The Link Between Sex and Death

As many readers and frequent customers to this website know, we are based in New York. Perhaps that’s why, eight years after the September 11 terrorist attacks, I feel compelled to write something – a memory, a tribute, some acknowledgment of the anniversary of an event that impacted not just New Yorkers, but all Americans.

What could 9-11 and sex possibly have in common? More than you might imagine, according to several sex researchers, including New Yorker Helen Fisher, a biological anthropologist and author of Why Him, Why Her?

Chemical Attractions

Unusual experiences, or novelty, Fisher notes in an article in Obit Magazine, increases the release of dopamine in the brain, which then triggers an increase in testosterone. That hormone enhances the sex drive in both men and women. Death – the great unknown – is novel and unusual enough to cause the “funeral sex” effect in our brains.

Highlighted, and lampooned, in movies like The Wedding Crashers, post-funeral sex is actually quite common. When we look into that casket, we face our own mortality then seek to celebrate our life. Few things make you feel quite alive as truly great sex. Also, following funerals, we seek comfort, and that, too, can be found in the primal connection between two people.

Sex after September 11

Now consider a day like September 11, 2001 – few living Americans ever experienced a tragedy of that magnitude before (and hopefully never will again). Fear, danger and novelty abounded. Not surprisingly, then, in the weeks following the terrorist attacks of September 11, more New Yorkers were having sex, at least according to some accounts.

The LA Times ran an article in October of that year describing a phenomenon called “terror sex” or “end-of-the-world” sex. Some experts attribute it to a biological desire to procreate in the face of death; bad things are happening around us but the species must survive.

Other experts say people used sex as a means to cope with the fear and vulnerability we felt. We sought comfort in others, because we all had the same feelings: grief, sadness, anger, fear. Nearly everyone in the New York area experienced a mere two degrees of separation from someone who had been killed in the attack.

A third theory for the increased sex following September 11 cites people acting impulsively as they faced their own mortality. Thoughts of: “It could have been me” made people live more in the moment, sharing feelings they may not have shared otherwise and taking greater risks. In some cases, those risks involved sex with strangers. In others, it was finally marrying a long-time lover, starting a family, or leaving a secure career to pursue their passion.

Maybe that, eight years later, is the “good” we can take from the terror attacks that changed America. In a post-9-11 world, we still never know what lurks around the bend, individually or as a nation.

Take a risk. Follow your passion. Say, “I love you.” Have wild, uninhibited sex with a partner, or partners, of your choice (but be safe.) Celebrate life.

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