Makeup Sex After A Fight? One Mum Swears By It
Mum-of-two Celeste Phua doesn’t believe in going to bed angry. In this Too Tired Mums episode, we unpack makeup sex, and how well it works in real life.
By Estelle Low -
Would you sacrifice sleep to resolve a conflict with your husband?
For Celeste, going to bed angry isn’t an option. She prefers to thrash things out immediately, even if it means staying up till the wee hours. In the process of clearing the air, it sometimes leads to makeup sex. The kind of happy ending we can imagine.
In her words: “If I’m angry, he will have to make up to me.”
Quite literally, this means spending more time making her happy. “More orgasm time for me.” It’s immediate, emotional, and in her experience, effective.
I, on the other hand, would rather sleep first and deal with it later.
Of course, there are nights when the frustration sits so heavily that I can’t sleep. And yes, I’ve been tempted to wake my husband up too. But more often than not, I don’t.
Because the reality is, we’re both exhausted. His brain is already switched off, and mine isn’t far behind. Trying to resolve something in that state — let alone initiate makeup sex — feels like a gargantuan task. One that requires time, energy, and emotional bandwidth we don’t always have.
The biggest deterrent? Our 6.20am wakeup time to prep our kids for school. (They are in Primary 5 and 2 this year.)
So we pause and sleep. And we come back to it the next day, sometimes even a few days later. It could be a text. Or a small gesture that says “I’m still here.”
Which is why makeup sex, for me, isn’t a rule. If it happens, it happens. There are so many other ways for us to reconcile.
Making up at 11pm? Maybe. But past midnight? Let’s sleep on it.
Watch the Too Tired Mums episode here.
Too Tired Mums is The Singapore Women’s Weekly’s original talk show series that gives motherhood its most honest voice — where real mums open up about the things we don’t always say out loud, reminding us that we’re never truly alone.
Host: Estelle Low
Guest: Celeste Phua
Producer: Maya Eman
Art director: Michelle Lee
Videography, studio setup and editing: Studio+65
Makeup: Dorcas Yam, using Dior
Hairstyling: Pattama Phumriew, using Schwarzkopf Osis+
Fashion styling: Angela Chu, assisted by Tricia Fan
Outfits: On Estelle, Onitsuka Tiger. On Celeste, Brunello Cucinelli