How Porn Affected My First Sexual Experience: Sian’s Story

During my first sexual experiences, it took me some time to realise that almost everything my partner and I were experimenting with came directly from the porn he was watching.

At 14, my understanding of sex and intimacy was extremely limited. My previous relationship had never gone further than a quick kiss or holding hands, and I had been perfectly happy with that. So when I started dating another boy in my year, the shift felt intense.

My knowledge of sex and sexual touching came mostly from the brief sex education sessions we had at school. The focus was heavily on sexually transmitted infections, with little explanation of how they are actually contracted. At home, my parents and I never had a ‘birds and the bees’ conversation, and I doubt they thought I would need it at that age. My main source of information was therefore my peers and my partner, who were both very open about watching pornography online.

The first time my partner came to my house felt no different from dating any boy before. It was not until he got up to leave that he slid his hands down my trousers while kissing me. I remember him pulling away quickly and it did not go any further. The next day, however, his friend told me that he had not done more because he “wasn’t expecting me to be so hairy down there”. I was mortified and shaved off all my pubic hair as soon as I got home.

That sense of shame stayed with me throughout our relationship. I allowed him to guide us into oral sex and other sexual touching because I believed he understood sex better than I did.

All the “knowledge” he had came from his friends and the porn they were watching. Our sex education was so poor that it is hard to imagine where else they might have learned about sex. At the time, porn was easy to access on sites such as Pornhub, long before the recent surge of explicit content on social media. It feels as if only now, ten years later, people are starting to notice the problems with pornography and its influence, but these issues began as soon as people could share explicit images online for free.

Once I had shaved, it did not take long for us to engage in oral sex, copying the videos he had seen. It did not stop there: he often sent very explicit text messages describing porn scenes he wanted to try. Looking back, I realise I was not entirely comfortable with everything we did. I worried that if I said no, the relationship would end, and I did not want that.

At the time, I was also vulnerable. My grandad was dying of cancer and dealing with such a grown-up issue made me seek comfort outside my family. I was desperate not to lose that sense of support.

Another challenge in understanding consent and maintaining the relationship was peer pressure. In my year at school, everyone shared everything. There was no privacy. It felt as if people were comparing notes on their sexual experiences and on the pornography they were watching.

Classmates I barely knew asked whether the rumours about me were true and pressed me to describe what had happened. One boy even told me that if I grew bored of my partner, he would be happy to “show me a good time”. The attention gave me a strange sense of status, but I also felt ashamed and disgusted that everyone seemed to know what I was doing. I feared my parents or family might find out.

Eventually, I began avoiding my partner. I would not meet him outside school and made excuses to spend time with my family whenever he tried to make plans. I told him I would not have penetrative sex until much later in the relationship, which I think surprised him because up to that point I had simply gone along with what I thought was normal.

He eventually broke up with me because I was no longer spending time with him. Honestly, I was relieved.

I do not blame him. We were both failed by the lack of proper sex education at school.

I do not think either of us truly understood consent or what a healthy sexual relationship should look like. As far as I know, his only reference points were pornography and what his friends said. My own ideas about sex came solely from him and from what our peers were doing.

I believe good sex education is crucial to prevent young people from relying on pornography and social media for information. By teaching about consent and having open, honest conversations about sex, we can reduce misinformation and help delay experiences that young people may not be ready for.

I wish my own sex education had been better and that my first experiences were not so heavily influenced by pornography. Yet, without that journey, I might not be working with Brook today.