African Women Weigh in on Sex, Sexual Taboos and Other Matters of Sezzjjual Wellness
TRIGGER Warning: This article contains discussions of child sexual assault, and may be triggering for some readers.
Sex and sexaulity has been a taboo for most of my life and even though as a child I expericned traumatic sexualization ( both from witnessing sexual assault and being inappropriately touched myself) the adults who raised me, my siblings and a slew of cousins had no concept of how to approach talking to children about sex.
Sexual development begins in the womb and continues through to infancy, young childhood, adoloscence and young adulthood. But sex is still an esoteric subject, and when the conversations do happen, the opinions and experinces shared reveal truamatic details of peoples’ sexual experiences.
It’s like my sister telling me about a guy at a dinner table proclaiming that he was having sex with his house help ( read: live-in housekeeper/ cleaner common in most African households) by age 9. What was more shocking was this grown man’s lack of understanding as to why this was problematic. The truth is, children have sexuality and can feel sexual pleasure. This often causes confusion as to what sexual assault actually is. Children experiencing pleasure from sexual stimulation is normal. What is abnormal is A. a grown woman having sex with a 9 year old and B. a grown woman having sex with a 9 year old in whom’s house she is also employed. What’s further abnormal is the number of times I’ve heard this in Ghana.
So many grown men believe this to be a normal occurance of childhood- almost as a rite of passage.
When discussing sex amongst friends, sexuality or the coming into understanding of sexuality is more trauma ridden than makes me comfortable.
Maybe this is why we dont like talking about it. Perhpas exploring sex brings up too many feeelings of shame, angst and guilt so much so, that we choose not to speak on it. Rather, we assume that once a person is of appropriate sexual age aka married, they just “get” sex. From personal experince I know this NOT to be true.
Sexual taboos are passed down to us from parents and soceity without any acknowledgement of A. the normalcy of sex and sexual feelings in developing age and B. that many of us experience traumatic sexualization way before we fully understand sex.
I’ve pondered my own experiences and how it’s affected my views on sex throughout my life: from shame and often ignorance and now towards acceptance and an interest in whole sexual wellness.
Curiosity led me to want to know about other womens’ journies navigating sexual taboos, so I caught up with a network of readers and friends to discuss sex, sexual taboos and how they’re defining sexual wellnes for themselves.
The OG Taboo!
“at 12 I was sexually assaulted by my uncle. I didn’t tell anyone. All I could think about was God would punish me and so would my parents”
One cannot talk sex without the mention of the OG taboo: sex before marriage and loss of virginity. On the issue of sex and sexual taboos, virginity and sex before marriage took olympic gold for number of times mentioned.
The taboos around sex before marriage in the religious context also contributed to feelings of shame and guilt amongst many of the women who responded to our query.
Not only did some mention the inability to report sexual assault, like one woman who recounted, “if you have sex before marriage God will punish you & when you have sex you get pregnant! My first sexual experience was not consensual. I was 10. That was my cousin. Then at 12 I was sexually assaulted by my uncle. I didn’t tell anyone. All I could think about was God would punish me and so would my parents & I just prayed that I don’t get pregnant and bring shame to my family”.
The emphasis on virginity also seemed to have caused a lapse or a gap in some of the womens’ ability to explore and experience pleasure as one woman spoke of her natural curiosity about body pleasure being classified as sinful. “Growing up I remember always being intrigued about my body, the changes that were naturally occurring and more speficiallly the ways certain parts made me feel to the touch. This natrual inquisitive tendacy of mine was swifty discouraged as soon as it got labeled “masterbation”. I was harshly reprimanded and told to pray and ask God for forgiveness of my sin. That was when the first seeds associating sexual pleasure with “sin” were planted.” That part.
It’s important to note that anatomical curiosity in children is normal, and yes that includes curiosity about the anatomy of sexual organs. What is abnormal is children touching adults, or children forcing sexual acts on other children. But children touching themselves is a normal part of growth and dvelopment that should be handled delicately and without shame if one is to develop a healthy relationship to sex and sexuality.
Although, many of the responses were downright outlandish and often tragic we also got some empowring stories too. One woman recounted the first time she ever had consensual sex and how empowering it felt after having survived rape twice : “For the longest time I hated sex. Until I met X…he was gentle, fun, kind and was truly a giver and receiver. I met him at 18. That was my first consensual sex and loved it. That fucked my world up tho! Before that, the thought of sex brought up pain, shame, and discomfort, which didn’t match up with what I was experiencing with him. So I embarked on a journey of healing.”<< #insertheartemoji
The Pleasure Principle
“Man, plain ole vanilla sex can be amazing,”
Within female sexuality was the issue of pleasure. Some of the bizarre and sometimes taboo topics centered sexual pleasure. Like one woman’s report of discovering the taboo of canillingus amongst sexually active people in Ghana: “I only came to know of it when I moved back to Ghana, but it’s taboo for a man to go down on a woman. That was crazy to me seeing as something like 80% of women only orgasm from clit stimulation 🤔 So I was very #makeitmakesense when I heard about this. Mind you, it wasn’t just guys saying this, but women would say this too. They would be shy or scared for a guy to be between their legs like that (because of grooming, smell, taste, it’s degrading to a man, etc).” SMH.
But as these women have grown and are owning their relationship to sex by themselves or with partners, self pleasure, bodily autonomy and the end to performative sex began to take center stage. One woman humorously responded : “Man, plain ole vanilla sex can be amazing,” as a challenge to a world that often looks down upon missionary style and other positions not likely to be shown in porn.
The prevelance of porn presents many a conundra with some veiwing porn as a means of sexaul education and exploration while others view it as all together bad. Although there are many atttempts to “do porn right” with ethical porn sites that claim to lean away from focusing only on the cis-het male gaze, porn is linked to performative sex and can result in some people feeling less of a connection with themselves and their partners. But I digress…
The performance culture around sex was once again challenged by one respondent who also mentioned the importance of never faking anything: “Don't fake anything. Point to your pleasure.” With one more responding to the question of “how your relationship to sex has changed over the years” by mentioning the importance of communicating with her partner about what feels right :” I’ve learned that my pleasure is my responsibility and I’ve learned to communicate it effectively.”
More than a buzz-word: Sexual Wellness.
“I am as responsible for my sexual pleasure, just as I am in other aspects of health. Not my partner, me.”
When we came down to sexaul wellness, this was when things got interesting. Each woman had a personal take on what sexaul wellness is- with or without a partner.
I loved one woman’s response as she stated that “Sexual health and wellness is apart of the abundance life offers. There is no pleasure comparable and everyone deserves to have amazing sex.” Here, here friend. Here, here!
Others expressed that the term can often feel buzzy or non- inclusive with one woman outright rejecting the term. “The term sexual wellness doesn’t really resonate with me because it feels selective and exclusive. I wish the term were closer to something like “sexual normalcy”. It doesn’t sound as sexy or trendy but the truth is that everyone who has a body has the right to the full experience their bodies gives them including pleasure. Normalcy should be for every grown adult and their great anf [sic] healthy relationship with sex .” Another expressed the term “sexual wellness” in less flattering terms, but defined it in very flattering terms: “Sexual wellness I’m assuming is another one of the new fangled labels we have for things but I take that to mean have good sex and have lots of it.” Facts.
One of my favorite responses involved one woman expressing that sexual wellness is not a different part of whole wellness expressing that sex is just as important as communication and mutual partnership in her marriage. “It’s not the type of wellness I think about in isolation, because it’s a part of the wellness of my marriage relationship, I guess. Sexual wellness could be down, per se, but communication is good (we know we’re both busy and tired, but are talking regularly) and partnership is good (equal distribution of home duties is occurring so one person isn’t unequally exhausted), which leads to a wellness of the entirety of the relationship, even if we’re not regularly having sex.”
Whether within a relationsip or not, sex and sexaulity is important. It is a part of us we choose to ignore because of all the shame it often elicits. And, whether we agree with the term or not, sexual wellness is crtitical to our evolution as people, thinkers, doers and feelers. To put it as one friend did, sexual wellness compels us “to think that I am as responsible for my sexual pleasure, just as I am in other aspects of [my] health. Not my partner, me.” I whole heartedly agree.
Before you go…
Also check ou this well written profile on Nana Darkoaa Sekyiama in Harper’s Bazar shes the founder of famed award winning blog, Adventures From the Bedroooms of African Women and author of The Sex Lives of African Women you can check it out by clicking the image link.>>
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