The gray area

Disclaimer I promise I take much better care of myself now. I just felt like I needed to tell someone this. Since I can't afford consistent therapy and can only go every so often, I felt like not writing this down somewhere was a disservice to myself, whether I ever post it or send it to someone close to me.

F21M22
A year ago I put myself in a situation to hookup with someone, I had not been with anybody before and just wanted to not be a virgin tbh and felt ready for sex. I was physically attracted to them and they acted nice towards me so when they message me at 2am I answered. At the time I was not busy only had responsibility of school and didn’t work so being up that late was normal. They picked me up and we went to their place, as someone who grew up with anxiety and bad social anxiety I felt it was telling I was never anxious with this person and didn’t feel weird about anything when we talked or when we got to their room.

It starts and I kinda didn’t want to say I was a virgin and ended up not saying so. They asked constantly if they could do this or that when we progressed from kissing clothes on to taking things off. They get a condom and I was a lil anxious on this part because I never penetrated and thought what if I can’t relax enough for the person to go in. This does kind of happens but nothing extreme I felt if maybe kissed or did something else a lil longer it would be fine because I really did feel comfortable with this person.
I’m on my back and they are trying for maybe a minute or two he kinda says one sec and something else but I didn’t hear and didn’t ask them to repeat. I assumed they just were trying to make themselves harder so I didn’t look down but they took off the condom. May sound dumb but I didn’t notice a difference in feeling so as they try again to go back in me I was just happy that they could penetrate because I was a lil nervous that somehow it wouldn’t happen.
They must have had it in their hand while over me and I don’t know cause I never brought it up, but either intentionally set it at the edge of the bed near me or just didn’t make it to the trash can that was beside the bed.
They were already inside me when I noticed it by my head on the bed. I didn’t say anything or stare at it I honestly don’t know if they noticed me look for that second or if they were still looking down at you know where. I stayed looking towards them and just put my hand up near my head and push it off the bed without looking at it.
I know not the best idea, to this day idk why I just didn’t act. It confused the fuck out of me how someone who believed if asking if it was okay to kiss me and take off my clothes didn’t think they should have said do you want to take condom off. It’s not like that was the reason they couldn’t go in I just needed a second more especially because they only had been trying to penetrate for minute or two. In my head things aren’t gonna happen right away for anyone virgin or not if they are not comfortable yet or wet enough yet. We continued and it became obvious I couldn’t ignore that it was off because they were about to release outside of me I guess since I didn’t say anything they thought it was okay that it was off. I go use the bathroom and comeback and change and then he kisses me and holds me. I wanted to feel happy about this experience because outside of the condom thing I didn’t feel hurt, but all I think about was why anything I did nonverbal would suggest that was okay. (Nothing in sex is okay to not get permission use your words)
Hate to say it but because I continued to see them as nice I just put it to the back of my brain and anytime I actually thought about it just tried not to because I continued to see them and dated them unfortunately.

I quickly realized how not ready I thought I was for any kind of relationship I had regressed into this people pleasing shell of myself that I have had to do work on to get out of. (Sorry if that sentence is confusing.) I am neurodivergent and struggle with selective mutism so how I have to handle and show up in relationships in any form is just different. I thought I could be successful at what I perceived to be this normal interaction of being attracted to someone and acting on it especially if it clear that you’re just hooking up. I was wrong and really needed to protect myself way more. I’m not happy to say it but I continued to see them without protection other than birth control I do get tested and throughout that year didn’t contract anything but understand that, that is still no reason to not ask for them to use protection. I know it not logical but after I just wanted to find a reason to blame anything but them and how if they knew they had something they wouldn’t do that to me, they didn’t mean it, I was in control, not realizing the first time was a violation to me because he didn’t ask and I didn’t say yes. I saw someone say “, I thought it gave me control. It couldn't have been….. and it couldn't have been that bad if I willingly to continue and chose to sleep with him after.”
That just how I rationalized it I guess. Worse happens to women and that didn’t align with what happened to me so it couldn’t have been that bad.
I couldn’t get the words to ask him to wear one to come out of my mouth after that night I didn’t confront him about it and early in our relationship they asked if we could be serious so I felt as long as they did right by me later on maybe no condom didn’t matter. All very dumb especially because stds and pregnancy exist but I was just thankful test never came back positive.
Not that good of a relationship cause as u could guess someone who could have no respect for you sexually isn’t gonna make a good partner and after months of feeling not respected and someone afterthought I broke up with them.