Can friends with benefits *actually* ever work? Here are all the potential pros and cons

Kelly Gonsalves is a sex educator, relationship coach, and journalist. She received her journalism degree from Northwestern University, and her writings on sex, relationships, identity, and wellness have appeared at The Cut, Vice, Teen Vogue, Cosmopolitan, and elsewhere. Among a certain crowd, they're a very desirable arrangement being actively sought out as an alternative to being in a real relationship—if you're in the dating market right now, you've probably heard somebody say or write in a profile that they're only seeking friends with benefits right now. Often it's a way of stating they want to be able to keep their distance emotionally and maintain their freedom to keep seeing other people. Meanwhile, there's another crowd of people that instinctually scrunches up their nose at the very idea of a FWB—there's an underlying assumption there that the type of dynamic in question is something only flaky, detached, shallow, or morally gray people pursue. Both these perspectives shortchange a lot of the good stuff that can come from being friends with benefits: a consistent sex partner without the promises involved in a romantic relationship and with all the fun, connection, and genuine care for each other that comes with a friendship. The genuine care part is where a lot of people get tripped up when it comes to friends with benefits: A lot of folks seem to think that just because you're not making a romantic commitment, it means you also have no obligations to one another whatsoever and that you don't need to care about each other's well-being. That's just not true.

How about something like this: Hey, I know we should have talked a propos this before, but since we've been having sex without condoms, I basic us to talk about safer femininity now. I don't want either of us to be taking risks after we don't have to, or after we should reduce them, so be able to we talk about this a bit? If he says yes -- which obviously he'd better: you don't absence to be with someone, even carelessly, who won't -- then the at the outset thing for you to do is to determine if you're monogamous absolute now. So, you ask is a bite like this, I know we're friends with benefits , so I'm asking this about our health, not absent of ownership or jealousy: are you having any kind of sex along with someone else right now, have you recently, or do you think you might while we're together?

Accomplish sure you both want the alike thing. Stay safe. Make sure femininity is the main event. This should be a mutually beneficial situation.