To all my non-virgin friends who think I am somehow missing something because I haven’t lost it yet:
Let me just start by putting it out there: I am an 18-year-old freshman in university in 2016 and I am a virgin, not because I am super religious and not because I am “saving myself for marriage.” I am a virgin for the pure and simple reason that I have not found anyone that I want to give it up for.
So let me set the record straight about a few things I have been accused of for being a virgin.
Virgins are not too scared to have sex. When I originally heard this line, my first response was “that is ridiculous,” but then immediately after that I thought “is it that ridiculous?” After thinking about it, I concluded that: no, I am not scared to actually have sex; I am, however, afraid of giving a part of myself that I can never get back to another person. I am afraid to regret my decision. I am afraid of all the judgments that come along with having sex in today’s society.
“Virgin” is not synonymous with “prude.” I know what all the parts are; I know how they work. Just because I don’t do it, doesn’t mean I won’t, or don’t want to, talk about your experiences. A lot of the time, it’s as if people find out I’m a virgin, and then think that they can’t talk about anything sex-related around me. I am still a normal 18-year-old! I am not a naïve child; just because I’m not having sex, doesn’t mean the topic doesn’t interest me just like everyone else.
Virgins do not have impossibly high standards. I think there is a huge stigma around sleeping with virgins because they’ll get “too attached” and “clingy.” But, personally, that couldn’t be further from the truth. I don’t think it’s unreasonable to want to be treated with respect and a little bit of romance, but that seems incredibly difficult to come by in today’s “hook-up society.” My biggest reason for not having sex is probably that I don’t want to be treated like a disposable thing; I don’t want to be used and then tossed aside like what we did didn’t matter.
I may be one of the few people left who actually believe that losing my virginity is a big deal. So many people nowadays have sex for the first time while drunk at a party or with someone they don’t really love simply to “get it over with” or because “everyone else is doing it,” which, I would like to make perfectly clear, is absolutely fine – for those people. Just because I am choosing not to do it doesn’t mean I am judging you for doing it. Obviously everyone is free to lose it however they want; the aforementioned scenarios are just not how I want to.
I want to have sex for the first time with someone that I love, someone I could imagine spending the rest of my life with. I don’t think this is an unreasonable request. I feel like sex is a very intimate experience to share with someone and, if I do it with a whole bunch of meaningless people, will it be as important when I eventually meet the person I am meant to be with? I have said it once and I’ll say it again: I believe with my entire being that there is one person out there who will live up to all of my expectations. I want that person to be one of the only, if not the only person who ever gets to have that part of me. I don’t think sex is just about a physical connection; I think it’s about trusting another person completely, and I don’t think that trust can be given to just anyone.
So, to all of the people out there who don’t understand my decision to remain a virgin for “so long,” let me ask you this: why does who we have or have not slept with matter so much?