Liquid Courage and 'Hooking up' in SELF Magazine

In what feels like a lifetime ago, I was a national educator on sexual assault prevention. As a young man just out of college it was an incredibly challenging and rewarding job. I was able to speak to survivors, college students, military personnel and participate in research that helped reduce myths men have about sexual assault. I still think about the good work we did with the job. I’ve also given presentations and workshops on healthy consent in local high schools so these ideas and concepts are still very much important to me. Unfortunately, as a society we still have so much work to do in this area to help reduce sex-based violence.

Now as a full time mental health provider I continue to support people in their process of healing within my work even though it’s not an area of focus in my practice. I’m still passionate about the topics of sexual health, relational safety and gender based violence and advocate for survivors and healthy relationships.

One of the themes that often comes up within this kind of work is the connection between alcohol, consent and hooking up. Alcohol, while normalized culturally, complicates dynamics around consent, and how we come to understand how to have more enjoyable, satisfying romantic lives.

Recently, I was invited to add my thoughts on relational health, hooking up and alcohol for SELF magazine. If these topics are of interest to you, you can check out the article at the following link:

Enjoy!