10 Years, 10 Dates—A Celebration of Feeld’s 10th Anniversary

I want to overshare. I want to say everything you're not supposed to say on a first date. I want to tell you the stories not meant for print. Ten years on Feeld, ten dates, and I intend to reveal all: the olive oil, the rat, the lit taper candle. You up for it? 

I first opened the app as a timid, 23-year-old bisexual riddled with imposter syndrome, a good monogamous girlfriend to a string of sweet, disappointing boyfriends. In the decade since, it's opened doors I walked through and never came back from: queer love and lust, kink, non-monogamy, community built gleefully outside the norms. I know these rooms. Let me guide you through them. 

We'll go slowly: one year at a time, from 2016 all the way to today. If you need to stop, closing the tab is your safeword, and I won't take it personally. 

Consent given? Then let the oversharing begin.

It’s 2016. The internet won’t shut up about bisexual lighting. I’m blasting Tame Impala, my bush is newly grown out, and the scripts about love I grew up with are getting harder and harder to follow. I download a handful of “alternative” dating apps, but none of them stand the test of time, each deleted after a week or so. Except for one: Feeld. The app that would come to define the next decade. 

1 - 2016-2017 - the word I had to Google

J is a nerd, a sadist, and a communist. “Polyamorous,” a word listed on his profile, is unfamiliar to me. I Google it. I feel a glimmer of intrigue, and decide to connect. I’m single, and dating multiple people anyway, could this be that different? He lives in the neighborhood where I grew up, and for our first date we meet in the park where as a kid I tore through the playground, and as a teenager got pissed and fumbled around after dark. He listens to my nostalgic tales intently, watching me through huge glasses with a hungry look in his eyes. A few beers in and we’re aggressively making out, and he fingers me in the afternoon sun. J and I date for 8 months, my first foray into non-monogamy. I meet his girlfriend A and we snog at London Pride, frolic around festivals as a triad, and writhe around for hours in J’s squeaky double bed. 

It's a flurry of firsts—queerness, threesomes, non-monogamy—that hits me all at once. I soak it up like a sponge. 

2 - 2018 - a sea of oiled up women

When R’s profile pops up, I gasp. She is absolutely stunning, with delicate brown curls and a beaming smile that melts my heart. We connect, chat, and she’s even more beautiful in person, as well as kind, and a bit weird—a winning combo. She’s new to dating women, and in classic baby sapphic style, the first date winds up feeling less flirty and more like girlies catching up. In an attempt to correct this, I make a rogue suggestion for our second date. My new friend J runs Lady Liquid Love, an erotic experience where women are covered in warm olive oil, and proceed to writhe around naked together for a couple hours. R is game, so off we trot. 

It’s surreal sharing our first intimate moments together in a room full of women sliding around like slick fish. I lose all sense of where my body ends and others begin, all flesh and warmth and groans. Even though our bodies are unfamiliar to one another, there are moments when, eyes closed, we somehow find each other in the slippery pile and savor an extra squeeze. In a sea of women, she feels like home.

Afterward, on my bed, we make out forever. Bodies the softest they could possibly be, hair saturated with so much oil we leave stains on my pillowcases that I’ll never get out. The sex is slow and soft, tender. 

We’re friends to this day, a rich romance forming the foundation of our love.

3 - 2019 - a beloved childhood movie

I briefly date a former child actor—finding it so bizarre when I finally clock who they are, and the niche part they played in a beloved movie of our childhood. We meet during the summer heatwave, the fan is on full blast when we fuck, but it’s still not enough for the sweat pouring from us. It’s clunky, but in a ravenous, endearing kind of way. I remember a lot of laughter. The sexual connection fizzles out, but I still get an invite to her annual sobriety party. Proof that lust can compost down into something else entirely, and still remain nourishing.

4 - 2020 - nudes group

I spend lockdown with my fellow queer polyamorous housemates, one of whom I met on Feeld (after a couple dates we realized we’re better as friends). We each have very different experiences dating virtually. Try as I might, I can’t hack the awkward first dates on Zoom, but G has a whale of a time getting wined and dined from the comfort of her bedroom, and B finds sanctuary—and international sexting—through  Feeld group chats. Craving connection, the three of us set up a WhatsApp group to share nudes among a bunch of poly friends. At such a turbulent and frightening time, we find queer joy staging elaborate shoots in our living room, taking turns posing, photographing, and cheerleading. 

In a year without much physical touch, weird and wonderful nudes from hot friends really keeps me going. I will never forget the image of a lit taper candle up someone's butt. 

5 - 2021 - wanking-on-sea

I move to Margate (on England’s south coast), and discover that using apps in small regional towns—even arty, gentrified ones—is very different to using them in a city. My maximum distance fluctuates depending on how horny I am: Am I thirsty enough to make the 40-minute pilgrimage to Canterbury for a hookup, or should I just have a wank? Besides one surprising date that ends in getting railed in a toilet cubicle, wanking rules supreme. In a small town it feels easier to meet people in the wild, and I tend to use Feeld to connect when I'm traveling, or fancy a date in London. The app and I are renegotiating, the way you do a few years into any relationship.

6 - 2022 - the comet

F is the ultimate service provider. He’s a gentle giant, and a solid fuck, which is hard to come by. We’ve been together for years but it's a comet-style set-up: which means we dip into each other's lives in a connected, more occasional way. We met through friends at a New Year’s Eve party, and when his Feeld profile pops up a few months into dating it makes me blush.

On a grim November night we catch up. The woman serving us whiskey sours keeps giving me weirdly encouraging eyes. I guess she doesn’t realize we’ve known each other for years, the “will we fuck?” of our first date having long been replaced by assured excitement.

Back at his, he holds me firm, with gentle control. His arms are so enormous they wrap around me completely, it’s like I’m being seduced by the BFG. When his hand reaches into my pants, he lets out a low guttural moan that vibrates down my throat.

After we fuck, we consider what our teenage selves would make of the sex we’ve just had, how it would read like another language from the scripts we’d been handed from generic porn and playground assumptions. We're doing those spotty, awkward babes proud.

7 - 2023 - 3 x 3 is a crowd

In Brooklyn, I open up Feeld, keen for some adventure while I’m alone in a new city. Little did I know I’d spend the week as a full-on bisexual unicorn, having a trio of threesomes.

First is T + J. Together 6 years, they’re getting married in a cemetery next month. She had a couple of threesomes in her youth, while it’s his first, and there’s a quiet care in the way she takes charge in the trio. They have a dog that’s cute but very needy. It’s annoying having to pretend I like dogs more than I actually do in order to get laid. They mostly want me to lie back and receive, which is fine by me. Afterwards, we cuddle and chat, but I register when it’s time to summon my carriage (Uber). They’re sweet saying bye, but there’s a tension I can’t quite place. I wonder if they’ll argue, fuck, or cuddle once I’m gone.

Next, L + B—a nerdy tech couple who, I discover, are also secretly ripped. The chat over drinks falls a bit flat, but they're experienced BDSM-ers, so I head back to theirs with high hopes. At the entrance to their building a massive rat darts out, and runs DIRECTLY OVER MY FOOT. I am horrified, they laugh it off as “the Bushwick baptism.” What a way to set the mood. They have an impressive collection of stainless steel toys, everyone fucks everyone with various sleek metal objects, it all feels very egalitarian. B gets out some rope and strings L up like a leg of lamb, with me as sous chef. They tell me to reach out next time I’m in town. Maybe I will.

The night before I fly home, I head to A + N’s apartment. We’re all exhausted but still want to meet, no obligation to hook up. The apartment is full to the brim with houseplants, an indoor forest, the lighting is soft and warm. We sip tea and chat about South Asian diasporas. N asks if I'd like to make out, I nod and they lean in. It’s gentle exploration without an agenda, and the first time I’ve slept with two chubby people at the same time. The squish of being pressed up against each other is gorgeous. 

Being a unicorn can become tiresome, but when it works there's something electric about being seduced by a couple. These no-strings-attached dates are a holiday from the mess of my life back home, and the time spent with strangers allows unexpected parts of me to rise to the surface. 

8 - 2024 - foreplay at the sex rave

B is visiting the UK for a poetry retreat. We have the exact same haircut. Her nails are airbrushed artworks, and she’s wearing a ’50s black bustier, her tits point out into gentle triangles. This is femme4femme at its finest.

We’ve made the slightly bold decision to go on a first date to Joyride, a queer rave and sex party. After a vibes-check drink and chat, we head to the venue and straight for the dancefloor. Hands roaming, thighs and hips and ass held tight. We consider going to the playroom, but the music's so good we dance for hours, bodies intertwined, before deciding to head home together.

I give her the southeast London tour from the top deck, pointing out the schools I’ve taught at, the crane my teenage boyfriend climbed to tag my name, a reckless declaration of puppy love. We get chips before turning onto the road where I’m staying, and both put an excessive amount of sauce on them—ketchup and mayo and burger sauce and vinegar and peri peri seasoning piled high, each of us egging the other on to add more. Our kisses are sweet and sticky.

Normally it takes me ages to cum, but grinding against her thigh it builds up quick, her hands dug into my sides as I peak. Then it’s her turn. We are both so pent up from hours of dancing that it doesn’t take much to tip us over the edge. Again and again. 

She wrote a poem about that night. It’s hung up on my bedroom wall.

9 - 2025 - the parting gift 

My first time at the Berlin Porn Film Festival, and I’m over the moon watching smut 24/7. P and I started chatting weeks before (a recent habit: setting my location to where I'm headed to do some hookup admin ahead of time). I invite them to a screening of Fetish Short Films. They arrive late, sneaking into the seat next to me, and we watch an hour of nylon, rubber, and beautiful trans bodies birthing jelly eggs, before we’ve properly spoken. When we emerge P shows off their pink cunty diamanté bag, which I envy.

Their flat is cute and chaotic, the walls covered in pictures of Lady Di, and vintage porn, and Care Bears. The sex is fast and hungry, pressed up close, fingers deep, moaning loud. We almost cum together but I lose it at the last minute, instead basking in their shuddery orgasm which washes over us both.

I’m due at another screening, so we wind things down and congratulate ourselves on an afternoon well spent. As a parting gift, they hand me a swatch of fabric covered in Twilight memes.

10 - 2026 - perverts (complimentary) unite

My car is full of friends-cum-lovers passionately debating Real Housewives lore as we zoom along the M40. We are headed to Birmingham for a POC trans-led FLINTA sex party. Is this a date? No, it’s a group adventure. We’ve all connected through a mix of IRL events, friendships, coincidences, and seeing each other pop up on Feeld over the years. Coming together for moments like this feels very special. 

The party is happening at one of the oldest swingers venues in the country. I fall in love with the building, it’s quite tacky, and impossibly endearing. I chat to some new people (it’s great hearing more about regional kink scenes), but ultimately end up fucking my friends, giggling and writhing, venturing with them into the makeshift dungeon in the cellar, leaving with bite marks dotting my thighs.

This is how I get to spend my weekends, gallivanting around with fellow debauched friends, before curling up together, chatting shit between mouthfuls of orange polenta cake before bedtime. I am so lucky.  

✳

Some aftercare: We saved a slice of cake for you.

Ten years. Friends as lovers, strangers as sanctuaries, falling in and out and back into love, queerness as my home. Alongside all this beauty, I’ve also had my fair share of terrible dates, but they were experiences I’ve grown from, and through. Feeld has opened the door to all this adventure and connection, a constant through it all. How affirming to look out at a sea of people doing things differently, to remember you’re not alone.

2016 Ruby, the one Googling polyamory, had no idea what was in store. But I think she’d be thrilled by all the fun and filth. And future Ruby, ten years on, with even more experience under her belt, is likely looking back at me now with the same endearment. What else is in store? Which terms, feelings, communities have I yet to discover? I’m hungry for it all. I commit to curiosity as a lifelong endeavor. Will you join me?