Music has long been used as a balm to soothe the pain of a broken heart, but, as Sherry Zhang explains, not just any old soundtrack will do. Valentine’s Day is the time for it. Other than the weeks leading up to Christmas, no other time spurs on the “it’s not you, it’s me” convo … Read more
The new sexuality education guidelines aim to teach kids about healthy relationships – and what sort of parent wouldn’t welcome that? On Tuesday, new sexuality education guidelines were introduced in New Zealand schools. The long-awaited changes include a greater focus on consent, gender and pornography. These guidelines have been years in the making and parents … Read more
With fewer couples than ever getting married, women are realising marriage is not all it’s cracked up to be. Emily Writes asks herself why, despite this, she’s so enamoured with her own. Last year, New Zealand recorded a record low of marriages and civil unions, with just 19,071 – less than half the rate of … Read more
As the past few weeks have starkly revealed, we can’t always conflate the occupants of a single residence into one neat group. Anthropologists Susanna Trnka and Sharyn Graham Davies explain. On March 23, New Zealanders were presented with a stark and unprecedented demand to get into our “bubbles” within 48 hours and stay there for … Read more
Jai Breitnauer on what happens when male role models start disappearing from a child’s life. Recently, we saw a ghost from the past. Once a regular visitor to our home, there just after the birth of our first child and a constant presence for more than a decade, this individual disappeared from our lives a … Read more
What could an online private investigator discover about you? Madeleine Chapman paid $99 to find out. When my colleague mentioned in passing that she once stood front row at a Beyoncé concert and incoherently screamed a line of a song into Beyoncé’s microphone, and that footage of the incident was somewhere on Youtube, I knew … Read more
Relationship expert Holly Dixon explains why the entire Married at First Sight franchise is based on bunk science. As the third MAFS NZ season has come to an end, I thought it relevant to answer the question upon which the entire MAFS enterprise is built: Is it possible to predict attraction and how successful a relationship … Read more
In these days of alienation, singletons need all the help they can get. But who is doing love right? Only the hottest couple in Fountain Lakes, explains Don Rowe. There are a lot of unhealthy behaviours on the television folks, a lot of cheating, philandering, and promiscuity. From Game of Thrones to Euphoria, our stars … Read more
As The Block NZ fizzles to an end, psychologist Dougal Sutherland argues that the show now seems designed to destroy relationships, rather than build houses. Over the past few months we’ve watched four couples designing, planning, painting, papering (sometimes poorly), plastering, and dressing the rooms of converted firehouses to auction them off to the highest … Read more
A new poem by performance poet Carrie Rudzinski. Love Poem after Seven Years At this point it’s difficult to sleep without you. I prefer to take up the whole bed with you in it, just to listen to your protests before I fall asleep. I’ve said No to your drunk half-proposals more times than … Read more
Over its eight seasons, Game of Thrones demonstrated some of the most screwed up inter-personal relationships ever shown on screen. But there were some bright spots, says relationship expert Holly Dixon. Contains Game of Thrones spoilers up to and including season 8 episode 5, ‘The Bells’. In many ways, Game of Thrones is a meditation … Read more
Pre-meeting meetings sound like bureaucracy gone mad to Westerners, but the Japanese method of decision-making means everyone is brought along together. From the moment you first arrive in Japan you realise that your conceptions, whatever they are, need to be thrown aside. I ended up living for a total of five years in Osaka and … Read more
In the second instalment of our Money Talks series, Alice Webb-Liddall and Henry Oliver face up to their finances. Dealing with money is complicated enough when you are a single person with a single income. But it can be more than twice as complicated if there are two (or more) of you in a committed … Read more
Is there nothing that public transport can’t do? My commute nearly killed me. And it also came pretty close to dismantling my marriage. To get from my home in Titirangi to my previous job in Penrose, I had little choice but to drive. The journey by car was 30 minutes to an hour depending on … Read more
Undercover Assholes wreck your self-esteem in some way, shape or form. But they’re also hard to spot, so how do you uncover one? Lauren Meredith gives her tips on how to look past their masterful disguise. You know how it goes. You meet someone. They seem awesome. They’re funny, nice and sweet. Maybe you want … Read more
Last week, a Supreme Court decision awarded a woman $520,000 to make up for the fact that she gave up her career and potential income to look after the couple’s children and home. The Law Commission’s Stephen Day discusses the Property (Relationships) Act 1976 as it stands and what could be done to change it. This … Read more
Last week The Legends Academy’s Ben Alexander was back in Auckland to hold one of his regular workshops on ‘modern dating skills’ for men. The Academy claims to reject the blatant misogyny of the old-style PUA culture, but what does it offer men instead? Branko Marcetic joined the audience to find out. If our Google … Read more
A new baby can be hell on your romantic relationship, but it doesn’t have to be. The secret? It’s really no great secret: communication, and lots of it, says Leigh-ann Griffiths. Meet Leigh-ann Griffiths, our new Spinoff Parents Relationships Expert. She’s got three kids and is a trained counsellor. She’s no-nonsense but she’s compassionate too. … Read more
This week, a teenage special: Ms. X dishes out advice to a uni student with a crush on an older guy, and to a teen girl sick of hearing her sister have loud sex. Hello Ms. X, I am a 17 year old girl and I have two problems. So I have a twin sister … Read more
In-house psychotherapist Ms. X has some good advice for couples stuck in the fight/make up/fight rut. Hey Ms. X, This is such a cool idea first of all! I tried to start an advice column at my uni mag but it didn’t work. I guess I’m the one who should be getting advice, not giving … Read more
There’s no reason to feel guilty about pulling the plug on a toxic friendship, says in-house psychotherapist Ms X. Dear Ms X, I’m writing to ask about maybe letting go of a long friendship. I’ve been friends with “Kate” for about a decade, since we were angsty teens in desperate need of some solid emotional … Read more