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How to Have a Good Relationship
No, a great one.
Is this an arrogant thing for me to be writing about? I’m not a therapist or relationship counselor. I’m just a woman who’s been with the same guy, 95% happily, for 32 years, 27 of them married.
It seems like a lot of people on Medium are really worried about what happens when two individuals who met on a dating app end up in bed for the first time. They worry about their smells, the appearance of their genitals (now, especially women), whether they should have pubic hair, about the number of other partners they had or have, and especially whether they are doing things correctly.
I’m from an earlier generation, when we really were slut-shamed. The only sex education we got in school was a movie in tenth-grade biology class. No banana demonstrations with condoms. The movie the class watched in silent embarrassment shamed a girl for having sex (in the back seat of a car, of course). We watched her hang her head in the hallways the next day. And soon came her punishment. I don’t remember whether it was getting pregnant or getting syphilis. Probably both.
A story posted the other day blamed this sanctimonious, judgmental attitude on the Christian church. You don’t have to be Christian! I went to a typical public California high school. Everybody was supposed to be a virgin until they got married. End…
