More from email

Stephen · 08-09-2000 1:22am #1

As the topic says...

It's supposed to be tender, romantic, intimate...But sometimes sex is
just an embarrassing ****-up. These women were willing to cringe and
tell about their Sexual Blunders:

'One night my boyfriend and I came back to my flat from a party a bit
tipsy. As I walked in, I switched on the answering machine to hear if
there were any messages. At that point, he started kissing me, and we
ended up having noisy, wildly energetic sex on the floor right there in the
entrance hall. After work the next evening my mum came round for coffee. On
my way to the kitchen, I switched the answering machine on again and, as we
settled down with our mugs for a chat, the unmistakable and definitely
X-rated sounds of our lovemaking suddenly echoed loudly through the flat. I
must have hit the record button rather than the playback button the night
before... My mother prides herself on being broadminded, but this was just
too much for her. She slopped coffee all over herself.'

-Maureen, manager, 25

'We'd been going out for about five years and, to be honest, the sex
wasn't that exciting. One night, as he was going through the motions, I lost
concentration. I started to think about the chores I had to do the next day
- one of which was to take the dog to the vet for some booster shots. Just
then he must have hit a spot because I suddenly called "Snoopy!" (The dog's
name, naturally.) I still cringe when I think about it, particularly as I
just couldn't think of any excuse to explain myself. The truth wouldn't
exactly have helped to improve the
atmosphere, would it? We aren't together any more, but I still have
Snoopy.

-Anna, journalist, 28

'One Christmas, I went with my boyfriend to his parents' home for a few
days. They are quite open-minded and on our first morning his father brought
us tea in bed. This was embarrassing enough, but as he turned to walk out
the door, I noticed that he was standing on a condom we had recklessly
discarded on the carpet during the night. It was stuck, like a persistent
piece of Sellotape, to his slipper. I was hysterical and we couldn't think
of what to say to him. "Excuse me, father, there's a condom stuck to your
foot." (I think not.) Afterwards we decided to act as if nothing had
happened and so did he. But I wasn't able to look him straight in the eye
again for the rest of the holiday.

-Jane, estate agent, 25

'One afternoon I was home alone in the flat I share with two friends,
feeling "experimental". I looked around for something vibrator-ish, and
settled for a cucumber. I had a wonderful time lazing in the lounge,
listening to music and playing around with the cucumber. When I was
finished, I left it lying on the table and drifted off to have a long bath,
thinking I would have plenty of time to throw it away and clean up before my
flatmates came back. Unfortunately, they returned while I was in the bath -
ravenous. The next thing I knew they were offering me a spinach and bacon
salad with ... cucumber. I didn't have the heart to ask them if they had
washed it. I said, "No thanks, I'm not hungry" - and I wasn't.'

-Angela, buyer, 31

'On our first holiday together, we went to Mauritius where we had booked a
room in a lovely hotel. On our first night there, we had ****tails and then
went for a romantic stroll along the beach. When we came back, we lay down
on one of the chaise lounges next to the pool. It seemed deserted and we
started getting really steamy. I kept looking around to check that there was
absolutely no-one there - and there wasn't. So we slipped out of our clothes
and slid into the pool to see if it was possible to have sex underwater. We
were doing quite well with our experiment when suddenly, out of nowhere, a
member of the hotel staff appeared and told us, very politely, that it was
better to keep intimacy to our bedroom. The pool, he added, had an
underwater window that made up one of the walls of the hotel's disco, and we
had been the floor show for all the guests who were dancing -until they had
seen us. I was so humiliated that I made my boyfriend check us out of the
hotel first thing the next morning, and I spent the rest of the holiday
dreading the flight back in case anyone recognised us.'

-Elana, publisher, 32

'I was about 18 I first went down on a man. It was winter and we were
cuddled up under a heap of duvets. When he guided my head down, I didn't
really know what to do, so I was quite relieved when I heard him telling me.
Although his voice was rather muffled by all the bedding, I did catch the
words, "bite ... bite", so I tried an experimental nibble or two. Then he
started pulling my hair a bit, which I took as a sign of him getting carried
away with passion. Assuming this meant that he was really enjoying what I
was doing, I became a bit braver and nibbled harder. Suddenly I heard a howl
of pain. Only after I'd scrambled out from under the covers to find out what
I was doing wrong did I realise he'd been saying, "don't bite, don't bite".
Telling him that it was my first time didn't make it any better.'

- Nomsa, record company executive, 25

'My husband and I, although devout Christians, enjoy a varied and
experimental sex life. I don't think there's anything wrong with a
little role-playing in the privacy of your marriage bed. We have quite a
well-stocked cupboard of fantasy outfits: a little black and white frilly
maid's outfit, an old-fashioned princess gown, a highwayman's outfit and
some rather racy costumes - a bit of vinyl and leather too. A few months ago
my mother-in-law came over one evening to baby-sit our one-year old and my
sister's two daughters. While she was watching television, the girls - one
eight and the other ten - decided to play "dress up" with the contents of
Auntie Trina's cupboard. Imagine my horror when my husband, my sister, my
brother-in-law and I arrived home to find the 10-year-old attired in a black
corset with red lacy underwear and the eight-year-old dressed as an
Egyptian slave-girl. My mother-in-law was even more horrified. She'd had no
idea what was going on because the girls had been hiding in our bedroom
waiting to 'surprise' us - and they weren't disappointed! They had five
open-mouthed adults staring at them in utter amazement. My sister was
furious - and still is, I'm afraid.

-Trina, pharmacist, 27

'I'm shy and quite conventional sexually. I'm happiest in the missionary
position. My boyfriend, however, is much more experimental and encourages me
to try different positions. Once, he persuaded me to get onto all fours and
was becoming very excited, ready to enter me from behind. The mood was
right: he'd been coaxing me, convincing me that it was beautiful between two
loving adults and there was soft music playing on the stereo, when I let off
the most enormous fart. Revolting! I was so embarrassed that I just wanted
the ground to swallow me up. He laughed and didn't seem to mind at all,
which was sweet of him, but my sexual education was put back by at least 10
steps.'

- Elaine, marketing manager, 31