Editorial Disclosure: Independent editorial — personal observations from Ali's relationship and solo travel practice.

When I tell people I'm going somewhere alone, the first thing they ask is whether everything is okay with me and Gab.

It is. It's more than okay. And the alone trips are part of why.

This is something I made clear from the very beginning of our relationship — I am someone who needs alone time, who needs to travel by myself, who needs space outside of our partnership to feel like myself. Gab understood it immediately. He still does. He can tell when I need it before I can, and he'll say: you need to go somewhere. Let's book you a flight.

That is one of the things I love most about him.

And yet every time I announce a solo trip, someone in my life implies that something must be wrong. That a healthy relationship means wanting to do everything together. That needing space is a symptom of distance rather than a practice of closeness.

I want to push back on that. Firmly.

What Esther Perel Taught Me

I've been reading Esther Perel's Mating in Captivity and it articulates something I had felt but never quite named.

Perel's core argument is that long-term love and desire are in fundamental tension. Love wants closeness, security, familiarity, predictability. Desire wants distance, mystery, the unknown, surprise. And when we try to satisfy both needs through the same person in the same relationship — when we become everything to each other, when we spend every moment together, when we merge completely — desire is almost always the first casualty.

The lack of self is the enemy of desire.

She puts it beautifully: desire requires a psychological space where you are with another person but able to let go of responsibility for that person and engage completely with yourself — your physical needs, your sexual needs, your fantasies. You become selfish. You show up completely for yourself. And that selfishness — that aliveness — is what fuels desire.

When you have nothing new to bring to the relationship. When every conversation is about logistics. When your partner knows everything about your life because they were present for all of it. When there's nothing unfamiliar to rediscover — desire fades. Not because the love is gone. But because the mystery is.

Solo travel restores mystery. It creates the unfamiliarity, the unpredictability, the adventure that long-term relationships slowly consume. You come back different. Slightly changed by what you saw and who you talked to and what you figured out about yourself when nobody who knows you was watching. And your partner gets to meet that version of you.

When I Know I Need It

I can tell when the alone time is overdue.

Gab and I work together, travel together, live together. We are together a lot. And there's a specific version of myself that appears when I've been in constant proximity to another person for too long — even a person I love deeply.

I get snappy. Small things become big things. I start criticizing things that don't matter. I feel vaguely anxious without a clear reason. I stop feeling particularly sexual.

That's not a relationship problem. That's a me problem. A cup that needs refilling. And the most efficient way to refill it is to go somewhere by myself.

When I come back, I'm different. I have things to share. I've had experiences that are mine, not ours. I've thought thoughts that didn't get interrupted. And I genuinely miss Gab in a way that proximity never allows for.

Missing someone is underrated as an erotic experience.

How I Actually Do It

There are three approaches I rotate depending on what I need:

The nearby overnight. When I can't get far — a night in a hotel down the road. Pack a small bag. Book a table for one at a restaurant. Order room service. Watch whatever I want. Sleep without negotiation. This sounds unremarkable but it is genuinely restorative. The ritual of packing the bag and leaving matters.

The solo trip to somewhere new. Another country, another city, somewhere I haven't been. I like adult-friendly hostels for these — the kind with communal spaces and a 30-plus crowd, where meeting people is easy but the party scene is not overwhelming.

The wellness retreat. This is my favorite and the most transformative. I've been on retreats in Quebec, Jamaica, Portugal, Colombia — all different in style but consistent in what they deliver.

The most significant one I've done was an intimacy retreat — completely alone, without Gab. A week-long experience called The Cocoon in Crete, where the focus was conscious intimacy, sensory exploration, and genuine depth of human connection. Not a sex retreat — an intimacy retreat. There's a difference. And going alone was the point. I needed to be there as myself, not as half of a couple. It was one of the more transformative experiences I've had. I wrote about it in full in What Really Happens at a 7-Day Intimacy Retreat → /world-issue/the-cocoon-crete

Gab thinks wellness retreats involve human sacrifices and group nakedness by firelight. He has seen my enthusiasm and drawn the wrong conclusions. When I've eventually dragged him to one, he comes home converted.

Why This Is Good for Your Relationship

Beyond the desire argument: there's something that happens when your partner watches you choose yourself that is genuinely attractive.

Independence is sexy. A person who has a life outside of the relationship — who has their own passions, their own adventures, their own inner world that you only partially have access to — is more interesting than one who has dissolved completely into the partnership.

There's a trust dimension too. Encouraging your partner to go somewhere alone — and meaning it — signals something important: I believe in your autonomy. I trust you. I trust us. The relationship doesn't need constant surveillance to hold.

That trust is more bonding than proximity.

The Permission You Might Need

If you've been waiting for someone to tell you that needing space doesn't mean something is wrong with your relationship — here it is.

You don't have to do everything together. You don't have to be present for every moment of each other's lives. You are allowed to have experiences that are yours, adventures that belong to you, versions of yourself that exist outside of the couple.

The couples who can genuinely encourage each other to go — and be happy for each other while they're gone — have figured out something important about what it means to love someone without consuming them.

💬 Is It Just Me?

Do you take solo trips? Does your partner? Has time apart ever genuinely changed something in your relationship or your desire?

Submit anonymously → /is-it-just-me

The Details

📚 Mating in Captivity — Esther Perel (highly recommended)
🔗 Sexual Health Alliance: sexhealthalliance.com
🔗 The Cocoon retreat: /world-issue/the-cocoon-crete
🌐 Retreat booking: BookRetreats, Retreat Guru, or Healing Holidays

Also in The World Issue:

About the Author

Ali Imperiale is a sex education student with the Sexual Health Alliance, a writer, and a traveler. She has visited 40+ countries and writes about sex, intimacy, and culture from wherever she currently is. The Nookie Nook is her shame-free, algorithm-free intimacy library.