<http://schema.org/articleBody>
" Seventeen contributing editor and author of Hooking Up: A Girl&amp;#039;s All-Out Guide to Sex &amp;amp;amp; Sexuality, Amber Madison, answers all the questions you&amp;#039;re too embarrassed to ask. Read on for advice on your first time, how to know you&amp;#039;re ready, and more! Q: Everyone says that sex is fun and that it feels good. I&amp;#039;m a virgin and curious \u2014 is that really true? A: Yes, sex can be fun and feel good, but it&amp;#039;s not true that sex just &amp;quot;feels good&amp;quot; across the board in any situation. It&amp;#039;s impossible to separate the act of sex from the person you&amp;#039;re doing it with\u2014or the person you are. Because if you&amp;#039;re not really ready to be having sex, or you&amp;#039;re doing it in the wrong relationship, you&amp;#039;ll be worrying about it way too much to enjoy it. But if you feel totally comfortable, secure, and cared about, and sex is something that you truly feel ready for, then yes! It can be an amazing experience. The best way to ensure that your first experience will be a good one is to wait until you are absolutely 150% ready, confident, and comfortable in your relationship. Q: My boyfriend and have been talking about having sex. Will it hurt? I&amp;#039;m afraid something will go wrong. A: Sex shouldn&amp;#039;t hurt too much the first time, but it certainly can hurt a lot if you&amp;#039;re not really ready for it. Being nervous can cause you to clench up your muscles, and if you and your guy haven&amp;#039;t worked up to intercourse by making out and touching each other a lot first, your body won&amp;#039;t be aroused\u2014and that can make things pretty uncomfortable. But here&amp;#039;s the thing: If you&amp;#039;re really scared about doing it, like you say you are, then it doesn&amp;#039;t sound like you&amp;#039;re truly ready. Having sex is a big responsibility because yes, there is always a chance something could go wrong. Even if you use protection, the condom could break, and no birth control is 100% foolproof. (Not to mention the risk of STDs\u2026) You have every right to feel freaked about that and not want to risk the consequences! But when you&amp;#039;re really ready for it, you&amp;#039;ll feel excited, secure, and safe\u2026like the way you feel before a rollercoaster\u2014good scared, not bad scared. Q: My boyfriend and I have been going out for almost nine months now and have only gotten to third base. Is this normal? Should I let him do more? A: Deciding to take any kind of sexual step should be a mutual decision\u2014not something that you do just because your boyfriend wants to\u2014so there is nothing wrong with taking things as slow as you need to. (This may mean dating someone for months or even years without ever having sex!) If you enjoy hooking up and doing things other than sex, then keep doing that. It&amp;#039;s totally normal. A lot of people like to work up to sex by experiencing the other bases first. And if you do at any point want to have sex, just be sure that you&amp;#039;re doing it because you really want to, not because you feel like you should. There&amp;#039;s no magic amount of time to be in a relationship where all of the sudden you need to have sex with a guy. Take your time, and wait until you&amp;#039;re truly comfortable.   Amber Madison is a Seventeen contributing editor and the author of Hooking Up: A Girl&amp;#039;s All-Out Guide to Sex &amp;amp;amp; Sexuality. Ask her your toughest questions at seventeen.com/getadvice.   "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.seventeen.com/love/advice/a16453/virginity-questions-answered/>