Sex Life is an anonymous Zikoko weekly series that explores the pleasures, frustrations and excitement of sex in the lives of Nigerians.
The subject of today’s Sex Life is a 31-year-old woman who combines her religion with her sex life. She talks about combating purity culture, realising she was bisexual and combining her spirituality with her sexuality.
Tell me about your first sexual experience
When I was 10 years old, my best friend’s brother kissed me. My parents had dropped me off at her house because they were travelling to the village and didn’t want to take me along.
One day, my best friend and I decided to sleep in his room for reasons I don’t remember. My best friend fell asleep first, so it was just me and him awake. He was asking me about crushes and if there was anyone I liked. When I said no, he kissed me. It was a light kiss and it ended so quickly, but it felt nice. Very nice.
How did the kiss make you feel?
At first, it felt nice. It was a quick kiss so I couldn’t tell you much about technique. However, I felt terrible after. I remember when my mum used to tell me that kissing boys was a sin against God and how my punishment will be pregnancy and hell. I was so scared.
When my parents eventually came back, I told my mum I thought I was pregnant. She asked what happened and I told her I had kissed my best friend’s brother. That was the last time my parents let me visit my bestie again. She also told me I had to go for confession so I could be forgiven of my sins. Looking at it now, it was a very fucked up thing to tell a 10-year-old.
I’m so sorry. I can imagine that was the end of kissing boys. Right?
Well, yes. I never kissed a boy again. But when I was 14 I kissed someone again, and this time it was a girl.
It was this friend I made in the all girls Catholic boarding school I attended. We did everything together and were basically inseparable. Some of our classmates used to call us husband and wife.
The kiss happened during evening prep while the Reverend Sister was chasing everyone out, we hid in a corner of the room so we wouldn’t have to go for prep. So while our mates were reading, we just stayed up talking. We talked about so many things and then she asked if she could kiss me. I said yes. She kissed me and I didn’t want her to stop. Unlike the first kiss I had with my best friend’s brother, this one lasted longer and was more intense. She touched my breasts and kissed me for a long time. It felt like heaven.
And how did you feel after?
Guilty. I knew at this point that kissing couldn’t get me pregnant, but I did know that kissing women was frowned upon in my religion. My parents made sure all the sins and their punishments were ingrained in our memory forever. That’s why I started to withdraw from her.
We no longer ate together, washed together, or even read together. Everyone was wondering what the problem was, but I couldn’t look her in the eye. Then a few days later, she cornered me while I was in my classroom and she made sure we had a conversation about the kiss.
She told me she liked me, wanted to still be my friend and even apologized for the kiss. So I forgave her and we kept being friends. It’s just that I noticed that our interactions changed. We maintained eye contact longer and touched each other more often. Now that I think about it, she was practically my first relationship.
Did you guys ever do anything else?
If you’re talking sexually, yes. We kissed a few times but they were always short and chaste. I would catch myself leaning in for more but she never indulged me. I think it’s because of how I acted every single time we kissed. It took a while for me to stop the withdrawals. I would cry sometimes in the school’s chapel and pray for God to take away that feeling from me. It never worked.
That sounds like such a troubling experience.
Oh, it was. It was two years of softness and guilt. Even touching her hand made me feel like I was committing sin. I didn’t want to feel the way I felt anymore. At one point, I thought maybe God cursed me and the only way to cure it was to die. Those final years in secondary school were both some of the happiest and unhappiest moments of my life.
Did you ever get over the feeling?
I did. When I was 17 and done with secondary school, my parents sent me to Canada to see my aunt and her family. My parents would always send my younger brother and I on solo trips out of the country so that it’d be easier for us to get approved when applying for visas.
During the holiday with my aunt, I followed her to church. That day, the preacher was teaching about how God loved us for who we are, irrespective of what we are. It felt like the preacher was seeing me and it led to a very emotional service. I walked up to him after the sermon and asked him to pray with me. For the first time, I told someone everything that was going on with me and he listened and gave me advice.
I went home that day filled with some kind of purpose and understanding. I got back to Nigeria and had to constantly remind myself of the things the preacher said. That’s how I finally got myself to masturbate for the first time.
So in all of this, no sex?
Yeah, while I was trying to navigate my sexuality, I wasn’t having sex with anyone. I didn’t want to annoy God any more than I already had, so I just abstained.
Now that I had a somewhat sensible grasp on it, it was like all the hormones of the past couple of years got released at once. I wanted to sleep with anyone, but I was shy. Extremely.
The day I masturbated for the first time, I was seated in the living room, watching a movie. The scenes got heated really quickly and I felt turned on. I tried rubbing my thighs together but that didn’t work. That’s when I decided I needed something better.
I knew about the concept of masturbating, so I wasn’t completely lost when I went down there. There were some slight hiccups, but when I found a frequency that worked, it felt like I was about to burst. That’s when I locked eyes with the portrait of Jesus in our living room and had my very first orgasm.
From crying and wailing to locking eyes with Jesus during mekwe. How?
I don’t know how, because I honestly didn’t plan it. I was just a curious 20-year-old who was no longer as scared of doing sexual things in God’s presence. I was very excited.
I want to think all that religious trauma developed into the kinks I have today.
These kinks, should I ask?
I’m very dominant in bed. I like to tie people up and just let them enjoy themselves. I want to provide a space where my partners are so comfortable and can be themselves. I think all those years of hiding who I am has made me so desperate to be myself and allow people to live their truth as well.
For someone that wasn’t fucking, how did you know you were a dom?
After going to ring the devil’s doorbell, I got even more curious about sex. I think that’s the thing about it. You start one thing and then everything else just follows. So, I made it a conscious effort to look for someone that will take things a little farther with me.
At a departmental party I was in, there was this girl who flirted with me and collected my number. We planned to see and when we were both finally free, I went over to her place. While we were watching a movie at her place, she kissed me. This was the third kiss I had ever gotten in my life, and the first one I actually let myself enjoy. We were making out and her hands kept going everywhere. I thought to myself that it’ll be more practical to have her hands tied up, but I didn’t have any rope. When she tugged on the rosary on my neck, I knew it would do. So, I tied her up with it.
It was my first time touching a woman down there and with the way she screamed, I believed she enjoyed it. Eventually, I started looking for another partner because she was about to graduate. Some of the partners I ended up having were introduced to me by her. I was just trying to figure this whole sex thing out.
That was years ago. How about now?
I’m proud to be out to myself. I’m a bisexual woman and that’s not the end of the world. I’m sad that it took me so long to finally be able to say it, but I’m glad I’m at least able to say it at all. I’ve also never stopped taking my religion seriously. It’s still very important to me. I pray sometimes before sex and after. It’s grounding and familiar.
On a scale of 1-10 what will you rate your sex life?
A 7. I’m having a lot of good sex, but it can be better. The girl that was 14 years old and crying in the chapel might not be proud of the person I am now, but she’s free and that’s all that matters.
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