Losing My Virginity

We stumbled back from the club in the early hours of Valentine’s Day. Drunk.

 

And now I bet you’re already thinking “Oh here we go again, another one of those twenty first century good-for-nothings who wears twelve inches of foundation and a crop top and shorts when it’s minus twenty degrees outside”. Well, if you are thinking that; you are thinking wrong. I was, in fact, only wearing 11 inches of foundation, and a low cut dress that just about covered my bottom. It was minus nineteen degrees outside.

 

I’d known him for a month. It was a Friday night, we hadn’t spoken since a minor disagreement on Sunday, and I hadn’t seen him for two weeks. But in the true style of what I shall now refer to myself as “One Too Many Becky”, I was, as usual, rather intoxicated. I knew he would be out, and in my drunken state had already explained to my friends via Facebook group chat that he was going to “be mine”. Of course this was, at the time, the quadruple vodka and lemon squash talking. It was only later I would find out that my drunken self had in fact correctly predicted the outcome of the night.

 

I’d (somehow) been granted entry into the club, and had been inside for around half an hour. Both of the friends I arrived with were already getting rather too friendly with two guys who were, admittedly, reasonably good looking. So there I was, bottle of Smirnoff Ice in hand, looking slightly awkward, drunk, and dancing by myself. I needn’t have worried about not finding a man, because within two minutes I was eating the face of another guy (and accidentally spilling my drink all over him). At this point I would like to applaud myself for “pulling” a rather handsome young fellow, but if I’m being brutally honest I cannot remember what he looked like at all. Having taken a short kissing break to apologise for covering him in my drink, it was then that I saw what I shall refer to as “The Guy”. Without saying a word to Guy No. 1 who was to later return home smelling of lemons thanks to my Smirnoff Ice spillage, I ran as fast as I could to see “The Guy”. I’m still surprised I made it over to him without being mistaken for Usain Bolt at some point along the way.

 

I will now backtrack. For those who don’t know, I’m Becky, I’m 18 years old and I am a Psychology student. My longest relationship lasted three weeks, and until I came to university, I was a virgin. A lot of my friends were virgins; a lot of people in my year at school were virgins. And even though I’m not a virgin anymore, I still absolutely hate the word virgin, so I’m going to try to use it as little as possible.

 

It wasn’t until I came to university that I started to become almost obsessed with the idea of having sex. It seemed like everyone had already done it, and if they hadn’t, they were likely to be found alone in the library with a face like a slapped arse, head buried in a book about “How To Care For Your Hamster”, and a whole day’s worth of work lined up in front of them, neatly planned out on the list they wrote using an inkwell and quill two weeks prior to this day. I was wrong. Firstly because I’ve never spent enough time in the library to be unfortunate enough to stumble across such a being, and secondly because I started to meet a fair amount of people who, like me, had never had sex.

 

At first it didn’t really bother me. Sure, I wouldn’t have to drink a lot in the “Never Have I Ever” drinking game, because no, I had never had sex with my boyfriend in a bush – I had never even had sex, never had a proper boyfriend, and quite frankly can’t think of a nice enough looking bush (careful…) to ever have sex in. But with the drinking came the nights out, and with the nights out came the boys. I’d like to think I’m not the least attractive person in the world, so admittedly will probably grab the attention of a guy or two on most nights out. But I soon came to find that they pretty much always want more than just a kiss.

“Will you come back to mine?”

“Are we going back to mine or yours?”

“Do you want to stay here or shall we leave now?”

To which my answer to all of those questions would always be no.

 

I’d always told myself I would never have sex outside of a relationship. Why should I compromise what I believe for a random guy I’ve just met, when I’m drunk, when I have the potential to make irrational decisions that I could regret in the future? But then for some reason, things changed and I started to have doubts about what I was (or wasn’t) doing. I wondered what these guys were thinking when I turned down an offer of staying at their place for the night. Could they tell I was a virgin? Were they going to start insulting me for not putting out? Were they wondering why they’d wasted the last ten minutes kissing me, only for me to turn down the offer of sex? Am I quite simply a complete and utter loser?

 

Every time I went out, it got worse. I was no closer to finding a boyfriend that I could give my virginity to, and was equally just as far from finding a nice guy who, within the first five minutes of meeting me, didn’t ask for a shag. I’m only 18 but for some reason I started to feel not desperate, but like time was running out. I know now, and I even knew it back then, that this is an absolutely ridiculous thought. Plenty of people are still virgins at my age, and many of them are probably in no hurry to lose it. But for me it was different. I don’t know why I did, and I’m highly embarrassed about it, but on several occasions I did find myself crying over it. Sex is clearly an important part of many peoples’ lives, and it’s not that I didn’t know it was going to be talked about so much at university. I just didn’t realise that not having had it would make me feel so shit about myself. Personally, I didn’t mind being a virgin. I still don’t see how not having had a penis in your vagina (or putting your penis in someone’s vagina) makes a great deal of difference to your life. If sex wasn’t discussed around me on a daily basis, I wouldn’t have felt so down about it. But it was the way that other people unintentionally put me down about it. I’m sorry if you’re reading this (I won’t say the name), but as an example, one of the defining moments for me was a comment made by one of my flatmates. We hadn’t been at university for long, and were sitting outside together at a bar, when his boyfriend arrived. I had met his boyfriend probably only once or twice before, but he came over and sat with us and it wasn’t at all awkward. Until, of course, a brief moment of silence. My flatmate, for some reason, decided that the best way to fill the silence was to announce to his boyfriend –

“Becky is a virgin.”

Those four words killed me.

I neither showed it in my face nor said anything, but I just couldn’t understand why he had felt the need to say it. Had one of my friends come to join us and there had been a moment of silence, would it have been okay for me to say “[name] is gay?” He might think differently, but I think not. I just couldn’t understand how being a virgin made me any different to anyone else.

 

I will now fast forward to January, when I met “The Guy”. We’d met on a night out at our Students’ Union and I thought he was absolutely lovely. We stood and chatted while laughing at his mate who was attempting to pull a girl, he asked for my number, and he didn’t even try to snog me or ask me back to his place (incredible)! The next week we went on a date and I couldn’t believe my luck. I thought the most wonderful person had just walked into my life. We had so much in common, there was never an awkward moment of silence, and for whatever reason I just really, really liked him. A week later we went on our second date and I felt the same. Then, the next week, I saw him out at the same club we always go to on a Friday night. We were both really drunk, it was almost closing time, so he took me by the hand and we went back to his. He’d already asked the dreaded virginity question before we left the club, so we both knew where we stood. Once we were back at his house, we grabbed something to eat and started making out. He assured me that he wouldn’t try anything I wasn’t comfortable with, and he stuck to his word. I slept over, but earlier that night he had told me that he had already slept with twelve people; ten of which were one night stands. I didn’t know how to feel. For some reason my opinion of him quickly changed. He’s not at all a bad person, but he wasn’t the type of person I thought he was. He explained to me that having ended two previous relationships on bad terms, he had told himself not to get into a relationship at university. He didn’t want anything serious. I went home the next day seeing him in a different light, and questioning myself again. Even though I know he didn’t, I felt like he judged me for being a virgin. I slept over his again the next night and everything I liked about him before came back to me. However, as my current “body count” stood at zero, I just couldn’t get over that number twelve!

 

I was meant to see him the next weekend, but he let me down twice. I’d spoken to a lot of friends and even my Mum about it. They told me that if I didn’t feel comfortable with the number of people he had slept with, I shouldn’t see him anymore. Letting me down twice was a perfect excuse to end it. I was reasonably blunt with him and told him not to come over, and he never replied to my message.

 

Fast forward again! To my Usain Bolt impression across the club, where I found him and despite me being a bitch and him not replying to my message, he was surprisingly nice to me. Again, he grabbed my hand and we left. This time we headed back to mine. Like before, he told me we didn’t have to do anything if I didn’t want to. I went to the toilet and came back to find he had already stripped down to his boxers. He took off my dress and my bra and we started to kiss. Weirdly, I didn’t have a sudden “Oh my god I’m about to lose my virginity” realisation. It might have been partly due to the fact I was still quite drunk, but I felt completely relaxed, and most importantly, I felt ready and it felt right. He asked if it was okay for him to take off my underwear, I said yes, and the next thing I knew, we were having sex.

 

I’m not going to turn this into a rip-off of 50 Shades of Grey, but to lighten the mood, I will list some embarrassingly funny things I (just about) remember saying during my first sexual experience:

“In my vagina please, not my arsehole!”

“Yep, that’s my arsehole.”

“Do I smell?”

“Will it go up the wall?”

“Has my clit come off?!”

 

I know that, despite clearly being drunk, this was actually the best way for me to lose my virginity. I lost it to someone I know, someone I like, someone I trust and someone who respects me. Since being at university I had started to realise that, as stupid as it sounds (and yes please feel more than free to judge me), I would have to be drunk in order to have sex for the first time. As a person who suffers waves of anxiety and lacks a substantial amount of self-confidence especially at the thought of someone seeing me naked, I knew that, for me, it had to happen in this way. I imagined myself being awkward in bed and worried about taking off my clothes in front of someone. I imagined an awful lot of pain – in fact I had actually imagined him not even being able to get inside me. But on the night I lost my virginity I had none of these fears at all, and for that I couldn’t be happier. I’m not suggesting that anyone should lose their virginity whilst not in a relationship, whilst drunk, or because they feel they have to in order to fit in. It was just the way that it was most comfortable for me personally. I understand that a lot of people want to give their virginity to someone they love, and in many cases may even want to give it to the person they marry, but I didn’t feel that way. I feel so much better in myself after having sex and I have not once felt regret. Oddly, I thought I would feel a lot different after having sex for the first time. I was worried I would develop a strong emotional connection to the person I lost it to, but thankfully for him I most certainly haven’t! However we do like each other and are going to continue seeing each other casually.

 

He’s not my boyfriend. I don’t love him. My sex drive is now through the roof. But I don’t regret it.

In fact, my only regret is not asking Guy No. 1 for a small donation towards my drink. That Smirnoff Ice cost me £2.50, and due to the high volume of drink I accidentally poured over his shirt, I reckon he owes me at least 50p.