Can We Talk about Sex without Condoms?

Photo titled "Packaged condom" by Kerry J via Creative Commons/Flickr

Not the we're-in-a-long-term-relationship kind of sex but the we-just-met-and-we're fucking kind of sex. The spontaneous kind. The risky kind. The kind that no one who lost their virginity after the year 1980 is ever allowed to have because it's UNSAFE and "Safety First" is supposed to be the slogan of our generation. 

I just got an IUD placed and when a friend asked me how I was doing with it I flippantly said, "Well I've had sex without condoms and I'm not pregnant so I guess it's working." This friend  loves me and knows my lifestyle and reads my writing and she still couldn't help herself from asking what my Ob/Gyn thought about that. She didn't know the context of the sex but she heard "sex without condoms" and assumed I was being UNSAFE and a doctor should take me to task. 

The story is that I met a guy in Europe a few weeks ago and less than 12 hours later I fucked him without a condom. And also without any kind of conversation about it. We had both gone thru an exhausting exhilarating kind of day. He was jet lagged and we were drunk. We dragged each other thru public spaces, making out, feeling each other up, I sucked his cock in an alley way, we fucked in doorway. People probably saw us. I didn't care. I felt naughty, guilty, exhilarated, concerned, like I shouldn't be doing it and oh it's too late. Doing it. 

The morning after I thought it was a good story. I hoped I didn't "catch anything," and quite truthfully I was much more concerned that I'd had a tampon in while we had sex and I couldn't find the tampon afterwards.... I eventually found the tampon with much effort but that was a harrowing adventure. Perhaps it overshadowed my emotions about the condom-less sex? 

I saw the same guy a few nights later. This time we were sober. We found a (less) public place that was (probably) not quite as visible.

He unzipped his pants and pulled out his cock. 

Him: I should have asked if you were on birth control. 
Me: I am

He positioned his cock at my opening.

Him: Of course I'm clean, I hope you are too
Me: I am

Thrust.
​
It's all so very 21st century, isn't it? First night hysterical euphoria, second night calculated risk taking and the token "are you clean?" conversation because all our training, all our education, everything we hear and see says sex without condoms is wrong. It's UNSAFE. And we should be SAFE. Always. 

It's why we have toddler car seats and bike helmets and temperature warnings on McDonald's coffee cups. For our Protection. For our Safety. 21st century rules of American life say that without Protection and Safety there's only Injury. Blood. Disease. Lawsuits. Anarchy. Death.   

But despite the rules and the lawsuits, here we all are, taking chances and figuring things out, making spur of the moment decisions and catching up later. So where are we all if we're not protected and safe? What does that space look like?  

My space looks like this: I'll continue to mostly use condoms. I'll also continue to sometimes not use them. I expect I'll have a few mornings of "oh shit, that wasn't smart" and God willing I'll mostly be smart. Because I'd rather be healthy. But I also want to say yes to things that are fun or that scare me and see what happens.

I should now go get tested but that's just a consequence of actions. It's not a conclusion. I don't have an easy conclusion because society says that I should feel bad about condom-less sex but I don't. And writing publicly means that I might have to defend my actions. Call them CHOICES—the biggest defense of any action in the 21st century. Maybe excuse myself or rationalize.

But the reason that I'm writing this is because it happened. And I'm still thinking about it.  ​

"Even without fascism I was dishonest. Even without fascism, I censored myself. I refused to let myself write about Germany, the unhappiness in my marriage, my sexual fantasies, my childhood, my negative feelings about my parents. Even without fascism, honesty was damned hard to come by...I decided then that I was not going to be self-righteous with Horst until I had learned to be honest with myself... Unless I could produce some proof of my own honesty in writing, what right had I to rage at his dishonesty?"
​
--Erica Jong, Fear of Flying