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Losing your virginity is exciting and scary at the same time. You might hope it will be "perfect", but hardly anything you do for the first time is, so simply aim for a pleasant experience by choosing the right time and person.
Boys and girls — or young men and women — of any age are a little anxious about the first time they have sex, and that's totally normal. Knowing a little more about what it's really like can help. We'll tackle the emotional and practical side of losing your virginity today.
READ More Young People having Unprotected Sex
Do It When You're Ready, With Someone You Like
Sex is a loaded topic about which everyone has thoughts. Some people believe you should not have sex until you get married, while others believe you should be in a long-term committed relationship or over a certain age. One thing is certain — sex is completely normal.
The vast majority of people has sexual desires, and those usually start during the teenage years.
If you are a teen, you may know a lot about sex or you may simply have been told that you should wait until [insert value here]. Your parents will definitely have their own ideas about when and with whom their kids should engage in sex for the first time, and those ideas usually include the hope that you won't have sex any time soon.
Whatever your personal values and the values of your parents, it's clear that you should not have sex if you don't want to.
Do it when you are sure you are ready, with someone you trust, like, and hopefully with someone you love.
Do It Safely
Are you saving yourself for marriage, and are sure your future spouse is doing the same? You might decide not to use contraceptives in that case. In any other case, you'll want to use condoms. Condoms keep you safe from sexually transmitted diseases and pregnancy.
Get condoms if you want to have sex, and remember that avoiding an unwanted pregnancy is as much your job as it is your partner's. Boys should probably practice putting on a condom before they lose their virginity. Messing around with condoms for a long time is not romantic.
Accidents do happen. Condoms can break or slip off, but you might also forget to use one or decide to go without if you don't have any. We hope you'll take contraceptive use seriously, but also that you'll get checked for sexually transmitted diseases if you have an accident.[1,2] In addition to an STD test, girls will want to take the morning-after pill if an accident happened [3].
- Photo courtesy of Pedro Ribeiro Simões by Flickr : www.flickr.com/photos/pedrosimoes7/2303136704/
- Photo courtesy of Eleazar by Flickr : www.flickr.com/photos/imagineitall/8015211080/