About women, sex and health

Gervex - Woman Tossed by a Wave

The Elusive Female Orgasm: 3 Tips to Awesome Orgasm (Part 1)

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Three Tips to Experience and Expand Female Orgasm

Orgasm is a learnable skill that every woman can acquire—and then expand upon.

Gervex - Woman Tossed by a Wave

Gervex – Woman Tossed by a Wave

Orgasm School?

Not having rip-roaring orgasms when you’d like to? Or at all? Don’t despair! Orgasm is a learnable skill —and every woman can become proficient at getting there. And if you already have your basic orgasm abilities down pat, you can use the same tools to expand your climax-ability.

Orgasm Challenges

Although sex is both natural and learned, for women, learning our path to orgasm is not always easy or natural. Just consider these statistics. Ten percent of women have never had one (yet!), while over half of women don’t have orgasms from intercourse, despite what you see in the wacky, unreal worlds of porn and romantic movies. Many if not most women are what I call “orgasm challenged”—sometimes they do, sometimes they don’t, and it’s a mystery why that is (or isn’t). So what’s a girl to do if she longs for delicious climaxes to her solo or partnered erotic experiences?

Relax–You Are NORMAL!

For starters, relax. There’s nothing wrong with you—these are simply skills you haven’t learned yet. That’s right: sexual abilities are learned, just like playing the piano, speaking French or any other complex set of skills. You can learn how to improve your orgasmic capacity if you want to. It will probably take some time, and you’ll definitely have to practice, but sooner or later you can be exclaiming, “Oui, oui, oui!” or “Whee, whee, whee!” Ultimately, the choice is yours.

Female Orgasm Basics 101

Unfortunately, in this world of ours it’s a lot easier to find someone to teach you French than it is to find a good orgasm class. Don’t despair! I’ll get you started right now on the basic class: Female Orgasm 101.

orgasmschoolbanner

1.      Slow Down and Take Your Time!

Since the average time spent in foreplay for couple sex is less than 10 minutes, we have one root cause of orgasmic issues right here. For most women full, deep and complete arousal can take up to 45 minutes. That’s right, 45 minutes! That amount of time is quite shocking to most people. When I present this info in a class there’s usually a moment of shocked silence. Then all the women give a big sigh of relief and suddenly light up with the understanding of why things may not work so well or how they’ve been engaging in erotic activities that they aren’t ready for—like intercourse. Our cultural models of arousal and orgasm are male-oriented, based on common patterns of men’s sexual responses. The male arousal pattern is of quick hot genitally-focused energy, leading to rapid erection. By contrast, for most women, most of the time, our erotic energy starts cool and diffuse and takes time to heat up and coalesce in our genitals. What’s the rush? Do you have something better to do than taking your time to get totally and utterly turned on?

Now, it is true that we women can learn how to enhance our arousal process and speed that curve up. In fact, everything I suggest below about learning to develop your own erotic mastery can help women get going faster. And everyone, both, men and women, can benefit from slowing down and taking enough time for both partners to get deeply and fully aroused.

2.      Breathe

Breath is basic. You don’t have to remember any complicated esoteric formulas or worry if you’re doing it wrong. You certainly won’t forget to do it at all. Breath happens—and, if you want your orgasms to happen and then to expand, all you need to do is enhance whatever your breath is already doing by itself. Just do a little more. Breathe a little faster, draw it in a little deeper, let it out a bit longer, or open your chest and belly more. Enhance your breathing and you’ll augment your arousal. Don’t hold your breath or let anxiety tighten it up. Breathe into your pleasure, breathe into your body, keep it moving and you can breathe yourself right into a nice juicy orgasm. Keep breathing into it and your climax will be bigger and better.

3.      Focus On Yourself

Yes, in this case it really is all about you. In order to get turned on, you need to connect to your own experience and feel your own pleasure. You can’t become a master musician only by playing duets. In order to become adept at playing your own instrument, you need to spend time doing solo practice. Yes: I did just tell you to go play with yourself. Solo sex is where you can pay attention to yourself without the distraction of another person’s needs, desires, expectations and demands. When focusing on your self-pleasure, you can discover what works for you and explore new pathways. Repeating behavior and action is how you learn. Like driving a car or playing a musical instrument, you need to practice to get good at any learned skills, including (and perhaps especially) sex. Then, just like playing the piano, when you get the learning practiced, automatic and embodied, you can let go of thinking and just let the music flow out of you.

That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t play with partners when appropriate and available. Go ahead — have fun with your playmates! However, if you want the most pleasure possible and the easiest access to your orgasms, you must also cultivate your own abilities, by yourself.

Now, go ahead and have some sweet sensuous succulent solo sex!

This is an excerpt from Sheri’s book, Succulent SexCraft: Your Hands-On Guide to Erotic Play and Practice.

Want more? Check out our free e-book Orgasmic Abundance!

Read Part Two for More Tips.

 OLC_Succulent_SexCraft_Website header_ProductAre you ready to have Sheri personally help you learn to play your own instrument with skill and passion?

You can do it in the comfort and privacy of your own home with Intimate Arts Online Education!

Join us for a 4-week deep dive into Succulent SexCraft: Supercharge Your OWN Pleasure for a lifetime of MORE!

Amplified arousal, easy orgasms, expanded orgasms and access to your own ecstasy awaits you!

 

The Ecstatic Journey of Birth and Sex

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The Ecstatic Journey of Birth and SexThe Ecstatic Journey of Birth and Sex

Sex, Fertility, Bliss, Bonding & Birth—One Elegant, Ecstatic System

Here’s the straightforward (and elegant) reality: women’s sexual, emotional and reproductive structures and systems are one connected, coordinated, integrated arrangement. Sex, pregnancy, birth, orgasm, breast-feeding, bleeding (and not bleeding) — all participate in the same grand system. Science tends to break systems down into their components, in the process often overlooking the fact that the whole is much greater than the sum of the parts. It’s an approach that has its virtues, but misses the forest for the trees. While the female sexual system does depend on the contributions of muscles, hormones, nerves, psyche, energy, neurochemistry and more, it’s not just a compilation of parts. It’s a unified, brilliantly designed system, and we’re missing something important if we don’t see it in that light.

lausselConnected Systems

In humans, sex and reproduction, love and lust, and care and connection all overlap and interconnect. There are not three separate systems, one for pleasure, one for reproduction and one for bonding. It’s all one integrated, multi-purpose arrangement. It makes evolutionary sense that this is so. While it’s certainly possible to have unconnected, uncaring sex, we are definitely hard-wired for connection.

The Evolution of Human Female Sexuality

This is especially true for women, for whom sex is a high-risk activity. Female humans have limited reproductive opportunities, unlike males with their unending supply of sperm. Pregnancy and child-rearing are activities that require an enormous amount of time and energy. Since it takes human babies many years to become independent, and since two can raise a family more easily than one, having sex with someone you are emotionally bonded to tends to be a successful reproductive strategy.

givingbirth5Sex and Birth: Joined Journeys

Our culture tends to see birth and sex as unrelated activities. Not that people don’t understand that sex is what gets the baby started, but the subsequent processes—pregnancy, birth and breast-feeding—are generally seen as maternal, not sexual. This is a false dichotomy. The fact is that arousal and labor are very similar, and so are orgasm and birth. While it’s true that sex is intensely pleasurable and birth is wildly intense (and often intensely painful), both are consuming, extraordinary and powerful processes that are similar by evolutionary design, and not by coincidence.

Sex and giving birth are not just two ends of a journey: they are the same journey, an intimately connected system that follows a primal evolutionary template. Evolutionary design conservatively uses the same equipment, energy and biochemical tides in both the sex and birth experiences. Both journeys also involve similarly altered states of consciousness, with the kindred trance states choreographed by the same chemistry.

The Same Trip

Both the first stage of labor and the process of arousal are involve surrender, release and opening. Each requires a person to go with the flow, turn inwards and become entranced. Both orgasm and the decidedly more active propulsive second part of labor involve adrenalin-mediated action.

Also, either process can get derailed by the same antagonists—fear, anxiety, and the inability to trust and to open. Yet another antagonist for both is stimulation of the analytical neocortical brain, which can cause either process to stall. Despite our generalized cultural anxiety, labor and birth have the potential to be powerful, transformative and even ecstatic experiences. Some women actually have orgasms during the birthing process!

Surrender in Safety

As a practical matter, it’s useful to keep the parallels between sex and birth in mind. As a midwife with over two decades’ experience birthing babies, I can say with certainty that, to have the best possible birth experience, you should choose your birth place the same way you’d select a place to make love — where you’ll feel safe, private and undisturbed. Surround yourself with trustworthy allies and people who have faith in the innate wisdom of the natural birth process. Only when a woman feels secure can she open to the powerful tides of arousal or labor and release into orgasm, birth or ideally orgasmic birth in a flood tide of pleasure, wonder and love.

The Milky Way by Rubens

The Milky Way by Rubens

Love Fest at the Breast

Breast-feeding is also part of women’s sexual experience, as it’s designed to be a pleasurable and even ecstatic lovefest between the sacred and intertwined dyad of mama and baby. The hormones of in-loveness and bonding are there to help us survive the exhausting demands of parenting and ensure that we nurture our offspring instead of ignoring or abandoning them, as we’d surely do if we didn’t love them madly.

The Integral Nature of Female Sexuality

All the aspects of the journey — cycles, fertility, pregnancy, arousal, orgasm, birth and breast-feeding — are part of the integral whole that is female sexuality. It is one of the tragedies of our culture that we’ve severed pregnancy, birth and breast-feeding from their messy, earthy, embodied sexual roots. To fully appreciate female sexuality, we must remember these connections, which hold true at a primordial level whether the woman in question chooses to (or is able to) reproduce or not.

Beyond that, we must also bear in mind that the integral nature of female sexuality does not begin and end with the body. The emotions are involved, too. There are not separate processes for love and lust. All these circuits are connected to and by the biggest sex organ of all, the brain. We’re hard-wired at all levels to bond, be blissful and to birth!

Read more

Juicy Coconuts

Coconut Oil: Getting It In When You’re Getting It On!

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Getting coconut oil onto your vulva is easy, but getting it where you need it most—deep inside your vagina—can be tricky. Luckily it’s easy to make suppositories or use applicators to help!

Lubricate and MoisturizePouring Coconut Milk

Lubricants make things slide and stay on the surface of your tissues. They’re wonderful for sex. They reduce friction and prevent irritation. Just as importantly, lubricants increase sensation and pleasure. While the vagina does produce its own lubrication, some women are just naturally less moist then others. Sexual arousal increases the production of natural vaginal juice, although when and how much can vary. At certain times of life, such as after menopause or after having a baby, there may be little lubrication no matter how aroused you are. I believe additional lubrication is always good since when it comes to erotic play, slipperier is better.

Moisturizers are absorbed into your tissues, improving tone, elasticity and resilience. They are particularly useful if your natural lubricating abilities are decreased such as during post-menopause, with certain medications and forms of birth control, and post-partum. If you’re going for healing your vagina, use coconut oil or other natural vaginal moisturizing products multiple times every day. Think of it as feeding your vaginal mucosa (the moist inner lining of the canal) and apply three times a day.

Vaginal Drynessjeff robinson_double coconuts_CC Lic

For those times in life when your vagina is dry, using additional lubricant can make the difference between pain and pleasure.

You may want to check out my Lube Rules blog post for lots more lube info.

Natural Plant-Based Oils

You can use any natural plant-based oil topically as a sexual lubricant. I highly recommend using organic products.

My favorite is coconut oil, which is a natural plant oil. It smells and tastes somewhere between barely-there and delicious. I also love coconut oil because it acts as both a lubricant and a moisturizer!

Other nice body-friendly and yummy oils include almond oil, jojoba oil, sesame oil and apricot kernel oil.

Plant-oils are NOT latex-compatible. DO NOT USE WITH LATEX PRODUCTS SUCH AS LATEX CONDOMS!

Phu Thinh Co-Coconut & Oil CC LicCoconut Oil

I like to use it straight. Just dip some out of the jar and slather it on.

Regular coconut oil is solid when cool and a liquid when warm. When it’s in its solid form, it melts deliciously at body temperature. If you want it to stay liquid at all temperatures, all the time, use fractionated coconut oil. Virgin coconut oil has a stronger coconut scent.

Coconut oil is also good for vaginas as it’s mildly anti-fungal and anti-bacterial (but only against the ‘bad’ bacteria and not the ‘good’ ones that live in a healthy vaginal ecosystem). (See Vaginal Ecology posts for more info,)

Getting In When You’re Getting Down

Slathering the outer parts of your genitals and using oil on anything that’s going inside is good! By using your fingers, you can get a little bit of oil inside the vagina, but not much and not far inside. So what are you going to do when the inner parts of your vagina need some extra luscious lubrication?

Make Coconut Oil Suppositories

To make: Start with warm liquid coconut oil. If you’re adding other oils, mix them in.

Pour the oil into ice cube trays, filling each compartment about ½ way. (Or about 1/2 inch deep) Or use a small glass square or rectangular baking dish.

Put the tray in the refrigerator. Cool until just firm. Take it out and slice each cube of coconut oil into 2 or 3 sticks, about the size of your pinkie. (About 1½ inches long)

Put it back in the fridge and leave it there until it’s very solid.

Remove the suppositories from the tray. You now have coconut oil vaginal suppositories. Yay!

Put them in a jar or container and store in the refrigerator.

To use: Unless it’s roasting hot out, the suppository will stay solid for a while at room temperature, so grab a few on your way to your sex place and leave them handy so you can use as needed. When you’re ready to be lubed up internally, take one and insert it deep into your vagina.

Besides using these for sex, you can also use them to help with general vaginal dryness issues. If you’re using them that way, insert one before going to bed.

Power Pack Your Suppositories

For additional healing, add any of these oils or a combination: Wheat germ oil, Vitamin E, evening primrose, borage, black current seed, comfrey, calendula, plantain, red clover.

These oils will stay liquid even when cold, so if you add too much of them, your suppositories won’t get hard. So either just add a little of these oils or make a salve.

It’s easy to make a salve: Just warm all your oils and mix. Then add a few tiny bits of melted pure beeswax or cocoa butter to your oil prior to making it hard.

The Easy Way

A favorite herbal company, Avena Botanicals makes this Vaginal Dryness Oil, which is an easy short-cut to add to your suppositories. (They also make a lovely Yoni Creme that makes for great lubricant and can be used daily as a soothing vulvar topical.)

Use an Applicator

If you don’t want to make suppositories, here’s another option for getting creams, salves and liquids into the vagina—use an applicator.

The plastic applicators that come with many vaginal cream products will work with any cream or salve. Clean your applicator with soap and water after use and it will last forever.

You can also use a large syringe (Not the needle — just the barrel). You can buy these marketed as lube applicators at many sexuality product stores. They come with applicator nozzles and are usually marketed as anal lubricators. They work fine for getting lube in your anus as well, but since anal bacteria should never be in your vagina, I recommend not using the same applicator for your butt and your vagina, even if you do clean them well, as of course you should.

It’s Worth It

Take a little time to make suppositories or get an applicator and you’ll be glad you did. Getting the lube deep inside and coating the inner walls of your vagina will make for a very happy vagina-owner. (And, if you have visitors, they’ll be happy, too.) You’ll be slippin’ and slidin’, satisfied and slathered!

Arousal_frontcover-w-Book of theYear AwardWant more info on vaginas and related parts? Check out my award-winning book, Women’s Anatomy of Arousal and/or the online course by the same name, Women’s Anatomy of Arousal Online Course to learn about all things vagina!

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Vaginal Ecology: An Owner’s Guide to Care & Maintenance (Pt 1)

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Yoni SymbolVaginal Ecology: An Owner’s Guide to Care & Maintenance

Part One (Go here for Part Two)

Here’s what you need to know about vaginal health — by understanding the ecology of your vagina you can learn to keep yours healthy, and prevent most vaginal infections and problems. Your vagina is a self-regulating, self-cleaning, resilient yet delicate ecosystem and the less you disrupt the natural balance, the better off you’ll be. This is what every vagina-owner needs to know!

An Elegant System

The vagina isn’t just a nice place to own or visit, nor is it merely a passive space awaiting fulfillment; it’s a complex, integrated environment. Your vagina is a dynamic system with inherent safeguards in place to maintain a healthy equilibrium despite being susceptible to myriad influences that can alter its state of balance. After all, the vagina is exposed to fluctuating hormones, the consequences of our modern diet, our stress-filled lives and numerous artificial products that nature never intended our delicate tissues to withstand. And, of course, Mother Nature did intend our vaginas to have visitors whose presence and leavings can stimulate and impact our vaginal ecosystem. The vagina is well designed to handle many of these influences but sometimes succumbs to influences that cause imbalance, often leading to infection and general grumpiness all around when she’s out of commission.

Vaginal Ecology

Vaginal ecology is the study of the vaginal environment and its interactions. By understanding the ecology, you can better handle your vagina, and keep her happy and healthy by supporting the natural systems. When, despite your best efforts, the normal balance is disturbed and you get a vaginal infection (vaginitis), knowing how your ecosystem works can give you the power to remedy the situation and restore your environment.

Nice and Normal

A normal vagina is constantly kept moist by its slick, slippery and savory natural discharge. (I don’t like that its called discharge though — that sounds yucky — I call it vagina juice.) The smell and taste of a healthy vagina is mild, earthy and slightly pungent with a pleasant, musky aroma. It certainly doesn’t smell like fish or have a strong foul odor. A healthy vagina does not smell or taste bad! In fact, it’s full of sexy scent plus fabulous pheromones, the chemicals of attraction that we don’t consciously smell. Your vaginal juice is a naturally compelling, perfumed invitation.

Juicy Goodness

Vaginal fluid mostly comes from the cells lining the walls, which act similar to sweat glands, producing moisture from the inner mucus membrane surfaces. The rest of the juice is made up of small contribution from several types of glands, located in the cervix and near the vaginal opening. Normal vaginal fluid varies in color from clear to white, although when it dries it may appear yellowish.

The amount differs from one woman to another, as well as for the same woman at different times, and ranges from scant to moderate. Some women are naturally wetter or kunisada-43drier then others, just as some people have oily skin or dry hair or sweat more or less profusely.

What’s most important for you as your vagina’s caretaker is to know what’s typical for you in amount, color, texture and odor. The vaginal fluid reflects where you are in your cycle, your age, your sexual arousal, hormonal contraceptive use, even your diet and fluid intake.

For women who are having normal fertility cycles the shifting pattern is usually similar each month. In general, most women are juiciest during the week leading up to and including the day of ovulation. Most women are driest the week before their period. Girls prior to puberty, breast-feeding moms and post-menopausal woman are drier and less varying.

The Vaginal Garden

A healthy vagina is full of friendly bacteria, mainly particular strains of Lactobacillus acidophilus. These good bacteria protect the vagina and keep it healthy in multiple ways. Their job is to control the population of unfriendly microbes such as yeast and ‘bad’ bacteria. They do so first by filling up the space, like a garden which is profusely filled with flowers, leaving no space for weeds. Next, the acidophilus maintain the proper vaginal environment by producing two important chemicals: lactic acid and hydrogen peroxide, a liquid form of oxygen. The lactic acid maintains an acid-alkaline balance (known as pH) in the vagina that’s acidic. Your helpful bacteria also produce hydrogen peroxide to create an aerobic (oxygenated) environment that discourages bad microbes. The beneficial bacteria are the essential hard-working engineers of the ecology of your vagina. When something causes a shift away from the ideal, they get working to bring your ecology back into line.

There’s more! Go here for Part Two.

Want more info on vaginas and related parts? I got more!

Arousal_frontcover-w-Book of theYear Award

Check out my award-winning book, Women’s Anatomy of Arousal.

WAA-LOLC_Wegener-Self-Exam_V7-HeaderYou can also explore the online course by the same name, Women’s Anatomy of Arousal Online Course to learn about all things vagina!

 

Vaginal Ecology: An Owner’s Guide to Care & Maintenance (Pt 2)

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ba19d3b6574adf0830b615465820dfebVaginal Ecology: An Owner’s Guide to Care & Maintenance

Part Two (Go here for Part One)

Flux and Flow

There are a variety of things that can shift the vaginal equilibrium and swing the system out of harmony.

To begin with there are the regular changes of the fertility cycle. The vaginal environment normally fluctuates slightly throughout the month for women during their fertile years. Just prior to menses, there’s a normal ebb in the population of good bacteria due to hormonal influences which causes the vagina to be less acidic. This pre-menstrual week is frequently a time when the vagina is driest, most tender and more prone to irritation and infection. During your period is another time when the environment is at risk of swinging out of balance. Blood is alkaline, (the opposite of acidic) and its presence can encourage imbalance. Semen is another alkaline influence that impacts the ecosystem. Ideally, you have a strong population of good bacteria, so your body can easily accommodate these factors and shift back to an acidic state quickly.

For post-menopausal women, the vaginal environment is most like that of the cycling woman’s pre-menstrual week. In other words, it’s somewhat dry, fragile, less acidic and has lower levels of good bacteria. It pretty much stays the same all the time although internal and external environmental factors play a role. For example, frequent arousal helps to promote blood flow and keep it more moist. Avoiding vaginal environment stressors is especially important.

Unfriendly Take-Over

If your beneficial bacteria die off then your ecosystem becomes fragile and susceptible to a take-over by unfriendly bacteria or yeast. There are many influences that can induce a decline in the population of good microbes. Sometimes imbalance just seems to happen for no reason, but factors such as high stress, poor diet, misguided ‘hygiene’ practices or other influences affecting the vaginal environment are usually at work. And when you kill off all the flowers in your garden, you can be sure that the weeds will take over.

Antibiotic Effects

One of the most common causes of a die-off of your normal flora is taking antibiotics to treat an infection. They can kill off your ‘good guys’ as they do their job of killing off the bad ones that were causing the original infection. Anytime you take antibiotics, you are at risk for yeast overgrowth, which can result in vaginal candida (a yeast infection) and gastro-intestinal problems such as indigestion and diarrhea. This is one of the many reasons to be careful about taking antibiotics and to use them only when you really need them.

Sweets for My Sweet

Normal vaginal discharge also contains a very small amount of natural sugars. The usual minimal level of sugar helps to discourage yeast overgrowth, while an increased level promotes it. The sugar level in the vaginal fluid is increased in diabetics and in pregnancy. Some women are sensitive to a high sugar diet and may find they need to be careful about their intake.

Keeping It Cool

Although the vagina is usually pretty steamy, at or slightly above normal body temperature (which is fairly toasty at almost 100°), its best if it doesn’t get much hotter then that. Anything that creates and holds in heat can contribute to an overgrowth of yeast and lead to a vaginal infection. A wet bathing suit on a hot day, pantyhose, lycra or spandex work-out clothes, synthetic panties or leggings, plastic-backed panti-liners, even tight jeans can all create an overheated crevice, at risk of disruption. Wear cotton panties, natural fiber leggings or tights, cotton menstrual pads, and nothing at all at night (or when you can get away with it!) Keep your crotch cool and you’ll be glad you did.

Contraceptive Concerns

Certain forms of contraception can affect the vaginal system, directly or indirectly. Any product that contains Nonoxynol 9, the chemical that’s in all spermicides can be problematic. Many women are highly sensitive to this chemical and will have inflammation as a result of its use. This includes condoms with spermicide, the jelly used with diaphragms and all other types of spermicidal creams, sponges and suppositories. It’s best to avoid this irritating sperm-killing chemical in all forms.

Hormonal birth control methods (birth control pills, the depo shot, implants, progesterone-containing IUDs, the ‘Patch’, the ‘Ring’), all work by tricking your body into thinking that its already pregnant and therefore doesn’t need to ovulate. So just like in actual pregnancy, there may be slightly higher amounts of natural sugars in your vaginal discharge, hormonal shifts and changes in the pH that may promote vaginal imbalance and infection.

Feminine Hygiene Crap

Exposure to synthetPelvicdoucheic chemicals and cleansing products can also shift the balance and cause a reduction in the supportive bacteria. Vaginal infections are commonly associated with what can be called “excessive American hygiene”, which includes the use of douche, vaginal deodorants, sprays, wipes, washes, powders, anti-bacterial soaps, deodorant soaps, body washes, bubble baths, and all of those so-called feminine hygiene products. These products are one of the main culprits in vaginal infections! Avoid them all. You do not need them! Don’t fall for the mass-marketing lies that tell you that you need to be “fresh” by using their chemical concoctions. You are fresh and delicious without that synthetic junk.

Luscious Lube

While a healthy vagina produces it’s own luscious lubrication, the amount varies from woman to woman, and for any individual, from time to time. Arousal certainly increases the amount to some extent, which may or may not be enough. In general, I’m a big fan of using extra lubrication for sex play. Slather it on! And, be aware that there are a wide variety of products, some wonderful and some not so great for your vaginal garden.

My favorite natural lubricant is organic coconut oil. It smells and tastes great, absorbs easily into skin and mucus membranes and is naturally antimicrobial against the ‘bad guys’ while promoting the health of the friendly forces. The only significant caveat is that is not compatible with latex. If you use latex barriers, do not use coconut oil!

There are a wide variety of natural, organic water-soluble lubes for those of you using latex for protection. Keep an eye out for products containing glycerin though–for some women it seems to encourage yeast infections. Silicon lubes, while not natural, do seem to work well without disturbing the vaginal ecology. Many mainstream commercial lubricants contains all sorts of very unnatural chemicals, some of which can be disruptive to the natural vaginal balance. This is a good area for you to go natural and organic!

(For more about lubricants, read Lube Rules!)

Keeping It Clean

Your healthy vagina doesn’t smell bad and doesn’t need artificial hygiene products to irritate it and kill off your normal flora. Clean with clear, clean water. That’s all you need. You can use your fingers to help rinse the crevices. A hand-held showerhead is excellent for crotch cleaning (and is also useful for self-pleasuring). A mild soap can be used on the outer areas such as the outside of the external lips but should be totally avoided on the inner lips and around the vaginal opening. There is never, ever a need to clean inside the vaginal canal at all. You have a self-cleaning vagina!

Watch for Warnings

Imbalance exists before an infection is fully manifest. By knowing what’s normal for you, you can often catch a problem early before it becomes a full-blown infection. By understanding the early signs and symptoms of a shift then you have the power to swing the ecology back into a healthy direction and prevent most problems. Or, at least catch and treat an infection early.

If there is increased or profuse discharge, if it smells wrong, tastes bad, or looks odd, that’s abnormal and usually a sign of imbalance or infection. Be alert for any changes including a funny color, if your vagina juice is thicker or thinner then usual, clumpy or milky. Your vaginal juice should never itch or burn. Swelling and irritation are also warning signs of a problem. So, be sure to check your own vaginal fluid regularly, so you’ll recognize any changes early.

Happy Healthy Havenyoni temple carving

Now that you understand the basics of your vaginal ecology, you have the means to make good decisions to protect and care for your delicate environment. You can support your healthy system and avoid the things that might disrupt your natural defenses. By knowing what’s normal for you, and paying close attention, you can detect early signs of a problem and often fix it before it becomes a full-blown infection. When signs of imbalance occur, you can take action to correct the system yourself or get help from your health care provider, before things get really bad.

Essentially, your genitalia are a self-regulating, self-cleaning ecosystem and the less you disrupt the natural balance, the better off you’ll be. Don’t mess with a good thing. Appreciate your elegant system with its natural resilience and ability to maintain itself. Respect and support your vaginal ecology and you’ll have a happy healthy haven that feels good so you, your vagina and your friends can have lots of luscious fun!

Want more info on vaginas and related parts? I got more!

Arousal_frontcover-w-Book of theYear Award

Check out my award-winning book, Women’s Anatomy of Arousal.

WAA-LOLC_Wegener-Self-Exam_V7-HeaderYou can also explore the online course by the same name, Women’s Anatomy of Arousal Online Course to learn about all things vagina!

The Joy of Squirting: How I Learned to Be a Juicy Goddess

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The_Birth_of_Venus_by_Robert_Fowler-soft_edgesThe Joy of Squirting—How I Learned to Be a Juicy Goddess

Whether you call it squirting, gushing, or female ejaculation, it’s a delicious form of hot wet pleasure. Releasing this fluid, also called amrita, the nectar of life, is truly an ecstatic experience. Here’s how I learned to go from orgasmic to a gushing goddess—and you can, too.

Female What?

When I first heard about female ejaculation (FE), I was already working as a nurse-midwife and gynecology practitioner. I had never experienced it myself. At first, I thought it was made-up porn nonsense. But over the next few years, I had patients who reported what sounded like FE: profuse release of fluid with high-level arousal and/or orgasm. This is when I began to suspect that gushing was a real but rare experience.

She Gushed On Me!

In the mid 90’s, I had an up-close personal experience of squirting with a female partner who was an ejaculator. She told me she had always ‘gushed’ with orgasm. The amount was profuse. I observed the fluid spurting out of her urethra. It did not smell like urine, wasn’t yellow, and it tasted briny and tangy but not at all like pee. It didn’t leave any stain on a white towel. When air-dried, the fragrance on the towel was quite pleasant.

As I’d been having orgasms for almost 30 years without such a response myself, I assumed it was something only a small number of women had the natural ability to do. I now ‘believed’ in FE, as an uncommon but natural ability.

Female Ejaculation Lessons?

My next shift in thinking came when I met a number of women who said that they had learned to squirt, commonly in their late 30’s and 40’s. This certainly got my interest! I started to believe that gushing might be a learnable skill.

I already knew that many sexual responses were based on skills that were learnable. I’d taught myself a variety of useful skills such as how to have assured orgasms, orgasms from intercourse, non-genital orgasms, and so on. Once I realized that female ejaculation was a skill that could be acquired, I figured that if these other women had learned to ejaculate, so could I. At that time, though, there were no books or classes on the topic, so I just kept asking questions when I had the opportunity while also expanding my orgasm skills and holding on to the vision that it was possible for me to experience squirting myself.

Squirting Is Possible and Learnable

Sure enough, now that I knew it was possible and learnable, and also had a foundation of orgasmic proficiency, it happened. After a delightful night of extensive stimulation and dozens of orgasms, I experienced my own dramatic gushing mega-orgasm. It was profuse, wildly expanded my already pretty wild orgasms, and had a component that felt deeply sacred and empowering. I was now a true believer. No question about it—squirting was a learnable skill!

Over the next few years, I became more proficient at having a wide spectrum of orgasms, including gushing ones. I was reinforced in my basic belief that if a person combined comfort and connection to their body, knowledge, skill and practice, they could learn to squirt.

Gushing Variety

The nature of my gushing varies quite a bit. I can produce vastly different amounts of fluid. With certain types of stimulation, especially if it’s prolonged, I may gush buckets. If I’m not in a deep state of arousal, inadequately stimulated or dehydrated, I produce very little. Not all my orgasms include obvious gushing at all.

I’m certain that I’m not producing pee. When I gush, the fluid I produce smells remarkably like amniotic fluid, briny and fresh like seawater. When I was still in my cycling years, it would be sweeter around ovulation. While it does emerge from the urethral opening, it’s not yellow and doesn’t smell like urine. I’ve checked the pH and it isn’t the same as urine.

Another consideration for me is that I can produce considerably more ejaculatory fluid than I can urine. When I pee, a finite amount of urine comes out. It takes some time before I can generate more. In a really prolonged orgasmic series of ejaculations, I can produce huge amounts of fluid. As long as I’m well hydrated, I can keep going. I measured the fluid once and found that I can expel about ½ cup with each series of gushes—and then keep going to have many additional series of gushes of similar amounts. I could never produce that much urine in such a short amount of time.

The Anatomy of Female Ejaculation

As I was developing my gushing abilities, I became intensely interested in the anatomy and physiology of the process. Since it was clear to me that it was not urine, diluted or otherwise, I wondered where the fluid came from. For a while, I found no plausible explanations for it. The scientific perspective seemed to be that it must be urine since there appeared to be no other place for a large amount of fluid to come from other than the bladder.

I did not (and do not) accept that theory. It was not congruent with my personal experience. I believed there must be another anatomically accurate and scientifically valid explanation.

Ejaculatory Eureka

My ‘aha’ insight into the possible mechanism of female ejaculation followed. You can hear about my ‘Eureka’ moment and find out where all that liquid comes from in my recorded online course The Learnable Art of Female Ejaculation. You can also get all of my subsequent learning about FE such as why we squirt and, of course, lots of tips and techniques for facilitating gushing goddess orgasms for yourself or your partners.

I have no doubt that many of the factors that contribute to the ability to squirt are learnable. These include getting to deep levels of arousal, orgasmic expansion skills, how to relax, release and expel, the mindset of permission, an accurate understanding of the relevant anatomy and specific manual stimulation skills. When women develop these skill sets, it increases the likelihood that they’ll have sexual experiences that are deeply satisfying and orgasmic, whether you discover the ability to get super juicy or not. If women also develop the ability to have glorious gushing orgasms, all the better!

Orgasmic Options

In my teaching about sexuality, I always emphasize that there are a wide range of pleasure pathways and many ways to access deep wells of ecstatic experience. Female ejaculation is not required to have extraordinary pleasure or to be sexy or for any reason other than that it’s a blissful way to expand the menu of orgasmic options.

Pouring forth amrita feels awesome, empowering and profoundly liberating. It taps into deep emotions and feelings of connectedness with yourself, your partners and the universe. It produces a sense of deep release and post-orgasmic relaxation. When you’re gushing you feel like a goddess (or in the presence of one)—beautiful, gorgeous, and wild.

ROLC_FE_March 2016_V4-HeaderGo here for more information about the recorded online course The Learnable Art of Female Ejaculation. For all genders.

 

Why Learn to Squirt? The Pleasures of Female Ejaculation

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JP1847Why Learn to Squirt?

The Pleasures of Female Ejaculation!

Whenever I talk to a group of people about female ejaculation, someone invariably asks, “Why would I want to learn how to gush?”

It’s a fair question. For a lot of people, squirting conjures images of mess—a flood at best, pee at worst. It makes sense to wonder, ‘Why bother?’ Or even to have a ‘yuck’ response. Who needs more laundry to do?

So let me tell you—it’s worth it. Believe me, it’s worth it!

Simply put, female ejaculating wildly expands the experience of orgasm. Each spurt of hot fluid brings a delicious and intense feeling of release. It’s a form of ecstatic liberation. When it’s happening, I feel like a goddess—powerful, ecstatic and beautiful. It’s like you’re connected to the universal life force and it’s flowing through you.

It also has a deep emotional component for me. I feel like a fountain of love juice. “The fountain of the goddess,” they call it—for a reason. This is only my experience, of course, but other female ejaculators describe gushing similarly.

It’s also fabulous to be with a gushing goddess. In a recent class, my partner Carl was asked the benefits of being with a female ejaculator. His answer: “It tastes delicious, it’s emotionally empowering, and it feels yummily squishy. It gives me immediate feedback that I’m giving my partner amazing pleasure. There’s nothing better!”

In ancient India, this fluid was called amrita, the nectar of life. It was collected in sacred rituals and used as a blessing. I totally get that—amrita feels blessed to give and to receive!

Female ejaculation—it’s a complete win-win!

It goes without saying that you can have fabulous sex and wonderful orgasms without gushing. As an enhancement, though, there’s nothing quite like it. Female ejaculation feels amazing (sacredly amazing!). It taps into deep wells of emotion. It feels profound, like a delirious, wild, primal force that erupts and spills you into a state of blessed-out bliss.

If it leaves you with some extra laundry, that’s a small price to pay for a ‘fountain-load’ of ecstasy.

To learn how to facilitate your hot wet pleasure, ‘attend’ my recorded online course The Learnable Art of Female Ejaculation. 

ROLC_FE_March 2016_V4-Header

You get three class sessions, special yummy home play assignments, resources and more. For all genders!

 

G-Spot Reality Check

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Ingres – The Source

So: Is There or Is There Not A G-Spot?

A 2012 Huffington Post article emphatically states “G-Spot Does Not Exist, ‘Without A Doubt,’ Say Researchers”. The controversy continues to this day.

Are they right or wrong? In one way, they are right — there is no actual structure called the G-spot.

In another way, they are quite wrong, as there is a structure in that area that is responsive to stimulation (the right kind, at the right time, in the right way for that particular woman at that time). But it is not a round, dime-sized spot as defined by Dr. Grafenburg for whom it is named. Nor is it a part of the vagina.  What people are wondering about, talking about and searching for is the bottom part of the urethral sponge.

The what?

Women have a structure known as the urethral sponge (aka the female prostate) that’s comprised of erectile and glandular tissue. It’s a tube that surrounds the tube of the urethra – like a roll of paper towels surrounding the inner cardboard tube. It’s above the vagina and it’s analogous to the male prostate.
The urethral sponge can be stimulated through the roof of the vagina and by pleasuring the area surrounding the urethral opening. But it is not a magic orgasm button. Most women will not enjoy having it stimulated until after they’ve reached mid-to high level arousal.

It’s Part of A Juicy Whole

The urethral sponge is part of the Erectile Network, a complex of structures that also includes all three parts of the clitoris, the paired vestibular bulbs, and the perineal sponge. For an overview of this wonderful conglomerate of erectile structures, read Be Vulva Wise. For more details about the different structures, take a look at this post: The Missing Female Pleasure Parts. For more information on what’s been misunderstood and neglected, here’s another post: Lost Sexy Bits.  (It includes a quickie home play assignment.)

The urethral sponge also houses the glands that produce the fluid know as female ejaculate. (Another post addresses this controversy: Discover the Source of Female Ejaculation.

Women can become aroused and orgasmic by stimulating any of these structures (and in many other non-genital ways as well) but in general, the best arousal and orgasms happen when all of these structures are thoroughly stimulated.

The Inner Upper Sponge

The urethral sponge is not a magic hot button that you can just push for an automatic orgasm. However, when a woman is already at high level arousal and the outer parts of her erectile network are pleasingly puffed, stimulation of the urethral sponge can be extraordinarily and intensely pleasurable! Since it’s made of highly innervated erectile tissue, it’s pleasurable presence becomes quite obvious as it swells. Once you experience it, you’ll never again doubt whether it’s really there!


Find out more  in my award-winning book,
Women’s Anatomy of Arousal – Secret Maps to Buried Pleasure.

Venus_at_Her_Toilet w-Phones & laptop_V4Online Courses

Here’s another way to learn more about the wondrous, elegant and integral female genitalia: Attend any of the relevant online classes:

 

 

 

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“What Is Squirting Video” Gets It So Wrong!

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Wow, do they get so so many things wrong in this video. I’ll try to be brief but thorough in clearing up the massive misinformation in this: What Is Squirting Video

cappiello-vittel-regime-1911-france-woman-waterfall-trickleIt’s All the Same

I’ll start with their basic premise. They claim that ‘female ejaculation’ and “squirting” are two different processes. I totally disagree! The only difference is in how much fluid is produced. A few tiny drops, small dribbles, big gushes, or huge fountains, it’s the same fluid, just more more or less, either more concentrated or more dilute.

Bad Science

Next, let me briefly address the recent study they refer to. I believe it has a variety of flaws most especially their methods of assessment, their stimulation and measurement techniques as well as a statistically insignificant sample size. I do not consider this study to be good or accurate science.

To the point made in the video about the study showing the subjects having an empty bladder post-ejaculation, I say that data is not borne out in real life. Anecdotally, I and many other women report that after having profuse ejaculation we have then gone to the bathroom and had an abundant amount of urine. If I squirted all my pee out with ejaculation, how would I still have a full bladder needing to be emptied afterward?

All Women Can Learn to Squirt

The video also refers to the idea that only some women ejaculate. I disagree. All women have the equipment to FE. Female ejaculation (whether small squirts or a generous series of giant gushes) is a learnable skill (much like female orgasm itself.) Women can learn to ejaculate with information, support and encourage. And, I most certainly encourage it! Female ejaculation, when done in concert with orgasm (which I heartily recommend) it is an awesome, expanded, emotional and often full-body experience. I encourage women to add squirting to their orgasmic repertoire (you’ll be glad you did)!

vienna-434519Demystifying The Fluid & It’s Source

Let me give you a bit more information about the fluid. It’s produced by the paraurethral glands and is released via tiny ducts into the urethra. From there it can emerge via the urethral opening or be retained and held in the bladder until the next urination.

The paraurethral glands are surrounded by the erectile tissue of the urethral sponge. (Commonly, but incorrectly named the g-spot.) The more stimulation that the sponge gets, the more engorged it becomes, as the erectile capillaries fill with blood. The fluid part of the blood diffuses through the capillary wall and enters glandular tubules. There it mix with the glandular products. Engorgement of the urethral sponge’s erectile tissue causes more fluid to fill the glands, leading to more profuse ejaculation.

Their claim that FE is a small amount of liquid that occurs solely in the vagina is incorrect. The fluid does come from the female prostate (AKA the urethral sponge). But it is not vaginal lubrication nor does it come from the vagina. As noted above, it comes from the paraurethral glands and they empty into the urethra.

It’s NOT Pee

They claim that “squirting is diluted pee”. Studies of female ejaculate (of which there are few) have documented that the fluid produced does not contain significant amounts of urea and nitrate (major components of urine) and that it does contain Prostate Specific Antigen (PSA is also produced by the male prostate.) If you are a woman who ejaculates or you have a partner that does, this claim can be easily checked in the laboratory of your bedroom with the fine sensing equipment of your own nose, eyes and mouth. It’s not yellow. It doesn’t smell like pee. It has a distinct non-urinary flavor.

Stimulating the so-called g-spot (which is actually the underside of the urethral sponge) certainly encourages FE because stimulation causes the erectile tissue to swell. But that doesn’t “put pressure on the urethra, opening the angle between the urethra and bladder making it easier to pee.” Anyone who has experience engorged erectile tissue around their urethra (male or female) knows that that makes it harder to urinate.

artist-making-natural-artAmrita By Any Other Name

Amrita is what this fluid was called in the Sanskrit by practitioners of the ancient practice of Tantra, where it was recognized as sacred. Whether we call it amrita or female ejaculate, whether we squirt, gush, or dribble—it’s all the same thing. A natural, learnable and intensely pleasurable experience that all women can have.

Become Your Own Expert

Check it out for yourselves, become your own experts and then it will be easy to disregard bad science, ignore confused experts and discount video’s like this one that are mostly, just plain wrong. Except that last little line—it is completely natural! Squirting happens!

You want MORE?
For more information about female ejaculation, watch the online class: The Fountain of the Goddess: the Learnable Art of Female Ejaculation.

Or read my award-winning book, Women’s Anatomy of Arousal: Secret Maps to Buried Pleasure to discover more about female anatomy and pleasure than you ever dreamed possible!

 

Circumcision Doesn’t Cause Women’s UTIs. What Does?

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Is Circumcision A Factor in Women’s Urinary Tract Infections?
Is Sex?

Claus Rebler-Scream-UTII started writing this as a response to a Facebook post about a women who doesn’t want to have sex with her uncircumcised partner as she believed his intact penis was causing her to get recurrent urinary tract infections. I don’t know if she wants him to get circumcised but that won’t solve her problem. She has my sympathies—urinary tract infections are painful and their association with sex is distressing. Unfortunately, few people seem to actually understand why they occur or how to prevent them.

To start with since the instigation of this post focused on the status of the male member, let me say clearly—whether a male partner is circumcised or intact is not a factor in UTIs.

Sex Is NOT The Cause of Urinary Tract Infections

UTI’s are almost exclusivity caused by anal bacteria that enter and proliferate in the urinary tract. How do the little buggers get from the butt to the urethra? We transport them there by ourselves or with the help of our sexual partners. So, while sex doesn’t cause UTIs, it does tend to transfer the bacteria where they don’t belong.

Prevention

The most important thing to prevent urinary tract infections is super-great sexual hygiene to prevent any bacteria from getting in at all.

Sexual hygiene starts with the basics of good hand, genital and butt washing prior to sexual activities.

However, it’s not our before-sex behavior that’s the main problem. It’s what we’re doing while we have our erotic romps that’s really at fault. The most significant UTI prevention strategy is to keep the butt bacteria where they belong! Take care during sex! Nothing that enters in or touches near the anus should then touch in or near the vulva, vagina and urethral opening.

24969142975_bebcb585bb_zSex—It’s Messy!

Let’s face it—sex is often a wet, messy business and all of the pleasure parts are quite close together. How do we keep the butt bugs where they belong? Here are a few strategies for avoiding contamination (and the possible urinary infections that can result). Try using different hands for front and back. Gloves are a great help as they can be removed after anal play. Similarly, use condoms for anal sex then remove before vaginal contact. Dental dams work great for analingus (and prevent the giver from getting other potential infections.) What to do if you’ve used a body part for anal play and now want to employ it on the vulva? Go take a break and have a good wash.

Is the Standard Advice Useful?

In addition to doing our best to keep the bacteria segregated, we can also decrease their opportunity to flourish. The standard advice of peeing before and after sex, maintaining good hydration and using generous lube can help reduce the risk of infection, should bacteria be inadvertently transferred from back to front.

However, these measures will often be inadequate to prevent an infection, especially if the bacterial load is substantial and the environment welcomes the invaders. Inflamed tissue leads to more adherence, increasing the risk of infection if bacteria have to have been accidentally introduced. An inflamed urethra is more susceptible to infection, but only if there’s a cause of infection, that is, the presence of anal microbes. If there’s no bacteria than you only have inflammation, which is still irritating and can be painful but is likely to resolve without treatment.

It certainly makes sense to stay away from irritants to prevent inflammation and irritation with the concomitant increased susceptibility to infection. Irritants can include friction, spermicides, feminine hygiene products and for some women, certain types of lubricants. Also, if the woman is not adequately aroused and adequately lubricated, penetration can cause irritation, which make her more likely to be unable to fend off bacteria. The health of the women can also be an underlying or co-existent factor.

aloeFor sexual lubricants I strongly advise natural lubricant products, like aloe-based Aloe Cadabra or Good Clean Love (water-soluble and latex-compatible) or coconut oil (NOT latex-compatible). If you’re using condoms, extra lubrication is strongly advised. Also, lubricants are very helpful for intercourse with circumcised men since the lack of the foreskin itself increases friction. The week before menstruation, the post-partum and post-menopause phases of a woman’s life are times that the genitals drier and more fragile. Personally, I think extra lube is pleasure-enhancing at any time, even for women with abundant natural juice.

In addition, unsweetened cranberry juice (liquid or concentrate capsules), Vitamin C and a variety of herbs such as Uva Ursi can naturally kill bacteria. Their use can help in prevention efforts.

Female Ejaculation Prevents UTIs

Finally, I have found that women who ejaculate rarely get UTIs. While peeing after sex may help reduce the number of bacteria, and lessen the chances of getting an infection, the actual flow of fluid through the urethra is only mildly helpful because bacteria adhere to cells. That’s why when you have a UTI and are urinating frequently, all that peeing doesn’t cure the infection. You can’t pee out all those sticky little bacteria. Yet, anecdotally, for myself, in my clinical practice and my teaching, I’ve discovered that abundant ejaculation seems to significantly or even completely prevent urinary infections. (Plus excellent sexual hygiene, of course.) I have a theory that female ejaculate is anti-microbial—I think it’s Mother’s Nature’s UTI prevention strategy.

No More UTIs!

Urinary tract infections are awful, painful and can have dramatic impacts on our sex lives. Some basic knowledge and simple measures can easily be put to use to prevent them once we understand where they come from and how to thwart them. Great sexual hygiene and learning to work with the body’s natural defenses can stop this common problem in its tracks and keep badly behaving bacteria from colonizing our urinary tracts as well.

Want to learn how to female ejaculate (or help your partner learn to do so)? Take the online course!

ROLC_FE_March 2016_V4-HeaderThe Learnable Art of Female Ejaculation

Three Online Classes, Supporting Texts and Videos, ‘Home Play’ Assignments, and More