Ashamed by inexperince

[girlplayer34]

Hello my name is Deja, I'm 24 years old and I'm a virgin. I know to most people its no big deal but it still something I'm deeply ashamed and it's why I don't date much. I have never had a long-term relationship before a mixture of extreme shyness in my teens/early adulthood , and lack of opportunities - ie. girls not asking me out / not being interested. So its been difficult, for a while I kinda though it would never happen and the older I get the more ashamed I feel. I know most people say its not a big deal but my biggest fear is that someone won't want to do it with me because I have no experience. This had made very difficult to date and meet new people since I'm afraid of looking inexperienced. Unfortunately, however, some people (women) are scared off when they hear someone is a virgin, particularly at what would be considered a later age. They worry about having to make the experience special or about neediness or that the virgin is a freak of some sort. I don't know what do anymore.

[Mo]

Hi Deja,

It sounds like this is causing you a lot of shame and stress, and I'm really sorry to hear that. I don't know if it helps to hear this, but these feelings are pretty common among people who haven't had a lot of sexual or relationship experience by their mid-20s. The flipside of this is that it isn't uncommon to reach that age without those experiences! I think it's really easy to get in this mindset that everyone's had sexual experience by that point, because there's so much general messaging around it, but you definitely aren't alone in this. I get that knowing it doesn't make everything immediately better, but I do think it's important to keep in mind. There are definitely going to be women in your area who also haven't had sex and are anxious about a partner's reaction to that!

I think the best thing you can do as you meet new people is be open about your desires or expectations, the same way I'd recommend for anyone regardless of their sexual experience. If you do want your first sexual experience to be special in a certain way, that's something you're allowed to ask for! People who aren't interested in that might not be a good fit for you, but it doesn't mean you shouldn't ask for it. If your goal is to enjoy yourself without any pressure on you or your partner to do anything special for "your first time," then it can help to be open about that too.

It wouldn't be right for anyone to assume they know what you want out of sex, and I encourage you not to assume what a potential partner's feelings about dating someone who hasn't had sex would be! There are definitely women who won't be scared off by your lack of experience, although I understand your frustration if it feels like most of the people you've talked to have acted like they're put off by that. It certainly isn't a universal reaction!
We do have a great article about how to approach sex and relationships in your 20s with little to no experience; if you haven't read through that yet, I think it may be helpful!

[girlplayer34]

I'm still nervous about having to tell someone about my sexual experience I don't want to be dishonest but I also don't know when the right time would be to tell someone.

[Heather]

Hi there, girlplayer.

I think that this can feel a lot more scary and intimidating when the person you're telling is potentially anyone, rather than someone you have gotten to know, built trust with, have built feelings of safety with, and would be telling in the context of an interaction or relationship after you have gotten to the point where you are starting to feel comfortable talking with them about sex and sexuality, and/or being sexual with them. It's not only hard to picture telling a stranger things we feel vulnerable about, it's also not likely to be accurate. It's much easier to figure out when the right time is for us, or others, when we actually know them, you know?

I do want to make sure that you know, like Mo touched on, that being your age without sexual partnership before is actually very average in 2022, and when we're talking about queer dating, it's not at all unusual for people in their twenties top only just even be getting opportunities for that, let alone to haver been in relationships. You're less unusual than you worry you are. Too, there are lots of other women out there like you in this way, so if it feels like it might feel better for you to date others at your same level of experience and age, please know they're out there. <3

Have you yet started dating? When you talk about how some women have responded, is this something that has actually happened to you, or more about what you have heard from others?

What do you think you will want or need to feel comfortable starting to get sexually involved with someone else, including feeling able to have conversations about your sexual histories, or to ask questions about what you don't know when it comes to them and sex (which will be almost nothing for any of us getting involved with someone new, btw)?

[MusicNerd]

Hey Deja! In addition to all of the wonderful insight and questions Heather has mentioned here (that I also am finding helpful to think about), it can also be important to remember that: EVERYONE has things they’re insecure about.

Even if someone you meet has sexual/relationship experience, you likely won’t be going out with someone who has zero insecurities, so it might help to know that you’ll also be dealing with someone who has some fears related to sharing certain things about themself with you too. And there are even people, like a close friend of mine, who have insecurities for the exact opposite reason— because they have a lot of sexual experience and are worried that someone would judge them for that. Personally, I don’t care if someone has a lot of experience (I actually think it can be a positive thing!), but this is something that my friend was worried their inexperienced date would judge them for.

Also, presumably since you’re going to be telling a potential partner about your inexperience after you’ve spent some time together, this means that by that point they’ll already have gotten to know all of the great things about you that make you the wonderfully unique person you are— this makes someone more likely to be understanding and supportive of the things that make you feel ashamed.

And if it makes you feel any better: I’m a queer person in my late twenties who has very little sexual experience, and I don’t yet have long-term relationship experience, which can definitely bring up feelings of shame and insecurity for me at times. But the last person I dated (we broke up for reasons not related to my inexperience) was someone who had gotten to know me for a bit before learning about my inexperience, and they were super understanding and didn’t judge me for it. I also learned in sharing my inexperience with them, that they had started queer dating at a “later age” themself; and even though they had quite a bit of experience with long-term hetero relationships, they hadn’t had long-term experience with queer relationships, and were judged for that by other people, so they were able to understand where I was coming from.

All this is to say, there absolutely ARE people who won’t judge you for your lack of experience, and the only way I was able to find that out was by letting myself open up to this person, after I had learned that they felt like a safe-enough person to share my dating history with.

Now that I’m actively dating and looking for a partner again, sometimes I get scared that maybe I won’t find anyone else that would be understanding of my inexperience/other things that I feel insecure about. But then I remember that:
1. If someone is really right for me, they’re gonna be able to hold ALL parts of me in their mind — wonderful parts and messy parts — and still value me as a partner based on all the positive things I have to bring to a relationship, because they like me for me
2. Even if they find my inexperience (or other things I’m insecure about) to be too much of a turn-off for them, that doesn’t mean that I’m undesirable in general— it just means I’m not right for *that* person
3. I haven’t met every single person in the world, or every eligible queer person in my city, so the odds of ZERO people being understanding of my sexual/relationship inexperience are highly unlikely, and
4. I also have things that are deal-breakers for me, that wouldn’t make me think less of someone, but would just show me that we’re not compatible. (As an example: I recently turned someone down, because I learned that they don’t like cats— because I have a cat of my own who’s like a child to me, it’s really important for me to be with someone who also likes cats. I didn’t think they were a bad person for not liking cats — in fact, I thought they seemed pretty cool — I just knew that we weren’t right for each other!)

(Sidenote: maybe it could be helpful to write down all the positive things that you could bring to a relationship to serve as a reminder that, “Hey, I’m actually a catch who has some great stuff to offer!”)

All of this is to say: I think Heather’s questions are fantastic to think about, and I just want to let you know that you’re not the only queer person to have similar insecurities, who has been judged by others for it in the past, but who has still been able to find potential partners who are understanding of my inexperience anyway.

You won’t know if someone will be cool with your inexperience unless you tell them— you miss 100% of the shots you don’t take!