Loose Girl: A Memoir of Promiscuity Paperback – June 2, 2009

Many parts of this book read as if the author were actually there in my head for some of the things I did, she merely changed a few surface details around. This, as a reader is both a thrilling and terrifying place to be. Someone gets me! Oh, but that's not me...that's someone I don't like very much...I was also bothered at times by the feeling that there was something I did that was altogether different and that difference, I believe will be the key to trying to explain what I did with men, how I tried so hard to become like them in an attempt to escape feeling at all. For much of my youth I was pretty sure men had no feelings and this state of being was obviously preferable to my own overly emotional existence. Who isn't emotional at fourteen? The problem is that I didn't know this then. So the experience of reading Loose Girl was one of both profound identification, and it also prompted a serious introspection.When I began running away from home, being promiscuous became more of a necessity than the desperate amusement it had been prior, though finding anyone who was willing to sleep with me, if they weren't really old and scary, still afforded a sense of validation no matter where I was. At the same time I compared myself to the author and saw the differences, I was aware of a restless, almost physical need to distance myself as far from the desperation and ugliness she presented in this book.I wasn't like this. No way. Let me count the ways...Loose Girl is a necessary book because it addresses a side of female sexuality that I have hardly heard talked about so honestly, and definitely not this fairly to the guy's side. In my own search for ways to explain my adolescence I have fielded various interpretations about what I did and none have ever seemed to fit right.You were emotionally disturbed and as such, screwing around was your way of acting out, or using others to make yourself feel better. That one at least feels honest, though doesn't address much beyond the obvious, it doesn't tell me anything about myself that I didn't already know.You were a victim. Of all the ways that teenage sexuality is presented, the way girls are portrayed as victims, unable to make their own decisions or go after boys on their own, this one has always made me the most insane. It feels like many women are more comfortable believing that we are simple victims of these big bad men forcing this or that on us, and we had no part in our own destruction, much less any culpability for using them for our own purposes and enjoying it. And not just the sex either, I am talking about the whole twisted power trip. To ignore our own motivations in favor of pretending some sort of innocence is to actually lie about what it is to grow up in a female body.Women are so very good at judging each other, and don't often acknowledge that we sometimes reflect back to each other what we don't like to believe about ourselves. The things that other women do that disgust me the most are always things that I have been ashamed of doing as well. The book's example of this would be judging the desperate looking woman at the writing conference and then acknowledging how close the behavior was to other things the author did. Her honesty about that was refreshing and gave me more to think about. I am really glad that she writes YA as I expect her honesty will rub off on at least some of her young readers, and hopefully help them become more sincere and aware young women.I enjoyed getting to know her thought process better by reading the questions and answers at the back of Loose Girl. When asked why she wrote this book, her answer was:"So many women feel alone with feelings similar to the ones I wrote about in Loose Girl. I want them to feel seen. I also hope readers will gain a deeper understanding of female promiscuity, that more often than not it's not simply "asking for it" or (another belief growing out there these days) being empowered. It's a girl who is likely trying to fill her emptiness with what feels like an easy fix. It's a girl who is trying, and failing, again and again to be loved. It's a girl who doesn't love herself."Two things about this struck me: being seen and what that means, and the idea that random sleeping around isn't as empowering as we might hope. I reflected on the fact that I was aware of my own dishonesty even at thirteen. I love how both she was able to bring that awareness to her story. I knew when I was trying to fill the emptiness inside by attracting a certain type of attention that I was cheating my way out of an important life test. I understood that even then, and I knew it was easier to continue the way I was rather than change something about the way I was living so that I could be proud of myself for something legitimate.Ms. Cohen, for the places you were like me, and for making me think about the places you were not, I am deeply grateful.

Memoirs have the same power and shortfalls as those found in personal therapy. The power comes from the individual speaking the truth of her/his life. The downfall is the individual's perspective is limited to his/her own experience. When a person risks the vulnerability of letting others see them, as much as one can be so transparent, as they see them themselves a magical even can occur. The listener has the occasion to become likewise vulnerable, at least to one's Self, in respect to one's on life. Ms. Cohen, a child of privilege and divorce, is that kind of vulnerable and transparent in this memoir that the invitation offered the reader to become likewise open, is frightening. When Ms. Cohen was eleven her parents divorced; neither her engineer father nor her "artistic" mother had sufficient Self to give the author or her sister the love, limits or guidance they needed. Instead, her mother abandons both girls to the care of their father in order to pursue a medical degree; her father's idea of parenting is being a "buddy" and buying them things. The gap this lack leaves in Ms. Cohen is deep and one she spends the next 20 years trying to fill by seeking a sense of self through external affirmations. The path she chooses in trying to achieve this goal is using her sexuality to ensnare someone into a meaningful, fulfilling relationship. As Ms. Cohen ages ("matures" would be an overstatement) she can see the choices she is making are poor, self-defeating and she feels powerless to resist them. To witness those numerous, cyclic attempts is tedious and painful, as it must have been for the author to have experienced. In describing herself, she appears as a classic Co-Dependent (one who is dependent/addicted to relationships &/or people to be "complete"). Her approach to relationships, as they are described, has more the flavor of addiction than they do of connection. She feels she knows what she is looking for but has no idea how to obtain it, that for which she searches does not exist - a person who "will make me whole by being with me." The book ends abruptly with a sense of being incomplete, with the author married to "someone who will love me," yet she continues to exhibit the emptiness that has plagued her all her life. The information listed about Ms. Cohen on the book's dust jacket states she is a psychotherapist, still married and the mother of two sons. One can suppose she has achieved some level of success. This is a book about an individual's descent into unhealthy relationships using sex as an object to trap someone into loving her. It is somewhat graphic and profane in its discussion about sex. Her ability to succeed in showing her desperation without being vulgar is an indication of her writing abilities. The only violent moments are shown to reveal the depth of her hopelessness. Those who read this book will better understand the pain of addiction.

The first half of this true memoirs works really well ; teenage girls , peer pressure , being thought of as a slut by your friends etc . Made me realise how much worse it must be for some girls now , as this is after all a teenager growing up in the 1980s , when times were far less sexual .Second part of her story [ college days ] becomes more borring and a soul search aka Oprah/ eat pray / pity me . There is not alot of graphic sex here [ better off with girl with a one track mind ] In fact kerry isnt looking for sex just for the boyfriend . Also she never really gets into any real danger / trys any thing kinky / even attempts to have a relationship with any one who isnt a college boy .The story looses its edge and becomes rather slowwww[...]There should have been more details and less pity party , yet another lost woman writing about lack of self worth rather than sex , this is more a book re self abuse that having a good time .

I constantly read this book, it's so brilliantly written and to myself quite relatable. This book doesn't make me feel a freak and gives me hope and continues too.Thank you for such an amazing read!!

Good book

Really good read, touches upon a lot of serious topics facing girls as they grow up. Couldn't stop reading until it'd finished!

Great value