Consent is Not a One-time Conversation.

“Hey, can you please stop doing that? I don't like that,” I said to a client who I was seeing one evening.

This is a pretty common phrase that I say a lot, and all it means is that they touched upon a boundary that I might not have mentioned because I probably didn't think to talk about it. If I have mentioned it, I’m reminding them now and adding the fact that I don’t like it to their action.

I had been seeing this client for nearly three years at this point when this happened. And he seemed puzzled. “Last time we had a session you are okay with this,” he said.

What was the offence?

He nuzzled himself on my back.

Normally I don't have any issues with this, but today I was wearing a tank top that dipped down behind my shoulders, so more skin was showing down my back and shoulders than the typical t-shirt I tend to favor (no reason why I wore that shirt that day; I just felt like it and felt comfortable cuddling in it). So when he nestled himself into my shoulder, I could feel his lips pressed against my shoulder, and I wasn't comfortable with that.

I stopped myself and decided that I wanted to have a much bigger conversation around this.

“I don't remember having a conversation with you last time,” I told him, “and maybe I was okay with it at that time. But I'm telling you this time that I'm not okay with it. It's a different day and a different feeling for me.”

I think most people teaching consent don't talk about this really important piece: it's not just a one-time conversation. It’s an ongoing one. That’s because relationships change over time, and our comfort level does too.

If you're in a romantic relationship, you don't start off with sex right away. You might start out with a first date where max, you hug the person. You might be comfortable holding hands next, then kissing, then—well, you get the picture. What you’re comfortable doing with your partner changes over time as your comfort with the person changes and you want to connect differently changes.

What we don't talk about much is that sometimes consent means going back and saying no to things we said yes to before, and that is completely and 100% okay to do.

Sometimes withdrawing that consent is something that happens because we're not comfortable because we didn’t actually like doing that in the past and don’t want to keep doing it.

Other times it may have to do with us and how we’re feeling about ourselves and our own comfort level with sharing that much with anyone, nevermind that person.

It may have to do with the situation at hand (like wearing a top that reveals more of your back than you normally do that particular day).

Or a million other reasons.

And that's okay, there's nothing wrong with that. In fact, I would love to see more people say, “I was okay with it then. I'm not okay with it today.” 

And yet I find that many cis-hetero men, in particular, are uncomfortable having consent conversations, especially if it’s because they already did something that someone didn’t want. They rush through the consent talk and boil it down to things they aren’t “allowed” to do so they can get to what it is that they want.

And when someone tries to pump the brakes or take something back? They take it personally. They get offended. In some cases where the willingness to emotionally process the situation healthfully is not there, they might even verbally attack the person that said it to justify to themselves that it’s their fault and their problem and there’s no reasonable reason to have to change.

(That’s called gaslighting, by the way.)

A man actually responded this way to this meme (that I posted on my Facebook page) that is about withdrawing consent.

As you can imagine, I don't think this is the right approach to consent.

In fact, I find it's more fun if consent is part of the everyday conversation.

For example, my boyfriend and I have conversations around it all the time, not just consent around touch but around everything. 

“Hey, love. Is this a topic that's too heavy for you right now?”

“Hey, I'm uncomfortable with this. Sam, can we drop this topic and move to something else?”

“I'm not really feeling like doing this right now. Can you help me?”

“Do you want some time to yourself? I want to talk to you, but I also know you’ve done a lot today.”

“Yeah, I’d rather have some time to myself in the living room. Can you give me space and I’ll come to you when I’m ready to stop being an introvert?”

I feel like we’re always having conversations around this. In fact, having boundaries allows the other person to speak up about what they want and what they don't want too.

No one should have to suffer through something they don't want without talking about it. Especially if it’s something that they were okay with at one point but aren’t anymore. Life happens, you learn about yourself more and what you want— but also what you don’t want too.

It's hard to discern in the moment sometimes, and some days that might mean walking away and talking about it after you’ve processed and realized what you want. It might sound like this: “Hey, that thing we did, I actually wasn't okay with it. I didn't realize that until now. I'm not blaming you, but can we not do that in the future until I say I'm ready again?”

And when you are ready again, you get to have another consent conversation.

Because consent is not a one-time conversation.