MediaDiet: Aleksandra Trkulja
Aleksandra Trkulja is emotionally intelligent but spiritually feral.
Aleks Trkulja is a certified Sex, Relationships, and Body Image Therapist from Sydney who loves to yap, write, and overshare – exactly the kind of qualities that make for a top-tier COMMPRESS: MediaDiet.
When she’s not running The Pleasure Centre, she’s rinsing her brain with TikTok comments or wrapped up with Harry Potter audiobooks (controversial comfort, she knows). She navigates her life via a careful balance of productivity anxiety, Opposite Action, Buffy reruns, and dog-poo-warmed hands on cold nights.
Aleks reminds us that while the media we consume shapes our days, it’s the way we consume it that shapes us.
Read on to see how Aleks fills her cup (and her screen).
Wake up
I absolutely reach for my phone first thing in the morning because I'm just a girl. I love reading comments on TikTok. The average Joe commenting on a video is somehow the funniest person on the internet. Some mornings I love to flick between TikTok, Instagram, Gmail, iMessage, and WhatsApp. It feels so good to absolutely rinse my brain of dopamine before I'm even fully awake. But then my dog literally gets on top of me, and lays down. He licks my face, and I'm forced to be present. I put my phone down so we can check in, I tell him he's the most handsome guy, and ask him how he slept. He responds with more licks, and a giant yawn.
Most mornings we will lay together, awake, snuggling for up to 30 minutes because he will only exist for a short time in my life and there is nothing as important as the time I spend being still and soft with him. To me, this is the perfect balance.
Morning
I run my own business, and my therapist once said that you have to reserve the part of your day that you have the most energy for yourself. Especially when your job requires you to give to others. That for me is the morning.
So my morning routine is: wake up, cuddle the dog, shower, eat a bagel I baked from scratch (because I'm that girl), make a coffee, sit somewhere I can smell fresh air and eat. I usually walk the dog, and/or go to Muay Thai where I enjoying beating the crap out of a boxing bag and kicking thai pads with the aim of making a man fall over.
My mornings are for me, so this is also the time I will make to do lists, read books, potter around the house, or see friends for coffee. Unless I have a deadline, 7am-12pm are MINE.
After I work out, I love showering. In the shower, I deliberately go as slow as possible. Even though my nervous system screams productivity anxiety, I practice something called Opposite Action (it's from Dialectical Behavioural Therapy), where I literally do just the opposite of what my little busy brain insists I must do. I double cleanse, and use body oil that smells good.
Afternoon
I dedicate my afternoons to others, or my business. I WFH, so from 12pm-7pm, I am but a capitalist that sits on the floor and works. I'm privileged in the sense that the work that pays me also brings me immense meaning and sense of purpose. Not the admin, I mean the actual therapy work. I absolutely hate admin. I am a Pisces, and I am not cut out for it. I will do almost anything instead of admin. Eat, sleep, clean, masturbate; anything.
But alas, I will spend my afternoons chipping away at it. I also make content for socials, edit videos, and write in the afternoons if it's a quiet client day.
Evening
My brain officially switches off at 7pm. I cannot explain to you this physiological or neurological phenomenon, but it's a fact.
At 7pm, my only purpose is to eat, rot, and sleep. I will almost never commit to a social event if I have worked until 7pm. I love to cook so I usually cook myself something yummy, and sit down to Netflix. Lately it's been Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Hacks, Love on the Spectrum, and-or Good Cop/Bad Cop.
On the evenings I finish early, I try to get outside and watch the sunset, or go for a little walk with the dog. I love to pick up his poop on a cold night and let it warm my hands. I love watching him piss on every second bush until there's nothing left, and I say to him "honey, there's nothing left! Time to go home."
Lately, I've absolutely LOVED being in bed at 9pm, putting on night cream, and listening to my Harry Potter audiobook. Yes, I know J.K. Rowling is a TERF, but it's a comfort listen for me. I'm not a podcast person. I know that seems weird for someone who listens for a living, but I fucking hate listening to people yap about nothing.
I also need visual cues to absorb information. I need to see a face expressing itself, or a body shifting to complement the story I hear. I also love reading my smutty little ‘romantasy’ books before bed. They're so silly and romantic and horny. Depending on where I'm at in my menstrual cycle I usually masturbate and fall asleep. Masturbating is really good for sleep, try it.
Aleks’ Picks & Recs
SCREEN TIME: I don't know how to check that and am unwilling to learn how
SUBSCRIBED TO: The Saturday Quiz
SOMETHING I WANT YOU TO READ: Come as You Are: The Surprising New Science that Will Transform Your Sex Life by Emily Nagoski
SOMETHING I WANT YOU TO LISTEN TO: JACOTÉNE
AN UNEXPECTED GOOGLE SEARCH: What is female ejaculate? & How to make a smudge stick?
AN INSTAGRAM ACCOUNT I AM LOVING RIGHT NOW: Just crawfish mukbang content on Instagram & TikTok
A LINK WORTH FORWARDING: