Our society focuses on love from the start with fairy tales of the Princess needing a Prince who then has to fight and perform heroics to finally earn the Princess and take her away to live happily ever after.
My experience of love had two very distinct categories that I did not understand at the time, nor do I claim to fully comprehend now. I remember my first experience of "love" involving my friend and next door neighbor Allyson. I thought she was perfect and I just always wanted to be with her. I thought she was smart, beautiful, and just "everything". I had a desire to both impress her and take care of her, especially later on when she was dying of leukemia.
I did not imagine myself kissing Allyson, perhaps because there were no roll models of women kissing women. I did know, however, that I wanted to be as close to her as possible; emotionally, physically, and Spiritually. She was the center of my world and being with her was what felt the happiest and most foundational to me. I definately felt as if I was following her around, probably what we might call lovestruck. She could color in the lines - I could not. Her greens eyes sparkled - mine were flat brown. Her fair skin and profound dark freckles along with a petite body and her black hair made her a Princess, like Snow White - my tall skinny body and rustic Mediterranean colors with my dirty blonde hair made me into the Prince and I longed to be most charming for her.
One day we were on the metal swing set in the yard. We were on the swing seats and I had an idea of how I could impress her. "I bet I can get under this swing as it is swinging."
Her face lit up with interest and also concern, "Oooo, but that would be too dangerous. You shouldn't, Aileen."
That made me want to do it all the more. She wanted to see me do it, however she was worried about me. I think I could feel her heart racing.
I hopped off the seat swing and started pushing her on it. I stood back and waited, watching the swing and focusing on its rhythm. The timing seemed perfect and I dove to the ground underneath it, feeling it skim over my back as I crawled as flat as possible to the other side.
"Aileen! That was terrific!! I can't believe you did that!" Her respect and excitement brought pride and strength to me. I was standing tall, brushing my clothes off. I could see how she looked at me. I loved it and I wanted more. I told her that I would do it again. She sat back in the swing and smiled. I pushed her again, stood back, and made my dive. This time my back was hunched up just a little too far and the metal swing caught the skin on my lower back, tearing a chunk of flesh off of my gallant body. I made it to the other side but needed to excuse myself into the house. To this day I love that scar on my back. It reminds me of what true first Prince Charming love feels like.
Allyson died the summer that we were going into sixth grade. I am sure that her death brought some interesting twists and blocks to my experience of "Love".
While this experience of Love was happening, there were cute boys in my life that sent exciting twinges of energy through my body. With certain boys I noticed how they looked. There was a strong physical connection. I found myself in trouble in second grade when I chased two boys in particular on the playground. I just thought they were so cute and I chased them, knocked them to the ground, and kissed them. This did not go over well even in 1969! I was not self conscious around boys. I had a direct hit of what I felt physically and I just went for it. I always have. I have been the first kisser, making the first move with the male species. I can still feel my first really strong lust experience with a boy. Ahhhh..it was at dusk in my neighborhood during a game of kick the can. The neighborhood boy that I had been crushing on for years was hiding right next to me, sunk down low together behind a stone wall, close to each other, breathing quietly, each with a hand practically touching. It was excruciating! I just wanted to do...well...do something! The energy tension in that moment, sweating and hiding behind the stone wall in the field with the boy I had days of desiring contact with...so close...so alone with him...
I was raised Catholic, and also because I am a modest person, I did not act on the strong sexual feelings I had (and perhaps because I got in trouble at Page School during my formative years for doing so!!!).
So what is Love? Lust? Attraction? Relationships? WHO should YOU be with?
I believe that all relationships are of great value. Each relationship we are in we learn about ourselves. We learn what we wanted and do not want anymore. We learn what feeds us and what depletes us. We learn about being ourselves as well as being what our partner wants. Sometimes we leave these relationships and sometimes we stay. Sometimes we come back around full circle to a relationship, and sometimes we never see that lover again.
There are moments when we love someone so deeply, so confidently, so "for sure", and yet we cannot be with her or him. Or perhaps we feel that truth and we are with her/him only to discover within weeks or a few short years that it turns into anger and frustration. What gives, folks?!
Having our hearts "broken" and "breaking" a few ourselves. Daring to love once, or twice, or over and over again.
Me and Dave from college, 1982. We were so deeply connected however we never could name it and it did not fit into the traditional college relationship."It" was too special and unique to make into a story so it just floated along.
What is this LOVE thing? What does it have to do with it? How do YOU know what love is for you? Have you fully reflected on love? If you could choose anyone to be with, who would it be? What would it feel like? How do you react to the person you "love"? Do they belong to you? Are there strings attached? Commitment rules? Expectations? Is it Love? Or Lust? Or People Pleasing? Or socially the right person to be with?
Take some time today to really ask yourself, "What's Love?" and reflect with an open heart and mind on your journey of Love. What does Love feel like to you in your Body? Your Spirit? Your Soul? Your Heart? Your Life? And welcome it in, over the rocky hills of pain, into the depths of past despairs, and find it again. Find it in someone new or find it in the relationship you currently have.
What's Love and what does it have to do with it? Everything, my friends...Love has to do with everything. So allow it big, beautiful, and healthy, into your life!
This was an interesting request from one of my best friends in high school. We were driving somewhere and I remember this scene so vividly even though it was thirty years ago.
Her, interrupting me: Can't you just be one way?!
Me, totally confused and taken off guard: What do you mean?
Her, annoyed: Like this...this thing you do. Why can't you just be like everyone else and be just one way?
Me, still clueless: I don't know.
I was shocked and completely unaware of anything that I could possibly be doing that aggravated her so much. And what did she mean about this 'one way' jazz?
Over the next few days I tried to figure out what I was doing, as a seventeen year old high school senior, that was so outrageously not 'one way'. The best I could discover is that I had work boots next to high heels next to toe shoes next to soccer cleats, in my closet. And then I had sports sweatshirts folded next to Dean sweaters folded next to pastel angora cowl neck sweaters next to over sized flannel buttoned shirts.
Was this the issue that drove my friend mad? That my closet looked like twelve different people used it?
As time rolled along I came to understand my own discomfort with being more than 'one way'. I would wear men's briefs (before it was 'stylish' to do so) under a pretty skirt and thong underwear under my man pants. My first and only pair of penny loafers were purchased not in a cute store or Bass outlet shop but rather from the little old Italian man in the beaten up shoe shop in the center of town. They were men's shoes. The shoemaker even put a penny in them for me.
I wear fedoras, and hemp caps, and pretty girly fluffy hair muffs. I love my black men wingtip shoes and my five inch heel glitter dancing shoes.
One way, you say. Who needs that boredom, I say! I also say, I am only being who I am and I can't be any other way.
I have caused great curiosity and some negative reactions from people because, quite frankly, I just don't understand GENDER. I guess I don't "play nice" when it comes to gender roles, identity, or orientation. That simply means, I live my way.
People get very very VERY confused with gender 'stuff' so in this blog I will put it all out there nice and easy. A little primer of sorts. This should make us all breathe easier and enjoy any and all ways of wonderful human kind!! We can only hope!
Gender Roles: This is the society ruling on what children, youth, adults, and elders should do depending on whether they were born with a penis or a vagina. And for those that were born with a combination of the two or no clear visible sign of either, well, the doctors and parents got to decide on a penis or vagina, form a gender identity for the baby, and then subsequently tell the child how to behave and what to do - the child's role in the world based on her or his genitalia.
So Gender Roles affected us in ways like, I was a girl and loved to climb trees and get into wrestling fights. As a girl I was suppose to play jump rope and dress up dolls. I had absolutely no interest in many typical girl activities. When I was three years old I hurt my head because I liked to lie under my bed, chairs, and tables on my back and pretend to be a car mechanic. My father was not a car mechanic. We didn't live near an auto garage. I just innately loved pretending to fix cars!
All of these "boy" interests made me stand out, look odd, and be called a Tomboy. Boys also faced abuse and became outcasts if they did anything like knit, cook, or chose not to want to beat up other boys on the playground. They were often called sissies. Why do we even have to have a name for a child being authentically who she or he is? Probably because we have great difficulty feeling safe in a kaleidoscope of colorful diversity. Too bad for all of us.
People who cross dress would fall under the gender role line as they do not want to be the other gender, they simply enjoy dressing more than "one way".
Gender Identity: This is the biological gender that we each identify as regardless of biological genitalia.
There are many incredible stories about gender identity for people of all ages. There are profound instances of children having their biological gender chosen such as the story of David (Bruce) Reimer.
In this category of gender identity there would be women and men who transition to the other gender using hormones and sometimes full surgery to have the other gender body pieces. This is sexual reassignment surgery. Not all transgender people will have full surgery. Often times they have their breasts either removed as they become fully men or hormones and augmentation as they become fully women. "Bottom" surgery is more difficult and often times people will not choose to have this.
Gender Sexual Orientation: This is the gender that one is attracted to for sexual pleasure. Gay men, Lesbian women, Heterosexual men and women, Bi-Sexual people, and Pansexual people.
Pansexual people are attracted to a person, a being, an energy source, regardless of gender or phase of gender. A Pansexual person would be in a loving sexual relationship with a transgender person and there would be no issue with what level of transitioning was or wasn't occurring.
People seem to get most confused with transgender people and their sexual preferences. It is very important to note that just because a man identifies as a woman and transitions to being a full time woman, this does not mean that he wants to be in a sexual or partnership relationship with a man once he becomes a woman.
People are attracted to a specific gender, or both genders, or all levels of gender fluidity. This does not usually change based on their gender identity. On occasion hormone use can affect a person's gender sexual orientation.
All of these three gender points; roles, identity, and orientation, exist separate from one another. We cannot judge who someone should be attracted to based on their genitals, whether they were born with the ones they have or surgically had them placed there. We also cannot judge what a person would like to do for a living or for a hobby based on their genitals, whether they were born with the ones they have or surgically had them placed there.
A quick summary:
Gender roles: the oppressive story that represses true joy in people because they are ostracized if they do not act, work, sit, behave, dress as a society tells them to do based on whether they have a vagina or a penis. (hhmm...do I have an opinion on this?)
Gender Identity: the emotional, mental, spiritual, and physical need to be a specific gender regardless of the biological parts of either vagina or penis, and breasts or no breasts, that one was born with. One could also be a combination of both genders, Androgynous or Universal (as someone lovingly told me that I was/am)
Gender Sexual Orientation: the sexual and relationship partnerships that one feels authentically drawn to engage in. Homosexual (same gender, biological or surgical), heterosexual (opposite genders, biological or surgical), bi-sexual (attracted to both genders), and pansexual (attracted to any and all genders and fluidity of genders).
As I have had the opportunity of age, wisdom, reflection, and beautiful people in my life as friends, lovers, and partners, I have come to rejoice and celebrate that I can't be just one way. I am not one way. I am a Pansexual Universal human who lives far beyond gender roles. This is because I see love as the only defining criteria for living. So I guess, I am ONE WAY afterall...and that ONE WAY is total and pure love, respect, awe, and support of each person to live a life based from the exact gender role, gender identity, and gender sexual orientation that aligns with their joyful, beautiful, unique self.
Hormones make us do wild, emotional things - just ask any teacher of middle school students! I remember being on recess duty when there was an especially harsh "throw water bottles at each others' junk" game
going on. Why middle school age boys like to whip hard objects at each others penises and scrotum (is a bunch of scrotum called scroti?) alludes me and perhaps has been a curious question since the beginning of time.The girls took sides regarding which boy should be defended, with one girl actually scratching the " bad boy" in the head. Often times my role at that school was to sit the small class down and unpack the heightened hysteria.
Another day a recess fight between two boys landed them in the main classroom with the math teacher. She was an incredible woman and did a wonderful job following their completely sporadic conversation and moods. As I joined the group, the boys were just beginning to find common ground between them...sobbing about all their fears and difficulties in life. These boys went from anger and defensiveness, to bonding over how hard life was as a twelve year old all in the span of twenty minutes.
Dear friends, we all get slammed by hormones. This is a fact of being a human. When we are young we begin cycling at about eight years old. Our hormones begin to surge in during periods of time letting us get used to the natural chemicals that will keep us hostage for the next forty years or so of our lives!
When we get to eleven and twelve years old those hormones start really pushing our bodies into new shapes, changes in voice pitch, pimples, and more intense sexual reactions to stimulation. There also is natural practicing of the equipment, shall we say, and this can cause great distress to boys in the locker room when their penises just decide to rise to erection when they are all changing. Those dang hormones making us do all this stuff!!
We get loaded up with natural hormones, and then things fly...sometimes literally. I remember one guy friend was a little shell shocked with he moved in with his girlfriend. "I didn't know that P.M.S. stood for Pack My Suitcase!" Oh what a ride it all is.
Women definitely can be taken over by hormones during much of their lives. We start cycling at age eight, get the full blown monthly slam, pregnancies can thrown in a huge curve ball, and then peri - menopause is just a bizarre surreal existence. My second hot flash of peri-menopause occurred in Deb's Natural Gourmet market in Concord, Ma. The fire department had to be called in and I am not kidding. It was a 911 alert and I did not make the call because I was passing out after being thrust into the dairy cooler by a friend I hadn't seen in five years. Oh hormones, you make my heart sing...you make everything groovy...wild thing....
Alas, it is not only women who go through hormonal insanity, much to the chagrin of you men out there who don't listen to the very real annoying things that you do and discount it all when we are foaming at the mouth while shoving sweet, then salty, then sweet, then chocolate, then sweet, then salty, in to our mouths. Men actually have cycles as well. When men begin to have a decrease in testosterone it can be very difficult. Testosterone begins to decline for men in their 30s. If there is low testosterone then men can feel very tired, depressed, anxious, weak, and lose their sex drive. This can lead to erectile dysfunction. Testosterone is also very important for overall body health.
Hormones are natural in the human body and they have their own ebb and flow which both men and women need to learn to accept in themselves and in each other. At some points in our lives, both men and women can have a spike in hormone levels, a significant change in hormone balance, or a decline in hormone levels. Both genders react to the hormone amounts being secreted, and both genders are greatly impacted emotionally and physically by their hormone levels. When our hormones are doing their wild things, we all can be uncomfortable. I will never forget the look on my ex husband's face when he met me in the grocery check out line with a package of bacon I had asked him to run and get. I was about five months pregnant with our first daughter and was craving a good bit of bacon. When I turned the package over to look at the 'bacon window' I saw a display of white fat. I began to both sob and yell at him in line. "This is a terrible package of bacon! Can't you see all the fat? Where is the bacon? Where is the bacon here?!" He looked worse than a deer in the headlights!
By the second pregnancy his reaction was less of shock and panic and more direct. I had taken an entire half gallon of vanilla ice cream and covered it in peanut butter and then poured chocolate syrup all over it. I snuggled my eight month pregnant body into the bed and dug in with a huge spoon. It looked delicious. Then I spooned it into my mouth. Tears began to drip out of the corner of my eyes. "This is not as good as I thought it would be..." I can still feel the disappointment and wave of despair related to that discovery twenty seven years ago!!
My ex husband didn't even look up from his book. "Next time maybe you shouldn't use all the ice cream for a craving. Try out a little bit first."
But of course I had no choice - my hormones made me do it!
Just a title that cuts to the quick on this subject.
One of the things that we are doing to ourselves and to our blossoming children is omitting sensuality. Oddly, we take away the very core of healthy sexuality.
The thought that comes to mind on this subject is the result of a survey that I read years ago. It was a survey of people after they participated in a taste test between a real blueberry pie and an artificially flavored blueberry pie. I was astonished and insulted to read the results; the artificial blueberry pie won the flavor contest hands down.
How is that even possible?! There was little to no real blueberry flavor in the pie, so how could it win a blueberry pie tasting contest? It wasn't actually blueberry! How bizarre that a chemically created "blueberry" could taste better than an actual blueberry? Poor real fruit grown normally...I feel your pain.
What other organically authentic sensual experiences are we excluding from society?
I worked in a nursing home for years. Talk about an artificial experience and lack of sensuality! It would have been a hermetically sealed environment had they not allowed oxygen in! It took me five months of arguing with my supervisor in order for her to allow me to take residents outside for walks in the fresh air. I felt as if I was suffocating with all the clogged pores and regulated building temperatures. I wondered how all the dust that was floating around the rooms ever left the building. I could see all the residents coated in artificial existence. They needed to sweat. I needed to sweat. So I would take a few of them out every day during my breaks and lunch hour. I took them on one on one walks down into the wooded areas and back up the steep hill. Pushing the more, shall we say, Rubenesque residents up the steep hill in their wheelchairs during the hot summer days was taxing. More than once I thought I was nuts, however when I saw sweat pushing out past the layers of archived must in their faces, I was super-charged like a superhero to keep going in that moment and beyond.
We have to feel life, taste life, smell life, and be charged by life. Life force pulses and radiates in real blueberries, through real air and natural sunlight.
We hear life, engage in life, and are thrown to and fro in the waves of it.
Sure, I can use mapquest to get directions and, while efficient, it misses the sensual interactions of asking a person. I will never forget the most sensual direction asking experience of my life...so far, anyway. I was driving in Haymarket Square in Boston looking for a parking spot. My mother was in the front passenger seat and my two daughters were in the back. I could not remember where the closest legal parking was, so I stopped and asked some cab drivers who were waiting on the side of the road near the market place. One happily approached the front passenger window of my car. He was incredibly friendly and helpful talking away and showing the route with his hands. My mother's head was turned towards him and I was leaning forward looking past the back of her head to talk to him and get the directions. Slowly, while he was still talking, my mother turned her head to face me. She looked straight at me, face held stoically. There on one lens of her big 1980s eye glasses was a chunk of chewed bagel. While our very helpful cab driver was telling us directions, he accidentally shot a piece of his breakfast out of his mouth and on to my mother's glasses! I started shaking as I attempted to hold in a full blown laughing fit.
Just think about it...plugging an address into a GPS to get somewhere or experiencing fresh air, the noises of life, and a half chewed bagel hitting your eye glasses on the journey to get somewhere.
How sensually "real" is your life? What are you experiencing in your life that touches all of your senses? What makes your hair stand on end? What causes you to sweat? What happens inside your mouth when you eat spicy or sweet or salty or sour? Can you smell something that sends tingling reactions throughout your body? When you look at a burning sunset, do you see the colors and feel them washing over you as the sun disappears beyond the ocean horizon? Can you laugh so hard that you fall to the ground from weakness? Have you ever cried so hard that you thought for sure you disappeared into the blankets of your bed? And have you slowed down a kiss with your lover long enough that you felt, through the softness of the gently touching lips, the ecstasy of a shared sensual lifetime to come?
Choose real blueberries in real blueberry pie, the sweating
intensity of an uphill climb in the sun, and smeared cream cheese and
everything bagel on your mother's eye glasses, for a sensual life.Once we begin to meld into the ever flowing energy waves of sensual experiences, our ability to share this expansive pleasuring world with our lover will be automatic.
I remember checking out the Wilhelm Reich Museum in Rangeley Maine one summer. I knew very little about Reich at that time, but enough to know that he was an unconventional scientist of interest. We entered the museum and had to attend a guided tour. There were two of us and that was the extent of the participants. The tour began with a brief video about Reich. We sat in metal folding chairs as our guide started the video. She sat beside it to the right, in perfect view of us and us to her. The choppy low budget film told me what I did not know about Reich as this 70+ year old woman sat observing me. Reich believed that the key to health was the human orgasm. He also believed that the orgasm was a manifestation of a universal energy source and he named that energy source Orgonon. Reich wanted to harness this energy source and use it to help the human race. The Orgone Accumulator was a box he invented that could accumulate Orgonon energy. Patients would sit in the Orgone Accumulator and be saturated with Orgonon energy. Reich believed that this life force energy that he argued was found everywhere could heal many human ailments.
Now that was not something I expected to learn as a 70 year old woman sat confidently, calmly, and at the ready to answer all my questions about the power of orgasms on that hot August day.
Then we have Napoleon Hill, one of my brilliant mentors. He wrote about Sex Transmutation.
By holding on to the sexual energy and not having an orgasm, according to Hill, one can use that powerful sexual energy to make positive things manifest in one's life. My favorite part of this YouTube selection on Sex Mutation, and there were a few to choose from, is from the comment section:
To the woman in in this vid: thanks for sharing your insight
on this subject as well as embedding a sexual desire for your body in my
mind i can now draw from to sexually transmute with a great burning
passion into my definite purpose. Your body and mind got me fired up i
might make a million dollars this week.
Shockingly that last comment did not get any like hits...hhhmmm....
Another sexual energy is known as Kundalini.
I experienced spontaneous Kundalini starting in college. I had no idea what it was and I was frightened and confused. Growing up as a Catholic and sneaking off to see the Exorcist at the movies contributed greatly to my belief that something crazy was going on inside me. I also was enjoying the Wednesday to Sunday long weekend fun at a few local bars at that time and suspected that my drinking was affecting my central nervous system.
So although I started today's blog on orgasms, the underlying energy of orgasms or choosing not to have orgasms is where we ended up. The extensive topic of orgasms will continue in following blogs. Just like with every other sexual and sensual topic of today, there is so much more to discover, discuss, and think about. What might you do with the sex energy that flows throughout you and perhaps the Universe?
Make a million dollars? If so, I expect to hear, in the famous words of the video commentator oddiemonsta, "Thanks tits."
Ahhh..this song brings back such great college memories. There were not too many songs that were sexier than this one back in the day. I think I danced erotically to this song in my dorm room preparing to go out more than I did with potential partners on the dance floor. (and that was both a magnificent feat and a committed danger as I was using a curling iron for my hair while getting ready!)
My memory of dancing alone in a state of anticipated ecstasy is ironic relative to the last segment of the song:
"And when I get this feeling I need sexual healing Ohh, when I get this feeling I need sexual healing I gotta have sexual healing, darling 'Cos I'm all alone And I need sexual healing, darling Till you come back home
Please don't procrastinate It's not good to masturbate
"
And here is where I must differ with my dear friend Marvin Gaye...
It is AWESOME to MASTURBATE!
Some of us may remember The Seinfeld episode called The Contest. According to the website ANSWERS:
"The episode was controversial when broadcasted because NBC thought that masturbation was not a topic suitable for prime time
television. As a result, the word "masturbation" is never used in the
episode. Instead, the subject is described using a series of euphemisms, while the meaning of the subject is still made clear to the audience.[2] The writer of the episode, Larry David, won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Individual Achievement in Writing in a Comedy Series for his work on the episode.[3] One euphemism used in the episode is "master of my domain", said by a character when still in the contest. It has become a catchphrase in popular culture, although it is not always used in reference to masturbation.[4][5]
The episode was ranked #1 on TV Guide's list of "TV's Top 100 Episodes of All Time".[6]"
I was very surprised when a woman in my office was so vocal about how disgusting she thought the show was as well as how gross masturbation was. I asked her if she would rather have her middle school aged daughter out somewhere having sex with someone and put herself in any jeopardy of her health or have her daughter safe at home masturbating in the privacy of her own room. She firmly responded that she did not want her daughter to masturbate. I attempted to educate this woman about the wonderful aspects of people discovering what they like and don't like sexually, where their highest sexual arousal areas are, and the safety factors of erotic self discovery. She wanted no part in the discussion. She continued to claim that masturbation was disgusting. Finally, after much gentle questioning., she told me it was disgusting because she didn't like the idea that she could shake someone's hand after they had masturbated.
Number one question from youth when the class starts talking about masturbating: "Should we wash our hands before masturbating?" to which I always answer, "Yes." In respect of my old co-worker's fears, I also make it clear that hands should always be well washed after masturbating as well.
It is interesting that women especially have difficulty touching their genital area. If we don't support and encourage masturbation for girls we will perpetuate a pattern of women giving up their power to others. Women have a wonderful smorgasbord of erotic potential between anal, vaginal, and clitoral stimulation. What healthy, sexual, confident women would be sent into the world of relationships if they all hand their hands on a triple pleasure toy in their teenage and young adult years!
We don't talk to our youth and young adults, they get bombarded with disempowering sexual escapades in the media, and then they fumble around in pairs and groups turning their sexual maturity over to others. I say become a masturbation specialist and then go exploring with others. Know where your biology is, what it does, and what it feels like when many different senses are introduced to these areas.
Many men miss out on the wonderful and highly satisfying experience of anal arousal and orgasms because so much focus is culturally put on the performance of the penis and the penis orgasm.Having their prostrates stimulated can have life long health benefits for men.
There are also potential nipple orgasms for both men and women.
Some people get highly aroused yet do not have one big earth shattering orgasm. Others have spasming sexual intensity rushing over them for hours if given the time. Everyone can enjoy a very exciting, healthy, and successful sexual healing through the very good art of masturbation.
Google around the web and learn more about the great toys available and the important health benefits to masturbation and arousal. Masturbation is a very low risk sexual behavior.
So move over Marvin...there are plenty of classic masturbation songs...it is all good...Self Love is an excellent form of sexual healing...
Ugh! Adolescent embarrassment! Sadly I was not introduced to tampons until my junior year in high school. As an athlete it was horribly emotionally painful as the disaster of a lifetime had potential to occur to me in any moment.
While my friends would grab a minute cigar shaped white paper wrapped tampon from their lockers and slide it into their long sleeve sweaters and button down shirts, I wrestled with a monstrous white pad and tried to shove it into my brown lunch bag.
Embarrassing moments didn't just happen to girls in junior high and high school. I remember a few years ago a man I knew was complaining about how good the boys of today have it. He pointed out to me that they don't have to tuck their shirts in. Those longer untucked shirt ends nicely cover any spontaneous and uncontrollable arousal that torments adolescent boys. This man had to rely on a handful of books and the kindness of male friends to hide behind to get through his secondary schools days.
For adults, we need some good opportunities to reflect on our sexual development. Many adults did not get any dialogue or accurate information about the biology of their bodies or the emotional components of healthy sexuality. Even when our parents attempted to help us out, we may have been too embarrassed to engage in the "Birds and the Bees" conversation.
When I was in sixth grade one such episode occurred for me. We were coming back from vacation. My brother and I always got along really well. During this trip he and I were having an exceptionally hilarious car ride home. When we parked in the driveway my brother and I raced out of the car to the front door. Oddly the outer door was opened a bit. We looked and inside was a big brown paper covered box. Of course we were intrigued. We pulled out the package and saw that it was for me! It wasn't my birthday. It wasn't any holiday I could think of in which I should be getting a present, and a huge square one at that! As my brother and I talked through the options of who it could be from, finally concluding it must be from my Godmother, Aunt Muriel, my mother made it to the door and quickly unlocked the inner door. With my awesome surprise present in one hand and grabbing at my brother's arm with the other, we started to bolt up the stairs intent on getting to my room. We would tear open the paper there and oooo and ahhhhhh over what was inside this box.
My mother stopped us short and insisted that I would prefer to open the box myself...alone. I fought back with her. I pleaded my case to share the gift with my brother. Nothing worked. My brother was sent to his room, me and my box were sent to mine. Disappointed and confused I opened it up alone. I was shocked, insulted, ashamed, and furious about what was inside! It was a beginners menstruation kit. What kind of people would make such a thing? How could my mother have bough this for me?
The uncomfortableness of the product, combined with the humiliation of getting excited about some fabulous gift with my brother was overwhelming. My mother came into my room and attempted to discuss the contents of the box. Of course I yelled at her and threw the box to the floor. She suggested that I may want to look at it thoroughly at a later time. I never did.
We each have many stories about our budding and blossoming sexuality. Some stories are not of opening up but rather shutting down and repressing. All of our sensual and sexual experiences, no matter how old we are today, have impacted how we feel about our sexuality, remembering that the term "sexuality" covers a very large table of content!
To begin the fun, reflective, challenging, and honest dialogue with ourselves about our sexuality we must first begin to look at what influences and experiences happened to us and with us. Some we can laugh at, some we still may feel sick to our stomachs about, some we may still be hiding, and others we may happily and eagerly remember.
Here's to our journey to be our authentic healthy and exploratory sexual selves!
At the University of Amherst in 1982 and 1983 I was a Peer Sexuality Educator. I had gone through two semesters of training and was ready to support my peers relative to their exploration of healthy sexuality. It was during this time that both the source of cold sores was revealed and HIV and AIDS. It was a busy and shocking time to be learning and educating college students about sex and sexuality. I was also a very interesting character to be someone who was attempting to do as as I was raised Catholic, attended a Catholic elementary school and pledged to not have intercourse until I was married. I also has begged God during sixth grade in many promising prayer sessions to not give me my period. I vowed to God that if he did not give me my period then I would become a nun. I am not a nun.
Skip to many years later as a youth adviser and sexuality educator for youth. I have spent countless hours looking up answers to anonymous questions placed in the question box, dealing with youth's anxiety ridden gender orientation concerns, and educating parents so that they can be the primary educators of healthy sexuality for their children.
Comfortably exploring sexuality is an invaluable choice of using one's time, attention, and money. All humans have some form of sexuality and the diversity of sexual interests, desires, and norms vary greatly. The most important aspect of sexuality education from my perspective is to focus on the openness to discussion, learning, and appropriate experiences that people must have in their lives. Repressing sexual energy can cause many unhealthy issues in the body, mind, and spirit. Shame, embarrassment, and lack of validation as a sexual being can really limit the fullness of our life experience. This blog is about sharing information and having fun while doing it to offer you a sense of normalcy to sexuality in your life.
Sexuality topics and information is every changing, just like most other aspects of the human life experience. It is important for me as an educator to stay on top of the latest medical information, fads, and language. In the curriculum of one of the youth sexual education programs that I have facilitated there is an activity in which the boys and girls are divided into groups by gender. They are given markers and poster paper to list all of the names and terms for parts of the male and female genitalia and female breasts. Most names have been around since I was young, and then there are some new ones and a few real doozies!
When my daughters were in high school and college I would ask them to keep me in the loop of any new sexual terms. I wanted to stay as "hip" as I could on the slang end of the sexual revolution. They always had the freedom to speak about sexual topics with me and I noted all the evolving ideas and words, sometimes needing to ask them for clarity. While sexuality education can be very serious business, it also can be quite hilarious.
One Saturday I was visiting my oldest daughter in Amherst while she was in college at UMass. We did our fall excursion to Atkins Farm and grabbed a dozen apple cider donuts. We left the farm and we were cruising back to campus, an apple cider doughnut in each of our hands, when I stopped for gas. I tossed my purse over on to my daughter's lap as I opened the door to pump the gas.
"Mom!" she exclaimed, rather annoyed, "you put your purse on my doughnut!"
I stopped for a moment and noted this information. Then I responded. "Oh, is that a new name for it?"
She looked at me blankly.
"For vagina" I clarified. "Are you guys calling a vagina a doughnut now?"
My daughter looked at me both with pity and aggravation. "No, Mom!" she firmly responded while she lifted my purse off of her lap. "You put your purse on my DOUGHNUT!" and there sitting on her lap was a now squished Atkins Farms apple cider doughnut.
