She Comes First (8 page)

I
F YOU GIVE
or receive cunnilingus casually, in an unsafe, unprotected environment, you are willfully placing yourself in a high-risk category for the transmission and/or contraction of an STD, including: AIDS, gonorrhea, syphilis, genital herpes, chlamydia, genital warts, and hepatitis. (Men also need to worry about nongonococcal urethritis, whereas women should be more than a little concerned about pelvic inflammatory disease.) Of these diseases, gonorrhea, syphilis, chlamydia, nongonococcal urethritis, and pelvic inflammatory disease are caused by the transmission of bacteria and can be cured with antibiotics if caught early enough; the rest are viral and without cure, although in some cases the symptoms are treatable. These STDs are highly contagious and can be transmitted from vulva to mouth and vice versa.

These days AIDS seems to garner most of the attention, but according to the
Sex in America Survey,
“The people who are most
likely to be infected with sexually transmitted diseases are not the same group who are at risk for AIDS—they are a much larger group.”

That’s not to say there isn’t any risk of contracting or transmitting AIDS via cunnilingus. Vaginal secretions of women who are HIV positive have been found to contain small amounts of HIV (with the amounts rising when she is menstruating), and HIV positive men can also transmit the virus via cuts in the mouth.

But unprotected cunnilingus places you at greater risk for a far wider array of STDs. Of those participants surveyed in the NSHLS survey, one in six said they had had an STD at some point in their lives, with a significant percentage reporting having had one in the last year. “To put the numbers in perspective, nearly as many said they had had a venereal disease in the last year as said they had been pregnant in the last year.” (
Sex in America Survey
)

Based on the numbers, it appears that women are more likely to have had at least one STD at some point in their lives. They were twice as likely as men to have had genital warts, and more than twice as likely to be infected with genital herpes. Overall, 18 percent of women and 16 percent of men have contracted one of the nine sexually transmitted diseases covered in the survey, with chlamydia and genital warts taking the top spots, displacing the formerly more common gonorrhea. The authors of
Sex in America
emphasize that the higher rate of STDs in women is by no means an indication of higher promiscuity, but rather that “it is at least twice as easy for a man to infect a woman with virtually any sexually transmitted disease, including AIDS, than it is for a woman to infect a man.”

Fortunately, it’s possible to pinpoint the attitudes and practices that increase the likelihood of being at risk for an STD versus those that don’t. “Although we find that large numbers of Americans have had a sexually transmitted disease at least once in their lives, there is nothing random about where the diseases strike…the people who are most likely to be infected share one key characteristic: They have many sex partners.”

If a man has two to four sexual partners in his lifetime, his chances of contracting an STD are about 3 percent. As the number of partners increases, so does the risk. With more than twenty partners, his risk is about 28 percent. The same rough pattern is true of women, with the spectrum of percentages increasing from 5 to 35 percent.

It should therefore come as no surprise that the more partners a person has had, the more likely that he or she has engaged with those partners outside of a monogamous relationship, and that his or her partner falls into a similar pattern of promiscuity, thereby greatly increasing the risk of having come into contact with an STD.

As it turns out, promiscuity triggers a domino effect of risky behaviors: “The more partners an individual has, the more likely he or she is to have sex with people who themselves have many partners, the more likely he or she is to have sex with virtual strangers, the more likely she or he is to have been under the influence of drugs or alcohol during some sexual encounters, and while it is more likely that a condom was used, the rate of increased use of a condom does not seem great enough to offset the higher risks of infection.” (
Sex in America Survey
)

Now you know the facts.

C
UNNILINGUS MAY BE
a casual activity, but that doesn’t mean you should treat it casually. Make sure that it’s part of your safe-sex routine. If you’re engaging a new partner, communicate openly and candidly. Be prepared to discuss your current sex partners, sexual history, risky behaviors, STD status, recent activities, and your approach to protection. Be aware that some STDs are asymptomatic and may flourish undetected; so if you find yourself caught up in the heat of the moment, think before engaging in unprotected cunnilingus. Regardless of the reward, even the smallest act is not without risk.

If you’re uncertain or nervous, don’t take the risk. It’s not worth it, and if you don’t want to avoid oral sex altogether, then at least take precautions through the use of barriers such as dental dams (a thin strip of latex that is placed over the vulva as you apply cunnilingus), latex gloves, or finger cots (individual plastic sheaths that
workers in restaurants use to protect themselves from cuts). All of these safe-sex accessories can typically be found in drugstores, and can also be ordered from specialty stores such as Good Vibrations or the Blowfish catalog. In a pinch, even a sheet of Saran Wrap will do; just make sure you’re using the nonmicrowavable kind, as the microwavable sort isn’t impervious to bacteria.

If all this talk of protection sounds like a bummer, there is a silver lining: you can definitely have oral sex that is HOT and safe! Later, we will specifically discuss techniques and routines that incorporate safe-sex equipment into the process and do not diminish it. The first step is to know what you need in terms of protection, and then know how to use it.

During sexual activity, a condom is usually not far from reach, and may typically be introduced by either partner. While condoms are generally accepted and prevalent in their use, the same cannot be said of dental dams and the accessories that make for a safe session of cunnilingus. Whereas a request to use a condom is SOP (Standard Operating Procedure) and these days doesn’t make one think twice, the introduction of a dental dam is often attention grabbing and may be perceived as signaling the possibility of risk, as opposed to just playing it safe. Perhaps this is because condoms serve the double function of preventing both unwanted pregnancy and unwanted STDs, whereas dental dams only prevent the latter. In short, condoms often embody positive attributes (attentiveness and concern for safety), whereas a dental dam may evoke the negative perception of risk. Rare is the guy who’s been carrying a dental dam around in his wallet for years, waiting for the opportunity to put it into use, and equally rare is the woman who’s going to insist he use one.

But for all our talk of precaution and protection, there is no substitute for the unfettered merging of our bodies. Like the linking together of two power cables to create a single flow of electricity, your tongue against her vulva is the conjoining of thousands of nerve endings, the firing of neurons, the buzzing of receptors, the ultimate melding of body and soul in a pulse-pounding current. Such joys are ultimately experienced in a trusting, committed relationship. As Sally Tisdale wrote:

When approaching safe sex, keep in mind what Dr. Comfort had to say in
The New Joy of Sex,
“There is no occasion for panic, or for losing out on the joy of sex—simply informed caution.”