In any gay relationship, there’s always that first time when one of you neglects to rubber up. That happened during a drunken sex session with Rich the other night. It would be easy to blame the amount of alcohol in my system for thinking it was a good idea to skip the condom part when fucking Rich, but I’m not so sure, because if you’re having sex you can’t be so drunk that you’ve lost all reasonable thought and the ability to carry out such basic mental argument. I suspect it’s more a case of so badly wanting to taste the forbidden bareback – ‘cos let’s face it, it feel so much better – that our subconscious sees an opportunity to commit the crime and have an alibi come morning, while your cock is only too willing an accomplice.

It did feel great and you can’t beat the feeling of cuming inside someone for the first time, but we’d always said we would get properly tested before the ‘glove’s came off and, to be honest, one night of rubber-free sex is never worth the anxiety afterwards. It also weakens your resolve, because once you’ve risked it the one time, what’s another slip?

So we’ve made our appointments at the clinic, having been doing it safe for 4 months until last week. I don’t know how this compares with the average. Within my last serious relationship we kept the latex for about 2 years before letting it go. The situation was, my boyfriend wouldn’t stop using rubbers before both getting tested, but didn’t want to get tested in case be didn’t get the all-clear, so a total catch-22. But one day he’d been fucking me with one on, and we’d stopped, so he’d taken it off, only for us to start up again and because I was so well lubed it just sort of slipped in, and neither of us stopped.

I suppose the issue of losing the rubber is a judgment call when you’re in a relationship – I don’t like using the term ‘safe sex’, because it’s all relative and never quite as black and white as all that – surely slipping up after 4 months is less risky than a bareback one-time screw. I once knew this guy who’s idea of being safe was to get to know a guy for the required length of time first, before judging him healthy enough to have unprotected sex – crazy.