I was in that weird place—the one where you realize you’re staring off into space and don’t exactly know how long you’ve been doing it. My lips were resting on my left bare shoulder as I gazed out of my fourth-floor window across the avenue at a young couple carrying grocery bags and wearing gloves. They stopped on the sidewalk, albeit briefly, to kiss, their masks draped around their necks. I watched longingly and, without thinking, kissed my own shoulder.
This is quarantine, I thought.
At this point I’ve spent an entire month sheltering in place mostly inside my 550-square-foot New York apartment. For safety’s sake, leaving here once the coronavirus pandemic hit to find refuge with either of my parents never truly felt like an option. I worried that I may have been exposed to the virus in this big, bustling, magical place I call home and that I could possibly have an asymptomatic case. I also knew that staying holed up here in the Big Apple would provide some normalcy.
And so I sit here alone. This is something that wasn’t exactly the easiest for me before the novel coronavirus hit, either. I’m a single woman in my early 30s. It’s been more than two years since someone called me their girlfriend, and not all that long since I exchanged an “I love you” and meant it, hard. Relationships are all wacky and complicated in their own way. While this pandemic exacerbates the feeling that I am one of the few in my circle who doesn’t seem to have a steady partnership, what I’m longing for right now is greater than a forever sort of thing or even emotional companionship in this terrifying time.
Instead, I long for touch. I have what some call “touch hunger.”
Think about, for just a moment, the number of people you may come into contact with during a normal day, regardless of your geographic location. Brushing by someone in the hallway of your apartment building or on your morning walk. Accidentally bumping into passersby during a subway commute. Exchanging smiles and words with your favorite barista at a local coffee shop, then brushing fingers as you take your drink. High-fiving sweat-drenched comrades at a workout class. Hugging a friend who shared some good news. Having a total stranger hold your hands for 40 minutes while you enjoy a manicure before meeting up with another buddy for a well-deserved nightcap after a long day.
The things I would do to sit next to someone having a loud conversation in a nail salon with “no cell phone use” signs everywhere while a manicurist gently paints my nails. The things I would do for a hug, or to hold someone’s—anyone’s—hand.
“We are wired to bond,” Irina Wen, Ph.D., psychologist and clinical assistant professor in the department of psychiatry at NYU Langone Health, tells SELF. “It’s not surprising [that] within the prison system, one of the worst punishments is isolation. From a young age, physical touch plays a huge role in our development.”
Pleasant physical touch pings parts of the brain, including the orbitofrontal cortex, which then helps you feel a sense of reward. But Wen emphasizes that touch is much, much more than a love language. Various small studies have found that, in couples, nonsexual, caring touch has been linked with higher levels of the feel-good hormone oxytocin and lower blood pressure. And in a wow-this-is-relevant-right-now example, research has even suggested that touch may have a beneficial effect on the immune system.
In a 2015 Psychological Science study, Carnegie Mellon researchers monitored a little more than 400 participants, asking them about recent social interactions and hugs they’d received over the course of each day for two weeks. Then the participants were each quarantined in hotel rooms and exposed to a cold or flu virus. The virus infected 78% of the participants, 31% showed actual signs of infection, and those who had experienced more positive, supportive social interactions—including more frequent hugs—experienced a protective “buffering” effect and showed fewer signs of illness. There are limitations to the study, like that the researchers didn’t know who the participants had hugged, but the overall takeaway is that consistent physical contact like hugging might help our immune systems function at their best.
Touch is something Kelly Whitten, a 31-year-old living alone in New York City, would have loved when she was sick with the coronavirus in March. “I was down for the count for about five days, sleeping for about 18 hours each one,” she tells SELF. “I felt scared, my family was scared, asking me to text them every single morning when I woke up to essentially let them know I was alive.”
Whitten says that before sequestering herself at home alone, which she’s been doing for 36 days now, she wouldn’t have thought twice about the last time she’d experienced physical touch. But now? “Having it removed so quickly for me, I’ve never missed an embrace more,” she says. “A touch can put you more at ease sometimes than words.”
Jessica Brucia, a middle school education teacher also in New York, can certainly relate. At age 39, Brucia is currently riding out the pandemic alone in her apartment while eight months pregnant. “After dating for many years and not finding a life partner, I decided to become a single mother by choice,” she tells SELF. “After 10 fertility treatments and two miscarriages, I’m here now doing the best I can to fill the void and count my blessings.”
Brucia says that she’s most afraid about not having anyone around to meet the baby. And while she never considered herself a super-affectionate person before this all happened, now she could really use a hug. “My friends are planning a virtual baby shower for me,” she says. “It’s just not the same, and it feels really [lonely].”
While there is nothing that can be a perfect substitute for physical interaction, Wen says that there are some things we can do from the relative safety of our own homes to try to stimulate the same feelings. Apparently, my shoulder kiss wasn’t all that weird, after all.
“If you can hold yourself, feel that hug and the container of that, start there,” Wen says. “Self-massage can be a great asset to release tension, as is finding another comforting gesture: placing your hands on your heart and feeling what comes up.” Even though none of this will replace touch from other people, touching your own body in a kind way is still worth trying.
Wen also encourages her clients to embrace the idea of staying socially connected and not social distancing to the point of emotional isolation. Being on your own throughout all of this may make you feel lonely, helpless, and out of control. That’s okay. It’s to be expected, honestly. Instead of feeling ashamed about it, try to notice and make way for those feelings, Wen says.
“Be in your present body,” Wen says. “And remember: This is temporary. Allow yourself to feel.”
Feel. I can do that. I’m good at that. And while I don’t know exactly how long it will be until I can embrace a friend after meeting up in Central Park for an early-morning run or plant soft, repetitive kisses on a partner’s cheek, I do know this: It feels really great to hold on to me, knowing I’m not in this alone thing alone.
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