Not everyone clicks in on the first night of their marriage. Sometimes the sex just doesn’t work right.
Let’s use the words purity movement in this next paragraph. It’s where sexual abstinence is meant to make sex the pinnacle moment of a newlyweds wedding night. It’s supposed to be the gift a couple gives each other after saying “I do”.
There are those who actively save their sex for that one special moment. Yes, it happens. But what I want to know are the results of practising celibacy. Don’t you? No one ever talks about the after-wedding celebration. It’s all about the party that’s going to happen. Was the night as magical and lovely as it promised to be? Did these loved-up purity couples who clung desperately to an ideal for years get their happy ever after in the bedroom?
Mitchell and Sam Felding dated for seven years. They waited right up to their wedding night to have sex. It wasn’t easy but they made it to their honeymoon suite with nervous anticipation. 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 would happen next. It had been building up to this for all of their lives. I know, I was there. The expectation was electric.
You’ll want to hear that it was a wonderful experience — every breath and bead of sweat was worth the seven-year wait. You’ll want to know that we soaked our sheets right to the floor. We didn’t come up for air all night long — I never knew where my body stopped and my lover’s started. The sex was absolutely amazing! It’s something everyone should do.
Liar.
No one should ever do that.
It was not perfect. It was a perfect disaster. That’s what it was.
There should be a law that prohibits long-term celibacy from going beyond a year. Anything longer than this is capable of shattering a young couple’s dreams into many pieces. No one tells you that it could go one of two ways and the second one is so unkind you wouldn’t wish it on your worst enemy. No one says that the longer you wait the higher the expectation becomes. They tell you it’ll all come naturally but 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 is yours and yours alone.
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 is almost impossible.
Do you want specifics?
Sure, why not? So few of us talk about it. I’ve already suggested that no one tells you the deal behind that door. Let’s get real for a moment and speak of specifics.
I could start with the hymen.
And that’s why people stop talking about things so quickly. The mechanics of sex is so damn unromantic. When the details of it come out, listeners shut down or turn away. It’s a very personal topic for me to bring up so I’ll persist with it anyway. Stay or leave. I don’t care.
Yes, a baby is meant to come out of that special place. A penis is meant to go inside it. That unbroken membrane at the vagina’s front door comes with lots of sensitive nerves. It can be excruciating for her to receive her husband for the first few times. All the lube in the world won’t change it. The process can leave scars that go beyond the physical one. Remember, this moment was promised to be magical.
Magic doesn’t come with so much hurt.
This brings me to the other part of the story. What happens after the honeymoon couple ends up retreating to opposite ends of the bedroom because of those moments?
If a couple places sex on such a high pedestal prior to their wedding, the honeymoon disaster won’t make any good sense to them in the days that follow it. For them, it was meant to come naturally and this felt unnatural. God promised it’d work but something wasn’t right. Maybe God sent them a message that they aren’t compatible at all and what they have isn’t true love.
Doubt and anxiety will follow.
It’ll develop pain in places that medical science can’t locate. And no moment beyond it will right that wrong. It’ll grow and fester until nothing but fear and guilt are left inside the marriage. 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 with mine.
Our wedding night was a total catastrophe due to our stupid celibacy rule. What happened back then infected our marriage. Our counsellor is optimistic. He thinks he can help. He says it’s worth fixing the problems and I believe him. 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 all over again.
What your posts encapsulates so well is the stigma that still manages to exist regarding sex. The degree to which so hung up on purity and virginity baffles me.