Sex. Not everyone is drawn to temptation during their dating period. There are those who actively save themselves for their wedding night — turning a magical, loving moment into a life-lasting, romantic event. It’s meant to mark the beginning of something beautiful — a sweet and wonderful love story. But we never get to hear how it works out for the couple. How was their wedding night? Was it filled with those magical, loving, perfect moments that were promised to them?
Mitchell and Sam Felding dated for seven years. They were a celibate couple right up to their wedding night. It wasn’t easy but they made it to their honeymoon suite without previously sampling each other’s flesh. They grinned as they rolled their suitcases through the threshold of the hotel room. They closed the door and then looked at each other. There was a bed on the other side of the room and they both knew what was to happen next. It had been building up to this all day long — for all of their lives. I know, I was there. The expectation was electric.
You’ll want to hear that it was wonderful — every breath and bead of sweat was worth the seven years of abstinence to get them. You’ll want to know that we soaked our sheets. We didn’t come up for air. I never knew where my body stopped and my lover’s started. The sex was absolutely amazing!
Liar.
It was not perfect. It was a perfect disaster. It also marked the beginning of our end.
There should be a law that prohibits long-term celibacy from taking hold as it is capable of shattering a couple’s dreams later. No one tells you the truth about what really happens at the moment when your sex life is supposed to transition. I’m not just talking about the physical pain but the psychological repercussions associated with failing to reach the dizzy heights promised. There’s no going back. Once the door of the honeymoon room is closed, you’re on your own. Anything that doesn’t work right on the other side of it doesn’t exist in the outside world and it never affects those who professed celibacy was a good thing to practice. If I knew then what I know now, I wouldn’t have done it. Only fools venture into a life of pre-marriage celibacy. Undoing the damage it causes is impossible.
Do you want specifics?
Sure, why not? So few of us talk about it in detail. I could say something of the hymen if you like. It’s a very personal topic for me to bring up but I’ll go there if it helps you to understand our problem better. It’s a small start. Small. Now that’s a good word to bring up here. Yes, a baby is meant to come out of that special place and a man’s penis is relatively small but it’s huge when nothing else has passed through it. That unbroken membrane at its front door comes with sensitive nerves. It’s going to take kindness and patience because she’ll feel pain, lots of it. It can be excruciating. She’ll scream like a birthing mother and none of that experience will be a pleasurable one. The process can leave scars beyond the physical one if it’s not an absolutely perfect moment.
This brings me to the other part of the story.
When is a perfect moment? If it’s painful, no moment will be absolutely right — and if a couple has placed sex on such a high pedestal, it won’t make any sense in the aftermath. Anxiety will follow, developing pain in places that medical science can’t identify. And no moment beyond it will right that wrong. It’ll grow and fester until there’s nothing but fear and guilt left. It’ll create even more anxiety, spoiling what should’ve been a loving relationship. And all of this started out with good intentions.
I failed us.
Our wedding night was a total catastrophe. What happened back then infected our marriage for all the days that followed. Our counsellor is optimistic. He thinks he can help us. It’s worth fixing the problems, right? We did everything right. I didn’t want any of this to occur in our marriage. Celibacy was wrong for us. I know that now. I just wish I could start our relationship over again.