Oh yes, they were absolutely fantastic, they were brilliant. They went through everything with me. Any questions I had they answered, you know, any information they gave me.

I didn’t feel intimidated, I felt very comfortable. I thought ‘oh no, they’re going to think I’m really young and what’s a 14 year old doing in here but as I was sitting in the waiting room there were other girls that seemed my age. You know, it was the vast majority of age groups and ranges there so I didn’t feel so bad, they made me feel very comfortable.

Okay, so you got that support?

Yes, I got the support from there. After I’d been prescribed the contraceptive Pill I went home and I said to my Mum in the kitchen, I said ‘Mum, I’ve gone on to the Pill and she seemed a bit shocked and then we sat down and had a Mum and daughter conversation. And I said ‘I’ve made a terrible mistake, Mum, I’ve lost my virginity’ and she was very upset.

But I said ‘I don’t want to fall pregnant so I’ve gone on to the Pill and she thought it was a fantastic idea because she had me when she was 16 so she was quite young as well. And shed had 6 children and I think she thought, ‘yes it’s a good idea.

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All you hear is like to prevent sexually transmitted diseases wear a condom, the pill does not stop sexually transmitted diseases and that’s the only thing you hear. You don’t hear anything about the diseases or anything like that, and you only hear like ‘well if you use a condom you won’t get any sexually transmitted diseases, but the pill don’t stop sexually transmitted diseases and that’s all you all you seem to find out about with them really, use a condom to stop them but the pill doesn’t stop them

So in your opinion do you think that there should be more detail in these classes?

Yeah I think they should, I think like until you know what it is or what can be done or what can’t be done about it, apart from Aids but everybody knows HIV and Aids, but other things they don’t know. So you tend, it doesn’t tend to stick in your mind if you know what I mean, like oh yeah well you could get one, but you could not and then until you get one and find out what it is you’re dealing with and things like that then you don’t think about it.

I didn’t really know what they were, it didn’t play a part in my mind, that sort of thing. I was just like ‘oh well. And then you actually got one and you was like but I think if I’d known more about them and what they are and how many different ones there are and things like that then I think it wouldve like opened my mind a bit more.

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In your opinion what information do young people require but are not getting?

Well, I think you get told about contraception but you don’t really get told about the emotional side of it really, and you can’t really talk about it that much and you know, it’s not a scary thing really’ I don’t know.

In your opinion what are areas related to sexuality and sexual behaviour that young people find the most difficult one to talk about or to seek advice about?

Well for me, I’ve got a low’ pulling from past experience, I’ve got a low libido and you know, lots of my friends have these great, amazing relationships and I don’t really feel like that at all. I’m not really sexually attracted to my boyfriend and it isn’t really normal, I found it really quite embarrassing to talk about it, but you know if I could talk to my friends about it, they may have the same problem, but I don’t really know because I think people would look upon me as like a freak.

I think I personally digest it better if I go and find out the information for myself.

And which websites do you tend to look at?

I just write into Google and look at anything that comes up which obviously then you go on Yahoo questions and have some 12-year-old tell you what they think but certain things like the Brooks website that I’ve been on a couple of times and I found that quite useful.

Sometimes there’s a, I believe it’s an American medical website that is like a diagnosis website. I think it’s called MedGP or something. I’m not entirely sure but it’s really easy to find with Google and you can go on it and write in symptoms and I find that quite a good medical website. Although I do take everything I read with a pinch of salt because I don’t want to start self-diagnosing myself for dreadful conditions.

And when you say that you found the Brook’s one a good one what do you think is good about it?

it’s not patronising. it’s, friendly. The way it is written is non-threatening and I think personally looking at it from someone who likes to look at it from a different perspective I think for younger people because when I go to Brook I feel like the oldest person there. Everyone else in the clinic is younger than me. I think people my age tend to have got a doctor sorted and go to a doctor but everyone else seems to be significantly younger. So I think it’s important that the website is written in a non-threatening way.

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Yes, and even sort of passing comments about sex as well, I don’t really want to go into a detailed discussion. But yeah, it’s really, really good when you can talk to your Mum about things, especially because your Mum knows a lot about life and shes got your best interests at heart as well. So those are the two main things for having a confidential discussion with her I guess.

I mean I could talk to my friends and they would be willing to listen, but they’re all wrapped up in their own worries and I’d be the same if I spoke to them as well. I don’t know, my mum’s just really willing to listen to me for what I am.

Before I went to Uni I did talk to my’ well, I did worry about when I should start having sex and whether I was being silly not wanting to start straightaway. Whether I should just go for it, I mean it wasn’t really a big deal or it shouldn’t really be a big deal, but you just worry about whether the guy is being faithful and whether he likes you as much as you like him, so I think those are the main things.

And these are the kinds of things that you talk to your Mum about with no problem?

Yes, well I mean when I worry about why he hasn’t called, then my mum just tells me to stop being silly. So I don’t like to tell her things like that, but I tell my mum the big things and my friends the little things, because you don’t like your mum to tell you that you are being stupid.

And what about your Dad?

No, I want my Dad to think that I’m completely innocent and pure and not to worry about me. He would just tell me that none of the boys are worth worrying about and that I should dump them all anyway! So no good at all.

Like a good Dad?

Yes, I mean hed just tell me that I was wasting my time with all these boys.

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No, I don’t think so. I mean I’m not really a shy person, so if I want to know something I’ll ask, so no. If I’m worried about something or needed something, I’ve always come here or gone to my GP. I don’t think I’d go to my Mum, because I think shed start squirming. So I’ve always come to the doctor or come here.

No, I mean my mum’s a squirt, unbelievably. I was teasing to her before, and I was saying, ‘Mum why have you never told us about the birds and bees?’, and she said, ‘Well you learnt it at school. And I said, ‘Well that’s not the point. Maybe I wanted to hear it from you. And she was just squirming. And I was like, ‘It’s alright Mum. If you need to know anything, I’m here.

Shes embarrassed to talk about sex?

I think so, I don’t know why.

Well, some parents are.

I don’t know why she is. Shes really’ what’s the word. very outgoing, so it does surprise me that shes a bit embarrassed to talk about stuff like that, because she is so loud and crazy and outgoing.

Do you think that young men have enough information about contraceptives?

B’ It’s a good question. I tend to think of myself as educated but I have a sister and I used to always take an interest in what she was reading in her magazines so I kind of found out a lot of information that way. But as for men in boys magazines and things, you don’t really see any information on contraception, I don’t know. But I haven’t bought a magazine for a long time so ‘

g You just read your sister’s!

B’ Yeah!

So how old were you when you started reading your sister’s magazine?

B’ Well I guess when she became a teenager, when she started buying magazines like Cosmo and all those girly magazines. Teenage girl magazines, so I was only 9 or 10 or so.

I don’t know. I talk to my male friends about sex a lot as well actually and I often get the impression when I talk to them that they don’t really have those kind of conversations very often, like it’s kind of quite, they’re quite shocked by the fact that I’m prepared to talk about it. I think girls are a lot more open.

And I think boys may be wouldn’t want to admit to having done anything wrong in bed, or had any embarrassing experiences whereas girls are a bit more willing to just kind of go “Oh my god I did this the other night,” or “this happened and it was really embarrassing.”

Most blokes always have that kind of macho thing of not wanting to, I don’t know admit they were wrong or admit they might have done something silly or whatever so that’s probably a problem.

In your opinion what information do young people require but are not getting?

Boys could do with the kind of sex tips you get in Cosmopolitan, they could do with a magazine with those kind of things in because Cosmopolitan is very, very useful for girls I think to kind of… whereas boys, a lot of boys don’t really understand girls very well I don’t think and kind of what girls like in bed.

And obviously it varies a lot from girl to girl as well but I think there are some things that it’s quite, you know obvious. And girls will exchange sex tips much more readily than boys will I think, because of the macho thing I think blokes wouldn’t want to admit they wouldn’t know how to do something whereas a girl would be quite happy to say to a friend “Oh you know, how do you give a blow job?” or like “What do you do when you do this?” without being embarrassed about it.

So I think boys could probably do with some way in which they can kind of find out about stuff like that, other than girls having to teach them which tends to be what happens I think. Which is okay I suppose at least it happens, but I don’t know.

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I think as girls, they are also given education at school but they are more about the mechanics of girls rather than the feelings of girls. They sort of have quite a few misconceptions about periods, you know, get your period, lasts a day, go to the toilet, end of story, you know they need a bit more guidance.

I think also, for me, I know how girls work but I wasn’t sure on the mechanics of the boys, you know how they feel about things and what they go through puberty and everything, so I think more information for both parties would be better.

I don’t think they have sufficient information about girls and the mechanics of girls

I think obviously when you’re in a sexual relationship, you learn about each other and each other’s bodies and how you know, I might not want sex or I’ve got my period or something like that. I was quite shocked when my boyfriend told me that he hadn’t had sex for 6 months and so things might go quite quickly’

It hadn’t occurred to me that things like this would happen, I’m not quite sure if that’s just me being naive or whether everyone feels this way.