When I was 17, I was home on leave from the army and got pregnant. I didn't know it until I was back in South Carolina (where I was stationed) and everyone involved was back in California. I heard my father say a number of times while I was growing up that there were only two types of women-wives and whores. When I told him I was pregnant, he called me everything but a whore...but the message was clear. It didn't matter too much since a few days later I was put in the hospital with a raging kidney infection and lost the baby. But since I was already a whore in my father's eyes, I decided to live up to his expectations. Didn't matter who, didn't matter where. The men where married or single...I didn't care. I didn't even enjoy the sex. All I was doing was using these guys and tossing them out like a used tissue. There was one guy who came to me the next morning and was almost in tears telling me that he couldn't believe he had been unfaithful to his wife. I laughed in his face and told him I really didn't care and that was his problem.

After I got stationed in Germany (and the self-destructive behavior continued), I offered myself to a friend who wasn't known for being 'choosy'. He turned me down and told me he loved me too much to destroy our friendship for sex. That helped to bring me to the reality of what I had been doing to myself. This was also the man who introduced me to my husband.

I try not to regret things I've done in my life. I try to learn something from everything I do. But this period in my life comes closest to regret for me. For the damage I did to myself.

This is also the first time I've ever told this part of my life.