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I host consent workshops professionally, and at one point during past workshops, when the audience is generally settled and feeling comfortable opening up, I have asked, “Who here has ever had something silly and awkward happen during a hookup? Even slightly awkward.” Hands have shot straight up and we all ended up getting a good laugh out of it. It just goes to show how awkward connecting with sex can be, whether you’re in bed, thinking about it, or just talking about it! I think a lot of these awkward moments happen because of the conversations we are having around our romance, or, should I say, the conversations we aren’t having.

helovesme31’s question continued: He used to smoke weed but he stopped cause I didn’t approve. I’m thankful he made that change but now I feel pressured into having sex with him. I lost my virginity to a big ass sleazy guy and then kept having sex with other men, they really were mean telling me I…

Good on you for aiming for social grace even when other people are being clumsy. You probably already know this, but it’s going to happen in your life that people are going to have feelings for you that you don’t share; have interest in doing things with you that you don’t have an interest in…

What our identity is in terms of our gender isn’t about what someone else decides or presumes–it’s up to us to reflect on our experiences and feelings about who are are on the inside, and to label that (or choose not to label it) in whatever way feels true to us as individuals. What feels right and…

That’s one of the best questions I’ve received in a long time. I wish more people would ask it! But. Umm. I can’t actually answer it. I can’t answer exactly what you’re asking because human sexuality is one of the most diverse things there is, and that diversity includes how different everyone is in…

I asked my hands-down favorite writer about sex and disability, Cory Silverberg, to answer this one for you. Here’s what Cory had to say: It already sounds like you have a good sense of what’s happening with your body since the spinal cord injury and one of the great things about having incredible…

When it comes to sex and sexuality, I was a very, very, very late bloomer. Raised in a Pentecostal Christian home where sex and sexuality were rarely discussed beyond, “No sex until you are married,” as a teen I assumed I would not have sex until my early- to mid-twenties, after I had finished undergrad. I assumed any boys/men I met would share my religious beliefs about sex. I assumed my values would never change. And I assumed my husband and I would know how to sexually please one another, in spite of having no sexual experience before our wedding night (which, of course, would be a night of unbridled passion and ecstasy).

I had a favorite line, in high school, when debating people on the subject of abortion. It was “Hey, that thing in your stomach’s not gonna come out a toaster, right? It’s a baby!” Oh, I thought I was really, super clever with that one. Because I loved talking about the babies. I talked about the…

Before I say anything else, I want to make sure you know how typical it is to not reach orgasm from vaginal intercourse for receptive partners. I don’t want to reinvent the wheel here since we’ve addressed this a lot, so I’ll just give you basics on that, followed by some links if you want more…

I’d say you have a few good options. Menstrual suppression isn’t really a one-shot deal like you’re thinking unless you are already using a hormonal method of contraception you can suppress with, like the birth control pill or the Nuvaring (in which case what you do is take pill packs or rings back…

Is your sex life or sexual relationship feeling like someone pressed the fast-forward button and now it’s spinning out of control? Evaluate whether things are moving too fast for you or a partner, and then get some help on pulling back the reins and slowing things down to a more comfortable pace.

I was in an abusive relationship. Here’s what finally got me to leave and the story of my journey in getting myself, my child and my heart and head out for good.

I want to first tell you a few things you should know are true. Whatever it turns out your sexuality and relationships are like, whatever it turns out you want from them, they’re about much, much more than your abuse. Because we’ve been abused doesn’t mean either or both of those things will be all…

Feeling unhappy in or unsure about your relationship? Having problems you don’t know how to work through, or don’t even know if you should? We’ll talk you through making these choices, including how-to’s on conflict resolution and doing breakups better.

When we’re quality sex educators; when we are or aim to be inclusive, forward-thinking and do sex education in ways that can or do serve diverse populations, we will tend to define sex very broadly, far more so than people who don’t work in sex education often tend to, even if and when their experiences with sex and sexuality have been broad. Often, the longer we work as sexuality educators, and the longer we also just live and experience our own sexual lives, the more expansive the definition becomes. If we live and/or work on the margins, like if we or people we serve are queer, gender-variant, culturally diverse, have disabilities, the diversity in our definitions of what sex can be will become even greater.

For starters, I think staying silent about this with a romantic partner isn’t likely to help you out, especially one you’re physical with. Unless you feel like your relationship is too new to be talking about sexuality at all yet, I also don’t think keeping how you’re feeling to yourself is going to…

Anarchofemme’s question continued: So, to get to the point, do you know of any strategies feminist groups have used to make issues of sexual violence more accessible to those not already familiar with them? Would it help to focus on issues of gender and bring sexual violence in later as part of the…

I’m writing today to make a modest funding ask of our allies and our readers capable of financial contributions on behalf of our volunteers. What we’re looking to do is to raise enough funds for all of our volunteers, who are able, to fly to San Francisco this April and attend the sex::tech…

We get a lot of questions from users who wonder whether there is a certain way they should act or feel or look, if the way they are doing things is weird or normal, or if there is something wrong with them or how they feel or act or look. I’d say that that topic is in the top three of our most…

I don’t know about you, but the times I call myself things like stupid are times I feel really bad about myself, usually for doing something I don’t feel good about. Then I call myself something like that and I feel even worse, and have an even harder time making choices that are about being kind to…

The way you framed this is tricky, because our sexuality isn’t separate from our minds and can’t be separated from our minds, just like our bodies can’t be separated from our minds. In fact, our mind is where most of sexuality really is and is what drives it the most. We can’t say something is…

Earlier this week, in the context of another conversation, one of our users at Scarleteen mentioned that her feelings on abortion had changed to a negative when she learned that her mother’s pregnancy had been unplanned, and that her mother considered abortion. She said that upset her, because she really liked existing. She did say she was still pro-choice, but her sentiment bothered me all the same. Some of why it bothered me was political, and also about the work that I do and have done. But in thinking about it, I came to the conclusion that the ways it bothered me most were intensely personal. The truth is, I envy her. A lot. I envy she was able to have a discussion in which her mother made clear she had the right to choose and she chose to remain pregnant and parent her.

Before anything else, one very important thing for you to know is that if you’re underage, making and/or sending nude or sexually explicit pictures could be a felony for both of you. In the United States, those images of legal minors are considered child pornography, and his asking you for them…

The co-editor of Yes Means Yes gives young women the tools to decipher the modern world’s confusing, hypersexualized, sometimes dangerous landscape so they can define their own sexual identity.

A one-stop-shopping handbook on relationships, sexuality, and big sexy confidence for people of all genders, sizes, and sexual orientations who know that a fantastic love life doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with the number on the bathroom scale