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It's been said that, in matters of love, "When you know, you know." But when it comes to matters of cohabitation, sometimes you can be right about the guy, and not the living-together part. I know because my boyfriend and I recently learned that while we're meant to share our lives, we're not meant to share an apartment.

He and I moved in together after just six months. Yeah, I know, much too soon, but it was the logical thing to do as we were both moving out of our places and had the opportunity to take a short-term sublet in New York City. It seemed like no big deal to live together for a bit, but obviously, that wasn't quite true. But to be quite honest, we were still in the phase where sex was good (like really, really good) that I didn't even care -- the thought of a permanent hotel room sounded pretty incredible.

And it was incredible. For the first three months.

When The Initial Thrill is Gone
At first, we were incredibly happy, despite being broke (did I mention we were both unemployed at the time?). In fact, I thought we had worked out pretty much the perfect scenario -- we didn't have to commute to one another's places anymore, and I was saving on the grocery bill. I had a new roomie who gave out sex, free back massages and would run out for tampons and gummi bears at midnight, no questions asked. I was one lucky chick.

Until one night, he came home from work, walked over to the couch, and tried to give me a peck on the lips. "Babe, stop," I said, turning my head so his kiss landed on my ear. "I'm playing Spider Solitaire, and I'm like one deck away from winning the expert level and the watching the cards fly over the screen."

And that was the beginning of the end, my friends. Not of our relationship, but the notion that this sexy creature who I used to want to lick every time he walked in the door with his cute little grin and almost-gay messenger bag, wasn't doing it for me as much as say ... Minesweeper. It wasn't like our sex life disappeared; it just turned into the scheduled, predictable (looks like doggy-style, again!) sex that I can only imagine marriages are made of. Every so often, we'd get overly tipsy on gin and tonics and do something crazy, but it'd usually wind up with him passed out and me convinced I was pregnant for a month.

First the Sex, Then the Talking
That was just the physical part. Emotionally, we wore out the deep conversations pretty quick. Soon, we'd put "Arrested Development "on during dinner because we didn't have anything that interesting to say to each other. We were close, of course -- we took turns doing dishes; we bought a cat; we read books together in bed in our sweatshirts.

I wasn't unhappy. Just instead of a sexy courtship where I'd jump out of bed to brush my teeth in the morning, it turned into a comfortable marriage where we'd discuss our finances over dinner, then have a glass of wine with a DVD. We talked about our cat a lot. We were married in every sense but legally.

And I don't want to be married. Because I love my boyfriend, but I still have a lot of partying to do.

The Beginning of the End (of the Beginning)
In a weekend of a panic, I hopped on a flight to visit my friends and had an insane girl's night to reevaluate my life. I returned to my apartment and my boyfriend afresh.

"Babe, we're way too young to be this boring," I told him.

He nodded, saying, "As much as I love that you love to sing Clay Aiken in the shower and 'speak' to our cat, we need lives." And then he said it: "We need to date each other again."

So we did. I moved out, and spent the whole first week in my new apartment painting and missing him like crazy. Pretty soon, I was picking up the phone to tell him every trivial detail in my life because, well, I missed him. It turns out, absence doesn't just make the heart grow fonder; it makes the sex-drive kick into overdrive, too. Sure, there are pros to shacking up, but hey, we've got the rest of our lives together to live in the same place.

Beth Brennan is the pseudonym used by Lemondrop bloggers and contributors when we want to write naughty stuff but keep our jobs/boyfriends/dignity.