Afro Sexual Wisdom

Sex Toys and Self Love

By Cosmic Yoruba

When I was 17 years old, I reached an epiphany and decided that I would have to learn to love myself first and foremost. It started with meditations, compiling lists of what I loved about myself, standing naked in front of a mirror and praising my beauty. While seemingly mundane, doing this all helped me become the self-confident person I am today. Part of me learning to love myself also involved

delving headfirst into sexuality. As a young “definitely not straight” girl growing up in a heteronormative and homophobic culture, I understandably spent most of my teenage years confused. To me then, masturbation was something I needed to do as part of learning to love myself, I was also adamant on doing this before a man would take my virginity as society had always told me would happen. At 17 years old, I did not stop to consider why I so rejected the idea but now I am older, wise enough to know that the concept of virginity is mostly bullshit, and brave enough to be more confident in my “definitely not straight” sexuality.

Apparently I was one of those overly sensual girls who did “dirty” stuff like that unknowingly and I had to make it stop somehow.

Female self love is still very much a taboo topic. I learnt this in boarding secondary school when in biology class I was told that it was okay and normal for boys to have wet dreams but that vaginas smelt of fish. It was also in secondary school where some girls told me that they had seen me masturbating at the night while I slept. That was the first time I had heard that word, I didn’t even know what masturbation meant or that I was doing it. Apparently I was one of those overly sensual girls who did “dirty” stuff like that unknowingly and I had to make it stop somehow.

But years later I made the decision to subvert that, to knowingly masturbate and discover my body on my own terms. I’ll never forget visiting clitical.com to learn more about female self love. I started with baby steps, first using fingers and then mirrors, then showerheads, pillows…I played with the idea of buying a sex toy for years before I was finally ready to do it. As with everything else in my life, I researched first. I knew I wanted to buy a sex toy that was made from material that was not scary. So no plastics or rubbers for me, only silicone. I was also looking for something reasonably cheap. I did not see anything special about buying a sex toy when I could get myself off without one. It was most likely this mentality that lead to me purchasing the Viking. The Viking was on sale and it was silicone. I ignored all the advice for first time sex toy buyers and went ahead to the pro section, it is a good thing I bought some lubricant as well because well, as the name implies the Viking was huge. And I mean humongous. I must have only attempted to use the Viking once or twice before deciding that sex toys were evil. I found a company that recycled sex toys and mailed the Viking to them.

I was never going to buy another sex toy.

Fast forward to about a year. I was back in Nigeria and trying to live as a modest Nigerian girl. I came across a website that catered to providing Nigerian women with sex toys, I had to join it. Soon enough I had convinced myself to give sex toys another go, not to mention I still had lots of lubricant sitting unused. I don’t recall the sex toy I decided on first, but after completing my order, I got a call from the woman who ran the website saying that the toy I chose was out of stock. After calling, back and forth, she recommended this Gold G-Spot Vibrator to me. Gold G-Spot Vibrator was reasonable, it was not silicone but the woman assured me that it was PVC free. At that point I really really wanted a new toy so I went ahead and purchased the Gold. The woman kept in touch with me until the Gold was safely in my hands. “Did you enjoy it?” she asked. “Yes I did” was the reply.

When I decided it was time to leave Nigeria once more for the United Kingdom. I knew I was going to go on a sex toy shopping spree. This was the perfect opportunity to have loads of sexual adventures, with other people and most definitely with myself. Within weeks of living on my own, I had already bought a new sex toy. Glass Dildo, is well, made of glass. Glass is a very interesting material to make a sex toy with, it is safe but, as can be expected, very hard. Glass Dildo’s main selling point is that it can be used heated or cold, thus producing different sensations. After months of using the Glass, I decided it was time for change. Using my usual mantra of “cheap, safe, does not look like a disembodied penis and is definitely not pink”, I acquired a lovely Silicone Double Dildo. SDD has two different ends, the curved head, and the “realistic” one, which as far as I was concerned meant that I was buying two dildos for the price of one.

A few days ago, a friend visiting from Nigeria and I made a trip to Ann Summers. I took this picture and sent it to Tiffany who asked me to write this post. And so if you ever wonder my reasons behind revealing my sex toy collection, there you have it. I find it amusing that I went from not caring about sex toys to owning four now.

Apparently this means I am still overly sensual.

To visit Cosmicyoruba’s blog click here

Also check out these pieces on how Africans love sex toys or even this one on why sex toys matter.

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