Part I: How my conservative upbringing helped me develop a healthy sexuality and have great sex
A few weeks ago, I got together with my book club here in Medellin, Colombia to discuss The Erotic Mind. Among arousing anecdotes about understanding your eroticism, the author delves into the negative influence of shame and limiting ideas about sex, often stemming from parents, trauma, societal messages, and a conservative upbringing.
In our discussion, many of the women disclosed coming from a conservative background and the negative influence that has had on their sexuality or eroticism.
I shouldn’t have been surprised. Many in my own LDS faith have opened up over the years about how they’ve felt shame for being victims of sexual abuse or that forgiveness for premarital sex was unattainable. Once married, even more struggled to enjoy sex viewing it as a necessary evil.
All of these stories are valid and true. Conservative traditions have a long history of throwing negative baggage onto anything sex related—churning out repressed prudes or burdening individuals with shame and self-hate. I have hardly heard anyone say that their conservative or religious upbringing helped them develop a healthy relationship with sex and sexuality. That is why I want to share my story. Because my LDS upbringing, and what it taught me about sex, has been one of the most empowering elements of my life.
Sex Is Special.
As a young person, I was taught that sex was special. It wasn’t something to make dirty jokes about, sneer at, or treat casually. It was something to share with a special person at a special time for a special purpose. Treat it with respect.
From TV and school, sex was portrayed as naughty, secret, and dirty, yet thrilling. It was something you snuck around to do, snickered about, and exchanged knowing glances over—a rite of passage. Even if you knew nothing about it, you’d pretend to just to seem cool and mature.
Funny, but I see now that I got more messages from secular sources about sex being scandalous and naughty (albeit fun) than I did from religious sources.
Sex Is Sacred.
Later, my understanding of sex developed from special to sacred as I saw its role in a divine purpose. Sex is the physical manifestation of two people becoming one. In my faith, marriage is an important step toward realizing our divine potential to become like our Heavenly Parents. God, in essence, is both male and female, so to become like them, we enter into an eternal sealing with someone of the opposite sex. Sex with your eternal partner is the crowning event in your union. I love how this elevates something society portrays as casual and carnal into something transcendent and spiritual.
I remember a specific experience at church which introduced sex to me in this way. To our group of girls ages 12-17, my Young Women’s leader shared the special place that sexuality had in her life, specifically in her marriage. She shared that through sexual intimacy with her husband, she at times felt something so beautiful and the spirit so strongly that she cried.
This portrayal of sex shocked me.
From TV, I had supposed that sex was fun and exciting. But she showed me something altogether different: sex on a higher plane. Not just about pleasure, or even connection, but communion with the divine. None of my sexually active friends talked about sex like that. No one on TV talked about sex like that. But if sex like that was possible, I wanted it.
Sex Is a Commitment.
As a young adult, I dated a guy while living in Spain who believed sex would deepen our connection. I knew in a way he was right. Besides the spiritual bonding it represents, sex is designed to create unity and bonding through the hormonal changes it triggers.
But for me this type of bonding comes with commitment. In our LDS faith, we see the power to create life as one of the few god-like powers we are granted as mortals, one which comes with immense blessings but also great responsibility. This power links everyone in the human race together where the strength of each partnership impacts those who came before and those who will come after. When a couple is sealed in an LDS temple, they are asked to stand between a pair of mirrors that reflect infinitely forward and backward, symbolizing how marriage, and the life-creating powers that come with it, link a couple to their ancestors and future generations.
I wasn’t ready to make that type of commitment, so I told my boyfriend sex was not an option. Interestingly, nine months into our relationship he admitted feeling closer to me than to any of his previous girlfriends despite having lived with some of them. Through this and other dating experiences, I realized that sex isn’t necessary as a pre-marital step and that it can sometimes slow down a relationship’s development rather than speed it up.
Sex Is Fun.
Ok, hands down, TV was the best source for sending the message that sex was fun. However, TV primarily shows beautiful young single people enjoying sex, rarely, married older people. As a younger sister, I got plenty of messages from my married siblings that sex was fun—from shopping for lingerie or hearing about their newly-wed sex-capades. But one LDS couple, in particular, showed me that sex is fun no matter what stage of life you’re in. Dancing in the kitchen, kissing constantly, sneaking butt slaps when they thought no one was looking—my friend’s parents could not keep their hands off each other. They broke every TV stereotype about who enjoys sex—they were older, married, had a ton of kids, and weren’t what I’d call TV attractive. But they were in love, and anyone could see they were having the time of their lives. My friend had enough stories to assure us of their sexual activity, and although we pretended to be grossed out at the time, I saw that sex after marriage could be fun, and I looked forward to sharing that with my future partner.
My husband and I both practiced abstinence before we got married, which made consummating our marriage a lot of fun—we were both learning together. During our engagement, we read sex books, listened to sex therapist CDs, and got on the LGN diet. I still treasure those moments of being vulnerable and naive together. Sex remains a fun part of our relationship, and thanks to the culture of sex education that we created when we were engaged, we continue to look and find ways to keep things spicy as we grow older.
Sexy Isn’t Everything.
Waiting allowed me to fully enjoy the innocent aspects of love and romance. As a teenager, I spent countless hours giggling with my girlfriends about cute boys and daydreaming about first kisses, dances, and holding hands. Pride and Prejudice was our favorite chick flick—no sex, just glances, subtle touches, and tension that made us swoon. Giving myself time and space to grow up slow was not only fun; it helped me develop a clear sense of who I was and what I wanted in a romantic partner.
The pressure to dress sexy or be sexually active as a teenager felt nonstop—from TV, magazines, and high school. It seemed like this was the gold standard for being popular or valued, and I saw many girls change their dress and behavior to gain the approval of the guys (and gals) around them.
In contrast, my experiences at church provided a different environment—one where my worth wasn’t tied to how sexy I looked or how much attention I could attract. Instead, I was encouraged to focus on inner qualities like kindness, knowledge, and faith. My leaders taught me how to set goals, measure my personal progress, and reflect on who I was becoming. I embraced modest dress as an outward expression of my inward commitment to God, and it was refreshing to be in an environment where I didn’t feel the need to adopt the mainstream trends to get a guy’s attention.
My choice of modest dress sometimes created some awkward social experiences, like when I wore a woolly shoulder shrug over my sleeveless homecoming dress. The people I was with kept telling me to take it off—I looked hot (I was) and it covered up my cute embroidered bust. They didn’t understand that my choice of outfit had little to do with being comfortable and cute and more to do with who I was and what I valued.
Now, as an adult living in Colombia where the sexy standard for women is extremely high, I'm grateful that when I was just fourteen, I learned that my beauty and worth were not equivalent to my sex appeal or stylish clothes, but rather an inherent characteristic of my eternal self.
Sex Will Mean What You Make It Mean.
While in Spain, I met another American girl who was also a virgin and had decided that having sex with her Spanish fling before she left would be the perfect how-I-lost-my-virginity story. And it was a good story. Romantic, sexy, thrilling. Great backdrop. Good guy. I saw then and have continued to see how sex can be whatever you want it to be. It can be something casual and purely physical that you do with a stranger, something romantic to make a good story, or something binding that seals two souls together.
Sex is neither good nor bad. Sex is a means to create something. The question I needed to ask myself was, “What do I want sex to create in my life?” My religious upbringing gave me an alternative that I didn’t see offered anywhere else. Rather than being a barrier to sexual fulfillment, these teachings provided a foundation for a healthy, joyful, and deeply meaningful sexual life, rooted in respect, commitment, and intentionality. It’s the less popular path, but for me, it led to exactly what I was looking for—soul-transcending, divine-partaking, eternity-crossing, great sex.
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