Drew Barrymore is opening up about her private life, saying that she does not "need sex" after splitting in 2016 from ex-husband Will Kopelman, the father of her two daughters.
The "Never Been Kissed" star got candid about her abstinence in a new blog post that was written in response to a media frenzy that erupted after she joked in Tuesday's episode of her talk show that she can go "years" without getting intimate, according to Page Six.
"What's wrong with me that six months doesn't seem like a very long time?" Barrymore said in response to Andrew Garfield's recent revelation that he was celibate for half a year.
Her comments garnered widespread media coverage and prompted the actor to write a blog elaborating on her comments.
"I have had the pleasure of shifting my focus when it comes to love for myself and my two daughters [Olive, 10, and Frankie, 8]," Barrymore wrote.
"I know that does not include a man nor has it for a while. I've come to realize through working in therapy [with therapist Barry Michels], he said something and I had to write it down," she continued.
Barrymore said through therapy she learned that "Sex is not love. It is the expression of love. I have searched my whole life to have words like that to help me understand the difference."
Barrymore said that being in a relationship was not a priority to her and that she was not a person "who needs sex and has to go out there and engage with people on that level."
Her commitment was to fostering how young girls, her daughters, and herself, as a woman, "are supposed to function in this world!"
"A relationship with a man has not been top of mind for me for a very long time," Barrymore continued, adding that there was nothing wrong with people leaving a marriage or relationship and entering a new one shortly after — it just was not for her.
"I needed to stay very celibate and honoring and in some sort of state of mourning of the loss of a nuclear family that I swore I would have for my daughters and to find grace and acceptance and what our new normal of a blended family would be," she wrote. "It took time. I'm proud of myself that I took that time. That's what I, as my own individual and no one else just me, needed to do and I honored that and I respect myself for it, as I respect anyone else for their choices."
Barrymore added: "I have just simply come to laugh about the fact that it is not my personal priority to be with a partner, but that doesn't mean it won't become one some day. I need time. And my view on sex has truly changed."