Speed Dating Events

If the idea of putting on something too tight and too short and being talked at and paid for by a perfect stranger makes you want to retch, you’re not alone. Actually, you are alone, in your house, but you know what we mean. “I didn’t go out with any guys for over a year,” says Betsy, a thirty-one-year old market analyst. “I was afraid of getting involved and then getting burned again. I figured I’d play it safe.”

Of course it’s natural to go on hiatus for a while after a big breakup—if you immediately launched into another life- soldering relationship, odds are it wouldn’t work anyway. Everyone needs time to refuel. But no guys, no sex, no nothing for a year? Jeez. “The problem is, avoidance can become habit- forming, “Romance has a certain risk element to it, but the risk—and the fear that goes along with it—increases as you have less and less romantic contact with men. It may be easier in the beginning just to hang out with your friends. But if you’re avoiding men altogether, you sacrifice satisfaction for security. It’s not that great a trade-off.”

Not that there’s anything wrong with being by yourself. Time alone can be a healthy, happy thing. But if you’ve stayed in seclusion for longer than an entire television season, maybe it’s time to analyze your motives. Are you a recluse because it truly makes you feel serene and content? Do you feel like your one-woman life is a full and satisfying one? Or was it justnoa great year for TV? If so, far be it for us to barge in onyour solitude. But sometimes there are darker reasons. Charlotte, thirty, says, “I wanted to be alone because I was heartbroken. . .. But I was heartbroken because I was alone. I couldn’t break out of the cycle.” Annika, twenty-seven, says she took a sabbatical from men for eighteen months because “I was angry. I hated men—I didn’t think I should start a relationship with so much hostility pent up inside of me.” And Donna, twenty-five, like many women, didn’t date simply because “I was painfully shy. Every time I tried to talk to someone, I felt so gawky and stupid. I decided it was better to avoid situations than to completely embarrass myself time and time again.”

Most of the time, the solitary confinement is temporary. Many of the women we spoke to came out of their cocoons on their own; others turned to friends, family, and therapists to coax them out of their isolation tanks. We say: Go with whatever works. Because while one is certainly not the loneliest number in the world (don’t believe everything you hear in songs), doing a little addition every now and then doesn’t hurt.

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