Yo! Youth OutLook

Sex is a funny thing. Not hysterically funny, well, at least to those who don’t have much or any experience in the field. While growing up the only information I got about sex was from steady doses brought to you by the media, movies, T.V. especially any WB show on from 8-10 pm during the week. But in reality, I realized sex isn’t wrapped up in a pretty little package with a bow. It is really wrapped up in a hurry, with newspaper and the words CAUTION sprawled out on the front sloppily with black marker.

When I first had sex I was on the verge of graduating high school. It was literally only a few days before I was going to receive my diploma. At the time, I was just having a hard time grasping where I was in my life. I was moving up in the world, my four-year cushion of high school was evaporating before my eyes, my friends were all heading in different directions, but I still felt like I hadn’t moved an inch. Everything just felt as though it was moving faster than I could take it in. And now, I wasn’t even a virgin, everything I used to be felt like it was written in dry erase markers – there one minute, and gone the next after you wipe it down with some semi-toxic chemical.

I lost my virginity to my ex-boyfriend but we weren’t together at the time. We had been together for a little less than a year but the relationship was pretty solid for such a short time. Things were good until the beginning of our junior year of high school. It felt similar to the stock market. The whole thing had been up to some pretty good highs before it slowly and steadily started to fall and then crashed with no one really knowing why. Basically, I called him up one night and he during our talk he told me he wanted to end things. At the time he said that he was having some personal problems, but later I found out he just didn’t want to be with me anymore. I was so angry and hurt that I fell into this deep, scary depression cycle. It was hard for other people to be around me, much less be around myself.

After that, I made the very stupid mistake of having an on and off fling with him, which never ended well. Why we kept messing around after all that drama happened, I’m not really sure. For me, I think it was the fear of maybe no one else would care about me the way he did, or even like me. I figured my love life peaked at 17 years old and had no chance of recovery after. As for him, I don’t know. I don’t like to speculate about that.

I was scared, for many reasons. First of all, I wasn’t sure if I had made the right decision about messing around but I couldn’t really tell anyone about it. My friends were very protective of me, especially after the break up. They saw how I was after it happened – I guess they just didn’t want me to go back there again. I was also scared of getting too attached. Having sex for the first time felt like this giant landmark that you always will, or are supposed to remember, the sort of memories you keep in big glossy photo albums and write cheesy captions next to them. Either I was supposed to remember it in a good way or remember it like an ugly pimple on your nose. I really didn’t want a permanent pimple on my brain.

That’s why I was scared to have sex with him, for the first time. My first time was going to be under the shadow of everything else that had happened. My gut instinct was screaming because I had a feeling I’d be just as broken up afterwards as I was when he wanted o see other people. We both made it clear that we were friends with benefits, no emotional baggage attached. Which I guess was good for him – being a young single guy out there in the world – I don’t think he was planning on settling down any time in the near future. Myself on the other hand, I was okay for a few months. Then we started chatting regularly on the phone and online when he was away at school and he casually told me that he had met someone back in the city and was considering starting something. What exactly should have been the ideal reaction to that? Smile and nod, easy, without wanting to cry hard? As much as I had accepted the ‘fling’ title of our relationship I wasn’t emotionally strong enough to finally understand that, ‘he doesn’t like me like that … anymore.”

One of my friends told me not to long ago that, “I don’t think any of us are strong enough to have a one night stand.” I think she meant none of us could have sex and not have any emotional strings attached. My ex had even said that, in his own personal opinion, the first time held more importance for a girl than a guy. I never asked him why, but I figured it had something to do with hormones. Or maybe it’s just that girls harbor this image of having this meaningful moment with another person that they can always remember in a nice way, while on the other hand a guy might just think of it as sex, no ifs ands or buts to it.

Sometimes the whole situation made me feel like I’m Alice (the rated PG-13 version) who fell into a Funky Relationship Wonderland, no strings attached, like I followed the cute white bunny and then I was stuck wondering if I’d ever be able to will myself to get out. I had made the decision to end the physical aspect of the relationship and almost went through with it. The last few times I saw my ex, I planned to end it. I walked in thinking that was the best thing for me, but I wasn’t able to keep that promise to myself. If things went to shit I wanted to be the one to end it. But like our whole pattern of our relationship. He ended it without a blink of an eye or any acknowledgement of my feelings. After it happened, and when I knew I was several miles away from him, I sat down on the stairs of a nearby church and cried my eyes out. I cried for every sad, hurt, vengeful feeling I could muster. I cried for how much I hated him and how much I hated myself. I cried for letting myself fall into such a volatile relationship that could hurt me on so many levels. And on some level, I cried because now I was really free.

Eming ,19, is a writer for YO! 1 of 1