Pelvic Floor Diary Entry #1 

Associate Editor Andy Sia: Candid and contemplative, Naa Asheley Ashitey’s diaristic piece explores the contours of desire and intimacy following violence. Ashitey does not only turn to the diary but also reimagines the form, professing a desire for a kind of intimacy, and additionally, a language capable of holding this desire. The process of healing, Ashitey suggests, is not linear, but a coming together of past, present, and future selves.

Pelvic Floor Diary Entry #1

I often write about the type of sex I haven’t had yet. I spend paragraphs and stanzas describing the kind of sex that I thought I would have when I reached an age defined by recovering from one too many bad relationships. I write about high-pitched, annoyingly loud orgasms with the spirit of reclaiming an agency that was stripped from the tips of fingers, and the lust that comes with the rush of sex that aligns closely with honesty and forgiveness of past, present, and future sins. Are my words that I have drafted across notes apps, Word documents, and journals simply a performance? Am I a liar for writing about sex that I have never had, but a type of sex I feel so strongly connected to? Is it wrong of me to write about a type of sex that I know I will have when I’m no longer terrified of letting a second finger slide in between my darker pair of lips, or when I no longer react to the smallest hint of intimacy as equivalent to an anxiety attack. Frankly, I am so jealous of all the poets who can write beautiful poetry about distinguishing between fucking and sex. I want to be able to explain the difference in my own words. The secondary orgasm that comes from aftercare, the gentleness of having a partner who holds my hand or even carries me to the bathroom to pee, and who ensures that I am at least wearing a liner, if not a full overnight pad, because they know that I’m particular about keeping my sheets esteemed. I want to write about all those feelings. I know that I am not lesser for not having experienced those just yet—in due time and with therapy, I will. But how frustrating it is that I won’t be able to write an honest poem about sex and fucking until a therapist helps me recover from the men that took the ease of that feeling away before I even knew I was ready to consider having sex or a good fuck.