Why I'm Glad I Slept With A Lot Of Guys Before Marriage
"At that point, I had slept with all the eligible men in my town."
BLGKV | Shutterstock My first one-night stand happened way back in high school. My longtime boyfriend had moved away and even though I still believed I was in love with him, the long-distance thing wasn't working.
So when I was at a party and a very cute boy from a different school started flirting with me, we were making out before I knew it. Eventually, we moved to a bedroom and got down to business.
It was rather exhilarating. I didn't want to date the guy or see him again but damn, that was seriously fun.
There were a few comedy of errors that night. It was so dark I didn't know he put on a condom, so I took the morning-after pill (back when you had to go to the clinic to get it. You Millennials are so lucky now that you can get it at the drugstore). News spread at school, of course, but I actually liked the notoriety.
A couple of years later in 1987, my roommate and I were hanging out at the local art school dive bar when she spotted a couple of guys she knew from high school. including one she had a huge crush on for years. Naturally, my job as wing girl was to talk to the other man so she could work her charm on her crush.
She was successful and we ended up taking both guys home. I was nervous; this was no fumbling high school situation. This man was experienced, older than me, and had a penis the size of a toddler's baseball bat. But wow, he was GREAT in bed. We saw each other a few more times and each time was great. But we didn't date.
There were a few more hookups and then I ended up in a long-term relationship for a few years. I was faithful, but once we broke up I went to town. I often joke that if I hadn't fallen in love with my now-husband of over twenty years, I would have needed to move because I'd slept with a lot of guys; in fact, at that point, I had slept with all the eligible men in my town.
But for about six months, I was owning my sexuality and loved fooling around. I slept with a lot of guys. There was that Ukrainian sailor that didn't speak English at all. We made out at the bar until we were delirious, then went outside and found a doorway to have sex in.
Then there was the Italian man who took my shirt off and fell to his knees because my breasts took his breath away (sadly, he was terrible in bed). There was that one that kept coming around, the one with the near-perfect loving that brought me all the way time and time again. There were also others that weren't terribly memorable, plus that sweet guy whose hair was set on fire by my bedside candles.
Here I am at almost 50 years old, happily married to the only man I'll be intimate with for the rest of our lives together, but I think about my slutty years fondly. My husband, ironically, is a serial monogamist so he's only been with a tiny handful of women in his life and he's fine with that.
He was also well aware of my history and wisely, recognizes the fact that he was the beneficiary of many of the tricks I learned during that time, so he accepts it with good grace.
I will say this for sure: I have no doubt that my marriage has benefited from my days of sleeping around. Because I don't have that feeling of 'missing out' so many of my friends my age say they have. I didn't miss out. I experienced my sexuality fully and deeply with great joy, and at a time it was easier to do so (I never had to get waxed or bleached). But I learned what I like, what I don't, and what really matters in someone you love.
Do I have a tiny pang of regret that I'll likely never get to run my hands over a 25-year-old man's rock-hard abs again? Nah. I've got plenty of memories of doing just that to live on forever.
Alex Alexander is a pseudonym. The author of this article is known to YourTango but is choosing to remain anonymous.