Do you believe there is such a thing as sexual chemistry?

Pheromones. I have been gloriously attracted to people I don’t know or can’t stand, and, conversely, I’ve had no desire to sleep with people I recognized as physically attractive, liked a lot and was emotionally compatible with. Go figure.

Yes, I know for fact sexual chemistry exists.

But I believe you are more referring to physical attraction, or just general “chemistry.” Your example of two good friends who are single and looking yet don’t end up dating doesn’t seem to imply they’ve had sex to “test it out” so to say. Sexual chemistry, to me at least, would more refer to “chemistry” in bed.

To that regard, yes I believe physical chemistry exists as well. I have had female friends where everything made sense and we were both single and looking…. but it just never happened because one or both of us never really felt that way about the other person. It just happens that way sometimes.

I read excerpts from a book called The Art of Approaching Women. It was written by a pick up artist and I don’t endorse that but, it was fascinating some of the principles of how he was suggesting a womens attraction buttons are pushed. He explained how it wasn’t so much about looks but about confidence and being fun and funny. It talked about how to read if a girl was interested and to back off if she was not. I think there is a lot a guy can learn from this literature, but that stops when it teaches how to just pick women up just to score.

I do beleive there is a lot more going on subconsciously than we would admit to ourselves and its all in our chemistry.

ted: I guess I would say that to me if the chemistry isn’t there before bed it’s not going to suddenly appear in bed. But the reverse can sometimes be true. You can be attracted to someone and then find that when you actually go to bed with them you just don’t “mesh” well together. And I don’t just mean when someone is a lousy lover, I mean it all of a sudden just doesn’t feel “right.”

Yes. I can feel it when I smell my girlfriend.

There is also the metaphorical sense of what it’s like being with or communicating with someone.

Jill the Tooth I definitely think pheromones have something to do with it, maybe everything. But I was also reading this article about love and chemicals and brain activity as it relates to people bonding and the state of infactuation. There seems to be long term attraction that has to do with the way someone appeals to you subconsciously as well as short term chemical effects going on that eventually fade away. Once those effects fade away, does the “chemistry” of attraction fade away too? Is it dependant on our bonding with that person in a certain way if it is to last? Here is the article I mentioned. Not sure if this guy has good creds but he seems to cite some reliable sources.
http://samvak.tripod.com/lovepathology.html

I’m really only attracted to people who I have things in common with, the sexual chemistry stems from that……. It could take minutes, hours or even weeks for me to see them in a sexual light…. But it has to work both ways…. With practice, you’ll naturally be able to tune into someone else’s sexual frequencies and set off powerful sexual chemistry. It just becomes part of you, something you do without even trying :-/

Yes there is such a thing and I don’t know where it comes from. There are no common factors that I am aware of.

Yes. Oh, yes, I do.

Q: Have you ever wished you could be attracted to someone because rationally they would be so right for you, but there was just no “chemistry”?

A: Oh yes. I remember a particular guy who I was attracted to and was a great person and we meshed in many ways..just no “chemistry”.

I also (in the past, when I was single) broke things off when a guy wasn’t just the right..smell. Not sure how to put it.. but I totally believe scent plays into who we pick as a partner, too.

yes, my husband still feels it for me, everytime he gets near me;) I do for him too but not as often as he would like—24/7

Yes, it’s that wonderful, unexplainable thing that no one can put their finger on. If we could figure out what causes it or where it comes from, we could bottle it and sell it for millions.

You can see a “fine” example of it here in this clip with Fran Drescher and Charles Shaugnessy from the Nanny. They’re 2 actors on a set, but they clearly have sexual chemistry!

You can see that same kind of chemistry here between Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer from the Sound of Music.

And here with another hot acting couple, Bruce Willis and Sybill Shepherd during their Moonlighting days.

And this super-romantic couple, Patrick Stewart and Gates McFadden from Star Trek, have it too. See

There are plenty of actors who are thrown into movies and TV shows that are supposed to be romantic couples, but they don’t have “it.” But I always know it when I see it.

I guess that’s why I love these particular shows, because these couples have it and we all want it.

I think chemistry is easier for men than for women.

@wundayatta I think you’re right. I think for men, they think or perceive that there are many good matches with regards to sexual chemistry for them, whereas with women, they think or perceive that there is only one special person for them (although that’s not really true). I think guys tend to feel the chemistry almost immediately, where women may take a long time to feel it.

That’s why you will often see some poor schlub at a bar or a party or other social gathering go up to a woman and ask her out, when she says no, you might see that same guy 5 minutes later, asking her best friend out, and when she says no, the same guy will ask out some other women and eventually one of them will say yes. On the other hand if a woman is interested in a particular guy at this gathering and he turns her down, she would just feel crappy, but it is unlikely that she would ever try to ask another guy at this same gathering out on a date because at that point, she still only feels chemistry with the first guy.

Well, when i’m on the brink of sexual gratification I tend to yell out Eureka!! This could lend credence to that particular theory :¬)

@Kardamom I always wanted to be that guy who could shamelessly ask out a string of women. Alas, I was afraid to even ask out one, even if we had spent the whole evening talking about deep things. I figured they were just interested in the conversation, not me.

But yeah, I can remember a lot of times when I had chemistry, and she didn’t ;-)

@wundayatta How did you ever get up the courage to ask your wife out?

I’ve also had a lot of the one sided chemistry too, it hurts.

No.

what @Kardamom said 100%

Definitely. Smell has a HUGE lot to do with how you respond to your partner when you start seeing past all the other goodies like braces straightened teeth, tans, hair do’s, snappy dressing, eloquence, humor, wit, intelligence, etc.

I guess everyone has to speak for themselves on this, but in my own case there is absolutely, undeniably such a thing. I know for a fact I am sensitive to pheromones. And the right kind can put me in seventh heaven making love.

@ETpro and then there’s all of those poor shy people who are too afraid to make a move and can’t figure out exactly how they feel about other people. Is it love or is it indigestion? They’re reacting to “Fear-mones.”

@Kardamom Ha! Good portmanteau.

@Kardamom I never did ask her out. She needed a ride home, and I provided it. Then we sat in the car talking for hours in front of her place. Then she’d go in, and I’d go home to my place.

This happened three times. The third time she invited me in, and that was pretty much when I knew who my wife would be. The weird thing was that I knew it, and that gave me the calmness to wait for her to figure it out. Up until that point in my life, I had assumed I would never get married.

But you can bet that, had I had to ask her out, we never would have gotten to know each other.

I absolutely believe it exists. I’ve often felt it before I’ve known anything about a guy, let alone enough about him to know whether I’m interested in a relationship with him.

Also: [mod says] This is our Question of the Day!

@wundayatta That’s wonderful! I’m in the same boat as you and kind of don’t like the idea of the dating thing. There’s this poor dude on another thread that was talking about using a wingman and going to the bars to try to meet women. Lots of us suggested that that was one of the worst places (and ways) to find love. I think you chimed in on that too. You’re much more likely to find a good solid relationship when you’re just going about your business and doing the things that you need to do and like to do. Bars are a huge crapshoot in my opinion unless a person is only looking for a one night stand. Congratulations for finding your wife in a much more pleasant manner. : )

@Kardamom Much more pleasant, less stressful, and kind of natural. You fall into it without any prior agenda instead of dating and interviewing each other. I don’t believe most people are very good at interviews, and I don’t think people show their real faces on a date. Everyone’s on best behavior, except those who aren’t, and those are the bad dates.

How about you? How did you meet your husband?

@wundayatta I have a fella, but we’re not married. We met at work, but we didn’t get involved until after he left that company, so no weird on the job stuff. But we didn’t have a “dating” situation either. We just already knew each other and fell into it. It is much better like that.

Kardamom: wundayatta: I’m laughing now because I did meet my husband at a bar! But it was not like a nightclub scene, just after hours drinks with friends. I was with a girlfriend from work who was about to go on vacation so we went out for a drink and a talk. We were watching the guys, but it wasn’t a pickup kind of place. He was just out for a few drinks with some business associates. My friend was very pretty and flirty. She started eating french fries off one of my husband’s friends’ plate. Chatting, flirting. So we all got to talking. By the end of the night my husband and I were in Greenwich Village having dessert and coffee. He took the subway with me to the Staten Island Ferry Terminal and kissed me goodbye. He called the next day and asked me on a date. The rest is history as they say!

@Earthgirl, very cool story. Lurve baby

Season of Fall: Thanks:)

@Earthgirl I’ve been looking through this thread to see if I ever mentioned meeting people in a bar here. I didn’t find it. Of course I have written about it elsewhere. But I exclude people who go to bars with friends, as part of a social occasion from what I think is unhealthy bar behavior.

It would be interesting to see the length and happiness of the marriages of couples who meet in bars. Oh God. Sometimes I feel like so much of a sociology geek. :0

wundayatta Chemistry can happen anywhere, can’t it? Do you believe in love at first sight?

@wundayatta I totally agree with that. I’m not into going to bars, but the times I was there, I was there with female friends going to see male friends that played in a band. It was always very disturbing when random dudes would try to pick up on us, even though we said we were there on a girls night out.

@Earthgirl That’s so cute that you met your hubby in the bar under those circumstances. And I’m glad to know that you were there socializing with friends, rather than for the actual activity of trolling for guys. LOL.

I don’t believe in love at first sight. I believe in sexual attraction and infatuation at first sight, but for me (because of my own definition of what love is) love is something that develops and deepens over time and is based on really knowing a person. But I do believe that you can fall in love with (eventually) people who you are instantly sexually attracted to.

Kardamom Yes, I agree. It’s not love but it could turn into love. At first it’s just infactuation, or chemical attraction. That’s what I want to understand. What causes that? It can’t just be pheromones. Humans are too complex for that. Couldn’t it have an element of intuition about it?

I don’t know, @Earthgirl. It’s never happened to me. I think there’s more to it than sight. There’s a lot more to a human than what they look like, and sometimes people are so much…. themselves, that they get each other almost instantly. I think people have this energy about them, and sometimes they meet someone who just gets it through all their senses. I think it’s very rare, though.

I think it can happen through words, too. That’s different. It could be very fast, but it isn’t first sight. I wonder what happens when people who meet online meet each other physically for the first time. I wonder if that feels like love at first sight? I’ve heard several people tell me of meetings like that. Others tell me it’s just not what they expected. Does online chemistry translate into the real world? I don’t know, that’s for sure.

wundayatta Yes, I think you’re getting at some of the complexity that I was trying to put into words. The energy, and the heightened senses. Obviously meeting someone online would be different.

I’ve been seeing a lot of this on TV and read about it too, but from what I’ve learned, sexual chemistry boils down to what scientists call “Major Histocompaitbility Complex”, or “MHC”. See the Wiki on it here.

The animalistic side of us humans somehow seeks out someone who “smells” different from us biologically as a way to ensure healthier offspring. If we only mated with those who had similar genes, our children would be much more likely to have hereditary diseases, etc., similar to how purebred dogs typically have more prominent health issues than mixed-breed dogs.

There was a National Geographic or Discovery Channel biopic called something like “The Science of Sex” or something like that (I don’t remember, it was on my Netflix and I just randomly watched it) and it’s really interesting.

I don’t know if I’m totally off base in answering your question, @Earthgirl, but I believe that the whole concept of MHC is distinct from that of pheremones.

I know that with my boyfriend, I have this intense desire to just rip his clothes off every time I see him. LOL. I don’t even know why. But even before we began dating and I was actually dating someone else, he drunknely asked me if I wanted to make out. I said no, of course, but there was this little thing in the back of my mind that was like “I kinda want to” even though I wasn’t available. And it’s not because I’m easy! LOL! I’ve just always had some kind of weird chemical/sexual attraction to him and we have great chemistry both in and out of bed.

hurtntired I don’t think you’re off base at all! That’s a great example of sexual chemistry at work, lol. You see, what I find interesting in your story is that you felt that chemistry even though you weren’t available. Because you weren’t available, you didn’t act on it. That was the human conscious decision making at work. And then, interestingly enough, you got a chance to find out if your “instincts” were correct in leading you to your current relationship. Great story! I’m so glad it worked out for you. I have to read up on the MHC. I think this whole subject of attraction is fascinating and much more complex than most people realize. The interplay between instinct, reason and emotion is uniquely human.

Sexual chemistry is a myth people concocted to justify their lust or physical infatuation. They say ”I won’t date him/or because we have no chemistry” aka code for he/she is not all that attractive bka sexy to me. To have two people who mesh in every way but have no physical or sexual attraction between them is no tragedy. To have two people who only can be in synch when they are boinking like bunnies

People want to believe that they are attractive so they want to be with someone they feel validates that. Many would rather be with some one considered hot or hunky than actually be with someone who is a great person. They would rather be with someone who is as sharp as a bag of bowling balls or as bright as a dim bulb spray painted black because they are good-looking than with someone real. They use sexual chemistry as the ruse to convince themselves the person is better than they are or more than the less than single dimension person they are.

If one person in such a relationship cares to go beyond the companionship and over to the sexual and the other don’t it can be frustrating to the one who wants to take it physical. If neither really placed that big of a deal on sex then no one is put out they will just have a very good working relationship; it might even be better because there won’t be that expectation or hang up to cloud certain issues.

Sexual chemistry is about as real as love at 1st sight, the Easter Bunny and unicorns.

Hypocrisy Central To a certain extent the things you say are true. People do place too much value on looks sometimes and the sexual chemistry not being there is one excuse they use to avoid hurting someone’s feelings by just saying “I won’t go out with you because you aren’t attractive enough.” But how do you explain Julia Roberts and Lyle Lovett? Sandra Bullock and Jesse James? If the chemistry is not there you aren’t going to enjoy the “boinking” with or without your eyes shut!!!

I don’t really agree with you, @Hypocrisy_Central, although I am not here to argue. The very reason being I have personally experienced it and it’s certainly not a “ruse” that my SO and I have convinced ourselves with. There is a LOT to be said for people who might be otherwise attracted to each other but not sexually. I do agree partially that there is an attraction on the outside that can be superficial, or the complete opposite, but not everyone thinks that way all the time. Do I want to be physically attracted to my mate? Of course I do. But what explains such a physical attraction? I could go and talk to the hottest guy in the room but then I find out he’s a douchebag, so he’s not attractive to me anymore. Another example is exactly the one I provided about my current boyfriend and I. I think he’s adorably cute, but I also objectively don’t see him as the most handsome, dashingly good looking guy in the world.

I’ve had a couple of long term relationships where there was some sexual chemistry, but not enough to last. It wore off after a few years in both cases. In my other two long term relationships, there was some very intense chemistry. For whatever reason, we were attracted to each other, and it wasn’t something that was going to end.

For example, for about a decade, my wife appeared to stop being interested in me, sexually. It was a big problem for me because I didn’t feel like she loved me any more, and she never was going to love me. But was still attracted to her. Very much so.

A lot of things happened; I’ve written about it elsewhere here. After a few years of counseling, we kind of sorted out what had happened and why it had happened and figured out what we could do about it. We forgave each other… and there was a lot to forgive. Well, maybe we’re still forgiving. Not sure that process ever ends. But at this point, I believe she loves me, which gives me a confidence I haven’t had in years.

Without the chemistry—without my desire for her—I don’t know if we could have come back together, even with two kids, a house, and retirement savings together. It is very important to me. It is a key ingredient in the relationship, for me, because it can keep me interested even though everything else is going wrong. It has to be there. It has to make me shake in her company. It has to make me want to look at her all the time. She has to compel me with a kind of tractor beam that reaches from her heart to mine. And, of course, there’s the magnetic connection at the end. Bang! We crash together and our bodies are like one and we don’t knew where one ends and the other begins.

That’s what has kept my relationships going. The lack of that is what let relationships die. It’s a rare woman who can do that for me. It’s an even rarer woman who does that for me and I do that for her. I’ve been lucky in that I’ve met a handful of women like that in my life. Lucky, and grateful. And totally blessed.

@Earthgirl But how do you explain Julia Roberts and Lyle Lovett? Sandra Bullock and Jesse James? If the chemistry is not there you aren’t going to enjoy the “boinking” with or without your eyes shut!!! I would explain it as real chemistry They found something in the other that transcended looks, same as Heidi Klum and Seal. To boink like bunnies you do not need chemistry, many people do it with people they have no chemistry with or even thought about, they did it solely to satisfy their loins. If you have a real connection the sexual component of the relationship will be fantastic more times than not.

@ette_ I could go and talk to the hottest guy in the room but then I find out he’s a douchebag, so he’s not attractive to me anymore. Another example is exactly the one I provided about my current boyfriend and I. I think he’s adorably cute, but I also objectively don’t see him as the most handsome, dashingly good looking guy in the world. Which proves my point. The attitude of a hunk can make him a toad to you in spite all other gals might be wagging their tongues and wanting to rip his shirt off. And your present man whom you can deduct is not collectively attractive because many or most women are not chasing him down in the mall asking him to sigh their boobies to you is adorably cute. Was he that way because of his personality in every arena or just because the motion in the bed was like a hypnotic potion? Many people will pass up the adorably cute because they are not societally attractive, they are not seen by the masses as hot. To make it easier to pass up on these people and not look shallow (but we are all shallow to a point) they say there was no chemistry which is code for their was no attraction to the eye for me to see it working.

Hypocrisy Central Methinks that thou dost protest too much! In many ways you are actually agreeing with those of us who believe sexual chemistry exists, lol. You just said it in the above. ”real sexual chemistry” Obviously you don’t need the real stuff to boink like bunnies (cute choice of words) but I don’t think you need common core values either to be attracted to someone. Sometimes there is just a sort of “magnetic pull” that can’t be analyzed or explained. It’s either there or it’s not. When the opposite happens, and you have a chance to be with someone that shares all of your core values, that you like as a person but are not attracted to that way, it can be very frustrating.