“Warning: Sort of graphic but not really. Deals with sex stuff. When I was in primary and high-school I had to attend sexual education classes. Once when I was 12, once when I was 15. Spoiler alert: They fucking sucked. 12-year-old lesbian me was confused because why the fuck did I want to know about dicks? 15-year-old me was equally confused because why the fuck am I only just now learning about periods when I’d been having them for 2 years already? Also why the fuck did I want to know about dicks? I remember those classes not-so-fondly. Big rooms filled with horny teenagers, some of whom were already pregnant or who had gotten someone pregnant. Teachers who couldn’t say the medical terms for genitalia without their eyes glazing over. The pill was an afterthought, and while there were condoms being passed around - there wasn’t a banana in sight. They fucking sucked. In hindsight, my sexual education classes didn’t contain a lot. I learned what a penis was, what sperm was. I learned what a vagina and clitoris was (that bit was important to me). I learned the STDs were a thing and I learned that sex could lead to pregnancy if you don’t use protection (note: *sex* led to pregnancy, not “penis-in-vagina sex”, just sex - this is important), and that protection wasn’t always 100% effective. Sounds important right? It is. It’s important information to know, but what wasn’t said was equally important. There was no discussion about consent. No talk of the LGBTI community and non-heteronormative sex. No talk about how sex was more than just “penis-in-vagina”. Not one discussion on boundaries and communication. Not a mention on how good sex can be fantastic or awkward or both. No one told me that having bad sex didn’t mean you failed. No discussions on healthy relationships. No one told me about queefing. I had to find the hard way. Of course, my parents didn’t help at all in regards to sexual matters. Parents often wonder why their kids can’t have open and honest conversations with them - My mother still can’t say the words “penis” or “vagina”, I spent the first decade of my life thinking the term for my vagina was “Whoopsie”. Nevermind having an open and honest discussion with them about fucking and relationships. Cue 17-year-old me knuckle deep in my first casual fling wondering why sex wasn’t like the movies (romantic movies or porn). Cue 19-year-old me in an abusive relationship because I thought it was normal, and that two women together would fight All The Time because we were both “emotional” because no one around me told me what a healthy relationship looked like. Cue 21-year-old me becoming a sex-worker as a means to pay my way through university and finally learning all of the stuff that I could have used when I was younger. Yes, your slightly chunky, over-achieving, benevolent dictator of a page admin used to be a hooker. Shock horror. You can stop clutching at your pearls now. Brothels are legal in my state. There are a ton of rules and regulations and licensing. I had to have my vaccines up to date as well as a few other vaccinations I hadn’t had before. I couldn’t have clients on the side. I couldn’t streetwalk. Condoms, gloves and dental dams were a must. We all had little “safe sex” packs that we kept stocked all the time to decrease the chances of infections. Mandatory STDs checks once per month. There was a standard booking (massage, oral, and PIV sex) for $140 per 30 minutes - anything else I could charge whatever I liked for and I keep half. Easy. Being a sex-worker taught me more about sex and sexual matters than I had ever learned in school or at home. I learned that you as a person define what empowerment means. I found self-confidence. I found a way to be assertive because if it’s one thing you learn quickly is that just because someone paid for you for sex - it doesn’t mean they own you. Some people will disagree with me on this point, but I don’t pay for a sandwich at Subway and then have the right and privilege to treat all staff like shit, even though I paid them. That's based on the bullshit notion that the customer is always right and it needs to stop. Customers are idiots. Granted it is a lot easier to have this attitude in a legal brothel, with panic buttons in every room. You learn that when someone wants anal, you can feel right at home charging an extra $100 because that dude really wants your butt and he should be damn near grateful I’m going to let him have at it. I learned the intricacies of consent, and how to set boundaries and communicate without feeling guilty for doing so. And when I went home to my partner I learned the difference between being fucked for my body, and fucked for my personality and that it was okay to like both ways. I learned how to tell people the things they needed to hear and not the things they wanted to hear. I learned faking orgasms should be considered illegal. I learned to soothe a wounded ego and tell people that practice makes perfect and that constructive feedback can only makes things better - if you learn from it. I learned that there were plenty of people just like me - navigating the world of sex without a damn clue what they were doing. I would listen to clients spill their guts, safe in the knowledge the unknown hooker wouldn’t judge - at least not openly. Some of them didn’t want sex - just to talk. Young guys who were scared of relationships, scared of being considered a fuck up because they were so damn insecure with themselves that they would cry if they had been taught how to express emotion. Young women who didn’t know who they liked and were trying to figure out who they were. People transitioning sexes who just wanted a few hours without feeling like the world was against them. Old lonely men wanting a human touch, most times not even a sexual one. Couples wanting to feel the thrill that happened when they first met - learning to communicate with each other again and opening themselves up to new experiences together. A surprising amount of young men paying for sex because they considered it safer to have sex in a legal brothel with protection knowing that the person they were with had a low chance getting pregnant or give them an STD. People with various disabilities who wanted a sex life without the creepy fetishisising. Ironically the people wanting to fuck me for my body, were the people that taught me what I needed to learn in order to enjoy myself, and how to have mutually enjoyable experience. My experiences with them taught me the things I needed to learn in order to protect myself from diseases, from assault, from emotional manipulation. This post isn’t about romanticising sex-work - it’s a job. It’s a job that comes with a shit ton of stigma, in most places not a lot of protections, and it is insanely high risk. That’s a post for another day. My point is that it wasn’t until I was in a position (pun not intended) that directly involved not being able to avoid making sexual choices, that I learned about sex and all the murky grey things that surround it. I didn’t learn the more valuable aspects of sex from school, or from my family. I had to become a hooker before I learned the things that aren’t taught to young people, in some cases actively hidden from young people. We teach young people for an hour about penises and vaginas, and menstrual cycles and STDs. But we don’t support them when they need assistance. We don’t listen to their sexual issues, we don’t answer their questions. We teach young men that “No” means “Yes”, and a lack of “No” means “Yes” and that if you don’t “score” you aren’t a man, but we don’t teach them about consent, or emotional intimacy and we wonder why young men strive so hard to adhere to the confines of toxic masculinity. We teach young women to “grin and bear it”, to lift our legs and think of England, that sex is something you giveaway but not enjoy. That we need to be sexy and not sexual, and that if a boy hits you it means he like you, and we wonder why the rates of domestic violence are so high. We don’t teach diverse sexualities and genders. We teach that sexuality is nothing more than sex. We don’t teach people that it is so much more than sex acts. We don’t teach what consent is or what it looks like and wonder why the rates of rape are so high, while denying rape culture exists. We don’t teach people how to resist peer pressure, and how to know when you’re ready to have sex. We don’t teach people that not wanting to have sex is completely okay. We aren’t approachable when discussing important matters and we wonder why the rates of abuse are so high. We don’t teach about various different sex acts and how to be safe. Not everyone has access to affordable birth control yet we’re disappointed when young people get pregnant or get others pregnant. And to some populations on the planet - we don’t say anything at all. We call sex “dirty”, and “sinful”. We lie about condoms and make people feel shit about producing hormones. We lie, and guilt and shame. We treat teenagers like children in near-adult bodies because we don’t think they can hack it while demanding they take responsibility for actions they were never taught about. We spend so much time arguing over who should teach sex education, that we forget to actually teach it. We say bullshit like “The female body can shut down legitimate cases of rape”, or “Periods can be controlled like a bladder”, “Penis-in-vagina sex standing up won’t get you pregnant”, “A blowjob isn’t sex”, or “The vaginal canal needs cleaning” We fail young people because we ourselves were failed by our parents, and they in-turn were failed by their parents. So here is my rough (pun not intended) guide to sex from a whore who has done it all: Oral sex *is* sex. Anal sex is sex. Female-bodied people have a vaginal canal where menstrual blood comes out, a urethra for peeing out of, an anus for pooping, and only two out of three can be used for sexual gratification. LUBRICATION IS YOUR FUCKING FRIEND. If the sex act hurts, you should stop. Don’t “push through it”, you’re going to hurt yourself. Communicate more, fake orgasms less. Period cramps can hurt but not as much as you think - excessively sore cramps can be another medical condition like endometriosis or ovarian cysts. Showers are a way to show you care. The clitoris - is awesome. THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS GAY OR LESBIAN SEX OR STRAIGHT SEX. THERE ARE ONLY SEX ACTS. Granted I can’t have sex with my wife with a flesh and blood penis because she doesn’t have one but we do have a ton of store-bought ones. My point being fingering isn’t just for the gay ladies. Butt sex isn't just for gay dudes. Sex acts aren't defined by sexuality. If it goes in an orifice, it needs a flared base or else it may not come out. I learned that the hard way. Protection comes in many forms (because if you have penetrative sex with someone who can ejaculate sperm - you can get pregnant regardless of the time of month or position you are in): Things that help protect against pregnancy: Male and female condoms (two different things), a diaphragm, a cervical cap, contraceptive pills, an Intrauterine Device (IUD), the Implanon implant, the depo-provera shot, spermicide, vaginal rings, the morning after pill, not having sex, and sterilisation. Things that help protect against STDS: Gloves, male condoms, not having sex, HPV vaccinations, regular STD health checks. Showers and peeing after sex can reduce the risk of UTIs as penetrative sex can cause bacteria to enter the urethra (for all people who have urethras). Also things like not having sex drunk or high as these increase the risk of unsafe sex. Get your sexual health checkups. Even if you don’t sleep around - get checked. HPV isn’t just a sexually transmitted disease. Transpeople! Look after your bits. Regardless of whether you are transitioning or not - you *need* to look after the bits you have, even if you don’t want them. The hymen can only be broken by penis-in-vagina sex - not a thing. Sex the first time is meant to hurt - not a thing. The hymen is a thin membrane that surrounds the inside of the opening to the vagina. So many things other than penis-in-vagina intercourse can wear the hymen away, including horseback riding, biking, gymnastics, using tampons, fingering, and masturbation. Some women are even born without hymen. Some women will bleed after having penetrative sex (any sort of penetrative sex, not just with a penis) for the first time, while others won't. Both are perfectly normal. A woman may bleed when she has penetrative sex for the first time because of her hymen breaking - it can bleed. For instance I accidentally broke my own hymen, I was fiddling around before I even knew what the word was and it broke. It hurt. More power to the women who didn’t have any pain. Virginity is a useless concept purely to make us feel guilty and ashamed. I valued my first mobile (cell) phone more than my virginity. I still value my Google Pixel more than I did my virginity 15 years ago. My virginity couldn’t store all of my photos, and phone numbers, access my bank account, hold my calendar, or let me watch porn. My virginity was useless, my phone is a sophisticated piece of technology I would be royally fucked if I lost. YOU ARE IN CONTROL OF YOUR SEXUAL ACTIVITIES AND YOUR BODY. Talking about sexual matters for pleasure is awesome, talking about it for health is even better. Many people struggle with the idea of going to see a doctor about a health issue - especially men and their prostates. Not sorry to single you out fellas but you guys have issues talking about things in your butthole, which can lead to issues with the organs up inside your butthole. Prostate cancer is real and brutal. See your goddamn doctor. Breast scans! Pap smears! All manner of reproductive health checks - please get them! GET YOUR FUCKING HPV VACCINE. PLEASE VACCINATE YOUR CHILDREN. STOP PUTTING STIR-FRY INGREDIENTS IN YOUR FUCKING VAGINAS. PLEASE JUST STOP. Additional: The more open and accurate conversations we have with have young people, the better prepared they will be. Knowledge is power. The more approachable you are the more comfortable people are in asking questions, reporting assualts, reporting possible medical problems. Adults fear talking about sex to others because they have no idea how to take about it themselves.“
