entry

I'm scared to touch my own vagina: why?

birthdaycake123 asks:

Hey. I'm 14 and I've never fingered myself. I've done other things, but the thought of fingering myself just seems gross. A couple times, I've tried to, but then I get to thinking about how gross vaginas are, and I chicken out. I know this is irrational, but do you have any advice on getting over this? Thanks.

Three on Getting to the Bottom of Things

Ariana11 asks:

So my boyfriend of 9 months was asking me about anal sex. We only ever done oral sex, so when he brought up anal I was a little scared. We both decided to at least see if it could work. We were at his house and I got on my knees and he slowly went in. At first if hurt then it didn't. All in all we only did this for about 7 seconds then we stopped. We were never intending to do anal for longer than 15 seconds. We were just going to do long enough to see what it would be like. After we stopped we sat on the bed and I asked him if this counted as sex. He said that it didn't. (We are both virgins by the way...or maybe not?) I'm not sure if it counted. If it did then did I just lose my virginity?

Girlfriend putting pressure on herself to lose virginity

nimpup asks:

My fiance and I are trying to have intercourse. But she can't do it, she's still a virgin and has her hymen. It's too painful for her. The most I can get in is about three inches and she has told me that's about how deep her hymen is. She really wants to give her virginity to me and I really want to be able to please her like that. We don't know why it's so painful for her but she reacts like she's being stabbed in the stomach with a sword. She told me that it feels like I'm killing her when I try to push past that three inches. I asked my older brother about this and he said that maybe that's just how deep she is and after that three inches I'm hitting her cervix.

Is intercourse a violence or a violation?

stullis asks:

I've been with my girlfriend for nearly six months now. I've always had a bit of a problem having sex with people (keeping it up) but this problem has never occurred between me and her. However, lately I've begun to feel very guilty about the physical action of having sex. The act of penetration is a great experience physically, but when I think about what I'm doing I feel like I'm stabbing her, or performing some kind of violent act on her. We haven't had sex yet since I started REALLY feeling like this (which was a little more than three weeks ago) but if we are making out and begin to have dry sex I often start to cry from the idea of what I am doing to her. She's very compassionate and understanding, and I have told her all of this, but I want it to stop. I need to know how to make myself stop feeling like I am abusing her when we have sex because considering the times we've had sex before I had this mindset, it's been an incredible experience of expressing our love to each other, and I'd really like to have that back.

Did my previous masturbation de-virginize me?

yesman asks:

I am 15 and when I was 14 I started becoming very interested in masturbating. I actually used objects and penetrated them inside my vagina. After a while i realized how stupid I was being so I stopped with the masturbating. I've been dating my boyfriend for about 4 months and we are so comfortable with each other. He makes comments as a joke about vagina tightness and how I'll bleed when I have sex at first and it will hurt. But the thing is I have basically de-virgined myself. Will the guy who I lose my virginity to notice that having sex for the first time with me will be easy to get in and everything? I really regret masturbating and everything. This may sound stupid but I'm very worried.

Spotlight on Scarleteen: Two new articles!

Submitted by Lena on Sun, 2009-02-08 01:22

If you’re a regular at the main site, you may have already seen these two new articles: An Immodest Proposal by Heather Corinna and Let's Get Metaphysical: The Etiquette of Entry by CJ Turett and Heather Corinna. But if you haven’t gotten a chance to check them out yet, there’s a brief introduction to both.

Once upon a time, revisited and revamped.

Heather Corinna’s article, An Immodest Proposal by Heather Corinna, excerpted from the 2008 anthology, Yes Means Yes: Visions of Female Sexual Power and A World Without Rape, is a modern-day fractured fairy tale about first-time sex-- revisited and revamped!

If Heather were to moonlight as a song lyricist, instead of saying a half-hearted “Oops!”, pop princess Britney Spears would be singing, “Yea, I did it again… and can’t wait to do it again and again!” In her Proposal, Heather conjures up an ideal sexual world that is not just free of rape and violence against women, but one where women and girls are free to express desire and initiate fulfilling sexual experiences. An Immodest Proposal is sure to inspire and empower with its mudluscious imagery, tasty wording, and homage to fist-pumping 80’s power ballads. To borrow from ACDC, for those about to rock sexual stereotypes and shake traditional gender roles all lifelong, we salute you! And for those about to read, we encourage you!

Let’s get deep, both literally and figuratively.

When you hear the word etiquette, you may think of old-school guru Miss Manners telling you to always say “Please, Thank-You and You’re Welcome!” or you may hear a nagging voice at the dinner table telling you to chew with your mouth closed and say “Excuse me!” when you burp. However annoying that may be in practice or antiquated at some point, the basic idea behind etiquette is timeless: Etiquette helps us feel comfortable in our various social surroundings. People may not think of cracking open an old manners book before sex, but what is sex other than an intense social interaction where you and yours want to be as comfortable as possible?!

Fingering, fellatio, anal sex and vaginal intercourse-- talk about very up-close-and-personal interactions where you’re really opening yourself up to others! While you may not be able to turn to the original Miss Manners for advice here, but you know you can rely on Scarleteen. We now have our very own shiny and brand-new online sexual etiquette guide, written just for you by Sexpert CJ Turett and Scarleteen Founder and Director Heather Corinna. When you talk about personal space, many, many forms of partnered sex are quite up close and personal. In fact, a large part of sex is physically entering someone else’s body, their personal space, their realm; it can be amazing and awe-inspiring or just flat-out uncomfortable. For hints for enjoying more of the former than the latter as well as loads of introspective ideas to wrap your head around, please join us in getting metaphysical!

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What is Spotlight on Scarleteen? Find out more by clicking here.


Let's Get Metaphysical: The Etiquette of Entry

From both our personal experiences of our own varied sex lives, and in our work in sexuality with many other people, it seems pretty clear that really letting someone into an internal space in your body, or going into someone else's insides -- which we know might sound a little gross, but that is what's going on with this stuff -- is a fairly big deal for many people. So, what might make sexual entry different from other sexual activities?

The FBI Files: Vaginismus

Some people experience great pain or discomfort with vaginal sex or other kinds of vaginal entry that's not about hymens, lack or arousal or lubrication, or rough partners, but about a health condition known as vaginismus.

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