Condom Monologues

Author: Pilar Reyes

  • Why I Always Make Him Wear a Condom

    Why I Always Make Him Wear a Condom

    Sure, there are the obvious reasons why I would want him to wear a condom (“him” referring to, of course, the anonymous him that comes and goes. Not a long-term boyfriend kind of him, but the one night stand kind of him; a friends-with-benefits-kind-of-him; a “we just started dating” kind of him).

    Being prepared and willing to use a condom is as common a courtesy as a hand shake.
    Being prepared and willing to use a condom is as common a courtesy as a hand shake.

    Those reasons being assigned to the usual “I don’t want a baby or an STD right now” category. But this isn’t another typical “Hey, wear a condom so you don’t get herpes” mini-rant. Nope, instead, I’m talking about the psychological reasons why I make him wear a condom. I’m talking about the emotional implications of raw dogging it, and that slightly shuddering sensation of the lack of respect that goes into a guy refusing to put a condom on after I’ve expressly requested it. I’m talking about these reasons because there are only so many times you can tell a girl that she should make him wear a condom; because STDs suck before you realize that there has to be another reason why you should expect all your female friends to abide by this standard of sexual courtesy.

    If you’re the type of person who might in any way be inclined to have casual sex with a variety of partners (or maybe even one), having condoms regularly stocked in your bedroom is an obvious five minute, five dollar solution to the “if I don’t have a condom, we might not bang” problem. It’s certainly less emotionally trying that the inevitable, “Holy shit, what if I have an STD” paranoid mind rant that can last for up to a month after an unprotected sexual interlude. It’s a common courtesy, really, a social necessity. It’s polite, much in the same way that shaking someone’s hand when you first meet them is polite. So why do anything other than err on the side of caution?

    I guess that’s why any time a guy tries to not wear a condom, I immediately question whether or not this guy has any social grace whatsoever.

    Sure, I guess you can’t buy a book at Walgreen’s that extols the virtues of abiding by hook up etiquette in a step by step how-to guide. But any guy that thinks he’s going to get away with disrespecting my body, putting me at risk for a whole host of unwanted consequences for the sake of a minimal increase in his sexual pleasure has another thing coming. Not wearing a condom makes it obvious that my concerns about my sexual health are irrelevant to this guy, and if my concerns aren’t respected in this situation, then what else about me does he not respect? Everything, probably, which is quite an unsexy, unthrilling realization. I’d rather run from the room screaming than sheepishly allow myself to be conned into unprotected sex.

    Maybe the usual, “Got a condom question?” isn’t so much a question of whether or not he has enough foresight to buy condoms from the store, but more a litmus test of whether or not he’s mastered the basic sexual skill of respecting the other person’s boundaries and precautionary desire to avoid STDs and pregnancy. Because heaven knows, if you’re not using a condom with me, you probably didn’t use a condom with the last girl

    or the girl before that, or the girl before that,

    which means the mathematical probability of contracting an STD has increased tenfold. And I’m sure you know by now that I’m not willing to subject myself to playing Russian roulette with a gun full of STD bullets.

    So, in lieu of that, please go to the corner store and buy some condoms. You’ll automatically earn an extra ten points in my book.

    Monologues are independent stories. The opinions shared are the author’s own.

     

  • I Ran Out Of Condoms

    I Ran Out Of Condoms

    He looks at me and says, “I don’t have any condoms.”

    At which I point I lean back and a flash dance of potential ensuing scenarios simultaneously create a cacophony of, “Hey, mom, what’s the best decision I can make here?” Mom never answers the question, so precariously I sit on the edge of the bed trying to preempt any awkward silence with the right, sexy, drunken thing to say. Does that mean that I stamp up, put my clothes on and storm out? Do I say something catty? Or do I smile like a trooper and take it with my eyes closed?

    This is a consistent problem. I think for me, and most of my female friends, very few of us ever expect a guy to have the condoms. I don’t know why this is, but in the name of Girl Scoutly caution, I always keep a few floating around the bottom of my purse. So when the, “I don’t have any condoms” bomb drops, I can quickly maneuver my private parts out of harm’s way and into properly protected sex. Maybe this is just indicative of a larger issue, namely my lack of faith in humanity to ever make educated, unselfish decisions, but, meh, life moves on.

    Speaking of moving on, it just so happens that I don’t have condoms on me right now. Which means that I’m not going to root around my jacket pockets and grinningly pull out one of those condoms that I got from that free condom basket at the teen sex booth at the street festival.

    And whenever I’m pulling that condom out with that look on my face of, “You’re not getting away with it this time, asshole!” I always try to look into his eyes so I can fully relish the, “This dumb bitch did not fall for my unprotected sex routine” look on his face. And then, even after that, even on the off chance he rips the condom off for “whatever reason” (aka his coke dick went limp again, or the supremely assholeish “It doesn’t feel good so I took it off two seconds ago”) the second time I dive back into my purse and pull out another – it’s just like, hey, I know you tried this once before, but it’s not happening again, okay?

    I mean, I don’t even know why it’s an issue in the first place. We’re both lucky enough to be having sex tonight, I don’t understand why you’re putting so much effort into poo-pooing my extremely rational, extremely altruistic need for you to wear a condom. It’s not like I just asked to pee on you. (Not to diss golden showers, but, you know, when you try to pee on a one night stand, and he’s not into it – the weird looks ensue.)

    This time, however: Nothing. I’m feeling in the bottom of my purse. Oh, god. My sluttiness has yet again left me with a purse with no condoms in it. No condoms in the jacket pockets either. I’m fresh out.

    So I look at him and say, “Well…”

    And he looks at me and says, “You know what we could do…”

    I shake my head. I look away. It’s the golden moment. It’s time for truth. It’s time for years of public education to waltz out of my mouth in a moment of glory, the fruition of years of putting condoms on bananas.

    Or, of course, I could crumble to the everpresent pressure of wanting people (aka this dude right here) to like me, and there’s also the fact that I absolutely love having sex, because it’s fun and it feels good. It’s a sudden war of ration versus passion in my mind, and while I notice that I am, indeed, quite drunk, I am proud of myself for having the mental capacity with which to spend five seconds thinking about how dumb it is for me to let this random ass dude stick his dick in me, just so I can sleep for five hours in his messy bed, wake up way too early tomorrow, catch the bus back to my house, sit there in shame and silence while I try to remember what happened last night, catch up on my text messages, let my friends know I’m okay. And then the ensuing weeks of, “Should I get tested? Is that itch in my crotch the sign of the onset of herpes? Or HPV? What if it’s AIDS? Am I being paranoid?” All for a bit of sex that, at the end of it, probably isn’t even going to register in my top 10 sexual experiences.

    So I look at him again, and without making eye contact, I come to the realization that this is probably going to be just another one night stand, so, fuck it, what’s the point? I might see him at a bar some other night, and we might try it again, but it’s not like I’m going to win any overwhelming sense of self validation or ego boost from lying on my bed and trying not to laugh at his sex noises.

    So I do the right thing. I dial a cab, ask him his address, and when the cab’s waiting for me out front, I straddle him, as he sits there in his underwear, given him a kiss, rub my tits in his face and say,“Sorry about your loss.”

    And as I sit, swirling inside my head inside the cab, the thought comes over me once again – why is it always my responsibility to have the condoms? I wish for once when I ran out, he (whoever he is) would say, “It’s okay, boo, I got you.”

    Opinions expressed on Condom Monologues are the author’s own.

  • The Person on the Other Side of Your Herpes Diagnosis

    The Person on the Other Side of Your Herpes Diagnosis

    Upon her sex partners herpes diagnosis, Pilar Reyes reflects on her personal path from initial anger to condoms enthusiast. The opinions shared are the authors own.

    FuckItWe had been sleeping together on and off for a few months when he got herpes. At first, it was the usual immature reaction: panic, followed by anger, followed by bitter text messages that said, “We’re never fucking ever again!” But that wasn’t true, because despite the echoes of my high school sex education that had planted the seed of “anybody who has an STD is a dirty, bad person,” the sex was still good, and I still wanted to fuck him.

    So I did my research. The Internet threw a lot of information at me, but at the end of the day I knew one thing for sure: condoms, condoms, condoms. We had always used condoms before the diagnosis, and it seemed that now using protection was imperative. The herpes virus is spread via direct physical contact. The herpes virus can shed from the skin and be passed from person to person even in the absence of a physical outbreak. Even with the use of condoms, herpes can still be passed on, although the use of condoms greatly diminishes that risk.

    I looked at the odds, I looked at my needs, and I came to the conclusion that the risk was worth the reward. Armed with the knowledge that I could potentially spread an STD to my other sexual partners, I did the responsible thing and let them know. Of course, when they found out, they decided to stop sleeping with me. That was fine, because it wasn’t that serious anyways. I guess that’s the thing about casual sex – at the risk of STDs, it becomes a less worthwhile pursuit.

    Which was why my partner and I became less casual and more serious. After a brief hiatus, and after the initial outbreak cleared up, I realized that the sex wasn’t the only reason I was coming back. Maybe it was the shared experience of dealing with a new STD diagnosis together, or maybe it was the fact that I hadn’t completely ditched him because of his herpes, we decided, fuck it, we clearly care about each other. Let’s stop fucking around and start dating.

    It would have been really easy to instead close my legs and walk away at that point. Certainly all my friends had advised me to do so, but when I had done my initial medical research, I also came across an online community devoted to debunking the STD shaming that is pervasive in modern culture. At first I was surprised that I had never come across this point of view before. As a feminist and an avid anti-slut shamer, it just made sense. Given my initial reaction and my friends’ reactions to the situation, I realized that , much to my chagrin, our attitudes to STDs were not exactly PC. Sure, I have friends with HIV and herpes, but they were certainly not people that I would have even considered having sex with. Of course, that’s a completely unfair perspective, because all it takes is a condom to diminish your risk. So long as a person is honest when disclosing their STDs, there shouldn’t be a problem.

    To give this story a happy ending, my partner and I are still together. We have safe sex every time, and, while I still do not have herpes, I’ve come to realize that if I get herpes, then I’ll have herpes. It won’t be a life shattering event, nor should it be, for myself or anyone else. Sure, I certainly don’t want an STD, nor does anyone else, but much like a cold or like acne, often times STDs are merely inconvenient medical conditions. With proper education, you can diminish your risk. Fuck it – just use a condom every time.

    Monologues are independent stories. The opinions shared are the author’s own.