We’re back to boats again. Several posts ago, we heard from 'Stuart', a man who sails great big boats all over the world, the captain of the ship if you like. But as he poignantly points out, he is ‘a boy doing a man’s job’. He believes this because he has never had sex. If only he knew how many emails I get from men and women just like him, perfectly normal people who, for one reason or another have never gotten around to ‘sealing the deal’.
I digress. Today’s storyteller comes from the Channel Islands and met her ‘first’ online. She then travels to France to meet him and is surprised when, meeting and spending time together for the first time, she feels nervous. ‘It was daunting and awkward to me, sleeping in the same bed as him and getting used to being open around someone new and different……I was not ready for the intimacy just yet, it took me by surprise.’ No shit!! It always surprises me – although I don’t know why. I was probably the same at that age – at how hard people are on themselves. How could you, at 21 years old, particularly never having had a close relationship, expect to feel comfortable around someone that you have only ever spoken to on the phone? Albeit most days for 5 months but still…..imagining something and being there are two different things and intimacy can be scary when you’re young. And is it even intimacy we are talking about anyway? A genuine intimacy is something that grows between two people over a period of time. It is symptomatic of the comfort and ease that two people feel together. Sex is something different. Don’t confuse the two. Although when they do happen to collide, it can lead to a life-changingly pleasurable situation.
One step at a time and all that.
‘Hi there Kate,
My name is Nicky, I am 22 and I live on Guernsey which is one of the Channel Islands. I read your article in Glamour magazine yesterday and it got me thinking that I would really love to write down how I lost my virginity. I love to have a record of things to look back on, and I hope my story will be interesting to you!
I met my other half through internet dating last year. I will admit that I have never taken such a risk before as to go to France, across to a different country to meet someone off the internet. Was I, at 21 years old, ready to have a proper adult relationship with someone who I had only talked to for about 5 months before hand? Was I just settling for the first man to ever show me any attention? What will people think of me? I have always had low self esteem issues so just the pure belief that someone could love me for myself was hard to get used to at first, and to me seemed a valid reason to take the plunge and make the first step.
That first boat trip I took over was the most nervous I had ever been about anything in my life. I had butterflies and my heart was going a million miles per hour. I was so scared of what he might think of me and what would I do if it didn’t work out how I hoped? My mum didn't even know that I was going to France. She thought I had gone somewhere on a 'girls' holiday. I had to take the plunge, not only for the possibility of having a long term relationship but for myself. It was something completely out of my comfort zone, but I figured what was life without a little risk?
I arrived in France to meet him. The man I had been talking to online for 5 months. It was daunting and awkward to me, sleeping in the same bed as him and getting used to being open around someone new and different, I was so used to talking to him that to be around him physically I felt very shy and it took me a few days to just get used to that. The first night we spent together in bed was awkward. I was not ready for the intimacy just yet, it took me by surprise. We kissed but it was too much too quickly, I could feel him getting excited in bed and it scared me. I was a virgin with hardly any experience, in bed with a man for the first time in my life. Yes at 21 it seems a bit old, but I felt I waited for the right person to give my virginity too which I always viewed as a gift. I used to be religious but I am more indifferent now that I can enjoy my life without feeling guilty for doing things like drinking too much or having sex before marriage that people would ultimately judge me for. Who have I got to prove myself to other than myself? I have learnt so much that life is what I can make of it despite what other people think.
Anyway the week progressed that I spent in France last July. Me and the other half went to the supermarket. Ironically we both were eyeing up condoms in the aisle. We went home and later that evening last year we were getting frisky, and I decided there and then that yes he was the one I wanted to do it with, and yes I knew that we were going to be together for as long as we both lived.
I don't know what made me decide that but I love the fact that my first time was with someone I knew was worth waiting for and that the story of it is amusing to me. So as I said we were getting frisky in bed and I said that I wanted to go all the way with him. He asked me if I had any condoms and I said no, I thought you had some. So as it turned out, at about 10 pm in Catholic France we decided to drive to the nearest town to look for a condom machine. We tried several places with no such luck. Although it seems crazy, I suggested that we drive all the way to St Malo which is a 70 mile round trip….for condoms. We looked at each other and we decided that, yes it was worth it for my first time. So we arrived in St Malo, get out the car and go into the walled city, walking around looking for shops that might sell condoms. I spot a newsagents and I make him go in there. He asks the guy for condoms who takes them out from under the counter as if it's a crime, gives them to him for a euro and winks and says, ‘Have a good time’. My boyfriend comes out of the shop, hands me the packet which I stuff in my jeans pocket, (I still have the box as a memento) and then we go back to his house to, well, do the deed. Which I will admit is not all what its cracked up to be. It hurt and I felt sore afterwards. I didn't orgasm but me and him have found ways around that. We love to do other things to each other which is part of the adaptation of having a relationship. A year on the passion is still there and I am counting down the days until I see him again soon. I am so glad that one risk for love has worked out in favor for me'.
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