"You're just one of...". How gay saunas help people cope with loneliness—and why it doesn't always work

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For a long time, gay saunas remained something separate from the rest of my life—like a parallel realm you enter not in a daytime mood, but in an evening or nighttime one, when you’re feeling a little tired. Not the kind of mood you’d have as a tourist, not a sunny one. More like the kind where you know exactly why you’re there: for sex.

I’d been to saunas in Russia, too, but back then everything was simpler and more straightforward: I went there mainly for sex, to satisfy a physical need, to let off steam, without getting caught up in any deeper meanings. After moving to Spain, I started going there more often than I expected—and the reasons turned out to be different. Here, it’s simpler in and of itself: everything is legal, out in the open, men are more relaxed, and the atmosphere is less tense. But that’s not the only reason. When you’re living abroad, aside from the new streets and the loneliness, the language doesn’t always cooperate. And at some point, you catch yourself looking not for a conversation, but for connection without explanations—because striking up a conversation with a guy you like in a bar or on the street turns out to be much harder when the language hasn’t truly become your own yet.

In this sense, a sauna is an utterly honest space. Here, no one pretends they’ve just come to drink a beer. Here, hardly anyone asks who you are or where you’re from. Everything happens through the body before it happens through words.

And yet, it's not as simple as it seems.

From the outside, it seems like a place without vulnerability: men striding confidently down the hallways, relaxed bodies, glances that don’t linger for more than a second if you’re not interesting. But the more often I found myself there, the clearer it became to me that beneath that confidence lay many very similar states of mind. Anticipation. Scanning. Hope. Quick disappointment. Another round.

I’ve noticed people coming and going. Some stay for a long time, while others disappear after twenty minutes. Some connect almost immediately, while others wander for hours between the pairs of tables and the dark aisles, as if they’re looking not for a body, but for a connection.

Sometimes I caught myself doing the same thing.

Sometimes the question “Why am I here?” becomes less philosophical and more physical. It pops up in the pauses between kisses and blowjobs, in that moment when you’ve just finished with one guy, and ten minutes later you’re already heading back into the dark room in search of another fuck buddy. In moments like these, you try to figure out exactly what you’re numbing right now—loneliness, anxiety, or the fear of being alone.

Because a sauna really can act as a temporary pain reliever. The heat, the skin, the closeness—all of this brings you back to your body and takes your mind off things. For a little while, you stop feeling separate, like an outsider, like a newcomer to the country. You’re just one of the crowd.

But then you step outside. It’s night. The air is cool. Your phone is in your pocket. And sometimes it’s not one specific man who stays in your memory, but several at once—different hands, cocks, scents. There was sex. There was connection. But the feeling you came here for has either quieted down—or simply retreated deep inside and decided to wait for next time.

I thought for a long time about whether a sauna intensifies loneliness or helps you cope with it.

I guess it doesn't depend on the place, but on what you bring with you. If you feel empty inside, you risk leaving with that same emptiness—only more tired. If you feel tense inside, you can actually let that tension go.

The hardest thing for me was admitting that sometimes I didn't go there for the sex itself. I went for validation. To know that I was desired. That I was chosen. That I wasn't just fading into the background in this new city.

And this is where the sauna becomes a mirror. Not a cruel one, but a direct one. It quickly reveals where you’re secure, and where you start to depend on the gaze of others. Where the mere fact of your presence is enough—and where you wait for someone to linger nearby for longer than ten minutes.

There were evenings after which I left feeling calmer than when I arrived. For example, on that New Year’s Eve. With the feeling that my body had regained its balance, that the tension had eased, and that life once again felt rich and real.

But there were others. When everything went smoothly and easily—immediate connection, familiar poses and movements, a stranger’s breath against my ear, when some man would press me against the wall and kiss me—yet inside, there remained a strange emptiness. Not a tragic one. Just cold. As if there were many bodies, but no connection with any of them.

A sauna isn’t a substitute for conversations, friends, long-term relationships, or a sense of home. It doesn’t build a future. But it can offer a break. A night that’s easier to get through. A connection that doesn’t require a backstory. And perhaps this is the most important thing: don’t ask of it what it doesn’t promise.

These days, I feel more at ease with these spaces than I used to. I have no illusions, but I don’t feel ashamed either. Sometimes I want to go there. Sometimes I don’t. Just sex, a release—and that’s it. And that, too, is part of growing up: realizing that you’re going not because you “have to,” but because it’s what feels right for you today.

I don’t consider saunas to be either a salvation or a trap. Rather, they’re a tool. A temporary one. A physical one. A human one. An imperfect one. And perhaps the most honest thing about them is that you can’t hide from yourself there. Not even in the dim light.

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