For those of us who’ve been affected by sexually
transmitted infections (including HPV – human papillomavirus), the interview
with Michael Douglas in this week’s Guardian newspaper was quite intriguing. In
it, he implied that his throat cancer could have been caused by performing oral
sex.
Whilst later in the week, he appeared to be retracting
these comments, it certainly has created interest and one suspects that there
might be a few alarm bells ringing in the heads of those that lovingly and
delightfully indulge in fellatio and cunnilingus.
We tend not to talk about this important aspect of
sexuality because, for some bizarre reason, we don’t like to admit that kissing
and sucking the sexual organs of our partners or lovers is so delicious. So the
thought of popping off to the clinic to discuss it in great detail might be
somewhat off-putting to many, yet it is something that we really ought to do.
The reality, though, is that many people who are sexually
active do participate in fellatio and cunnilingus without any negative health
repercussions.
I adore both. I love nothing more than filling my entire
mouth with a wholesome, large and erect penis that, with joyous practice,
slides down comfortably without the gagging reactions forcing an abrupt end to
the proceedings. It takes time to get it right and the old adage practice makes
perfect is completely right.
Likewise with cunnilingus. I’ve had lovers who think that
the mere fact that they’re prepared to stick their tongue inside my vagina will
do the trick and force an eruption of my bodily fluids. But just as we need to
learn with our fingers or our cocks, so too do we need to learn with our
tongues. It’s not enough to go in and go out again without exploring every
corner of this fascinating and enthralling part of the body.
Whether you are the recipient or the provider of
cunnilingus, it’s really important to talk it through with your partner. Tell
them where to go. Explain as they are doing it precisely what is happening to
your body. Get them to lick inside and outside, exploring the form of the body
with that delicious line of expectation that hides the wonderment of woman’s
hidden parts. To be honest, I’m juicing up at the thought of it. Oh to be
licked and kissed like that – pure delight.
Enough of that though. We need to return to the health
message. The overwhelming delights of this sexual experience can turn into a
horror if you do end up with an infection – at worse cancerous growths.
We need to be safe. We need to respect the safety of
others and we need to be very aware that our sexual behaviour can impact
significantly on ourselves and the lives of our sexual partners.
My own experience is something that I would like to share
with others because it’s a reality and shows just how negligent we can be about
our own bodies and their healthiness, either wittingly or not.
As a person who has indulged in polyamorous behaviour, I
took a hell of a risk. I knew that my lover had another sexual partner, and at
the time, albeit reluctantly, I too was having sex with another person. We
continued in that manner without ever once going to a clinic to check that our
sexual health was intact, assuming (rightly or wrongly) that our other sexual
partners were only having sex with us. To this day, I don’t know whether that
is the case. What I do know is that we took unnecessary risks, and with an understandable
lack of honesty with our respective partners, we placed them in similar
jeopardy.
At the time, however, two issues took precedence for me.
Firstly, I wanted to have sex with this man no matter
what. My desire for his “un-condomed” cock was driving my mind far more than
any amount of knowledge about safe sex. If I had to share that unprotected cock
with another, then fine. That’s what I’d have to do, and that’s what I did –
often.
Secondly, I was in a relationship that wouldn’t cope with
the truth of me having sex with another. My lover was in a similar situation.
My partner and my lover’s partner couldn’t be told that we were in a sexual
relationship that didn’t use condoms and had plenty of fellatio and
cunnilingus. My lover was adamant that I shouldn’t tell my partner and that his
shouldn’t be told either.
So there was a choice. Tell people (our partners) the
truth, stop having sex with my lover, start having protective sex with my lover
without the joy of aforementioned oral sex or stop having sex with our
respective partners.
Circumstances meant that the latter was the option that
we took, and for years, whilst maintaining a policy of polyamory (and practice
too unbeknown to me) to all intents and purposes we only had one another as a
sexual partner.
But even this isn’t and wasn’t safe. The fact that my
lover had another lover during this time was totally unknown to me. Wrongly, he
assumed that I would find this difficult. Wrongly, he chose not to tell me,
possibly because I would have wanted him and me to check ourselves out at a
clinic, for all its embarrassment. But even if we were monogamous, we should
still have probably got the all clear as we both knew we had been in a
relationship with other sexual partners whilst indulging in glorious sex
together.
We were utter fools.
The situation changed once more when he decided he wanted
more permanent additional lovers in his life. Telling me that he was having
protected sex with both of them, I happily indulged in unprotected sex,
thinking, stupidly, that I was safe.
Even if he had been wearing a condom with his other
lovers, he was still more than likely to be giving them cunnilingus, which
meant that I was still potentially at risk of contracting a sexually
transmitted infection, as was he. Even if he hadn’t been having oral sex with
these other women, the fact that he came straight from them to me meant that
there were times when I was sucking the sexual juices of those women from his
cock when I gave him an instinctive blow job prior to him showering them off
him. Funny really, because I can remember how he grinned as I told him how good
he tasted. Perverse? Maybe but not to me.
The point is that if you choose to have sex with multiple
partners, then all of those involved need to be seen at a clinic regularly. I
know to my cost that this should have happened and didn’t, and it’s something
that I bitterly regret and hope that I don’t regret it in the future even more
than I do right now and even more so than I did this time last year.
Sexual health is important, and I don’t know whether
Michael Douglas and his wife have other sexual partners. In many ways, it’s an
irrelevance. One slight non-sexually related infection or benign existence of
the HPV in her could have been a causal factor to his cancer. However, if you
are having sex with more than one person or if you have very good reason to
believe that your partner is having unprotected sex of any form with another,
then I implore you to get yourself checked out as you do carry a greater risk.
What you might find can be alarming and frightening but it’s far worse than
sitting around waiting for whatever potential infection there may be to grow
into something far worse and potentially untreatable. An arrogant belief that
everyone is safe is wrong, unfair and downright irresponsible.
Polyamory should always come with a health warning – the main
one being an emotional health warning with the potential of a massive, damaging
and long-living impact on your feelings and self-worth. Polyamory can be safe,
though it’s impossible to get away from the fact that you are more at risk of
infection by the very nature of probability than you are in a monogamous
relationship. Monogamous relationships aren’t immune from infections. It
happens.
Just be safe. Check yourself out and deal with the
consequences and the downside of the most brilliant aspects of life – our sexuality.
PS – I still fundamentally believe in polyamory.
