I’m not on PrEP. Is it weird to ask for condoms during hook-ups?

“I assure you, you are doing nothing wrong by asking to practice safer sex,” Kai advises

“I would say we always have the right to ask our sexual partners to use condoms or to observe any kind of sexual safety practices that might make things more comfortable or better for us,” Kai Cheng Thom says. “Make it about what we want and what we need instead of about what that other person might be doing or saying. So I wouldn’t say to someone, ‘Well, I can’t trust you and you’re a liar, so we have to use condoms.’”

“How I would phrase the request or the ask is to make it about myself rather than the other person. So it’s a matter of what I need to make the sexual interaction good and safe for me.”

It’s our latest in the video series “Ask Kai: Quickies,” offering sex and relationship advice for those in a hurry.

Kai Cheng Thom is a writer, performer, and social worker who divides her heart between Montreal and Toronto, unceded Indigenous territories. She is the author of the Lambda Award-nominated novel Fierce Femmes and Notorious Liars: A Dangerous Trans Girl's Confabulous Memoir (Metonymy Press), as well as the poetry collection a place called No Homeland (Arsenal Pulp Press). Her latest book, Falling Back in Love with Being Human, a collection of letters and poetry, is out now from Penguin Random House Canada.

Lito Howse (they/them) is a queer and trans/non-binary identified videographer, editor and producer based in Toronto. They previously worked for the CBC where they wrote TV stories, edited and control room produced for News Network. They also produced videos for CBC Radio and wrote web articles for shows like The Current and As It Happens, among other roles. They speak English.

Read More About:
Health, Video, Dating, Ask Kai: Quickies, PrEP

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