Sex Lives: The Guy Who Lost His Virginity to a Future Porn Star and Then Became a Sex Ed Teacher

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Sex Lives chronicles the evolution of one person's sexual history. This week: Palmer, 45, in Whittier, CA.

I guess I was kind of a little bit of a late bloomer. I didn't even really masturbate or anything until my sophomore year of high school. Freshman year of high school, everybody was giving me shit about it, but it took me a while to get into it. I knew what it was; I had just never done it. I kind of just got tired of everybody giving me shit about it, so I was like, Ok, let's try this. And I went to the bathroom and tried it until it worked, and then I was like, Oh, I get what everybody's saying now.

That same year, I hooked up with one of my classmates that I really liked. Over the course of that summer, we did everything except have sex. I ended up having sex for the first time in my junior year with someone who would go on to be an adult film star. We were Facebook friends for a long time after that, and through Facebook, I found out that she was an adult film star; she became one pretty much right out of high school.

The first time was relatively smooth. We went to our homecoming dance, and I took her, and then I dropped her off, and her parents weren't home, and she invited me in, and we had sex. I could tell that I was the new one to this. It was fairly unremarkable except for the fact that, like, three years later, she was in the porn industry. I watched something of hers just for the novelty of it. She did a lot of Miley Cyrus stuff because she was also a redhead then. But yeah, I did watch it.

After that, I entered into a long relationship in college and ended up getting married at 24. We were married for quite a few years and then got divorced in 2017, and during that time, I was monogamous that whole time. Sexually, there was quality over quantity. She was raised religiously—Catholic. And she still had a lot of trauma and hangups about it. So it was good when we had sex, but it was like once a month. Not very often. It was few and far between, but when we did it, it was great. It wasn't part of the reason for the divorce, though.

A lot changed for me around the time of the divorce. I lost 130 pounds and got in shape. It wasn't as a result of wanting to date post-divorce. But I was getting back out there for the first time in a long time, and it was nerve-wracking. Since then, there have been a lot of eye-opening and different experiences that I've had that have been positive. But it wasn't something I was necessarily thinking about at the time of the divorce. Honestly, dating gave me a lot of anxiety, I suppose because it had been so long.

The first time I had sex post-divorce, it was on a third date, and she took me to a wedding. She'd always gone to weddings alone. But we raced back to her place afterward. It was pretty built up. The thing that's remarkable about that time is that I had just started taking antidepressant /anti-anxiety medication, so I couldn't ejaculate quickly. So we were having sex for like an hour and a half. She had gotten her hair re-dyed the day before and her hair dye partially came out on the mattress. Like I had sex with her until the color of her hair came out.

I just got into a relationship in December, but before then, I had some friends-with-benefits situations. I had my first threesome this past summer. I was just putting myself out there. But safely! I teach sex ed, so making sure I'm safe and getting tested and all that stuff is pretty important to me.

Something incredibly stupid happened at my college. I went to a small Christian school, and a large percentage of the campus got Gonorrhea. The school tried to blame it on people getting in the pool—like the school pool, and they just swept everything under the rug. Luckily, I avoided that, but many people I knew did get it. It was like a fifth of campus at this supposedly very Christian school, which was a big deal. But I did avoid it. That was before my time teaching sex ed and knowing how important it is to be protected as a stupid college kid, but it did definitely open my eyes. I've been teaching for over a decade now, and it's something that I share with my students, like just because you're in a situation where you think you're safe doesn't mean you are.

But yeah, I had two threesomes this past summer. Both were with one person I'd been hooking up with for a while, and we were together about eight or nine months. The first one we had, we both didn't really like the other girl. Afterward, she whispered in my ear, "I'll get somebody funner next time!" And I was like, "That sounds good." The second time, she brought someone else she'd known. I'd met her briefly before then. The second threesome was definitely what I always hoped it would be—a lot more fun. We were just more open than the first one. Everybody was trying to make sure everybody else had a good time, whereas the first time, the other girl wasn't like that so much.

In the back of my mind, I guess I'd always wanted to try a threesome, but I never really thought it would happen. She was the one who was like, "Yes!". It was more her bucket list than mine. But I certainly didn't need my arm twisted to do it. The second time was also better because I knew what to expect more. The first time, the other girl was not really our vibe, so my FWB and I just ended up having sex, and the other person was just kind of…there by the end.

The best sex I've ever had was probably the first time with that friend. It was very spontaneous, but we knew we were into each other. And then we had the talk afterward. We were both like, "Hey, I'm not really looking for anything." And we were like, "Perfect!" We were at a party and we'd known each other through a mutual friend. It was one of those things you've seen in movies but you never really expect to happen in real life. We went in a room and threw stuff off the bed, and I picked her up and fucked her against a wall. Her fake eyelashes came off, and I had to help her remove them. It was silly, but at the same time, it was the most intense passion, like we needed to bang this out and talk about it and figure stuff out afterward.

That started about a year ago, and then around October and November, we were so into each other, but we knew a long-term thing would never work between us, so we decided to go our separate ways. Then, I got into a relationship with someone else, and she did too. It kind of worked out perfectly. But it was eight or nine months of being in a friends-with-benefits relationship with each other.

In my current relationship, we've been really open about our history and what we want going forward. She's bisexual, but not totally sure if/how she wants to explore that. A threesome is something that she's said she'd be interested in exploring, but I'm not trying to push anything on anybody. If it's something she wants to explore, I'd be open to it again. My friends with benefits was really into analingus, and I did not think that would be for me. (Her licking me.) It ended up being for me! I wasn't really sure about that at first. It's not something I'll bring up probably for a bit longer with my current partner, but I'll eventually bring it up.

I think it helps that I teach sex ed and know female anatomy well, but I'm really good at performing oral sex. That's been something that catches people off guard, I think. I've had women tell me, "That's the best I've had since my ex-girlfriend," and that's the biggest badge of honor to me. I just think I know where everything is, and it's something I enjoy. I enjoy bringing people pleasure.

Originally Appeared on GQ