Why, aged 29, I have decided I’ll NEVER have sex again

Guys — and you know who you are when I say “guys” — have you read this in the Daily Mail?

It’s an article by a woman who has decided to never have sex again because she identifies as asexual. 

Needless to say, I was fascinated by it:

• Lisa Smith, from Buckinghamshire, finds sex ‘repellant’
• Has had three lovers, two of whom she has lived with
• Wants to find a man with whom she can have a celibate relationship
• Will adopt children if she ever decides she wants them

By LISA SMITH

PUBLISHED: 22:19 GMT, 30 January 2013 | UPDATED: 23:35 GMT, 30 January 2013

•  

My strategies for avoiding sex had run out and so, as the inevitable happened, I simply hoped my boyfriend could not tell that I was enduring, rather than enjoying, our encounter.

John was a virgin when we met, so I assume he did not realise how strange and dysfunctional our perfunctory couplings were.

We’d abstain for months until, finally, he’d start bribing me with gifts to go to bed with him. But I loathed it. I dreaded the foreplay, and the act itself repulsed me. I could only bear it by focusing my mind on something else.

It’s not that John was a particularly inept lover – he wanted very much to please me – nor was this a terminal case of bedroom boredom. The problem is that I have always detested sex: the idea of it, the fact of it, and the repellent notion that society seems to revolve around it.

I am 29 and I have had three lovers, two of whom I lived with. I have tried to quell the disgust I feel at the prospect of sex, but have failed repeatedly to do so.

There is nothing physically wrong with me – doctors have confirmed this – and I am not afflicted by guilt. My parents had a healthy and open attitude to sex. There is no dark incident lurking in my past that would explain my abhorrence: I have not been abused nor mistreated, and I have never been coerced into having sex against my will.

I am not gay, and I feel no physical attraction towards women. I do not think anything is ‘wrong’ with me, although perhaps my attitude would have been considered less freakish if I had been born in the Victorian era.

I just hate sex, and have decided I will never put myself through the torture of it again. I am in my physical prime, but my sex life is over. I wish it were not so. My tragedy is that I want to be ‘normal’. I crave the companionship of a man. I would love to be married; to build a home, to enjoy the comfort and domesticity of a life-long relationship with a partner I could cherish. I want to love and be loved.

I do not find men themselves abhorrent. On the contrary, I appreciate their looks and enjoy their company. I like cuddles, I don’t mind kissing and I yearn for affection; but nothing more than that.

I have researched internet sites and discovered that only one per cent of the population is, like me, asexual. Of these, half are men and a smaller proportion is gay.

So I have resigned myself to the fact that there is scant chance of my finding a man I love who, like me, wants a celibate relationship.

I have not discussed my lack of libido with my parents – in a sense, this article is my ‘coming out’ – but I know it saddens them that the wedding and grandchildren they yearn for have not been forthcoming.

Perhaps they believe I just haven’t met the right man yet. I can assure them,  however, that I have persevered with sex for long enough to know that for me it is a  misery and a penance.

Why should I endure it, just to make other people happy?

I have known since my teenage years that I am different from my peers. I grew up in Buckinghamshire, where I still live with my parents, and attended a girls’ grammar school.

While my friends were devouring teen fiction and sniggering over the salacious nuances in it, I was immersed in animal stories. I found sex-education lessons alien and embarrassing: I did not see how they could ever apply to me. 

 

When my friends started pairing off with boys, I could not identify with them. While they bought make-up and made covert visits to Ann Summers shops, I enjoyed ballet and my beloved pets.

One by one they lost their virginity, and described the fact to me in dreadful detail. I couldn’t see how any of it applied to me, but reassured myself that once I had a boyfriend, everything would fall into place.

 t didn’t. My best friend, Stephanie, introduced me to Adrian, her  boyfriend’s pal, in the summer of 1999, when I was 16. Adrian was 19 – sweet, funny and slightly overweight. I liked him: we shared the same interest in trashy TV, and he didn’t seem to mind that I was a bit of a nerd.

I decided I was going to lose my  virginity to him as quickly as possible, to silence my friends – who considered me abnormally prudish – and to be like everyone else.

So, three months after we started going out, I slept with Adrian for the first time on his rumpled bed at his parents’ house, one afternoon when they were both at work.

There was no romance, but I didn’t want that. I wanted to get it over and done with, as you would some tedious chore. Adrian, who’d had two previous relationships, knew it was my first time. He was kind and patient, but he hadn’t bargained for the level of fear and panic I felt. 

 

Afterwards, I felt only revulsion, but I was determined to persevere.

I stayed with Adrian at weekends, making sure sex was the first thing on the agenda when I arrived, so we could get it over with and progress to things that were interesting and fun.

But each encounter confirmed that I was repelled by it. I learned to fake pleasure but afterwards, while Adrian slept, I stared at the ceiling and silently cried.

Eventually, realising the true nature of my feelings, he was angry and hurt. We’d been together for nine months; I was due to take up a place to read anthropology at the University of Surrey, in October 2000 and it seemed the right moment to separate, so we did.

 But I felt distraught; convinced there must be something physically wrong with me that was preventing me from enjoying sex.

The doctor gave me a check-up and did several tests, all of which confirmed my hormone levels were normal and that there was nothing physically untoward. Still, though, I continued to feel like a freak, an outsider.

At university, I was lonely and miserable. It seemed everyone else was having lots of fantastic sex, when all I wanted was a cuddle and a companion.

After five months there, I could stand it no longer. In February 2001, I moved back home to my parents.

My friends from school had all paired up and gone off to pursue their dreams, and my sense of isolation deepened.

When I met John, my next boyfriend, three years later, I think I just felt grateful that anyone wanted me. He was a friend of a friend. I was 20; he was 23, worked in retail management and had never had a girlfriend.

We were two lonely people, and he was almost absurdly grateful that I was taking an interest in him.

So we started seeing each other – and I steeled myself for the inevitable. After a month or so, when I felt I could procrastinate no longer, we slept together. It was every bit as awful as I had feared.

However, a shared dread of loneliness and a need to conform propelled us into a relationship. We rented a two-bedroom terrace together, acquired two cats, and for much of the time life was fine.

I started work in the same DIY store as John – I’m still there now – and in my spare time wrote teen fiction and poetry, which remains my real passion.

Although John and I only had sex once every three or four months, I found it so repellent I ceased even to fake enjoyment – poor John would have done anything to please me

In the evenings we ate together, then curled up on the sofa watching films on television. My parents hoped for a wedding and grandchildren, but I knew that neither would happen.

The problem, of course, was sex. The idea of it remained abhorrent to me, and I found 1,000 reasons to avoid it.

Although John and I only had sex once every three or four months, I found it so repellent I ceased even to fake enjoyment. Poor John would have done anything to please me, but I could never tell him that the only way to make me happy was for us both to take a lifetime’s vow of abstinence.

Remarkably, we stayed together for seven years but, inevitably perhaps, John finally left me for another woman. I just felt relieved that it had ended, and that the charade was over.

At 27, I went back to live with my  parents, feeling disillusioned and  convinced of my weirdness.

I sought help from a psychosexual therapist. She said: ‘If you hate sex and you’re fine with that, you have no problem. If you don’t want to hate it, you do have a problem.’

 

I had a problem. So I visited the therapist for six weeks, but talking about sex made me squirm with discomfort and eventually I realised it was pointless to continue. I stopped going to the sessions.

I had assumed there was something about me that needed to be fixed. It didn’t occur to me that I could just accept the way I was.

And then, in July 2011, I met Owen in a local bar. He was tall, slim and athletic, with curly hair and a beard: close to my idea of physical perfection in a man.

I didn’t know what to do, who to talk to or where to go. I felt lost. So what did I do? I dissembled, as I had so many times before

 

He seemed shy, which was a good fit for me, and was working as a barman while he studied for an engineering degree at London University.

Meeting him ignited a spark of optimism in me. Owen was so attractive, I even nurtured a hope that if I had sex with him, my revulsion might finally evaporate.

I dared to believe he might change me; that all I needed was to be with someone like him and then I would become a normal, functioning partner.When we started dating, I felt happy and full of hope. And when, after just two weeks, it became obvious we would have sex, I was neither fearful nor tense. Actually, I was looking  forward to it.

But as things progressed, the old dread and revulsion consumed me. I felt confused and angry: why was I such a freak?

I didn’t know what to do, who to talk to or where to go. I felt lost. So what did I do? I dissembled, as I had so many times before. I’d become such a proficient actress that I don’t think Owen suspected my true feelings.

Celibacy: ‘There aren’t many of us, and I know my chances of finding an asexual partner – a man I love but who never wants to have a physical relationship – are remote’

We moved in together two months later and I was prepared to play at happy families. Sometimes, I even initiated sex because I wanted so much for him to love me.

But it was all a sham. We broke up last April, after eight months together, just as I had begun to find excuses for not sleeping with him. There was housework to do; I had a headache.

How could I tell him the truth: that he was gorgeous, but I found intimacy repulsive?

So, once again, I am back living with my parents. Loneliness haunts me. Although I go through the motions of a normal life – I occupy myself with ballet classes, gym, Pilates and the odd outing to the pub – I know I do not fit in.

You may wonder how I can be so sure, at 29, that I will not change. My response is: would you ask a gay person the same question? I make the parallel because it used to be thought that gay people could be treated or have therapy to make them heterosexual. It didn’t work any more than it would ‘cure’ me of my asexuality.

Hopes: ‘By writing this article, I hope more people will be emboldened to admit they feel the same way as me’

My friends are few, and most of them are engaged or married. I do not tell them I find sex disgusting. Why should I? They would only regard me with puzzlement and disbelief. Certainly, none of them could empathise with me.

I haven’t discussed my problem with anyone. Whenever female friends have discussed sex I played along, pretending I shared their interest in it.

John knew I hated sleeping with him – we were together too long for that not to have been obvious – but it became the elephant in the room. We didn’t discuss it; I think we both feared that would make the problem worse.

Seven months ago, I began to wonder if anyone else shared my problem. I stumbled on a website called Asexuality Visibility & Education Network. Actually, it was a comfort to discover there are others in the world who never want to have sex.

And by writing this article, I hope more people will be emboldened to admit they feel the same way as me.

But there aren’t many of us, and I know my chances of finding an asexual partner – a man I love but who never wants to have a physical relationship – are remote.

Still, I hope that one day I may discover him and marry. I do not want children of my own. The idea of carrying a baby repulses me as much as the act of procreation itself. I feel it is unnatural.

People say that, as I get older, I may change my mind. I wish I could say there was a glimmer of hope that I would, but I have absolutely no sense of a biological clock ticking. If ever I do want children, I will adopt.

My mind is made up: I will not have sex again. This may consign me to a lonely life, but it is better than deceiving a man a love. A relationship based on such a sham is the ultimate lie.

(Some names have been changed)

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2270895/I-loathe-foreplay-act-repulses-Lisa-Smith-Buckinghamshire-decided-sex-again.html#ixzz2JVf5pnjy 
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I vowed up and down that I would never go back online. 

I was through with the disappointments, I told myself. 

Obviously, I was lying — as much to myself as I was to everyone else. 

What prompted the return trip online? 

The Married Man and I finally met up recently for lunch. It was the first time we were seeing each other in person since I left my old job. We’d been in constant contact this whole time. 

Don’t say it. I know it’s wrong. 

But you know what? It was different seeing him in person and seeing his wedding ring. That circular band had a weird power over me. I couldn’t stop staring at it. 

I didn’t know how it made me feel. 

For once, I was direct and forced him to talk about his family. It made him uncomfortable. When we parted ways, he hugged me for a beat too long. A series of emails followed. He asked if he could see me again. 

I felt really, really tired. 

I went back online the next day. 

Within a week, I had a date with a guy who was cute and age-appropriate. The date was fine — I mean, you don’t spend two hours with someone unless you’re having a somewhat decent time, right? And, yet, I kept thinking about the Married Man. 

I thought about him obsessively, actually. It made me really hate myself. 

I’ve stubbornly refused to email him. 

I haven’t heard from Cute Guy, either. 

A not-so-cute guy emailed me, though. His hair looks stupid. I know this is a stupid reason to want to reject someone — which is why I haven’t…yet. But I feel like I’m going through the motions. 

I’m so tired of this. 

I didn’t realize that I haven’t posted here since August — though, I can’t honestly say that anything interesting has happened to me since then…okay, nothing positive has happened to me.

Oh. I have a new job. The Married Man and I are still in touch — but now it’s this weird thing where all we do is email each other. What is that? It’s certainly not a relationship. We had a conversation shortly after I left where we sort of tip-toed closer to the subject of us…but then quickly backed away because it was uncomfortable and I suspect we’re both ultimately very shy people.

The Married Man isn’t what I would have ever imagined myself falling for; he’s more than a little awkward; he’s not particularly attractive; and, to be honest, I can’t really put my finger on why I’m attracted to him.

But…nothing has happened.

What else is new?

I feel like I’m in a state of arrested development.

There’s this older woman at work I’ve become good friends with. She’s a single mother to a sickly teen who’s in and out of the hospital quite a bit. She hasn’t been in a relationship for years and admitted that when she was with her ex-husband, her lack of interest in sex was a major issue. He bailed shortly after their kid was born.

Her life has been nothing but a series of disappointments; she’s tried to change careers but her chosen career doesn’t have any available jobs; she’s the only one out of her siblings who helps out with her parents, who are both elderly and in ill-health; our jobs lately haven’t seemed particularly secure and the gossip-mill is running overtime.

I don’t know why, but when I think of my friend, I feel this sense of, “Life could always be worse.”

Isn’t that horrible?!

How has my weak semblance of “happiness” turned into a matter of comparing myself to others and thinking, “It could be worse”?

This whole weekend, I’ve felt depressed. I feel like a pathetic old maid.

I was reading this book, recently, where the main character mused that she was quickly becoming one of “those” women — someone who either waited too long or settled too fast.

I couldn’t help but wonder if maybe I had rapidly passed my “best before date” and had now simply waited too long…or can it really be considered “waiting” when you’ve had zero luck meeting somebody, nevermind dating and being in a relationship?

I’ve been told by the people in my life over and over again that I could have been with somebody a long time ago if I’d chosen to settle. I really wonder if that’s true. I’ve tried settling before, but something in me stubbornly refused to do it — I used to think it was fear.

Even at the ripe old age of 34, my old school mother is still agreeing to set-ups on my behalf. She doesn’t even bother asking to see if I’m okay with it because the offers to set me up are far and few between. Who gets set up through their mothers anymore? Haven’t we all migrated over to online dating? At least there’s some semblance of control online.

What bothered me about it was that my mother didn’t even bother to find out anything about this man. I guess it was her own desperation showing — her fear that I was rapidly turning into a spinster — that bothered me.

Of course, she doesn’t know anything about the Married Man, either — not that there’s been much to report on lately.

I think back on how things slowly unfolded between us but how it hasn’t crossed over into sad, predictable, cliched territory because of my steadfast refusal to let it. I’m actually quite good at burying my head in the sand and pretending everything is innocent when I know in my gut that it isn’t.

I’ll admit, a part of me wonders if, because I’m a 34-year-old virgin who’s never been in a relationship, my fear has largely prevented me from doing anything with the Married Man. Maybe, this has less to do with integrity and more to do with fear.

The first time he asked me to grab a coffee with him, I told myself it was perfectly innocent even though there was a moment when he looked at me and I felt a flood of heat flood across my face. It was like my scalp was on fire. And then later, when I returned to my desk, an email popped up, thanking me for making it a great afternoon. The next day, randomly, he emailed me about something I had mentioned and I pictured him sitting in his corner office, thinking of some bullshit reason to email me.

When I tried to ignore him and put some distance between us, he’d continue to email if he hadn’t heard from me in a few days — and I’d lie to myself and tell myself that we were just two friendly colleagues, nothing more…that I wouldn’t ever let anything happen…and that’s the truth: I wouldn’t let anything happen because I’m too chicken-shit to let anything happen.

And yet, the fact that I wrote a polite response to brush off this guy that my mother wanted to set me up with just goes to show that maybe I’ve been lying to myself all along and that I’m way too emotionally involved with the Married Man and that, in some ways, that’s worse for someone like me.

Pathetically, I’ve laid awake at night, imagining what would happen if he left his wife and whether his children would ever like or accept me. And, trust me, I hate myself for even entertaining those thoughts because I know how pathetic it sounds.

I haven’t been following the Olympics, so the first time I heard about Lolo Jones was through the Salon article that I posted last night.

Now, I’m fascinated and can’t seem to stop reading about her.

Granted, Access Hollywood isn’t exactly “real” journalism, but here’s something interesting that she said in an interview with them:

…Lolo – who emphasized that she’s single by choice — admitted that she gets tired of people on Twitter asking why she’s not dating anyone.

“That’s one of the main reasons, because literally there are so many people who aren’t willing to wait for their future spouse. They want to have sex now, they want to hook up,” Lolo – who has openly spoken about being a virgin — said. “That’s their life. My life is something else.”

As someone who values waiting for the right guy, Lolo admitted it’s been a challenge meeting her prince charming.

“I’ve complained about this to all my friends,” Lolo told Access. “‘When am I going to finally meet the man of my dreams, my husband, and experience, you know?’ Please, end this drought.”

I’ve been overthinking my virgin status lately.

Here’s the thing: yes, I complain a lot in this journal — but the reason I complain a lot here is because I don’t dare to complain out loud to anybody else.

I’m not a fool — nobody wants to hang around the bitter whiner who’s always complaining. The only way you get ahead in life is by pretending you’re okay — and it’s surprisingly easy to do that. You just flip everything back to the other person because most people don’t understand how to listen and are just waiting for their turn to talk.

The main reason other people love telling me stuff — and really, I hear loads of things that people are better off keeping to themselves — is because I really listen to them.

But, that also means I have nobody to confide in because I don’t trust other people.

Over the span of the last eight months, things have changed a little…it’s the main reason I haven’t updated all that much. Slowly, little by little, in painfully tiny increments, I’ve landed in a weird place.

Having never really been in a relationship before, I don’t like to presume to know someone else’s feelings — but often, there are some painfully obvious signs that are too hard to ignore…even if you like to lie to yourself so that you can protect yourself in case things aren’t what you thought. So…all of this is just to say that there’s this man — this man, who, if something were to happen with him, would be completely inappropriate because he’s married, he’s got kids, he’s a lot older and I also work for him.

Can you imagine a worse combination? I know that nothing can happen with him. Full stop. But honestly, in the last little bit, I’ve started to understand how people wind up having affairs because I don’t know if I genuinely have feelings for this man — I think I just like the fact that he wants me…and as disgusting as this sounds, I actually wouldn’t mind losing my virginity to him…but I know I won’t. What can I say? I’m a prude on top of being a virgin. But still…I can’t help thinking about it a lot.

Why do people leave nasty comments?

I get it if you stumble across my blog and think that I’m a miserable bitch who deserves to be alone because I seem really negative — but why do you need to bother wasting your time and leaving me a message telling me that you hope I’ll never get married because I “don’t deserve to”?

Have you ever considered that maybe the loneliness is what’s driven me to the point of being bitter and miserable? Have you considered that, when you face rejection time and time again and have had your self-confidence stripped off over the years and you’re clinically depressed and lonely that you’re not going to be optimistic and cheerful? Have you also considered that this is my blog and that this is meant to be my forum for venting?

If you find my blog stupid and annoying and you find me pathetic and disgusting, here’s a simple piece of advice for you: Don’t fucking read it.

Came across this article in Salon this morning and it struck a chord — for obvious reasons.

---

FRIDAY, AUG 17, 2012 07:30 PM EDT
27 and never been kissed
I felt like the last woman in America to have virgin lips. How did this happen, and would it ever change?
BY TIFFANY HAACHE

“I think she’s a virgin,” said my classmate from grad school, gossiping about a mutual friend. “She’s 26!” he continued. “It’s weird to be a virgin over 24. Even for a woman.”

And most people would agree with him. A virgin in her mid-20s is like a unicorn. Lolo Jones, a stunningly beautiful Olympic hurdler, made huge waves when she admitted she was still a virgin at 29 years old. When one of the main characters on HBO’s “Girls” revealed her 20-something virginity, many viewers scoffed. No way, not realistic. It just doesn’t compute in an age of casual hookups and “friends with benefits.” But at 27 years old, I could one-up all those women. Not only had I never had sex, I had never even been kissed.

It will probably not surprise you to discover that I grew up in a church-every-Sunday, sex-is-for-marriage Christian household. Until college, I played that part well. I wasn’t one of those evangelicals who would share my beliefs with anyone who would listen. I was easygoing, live-and-let-live. But I subscribed to traditional Christian values. I had no intention of having sex before marriage and, while I am pro-choice, I personally would never abort. For the most part, I kept these feelings to myself. If you didn’t ask (and most people didn’t), you would have never known.

But college was a far cry from the safety of my Christian youth. At my liberal arts school (one of the most liberal in the nation), I hung out with all types of people, socialized often, learned to grind on the dance floor, and discovered the bliss that alcohol can bring. I didn’t drink much, but when I did, it opened an unfamiliar side of me – the flirty side. For a supposedly Christian woman, I was living on the wild side.

I carried my never-been-kissed status around like a secret, but it was also freeing to realize no one would ever have to know. In those days, I was still looking for my perfect mate. I wanted a guy who was attractive, smart, and open-minded but Christian enough to be willing to put off sex until marriage. But most guys were either too liberal to wait or too conservative to be OK with a woman drinking and flirting in the first place. I was drawn to those bad boys like a moth to a flame, and some of them were interested in me, but I needed to play it safe and keep them far away. So I became the queen of elusiveness, throwing up walls all around me, because I doubted my ability to resist temptation when temptation was standing in my dorm room looking very hot and bothered. Years later, I found out that some would-be suitors who might have had a shot at meeting my impossible criteria thought I had a boy waiting for me back home. If only I had known.

But my college freedom was short-lived. After two glorious years of independence, I transferred to a different school and moved back home. I continued living there after I graduated and I started working, which basically led me to revert to my pre-college lifestyle. My mind had been opened to the left-leaning ways of the world and there were one or two relapses, not least of which was getting totally hammered at my office Christmas party. However, for the most part, I was back in good-girl mode. The fun-loving me began to feel trapped, like the oxygen was disappearing from the room around me and I couldn’t breathe.

Thus began a chapter of my life where I flitted from city to city every so often. I wanted to be free and to live and experience life. Well, as much as I could without compromising my values. And I did get something like that: the kind of excitement that comes from traveling on your own as a single woman in your twenties. I slept in a strange man’s house for five days in one country, traveled up a mountain in another country with another stranger five minutes after meeting him, spent an entire day in a European city with a girl I had met that morning, had a 4.5-mile beach on a tiny island all to myself to watch the sunset, and experienced the fun of second-language bargaining in yet another foreign land. I was living the dream. But in all those years of risk and adventure, I never had the one experience I wanted and feared most: a relationship. Or even, let’s be honest, a good fling. The idea of it took on magical proportions in my mind, the stuff of Disney happy endings and romantic comedies. A kiss at sunset, a passionate embrace in the rain, a date filled with clever banter — any one of those would have sufficed.

I told myself I didn’t need anyone. I told myself I was happy having other experiences. Dating was not a priority. I think I had two dates in five years. Which doesn’t mean that I didn’t have offers, but when they arrived, I found reasons to dismiss them. I put those guys in my ever-growing “friends” category, or I just never returned their calls and avoided contact until they got the message. Clearly, I was wanting in the maturity department. But the longer I waited, the higher the stakes became, and the more nervous I was to go on any dates whatsoever. It was so unfair: I wanted to be friends with a guy first and then, after I had got to know him in a no-pressure situation, I might decide to go on a few dates with him. But cruel fate would have it the other way: You had to date a guy in order to get to know him. And the older I got, the more people just assumed I was experienced at sex, dating and relationships. Of course they would! I was 25 by this point. There would have to be something dreadfully wrong with a person to be so inexperienced at that age.

More than anything, I feared rejection. No guy was going to stay with me when he realized what was up. Runner Lolo Jones is easily a 12 out of 10, but in interviews, she’s said men would get antsy at the three-month mark and make themselves scarce when it finally sank in that she was not going to sleep with them before marriage. I am nowhere near Lolo’s level of hotness. My very optimistic projections were that a guy would stay with me for two months tops before splitting to find a woman who did not wear a chastity belt. I didn’t think I could deal with those repeated rejections, so I didn’t just wear my chastity belt. I wore my lip guard.

But then, one day, it happened. Twenty-seven years of total abstinence — and it finally happened. Did I find my knight in shining armor? The answer is a big, fat no. There was no dramatic rain. No glorious sunset. In the end, it all happened quite fast.

While out clubbing one night, I was drinking and flirting with a guy. When the club closed, he got the brilliant idea that we should go swimming in our underwear in the outdoor pool at his apartment complex. Drunken me was all for it. Naturally, the other part of me tried not to consider what he had in mind. I decided to go for the thrill of breaking the rules.

Of course, once we were in the pool, he zeroed in for the kiss. He was a tall, muscular, fairly attractive man, and I remember thinking, “Why not?” By the time we were kissing I had long forgotten his name. However, I do remember thinking that I had no idea what I was doing. Blessedly, the alcohol in my system made me very enthusiastic. It was easy. He lifted me up partly out of the water, and my legs wrapped around him quite naturally. We made out for a long time that night, but he was a gentleman, and we didn’t take it much further.

It was hard being one of the last 20-something women in America to never have been kissed. I’m sure people think I wasted a lot of good make-out years, and maybe I did. Still, we only get one first kiss in our lives. I may have waited 27 years for mine, but it was worth it.

Hello.

It’s been awhile, hasn’t it?

Nothing horribly exciting to report. (Though, maybe that’s a good thing compared to endlessly reading about how unhappy someone is.)

Nope, haven’t lost my virginity.

Nope, haven’t been kissed in a long while.

Nope, haven’t been on a date.

Nope, haven’t met anybody.

But, life, unexpectedly, is okay.

Or, maybe, after having found a therapist who’s right for me, I’ve started to just see life a little differently…and maybe that’s enough to change how I feel…which is all I can really ask for.

Stumbled across this on Post Secret today:

To the woman who wrote this: I get it. I feel the same way.

So, I listened to that CBC podcast — and I liked it.

I thought it was a very dignified interview with three people who happened to be virgins.

To be fair, one of them identified as asexual — and that sort of makes it different. But still…she’s a virgin.

The only thing that made me a little sad was listening to the one guy who was 42 who, on the one hand, identified strongly with his Roman Catholic faith but at the same time, felt like it was “over” for him and like there was no chance to find someone…and here, I don’t think the sadness was solely focused on his virginity. He sort of seemed upset that he still hadn’t found someone yet.

Ultimately, I think that’s probably what bothers most of us who are still virgins — we’re not solely seeking that physical connection to relieve us of the “burden” of being virgins. It’s that emotional connection that we’re seeking — and it’s that emotional connection that needs to be present first before you can even entertain thoughts about doing the deed and being sexually active.

And when it’s so difficult to meet someone and have a relationship, you’re bound to ask yourself if there’s something wrong with you…and in most cases, I don’t think there is. Sometimes, it just boils down to really shitty luck.

People get together every day — those who are lucky enough to have had zero trouble in this regard fail to understand why it’s so difficult for the rest of us.

Take my boss, for instance. She went online, met a guy who she invited to her place and had sex with on their first date. Now, six months later, they’re looking at moving in together and engagement ring-shopping.

(She’s an odious human being, by the way.)

Anyways…that’s that.

I don’t know if I would have been a horribly engaging person if I had appeared on that radio program, though.

I’m a virgin because I never met anybody — I have dated very casually, done everything that people usually suggest (in the same manner in which people give overweight people advice on losing weight…you know, like they never thought to do that themselves) to meet people, but I have never met anybody I wanted to be in a relationship with (and who similarly wanted the same thing of me).

The older I get, I wouldn’t say that it gets more “difficult.” It remains the same.

I don’t think my virginity defines me.

My loneliness haunts me, of course, but I’ve had to deal with that all of my life…so that’s nothing new.

The only thing at issue is my biological clock ticking. Once upon a time, I thought I wanted kids…but now, I sort of feel like that might not happen — not in any natural sense, that is.

Anyways…thought I’d post that.

I guess this is my first post of 2012…is it? I don’t remember now as I start to type this — and honestly, while things are “same old, same old” where my non-existent love life is concerned, work has been stressful.

It has been confirmed: I do not work well in teams made up predominantly of other women — especially the clique-y type who act like they’re still in high school (and talk, like, they’re, like, totally 16-years-old, ya know?).

Here’s what complicates things — and it’s a recurring thing in my career so far: there’s a new player at the top and he’s the sort of man who prefers dealing with a certain type of woman — the completely non-sexual type who isn’t flirty or charming but who knows how to get shit done.

I guess it’s the one time in my life that it has worked to my favor that I am completely, totally unattractive to men — for certain big wig types who are almost idiot-savant like in their genius with all things business, but maybe not-so-social, it’s easier to deal with a completely humorless, all-business type of female as opposed to a giggly, baby-voiced, boobs-pushed-out airhead who stalks the hallways with her posse of girlfriends. (Because, it only takes one giggly, baby-voiced, boobs-pushed-out airhead to make it into management and you just know all subsequent hires will be various friends she’s picked up along the way.)

I’ve always been an outsider with few friends — that’s just my lot in life. In the working world, I like to go in, get my work done and then go home. End of story. I don’t want to socialize after work with bimbos who never invite me along, anyway.

And, trust me, I realize that I sound sort of jealous here, but that’s not the case.

The Queen Bee of the Airhead Posse happens to be my boss…except, she barely deals with me directly because she doesn’t like me very much and has actually asked her admin assistant to assign me work like I report into the admin assistant. This assistant, by the way, is also her best friend, who you can see on Facebook posting pictures of girls’ only long-weekend trips featuring the entire clique from work.

I made the mistake of voicing my complaints to a new middle-manager who has turned out to be dumber than a sack of shit and who promptly went to my boss to tell her everything I said. Now, I am persona non grata — even more so than before.

So…yeah, I’ve been stressed.

A few weeks ago, a radio producer for the national radio station up here in Canada emailed me to ask if I might be interested in being on a radio panel to discuss the Virgin Diaries. I briefly emailed neverhadaboyfriend, who had also received an email from the radio lady.

I had zero interest in appearing on radio — especially in my home town — and couldn’t bring myself to respond. Luckily, if you go over onto http://neverhadaboyfriend.org/, you can access the podcast.

I plan on listening to it later.

So, maybe there’ll be thoughts on this later…maybe not.

I’ve recently started doing freelance work on the side, so that has been occupying a lot of my time, too.

Yup. I have no personal life.