Scarleteen

Hi there Scarleteen staff! First off I wanted to thank you for everything you do, this site has helped me out more times than I can count.

I've been having some trouble with my sex life. I'm currently with my first boyfriend, and we've been together for 8 months.

We had sex the first night we met (we never planned for it to be more than a hookup, but we ended up really liking each other and decided to start dating,) and for the most part, it was magical. But before he had to leave in the morning, I asked if we could try penetration.

It was honestly really painful and scary, but I didn't have the confidence to tell him, and I wanted him to finish, so I just kinda let it happen. I tried not to make a big deal out of it to his face, but privately I freaked out about it for a long time afterwards.

I don't feel like he took advantage of me, (I never indicated that anything was wrong while we were doing it, and when I told him afterwards that it hurt, he looked dismayed.) I feel like it was totally my fault for pushing myself into it too quickly, but irrationally I wish that he would have noticed he was hurting me, or apologized afterwards, or something.

Now I worry that I let that ruin our sex life. Sometimes we have fun, but a lot of time it's really scary for me. anytime anything is a little uncomfortable or intimidating for me, I freak out and cry. I like sex and I want to keep working at it, but I'm scared that things won't get better and I'll just end up traumatizing myself.

I want to talk to him about it, but I've already put a lot of drama into our relationship and I don't want to put him through anything else. And it's hard to communicate with him about my feelings in general; he's always exhausted from work and I feel like it's just irritating for him to listen to me go on about my issues.

TL;DR I love my boyfriend, and I don't think he'd ever hurt me on purpose. But sometimes sex is really scary for me, and I don't know what to do.

Hi there Missingno, and welcome to the Scarleteen boards.

It sounds like you're reluctant to talk to your boyfriend about this, and I get that it can be intimidating, but I do think it's the best thing to do here. Telling him something important about your sex life and your comfort level isn't introducing drama or putting him through an ordeal, it's just maintaining healthy communication and making sure you have a sex life that's working for everyone. It may help to think of it this way: people in a caring relationship don't WANT to have sex that the other person doesn't enjoy. If your fear is making sex unpleasant, that's probably information he wants to know, because he doesn't want sex to be scary or upsetting for you.

Here's my thought. Before the next time you have sex, at a time when you're both doing ok and have time to talk, bring this up with him. You could say something like "I haven't mentioned this earlier because it's really hard for me to talk about, but it's important that I be open about this with you. I really love when we do X and Y during sex, but Z kind of sex is scary/intimidating/painful for me. I want to take a break from doing that for now, while we focus on things that feel good for both of us."

It sounds like there are sexual things you do feel ok about, and that it's only some things (intercourse in particular, if I'm understanding you correctly), that are scary or upsetting to you. If that's the case, I think it's a good idea to step back from any scary kinds of sex for the time being and just enjoy the sexual activities that you both feel good about. If you don't enjoy any sex at all, that's a little different, but still I think it's still a good idea to stop anything you don't enjoy for now. Sex that you don't like or that makes you upset doesn't get better if you push through that discomfort! Doing that is only more likely to make it less enjoyable, over time. So for now, I think it's good to clear the air with your boyfriend as soon as you can, and talk with him about what you DO like that he likes too, so y'all can focus on that for now.

We can absolutely talk, too, about what feels so scary about certain kinds of sex, if that's something you want to do.