It takes a lot to shock me. I write about sex and dating for a living – I’ve heard it all. 

But recently, at a dinner with friends, I learned something that made my jaw hit the floor. 

A married couple in my friendship group – sweet, mortgage-burdened, white-picket-fence types – decided to tell me about the unconventional way they had saved their marriage during a recent rocky patch. 

They had tried counselling but couldn’t afford the time or cost of weekly sessions.

Then, they’d heard through the grapevine of other middle-class couples struggling with marriage monotony and Groundhog Day sex (or – horror – no sex at all!) that MDMA, also known as ecstasy or molly, could help.

Yep. The party drug you might have experimented with in your teens, the one that gave you enough of a buzz to dance all night and lose your inhibitions with a sexy stranger, is now the middle-class drug du jour for those whose marriages and sex lives need a little… pepping up. 

The drug (which Aussies call ‘pingers’ because we have our own weird nicknames for everything) breaks down barriers and dissolves fears while cultivating strong feelings of empathy and love.

Which kind of sounds like couples therapy, only more fun. 

Jana Hocking says several of her friends saved their marriages by having 'chemsex'

Jana Hocking says several of her friends saved their marriages by having ‘chemsex’

And when you combine ecstasy and sex, there’s a buzzy name for it: chemsex. 

Now, despite the fact this couple hadn’t touched an illegal drug since their university days 15 years earlier, they decided to give it a go before meeting divorce lawyers.

My curiosity piqued, I asked them – purely for research purposes – how it all went down.

They told me they’d sourced MDMA from a friend of a friend, hired a babysitter for the night, checked into a fancy hotel, and locked themselves in.

And after a couple of glasses of champagne, a small amount of MDMA for them both (and half a Viagra for him) they began to feel like naughty teenagers again.

They had sex. Then they talked for hours. They really listened to each other. They cried together, held each other and made love again. 

Afterwards, they felt more connected than they had in years.

I started to wonder how many other couples were doing the same, so I asked my social media followers for their stories – and they did not disappoint.

'At first it was beautiful. We were hugging and laughing and saying all the things we missed about each other' (stock image)

‘At first it was beautiful. We were hugging and laughing and saying all the things we missed about each other’ (stock image)

Sharon* told me: ‘I was honestly about to file for divorce. The only thing keeping us together was inertia and guilt. A friend from Los Angeles told me about MDMA therapy and I figured, f*** it, I’ll give it one last try.

‘We did it at home with music, wine, snacks (no one tells you it kills your appetite). What I didn’t expect was how safe I felt to finally tell him how invisible I’d felt since becoming a mother. He just held me and said, “I miss you too”. We sobbed and slow danced to the Rolling Stones.

‘I don’t know if it was the drugs, the nostalgia, or just trying something out of our comfort zone, but something definitely shifted. 

‘Since then, we’ve started seeing a couples’ counsellor and we’re both more open to talking than we’ve ever been.’

Another woman used the drug to try to feel safer in her body after sexual trauma. 

‘I experienced serious sexual trauma as a child, at the hands of a male family member. It took me more than 20 years to even begin unpacking it,’ she said.

‘I never used psychedelics recreationally, but eventually I began working with MDMA under expert guidance to help process what had happened to me. 

‘For most of my adult life, sex had felt hollow and traumatic. I would dissociate, cry or even get physically ill after being intimate. I had very few partners. Ironically, they all thought I was the “best sex” they’d ever had – because I was hyper-focused on their needs and desires. But it was all performance.

‘The first time I had sex while assisted by MDMA, something shifted. I felt present. I felt safe in my own body. There was no fear, no shame, no panic. Just connection.’

Now she is finally able to enjoy sex.

‘I’m more adventurous, more confident, and for the first time, it doesn’t feel like a performance. My partner says he’s never felt closer to me.’

'The first time I had sex while on MDMA, something shifted' (stock image posed by models)

‘The first time I had sex while on MDMA, something shifted’ (stock image posed by models)

Then there are the couples who make it a regular ritual.

‘We do it every three months,’ one woman told me.

‘Just us at home with a small dose of MDMA, and a “no phones, no fights” rule. It’s become our little marriage retreat.

“It’s not about sex – although that’s great, too – it’s about getting out of the day-to-day chaos and actually seeing each other again. We write stuff down, share our feelings from the past month and even set intentions. 

‘I know it sounds woo-woo, but it’s the only thing that’s stopped us from becoming full passive-aggressive divorce monsters that we’ve seen our other friends turn into.’

However, not all of the stories were positive. 

Mick* regrets the day he tried it with his wife.

‘We were already rocky. There’d been a couple of suspicious texts, a few vague stories. I thought maybe the drug would help us talk it out, clear the air,’ he said.

‘At first it was beautiful. We were hugging and laughing and saying all the things we missed about each other. But then she told me she’d kissed someone at a work event.

‘She said it didn’t mean anything, but felt like she had to come clean. I nodded at the time, but the next day, once the drugs had worn off, I was a complete mess.

‘We broke up three weeks later. Would we have lasted without the MDMA? Probably not, but I won’t pretend it didn’t hurt like hell.’

Another couple made an unexpected discovery at a music festival.

‘We’d taken a mix of MDMA and ketamine at a festival, and when we got home, something clicked or maybe unclicked? Either way, it was the most intense sex we’d ever had,’ a wife told me. 

‘I squirted for the first time in my life, which shocked us both in the best possible way. We just kept laughing, touching, connecting… it was playful and primal and completely unexpected. It felt like we discovered a whole new side to each other.’

Then there was the couple who scratched their ‘seven-year itch’.

‘Seven years in, things were feeling a bit stale. The spark had dulled, sex was routine, and we were starting to drift emotionally,’ she began. 

‘Then one night, we tried MDMA together. I know… not exactly what a relationship counsellor would recommend but it changed everything. We stayed up for hours just talking about fantasies, insecurities, all the stuff we were too shy to bring up sober. 

‘Then we had the wildest sex of our relationship. Since then, we’ve had a great sex life. We do chemsex a couple of times a year, and every time it resets us emotionally and physically. We even told close friends about it and it saved their marriages too.’

Now, let’s be very clear: this isn’t a recommendation. It’s an observation.

The couples I spoke to weren’t reckless thrill-seekers. They were exhausted professionals with kids, debt and relationship issues they were trying to solve. 

For them, MDMA wasn’t a party drug – it was a last-ditch effort to get emotionally naked when all else had failed.

So, is it legal? Not really… but kind of. In Australia, as of July 1, 2023, authorised psychiatrists can prescribe MDMA (and psilocybin – the active ingredient in magic mushrooms) for specific mental health conditions like post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and treatment-resistant depression (TRD).

According to the Therapeutic Goods Administration, these substances have shown promising results when used in controlled, medically supervised environments (not in hotel rooms with a bottle of Veuve).

They stress that while MDMA is relatively safe when administered in precise doses by professionals, it can be dangerous – even lethal – when taken recreationally. And no, it’s not approved for use in treating relationship issues.

Would I try it? Maybe. Because I’ve always believed that anything that helps couples communicate better is worth trying. 

* Names have been changed. Recreational drugs are illegal and carry risks

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Read more at DailyMail.co.uk