Because I had told my parents I was staying at a friend’s house, I couldn’t explain where I had actually been or what had happened. I walked into my house carrying something heavy—something I wasn’t ready to talk about. I couldn’t tell them. I couldn’t tell anyone in my family. And so, I stayed quiet.
That silence followed me for a long time.
It wasn’t just about what had happened physically—it was about everything I didn’t understand, everything I hadn’t been prepared for, and everything I felt like I should have known but didn’t. I kept replaying it in my head, trying to make sense of it, trying to figure out where things had gone wrong.
Later, when I started talking to friends, I realized something important.
I wasn’t alone.
One of my friends told me that the first time she had sex, all she felt was wetness everywhere and pain. Another told me that her first time hurt so much that she ended up crying. These weren’t isolated experiences—they were common, shared, and yet rarely talked about openly before they happened.
That realization was both comforting and frustrating.
Comforting, because I understood I wasn’t the only one who had gone through something difficult.
Frustrating, because it made me question why no one had talked about it honestly beforehand.
