What’s Missing in Your Relationship That Others Seem to Have?

Intimacy beyond Instagram filters and reality

Mary Carter
5 min readSep 24, 2024

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You scroll through Instagram and there they are: the perfect couple. Passionate beach hugs, romantic candlelit dinners, declarations of eternal love in carefully crafted captions.

You look over and see your partner in pajamas, snoring on the couch.

And you think: “What are we missing?”

But is something really missing?

Or is true intimacy something that Instagram filters can’t capture?

Real intimacy doesn’t fit in a 1080x1080 pixel square. It’s not measured in likes or shares. It’s something deeper, more real, and paradoxically, harder to photograph.

Imagine this… you wake up in the middle of the night and, without a word, make tea exactly how your partner likes it.

You don’t need to ask. You just know. That’s intimacy.

Or this: you’re at a noisy party and, with a single look, you both know it’s time to leave.

No words.

No discussion.

Just a silent understanding. That’s intimacy.

Real intimacy is in the small moments, not the grand declarations. It’s in how you…

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Mary Carter

I share candid reflections on love, sex, and life's ups and downs, no holds barred and no taboos.