find someone.

Should I open Tinder?

No. Too random.

Besides, I’m not some real sex addict.

That phrase belongs to sweaty men in movies with burner phones, ruined marriages, and dramatic rock bottoms. It belongs to people who have truly lost control. Not women like me. Not self-aware women. Not women with decent skincare and a sense of humor. Not women who can psychoanalyze themselves in real time.

I’m just a pretty girl with lovers.

Right?

That’s what I tell myself, anyway.

But what do you call it when sex starts functioning less like desire and more like medicine?

What do you call it when another person’s body becomes something you reach for the way someone else might reach for a drink? Or a pill. Or a vape. Or a shopping cart. What do you call it when intimacy becomes less about connection and more about regulation?

Because somebody has to make this feeling go away.

And if reading that makes you uncomfortable, imagine living it.

Because this is the part that sounds ugly when you say it plainly.

Women are allowed to be heartbroken. Women are allowed to be messy. Women are allowed to be “finding themselves.” Women are allowed to be sexually liberated. Women are allowed to be “just having fun.”

But a woman openly admitting that sometimes she seeks out sex not from desire, but because she cannot tolerate being alone with her own nervous system?

That makes people shift in their seats.

But why?

If someone drank every time they felt emotionally activated, we’d recognize the pattern immediately. Bad day? Drink. Feeling rejected? Drink. Anxious? Drink. Restless? Drink. Need relief? Drink. Need to shut your brain off? Drink.

We understand that.

But sex?

Pretty women having sex gets framed as empowerment so often that sometimes nobody asks whether it’s actually compulsion.

Including her.

Especially her.

And I need to be clear: I’m not writing this from some weird puritanical place where women are only respectable if they’re modest and celibate. I like sex. This is not regret over desire. This is not me renouncing hot girl behavior and becoming a nun.

This is about asking what happens when desire stops being desire and starts becoming anesthesia.

Because I think I have, at times, used sex the exact same way other people use alcohol.

Bad day? Sex.

Feeling rejected? Sex.

Anxious? Sex.

Restless? Sex.

Need validation? Definitely sex.

Need proof I’m still desirable? Sex.

Need to temporarily transform from a complicated human woman into just a body someone wants?

Oh, absolutely sex.

And the darkest part?

Sometimes it’s not even about the person.

That’s how I know this isn’t just messy dating.

Because if Cameron doesn’t answer, the grief isn’t Oh no, I miss Cameron.

The thought is simply:

Okay. Who else?

That’s not longing.

That’s symptom management.

Because the sex is almost secondary. The real high is interruption.

That immediate shift from I am alone with my feelings to something is happening.

Suddenly, I have a purpose. A text to draft. A body to prepare. A logistics problem to solve.

Who’s free?

What are they doing?

Do I shave?

What do I wear?

Should I pretend I’m “just up?”

And just like that, the unbearable stillness of my own brain has been replaced with movement.

That’s the drug.

Honestly, sometimes even more than the sex itself.

Because what I’m actually chasing is relief.

Relief from loneliness.

Relief from anxiety.

Relief from boredom.

Relief from myself.

I think people imagine addiction as dramatic. Rock bottom. Chaos. Public collapse.

But addiction can look functional.

Pretty.

Lip-glossed.

Self-aware.

It can look like someone who fully understands the pattern while continuing to participate in it.

And maybe that’s the cruelest part.

Because I have never lacked insight.

I could psychoanalyze myself in real time. Mid-scroll. Mid-text. Mid-Uber. Possibly mid-undressing.

But awareness and behavior are not the same thing.

Healing culture has convinced us that if you can name the pattern, you should be above it. As if intellectual understanding automatically rewires compulsion.

It does not.

Sometimes you can explain your dysfunction in exquisite detail and still participate in it by 11:30.

Maybe sex addiction is the wrong term.

Maybe compulsion.

Maybe emotional avoidance.

Maybe attachment trauma in a cute outfit.

Maybe dysregulation with a body count.

I don’t know.

But I do know what it feels like to seek relief more than connection. I know what it feels like to confuse being chosen with being soothed. I know what it feels like to use another person as a temporary mute button for my own nervous system.

And maybe the most uncomfortable part of writing this is realizing how deeply unromantic it actually is.

Because this isn’t really about desire.

It’s about escape.

Because I wish this ended with some beautiful lesson. Some polished conclusion about healing, self-worth, emotional regulation, and choosing myself.

But if I’m being honest?

Writing this just reminded me exactly what that feeling feels like.

That familiar itch.

That restlessness.

That low-grade panic disguised as loneliness.

That unbearable need to make the inside of my body quieter.

And fuck.

The sun went down again.

So now I’m sitting here wondering…

Where the fuck is Cameron right now?