Auntie Stella

1. Should I sleep with him?

Theme: Sex and relationships
Safer sex
Speaking out

Dear Auntie Stella

I am a 17-year-old girl and I am in love with a boy two years older than me. My problem is that he always wants me to satisfy him in ways that hurt my feelings. We kiss and hug which I like very much but I don’t let him have sex with me. He says he’ll go blind if I continue to make him stop half-way.

My girlfriends tell me that if I want to keep him, I have to have sex with him. I’m worried that he will sleep with other girls if I say no, so should I sleep with him? He says everyone has sex at our age. 

Zandile

Talking points

  • Do you and your friends ever find yourselves in the same situation as Zandile and her boyfriend – where one partner wants to have sex and the other doesn’t? What do you do about it?
  • Ask two members of your group to act out the conversation between Zandile and her boyfriend. Zandile says that she loves him but doesn’t want to have sex. Her boyfriend tries to convince her she should have sex with him. At the end of the roleplay, ask the actors what it felt like to be in their situation. Did they resolve their differences? If not, ask them to go back into their roles and try to find a solution.
  • Zandile’s boyfriend says he’ll go blind if he has to stop half-way. What does he mean by ‘half-way’? What other things do boys say will happen if they: a get sexually excited from touching and kissing and then stop before having sex and b don’t have sex? Which of these things are true? Do people say similar things about girls?
  • Are there other ways that people can give each other sexual pleasure without the boy’s penis going inside his partner? Would you recommend these?