Sex Drive—That’s My Number

Written By Bobbi
tallyWhen I was 18, I made my first visit to the gynecologist. I had just started sleeping with an older man, whom I met at the bar where I worked. I said to myself, “If you’re going to have sex with a grown-up, you should be a grown-up and go to the gyno.”
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Along with incriminating questions like, “Do you smoke marijuana?” the form that I had to fill out also asked me, how many sexual partners I’d had.

“Do they really need to know that?” I thought, along with, “Is my nurse going to tell my advisor that I puff the La?”

I cringed as I sketched in the number “3.” I felt like a slut, half of my friends in college were virgins and the other half had just lost their Vs to their high school sweethearts.

Without much adult supervision, my friends quickly caught up to me that year; some even surpassed me as they learned that long island iced teas (yes we still drank those back then) + co-ed with no responsibilities = jackhammer sex in boy’s dirty apartment with possible risk of waking roommate.

onshoot3I’m 25 now and just as boy crazy as I was at 18; and while I’m not so caught up on numbers any more, the irrational (or so I’ve been told) Christian guilt that my mother so diligently instilled in me has me questioning my virtue once more. You see, I am on the cusp of the dreaded double-digits. I’ve always considered myself a choosy girl (although some of my friends have disagreed with my choices on occasion) but all of a sudden, I find myself being extra guarded over whom I potentially sleep with. And I know number ten could possibly be like a new year’s eve party or losing my virginity—beginning with lot’s of anxiety and anticipation and ending in perplexed disappointment.

But I can’t help but put a lot of pressure on this one. After all, he will be my number ten! And while I hate to admit it, a part of me would like to stop here and never have to get to a number 11.

On one hand I feel like my virtue is at stake. On the other hand, I am shocked at myself for even entertaining these questions about my sexuality. I wonder if feminists past are shaking their heads as I type this.

So I have some questions for you ladies. What happens after ten? Are 11 and 12 better than ten? Is there such a thing as too many sexual partners? How many is too many? Does it even matter?

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