My friend Olivia sent me an urgent text message at four in the morning.
“U awake? Really need 2 talk 2 u!!!”
Luckily, with it being a Saturday night, and me choosing clubbing over beauty sleep, I was still conscious, if somewhat the worse for wear, so I called her to see what the problem was.
“I’ve just had sex,” she hissed down the phone.
I should point out that my friends and I are not normally in the habit of informing each other immediately of every sexual experience we indulge in, but Olivia was an exception. A few years back she gave up on casual sex and had sworn off men until she found ‘The One’. Olivia was a born-again virgin, so this was big news indeed.
It should have been great new, but apparently this was not the case. Two DVDs, three bottles of wine and several years of sexual frustration had resulted in Olivia ending up naked on the couch with her neighbour. Olivia hadn’t eventually found her prince; instead she’d been shagging under the influence.
Only the most sensible of us have not been in this situation. You start off an evening with nothing but good intentions, only to end up doing something – or someone – you wouldn’t have if it hadn’t been for the demon drink. Ogden Nash wrote “Candy/Is dandy/But liquor/Is quicker” – and that’s as true today as it was in 1931 when he penned it.
It’s probably fair to say that several of my early sexual experiences would not have happened had I not been drinking. For a shy but horny person, alcohol is often a means to an end. It allows you to let go of your inhibitions and relax. That’s fine as long as you remain sober enough to know what you are doing, but often that’s not the case.
Olivia might well have been concerned about having broken her sexual fasting with someone so eminently unsuitable as the bloke downstairs. He was a beer-guzzling, rugby-loving waiter who claimed to supplement his tips by moonlighting as a gigolo. Olivia had doubts about the gigolo business, describing him as average looking and slightly overweight.
But, as it turned out, the fact that he was no Mr Darcy was not the problem. She was concerned about something much more serious.
During their intoxicated encounter, Olivia’s gigolo had removed his condom sometime before the end. She’d been drunk and hadn’t noticed until it was too late. She was frantic – hence the nocturnal phone call.
A recent report noted that alcohol makes us take risks with safe sex. Golly, who would have thought that? Unfortunately, and I am ashamed to admit it, but that’s something I know from bitter experience. When you are drunk and horny responsibility too often takes a back seat.
I am much more sensible than I used to be. In the past though, I often took risks, but somehow managed to justify them to myself. Since I was on the pill, pregnancy was not an issue, and if condoms were not available, well, chances are, it would be fine. After all, what is the incidence of STDs among science-fiction nuts? What about those who love the Cocteau Twins? Fellini fans?
Somewhere in my tiny mind, I was convinced that evidence of similar tastes in music, books or movies meant that the guy I was sleeping with was nice and therefore couldn’t possibly pose a threat. Bullshit.
I was personally forced to reconsider my tendency to take risks when my boyfriend’s best friend caught syphilis. Gunter was tall, blonde, German, a tennis champion and a junior doctor. If it could happen to him, it could happen to anybody. It frightened me and so my best friend and I decided to go for full spectrum STD checks. I spent an agonising week waiting for the results, remembering all the people I’d ever slept with and realising I knew a lot less about their sexual histories than I’d thought.
After that, I insisted on condoms. My motto was ‘no glove, no love’. I had all the zeal of a recent convert and stuck to it religiously – unless I was drunk, of course.
Oh God, the absolute fucking stupidity of shagging under the influence. I have no real regrets about anything I’ve done sexually, but I sure wish I’d been smarter than doing it when I was drunk. What the hell was I thinking? I don’t know: I was drunk, I was horny and I probably wasn’t thinking at all.
I haven’t done anything that brainless in a long time now – thankfully. And I am lucky enough not to have caught anything, but it’s really a case of ‘there but for the grace of God go I’. All it takes is one bad decision.
In the cold, sober light of morning, the realisation that I’d put my health at risk cancelled out the pleasure of the night before. Instead of waking up basking in the glowing aftermath of good sex, and possibly horny enough to go for round two, I’d feel like an idiot.
I can’t trust myself if I’ve been drinking. Having proved this to myself time and time again I realised there was only one thing for it – no shagging under the influence.
I can drink or I can have sex, but experience has taught me that I shouldn’t mix the two – at least not with a new lover who may not be sober or responsible enough to use a condom without me insisting upon it. Unfortunately, like driving when drunk, shagging under the influence, can have serious consequences.
Don’t let them happen to you.