\u201cThe problem is that \u2018sex and love addiction\u2019 has terrible branding,\u201d Richardson says. \u201cAs soon as you tell someone, they assume that your issue is not being able to keep it in your pants. And it\u2019s funny, because mine\u2019s the opposite. I\u2019m not looking for a quick shag. I\u2019m looking for an idol to dedicate my thoughts, my life, my purpose to. I\u2019ve only slept with 14 people, as everyone now knows<\/a>. That\u2019s quite low. But it\u2019s because I have to get obsessed with them first.\u201d<\/p>\n Richardson has identified as a sex and love addict since the age of 20 \u2013 \u201cI can\u2019t relate to people in a healthy way. It\u2019s always about consuming, or being consumed by someone\u201d \u2013 even though she\u2019s been engaged in a cycle of infatuations and obsessions since the age of 14. She\u2019s now in a process of recovering from her addiction with the help of therapy, and is doing much better; partly due to being celibate for eight months.<\/p>\n But last month, she went on 100 dates \u2013 all in one day. It was part of a performance piece entitled \u201c100 Dates\u201d, where on Valentine\u2019s Day, she speed-dated 100 people over Zoom. Anyone could sign up for a slot; everyone got the same five minutes. <\/p>\n open image in gallery<\/p>\n Richardson\u2019s \u2018Temporary\u2019 (2025), in which she had the names of her ex-lovers\u2019 mothers tattooed on her ribcage (Harriet Richardson)<\/p>\n Her reasons are part experimental, part to prove something to herself. \u201cThrough recovery, I\u2019ve had to look at how I connect to people, and going on 100 dates is an extreme version of that analysis. I want to show that it\u2019s possible to have connections other than Wuthering Heights-level obsession. That, and I think 18 hours of durational dating is good for me.\u201d<\/p>\n When I make an exhausted-sounding noise in response, Harriet laughs. \u201cIt\u2019s funny, because when I tell people about the \u2018100 Dates\u2019 performances, they say, \u2018You\u2019re mad, I could never do that.\u2019 But compared to the effort that I put in when I get obsessed with someone, this is not taxing. Let me tell you what\u2019s taxing: giving your life to a concept for two decades.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s a fitting stunt amid an online culture wholly preoccupied with extremes of all kinds. From MrBeast, the most popular YouTuber in the world, who made his fortune by cramming ever-larger numbers of people into various places<\/a> and asking them to do various things, to Bonnie Blue<\/a>, who is constantly finding new, concerning numbers of men to have sex with in a day.<\/p>\n Richardson\u2019s process for her day of 100 dates began on 9 February when she posted a sign-up link online: \u201cOpen to all ages, genders, orientations and relationship statuses. Exes, singletons, old flames, people I\u2019ve accidentally ghosted, and David Harbour are all welcome.\u201d The day before, she spent hours meal-prepping and doing test calls to make sure the tech wouldn\u2019t fall through.<\/p>\n open image in gallery<\/p>\n Maja Anushka on her Zoom date with Harriet (Harriet Richardson)<\/p>\n Finally, on Valentine\u2019s Day, after \u201cabout four hours\u2019 sleep\u201d, Harriet sat down for her first date at 8am. With a five-minute comfort break between each participant to eat and go to the bathroom, she was scheduled to be done by 2am the next day.<\/p>\n One of the dates was with me. Knowing I would be writing this piece, I wanted to know what the process felt like from the other side. For the whole day, the all-important time slot of 4pm loomed over me (\u201cDon\u2019t be late,\u201d Harriet had warned her Instagram followers the day before). Finally, after locating the best lighting in my living room, I settled onto the sofa and logged on. I was nervous. <\/p>\n But five minutes, as it turns out, is not a very long time. We laughed about our types (\u201cline them up, and they all look like that rat from Flushed Away\u201d) and awkwardly interrupted each other over a slightly dodgy internet connection. And then our time was up; she said goodbye; it was over. The date had felt rushed, but I still enjoyed it more than most of the dates I\u2019ve been on in my two years of being single; I felt I\u2019d played a tiny part in a wider, more complicated whole, and it left me with a buzz for the rest of the day.<\/p>\n After we parted ways, Harriet stayed sitting, and dating, for another 12 hours. At 2.45am, after a grand total of 105 dates (with some extras thrown in to make up for some no-shows), she was done. With the last date logged off, Harriet closed her laptop, and immediately burst into exhausted, happy tears.<\/p>\n \u201cI just felt this gratitude for being alive, for these connections with people that don\u2019t owe me anything, who still set candles up and put on a nice top and prepared questions to ask,\u201d Harriet tells me the next day, through a croaky voice. \u201cIt\u2019s that amazing sense of: we\u2019re all here, trying to be seen or happy or loved.\u201d<\/p>\n open image in gallery<\/p>\n Makes you sip: Harriet drinking on one of her dates (Harriet Richardson)<\/p>\n This is not the first time Richardson has gone on 100 dates in a day. Back in 2024, she did the same stunt on Valentine\u2019s Day. Only back then, her relationship was failing and she wanted to prove that she wasn\u2019t as alone as she felt. This second version of 100 dates partly functioned as a reaction to her growth through addiction. <\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m not recovered, and I never will be,\u201d explains Richardson. While some addictions require abstinence, others must be managed. The tricky thing about being addicted to people is that they cannot simply be sworn off forever. \u201cI\u2019m always managing it, and it\u2019ll always be there. Like any other addiction, it\u2019ll flare up in times of stress or uncertainty. With everything going on in the world, I can feel myself wanting to yearn again, because it\u2019s familiar, and I know how that process goes.\u201d<\/p>\n This time, Richardson was more focused on being authentic, rather than acting out what she thought other people wanted her to be, in order to get their approval. \u201cI recognised it most in the dates where I didn\u2019t get on with them. Last time, I would have been all, oh my God, that\u2019s so funny, that\u2019s amazing, ha ha ha. This time, I just reacted how I wanted to react. I didn\u2019t play anything up. I\u2019ve not done that before.\u201d<\/p>\n Both years, Richardson was sick in bed for a week after the 100 dates, her brain and body reeling from sheer exposure to humanity. Her skin broke out. She had mouth ulcers from talking so much. Her Oura ring \u2013 a fitness tracking device \u2013 told her she\u2019d hit her daily walking goal by midday, despite her sitting still. \u201cWaking up the next morning, I could not move. I\u2019ve never been exhausted like that before.\u201d<\/p>\n She found herself wanting to go on a second date with around 10 per cent of her dates, but won\u2019t follow up with them as she believes in the integrity of the isolated performance \u2013 and she\u2019s also too tired. \u201cExhaustion is a great way to avoid addictive behaviour,\u201d she laughs.<\/p>\n Waking up the next morning, I could not move. I\u2019ve never been exhausted like that before<\/p>\n Harriet Richardson<\/p>\n Back in 2024, she felt attracted to a similar amount of people, but this time, she realised her type was different. Instead of the usual mysterious (read: inaccessible) men, the people Harriet was intrigued by this time were those who had taken the time to get to know themselves. The attraction superseded everything else \u2013 gender, age, appearance. \u201cMy type has changed! It\u2019s such a relief that I could cry!\u201d<\/p>\n One date, in particular, was familiar in a way she couldn\u2019t quite understand, until he explained that his problem with dating was that people kept saying he was \u2018too unproblematic\u2019. She smiled and gently pointed out that a lack of problems might be, in itself, a problem. She\u2019d heard this exact sentiment numerous times before \u2013 from her ex-boyfriend.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd this guy was precisely the kind I would have dated before. Moustache, Irish, hot. But I realised very quickly: you\u2019re like a mousetrap, and that cheese is going to give me food poisoning in five years\u2019 time.\u201d<\/p>\n A few weeks on from her 100 dates, Harriet remains celibate. It\u2019s hard for her, but she\u2019s seeing it out, to whichever end she needs. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t have a set end date, because that won\u2019t be helpful to me. I\u2019m just doing it until I feel that I can have sex and relate to someone healthily, and I think I\u2019m getting there. But it doesn\u2019t ever stop. I just have to continually watch these things, like a child who wants sweets. They can have a few, but not the whole shop.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Your support helps us to tell the story From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":330762,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[430,156,111,139,69],"class_list":["post-330761","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330761","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=330761"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330761\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/330762"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=330761"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=330761"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=330761"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Richardson\u2019s](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/10--Temporary-2025-Hero-Image-Harriet-Richardson-copy.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n![\"Maja](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/maja-date.png\")
<\/p>\n![\"Makes](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/D11.png\")
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