Approximately 35% of women have been involved in emotionally abusive relationships at some point in their lives. We tend to take the philosophy to heart that making mistakes in relationships is part of our evolutionary process of growth. But what’s the difference between mistakes and being emotionally abused? And can we recognise the signs, before…
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Ida Jessen is a popular and award-winning Danish author whose 2009 work, The Children, has recently been published in English. Beginning in 1992, The Children opens with recently divorced Solvej renting a house in isolated Hvium so she can be with her daughter, Christiane. While Solvej is eager to find a place to belong, her…
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Do you find it difficult to be assertive about condoms? Do you find it extremely difficult to be assertive about using condoms and dental dams when performing oral sex? Starting a new sexual relationship with anyone is fraught with a multitude of awkward questions. Are we dating? Is this causal? Are we going to have…
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Welcome to our second installment of ‘Kiss & Tell’. At Lip, it’s important to us not to assume heteronormativity when talking about sex or relationships, but as our columnist is heterosexual herself, most of these columns will focus on issues related primarily to hetero dating. If you are interested in looking at relationships from a…
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If there was one word I would have used to describe my husband’s ex-girlfriend, it was ‘crazy’. I said it and I said it often. So did he and I have to say, I took a particular malicious joy whenever the word passed his lips in regard to her. After all, she had harassed both…
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Welcome to Lip’s new relationships column, Kiss & Tell. Our new anonymous columnist is going to be sharing her experiences and thoughts on dating and relationships every fortnight! At Lip, it’s important to us not to assume heteronormativity when talking about sex or relationships, but as our columnist is heterosexual herself, most of these columns…
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It’s a warm January in the early 90s. Every radio station in Sydney is playing ‘Ice Ice Baby’ while every child between the ages of four and 12 is watching Agro’s Cartoon Connection. Standing in front of the television I change out of my pyjamas and into my school uniform for the first time. I…
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For anyone who has ever lived overseas, the idea of the expat love affair will be distinctly familiar. Either experienced firsthand or witnessed too closely, it is a phenomenon that occurs time and time again the world over. It can take the form of a brief and sensual holiday fling, the newly found best friend/soul…
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My ex and I were together three years and we broke up eighteen months go. While the strength of a relationship fades gradually (at least I don’t know anybody who was madly in love one day and not the next) long term or serious relationships end bluntly, “Now I’m here, now I ain’t” type thing….
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He smiles. She bites her lip. He ‘accidentally’ brushes his hand against her shoulder. She leans in to “hear him better”. Flirting. We all do it. With words, intonation, a lascivious gesture, a coquettish glance. Is it biology? Are we trained by society or fuelled by our emotions? Most people, predominantly those who are already…
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Internet dating. The idea of being physically swept off your feet by a tall dark and handsome stranger replaced by the virtual sweep of a…well any persona the alter-ego is capable of conjuring. For someone of a natural over-analytical disposition, the thought of plating myself up for the picking by every love-lusting Tom, Dick or…
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Have you ever had that moment, when you climb into bed next to your partner/casual-sex-partner (look, I don’t know what kind of relationship you may be in), and you’re kind of filled with dread because although you would normally jump at the chance to ravage their sexy body, tonight you’re just not up for it?*…
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Having survived the winter, spring is traditionally the time to rid the house of dirt, dust and cobwebs that have crept in over the cooler months. Spring cleaning typically means vacuums, open windows and elbow grease. Now, as a resident of a shoebox apartment with no floor space and a ten-centimetre square of ventilation, I’ve…
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Hope Springs opens with Kay (Meryl Streep) sheepishly attempting to suggest she and her husband of thirty-one years might like to share the same bed for once— a feat at which she fails miserably. This moment just about sums up her marriage to Alfred (Tommy Lee Jones), which has become predictable, unromantic and bereft of closeness of…
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