Real Reasons I’ve Settled For Bad Sex
One of the most surprising things I’ve learned from writing about my negative sexual experiences with men is that plenty of people blame women for choosing to be with the wrong guys.
We live in a culture where anything can be blamed upon women… even a man’s own bad behavior in bed.
It’s disheartening that so many people still seem to think all sexual problems revert back to the woman, as if toxic male behavior couldn’t possibly bleed into the bedroom.
Sure, I am a woman who has previously settled for too much bad sex, but I know that there are real reasons for that.
Count yourself fortunate if you did not grow up in an environment designed to serve men without expecting too much from them. I was raised in a Christian bubble where women were supposed to protect men from their own sexual urges and weaknesses.
Even as a teenager, I was taught to be considerate of a poor guy’s ego. Let him down gently. Never criticize a man. Never make him feel uncomfortable.
We had dress codes designed to avoid “making men stumble.” When it came to love, sex, and dating, we weren’t taught what made a healthy connection. Instead, we were told how to always make ourselves available to our future husbands.
If a married man had an affair, the mistress was a home wrecker. And the wife was often blamed for letting herself go.
Men? Don’t be too hard on them. Poor guys.
It began at an early age and unless you’ve been through it too, you can’t understand how insidious it is. My upbringing left me feeling like it was my fault if a man wanted to have sex with me. Even worse, I grew up believing that I couldn’t say no to men because I must have somehow led them on in the first place.
Men needed sex but they couldn’t control themselves. That job went to every woman in the bubble. Men were supposedly the progenitors and initiators, yet women carried the consequences of any sexual interlude in every way.
Submissive and compliant women don’t rock the boat. We don’t ask for what we want or need. We aim to please.
And we certainly don’t say no.
Many women have been steeped in a purity culture which left us feeling guilty for even having a sex drive. If we dared to have sexual encounters before marriage, we often wound up feeling dirty and confused.
For decades, I had sexual hangups that left me feeling like a freak. I had a high libido along with a terrible fear of sexual intercourse. And there weren’t many ways to talk about any of that. It was too tawdry or TMI.
I had to unlearn basically everything I’d been taught about sex just to handle it with an ounce of normalcy.
Growing up in the 80s and 90s, every Christian circle I knew was obsessed with sex and purity. But as much as we were talked to about sex, we never heard anything regarding actual healthy or good sex.
Evangelical Christianity says that good sex happens between a man and his wife. That’s it. They leave it at that which means they don’t have to talk about real sexuality at all.
If you’re unmarried, sex doesn’t happen. Lalala! Stick your fingers in your ears.
And if you’re married? You’re divinely already having the best sex of your life. There’s nothing left to discuss, apparently. As long as the wife is submitting to her husband, of course.
It takes privilege to complain that women just need to learn how to speak up for themselves to avoid negative sexual encounters with men. Some women who have been through trauma and spiritual abuse will undoubtedly take more time to even get to that point.
We ought to be sending women empowering messages to let them know that they don’t have to stay chained to their abuse. Instead, we treat them like whiney babies for being (rightfully) affected by their trauma.
I feel fortunate that at 36 years old, I have finally quit feeling so damn guilty about sex. I don’t apologize for my high sex drive. I no longer apologize for having an imperfect body.
And I certainly don’t allow myself to take on any of that guilt for having sex before or outside of marriage.
I do force myself to speak my mind and say what I like or need in bed, but none of that changes the fact that all of this remains an uphill battle. The idea that I have a say (and more than a say) over my own body is still new to me.
Yet every time I write about any negative sexual encounter, a few folks comment to remind me that rape culture is still a problem. They want to know how I let myself get involved with a shitty partner.
Men can’t be held responsible… and I feel like we’re stuck in The Verve Pipe’s The Freshmen song: “I can’t be held responsible, cause she was touching her face.”
We need to quit asking women what they’ve done wrong to experience shitty behavior from men. I get it. This is our culture that expects women to take on all the blame.
But the answer doesn’t lie in questioning women about how they fell for the wrong guys in the first place. It lies in holding these men accountable for their bad behavior.
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Real Reasons I’ve Settled For Bad Sex
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