sexual history

The number of people you choose to sleep with isn’t the crux of sexual liberation. People who choose to have sex with fewer (or no) people shouldn’t be ashamed, and neither should people who choose to have multiple partners. It’s all about the choice - having the agency to sleep with as many or as few people as you please. It doesn’t make you naïve or boring or a slut or a whore; it’s just a choice that you’ve made, and that in itself is sexually liberating.

I'm going to answer your first question last. What would I, personally, do if I found out my partner had engaged in oral sex (or any other kind of sex) a certain number of times? I'd figure their sexual past is theirs to judge as they please and would hope they thought the same way about my past. I...

Not having sexual contact with anyone in the past does decrease your risk of STI transmission, however it does not totally negate the risk. First of all, some STIs can be transmitted via non-sexual means. One example that works really well when we're talking about oral sex is herpes. As is noted in...

It sounds to me like this is really about you more than it is about him. The person having trouble with his history right now appears to be you, and that's the person who I think needs to work through this. In other words, you say he won't open up about this, but I'm not sure I can envision what you...

With most sexually transmitted infections, it would be highly unlikely for a person to have one who has not had any kind of sexual contact -- with genitals, hands or mouths -- to have one. We call STIs -- sexually transmitted infections -- what we do because that is usually how they are transmitted...

If you feel like -- and you seem to be very clearly saying you do -- that YOU need to hold off on sex with someone new, for YOU, that's really all you need to know. You're the only person waiting needs to be okay with. If it's not okay with anyone else, too bad for them. Some not-as-yet boyfriend...

Do you want to have a better sexual experience this time, as well as a relationship of real quality -- in which someone loves, likes and cares for you just as you ARE, not based on a persona -- with your new boyfriend? If you do, then it's really important to be honest. When we're dishonest with...

You most likely got the kidney infection because of not treating your urinary tract infection soon enough. Kidney infections almost always arise from a urinary tract or bladder infection, which come about from bacteria introduced to the urethral opening (which, unfortunately, happens to be mighty...

Oooooooooookay. Let's try to go ahead and unpack all of this, once and for all. First things first: the vagina is a muscle. It's not some flippety-floppedy passive tube, nor is it tissue like your skin. It's muscle, like the muscles of your arms, legs or tongue. When we put something inside of it...

Before I say anything else, let me just say that I'm so sorry you had to have this experience. Sadly, very few women who have had even the smallest measure of sexual experience will go through life without at least one person responding like this, but it's particularly painful when the person saying...