When I was 32, I became single for the first time since I was 19 years old. I hadn’t had the chance to experiment with many other partners prior to meeting the man that would become my husband, and that meant we were both limited by our own lack of experience. We didn’t really try new things or know much of what we liked or wanted from sex. At 19, it never occurred to me to make sure the person I was committing my life to was open-minded sexually.

Our sex life then, as you can imagine, was quite lacking. It started with how uncommunicative he was about everything. He struggled with mental health issues that he didn’t like to talk about, and being so young I didn’t really know how to handle that. So, I took on more of a caring, parental role in our relationship that just doesn’t inspire much sexual §attraction. When you feel like you’re someone’s parent, your relationship becomes less about passion and more about function. Where he refused to open up, I started to feel incredibly alone in our marriage and ultimately that had a huge impact on our intimacy. It was difficult to feel positive most of the time, let alone sexual.

When it became obvious that nothing was going to change, I realised that I needed to put myself first instead of trying to ‘save’ him – I’d tried and failed for 13 years at that point. I started to think, ‘What could I have experienced had we not got together so young?’

So, I took the plunge, divorced, and suddenly I was thrust into an entirely unfamiliar world of dating. Everything was very different to when I was a teen, not just in landscape but in what I wanted and needed now as a woman in her early 30s. I’d never done online dating, and barely even been on a real date. But in this world, everyone was very forward and open-minded. It was exhilarating.

I’d spent years feeling unattractive and unwanted in my marriage, so having people on Tinder tell me I was ‘sexy’ and ‘beautiful’ did wonders for my self-esteem – as sad as that sounds. In hindsight, I probably joined dating apps too quickly post-divorce, but it served as a positive distraction to the guilt I was feeling at leaving my husband. I knew I needed to reinvent myself sexually, so I developed a new approach of saying ‘Yes’ to everything.

I went on tons of dates, had one-night stands, and started watching porn (something I’d never once done). It was through porn I realised I was really turned on by BDSM, and actively started looking for men who were into that. I had so many great experiences trying out new things and gauging how far I would go with certain areas – or not, consent is key! I realised how important communicating what I do and don’t like is, and that most men actually find it a turn on. Previously, I may’ve just lay there and hoped they would figure it out, but then you never end up getting what you want, right?

When I was married, I was convinced I had a low sex drive. Seven years post-divorce, with all my new experimentation, I know that’s far from true. Actually, sexual intimacy is very important to me and now I make sure my new partners match me on that. Honestly, at 39 I’m a very different woman to who I was during marriage. If I had a time machine and could go back and tell my former self what I was up to now, I’d think she’d lost her mind… but I know which version I prefer!

*Names have been changed