Dear Future Husband

Letter #2: virginity

Dear Future Husband,

How are you?

You're probably doing pretty well, if I'm actually letting you read these. We must be really close. I'm glad I have somebody to count on. I deserve that.

I honestly kinda feel like I'm cheating on my future self by writing you. Like, I'm anticipating that you're talking to basically a whole other person. At least I'm eighteen. So you're not a pedophile. That's good.

I'd bet that, by now, you've figured out I'm really fucking funny. But I'm about to talk to you about something a lil serious... my virginity.

Hopefully, by now, I will have lost it.

Through a fault of my own and nobody else's—there's one exception, which I'll get to—I have chosen to envision my virginity as a hot potato that I desperately want to get rid of. I hate being a virgin. Especially at eighteen. I feel like I should have gotten rid of it by now.

No, I really don't cut myself any slack.

Why? Couldn't tell you. All of my friends are super supportive. They don't want me to throw it away on some asshole. But I'd do it in a heartbeat if it meant I'd finally be on that other side.

I wonder how it happens. How I'm going to lose it. A long-term boyfriend? A one-night stand? Friends-with-benefits? Is he going to be a dick about it? Or will he be sweet?

There was a guy I met this year, Damien—truly the gayest person I've ever met, and I worked at a doggie daycare for a year. He had moved from Kansas and he kinda joined my friend group for a few weeks. At first he seemed really cool—he was bubbly and funny and chaotic, and I honestly kinda loved his energy. He did do a shit-ton of drugs. Especially at school. But we got to talking one day and the subject of virginity came up.

Damien was sixteen, and he was already having sex with grown-ass men. He literally showed me videos of him getting butt-fucked by twenty-somethings. A little intimidated—and also concerned for both his mental and physical health—I told him I was a virgin.

Damien looked me up and down and then laughed hysterically. "You look like a virgin," he said to me.

At first I laughed with him. I truly didn't know what else to do. It knocked the wind out of me, my feelings were so hurt. I was in such shock that I didn't cry until hours later, when I came home from school and completely registered what he had said to me.

A little teasing, I totally get it. Society values a little bit of promiscuousness, I think. Not too much, of course, but generally people like to know you're experienced. So if somebody wanted to throw me a few jabs about my virginity, I could 100% take them. I'm a big girl. I can handle it.

But Damien had basically told me that he wasn't shocked that nobody had ever had sex with me because of how I looked. I looked like someone nobody would ever want to fuck. That really, really hurt.

That day is probably the one I started to loathe my virginity. Granted, I had never loved it before Damien came along, but it became a burden that day—one that I couldn't even begin to accept.

I didn't tell my friends for a few days. I was so embarrassed. But got to a point that every time we were alone, just the two of us, he would bring it up. He even offered—on several occasions—to take it for me. He'd make his voice really low and say, "See, I can be straight."

Not only was it kinda insulting, it was honestly just weird. It made me super uncomfortable. So, I finally told my friends about it. I'd never seen them so angry about anything before. They all met to confront Damien in the hallway, and I made myself scarce. Looking back, I probably should have stuck around, but I was terrified of confrontation and still morbidly embarrassed that he had chose to fixate on my virginity.

He texted me an apology later, and I said I accepted it, but I wasn't comfortable being friends anymore. It was weird to see a sophomore in the senior hallway, anyway. I never saw him again.

There was certainly a silver lining to the Damien thing—I saw how fiercely loyal my friends were. And that helped, a lot. I felt so incredibly loved. Still, the slow acceptance of my seemingly perpetual virginity came to a screeching halt.

I know it'll all be okay someday. This will all seem trivial, and I'll laugh at myself for making it such a big deal. My virginity (or lack thereof) will be something I won't give a second thought about. But right now, I stress out about it all the time.

Oddly, it gives me piece of mind to know you won't care.

Thanks again for listening.

Love,

Your Future Wife