More Than A Moment
I have never had sex. Not because I’m immune to desire or uninterested in what all the fuss is about, but because I’ve chosen to wait. And in a world where restraint is often confused with repression, that decision tends to draw awkward silences, curious looks, or patronising smiles. Still, I hold it quietly and confidently, not as a badge of honour, but as a private conviction.
Yet here I am, writing about sex.
Because whether you’re having it, avoiding it, healing from it, or longing for it, if you’re a woman in your twenties, it’s part of the conversation. Loudly. Constantly. Sometimes painfully.
Sex has become a kind of cultural currency, and like any currency, its value depends on how it’s spent. Some women I know carry it like a statement. They speak openly about one-night stands, recounting them like war stories, with pride, not shame. They feel empowered by their autonomy, by the simple fact that their bodies belong to them and no one else. I’ve had girlfriends laugh about getting dressed in a stranger’s flat at 6am, heels in hand, lipstick smudged, and feeling more powerful than pitiful. They weren’t waiting for a good morning text. They were reclaiming a part of themselves that once felt controlled.
And I get it. There’s something beautiful in a woman choosing herself. In rejecting the centuries-old notion that sex is something done to her, rather than something she initiates, enjoys, even celebrates.
But I’ve also seen the shadow side. The girl who jokes about it the next day but cries the next week. The woman who starts sex as a statement and ends up using it as a sedative, quieting the ache of not being chosen, not being seen, not being loved in the way she hoped. Sometimes the difference between empowerment and escapism is paper-thin.
I’ve listened to stories over wine and tissues, stories where sex was transactional, or obligatory, or silently regretted. Women who felt like their bodies became bartering chips, their boundaries blurred under the illusion of intimacy. They left beds not just undressed, but unravelled. And that grief, though rarely spoken of out loud, is deeply real.
But sex isn’t just dangerous. It isn’t just degrading. It’s also breathtaking.
Some of the most beautiful things I’ve ever heard have come from women in love, truly, safely, wildly in love, who describe sex as something transcendent. They tell me how it drew them closer than words ever could. How it softened them. How they cried, not from shame, but from the kind of emotional release that only comes when you feel completely known and completely safe.
One friend told me that after years of surviving in high-alert mode, her first time with her husband felt like exhaling for the first time in years. She wept. Not because it hurt, but because it healed. She said, “For once, my body wasn’t a battlefield. It was home.”
In long-term relationships, too, sex can be the quiet glue. The late-night I-see-you kind of closeness. It’s not just about pleasure, it’s about presence. It can become a language, spoken through touch, where walls come down and the sacred meets the physical. It’s the beginning of families. Of new life. Of unspoken promises sealed without a word.
And that’s the complexity of it all. Sex isn’t black or white. It’s not only holy or harmful. It can be both, depending on where it lives and who’s holding it.
I’ve chosen to wait, not because I think sex is dirty, but because I think it’s divine. I believe it deserves a container strong enough to hold its weight. And for me, that container is covenant. I want to give that part of myself to a man who’s already vowed to stay when I’m not fun, or pretty, or easy to love. Not because he’s earned it through time or tactics, but because we’ve both promised forever.
But I’m also not blind to the world I live in. I understand why women crave the thrill, the power, the freedom. I understand the curiosity, the rebellion, the desire to be held after a bad day or a lonely week. I understand wanting to feel alive again, even if it’s just for one night. And I don’t stand above any of it. I just choose to stand apart.
What I know, deep in my bones, is that most of us don’t just want sex. We want to be safe. We want to be adored. We want our bodies to be held like they’re sacred, not scavenged. We want to be pursued, not just to the bedroom, but to the altar, to the soul, to the very core of who we are.
So to the woman who wears her sexuality like armour, know that you are allowed to be soft too.
To the one who gave herself and wasn’t chosen, know that your value didn’t leave with him.
To the one who’s waiting, like me, know that your patience isn’t prudish. It’s powerful.
Sex is not the enemy. But neither is waiting.
And if no one’s ever told you, let me be the first: you are allowed to want more.
Not just sex.
Sacredness. Safety. Something real.
When the time comes, it will be more than an experience. It will be an unveiling. A knowing. A return to something your soul always suspected was possible.
