I’ll be the first person to admit that I’m slutty. However, my sluthood today is very different than what it was in my earlier years. I’ve been thinking about this quite a bit lately, because my youngest sister has a slutty friend who I need to talk to. I’ve only met her a few times, but I can tell she’s troubled, depressed, and probably not being all that safe.

And I’ve been there. My early sexual escapades, after I lost my virginity, were not the fun, sexy, thought out romps they are now. They were done for all the wrong reasons.

I was young, depressed, and had some of the lowest self esteem you could come across. I had body issues. I hungered for human contact, and to feel…anything. This was the same time in my life that I was still self injuring, and well before therapy and medication.

I would throw myself at anyone who would have me, and I though I was happy for it. I had no standards, no selection process. If some guy wanted to put his dick in one of my orifices, and I found him tolerable and fairly good looking, it’d happen.

I spent lots of time feeling dirty and used, except for the moments when I was being pursued, and fucking.

I slept with questionable men, and engaged in risky behaviours.

Like the time I picked up this keyboard player in an electronica band. I didn’t tell anyone I was going with him, or where we were going, or to call me at a certain time. We messaged back and forth on myspace, I picked him up in my dad’s truck, and we drove around looking for a section of the beach that wasn’t locked up for the night so we could sneak in. We both lived at home, you see, and were too cheap to rent a room for a few hours.

So, I went to the beach with a total stranger in the middle of the night without telling anyone where I was going or who I was going to be with. Its amazing things only went mildly bad. I didn’t get raped or killed, I just had crappy sex. My vagina was SO COLD, because not only were we at the beach at night, it was in the winter. I threw my back out on the sand.

There was the creepyhot door guy from my local goth club - the reason I got my first full STD panel.

There was the three way I didn’t even want to be involved in, and a drunken orgy at a dorm in upstate New York that I remember in bits and pieces, such as throwing myself at my friends roommate and being soundly rejected.

There were various men I threw myself at, most of who thankfully were gentle in their rejections. There was the friend I slept with for all the wrong reason, and all the extraneous head I gave because I wanted people to like me. I went about things in all the wrong way.

Then, I met Daniel and we started sort of dating, and despite our problems, he actually did like me. That helped me a lot. Then, of course, I met Franklin, and we did the whirlwind falling into love and monogamy thing, and I had a crazy breakdown and started some hardcore therapy and medication and started to deal with myself, and he really helped with that.

You know, I don’t think I ever told Daniel or Franklin how much meeting them helped me. I’ve always felt that you meet people at the times in your life when you most need them, and they were awesome, even if they didn’t know it. Thanks guys. You both rock, and you know I love both of you!

Now, I’m not saying being a slut is bad. I still consider myself one, but its different now. I’m aware. I have what some of my friends would call agency. I don’t knowingly put myself in uncomfortable or bad situations, and at 24, I’m a little better at dealing with them than when I was younger. I own my sexuality today in a way I did not, and I think, could not, when I was younger.

Next Soon: Sluthood, the good new days!