Drew Barrymore says she’s not someone who needs sex

Drew Barrymore has opened up about love and intimacy following her divorce from Will Kopelman, stating that she is “not a person who needs sex”.

Posting on her blog on Sunday (16 October), Barrymore explained that a woman had assumed that she “hates sex” after comments she made that “abstaining from sex for six months just didn’t seem like that long to me”.

In the deeply intimate post, Barrymore, 47, explained that since her divorce in 2016 after four years of marriage she does not hate sex, however she now has “very different feelings about intimacy”.

She wrote: “At nearly 48 I have very different feelings about intimacy than I did growing up… After two kids and a separation from their father that has made me cautious, I have had the pleasure of shifting my focus when it comes to love for myself and my two daughters.

“I know that does not include a man nor has it for a while. I’ve come to realise through working in therapy (with Barry), he said something and I had to write it down.

“He said, ‘Sex is not love! It is the expression of love.’ I have searched my whole life to have words like that to help me understand the difference and now, thanks to him, I do.”

Barrymore added that since her divorce she has “not been able to have an intimate relationship”, but is instead able to “work on myself” and “learn what parenting is”.

“I also talk about and have learned when something doesn’t make you feel good or it makes you feel bad about yourself, pay as much attention to that as what makes you feel great because there’s a lesson in there,” she wrote.

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Drew Barrymore also opened up about the ending of her marriage, explaining that her divorce “rocked my core”.

“For the record, I do not hate sex! I have just finally come to the epiphany that love and sex are simply not the same thing I searched my whole life for, which is to be a calm woman and not a bombastic party girl.

“When you grow up and are in a marriage with kids, you think you’ll only be with this one person for the rest of your life, and then that doesn’t happen? It rocked me to my core, to put it lightly.

“But I am lucky enough to have my cup runneth over in the love department: I have my two daughters, and for the first time ever in my life, I’m actually including self-love, too.”

Barrymore has previously stated that she has been meeting new people in recent years, explaining that Queer Eye‘s Fab Five has helped her to reenter the dating scene since her split.

During an appearance on The Drew Barrymore Show, the Fab Five coached the actress through a digital date with chef Sam Talbot.

Speaking to interior designer Bobby Berk, Barrymore admitted she thought it would take her a “very long time” to meet someone, as she has “two young girls” at home.

But Berk told her not to put too much pressure on herself, and that admitting “I don’t know how to do it” is usually the “first step of figuring out how to do it”.

Speaking to ET after the show, Barrymore said Bobby’s advice was “honestly was one of the most healing moments I have had in the last decade”.

“He said, ‘Your apprehension and cautiousness is what helps make you a good parent,” she added.

“It was a real gift for me to to get that nod of approval that yeah, my parenting comes first.”