Hello Coco : A diary

Tag: sex

  • The Biological & Gender Shock of Re-Introducing Sex with Men after 7 Years.

    If you’ve been reading my stuff, you know already that I have been sleeping with a lot of guys lately. For quick context, I just recently got out of a six year relationship with a woman where for most of the time there was a severe lack of sexual intimacy.

    Getting out of that relationship, I wanted to experience men again and being 30-years old now with a new perspective, 10 years of therapy, and liberated by all the wonderful changes I’ve already experienced – I’ve been going a little wild. There have been many guys, good & bad & neutral, and plenty of journal entries highlighting all my favorite moments for my future self to look back and be proud of.

    With all my new…experiences, I’ve compiled some observations.

    Sleeping with men after 7 years of being strictly with women has been an entire gender shock for me. I’ve had to look at sex from a difference, more serious, lens in terms of biology and risk mitigation. Then of course there’s personality differential between the sexes and navigating communication and emotional connection differently.

    I’m going to preface this entire post by saying that these notes are based solely on my own personal experiences over the course of the last 2 months with various sexual and non-sexual partners.

    The solo mustaches and fish pics are SO real. Just wow. More just an observation here.

    No condoms.

    First off, just the topic of protection is foreign to me considering I’ve been with a woman for 6 years and we were not concerned for STDs or pregnancy, but I was absolutely gob-smacked at how a lot of men do not carry condoms with them or even have them at home. It’s as if they are in the same boat – coming out of a gay revelation into exploring heterosexuality.

    I’m starting to put it together that condoms are stigmatized more than when I was 23 and last had sex with a guy.

    The words “Feeling Protector” has come up too many times to feel comfortable.

      I’m curious if it’s because abortions have become more normalized (even though the legalities haven’t) that men don’t have the same fears they did back then at accidentally conceiving. It also makes me think that they think abortions are a quick, easy thing for women’s bodies to go through – or if they care at all about the bodily trauma.

      I recently tried ‘the [infamous] pill’ and that was awful for a full month just getting used to elevated levels of Estrogen and Progesterone in my body on top of the spotting for a week and knocking my period completely off it’s cycle.

      When that failed I decided to get an IUD, which fucking hurt and now I’m spotting all over again and it’s been over a week of cramping.

      Having sex with men has opened up my eyes that it’s really up to us women to figure it the fuck out.

      Talking about feelings is like pulling teeth. I bet you all can imagine that in a woman-loving-woman relationship we talk about our feelings a lot. We’re in-sync with how our bodies and hormones work. The girlies that get it, get it.

      Thinking that I could be open with men just the same was a big mistake. I will say my situation is different than if pursuing a relationship in that I’m primarily seeking physical intimacy, however it’s been quite tricky to just understand someone’s emotional intelligence at the surface. I like to warm up a little bit and understand the nature of the person I’m about to sleep with.

      I’ve had men get highly defensive and shut down entirely to questions like, “When was your last relationship?” and “Oh you’re on the road a lot, does that get lonely?”. One man snapped at me for asking him to tell me about why he bailed on me one night we were supposed to meet up (mind you, I came at with no intentions of being combative).

      They don’t ask questions.

      I know it’s a normal thing based on my Tik Tok algorithm of women talking about it, but what the fuck is that? I will ask them question after question – mostly trying to stay relevant to the goals of our hang out but notice they never ask any questions back, as if they don’t care about my experience even though it’s a mutual arrangement.

      Is it nerves? Is it ADD/ADHD? Is it truly that you don’t care?

      They really do love to just ‘teach’ us, don’t they?

      Yes, sir I know why my bathroom door won’t close.

      Yes, sir I know the purpose behind why pets should get a dental cleaning regularly.

      Yes, sir I’m so aware of how to submit a maintenance request for my broken dishwasher.

      The first guy I had sex with off the bat spent a solid 30-mintues telling me about geopolitics and why religion is the way it is.

      The last guy spent a good amount of time giving me pointers on every answer I would give him about nutrition and protein intake.

      There’s more but I stopped listening.

      I have never received so much pointless, unsolicited information in such a short amount of time.

      Lastly (for now), the oral sex.

      I have been with a lot of woman partners to have experienced getting eaten out in quite a few different ways and styles. There’s angle, sucking, blowing, edging, soft kisses, hard kisses, side-to-side, finger & tongue play, etc;

      So far out of the 4 guys I’ve slept with only 2 really knew what was up and made me come with their mouth, but a common theme amongst them all has been the noise.

      I think in porn women learn that men like their oral sloppy, right? They have probably assumed the same for us? That might be in some women’s interest – won’t yuck someone’s yum – but a trend I’ve seen is that they do not get embarrassed about the sloppy sounds of lips on lips in fact, I truly believe it’s a goal at this point.

      Personally, not interested in the dramatics – I know my pussy is wet.

      What I have appreciated though is that each guy I’ve been with so far has been open to direction – something that wouldn’t have flown back in my early days of getting with guys in college.

      They listen and are appreciative to the direction and I fucking love that.

      In summation, I’ve had more positive experiences than bad and overall I’m happy that I it turned out that I’d be exploring men all over again in my 30s. Where I am mentally; the work I’ve put into myself and knowing exactly what I want and need and most importantly how to communicate it has made this experience liberating on a few different levels.

      The shock of understanding and connecting with men is still on-going. Every new guy I meet and/or have sex with is a fun new experience and I learn something new about my own body and preferences. I so appreciate them for that regardless of my points above – though the condom thing I won’t get over, still bat-shit crazy to me.

      More to come.

    1. Exploring Hook-Ups: Casual to Primal Needs

      For the last two months since having intentional short flings & hook-ups with various men, I’ve started to melt toward more levels of connection. Maslow’s 3rd level of need is love and belonging and although I couldn’t really ask that of these men formally, nor would I want to, I found myself leaning toward that direction like a plant to sunlight.

      I’ve been in this studio apartment for three months now and it’s the first time I’ve lived alone in quite a few years. I’ve always prided myself on my independence and lack of need for other people to fill my cup, but I was ignorant from the comfortability of being fulfilled in other ways and not realizing all that I had been missing.

      I am officially in this ‘hoe phase’, as people like to call it, with the expectation of seeking after the physical elements of what a man can bring since being with a woman these last six years. The expectation being sex and only sex.

      After time went on with having these guys in my bed, I realized that I began to crave hugs, being squished, and face-on-skin contact. I would bury myself in their arms and neck, pulling myself closer into them as much as I could. When cuddling wouldn’t happen, I’d feel robbed even though it technically fulfilled my ask.

      I got confused for a moment because I thought perhaps that need surfaced from feelings bubbling up, but after some time really thinking about it I truly didn’t/don’t have romantic feelings for any of these men. I would never seriously consider dating any of them.

      I realize that just as sex is important, physical touch is essential for me to feel regulated and emotionally fulfilled.

      I love the relaxation of noticing my heart rate decrease with slow deep sighs. The softness of his bicep under my cheek as I pull his arm into me in a hug, or when he grabs me in a small burst of tightness before releasing.

      I’d flip around eventually and tuck my face in the space between his collarbone and neck, nuzzling in as I wrap my legs between his and pull in tighter letting any extra excitement writhe beneath the surface as I press myself into him.

      We would talk a little bit about easy things, sharing perspectives on light topics and laughing. We were comfortably warm and found the perfect position. I realized after this that this was exactly what I needed, sometimes even more so than sex.

      Now that I’ve been experiencing a lot of new things, things that I now crave even more, it’s been making the need feel more primal. Instead of just wanting it, I feel I need it. With that need a new feeling bubbled up – fear. Fear of not having it, not being able to obtain it, a lack mentality.

      It was something I had always needed, but only just realized.

      In the beginning of this entire journey, I began to go to Swing Dance classes. I think originally it was because I just like to dance and try new things, but over time I would find myself seeking out classes when I was feeling lonely or sad. Of course, the conversations that would come from this community were fulfilling in their own way, but it was the craving of physical touch that I started to realize was prevalent every time I asked myself why I would gravitate toward it. The holding hands and being close to someone in an almost a hug.

      I guess I didn’t want to admit it because it sounds fucking sad, but after time I’m just beginning to come to peace that this is what being a human feels like when you don’t have a long-term committed person in your life to fulfill these needs when you want them. My prior relationship didn’t actually offer a lot of this, it was primarily a friendship for the last year or so, so now that I’m back into it, I feel as though every need is heightened after getting a taste of it.

      It’s as if it’s brand new. Like it’s my first time. Like I had been so hungry for so long and I hadn’t realized it because I frankly just got used to it.

      As I move through my days, I feel this perpetual want. I’m always wanting. For the last two months since the first time, I’ve been with a guy it’s been a tidal wave of feeling unsatiated, even when I’m completely satisfied in the moment. It’s ongoing and almost endless.

      With the sex and now this physical intimacy, I’m just feral for the connection.

    2. Being Mean: A Coping Mechanism in My Relationships

      When I was young, my parents would take bets on my relationships to see how long they would last. Rude right? It was because they said I was so mean to the boys. It hurt my feelings at the time because I felt like it meant that something was wrong with me.

      I took pride for a little while that I was mean to them because it made me feel superior. My dad even egged it on, probably because he was nervous about me dating as dads are. Also boys at that age were fucking idiots and I felt like I had to be mean to get my point across.

      Over the years the meanness had persisted in different ways/degrees. I’ve gone to therapy, have talked about it and tried to understand it without it actually going anywhere. My last relationship suffered quite a bit from it, but she would call it my ‘night spicy-ness’ as at the end of every day I would get pointy. It impacted our sex life and her overall comfortability around me. In the last year of our relationship, it reached an all-time high. I still remember lying in bed hearing her say,

      “I know my girlfriend is somewhere in there, I’m just waiting for her.”

      I think that level of meanness in the last year was triggered from internal dissonance. I wasn’t doing what I felt I needed to in my soul and instead working against it to try to be more ‘comfortable’ in that relationship. This was all happening on the back end though and I wasn’t ready to face it, which I feel made it even worse.

      The meanness of when I was younger I feel was triggered from not feeling like I can be authentic because I was emotionally stunted.

      Now that I am experiencing guys all over again, ass-deep in therapy, and having mini-realizations about how guys repress their feelings and have a hard time emoting/opening up, I’ve been practicing being gentler with myself and them- look at me go!

      With that gentleness, I’ve been filtering my thoughts through an extra layer of ‘how would they interpret what I am about to say?’ or ‘how would I feel if they said this to me?’ 8 times out of 10, I rework the words in my mind or forego it altogether. It makes me feel bad when I realize how many times, I actually do that and how long I’ve been going without the filter. Getting out of that negative mindset is a new obstacle for me. I should be celebrating the self-awareness, but it’s making me nervous at how far I’ve come without it and how I’ve been perceived.

      So, I’ve been doing this work and then in comes fucking Carter.

      The first time we met we had drinks, talked about our sexual preferences and hooked up in the same night. The second time he just came over and we fucked. This time, he came to pick me up to go out to a few bars in the area. The plan was that we would go out, he would use my panty vibrator and then we’d fool around in his car until we got back to my place. It was a solid, well-thought-out plan in my books. We are so sexually in-sync that I didn’t see any flaw to it.

      I jumped into his car, and he immediately made a comment about my swaying the car, cracking a joke about his suspension. I asked what these lights were on his car, and he gave me a passive, dick-ish answer. The rest of the next hour went just like that – being poked and prodded by every question and answer I’d give until he started making comments about girl friend groups and how there is always a ‘D.U.F.F’ and then proceeded to ask if I was one. I slapped him with my purse and told him if he planned on getting laid he should shut his fucking mouth.

      What happened next was the most interesting part. He shut up, started playing around on his phone, and sat on the opposite side of the booth. He made me work to turn the night back around as I persuaded him to come join me on my side. He apologized for being so mean, but I knew there was something else going on behind the scenes I wasn’t seeing. I asked him about it and he said he genuinely feels like this was his personality and I felt that. I felt that unsettling feeling of permanence as I’ve felt it thinking about how I’ve always struggled with it.

      Although the night went exactly as planned sexually & logistically, I began to realize that I couldn’t quite get comfortable, and he picked up on it. I couldn’t quite relax enough to truly just enjoy the sex and the foreplay beforehand. I became self-conscious of my razor-burn, how I looked on top, my facial expressions…everything because I knew how mean he could be that perhaps he had internal thoughts about them.

      Then it clicked this morning when I woke up, Carter is a lesson for me. Perhaps a little Karma too.

      What I am beginning to learn:

      1. Other people struggle with keeping ‘nice-ness’ in the forefront of their brain when interacting with partners of any degree (I just hadn’t met anyone else like this until Carter).
      2. Whether it’s a personality trait is actually a mystery, but I feel mine are from triggers, communication struggles and learned patterns that I believe can be helped. Maybe it’s time I dig into it further.
      3. Even if you are emotionally detached from the person you are sleeping with, what they do/say will impact the quality of sex. That is perhaps a reason why my sex life with my prior person was such shit.

    3. Approaching Sexuality at 30: Straight to Bisexual to Questioning. All Over Again.

      I’ve had sex with four different guys in the last month and a half.

      Mind you I haven’t had sex with a guy for 7 years beforehand because I was in a relationship with a woman – so, it does kind of feel like I’m walking back into my twenties and trying to experience things all over again, just through a different lens.

      I feel I do give myself some grace for that, but I can’t help but feel a twinge of guilt or judgement coming from behind it. Perhaps it’s the internalized notion that what I am doing is slutty, irresponsible, un-ladylike, whore-ish. I’ll be honest, some of the kinks that have come to light from my ventures definitely make me feel like I am treading further in that direction.

      After that first time with Drake, I was hooked. I just didn’t realize that it could feel that good, that I could get off by a man being inside me. I know my 23-year-old self never experienced that. Most if not all the guys I had slept with back then got off leaving me high and dry. It was like a transaction; except they didn’t understand I needed something in return. It created this idea that men were inherently selfish, and that penetration wasn’t what it was cracked up to be.

      I had heard [from where, who the fuck knows] once way back when that only 20% of women can actually orgasm from penetration and that thought kind of made me give up on it altogether. If external stimulation was all most women could really experience, then what’s the point? I guess in that scenario the point would be to give pleasure to them, but none of them even attempted putting my pleasure first so I was S.O.L.

      I find myself asking if I only dated women despite men. I’ve been asking myself if I could see myself dating women again based on these new experiences. I would have to ask myself at that point if I was only thinking that because the sex these last 5 years wasn’t good, but we stuck around for comfortability.

      I think sadly I have to just admit that as 30-year-old woman I haven’t had a lot of quality sexual experiences. I’ve had mind-blowing sex with 1 woman in my life, and a lot of amazing sex with these men in just the last month. It makes me sad, but also excited to see what else I’ve been missing out on.

      I’ve been craving to write about it, to experience them all over again.

      Drake had this remarkable way of sliding into me at the perfect angle to hit my g-spot every. time. He’d made twirls with his hips, spelling god-knows what. He’d whisper in my ear asking me what I like and then give it to me without a second thought. There were moments where each push inside me, we’d make eye contact connecting on breath, feeling literally everything between us until we’d both come.

      Wesley spooned me on the couch as we watched a movie. He caressed my back and hips, playfully pulling them ever so slightly closer to him making my eyes role at the subtle feel of his hard cock against me. When he caught on to me moving with him, he started to trace my neck with deep, breathy kisses making my entire body shutter and press into him deeper. He took me to his bed, ate me out beautifully and then let me ride his fingers until I came.

      Then there’s Cade from last night who talked dirty to me at a packed bar for a good 45-minutes before scooting my chair closer, tucking his hand between my crossed legs and squeezing so hard I about came right then and there. We went back to my place, and he played with me for a long while before everything turned feral. He spanked me hard and let me ride his cock as he took me from behind. I was so wet, begging for more.

      So, yeah – can you blame me? I ask myself really, the person who is casting the most judgement.

      Part of me feels that me listening to my primal needs, wants and desires is a way of honoring this sexual liberation. Leaning into feeling good and experiencing good sex shouldn’t feel like I’m doing something wrong. I think that I will even out and adapt balance, but for now I’m just learning how to let go and let myself enjoy this part of life.

      I just want to learn how to embrace it without the judgement. The internalized slut-shaming of my generation and gender expectations. How the fuck do I do that?

    4. Breaking the Cycle: Compassion for Men, Mental Health & Intimacy

      I took a 7 year break from men. From the ages 23 – 30, I dated women and tried my best to forget men existed for all the hurt I felt from high school and college. It wasn’t their fault, we were all just figuring things out at that age, but it was my first impression of intimacy, and it stained me.

      The sex that felt transactional, harshly pornographic, and hasty made me feel like I was just a body – that I couldn’t have a deep romantic relationship with them.

      Experiencing men now, I’ve began to realize that the world did guys dirty. Obviously, they have their privilege, but the men that I have personally experienced have this underlying sadness. They are hurting and don’t know how to express it.

      I think you could probably guess that a romantic relationship with a woman is highly communicative. We’re in-tune with our cycles, hormones, feelings, and the complexities behind them. Women are also generally more likely to get vulnerable. Testing that theory; if a woman was crying in public people wouldn’t be all that surprised, but if a man was crying in public people would think something is deeply wrong. It’s a bias we all contribute to whether we like it or not and that’s just because the world taught men to suck it up.

      I’m meeting these thirty-something men and I’m seeing it all over their faces. When I bring up a boundary, call them out on being shitty, or even harmlessly tease – I see their eyes glaze over and they get defensive, quiet or completely refuse to acknowledge it, dodging the words altogether.

      Over the years, we’ve developed this kind of man-hating culture because of all the really bad news coming to light on celebrities and college boys assaulting women and covering it up. Don’t get me wrong, there are a LOT of bad men out there doing all sorts of fucked up shit, but I feel the over-arching generalizations have made the state of men’s mental health even worse. They are more scared than ever to open up, again just judging from my personal experiences.

      One guy I have been talking to, Drake, struggled to even form words when I asked him a vulnerable question around loneliness. He stumbled and I could see him trying to change the topic completely out of discomfort. I did everything in my power to show him he could be safe and say what was on his mind and it was like pulling teeth. Trying to know the push and pull balance is a new dynamic for me, coming from a prior relationship where everything was on the table.

      Another guy I had been talking to, Jesse, just didn’t engage with me when I would ask slightly personal questions. Everything was a soft spot, even me asking when his last relationship was. He became defensive, snapped at me to derail the conversation, and would ghost me for hours only to respond on a completely different topic. Don’t get me wrong, I know that I don’t know these men very well and they could very well have past traumas that I could never understand – but I was gob smacked at the stark difference between interacting with women these last 7 years and then my first interactions with men being so alike to one another.

      My biggest question, obviously stemming from the ignorance of the male experience, is why they wouldn’t want to try and help themselves – to feel better. To go to therapy and try to break past those barriers. I suppose some feel that is what they have to do to fit in and that perhaps it’s not wrong. I suppose others are too imbedded in their traumas and experiences to see that they can help it. And some are just perhaps stubborn and don’t believe they need the help.

      Regardless of whatever it may be, it breaks my heart. Talking, and having intimacy with these men as a 30-year old woman, has changed my entire outlook on men. As sad and twisty it is to admit, it has healed some of my inner-child’s harsh beliefs from judgement to compassion. It has built some bridges for me from difficult memories into re-framed sad ones.

      I had been really mean to men when I dated them back then because they kept hurting my feelings in so many different ways. I don’t make excuses for them but reapproaching those memories with 8 years of therapy and a fresh perspective, I can at least try to understand and not take them as personally.

      So, where do I go from here?

      I think it’d be difficult for me to say that I won’t date a man who can’t communicate, express their feelings appropriately, or have a hard time doing the work to better themselves, but I’m beginning to realize that a boundary I need to have is balance. I can’t work with a man who won’t try.

      For those who can’t or won’t try, for their own reasons, I have compassion, but my heart can’t save theirs even though I do have so much love to give.

      The tricky part is knowing for certain what side of it they are on. There are men who say they are trying, but the proof isn’t there. You want to believe in them, root for them and give them the support but it’s a torturous game of figuring out when to walk away.

      I had to walk away from Jesse because my alarm bells wouldn’t stop going off and I began to feel that perhaps one day I wouldn’t be safe with him. Jury is still out on Drake and this new guy I’ve been seeing – Wesley – seems to be the first out of about 5 guys that hasn’t shied away from a vulnerable question.

      I didn’t think that this period of sexual experimentation and discovery would lead to me reflecting on every experience with a man that I had ever had, but I’m so grateful for it. But I’m equally as sad processing it all through.

      I have this deep desire to cup these men’s faces between both my hands and tell them it’s okay. That everything will be okay. That they are safe. I wish them all the love they could possibly imagine and that whatever is holding them in a vice grip will just let them breathe already.