4 Valuable Lessons I Learned From Having Really Terrible Sex
Readers share their not-so-satisfying bedroom tales.
Kamil Macniak / Shutterstock Terrible sex comes in many forms. You can have it with a person you've just met, someone you've been holding out for, or even with someone you've been dating for a while.
Sometimes bad sex happens when you least expect it, like following an amazing makeout sesh (buzzkill).
Instead of counting the orgasms that could have been, we've asked readers to share their not-so-satisfying bedroom tales, along with a lesson they've taken away from each.
1. Don't force it.
April was out with friends at a beach bar when she met a guy that she clicked with right away.
"He was tan and cute, and had a little chest stubble, which I'm really into," she said. "Long story short, I hadn't slept with anyone in ages, and I decided that this guy would do."
The two went back to his summerhouse and went at it ... sort of.
"He couldn't get it up … like at all," April said. "I tried everything, and even after going down on him for a while with no results, I wasn't ready to forfeit yet."
Since it's only fair, April encouraged her beach boy to go down on her, since nothing else seemed to be working, and she didn’t want to call the whole night a wash (especially after ditching her girls for Mr. No-Go).
"Finally, I began to actually enjoy myself," she said. "He was really good, and I was just getting into it when he suddenly stopped," she continued. "Beyond aggravated at this point, I sat up to ask what was wrong, and boy did I find out."
April looked down to find Beach Boy's face covered in blood.
"I freaked!" she said. "All I could do was ask if I got my period when he told me that he got a bloody nose! I must have gotten so into it that I accidentally head-butted him with my pelvic bone."
After blood was drawn, the two decided to finally call it quits and April took a cab back to where her friends were staying.
2. Your favorite search engine does not qualify as a stand-in gyno.
We've all had one … they make you look awkward in public, take sex off the menu and make life, in general, a whole lot uglier. No — we're not referring to your old scrunchie collection, we're talking about a yeast infection.
A couple of years ago, Lisa was newly dating a guy that she found herself really into, really quickly. "Things escalated between us almost instantly," she said. "So while he had already made himself my boyfriend, we still had a lot of uncharted territories to cover, especially in the bedroom."
The two had been sleeping together for a couple of weeks when Lisa came down with a yeast infection. "I'm no stranger to them, so I just made some excuses and became more generous in the blow job department to keep me in the clear for a couple of days, while I was taking Monistat," she said.
With the reassurance of a Google search, "When can you have sex again after using Monistat?" she decided that it was time to give it a go, just 24 hours after treatment. "I was tired of waiting, so we went up to his room in the middle of the day and did the deed," she said. "Needless to say, you could see everything."
As the couple recovered from their romp, Lisa looked over to see her boyfriend looking questionably at his … er, junk. When she looked down to uncover the object of his horrified expression, she saw the remains of her medication all over his man parts.
"It was the most embarrassing experience of my life!" she exclaimed. "First of all, he didn't even know I had a yeast infection to begin with, so I had to start the story there, which is horrifying enough in itself to divulge to someone you just began sleeping with," she said. "And then I had to explain that my meds were all over him!"
Luckily, he took it well, and laughed, relieved that there wasn't something else going on. "He was a good sport," Lisa said, but he did say that he'd never look at cream cheese the same way again."
3. Souvenirs are for Disney World — not the bedroom.
You can't change a guy's obsessive-compulsive behavior, and honestly, unless you're starring in Hollywood's latest rom-com, really shouldn't try changing a guy period. However, when he becomes compulsively obsessed with you, then you've got yourself a problem.
Jen was in her junior year of college when a one-night stand turned into something more. "One morning I'm waking up still buzzed from the night before and making fun of his 'dad jeans' and the next thing I know he's bringing me roses in the library," she said.
Quickly smitten, she began spending most nights at his house, where she fit in perfectly with his roommates. "I loved going over there," she said. "And I think that has a little something to do with why I ignored so many warning signs that he was a little off."
The red flags included his inability to compromise, and a constant guilt trip. "If we weren't doing what he wanted to do, he would make me feel so bad about it, even I was choosing school work over him," Jen said, who also admits that she was a little blinded by their awesome sex life.
One night the two decided to add a little something extra to their bedroom repertoire. "I had read that if you put a pillow underneath your butt when a guy performs oral sex on you, it totally enhances the experience," Jen said. "Well … it does. And that whole 'female ejaculation myth?' Yeah…not a myth."
Soon enough, Jen decided that the hot sex she was having wasn't worth everything else she had to put up with, and cut things off with her guy. "He kept texting me for weeks afterward, and sometimes I would answer out of pity but made it clear that it was very much over," she said.
However, one text message took things to a whole new level of creepy. "He texted me saying that he kept that pillow, and didn't plan on washing it! I was mortified! Needless to say, I never answered him again.
4. Anything "back-door" oriented required a discussion (and we know it wasn't an accident.)
Just … no.
After waiting a month, Amanda had finally decided to sleep with the guy she was seeing. "He had already come over and met my family, the works," she said.
She had invited him to a wedding and made it clear that it was going to happen that night. "After the church ceremony, we had an hour to kill before the reception started," she said, "and I had waited long enough."
They headed up to her hotel room where she describes being "attacked by his mouth."
"He was literally acting like a starved animal that just got served Thanksgiving dinner," she said.
When she was finally able to escape his grip for some air, both of their clothes had already come off. "I chose to go on top because my rib cage and lungs could no longer handle this creature on top of me," she said.
"After a mere three minutes of actual intercourse I felt a foreign object in a hole that has never had anything inserted in it before," she continued. "In horror, I realized that this kid had stuck his thumb up my butt — no warning, nothing."
Deciding to end it there, Amanda hopped out of bed and began to get dressed. "To make matters worse, he explained that he saw it in a porno and thought that girls liked it," she said. "He also admitted that he had never 'finished' from having sex before. I'm still debating whether he was a virgin or not."
Tiffany McHugh is a new-media journalist who writes about relationships, dating, and sex.