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 this week’s Sex Life is a 48 year old woman who has been married for 24 years. She talks about ignoring all the rules of sex prescribed by her church before marriage and how she and her husband keep their sex life exciting.
Do you remember your first sexual experience?
In the beginning, I was saving myself for marriage. I used to manage the small kiss here and the small breast pressing there. My body was really itching me to do more, but I made a promise to God. At the end of the day, I had sex with someone I thought I was going to marry. It didn’t work out.
What happened?
He jilted me after he went abroad. I was supposed to go and meet him there after I finished university, but he said he was still setting up himself. It wasn’t his marriage I heard about first, it was his child. People were saying she was very white. I almost died.
I’m sorry. How old were you?
I was 21 when we started dating. 23 or so when I heard about his new family.
Did you feel bad about it?
Bastard bad. I had saved myself for marriage. I thought, since I’m going to marry this man, let me give him my ‘flower’, as we called it then. Then he left me and I felt like I had sold myself short.
That sucks. Was the sex good at least?
It was really just sex.
So not good or bad?
It would even be good if it was bad. It was terrible.
Why was it so bad?
I didn’t really feel anything he was doing. That’s for the sex part. With regards to the making out part, it was too much saliva. I don’t think I was very attracted to him, even though he was a very attractive person. So today, I say, good riddance.
LMAO. How often did you guys have sex?
We were only together a few months before he japa-ed. So maybe like once a day when we were together.
Did you say something about how bad it was?
I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know how sex was supposed to feel.
So when did you know how sex was supposed to feel?
When I married my husband, which wasn’t too long after. We saved ourselves for marriage and it was very sweet when we started doing it. We dated for only a few months before we got married.
I remember being apprehensive at some point that he would jilt me the same way the first guy did and that’s why I wanted us to get married sharply. I was also very adamant about not having sex till we got married. Luckily, he was on the same page.
Why did he want to wait till marriage?
Our faith. He’s also a Christian. He was a bit extreme sha because while me, I was open to kissing and oral sex, he wasn’t interested in doing any of that. His motto was that we won’t be able to get enough of each other on our wedding night.
I had brief periods pre-wedding where I wondered whether the problem was that he wasn’t attracted to me or that he had a medical problem that prevented him from getting aroused, or maybe even that he had somebody elsewhere.
Ah. How did you get rid of those thoughts?
Relationships — whether friendships or marriages — can’t be built around distrust. I had to let go and trust him. And if I’m being fair, he hadn’t done anything to give me the impression that there was a problem and that it wasn’t just his faith.
So, I had to just let go of those thoughts and trust him. It was hard because I’d ask myself: what if it’s my friend he’s sleeping with? Or what if he cheats on me and we have to break up?
I realised I was more afraid of how people would react, and how they’d feel sorry for me — especially given what had already happened to me in the past. I’d often think of myself as having ill luck with men on top imaginations of my husband leaving me. I really had to learn to trust him.
What was the first experience with your husband like?
It was great. It wasn’t our wedding night as we thought it’d be and actually planned for. We were so tired after the wedding that we just fell asleep. When we got around to it, we couldn’t let go of each other.
I’m curious, what kind of plans did you make for the wedding night?
Lingerie, wine and aphrodisiacs. We even rented some ‘blue film’.
Despite your faith? 👀
Faith doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have fun in bed.
So when was the first actual time?
Two nights later.
How long have you been married?
Almost 24 years now.
How often would you say you have sex?
At least 5 times a week. On a good week, we have sex every day. Except when we are in different places for work and even then, with mobile phones now, we have found creative ways to do it. There’s virtual sex and sexting.
That’s incredible.
Yes. From the onset, we made up our minds that ours won’t be the normal sex life of ‘Christian couples’ that collapses after a few years. We had heard so many stringent rules about how Christian married couples were supposed to have sex and things not to do on the marital bed.
So we made our own rules and started working on increasing our knowledge of sex. Till today, we buy books and exchange articles on sex.
What kind of rules do you have?
To go against every rule the church gave us. For example, during counselling, we were told doggy was bad and that as the name implied, it was for dogs. We disobeyed that one and tried out different positions.
Doggy is actually our favourite position. Then there are other rules: we’re to ensure that we have sex every other day. We also enjoy roleplay, so we made a rule recently to ensure that we roleplay at least twice a month.
Does having rules ever make it feel mechanical?
In the beginning, it didn’t. But there are times it feels like that. Especially if we just had a fight, we’re not in the mood or we’re tired and it’s time to have sex. These are few and far between. I have a very sexy husband, if he just opens his mouth and says A, I can jump on him. If I don’t, it’s just because I’m doing shakara. And me too, I’m not bad.
We pray before having sex. Not all the time, but we do. We ask God to make both parties fulfilled during and after the act.
Lmao. That’s interesting…
Haha, people have called it weird.
What about your children? I imagine having children would have —
We don’t have children.
Mad. So it’s just you and your husband?
Yes. There’s no place or surface in the house we haven’t had sex on.
What else do you do to spice up your sex life?
Like I said, we love roleplaying a lot. Especially as doctor and patient. My husband is a doctor, so I’m his patient. When we don’t do that, we roleplay as madam and gardener or something. Things like that. Recently, we opened up our marriage. Just for a short period of time. That’s the most enthralling thing we ever did.
Why did you do that?
We didn’t exactly say that we were opening our marriage. We just decided to explore sexually with one person each. Monogamy is hard. My husband and I are on the same page on that. Since the beginning of our relationship and then marriage, we’ve allowed ourselves to ‘appreciate’ members of the opposite sex, without doing more. So if I see someone who I find really attractive, I can let my eyes linger and even tell my husband about it and he does the same too. So seeing someone else outside each other, just for sex didn’t seem too far fetched. It was like an experiment.
What was the outcome?
My husband says he didn’t really enjoy it and I have chosen to believe him. I did. I really enjoyed having sex with someone new and different. But it also made me realise just how much I really love having sex with my husband. So going back to him after that? We had the best sex till date. We haven’t spoken anymore about seeing other people.
I’m just wondering how you reconcile this with your beliefs or what your faith believes generally?
I’m not going against anything I believe in. I’m pretty sure that God wants us to find creative ways to entertain each other in and outside our bed, so yeah.
Sounds fair. How would you rate your sex life?
10 or maybe 9. But I’m just looking for the next adventure. There’s just so many things out there.
