Sahar Pirzada is the Director of Movement Building at HEART To Grow, a national nonprofit advancing sexual health, reproductive justice, and support for survivors of gendered violence in Muslim communities.

In this episode, Sahar joins Salma for a conversation about the sex education Muslims actually need. She shares her own journey entering marriage with little sexual knowledge, experiencing years of painful sex before discovering she had vaginismus and a physical condition requiring surgery, and eventually healing through pelvic floor and sex therapy.

Sahar also opens up about terminating a deeply wanted first pregnancy after discovering severe chromosomal abnormalities, navigating abortion through her faith, and finding support from Muslim scholars, imams, therapists, and an abortion doula. Together, they unpack the stigma around abortion, miscarriage, STI testing, premarital sex, and the assumption that teaching Muslims about sexual health somehow “encourages zina (fornication).”

They also discuss sexual abuse in Muslim communities, how the default in our communities is to disbelieve survivors, teaching children consent and the correct names for their body parts, and why protecting one another’s sexual health can be understood not as a departure from Islam, but as a communal responsibility.

Your sexual health is an amanah.

Plus: Salma calls out her own hypocrisy and admits she judged Sahar when she first saw a hijabi woman, Sahar explains why sex shouldn’t hurt, and they may have accidentally invented the hottest date imaginable: getting STI tested together.

This is the penultimate episode of Season 2! One more to go. 🥹

HELP KEEP THE POD ALIVE FOR 2026, DONATE TO OUR GOFUNDME: https://gofund.me/f646f3082

For more information on Heart:

https://hearttogrow.org/

https://www.instagram.com/hearttogrow/

https://linktr.ee/HEARTtogrow

https://www.youtube.com/@heartwomengirls1584

CREDITS:

Host & Creator: Salma Hindy
Executive Producer: Salma Hindy
Videographer & Sound Engineer: Patrick Samaha
Written By: Salma Hindy
Edited By: Salma Hindy
Studio: 30 Irving Studios
Artwork: Rana Omar
Social Media Intern: Noor Jehan Ansari
Grants & Sponsorship Intern: Christina Saoud

© The Secret Sex Lives of Muslim Women, 2026

Instagram: @thesecretsexlivesofmuslimwomen

YouTube: @thesecretsexlivesofmuslimwomen

HOST'S INSTAGRAM: @salma.hindy

HOST'S TIKTOK: @salma.hindy

This week, Salma sits down with comedian Marito Lopez, the first straight cis man to ever enter The Secret Sex Lives of Muslim Women.

Salma and Marito first knew each other in Toronto, when Salma was a deeply religious virgin and Marito was drinking, partying, and struggling with addiction. Years later, their lives have taken almost opposite turns: Salma stepped away from practicing Islam, while Marito got sober, converted to Islam, and found in faith the higher power he had been searching for through recovery.

They talk about addiction, AA, losing control, finding God, converting to Islam as a Latino man, religious hypocrisy, judgment, sex outside marriage, dating a non-Muslim white woman, and building a relationship with faith that doesn’t require perfection.

They also talk about foreskin, dick size, strip clubs, hijabi baddies, fat asses, pork, tattoos, and why apparently hearing women scream is a legitimate form of penis-size research.

It is, somehow, both one of the most sincere conversations about faith on the podcast and one of the filthiest episodes ever recorded, it even got Salma feeling prude-ish.

HELP KEEP THE POD ALIVE FOR 2026, DONATE TO OUR GOFUNDME: https://gofund.me/f646f3082

CREDITS:

Host & Creator: Salma Hindy
Special Guest: Marito Lopez
Executive Producer: Salma Hindy
Videographer & Sound Engineer: Patrick Samaha
Written By: Salma Hindy
Edited By: Salma Hindy
Studio: 30 Irving Studios
Artwork: Rana Omar
Social Media Intern: Noor Jehan Ansari
Grants & Sponsorship Intern: Christina Saoud

© The Secret Sex Lives of Muslim Women, 2026

Instagram: @thesecretsexlivesofmuslimwomen

YouTube: @thesecretsexlivesofmuslimwomen

HOST'S INSTAGRAM: @salma.hindy

HOST'S TIKTOK: @salma.hindy

This week, Salma sits down with Pakistani trans woman, celebrity makeup artist and content creator Ayman to talk about the extraordinary journey that led her to becoming the woman she always knew she was.

As a child, Ayman had a recurring dream about a mysterious girl she could never quite see…until years later, after transitioning, she realized the woman she had been chasing was herself.

Ayman opens up about growing up between Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and the U.S.; experimenting with femininity and makeup from childhood; being put on testosterone as a teenager in an attempt to make her more masculine; coming out to her family; losing their financial support and experiencing homelessness; surviving abuse and sexual assault; and eventually building a career and online community for queer and trans South Asians who had never seen themselves represented.

At the heart of the conversation is also the grief of growing up without the unconditional love you needed from a parent. Ayman shares the devastating moment that changed her relationship with her mother forever, and she and Salma talk about what it means to grow up, grieve the mother you needed, and eventually learn to care for the child inside you yourself.

They also talk about Islam, Hajj, family rejection and reconciliation, the hypersexualization of trans women, and why, at 36, Ayman still considers herself a virgin. For Ayman, sex isn't about marriage or purity. It's about finally loving the body she fought to make her own, feeling completely safe with another person, and knowing that sometimes, love simply isn't enough.

HELP KEEP THE POD ALIVE FOR 2026, DONATE TO OUR GOFUNDME: https://gofund.me/f646f3082

CREDITS:

Host & Creator: Salma Hindy
Special Guest: Ayman Syed
Executive Producer: Salma Hindy
Videographer & Sound Engineer: Patrick Samaha
Written By: Salma Hindy
Edited By: Salma Hindy
Studio: 30 Irving Studios
Makeup: Ayman Syed
Artwork: Rana Omar
Social Media Intern: Noor Jehan Ansari
Grants & Sponsorship Intern: Christina Saoud

© The Secret Sex Lives of Muslim Women, 2026

Instagram: @thesecretsexlivesofmuslimwomen

YouTube: @thesecretsexlivesofmuslimwomen

HOST'S INSTAGRAM: @salma.hindy

HOST'S TIKTOK: @salma.hindy