My husband has chronic health issues, so I can’t get boned
I read the Offbeat Home post about “Asexuality and queerness redefined sex for us,” and I hate to be a downer, but this is so much harder when you are in a monogamous heterosexual relationship…
How sex toys empowered me after trauma & shame
In December of 2009, I bought my first sex toy, and it was incredible. Here was an entire industry dedicated to the act of bringing my body pleasure. Not for anyone else, but for my own enjoyment. And it wasn’t presented as secretive and embarrassing and shameful: it was bright purple. And for the first time, my body felt like mine and my sexuality belonged to me. Since then, sex toys have been an active interest of mine, and I’ve learned a lot about them — and about how important they are.
Asexuality and queerness redefined sex for us (& how we’re making it work)
What is sexual compatibility? Insecurity made our life a little rocky early on. I worried that my partner’s asexuality was simply disinterest in me, while she worried that I might prefer someone else. But after nearly seven years together, we’ve ironed that out — and in the process, built a sex life that we both find satisfying, exploring a non-traditional definition of sex. Here are the tools that we use to help us to define sex for ourselves…
My child was sexually harassed on the school bus & the reality set in
Yesterday should have been a normal day. It started off that way. But instead it became a first for my eldest daughter. My daughter asked a boy to stop using profanities, and instead, he used them more and more, especially directed at her. And then he threatened her, repeatedly.
When the bus did stop, she ran as fast as she could and into my arms. Her whole body shook with fear and anger. That was the day our daughter became the victim of sexually violent language. She is ten years old. The boy was twelve. She was riding the school bus home from fifth grade.
Requiem for Tumblr: pouring one out for a fat-positive space for nudes
Besides being a huge blow to sex workers and LGBTQ people, Tumblr’s recent decision to ban adult content from its platform is a misguided form of censorship that will remove an outlet of self-expression for those who fall outside of typical Western beauty standards. There was something else, though, and that something is what I and I think many other people will miss most now that Tumblr has moved to ban adult content from its site…
Will Tumblr’s adult content ban be catastrophic for sex work and queer communities?
Tumblr announced that they are going scorched earth with pornographic content by removing it from the site entirely. Tumblr’s decision feels very much like a condemnation of sex work and pornography as a whole, and specifically ends up targeting marginalized groups who rely on the site in a number of ways. For those of us who don’t have a problem with safe, consensual sex work, this has the appearance of making it unnecessarily harder for folks to make a living online. For others, it feels like the only way to save the children (why won’t somebody think of the children?!).
Talking about sexuality: the big dirty elephant in the room
Talking about sexuality is a conversation that can make folks a tad uncomfortable. Sexuality is always some big dirty elephant in the room — it’s there and obvious but everyone avoids talking about it. That’s because, for many of us, it has been taught for generations that sex is a dirty thing we keep to ourselves.
We offer sexual education in some schools, we talk to our kids about the birds and the bees, but beyond that, how often do we ever really talk about sexuality?
Figuring out why I’m so uncomfortable with my partner’s self pleasure
My partner masturbates without my knowing and for some reason it really bothers me. My reaction surprised me and I had to dig into it to understand why. We have had a lot of conversations about how I struggle with the fact that he masturbates. Thankfully he is typically able to be open-minded and not take it personally. He knows that it’s my issue, and he knows that I know it’s my issue and that I’m not trying to control him. Here’s how I’m parsing my feelings…