So this is actually a really complicated and sticky prompt, right? Because, what even is queer sex? What even is a first time? Where do you draw the line? Do you have to draw a line? Is queer sex any sex a queer person has? Does it require both / all people to be queer / lesbian / gay / bisexual? I’m really not afraid to say I don’t know and I’m not going to answer that for you because only you can answer what it means to you, for yourself. As Drew says in her response, which, when I read it I nodded and said “yes absolutely” out loud: “I think we get to choose our own firsts.” I think she’s really spot on. We make our own rules, define our own firsts, tell our own stories.
The Autostraddle team approached this prompt in a lot of different ways, each as valid and interesting as the others, but all of them so very different. I’m really grateful for what their honesty and vulnerability has revealed about the endless possibilities and multitudes that comprise queerness, all the winding paths that we can take, all the different ways we can touch and connect, love and fuck each other, view our queerness and our relationships to our sexualities and to each other.
Thank you, always, for being an A+ member and for holding this space open for all of our possibilities.
xoxo,
Nico
wow, thank you all so so so much for sharing!!!
I feel similarly grateful to Ro and could say the same “When I think about how my first sexual experience was A) with a girl, B) positive, and C) free from the shame that so many queer teens feel when they start exploring their sexuality, I feel incredibly privileged and grateful.”
also, Nico, I had gay sex on a school bus in high school; in the moment I think we got away with it. But after one of our team members told me I had sex hair lol (everyone knew we were a couple)
OH NOOOO (to what you said to me). Yeah like, the sneakiness you *think* you’re achieving vs that which you are actually achieving are two completely different circles of the diagram.
My situation was probably a bit more than Drew’s. Before I transitioned, I knew I was trans and bisexual, but wasn’t out to anyone but my immediate family. Since all the time and opportunity I had back then was for was occasional random hookups, it didn’t seem worth opening that can of worms with someone who I’d only know for a few hours at most, so I was male-presenting with everyone I was with. Was it queer when I was with a straight woman? Was it queer when I was with a gay man? Is it even possible for it to be simultaneously straight for one person and queer for the other? For my own part, both situations felt “kinda, but also kinda not”.
“a bit more confusing” I meant.
this is gorgeous and thank you everyone for sharing 💗
I love all of these, thank you all for sharing!
Nico, my first time hooking up with a girl was also in a hotel room with 2 other people in the other bed! We had met online, she lived in Louisiana and I had just started my freshman year of college in Pittsburgh. She was taking a trip to NYC to meet up with some other friends and see RENT, and she asked if I could come to meet her. I said yes and (without telling my parents!) rode a Greyhound bus for 8 hours to get there. I arrived so late at night and we were so tired but we were determined not to waste any of our very limited time together. We tried to be quiet but I’m sure her friends heard us, but I really didn’t care. ANYWAY. We only tried to date long distance for a few months but this was almost 25 years ago and we’re still friends.
Thank you so much for the nuanced treatment of what a first means and putting the emphasis on everyone deciding for themselves. I have given myself permission to ignore the experiences in which I wasn’t giving informed or engaged consent, but it’s so validating to hear it from others as well. And of course thank you for sharing your experiences!
All of you: Thank you so much for sharing! There are so many lines that I want to copy and print because that’s how it was, that’s how it felt. Like a queer rite de passage we took part in, individually, but as part of our community, as well. It makes me appreciate once more this place here that Autostraddle has built for us.
Sa’iyda Shabazz you’re totally going to have to tell us about the second time! Feel like this is me as my first time with a woman was when I was 19 and I’m now in my 30s and feeling petrified like I’ve never touched anyone before!
Loved these stories so varied, thanks for sharing! X
Oops posted in the wrong field
This was so affirming I, now, can’t breathe! God damn. Also Drew never fails to deliver, Analyssa this is SO WHOLESOME I LOVE IT, Stef’s made me feel cool just by reading it, I just want to hug Laneia, Sa’idya made me CRACK UP LAUGHING (I just feel enormously seen by this plan and adore imagining these feckin nerds planning in such meticulous detail, just perfect), thank you to all the writers.
[My first time had a lead-up of about six years, cuddling and stroking each other’s hair and sharing bisexual feelings that I had never comfortably had with a friend. She was very much only a friend, though, until the night she came to visit me in university and we went out with another friend. He was extremely into her and discreetly asked my permission to take her home – if she was into the idea. As he murmured about how beautiful she was and we both watched her ice-skate, I remember feeling a faint pang at the idea of her being into the idea. Luckily for me, she wasn’t into the idea. She was into the idea of both of us cautiously, tenderly, slowly circling lower and closer to the parts of each other that had always been beyond the limits of our friendship. It was great. It remains the best orgasm of my life, over a decade later. And we are still friends, despite numerous complications and obstacles.