1. The first time I came, I thought I’d injured myself.
“I remember the first time that I masturbated the only thing I really knew is that somebody had called it ‘spanking the monkey.’ I was in the bathroom and got hard so I started slapping my penis (albeit lightly) until I orgasmed. Oh, and I had no idea that orgasming was a thing, so that scared me to death. I assumed that I had injured myself somehow and that’s why my dick was spewing out this weird stuff and I suddenly had no sexual drive.”
2. I thought “sex” was when a man peed all over your body.
“I went to a Catholic school. We had ‘sex ed,’ except they only taught us what happened once the sperm had already reached the egg…leaving us to wonder how the hell sperm got anywhere near the vicinity in the first place. In 7th grade, my friend told me that sex was when you are naked in bed with a man, he stands up in the bed while you are lying down, and he pees all over your body. I was an idiot and believed this—so the next year, another friend told me she had sex. I laughed and asked her what it felt like to be a human toilet.”
3. I thought girls had balls.
“I (13) had to tell my friend (16) that girls do not, in fact, have balls. He argued with me over it for days.”
4. I thought girls had penises.
“I found out girls didn’t have penises when I was 12.”
5. I thought everyone had penises.
“Growing up, I really thought that everyone had penises, and that girls’ penises just didn’t grow until they turned 18. It took me asking another girl in middle school if her penis had started growing yet to realize how wrong I was.”
6. I didn’t know you were supposed to remove the plastic part of the tampon.
“I put my tampon with the plastic that encapsules the cotton part still on. I didn’t know how I was supposed to put it in and that you had to pull out the other plastic. Then YouTube saved me.
7. When I developed pubic hair, I was convinced I was a Neanderthal.
“When I first started developing, there was two things I didn’t understand. First was pubic hair. I was convinced I was a Neanderthal that somehow slipped generations, and I was the only person to have this monstrosity. Second was when my breasts grew and I got some tiny purple stretch marks. Convinced veins in my breast were rupturing. Looking back, I wasn’t too swift. Then a boy did this motion at me in English class. He made a v with his fingers and stuck his tongue in the middle. I thought it was just some goofy gesture, and I went about my day doing it towards everyone.”
8. I had no idea how messy sex would be!
“How messy sex would be! They don’t show people with tissue or towels after sex in movies.”
9. I thought I was the first human being to discover masturbation.
“When I first learned about masturbation I had no idea it existed at all. I thought I invented it. I was like ‘Holy shit, how can nobody else know about this?!’ ‘How do I let the world know without sounding weird?!’”
10. I didn’t know about the in-out part.
“I didn’t know about the in-out part until I found video porn. I thought you just put it in and left it there.”
11. I needed the term “fudge-packer” explained to me.
“Had sex ed, but in my school’s sex ed obviously gay people didn’t exist. Fast-forward two or three years, and the first time I was introduced to anal intercourse as a concept was one when of my classmates called me a ‘fudge-packer’ and had to explain to a confused me what it meant.”
12. I never knew you had to stick it in.
“Never knew you had to stick it in. Always thought you just rubbed the parts together like spreading peanut butter onto some bread. Boy, oh boy, was I wrong.”
13. I panicked the first time I came—even cried a bit.
“Didn’t know about masturbation. So when I was masturbating without actually knowing that was what I was doing I came and panicked because I didn’t know what it was and cried a bit.”
14. I mistook a bloody tampon for a cloth firecracker.
“I moved the year before sex ed happened in my school district and it was taught the previous year in my new school. There was a bloody tampon outside one of the girls’ bathrooms and I was just like, ‘WTF is that some kinda cloth firecracker?’ and kicked it. My friends looked at me really weirdly and I guess just assumed I was joking.”
15. I locked myself in the bathroom and cried for hours when I got my first period.
“I got my first period really early and I didn’t know about periods yet. All I knew was that I was in a lot of pain and my vagina was bleeding. It was terrifying; I thought I was going to die. I locked myself in the bathroom and cried for a few hours until my mom explained what was happening. Also I was under the impression that sex consisted of just sticking it and leaving it in there for a while, motionless, until suddenly the guy ejaculates.”
16. I thought after a guy climaxed it would deflate like a balloon really fast.
“I was home-schooled so, while I had ‘the talk’ I didn’t have sex ed. I thought for whatever reason if a guy got hard there was no other way to get him un-hard unless he climaxed, which a very understanding guy I dated explained to me that it could. When I wasn’t ready for sex, but felt bad I got him so hard. Also for some reason I thought after a guy climaxed it would deflate like a balloon really fast; that is, in fact, not the case. For clarity: The guy I dated (while later being a jerk, but not in this instance) explained to me that his hard-on would go away without needing climax, which I didn’t think was possible until he had to explain it to me!”
17. I didn’t realize there was a limit to how far back you could pull on your dick.
“I didn’t realize there was a limit to how far back you could pull on your dick. Quite literally RIPPED my frenulum…blood everywhere.”
18. I thought blowjobs were just the act of blowing into a guy’s penis.
“I thought blowjobs were just the act of blowing into a guy’s penis.
So 14-year-old me decided to take a straw into the shower with me, stick it in my urethra, and blow.
It was at that point that I knew I had fucked up.”
19. I didn’t know what erections were until I got an obvious one in class.
“I’ve taken sex ed since (twice, actually), but I hadn’t at the time this happened.
I was in 5th grade, they hadn’t given us sex ed, and we were at that age where we were noticing changes in our bodies. You can probably tell where this story is going to go from the next sentence.
It all happened on pajama day. I was beginning to notice girls, and there were two or three girls in my class that I liked. The teacher told us to get up and get some papers.
But hold the phone! My weenie is standing up on end, sticking out (literally) like a sore thumb. My assumption was that I just had a really big penis and I got up in all my glory. All I can recall is one of my crushes saying. ‘Well, that’s disturbing.’
I had no idea what was going on.”
20. I didn’t know you can get a shitty STD with only one exposure without a condom.
“I learned that you can get a shitty STD with only one exposure without a condom, that you really do need to get checked if you are sexually active, and men actually will take a condom off if you aren’t vigilant.”
21. I had no idea where the clitoris is.
“Where the clitoris is; why don’t you girls just move our fingers up a little?”
22. I was freaked out when I saw an uncircumcised penis.
“I was freaked out when I saw an uncircumcised penis. Had no idea what was wrong with it. My sister on the other hand thought cum was pus…again, didn’t know what was wrong.”
23. I thought periods lasted only one day a month.
“I didn’t learn until a senior in high school that a girl’s period lasted longer than one day. I always assumed it was just one day a month, until I made a comment and was told how wrong I was.”
24. I thought vaginas were supposed to smell like rotten fish.
“When I was 13 I started working in a seafood market in my little harbor side town. There was a cute girl that worked there and I started flirting with her. Her dad, who also worked there, didn’t like that. He would do little things to torture me and make my job ridiculously difficult but I persevered and not only stayed on at that job longer than he did, but I also ended up losing my virginity to his daughter, who was also a virgin. We dated for like a year so it was all good.
Anyway I’ll never forget something he told me long before it had gotten to the point of banging his daughter. There was some bait that had been left out of the cooler room over night and when we came in the next morning it was rank and stunk up the entire building. We finally found the source and he told me to stick my nose in there and get a good whiff. I did and it was potent. The stuff of nightmares. He looks me straight in the eye and says “if you ever get a girl naked and her pussy smells like that, eat that motherfucker up. Just bury your face in there cuz that’s the best pussy you’re ever gonna find.”
I believed him for the longest time. And though his daughter’s pussy smelled nothing like rotten fish, I longed for the day that I stumbled across this holy grail of vaginas. After breaking it off with his daughter, I set out of a fucking spree, mostly because I was in love with the act of sex, all the while measuring each vagina I came across to the memory of that smell. It didn’t take long. I think the 4th girl I fucked smelled so bad that the stench would fill up the room and linger. I hate to disappoint anyone reading this but once it finally happened and I had that chick laying there with her legs spread, the nauseating odor overwhelming, I realized then that he had been fucking with me. Because he hated me. Then it all made sense. I still hit it and I may have ran directly to the shower afterwards, eyes watering and throat closing up along the way, but I’m proud to say that I did not eat that girl out. Fuck you David.
I think a little sex education may have prevented me from seeking out rotten pussy.”
25. I always thought women just peed blood on their period.
“I had a sex ed course in high school, but it consisted of our teacher playing movies every day (like Pirates of the Caribbean). And my parents never had any talk with me. I always thought women just peed blood on their period. So wrong when I woke up one day with ruined undies.”
26. I assumed that during sex, my urethra stretched out over the guy’s penis.
“To be clear, I went through sex ed, had many ‘talks’ with my mom, and was still entirely confused about how the penis would get into my body. (I was 10 maybe?) I had no concept of a 3rd hole, so I assumed my urethra stretched out over the penis. I remember looking at a picture of a urethra and thinking, ‘This is going to hurt a lot.’ Eventually I figured it out.”
27. I thought menstruation only happened once.
“I didn’t learn until 15 that menstruation wasn’t a ‘one off’ thing. Imagine my surprise when I realized that women bleed like once every month.”
28. I was afraid of spontaneous ejaculation.
“I had a small amount of sex ed in school. But somehow I had mixed up the meanings of the words ‘erection’ and ‘ejaculation’…so after my teacher was talking about how erections can happen randomly at any time during puberty, ‘even just standing in line for the drinking fountain,’ I spent a good 2-3 years terrified that I’d just spontaneously bust a nut in my pants without warning.”
29. I thought the uterus was the size of the entire abdomen.
“One time in high school biology class we had to do this project where we had a boy and a girl lay down and be traced onto separate large pieces of paper and then the group had to draw organs where they were located.
I thought the size of the uterus was much, much, much larger than it is (like the entire abdomen) and I got laughed at by the girls in our group. They put the testicles in the dude’s thighs, though.
I guess what I really learned that people like to act like they know what they’re doing when it comes to sex, but really they’re just as clueless.”
30. I had no clue I was circumcised until I was 20.
“I had no clue I was circumcised until I was 20. I didn’t even suspect until I was at the doctor getting something checked out and they mentioned it in passing. I still have no clue how most things work (21 now). The sex ed classes in my high school were horrible, and we only had to take two. We spent most of the time playing games. Plus, my parents never gave me the ‘talk’ or anything. I didn’t even know what sex was until I was 12.”
31. I thought the vagina was like a big, cavernous hole.
“Two main things:
1) The first time I masturbated, I was like 14 and just touching myself casually (with my parents in the same room but around the corner so a little out of sight: still like 3 meters away though). All of a sudden, BAM. I freaked the fuck out. It scared me and I can still remember being so scared. I didn’t know wtf was going on, lol.
2) I had no idea what the inside of a vagina looked like. I thought it was like, a big cavernous hole. I asked my friend when I was like 23 and she corrected me. Lol.”
32. When I got my first period, I thought it would last until the day I died.
“When I got my period for the first time, I wouldn’t stop crying and my mother didn’t understand why. Turns out I didn’t get the memo that it’s only for a few days a month. I thought it was permanent, every day, until you die.”
33. I didn’t realize that I wasn’t like all the other boys until I started my first period.
“I didn’t realize that I wasn’t like all the other boys until I started my first period at 11. Two days before 7th grade started to boot.”
34. I thought babies were made by simply sleeping together.
“I thought babies were made by simply sleeping together. Literally just a man and a woman just sleeping together. We learned about the reproductive system in the 5th grade or so with the sperms and eggs, but sex was never explained. So having the imagination of a child, I just thought that the sperm crawls out of the penis and travels through the distance into the woman’s vagina where the egg cell is. Something like that. Then I dismissed and put it in the back of my mind probably since it doesn’t concern me.
Unfortunately, I never really encountered anyone willing to talk about sex in high school. Only in college, that I realized, that people actually put the stuff in. :/“
35. When I got my first period, I thought I had back pain.
“I went to a Christian school that thoroughly taught us different methods of contraception (bonus!), gave us an immature ‘how to’ of sex, and then sent us on our merry way. No Talk from parents. When I got my first period, I thought I had back pain. It wasn’t until I saw the blood the next day did I clue in.”
36. When I got my first period I thought I had shat my pants.
“I got my first period at age 12 and didn’t knew what was happening. For those who doesn’t have this gift of mother nature: it can be brownish (blood that is old). So I went to my mom crying, thinking I had shat my pants.”
37. I didn’t know that ‘accidentally’ putting it in the wrong hole can cause severe pain and even bleeding.
“Suddenly, ‘accidentally’ putting it in the wrong hole, with or without lubricant, can cause severe pain, and even bleeding.”
38. I thought that if you masturbated, you’d get possessed by the Devil and burn in hell.
“I was 11, in a Catholic school. So basically we had a ‘sex ed’ but it wasn’t very … accurate per se. They said ‘If you masturbate, you will get possessed by the Devil and die and burn in hell.’
I was thinking fuck wow I’m never gonna do that.
Several nights later, I got bored so I don’t even know why but I started touching myself and after I climaxed, I remembered what the teacher said and I started crying thinking I was possessed and when I went to school the next day I tried to be emo because I thought that’s what possessed people do and my peers were like oh wow I wanna get possessed too so within a week there was a whole class of possessed ’emo’ kids who were convinced they were going to burn in hell. The teacher was horrified.
I did it again the week after, as nothing happened.”
39. I panicked the first time I got a boner.
“I didn’t know anything about sex or nudity, living in a country where the topic is a major taboo, until I was around 16.
And I was always a very curious kid, I wondered how naked people looked like. Especially after looking at all those diagrams in biology classes, and being a good student I had a habit of getting to know everything I studied. One night, at the age of 12 I pretended to sleep for an hour or few. Then I jumped out of bed at 1 AM, made sure everyone was asleep, and proceeded to search for ‘pictures of people without clothes’ on the Internet like the naive curious thing I was.
Then I had the first boner I ever felt, and I didn’t have an idea what was going on. I panicked. Panicked really a lot. I thought my dick was going turn to stone and fall off (and tear my stomach away), and that this was curse of the gods for me crossing the line and looking at indecent things. I went to sleep scared as hell.
…And I didn’t dare to do it again I learned about a thing called ‘porn’ after overhearing a few high-school classmates years, years later.” 
