The craving for touch
Touch and skin hunger?
Do you know that quiet longing for warmth and skin against skin? Let your skin hunger settle in a meeting full of attention, tenderness and honest touch.
What is skin hunger?
Skin hunger is your skin craving touch, not sex. It is an arm around you, a hand that stays resting on your back, a hug that lasts longer than is polite. When you go months or years barely being touched, you feel it in your mood, your sleep and your body. Usually only afterward.
You often don’t notice it. Not until someone holds you again and something eases that you never knew was tense.
Plenty of women who are thinking about a gigolo are really looking for exactly this. Not the sex first of all. Just to be truly touched again.
Why is the craving for touch so strong?
Touch is one of our very first needs, older than language. A newborn baby literally needs skin-to-skin contact to grow. That craving doesn’t wear off over the years, it only goes underground. At forty, at eighty, your nervous system keeps longing for the warmth of another body.
Maud
I'd say, woman, don't doubt, this man is safe, very safe and not like your standard gigolo. Give it to yourself. Boundaries are sensed and, more importantly, respected.Read Maud's full reviewShow less
My experience with Victor is honestly hard to put into words. I’d say, woman, don’t doubt, this man is safe, very safe and not like your standard gigolo. Give it to yourself. I went looking for Victor to close off a period in which I had completely lost myself because of a narcissist. For me, Victor is the addition to a piece of personal development. By then I was longing for genuine touch, feeling like a woman and intimacy without pain. The contact with Victor started very easily via the app. Long conversations about connection, wishes and boundaries. That already made it feel a little safer for me to meet. Our eventual date was indescribable. We had deliberately planned plenty of time so there was enough time to ‘land’. Victor is incredibly good at sensing you and putting you at ease with his soft accent, warm eyes and strong arms. Beautiful, deep conversations with a lot of humor and some teasing helped with this too, and slowly it became time for intimacy. In that too, Victor takes a lot of time to put you at ease. At one point I got a bit emotional, and Victor supported me so nicely in that, a little pause, rest, feeling. Everything is allowed to be there. Boundaries are sensed and, more importantly, respected. Not just plain hard sex but intimacy from connection, touch, caressing etc. From this safety I got to experience really beautiful (read: delicious) new things in bed. Experiences that make me feel like a woman again, feel sexy, feel naughty.
Rianne
You were more tender than I had dared to hope, more understanding, more caring, more genuine. I felt so seen, so heard, so held. You are unique and precious.Read Rianne's full reviewShow less
I didn’t know what to expect when I sought contact with you, but what you gave me was more than I could ever have thought up. My date with you was more than just a date. You had contacted me beforehand, which made it feel as if I already knew you when we saw each other, and you me.
You were more tender than I had dared to hope, more understanding, more caring, more genuine. I felt I could tell you anything, ask you anything, want or need anything, and that you were there for me. Lying in your arms while you ran your hand through my hair and softly kissed my head gave me the strength to take on the world again.
I felt so seen, so heard, so held. And even after our meeting you reached out to me again to ask how I was doing. Whatever I thought you could mean to me, you gave me so much more.
I don’t believe there’s anyone else like you. You are unique and precious.
Linda
I felt enormously at ease with him. The date itself (was my first meeting) flew by. Victor is wonderful to cuddle with.Read Linda's full reviewShow less
Victor is a sweet, reliable man who has no hidden agenda and keeps to his agreements. I felt enormously at ease with him. On top of that, the personal contact via WhatsApp beforehand is also really nice, so that (especially for a first meeting) you’re not immediately facing a complete stranger. After the date there’s room to WhatsApp too. The date itself (was my first meeting) flew by. Victor is wonderful to cuddle with.
Which hormones are released by touch?
When you are touched, oxytocin, dopamine and endorphins are released, while your cortisol drops, the hormone that keeps you on edge all day. Your shoulders come down, you breathe deeper. Slowly you grow calmer. Put simply: your body believes for a moment that you are safe again.
That isn’t a guess. Tiffany Field, a professor at the University of Miami and founder of the Touch Research Institute, has been studying this for more than forty years. Her account of the mechanism: touch stimulates pressure receptors under your skin, the vagus nerve becomes more active, your heart rate drops and your cortisol level falls.
So it isn’t woolly. It is your nervous system pressing a button that can only be worked from the outside.
What happens when you lack touch?
Go too long with too little touch and you notice it in all kinds of ways. Think of:
- more stress, a shorter fuse
- a grey, gloomy undertone that keeps hanging around
- sleep that doesn’t really recharge you
- a body that gets more susceptible to all sorts of things
During the covid years especially, with all that distance, skin hunger suddenly got talked about out loud. That makes sense. When you live alone or have a small circle, you can easily go weeks without a single real touch.
How does skin hunger change through life?
The need changes shape, but never disappears.
- Babies and children: for them touch isn’t a luxury but fuel. A child who is held little develops more slowly.
- Adults: in the middle of a busy life, touch is often the first thing to slip away. A hug, a massage, a hand on the back of your neck: it keeps you connected and takes the sharp edges off the day.
- Older people: for those who live alone or get few visitors, the hunger can be at its fiercest. A touch then says without words: you still matter.
What is the psychology behind skin hunger?
This craving is baked deep into your biology. Your skin holds special nerve fibres that respond only to soft, loving touch, and they connect straight to the parts of your brain that handle emotion and sense of self. As a psychotherapist I see it again and again: people underestimate how much comes loose the moment they are properly held once more.
What are the symptoms of skin hunger?
The symptoms of skin hunger sit mostly in your body and your mood. Recognize this? Then your skin is probably speaking up:
- an almost physical longing to be held
- irritability, or a low mood you can’t quite place
- broken nights
- tension that settles into your neck and shoulders
What helps against skin hunger?
What helps against skin hunger is regular warm touch, in whatever form. Not everyone always has someone close by, but there is something you can do about it.
A warm bath. A dog that curls up against you. A massage from a good masseur. And, maybe the hardest and the most important part: daring to say out loud that you miss touch. That is where it starts.
Sometimes the most honest solution is simply hiring someone who is there for you with full attention. No rush, no expectations. Only time, warmth and hands that know how to hold you. With me that is called cuddle therapy: a few hours of being held, clothes on, with nothing sexual involved.
Touch versus a lack of touch
What touch gives you and what you miss without it stand almost as mirror images of each other:
| Effect of touch | Result of a lack |
|---|---|
| More relaxation | Raised stress and anxiety |
| Higher oxytocin production | Less connection |
| Better sleep | Worse sleep |
| Stronger immune system | Weakened immune system |
| A sense of connection | Feelings of loneliness |
Touch is essential
Skin hunger shows one thing above all: touch is not an extra. It is a basic need, like food and sleep. A warm handshake, a long hug, a body that carries yours completely for a while. That makes you healthier, calmer and more at home in your own skin.
Give yourself that. Would you rather just ask your question before you arrange anything? That’s fine. Send me a message on WhatsApp and we’ll look together at what would do you good.
Frequently asked questions
Answers to the questions I hear most.
What is skin hunger, and can it give you physical symptoms?
Skin hunger is your skin’s physical craving for touch. Not necessarily for sex. When you go months, sometimes years, barely being held, in time you feel it everywhere: in your mood, your sleep, your body. And yes, a long-lasting lack gives real physical symptoms. Not imagination.
Touch is a basic need, just as much as food and sleep. When you are touched, oxytocin is released and your cortisol drops, the stress hormone that keeps you on edge all day. Your skin holds special nerve fibres that respond only to soft touch, with a direct line to the emotion centres in your brain. That is why a lack hits both your body and your feelings.
Physically, skin hunger can show up as:
- more stress and a shorter fuse
- broken nights that don’t really recharge you
- a low mood that keeps hanging around
- tension stuck in your neck and shoulders
At Gigolo Victor I look, as a psychotherapist, at exactly that layer: what comes loose underneath the moment you are held again. You can read more on Touch / Skin hunger.
Is there someone who cuddles you professionally, and how does that work?
Yes. Professional cuddling exists: you hire someone to hold you, purely for the warmth and the contact, without it becoming sexual. You keep your clothes on. It is about closeness: an arm around you, lying together, a hand resting calmly on your back.
How it works, we agree beforehand. Non-sexual means genuinely non-sexual with me, and you decide exactly how much or how little touch you want. Say “not right now” at any moment and that is that, without me having to ask why.
Keeping those boundaries crystal clear and safe, I guard with the calm of my background as a psychotherapist. You can read more about cuddling and skin hunger at Touch / Skin hunger.
Can I get cuddling and intimacy without it becoming sex or a relationship?
Yes, you can. You can get cuddles and intimacy without it becoming sex or turning into a relationship. Plenty of women book exactly this: warmth and attention for a while, with no expectations for afterward. It is not a compromise and not a stripped-down arrangement: for anyone who hasn’t been held in months or years, this is precisely the point. You decide where the boundary lies, and I fully respect that boundary, even when the mood suggests something else.
Want to just lie together, talk and be held? Then that is where it stays. Even staying the night can be about nothing but the cuddling. No pressure to go further, no unspoken expectation that “more” is supposed to follow.
That you get exactly what you are looking for and nothing you don’t want is how I work: your wishes lead. Read more at Touch / Skin hunger.
Is it weird or pathetic that I long for touch as a grown woman?
No, it isn’t weird and certainly not pathetic. Longing for touch is one of the most human things there is, as basic as hunger or sleep. That you take it seriously instead of waving it away is actually healthy, not a sign of lack or weakness.
Touch is a basic need, not a luxury. Skin hunger, that quiet shortage of warm touch, is a real and recognized phenomenon that you feel in your mood, your sleep and your body. There is nothing strange about you; you are simply listening to what your body needs.
With me you meet someone who looks at that with the calm of a psychotherapist, entirely without judgement. You can read more about this longing at Touch / Skin hunger.
Am I too old to still long for touch and tenderness?
No, you are never too old. The longing for touch and tenderness doesn’t fade with the years. Your nervous system keeps craving the warmth of another body, whether you are forty, sixty or eighty. Age changes the shape of that need at most, it doesn’t burn out.
For those who live alone or get few visitors especially, the hunger for touch can be at its fiercest. An embrace then says without words: you still matter, you are still allowed to be here as a woman. That feeling has no expiry date.
Women of every age book me for this, and it surprises no one who understands how deep this runs. You can read more about it at Touch / Skin hunger.
Can intimacy later in life actually become more valuable than before?
Yes, and I hear it more often than you’d think. What falls away later in life is the rush. You no longer have to prove to anyone that you are worth the trouble, and the fear of doing something wrong fades. What comes back in its place is bigger: by now you know what you like, and you dare to say it too.
It used to be about performing. Now it is about feeling. Women in their sixties tell me they have only really been enjoying it these last few years, because they no longer watch themselves out of the corner of one eye. That your body has changed in the meantime takes nothing away from that. It doesn’t need to be hidden to be enjoyed.
You can read more about this at Touch / Skin hunger.