Cautious as I am, I tend to view adrenaline with a wary eye. I associate it so closely with anxiety that I often forget about its more life-affirming qualities.

For the last 6 weeks or so, I’ve been doing a teacher-training course on top of my usual job. Truth be told, before it started I’d been dreading it. I didn’t fancy the 4 hour round commute into London and back, nor was I looking forward to standing up in front of fifteen adults or being observed.

But the reality has surprised me. Yes, it’s stressful. Yes, it’s exhausting. What I really wasn’t expecting, though, is how goddamn alive I feel after delivering a successful lesson.

It reminds me of sex, especially the first time you fuck someone new.

The first time I fucked the boy has stuck with me. Was I nervous? Hell, yes. I lost 4lb in the run up to our 3rd date – it’d been so long since I’d slept with a guy that I couldn’t eat for nerves. I remember that it was a gorgeous, gorgeous afternoon and that I was planning to have a glass of wine to try and disguise the fact that my heart was racing and I was shit-scared of what we were about to do. Shit-scared, but y’know, giddy with excitement all at the same time.

I never got that drink. He rocked up early and somehow bypassed the buzzer on the front door, and then all my reservations, too.

And every time I get that adrenaline spike from teaching it reminds me of getting naked with him that day: the promise of fumbling fingers on his belt, of unsnapping his button fly, of watching his cock spring free from his boxers…

Sometimes the fear is worth it.