An Asexual’s Guide To … Having Sex

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What is sex?

I don’t know, something about birds and bees and flowers and trees?  I’m not exactly sure how the moon up above is supposed to be involved, but there are some things I’m probably better off not knowing.

Um…  Let’s try that again.  What is sex?

There are a lot of possible definitions and gray areas and legal decisions about what sex is and is not, but for the purposes of this post, I’m going to go with this definition:

Sex is an activity that involves more than one person and a deliberate involvement of the genitals of at least one of them, with an intent to arouse and/or cause pleasure/orgasm.

What are some of the types of sex?

There are many activities that can be considered “sex”.  Here’s a few of the more common ones.  These aren’t presented in any particular order, and although it’s common for a session of sex to include more than one of these items, it doesn’t have to.  I strongly recommend that you become familiar with the health risks of any activity before you take part in it.

  • Foreplay:  Not exactly a type of sex, this encompasses any activity used to “warm up” or get ready for the main event (whatever the main event is), so that participants are sufficiently physically aroused or “in the mood” enough to proceed.  It can involve hugging or kissing or stripping or touching your partner.  It can even involve activities such as manual or oral sex, if they’re a prelude to something else.
  • Manual Sex/Mutual Masturbation:  This involves using your hands or a toy to stimulate your partner’s genitals.  This is also known as a hand job or fingering.
  • Dry Humping/Frottage:  This involves rubbing your genitals against your partner’s body.  This can be done through clothing, so there is no direct skin to skin contact (hence the “dry”).
  • Oral Sex:  This involves using your mouth and tongue to stimulate the genitals of your partner.  This is also known as a blow job, cunnilingus or eating out, depending on the equipment involved.
  • Vaginal Sex:  This involves penetration of the vagina, typically (but not always) by a penis.
  • Anal Sex:  This involves penetration of the anus (butt), typically (but not always) by a penis.

What if I don’t want to do it?

You don’t have to have sex.  Ever.  If you’re not interested, if you’re not into the concept, if the thought of it makes you ill, even if you just plain don’t want to, whatever the reason is, you don’t have to have sex.  No matter what your friends say or what the TV says or what “society” says, you do not have to have sex if you do not want to have sex.  You don’t even have to justify why not.  If you don’t want to have sex, you don’t have to get anyone else’s approval.  No means no, and if anyone else has a problem with that, that’s their problem to deal with.

What if I want to do it?

Then go for it.  You’re allowed to have sex, even if you’re asexual.

If you decide to have sex, make sure you’re doing it for the right reason.  Basically, the right reason is “I want to do this”, regardless of why, specifically.  There are countless reasons why you might want to.  You might want to see what it’s like.  You might want to give someone pleasure.  You might want pleasure yourself.  You might want to conceive a child.  You might be doing research.  You might just be thinking “It’s Tuesday, I’m bored, why not?”  And so on.  There’s no universal list of acceptable and unacceptable reasons for an asexual to have sex.  It’s about whatever is right for you.

If you force yourself into having sex when you don’t really want to, it’s almost certainly going to be a miserable experience.  If you feel that it is not the right thing to do or is not the right time or right situation, then don’t do it.

You shouldn’t feel compelled to have sex to “prove” that you’re asexual or to try to “cure” your asexuality.  Sex isn’t likely to change your mind.  Most aces that have had sex report that they’re still just as asexual afterward.  I’m unaware of anyone who’s said “Oh, hey, I was wrong about myself this whole time!”  Most people who offer to sleep with you in order to help “cure” you probably just want in your pants, and have very little interest in anything else.

How do I get aroused if I’m not attracted to my partner?

Some people think that sexual attraction is required for sexual arousal, but that’s not the case.  Many times, the thought of having sex or the actions involved in preparing for sex will get you physically aroused.  If that doesn’t work, then physical stimulation of the genitals will often lead to arousal.  This is one of the primary intents of foreplay, even for non-asexual people.  If you are able to become aroused for masturbation, then the same techniques will likely work in a partnered scenario, as well.

If you’re still unable to become aroused, there are artificial ways of helping.  Wearing a cock ring on a penis will constrict blood flow and often lead to an erection, and there are prescription medications which might also help.  Personal lubricants can replace or enhance natural vaginal lubrication.

And if none of those work, either, then there are still ways to have sex that do not require arousal on your part.  You can perform oral or manual sex on your partner, or use a sex toy on them.

What is “Protection”?

“Protection” is a blanket term for something used to prevent sexually transmitted diseases and/or pregnancy.

Learn about it.  Use it.  Use it correctly.

Protection is important regardless of genital configuration.  Most people just think of protection being used to prevent a pregnancy in a situation that involves a penis and vagina, but several types of protection will offer disease prevention benefits in any situation, even in the cases of oral sex or sharing toys.

The following is a very limited list of forms of protection.  You should not use this list as your only source of information, only as a starting point for further research.

  • Condoms will help prevent both pregnancy and disease transmission.  Condoms are typically placed on a penis or a toy and should not be reused, and they should be changed between partners if sharing a toy.
  • Dental dams will help prevent disease transmission, but are not used to prevent pregnancy.  Dental dams are typically used to cover the vulva or anus during anal sex.  You can make a dental dam out of a condom, but you should not try to use a dental dam as a condom.
  • Gloves can be used during manual stimulation to prevent disease transmission.
  • Birth control pills, IUDs, diaphragms, and spermicides may help prevent pregnancy, but will not prevent disease transmission.

You should never use anything made out of latex with anything made out of oil.  You should only use water-based or latex compatible lubricants with latex condoms, dams, or other items.  Oil will break down the latex and render it useless.  Things like hand lotion, Vaseline, mineral oil, or cooking oil may seem like a good lubricant, but they should never be used on latex.

And finally, if you want to use protection, for any reason, and your partner does not, say no.  That decision is yours and yours alone.  Don’t let any talk about “raincoats” or “it feels better without it” or “the test I took ten years ago said I was clean” or any amount of other whining convince you otherwise.  Remember, the words “Don’t worry, I’ll be careful” have never prevented a pregnancy or STD transmission.

Am I still asexual if I’ve had sex?

Yes.

Asexuality is a sexual orientation.  Sexual behavior does not change that.  Remember, it’s about attraction, not action.

Will it be as good as I’ve heard?

“Sex is the best thing ever!  It’ll rock your world and blow your mind!”

Despite what people say, this generally isn’t actually the case.  Sex is probably not the best thing ever, it’s probably not going to rock your world or blow your mind.

In particular, your first time is likely to be awkward and confusing and potentially even painful.  And you should know that’s a possibility going in.  Don’t expect to wake up the next morning to a new understanding of the universe.  Don’t even necessarily expect to have an orgasm.

Additionally, for asexual people, sex tends to be underwhelming.  It’s not uncommon for aces to feel disconnected, out of place, or even bored while having sex.

How fast should I go?

If you’re jumping straight to the “Let’s have sex now” step, you might want to slow down and get there in stages.  Heading straight to sex without working up to it can be a little daunting.  Smaller steps will help you find your footing and be more comfortable with what you’re doing.  Have a set goal in mind for a given day and don’t worry about trying to do too much, too fast. ”Today, we’ll kiss”, ”Today, we’ll strip to our underwear and cuddle”, “Today, we’ll get naked and become familiar with each other’s body”, “Today, I’ll watch as you masturbate”, “Today, let’s have sex”.  Something like that, although not necessarily those specific tasks.  That way, when you get to the sex, everything won’t be so overwhelming.

Then again, if you feel comfortable going straight to the “Let’s have sex now” step and skipping the rest, go right ahead.  There’s nothing wrong with that.

Be comfortable with your partner.

It’s very important to be comfortable with your partner.  You will probably want to discuss the situation beforehand.  If you’re not sure you want to have sex, but are thinking about trying it out, talk to them in a non-sexual situation about any concerns you might have and about what you might be willing to do.  Having a partner who is patient, understanding, and willing to guide you if you want can be a huge help.  Having a partner who is part of the process will also help ensure that they know what your goals are, and they won’t pressure you for more or be frustrated or overly disappointed if you back out.

Speaking of which…

It’s okay to back out.

At any time, for any reason, it is absolutely okay to back out.  It’s okay to stop.  It’s okay to turn your yes into a no.  It is your body and yours alone.  You are allowed to say no at any point in the process.

You are allowed to say no and stop when the subject of sex is first brought up.

You are allowed to say no and stop after agreeing to have sex.

You are allowed to say no and stop on the way to the bedroom.

You are allowed to say no and stop during a pre-sex make-out session.

You are allowed to say no and stop when they reach for a zipper.

You are allowed to say no and stop during foreplay.

You are even allowed to say no and stop during sex itself.

Sure, your partner may be frustrated or upset by this, but that’s their problem.  No matter how frustrated or upset they are, it does not give them a right to do something to you that you do not want done.

Is there a “right way” to have sex?  Do I have to perform a checklist of things for it to be any good?

Porn often gives the impression that sex has to be a complicated series of different actions in a certain order, as if there’s rules that say:  “You must perform at least three activities from list A, in at least four positions from list B.  You must not remain in any combination of activity and position for any longer than 90 seconds.”

Porn is like that because there probably are those rules for film production.  By changing things up and showing a number of different things, it gives the viewer something they like to see and keeps them interested.  But it’s just another way that porn is unrealistic.

When you have sex, you don’t have to work off a checklist.  You don’t have to change what you’re doing based off a timer.  Do what works for you for as long as it works for you.  If that means two minutes of missionary and then you call it a night, that’s the right way to have sex for you.  If that means more moves than the Olympic gymnastics competition, that’s the right way to have sex for you.

Changing up activities and positions can lead to different sensations and the excitement of variety, but it is in no way required.

How much sex should I have?

Some people never have sex.  Some people have it twice a day.  Some people have it once a week or once a decade.  Those are all perfectly fine amounts of sex.  There’s a misconception that you must have at least so much sex in order to be in a happy relationship.  The reality is that if you’re in a happy relationship, then you’re in a happy relationship, regardless of how much sex you’re having.  And if you’re in an unhappy relationship, it probably won’t matter how much sex you’re having.

What about fluids?

One of the biggest concerns people have about sex are the fluids involved.  Yes, there are fluids.  Several types, in fact.  Various forms of sex often involve one body part moving across another, and many of these fluids help to lubricate and decrease the friction present in that motion.  It can be uncomfortable to have sex without adequate lubrication.

If you dislike the thought of fluids but want to try sex anyway, there are three things to keep in mind:

  1. The volume of the fluids is probably less than you expect.  Usually, just a few milliliters.
  2. Urine is typically not one of the fluids.
  3. Most forms of protection will block or contain fluids, because that’s precisely what they’re designed to do.

Here are the more common fluids you may encounter:

  • Saliva:  Found in the mouth.  Also known as spit.  Usually encountered during kissing or oral sex.
  • Sweat:  Sex can be a form of exercise, and with all forms of exercise, participants may break a sweat.
  • Blood:  At “that time of the month”, there may be blood present within the vagina.  (However, blood appearing anywhere else or at some other time is probably a sign that something is not right.)
  • Vaginal lubrication:  The walls of the vagina will often release a lubricating fluid when aroused.  This fluid is somewhat slippery and can aid in penetration.
  • Precum/Pre-ejaculate:  After a period of arousal, the penis may begin to produce a small amount of a clear, slippery fluid from the urethra.
  • Personal lubricant:  This is artificial lubricant, for cases when the natural lubricant is insufficient.  This can be bought at most drugstores or the pharmacy aisle of a supermarket.
  • Semen:  Usually during orgasm, semen will be expelled from the penis.  It is usually a somewhat thick, whitish substance, but it will vary in color and consistency.  Semen contains sperm.  For people who find fluids disgusting, this one is usually viewed as the worst.  There are several things to note:  The owner of the penis can usually sense when it’s about to happen and can therefore direct where it goes (to some degree).  Also, the ejaculation will be entirely contained within a properly worn, intact condom, since that’s what they’re for.

There are also activities that will limit the presence of or contact with fluids.  Frottage or “Dry Humping” is an activity where one partner rubs against another while remaining fully clothed.  There is no direct genital contact and all fluids remain within the clothing.

Don’t be afraid to ask for what you want and say no to what you don’t want.

Even though you’re asexual, it’s perfectly fine to have preferences about what you want to do or don’t want to do when having sex.  If there’s something you like to do or want to do or like to have done to you, tell your partner.  And if there’s something you absolutely loathe, tell your partner.  Many people have a misconception that there shouldn’t be any talking during sex, and that all communication will be non verbal and clearly understood. That’s complete nonsense.

Is it okay to dislike or not want sex?

No one expects everyone to like roller coasters.  No one expects everyone to like sushi.  No one expects everyone to like hiking.  No one expects everyone to like reality TV.  No one expects everyone to like cute, fluffy puppies.  There is absolutely nothing that everyone likes.  So no one should expect everyone to like sex.

It’s okay to not like sex.  It’s okay to not want sex.  You’re not broken, you’re not missing some fundamental part of the human experience.  You’re just not a fan of a recreational activity.  Big deal.

Is it okay to like sex or want it, even if I’m asexual?

Asexuality is not “I hate sex”.

Asexuality is not “I don’t want sex”.

Asexuality is not “I can’t have sex”.

You’re allowed to like sex and want to have sex, even if you’re asexual.  Your orientation is about attraction, not action.  What you do doesn’t matter.

Do I have to compromise?

Many people seem to think that “compromise” is a dirty word when it comes to sex and asexuals.  The reality is that sex is pretty much always a compromise, no matter who is involved.  Compromise isn’t limited to asexuals.

Often, one partner will want sex more often than the other.

Often, one partner will like certain things more than the other.

Often, one partner will want it to last longer than the other.

Often, one partner will want their partner to do things their partner isn’t interested in doing.

And so on.

That’s where compromise comes in.  You say “I’ll do that, if you do this”.  You say “Not tonight, but maybe later”.  You say “I’m not a fan of that, but I’ll try this”.  Compromise should be fairly balanced, it’s not about one person getting their way entirely.

And compromise should never involve you feeling forced to do things you absolutely refuse to do.  If you do not, under any circumstances, want to do a certain thing, then do not do it.  And if your “do not, under any circumstances” thing happens to be having sex at all, then don’t have sex.

As with any negotiations, there may be deal breakers that cause the parties involved to walk away.  If you do not want to have sex at all, or do not want to have sex in the way that your partner desires, and that’s a major issue for your partner, then you may have a fundamentally incompatible relationship, and everyone involve might be better off with a break up.  You shouldn’t have sex just to save a relationship, because relationships that need sex to “save” them usually can’t be saved.

Do I have to know what to do?

Despite the myths, no one is born instinctually knowing how to have amazing sex.  Even non-asexual people are generally clueless about exactly what to do when they first try it.  Your partner probably won’t mind your inexperience.  You should feel free to ask them for guidance or have them tell you what things they like.  You’re allowed to need to figure things out.

You’re also allowed to do research ahead of time.  There are a number of trustworthy websites that provide information and advice on sex.  You don’t have to memorize the Kama Sutra and the collected works of Dr. Ruth, just get familiar with some of the basics. You can also talk about what to expect with your partner.

Which brings me to…

It’s okay to plan ahead of time.

Sex does not have to be some completely spontaneous, unplanned event.  Some people find that they’re more comfortable with what’s going on if they have some idea of where it is leading and what will happen next.  You are allowed to plan as much or as little as you want.  You can pick the date and time.  You can pick the location.  You can decide what you’re interested in doing.  You can decide the sequence of events.  You can involve your partner in this planning, or keep it to yourself, if you’d rather.  And you’re allowed to change your plans after you get started.

Will I have to make noise when I have sex?

Porn and pop culture often make sex out to be a noisy scream-fest, with all sorts of moaning and exclamations going on.  It doesn’t have to be like that.  Sex can be as quiet or as loud as you want it to be.  If you’re uncomfortable with moaning, screaming, or “talking dirty”, you don’t have to do any of that.  Sounds can be used as a way for communicate with your partner, but a simple, quiet “yes” or “mmm” is often enough to get the point across.

Is it okay to give myself a “helping hand”?

When having sex, you are allowed to stimulate yourself if you want to.  In some cases, the actions of your partner may not be getting the job done, or you might want to be stimulated in a certain place in a certain way.  There’s nothing wrong with taking care of yourself.  It does not mean that your partner is inadequate or that your asexuality prevents you from feeling something.  Many non-asexual people will also stimulate themselves during sex.

Is it okay to have an orgasm during sex, even if I’m asexual?

There’s a strange misconception that if an asexual person is having sex, that they can’t get anything out of it themselves.  Like if they have an orgasm, it means they’re not asexual.  As a result, an asexual having sex is supposed to simply lie there and do whatever their partner wants and not feel any pleasure from it.

Nonsense.

If you want to have an orgasm while having sex, then it’s okay to have an orgasm during sex.  Have two or three or fourteen if that’s what you want.  Orgasm is an experience of physical pleasure that has nothing to do with your orientation.

But do I have to have an orgasm?

On the other hand, if orgasm isn’t your thing or you don’t want one at the moment, you don’t have to have one.  There’s another misconception that sex is a failure unless everyone has an orgasm, but that is not the case.  Sex can be satisfying and successful even if you don’t get off.  If you don’t want one, clearly communicate to your partner how you feel, and let them know that it’s okay if you don’t have one and that you’d rather not have them try.

Do I have to try it to know for sure that I’m asexual?

If you don’t want to have sex, you don’t have to try it in order to “prove” that you really don’t want to.  You know you don’t want to, and that’s enough.  Think of it this way.  You don’t have to go rock climbing to know you’re not interested in rock climbing.  You don’t have to stick your hand in a vat full of spiders and millipedes to know you’d find that unpleasant.  It’s possible to know that you don’t want to do something without doing it.

For the most part, having sex won’t change you.  It won’t make you taller, it won’t make you stronger, it won’t make you smarter, it won’t make you smell like honeysuckle, it won’t give you the ability to fly or see through walls or turn invisible.  You’ll get a few experience points, but that’s it.  You’ll still be you and you’ll still be asexual.

I’m not aware of anyone who has had sex and suddenly decided that they’re not actually asexual after all.  They may decide that they enjoyed it.  They might be willing to do it again.  But it’s unlikely that it will fundamentally change you and make you not ace anymore.

If I try it once, to I have to keep doing it?

If you have sex once, it doesn’t permanently flip a switch inside that makes you obligated to have sex over and over again.  If you try it and realize that you’re not a fan, you don’t have to do it again.  If that upsets your partner, that’s their problem to deal with.  Having sex with someone once does not guarantee a repeat in the future.

Will my partner understand that I’m asexual?

Your partner will probably want sex more than you.

Your partner may not understand why you’re not interested in sex.

Your partner may decide that a lack of sex is a relationship deal-breaker.

Your partner may want to do things you’re uncomfortable with.

Your partner may wish you felt differently about sex.

Your partner may feel that you don’t love them because you won’t sleep with them or because you don’t find them attractive.

Here’s the thing:  All of those issues can happen in any relationship, not just one where one of the partners is asexual.

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An Asexual’s Guide To …

There are some topics that I see turn up repeatedly in asexual spaces, yet I rarely see them explored to any great extent.  “An Asexual’s Guide To …” was born out of a desire to explore some of those topics.  In this series, I aim to go in depth into topics that many aces are curious about, but are reluctant to explore.  There are certainly other sites out there that talk about these subjects, but they rarely approach them from an asexual point of view.  Often, in fact, these topics are discussed in a manner that is alienating to asexual people.

In the coming pages, I will be direct and detailed about the topics I’m discussing.  My intent is to bring these subjects into the open and talk about them without shame or squeamishness or stigma.

An Asexual’s Guide To … AnatomyThis post starts you on a tour of your body.

An Asexual’s Guide To … Female Anatomy:  This post takes you on a tour of a body that’s generally characterized as having a clitoris and vagina.

An Asexual’s Guide To … Male Anatomy:  This post takes you on a tour of a body that’s generally characterized as having a penis and testicles.

An Asexual’s Guide To … Arousal:  This post talks about what arousal is and what it does to your body.

An Asexual’s Guide To … Orgasms:  This post talks about orgasms, what they are and what they aren’t.

An Asexual’s Guide To … Masturbation:  This post talks about masturbation, what it is and what it’s like.

An Asexual’s Guide To … Male Masturbation:  This post talks about masturbation with a male body, including a basic how-to.

An Asexual’s Guide To … Female Masturbation:  This post talks about masturbation with a female body, including a basic how-to.

An Asexual’s Guide To … Having Sex:  This post talks about having sex with a partner.

Disclaimers and such:

I’ve written much of this series in the second person.  This is to make it more conversational and less formal in tone.  However, this does not necessarily mean that you, personally, will have all the bits and pieces exactly as described or that you’ll feel everything that’s described.  If something says “you”, but it doesn’t match you, don’t worry about it too much.  Everyone is different and most variations are completely natural and don’t mean anything is wrong.  Unfortunately, these posts can’t cover everyone’s experiences.  It’s simply impossible to do that.  While I’ve tried to include a wide range of perspectives, there will undoubtedly be some of you who disagree with or feel left out or alienated or are offended by some of what I say.  For that I apologize.

In cases where “male” or “female” are used, they are used to refer to physical sex, not gender.

Also, note that the title of the series is “An Asexual’s Guide To …”, not “The Asexual Guide To …”.  Although I have invited input from a number of people, the writing and the viewpoint within is still just mine, and should not be taken as the official view of every single asexual ever.  I could very well be wrong or uninformed about a lot of things.

And, of course, I’m not a doctor.  Don’t use this site as a substitute for a qualified medical opinion on any issue.

An Asexual’s Guide To … Orgasms

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What’s an orgasm?

An orgasm, also known as “coming” or “climax”, is the peak of the sexual response cycle, and is typically the result of sexual stimulation of some form.  An orgasm is usually considered pleasurable, and will often be accompanied by a series of rhythmic contractions in the genital muscles.  Before an orgasm, tension is built up, and after the orgasm, there is usually a sense of relief and relaxation as that tension fades away.

That sounds complicated.  Care to try again, in English this time?

Okay…  If your bits down below are touched in the right way for a while, you’ll start to feel a building pressure downstairs.  As that pressure builds, muscles all over your body begin to tense up.  Suddenly, your bits down below may start to feel really good, as the muscles contract and release over and over a couple of times.  After that, as the good feeling fades, you feel relaxed all over.

At least that’s one way it could happen.  The reality is that it’s different each time and different for every person.

Can you be a bit more specific about what happens when I have an orgasm?

Prior to the orgasm, you will generally start feeling a pleasurable sensation down below.  That sensation will usually react to stimulation.  If you do one thing, it may feel better, but if you do something else, you may lose it entirely.  Together with this pleasurable feeling, there will start to be a feeling of a build up of a sort.  It’s not really pressure, nothing really feels like it’s pushing.  It’s more of a sensation that something is going to happen, but that you have to work for it, kinda like your body is riding a bike up a hill, or like your body is a stretched rubber band about to snap.  Muscles all over your body may start to clench or twitch.  Your pulse will likely quicken and your rate of breathing will probably change.

As you get closer, your back may arch and your legs may stiffen.  Your toes may curl and your face may also contort.  You might bite your lip, you might close your eyes.  The muscles in your genitals may rapidly contract or pulse at this point, but usually without any kind of rhythm or pattern.  The pleasure in your genitals will probably increase.

Sometimes on the path to orgasm, it may feel like you have to pee, and that you will pee if you keep going.  You probably won’t.  It’s just a side effect of all the muscles and plumbing being intertwined down there.  Take it as a sign that you’re on the right track and keep going.  Of course, if you’re concerned, you might want to continue somewhere that’s easy to clean or put a towel down.  It probably isn’t necessary, though.  (And if you’re the owner of a penis, there’s a good bet that you know just how hard it is to pee with an erection.  That’s because some internal valves close off specifically so that you can’t pee during orgasm.)

Immediately before the orgasm, there will be a moment where everything suddenly changes.  This is known as the point of no return.  Before this point, if you stopped all stimulation, you’d likely return to an unaroused state without having an orgasm.  But after this point, you’re on the glide path to orgasm and it’s almost guaranteed to happen, no matter what.

After the point of no return, you go on autopilot for a bit.  Your body will mostly go rigid and you are carried along for the ride.  A spike in the level of pleasure usually happens at the same time, and the pleasure may radiate outward from your genitals over the rest of your body.  The orgasm has begun.

During the orgasm, the muscles downstairs will pulse rhythmically for several seconds.  These pulses are rapid and strong at first, but quickly become weaker and further apart.  Usually, each pulse brings another wave of pleasure.

As the pulses die away, the orgasm fades, and you are typically left feeling deeply relaxed with a sense of satisfaction.  This is sometimes called the afterglow.  Your genitals will often become hypersensitive at this point, so much so that the same touch that may have been blissfully euphoric just moments before will leave you squirming in discomfort.  All the muscles that had become tense will gradually relax. The sex flush, if you had one, will disappear.  The erection of your genitals will usually fade, the aroused sensitivity of your genitals will go away, and your heart rate and breathing will return to normal.

In some cases, you might drift off into a half asleep state and lay there for several minutes as you let the relaxation take you away.  In other cases, it may only last a few seconds and you’re ready to clean up and go about your day.

In many cases, it will be difficult to remain aroused after an orgasm, and you may not be able to become re-aroused for some time.  This is called the refractory period, and can vary in time from minutes to days.

You may have noticed that this description of an orgasm did not really contain many references to specific pieces of anatomy.  That’s because, for the most part, the experience of an orgasm is the same, regardless of the body you have.  There are, of course, a few differences, which I’ll note here:

The biggest difference between male and female orgasm is that males will typically experience ejaculation at the same time as the orgasm.  Ejaculation is where semen squirts out of your penis, through the urethra.  Semen is a whitish fluid that varies in consistency from watery to thick, kinda like glue.  Semen contains sperm, which is the male ingredient in babymaking, so if you’re not interested in babymaking, keep it a safe distance away from a vulva (or contained within a condom). There’s usually only a few milliliters of the stuff, but the amount will vary every time.  If you ejaculate frequently, there will often be less of it than if you don’t ejaculate for several days.  The rhythmic pulses during an orgasm will contract the muscles in such away that semen is pumped out of your penis.  The force with which it comes out will be different every time.  Sometimes, it’s a dribble, sometimes it’ll go an inch or two, but it’s not unheard of for the ejaculate to land several feet away.  There is no way to predict beforehand precisely how much semen there will be or how far it will end up going.  It should be noted that ejaculation is not the same as orgasm, and it is possible for one to occur without the other.

Also, during orgasm in a male, your testicles are likely to pull close to your body.  You may not always be aware of this happening.  It’s also important to note that although the testicles are where sperm is produced, the testicles themselves are not really involved in ejaculation.  They don’t work to pump out the semen or anything like that.

For a female, the contractions in your vagina may push out some of the lubricating fluids that had built up, so you may suddenly feel wetter downstairs.  Additionally, sometimes there will be another fluid that squirts out in a process known as female ejaculation.  This fluid is not urine.  Female ejaculation does not happen all the time and does not happen to everyone, so don’t worry if it’s never happened to you.

The more you experience orgasms, the more you’ll become aware of all of these different things happening.  And not all of the things I’ve mentioned happen every time.

How do I know if I’ve had one?

If you had one, you’d know.

Really, though, that’s a cheap cop-out of an answer.  I mean, if you haven’t had one, then you have no way of knowing whether or not you’ve had one, because you know know if you’ve felt what you’d supposedly know that you felt.  So you end up thinking “Maybe I’ve had one”, and assigning the word “orgasm” to things that aren’t really an orgasm.  It’s a bit like how people say the same thing about sexual attraction, which bugs us aces to no end.

The real answer is that if you’ve experienced a combination of the sensations that I mentioned in the last question, then you’ve probably had an orgasm.  Not every orgasm feels the same, though.  If it just sort of felt good, but then it felt like you hit a wall and couldn’t get any further, you probably didn’t have an orgasm.  If you had a sudden wave of pleasure, and some rhythmic genital muscle spasms, but your facial muscles didn’t contort and your legs didn’t go stiff, then you probably did have an orgasm.  If the sensations kinda just drifted away without any sense of a peak or a climax, you probably didn’t have an orgasm.  If your body shifted from feeling tense to suddenly deeply relaxed and satisfied, with a brief feeling like you were on autopilot in between, you probably had an orgasm.

The pleasure isn’t always intense and the rhythmic contractions aren’t always that strong, but in general, even the most lackluster and disappointing orgasm feels like something distinct happened.

Can asexuals have orgasms?

Yep.  Next question.

But wait, how can someone have an orgasm and still claim they’re asexual?

Because orgasms have nothing to do with sexual orientation.  They’re a response to physical and mental stimulation, they don’t require that you be sexually attracted to someone in order for them to work.  It’s body parts doing what they do.

Having an orgasm does not make you less ace.

Having an orgasm does not make you a bad ace.

It’s okay to have an orgasm, even if you’re asexual.

It’s okay to want to have an orgasm, even if you’re asexual.

It’s okay to enjoy an orgasm, even if you’re asexual.

Can an asexual have an orgasm during sex with someone else?

Yes. Just because someone isn’t attracted to their partner, it doesn’t mean that their body physically shuts down.  You may not think your partner is hot, but if they touch you in the right way, you’re probably going to respond.

On the flip side, if you don’t have an orgasm during sex, that’s not necessarily because you’re asexual.  It could be because you were nervous, it could be because your partner needs more guidance about what works for you, it could be because you were so concerned that being asexual meant that you wouldn’t enjoy sex that you inadvertently stopped yourself from being able to enjoy sex.  It could be anything.  In fact, many non-asexual people are unable to have an orgasm during sex, either.  In many of these cases, an orgasm can be obtained by understanding how your body responds, then telling your partner what you need and doing it yourself if you have to.

Can an asexual have an orgasm through masturbation?

Yes. Masturbation has nothing to do with sexual orientation.  I’ll talk about that in more detail in another post.

How do I have an orgasm?

Masturbation is probably the easiest, most convenient, and most reliable way.  Particularly for asexuals, who may not feel comfortable or interested in being sexually involved with a partner.  Masturbation allows you to have full control over the experience, so you can instantly do whatever feels best at the moment, without having to attempt to communicate what you mean by “a tiny bit faster and slightly less pressure, a quarter inch to the left” to a partner.

Sexual activity with a partner is another way, although this way is more hit and miss.  In particular, many times, penis-in-vagina sex alone is not enough to cause an orgasm for the person with the vagina.  It’s not because you’re asexual and don’t respond to sex like other people.  It’s because the vagina is not really all that sensitive.  Non-asexual people are in the same boat.  Quite frequently, clitoral stimulation of some kind is required.  Don’t be afraid to direct your partner to pay attention to your clitoris during sex, and don’t be afraid to take matters into your own hand, so to speak, and touch yourself.  (If your partner balks at this and thinks that their magic penis is enough to get you off by itself, well, then they’re a lousy sex partner who needs to watch less porn and try reading up on how your body works.  A good sex partner will welcome your pleasure, even if it comes through an assist.)

Of course, penis-in-vagina intercourse isn’t the only kind of partnered sexual activity there is.  Oral sex is often effective, regardless of the equipment involved.  Anal sex is another option, but it’s often orgasmically one-sided.  Mutual masturbation will work most of the time.  Frottage, dry humping, and countless other outercourse techniques can lead to orgasms.  Even a massage may lead to an orgasm, if the conditions are right.  And I’m sure there are many other ways that two or more people can give each other orgasms.

In some cases, orgasms can happen on their own.  Wet dreams may happen while you sleep.  Exercise may cause you to move your muscles in just the right way.  Riding a horse or a bicycle might unintentionally stimulate your bits downstairs.  Driving along a rough and bumpy road might cause the right kind of vibrations.  Wearing tight clothes might make your underwear rub against you in a certain way.  And sometimes, very rarely, one might just happen out of the blue.

I’ve heard that orgasms are the best, most amazing feeling ever.  Is this true?

Probably not.  People tend to overstate how good orgasms feel.  They usually feel pretty good, but if you’re expecting a life-changing, earth-shattering bolt of lightning that’ll leave you quivering in ecstasy for two solid hours, well, that probably won’t happen.

But if it does, congratulations!

Do orgasms all feel the same?

No, they don’t.

For most people, the experience of orgasm ranges between “Meh, that could’ve been better” to “Wow, I think I just caused an earthquake in New Zealand!”.  Most of the time, it sits between “That was okay” and “That was pretty good”.  Not all orgasms are of the rockets and fireworks variety.

Many factors contribute to how an orgasm feels.  How aroused you are, how relaxed you are, how comfortable you are, what’s on your mind, how long it’s been since your last orgasm, how your genitals are being stimulated, how long you’ve been aroused.  All of these things and more will affect your orgasm.

Your orgasm may be weak and only last for two seconds, or it may be strong and have a minute and a half of aftershocks.  You might shift your body at the last moment and ruin the whole thing, or you might shift your body and push the orgasm into overdrive.

As you have more orgasms and learn what works best for you and how your body responds, you’ll be more likely to have fewer “Meh, that could’ve been betters” and more “That was pretty goods”, with the occasional “New Zealand Earthquake” that you’ll remember for weeks.

Are orgasms the only part of sexual activity that feel good?

In most cases, no.  The stimulation leading up to the orgasm is often quite pleasant.  It’s not like the genitals are completely numb and lifeless until BAM! an orgasm hits you out of the blue.  The road to orgasm is usually a build up of pleasurable feelings, with the orgasm at the peak.

Some people will even intentionally delay an orgasm, so that they can continue to  remain in the pre-orgasm pleasure zone.  This is called edging, because you’re riding the edge of an orgasm.  In order to delay an orgasm, you have to have a fairly good sense about when you’re going to have one.  Then, before you reach the point of no return, slow down or stop the stimulation for a bit until your body backs off the edge before continuing.  Often, the pleasure builds and becomes more intense the longer you go, and in some cases, it can end up being stronger than the orgasm is.

If I have an orgasm, can anyone tell?

That depends.  If someone walks in on you, when you’re sprawled on your bed, lost in the afterglow, then yes, they probably can tell.  If haven’t cleaned up the physical evidence, then yes, they probably can tell.  In most other cases, no, they can’t.  There’s not some post-orgasmic change in the way you walk, you don’t get a slight accent, you don’t smell like lavender, you don’t give off a faint blue glow, you don’t have a freckle on your cheek that’s visible for five and a half hours following an orgasm.  There’s no physical signs that say “I just had an orgasm”.

Can I have more than one?

Multiple orgasms are possible, regardless of the equipment you have.  It takes practice and should be considered an “advanced technique”, so don’t expect to have thirteen orgasms the first time you masturbate.  Reportedly, it’s easier for people with a clitoris, although penis owners can have multiple orgasms, as well, despite what some people claim.

The question that’s often asked about multiple orgasms is why would anyone ever stop if they could just keep having orgasms.  There are two answers:  First, sometimes you just feel like you’ve had enough.  It’s a bit like eating pieces of a candy from a candy bowl.  Yes, they’re good, and no, you’re not full, so you could have more, but you’re just done, so you stop.  Second, sometimes your body will stop you.  After one of the orgasms in the chain, you’ll lose the arousal and your genitals will lose their sensitivity.  It’s like everything gets turned off downstairs.  No matter what you do, it just won’t restart.

Can I have too many?

No.  And yes.

No, you can’t physically have too many orgasms.  The refractory period generally puts a time delay between orgasms, and it’s usually more difficult to reach each subsequent orgasm within a few hours.  In other words, you might think that it would be awesome to try to have five orgasms one day, but you might find that they become more trouble than they’re worth after the third.  (Five is just an example.  Your desire and/or ability may vary.)

You don’t have a limited number of orgasms, so you’re not going to run out if you use them too fast.  For males, you might have a limited amount of semen per day, but that just means you’ll ejaculate less.  You don’t need semen to have an orgasm.  Besides, it’ll be refilled by tomorrow anyway.

And yes, you can have too many orgasms.  If time devoted to having orgasms is affecting other things, like work, school, friendships, guitar practice, etc., then give it a rest.  Also, if you start to feel sore down below, that’s your body’s way of saying that you should just watch TV instead.

What happens if I can’t have one?

Try again or try something different.  Read what works for other people.  Try using a toy, like a vibrator.  Many people who were unable to have an orgasm, even though they’d been trying for years, eventually discovered something that worked for them.

Oh, and if you have a female body, focus on the clitoris, not the vagina.  The clitoris is more sensitive and far more likely to produce an orgasm than the vagina is.

If you’ve gotten to the point where it feels like nothing is going to work, talk to a doctor or a therapist.  They may be able to help you.

I don’t really want to have an orgasm.  Do I have to have one?

No.  If you don’t want to have an orgasm, you do not have to have one.  You’re not going to burst from some sort of unreleased sexual energy, there isn’t some kind of fluid build-up that needs to be regulated.  If you never have an orgasm, you’ll be just fine.

Even if you’re engaged in some sort of sexual activity, whether by yourself or with a partner, you can stop at any time if you decide you don’t want to have an orgasm.

If you’re aroused and you don’t have an orgasm, you may occasionally feel an uncomfortable heaviness or dull ache in your genitals.  This is called vasocongestion, sometimes referred to as “blue balls” (although people without testicles can experience it, too).  It is harmless and will go away on its own in a few minutes.  Essentially, it’s like a traffic jam in your blood vessels down below.  When aroused, your bits filled with blood, and now that you’re no longer aroused, the show’s over and all the blood tries to leave at the same time.  Not everyone experiences this.

If you don’t like orgasms or don’t want to have one, there’s nothing wrong with you.  It’s your body, and you get to decide what you do with it.  Whether or not you like orgasms is your preference.  Some people don’t like Thai food, some people don’t like to travel, some people don’t like listening to synthpop music, and some people don’t like orgasms, and there’s nothing wrong with that.

That description of having an orgasm you gave sounds horrifying!  Losing control of my body, having muscle spasms everywhere, increased heart rate, irregular breathing, and maybe even spurting fluids…  Why would I ever want to have that happen to me?

Yeah, good point…

When you write out the mechanical effects of an orgasm, it really does sound like the symptoms of some terrible disease.  Thing is, most of those effects serve to heighten the experience.  When the muscles tense or your legs stiffen or your face contorts, it feels sorta good, like a nice stretch.  It’s not really pleasure, at least not on the same level as the pleasure that’s centered in the genitals, but it feels good.

The changes in breathing, biting your lip, closing your eyes, all that tends to enhance what you’re feeling.  When the muscles down below begin to pulse, each pulse may bring with it a surge of pleasure.

And when you go on autopilot, it’s less like you lose control of your body and more like your body is taking you for a ride.  You’re carried along by the sensations, it’s not like some alien force is making your body do things against your will.  You never really lose control of your entire body.  Most of the things that I mentioned can be overcome if you don’t want them to happen.  A lot of them you might do semi-voluntarily, because you want to, because they feel good.  The rhythmic pulsing of your genitals is about the only part that really feels involuntarily, but since it usually comes with rhythmic pulses of “That Feels Good”, it’s typically not a big deal.

A lot of people compare this autopilot sensation to a sneeze.  When you sneeze, a lot of muscles do a lot of things on their own in a short amount of time.  An orgasm is a bit like that, except it usually feels considerably better than a sneeze.

However, if you go into the experience thinking that an orgasm is comparable to contracting ebola, then you’re almost guaranteed not to enjoy any of it, no matter what happens.  A huge component of an orgasm, indeed, of the entire arousal experience, is mental, so if you have a preconceived notion that it’s going to be terrible, then it will be.

Do they ever happen on their own?

Sometimes, yes.  It most often happens when you’re sleeping.  These are called wet dreams or nocturnal emissions.  It probably won’t happen every night, and it doesn’t happen to everyone.  In many cases, you won’t even know it happened, unless there’s evidence left behind in your underwear.  You may not wake up when it happens, and you probably weren’t having a “sexy” dream.  Wet dreams are often viewed as a male only issue, but females can have them too.  It’s just the male side gets more attention, because ejaculation tends to leave behind an embarrassing annoyance, while on the female side, the vaginal lubrication, if present, tends to just dry up and go away.

In other, much rarer cases, it’s possible for someone who’s awake to have an orgasm out of the blue, without any intent or stimulation.

I’ve seen orgasms in porn.  Will mine be like that?

Almost certainly not.

It’s very important to remember that porn is scripted and staged.  It’s usually designed to appeal to the stereotypical horny male fantasy.  As a result, much of what you see is exaggerated and embellished for effect.  Female orgasms in porn are typically faked, and are more often the result of the director looking at their watch and saying “okay, time to come”, than the result of any kind of stimulation.  You’re probably not going to scream and moan and writhe uncontrollably…  then act like nothing happened two seconds later.  Male orgasms aren’t usually faked completely (although it can be done…), but they’re also not representative of a typical male orgasm.  In many cases, the volume and force of the ejaculation is considerably higher than average.  In fact, there’s a good chance that the performers work in the pornographic industry because of those qualities.  In some cases, the penis you see in the money shot isn’t even the one that’s attached to the performer you saw in the rest of the scene, and that replacement performer was brought in specifically to ejaculate for the scene.

Real orgasms do sometimes appear in porn, but it’s somewhat rare, because for the most part, real orgasms don’t play well on camera.

I’m not really a fan of my genitals.  Can I have an orgasm without touching them?

Yes, but I’ll cover that in the masturbation post.

I’m not really a fan of fluids.  Can I have an orgasm without dealing with them?

Yes, but I’ll cover that in the masturbation post, too.

Are there any health benefits from having an orgasm?

It may help you sleep.

It may help you relax.

It may relieve tension or stress.

It may relieve a headache.

It may relieve period pain.

It may improve your mood.

There are some claims that regular male ejaculation helps reduce the risk of prostate cancer.

But, and here’s the thing, none of those benefits are worth having an orgasm if you’re not interested in having orgasms or if you find them unpleasant.  Even that prostate cancer one.  Sure, prostate cancer is bad.  But, do you really think you’d be better off if you do something you loathe more than 21 times a month (The amount that’s said to give the greatest reduction in risk), every month for the rest of your life?  What impact will the stress that produces have on your quality of life?  Not to mention that, for most people reading this, there’s probably still at least 30-40 years until you’re likely to be affected by prostate cancer.  You don’t think that they’ll have better treatments, maybe even a cure by then?

Think of it like the claims that drinking red wine are good for your heart.  That’s fine, if you drink red wine now and then.  But if you don’t drink, they’re usually very clear that you shouldn’t bother to start drinking just for those heart health benefits, because they’re really not that great.  Doctors aren’t going to prescribe an orgasm for headaches or insomnia.  If you don’t want to have an orgasm, don’t force yourself to, just because of some supposed health benefits.

How often should I have an orgasm?

As often as you want to.  Some people never have them, others people have more than one a day.  Some people have a few a year, others have a few a week.  And some people have a few every couple of months.  Sometimes people have a bunch one week, then none for a few weeks.  It’s all up to you.  There is no “correct” amount of orgasms to have, there’s no number you “should” be having.  If your friend has three a month, and you have three a day, there’s nothing wrong with you or with your friend.

Will I make any noise when I have an orgasm?

Maybe, maybe not.  The stereotypical screaming moaning orgasm is usually just an act.  Most people can have mostly silent orgasms if they want to, and typically don’t have a highly vocal production in any case.  That’s not to say there aren’t sounds.  There’s often the sound of the motion that produces the orgasm, whether that be a moving hand, a creaking bed, or a buzzing toy.  Then, there can also be audible changes in breathing or slight gasps.  Soft moans are common, but are often controllable.

Then again, if screaming and moaning is your thing, go for it.

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An Asexual’s Guide To … Anatomy

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While working on the “Asexual’s Guide To …” series, I realized that it would be helpful to give an overview of anatomy, so that all readers will have a common reference point.  (Even those readers who slept through or skipped out on their eighth grade sex-ed class…)  Not an overview of general anatomy, mind you.  I’m not going to talk about your philtrum or your medial phalanges here.  Specifically, I’m going to act as the tour guide as we travel to the points of interest found in the land of genitalia, along with other potentially erogenous zones.

This isn’t meant to be a comprehensive review of reproductive biology.  There are other sites about all that stuff.  Here, I’m going to focus mostly on what you can see and touch and what’s relevant to the rest of the series.  (By the way, if you’re not already familiar with what’s downstairs, and if you’re able to safely and comfortably do so, I encourage you actually look at and touch the bits and pieces you own as we go along.  You might even want to get a mirror to get a look at the harder to see bits.  It’s your body, so you might as well know where things are on it.  But if you’d rather not, that’s perfectly okay, too.)

Since asexuality has no physical effects, there’s nothing specific about asexuality that’s going to be discussed in this post.  So, if you already know your way around the land down under, you can skip this without worrying about missing out on anything.

And finally, I’m going to write this talking to “you” in the second person.  That does not necessarily imply that you actually do have all of the pieces and parts that I’m going to talk about.

A Few Notes Before We Begin

These are just a few things I’d like to get out of the way before continuing with the tour.

  • Don’t worry about the size or shape of your genitals or any other part of your body.  You’re not in competition with anyone else.  Most people aren’t going to care about your endowments.  There isn’t going to be a day where everyone with a short cock or flat chest is going to be rounded up and kicked off the island.  Fretting over matters of size will get you nowhere.  There’s always going to be someone bigger than you and there’s always going to be someone smaller than you, so it’s best to be comfortable with where you are and not worry about measuring up to others.
  • Porn lies to you.  I’m not saying that as some kind of moral stand against pornography.  I’m saying it as objective truth.  Many performers in porn are in porn specifically because they’re several standard deviations away from most other people.  Comparing your body to people in porn is a bit like trying to determine whether or not you’re in good shape by comparing yourself to a Super Bowl Quarterback.  It’s very unfortunate that the most readily available source of anatomical references is pornography.
  • If it hurts, STOP.  Nothing I mention should be the source of pain.  If something does hurt, you’re either doing it wrong or you should consult a doctor about the pain.
  • If you have any questions whether something is “normal” or if you think that something may be a sign of some medical condition, talk to a doctor.  This is just an article by some random guy on the Internet who has absolutely no medical training (I didn’t even take high school biology), and should not be considered an accurate and reliable source of medical information.  If in doubt, get it checked out.  It could save your life.
  • And most importantly, please remain seated and keep your hands and arms inside the car until the ride comes to a full and complete stop.

I’ve stuck most of the content on separate pages, so you don’t have to scroll around the page to find what applies to you.

An Asexual’s Guide To … Male Anatomy  (For most men, most boys, and anyone else who happens to have a penis.)

An Asexual’s Guide To … Female Anatomy (For most women, most girls, and anyone else who happens to have a clitoris and/or vagina.)

But wait!  There’s more!

So, while most people fit into nice, orderly buckets of “female bodied” or “male bodied”, not everyone does.  Some intersex people are born with ambiguous genitalia, that is, genitals that do not fit into the preconceived notions regarding how large a clitoris or penis should be.  Unfortunately, intersex infants are often subjected to “corrective” genital surgery because of this.  Some transgender people choose to physically transition in order to make their physical sex match their gender.  This can involve surgery or hormones to change the body.

Unfortunately, it would be impossible for me to go into detail about all of these possible variations of anatomical configuration here.  In many cases, there will be enough similarities between your body and what’s described in the sections above to be helpful.  However, if you are intersex or are transitioning, there’s a very good chance that you know more about your anatomy than I could ever teach you, anyway.  For the rest of you who are merely curious about these cases, there are other, more specific resources out there that can give you the information you want.

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An Asexual’s Guide To … Arousal

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What’s this “Arousal” thing I’ve heard of?

Sexual arousal, the type of arousal I’m talking about here, is the body preparing itself for sexual activity of some kind.  It doesn’t mean that you have to do anything, and it doesn’t mean you want to do anything.  It’s just your body saying “Hey, there might be sex about to happen.  I should probably get ready for that, just in case.”  Of course, in some cases, your body isn’t grounded in reality and will end up getting aroused all by itself, for no reason at all.

Arousal is also called being “turned on” because it is, in a way, like your genitals (and other areas, like the nipples) have been turned on or activated.  Most of the time, your genitals are in a kind of sleep mode, where they don’t really feel any different or respond to touch more than any other part of your body.  For instance, most people with a penis don’t have to fight off an orgasm every time they step up to a urinal.  Arousal is the state where these body parts become more sensitive and more receptive to touch and other stimulation.

Can an asexual get aroused?

For the most part, yes.  Arousal is a physical response, and it does not require sexual attraction.  Aces may be less likely to become aroused in certain situations (for instance, when someone who’s “hot” walks by), but if an asexual cannot get aroused at all, then there is likely something other than asexuality at work and consulting a doctor might be in order.

But doesn’t arousal mean someone isn’t asexual?

Of course not!  Arousal in no way contradicts, counteracts, or invalidates asexuality.  One of the triggers of sexual arousal is sexual attraction, but there are countless other triggers that have nothing to do with attraction of any kind.  Arousal does not mean that someone is thinking about sex, wants sex, or has experienced sexual attraction.  It just means that certain body parts are exhibiting their typical functionality.

It’s perfectly fine for an asexual to become aroused.

It’s perfectly fine for an asexual to want to become aroused.

It’s perfectly fine for an asexual to enjoy being aroused.

It’s perfectly fine for an asexual to take steps to become aroused.

It’s perfectly fine for an asexual to become aroused by someone else.

It’s perfectly fine for an asexual to not want to become aroused.

It’s perfectly fine for an asexual to be curious about arousal.

It’s perfectly fine for an asexual to not care about arousal.

We’re not going to take away your Ace Club Membership Card if you’re ever aroused, and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise (particularly if that someone is not asexual themselves).

How can I tell if I’m aroused?

If you’re wet and/or hard downstairs, it’s a good bet you’re aroused.

I’m not sure I understand.  Can you be a bit more specific about what happens when I’m aroused?

Blood flows to the genitals.  This “fills up” or “inflates” certain areas.  Your genitals may feel “full” or “warm” or “heavy”.

For a female body, this means your labia will enlarge, the walls of your vagina will swell, and your clitoris will become erect, which means that it’ll get bigger and harder, and may come out of hiding from under its hood.  Your nipples may also get hard.

For a male body, this means that your penis will become erect, which means that it’ll get bigger and harder and stand up on its own.  This is often the most noticeable sign of arousal in a male body, which is why many people refer to arousal as “getting hard”. If you have a foreskin, the head of the penis may emerge from the foreskin.  Your nipples may also get hard.

Your genitals will likely be more sensitive and receptive to touch.  This doesn’t necessarily mean that it suddenly feels good if something touches them (although it can), but it does mean that you’re more likely to notice if something touches them.  In some cases, you might feel a muscle twitch in response to a touch.  In many cases, it will start to feel good after a while if you do touch your genitals at this point.  That’s called masturbation, and will be covered in a different post.

Your genitals may change color.  They’re probably not going to turn bright green or radioactive fuchsia or anything like that, but they may get darker or turn redder or purple.  They may not change color uniformly, either.  The head of the clitoris or the penis may change while nothing else does.

Your genitals may become lubricated.  This lubrication is a somewhat thick, slippery, clear fluid.  It is not urine.  There’s usually not a large amount of this fluid, although the more you’re aroused or the longer you’re aroused, the more of it there will typically be.  If you pinch some of it between your fingers, then pull your fingers apart, the fluid may form a string between your fingers.

For a male body, there may be a small amount of lubricating fluid that flows out of the tip of the penis.  This is called pre-ejaculate fluid, also known as precum.  It won’t come out in a stream, like urine, or a spurt, like semen.  Instead, a few drops at a time will flow from the urethra.  This fluid is often not produced right away after becoming aroused.  It is not the same as semen and does not typically contain sperm.  In some cases, you may even produce this fluid without an erection, if you have been at a low level of arousal for a while.  It doesn’t always happen, and doesn’t happen for everyone, so don’t worry if you don’t have any.

For a female body, the walls of the vagina may become lubricated.   This is often the most noticeable sign of arousal in a female body, which is why many people refer to arousal as “getting wet”.  As the vagina becomes lubricated, the fluid may spread to the rest of the vulva area.

Your pulse and rate of breathing may increase.

You may get a “sex flush”, which looks a bit like you’re blushing, but it’s primarily on your chest.  Don’t worry if you don’t have this happen, though.  Many people do not.

None of these changes are permanent.  As the arousal subsides, all of these changes will go away, whether or not you’ve had an orgasm.

I may get “hard”?  Like concrete?

It’s not actually like that at all.  Your genitals won’t feel like they’re solid all of a sudden.  It actually feels more firm, kinda like a muscle.  Harder than usual, yes, but still with some give to it.

Since it’s called being “turned on”, does that mean I’ll get aroused instantly?

Although it’s called being “turned on”, it’s less like turning on a light and more like turning on an oven.  It may take a while for everything to warm up.  You may not always be aware of the early stages of arousal, though.

How long does arousal last?

Anywhere from a few seconds to several hours.  It all depends on what you do.  If you ignore the arousal and stop any kind of stimulation (including of the mental kind) that might be contributing to the arousal, it’ll often dissipate within a minute or so.  On the other hand, if you encourage the arousal in some way, then it can hang around for pretty much as long as you want it to.

Is arousal always the same?

No.  All of the effects are variable.  One time, you may end up very wet, but the next time, there might be hardly anything.  One time, you might become extremely sensitive to even the lightest touch, but the next time, you might be practically numb.  One time you might have a large and very stiff erection, but the next time, you might only get partially hard.  One time, you may stay aroused for half an hour, but the next time, you might only be aroused for a minute.

Does arousal feel good?

Maybe.  Often, arousal in itself is vaguely pleasant, but doesn’t really feel good.  What you do with the arousal can feel very good, though.  Sometimes, when you’re aroused, any contact with your genitals will send a shudder of pleasure through your body.  Other times, it doesn’t feel much different down there than it normally does.  Once you’re aroused, continued stimulation of your genitals may lead to orgasm, which usually feels really good.  Both orgasms and self-stimulation of your genitals (called masturbation) will be covered in other posts.

What if I don’t want to be aroused?

Wait a while.  It’ll usually fade away if you don’t do anything to keep it around.  Thing is, it has a habit of being just noticeable enough that it’ll keep you thinking about it, and thinking about it will keep you aroused.  So do something that’ll get you distracted, if possible.  Also, try shifting how you’re sitting and adjust your pants.  That may sound silly, but pressure on the parts down below (from sitting in a certain way or from clothing pressed against them) can actually trigger arousal.

Having an orgasm, through masturbation or other means, will also often take care of arousal, but that’s probably not the answer you were looking for…

How can I get aroused if I want to be?

First, relax.  Don’t push it.  Forcing yourself to become aroused and failing leads to stress, and stress is one of the most common arousal killers.  Don’t go into it thinking “This will never work”, because if you’re thinking that, there’s a good chance it won’t work.

There are many ways to try to become aroused.  This is only a partial list, there are countless others not listed here.

  • Think about becoming aroused.  Arousal is sometimes a self-fulfilling idea.
  • Touch yourself or have someone you’re comfortable with touch you.  Touching or rubbing your genitals, your inner thighs, or your breasts and nipples can often lead to arousal.  Sometimes even a shoulder massage might be enough to turn you on.
    • For males, touching, rubbing, squeezing or pulling on the shaft of your penis may work.  The head of the penis may be too sensitive to touch initially.  You may try sliding the skin of the shaft up and down gently.  Touching or rubbing your testicles or pressing against your perineum may also help.
    • For females, touching or rubbing your vulva may work.  Cupping your hand around the front of your vulva, and moving your hand back and forth while pressing against the vulva (gently at first) may also help.  Rubbing the outside of the clitoral hood or sliding the hood gently might get you aroused, although the clitoris itself may be too sensitive to touch.  Note that vaginal penetration may not be all that effective.
  • Apply pressure to your genitals.  Sit or lie in such a way that something presses against your genitals, in particular, your clitoris or penis.  A bunched up towel or blanket, balled up socks, or a folded pillow will often provide the right amount of pressure.
  • Think about sex.  Even though you’re asexual, thinking about sexual situations (Even if you’re not fantasizing about taking part) can get you aroused.  This does not mean that you’re not asexual.
  • Watch porn, watch a steamy scene in a movie, or read an erotic story.  Even if you’re asexual, erotica can sometimes turn you on.  This does not mean that you’re not asexual.
  • Use a sex toy.  Vibrators will generally work on a clitoris or a penis, and a cock ring will generally work on a penis.
  • Repeatedly clench and release your muscles downstairs, the same ones you’d use to stop peeing.  (Those are called your PC muscles and these clench-and-release exercises are called “Kegels”.)  Try clenching those muscles tight for as long as you can hold them.
  • Drive on a bumpy road or sit on a washing machine.  The strong vibrations may work to turn you on.
  • Press your thighs together repeatedly.  This has the effect of moving skin around and applying pressure to your genitals, without direct contact.
  • Read a list of tips for how to become aroused.  If you became aroused while reading the above, there’s nothing wrong with that.

Is it harder for an asexual to get aroused?

It’s probably harder for an asexual person to become aroused while thinking about sex.  It’s probably not any harder to become aroused by touching themselves or through most of the other methods I mentioned above.

Arousal is largely a physical process, and asexuality does not have a physical component.  As such, asexuality by itself does not prevent the physical process from taking place.

Of course, although arousal is a physical process, it can often be influenced by your state of mind.  That’s why thinking about sex can lead to arousal and being stressed out can prevent arousal.  So, if you feel that asexuals can’t get aroused or shouldn’t get aroused, or that being aroused means you’re not asexual, it’s certainly possible that those thoughts might be inhibiting arousal.

Can an asexual get aroused by another person?

Yep. Being asexual means that you don’t experience sexual attraction, but there are plenty of ways that someone else can get you aroused that don’t require attraction.  Getting aroused by someone else does not mean that you’re attracted to them, it just means that your body parts are doing what millions of years of evolution have resulted in them being built to do.

Can an asexual get aroused by porn or erotic stories?

Yep. It has been well established that people of any sexual orientation can be aroused by porn or erotic stories, even if the content runs counter to their sexual orientation.  Straight women can get turned on by lesbian porn, straight men can get turned on by the sight of a penis, lesbians sometimes enjoy watching gay male porn, and gay men sometimes enjoy watching a woman touch herself.  It does not mean that everyone is secretly bisexual, it just means that, for many people, one of the triggers of arousal is the sight of sex, regardless of the specific anatomy involved.  This is also true for many asexuals.

I can’t seem to get aroused.  Why not?  What can I do about it?

In many cases, an inability to become aroused is something you might want to discuss with your doctor, especially if you view it as a problem.  This is true, even if you have no interest in having sex with someone else.  There may be a treatable physical or psychological reason for your lack of arousal.  The following is a list of some specific reasons for why you might not be able to get aroused, but it’s by no means the only possible reasons.

  • Stressing about not being able to be aroused is often one of the biggest reasons someone can’t get aroused.  If you’ve convinced yourself that you can’t get aroused, then you probably won’t be able to get aroused.  Then next time you try, you’ll remember that you couldn’t get aroused the last time you tried, and you’ll be caught up in a downward spin..  Clear your mind of such negative thoughts and try again.  Don’t worry if you don’t succeed the first time.  Or the second.  Or the thirtieth or fortieth.
  • Stress or fear can also inhibit arousal.  If you’re too distracted by other things, you might keep talking yourself out of becoming aroused.  Calm down and relax and try again.  Try a different time, when you’re not so wound up.  If you’re afraid of being aroused, don’t be.  It doesn’t hurt.  Many, many people have become aroused (including many you know), without any ill effects.  You may enjoy it, if you give yourself permission to.
  • Thinking that your body is ugly or your genitals are gross or -ewww fluids-, or something along those lines can make you not want to be aroused.  So, on those notes, your body isn’t ugly, your genitals aren’t gross, and there are ways to avoid the fluids (which are easy to get rid of by washing your hands, anyway).
  • Some drugs and alcohol can turn arousal right off.  Getting drunk or high may end up leading to sex that wouldn’t have happened when sober, but that’s primarily because getting high or drunk tends to lower inhibitions, not because it makes you more likely to become aroused.  It’s well documented that alcohol consumption can lead to impotence.
  • Taking certain medications can reduce sexual arousal.  Two well known culprits are the birth control pill and anti-depressants, but they are by no means the only ones.  If you used to be able to get aroused, but you haven’t had as much luck since you started taking a new pill, tell your doctor about it.
  • Some physical conditions may make arousal difficult or painful.  If you think you may have one of these conditions, speak with your doctor.

What’s a libido?  Is it like arousal?

Libido is often called a “sex drive”.  It’s an urge to engage in some kind of sexual activity.  It’s primarily a mental thing.  Arousal, on the other hand, is a primarily physical thing, where the genitals wake up and get ready for some sort of sexual activity.  It’s possible to have a libido and not be aroused and it’s possible to be aroused without a libido, although, often if you have a libido, it will contribute to arousal and arousability.

Think of it this way:  The libido is when your genitals say “Hey!  Hey!  Down here!  Notice me!  I wanna do something!  Down here!  Hey!  Listen!” and generally nag you for attention.  Arousal is when your genitals physically react to something.  Either one can happen without the other, but if your genitals are nagging you, they’re also more likely to be reacting physically.

Not everyone has a libido.  If you’re perfectly fine without having a sex drive, then there’s nothing wrong with that.  However, if you used to have a libido and it’s suddenly disappeared, you may want to consult a doctor, as that could be a sign of a medical issue.

For some people, libido is a fairly constant background noise.  You may experience it to some extent all the time.  For others, it seems to come and go.  In particular, if you have a menstrual cycle, you may find that your libido acts up for a few days during part of the cycle, then quiets down until next month.

It is possible to ignore your libido and not engage in any kind of sexual activity, even though it wants you to do something.  It’s also possible to decide to engage in some kind of sexual activity, even without a libido encouraging you to do so.

Can asexuals have a libido?

Yes, aces can.  To many people, the concept is a bit strange.  How can an asexual have a “sex drive” and still be considered asexual?  The answer is that asexuality is about attraction, not action.  For non-asexual people, the libido often manifests in thoughts like “I’m horny and I would like to have sex with that person because I find them sexually attractive”, while for asexual people, it’s often more like “I’m horny and … uh, what now?”  It’s an undirected sex drive.  Their body is begging for sexual activity, but it’s not begging for it from a particular source.  In many cases, asexual people with a libido will resolve the issue by masturbating, but it’s also possible that they’ll have sex with a partner or even just ignore it and do nothing at all until it goes away.

On the other hand, many asexuals do not have a libido.  They never feel an innate urge to engage in sexual activity.  That doesn’t mean that they can’t engage in sexual activity (whether that be masturbation, partnered sex, or what have you), it just means that there’s never a compelling urge to do so.

[Up to Main]

An Asexual’s Guide To … Masturbation

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What is masturbation?

Masturbation is the self-stimulation of the genitals, typically to orgasm.

Less scientific, please?

Masturbation is touching yourself downstairs in a way that causes your body to respond.  It’s also known as “jacking off”, “jilling off”, “playing with yourself”, and roughly three hundred thousand other euphemisms.  In most cases, but not all, the intent is to make yourself feel good down there.

Commonly, masturbation involves using your hand to make a repetitive rubbing or stroking motion on your clitoris or penis.  Usually, this is done for several minutes until orgasm occurs.  However, masturbation techniques and outcomes are widely varied. Sometimes people rub against an object of some sort.  Sometimes people use items called “sex toys”, which are designed for use with the genitals during masturbation.  Sometimes people don’t have an orgasm while they masturbate.  There’s no “One True Way™” to masturbate.

Why would I do that?

Well, for many people, masturbation feels good, and that’s enough of a reason for them.

But that’s not the only reason people have for masturbating.  Some people do it to help them fall asleep.  Some people do it to relieve headaches or cramps.  Some people do it because their body tells them to.  Some people do it because their partners enjoy watching.  Some people do it because they’re bored.  Some people do it because they want to know what it’s like.  And that’s just a small subset of the reasons that people masturbate.

Should I masturbate?

If you want to, go ahead.  If you don’t want to, don’t.  If you’re on the fence, maybe give it a try. It’s your body, you decide.  Don’t let anyone talk you into it or force you to do anything you’re not comfortable with doing.  If you try it out and don’t care for it, you’re free to stop.

Does it always feel good?

For many people, it usually does, but not always.  Most people who masturbate have, at one time or another, had bland or unsatisfying orgasms.  Some people rarely, if ever get any pleasure from it.  In some cases, the situation you’re in may make it difficult to get any pleasure from it.  Maybe you’re too preoccupied by something else, and your mind’s just not in it.  In other cases, it may be a matter of technique.  Maybe you’re just not doing it quite the right way, and if you tried a different method, it might feel a lot better.  And in rare cases, there is a medical condition that prevents it from feeling good.  One such condition is sexual anhedonia, which is the inability to feel pleasure from sexual activities.  Talk to a doctor if you think you might have that and you feel that it’s a problem.

Masturbation should never hurt, so if it does hurt, you should probably stop and change what you’re doing. (Unless that’s what you’re into…  But that discussion is outside of the scope of this guide.)

Does masturbating mean I’m not asexual?

Masturbation, at its core, is a physical act which has nothing to do with sexual attraction.  Although many people use it as an outlet for their sexual attraction, masturbating does not actually require sexual attraction in any way.

Masturbating does not make you less ace.

Masturbating does not make you a bad ace.

No matter how you masturbate, whether you use anatomically correct toys, whether you do something that simulates or resembles partnered sex in some way, whether or not you enjoy it, and no matter what body parts you choose to involve nor how you choose to involve them, none of it will ever make you straight or gay or whatever or ever mean you’re not asexual.  Just because you’re not attracted to anyone doesn’t mean you’re not allowed to take care of yourself.

So, to put it simply and directly:  Whether or not you masturbate has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not you’re asexual.

I keep hearing other aces say they do it to “scratch an itch”, but I do it because it feels good.  Does this mean I’m not asexual?

Again:  Whether or not you masturbate has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not you’re asexual.  This also goes for why you masturbate.

Many asexuals who masturbate say they do it because it feels good.  There is nothing un-asexual about masturbating strictly for pleasure.

I’ve never done it before.  How do I get started?

First, it’s okay to not know how and want a few tips.  After all, we didn’t come with owner’s manuals, and it’s not all that apparent what to do or what’ll happen if you do it.  Some people accidentally discover it out of the blue, some people figure it out by piecing together clues, while others learn from someone or somewhere.

One of the most important things to remember when you’re first trying to masturbate is that you shouldn’t go into it with expectations that are unreachable.  If you’re expecting that you’ll have a flawless performance and end up with a mindblowing orgasm that leaves you unable to move from its power, then you’re going to be disappointed.  The first time you try to masturbate, you’re not going to have a mindblowing orgasm.  You probably won’t have an orgasm at all.  This doesn’t mean you’re broken and it doesn’t mean that you can’t ever have an orgasm.  More than likely, it just means that you don’t know what you’re doing, and that’s okay.  So don’t get discouraged.  If you get discouraged, you’re going to start to think that you can never have an orgasm, and having negative thoughts like that going in are going to kill your chances.

Masturbation is a skill.  It’s something you have to learn and practice to get good at.  It’s not some innate instinct that you’re supposed to be born knowing exactly how to do it perfectly.  It takes patience and persistence to get right.  It’s a bit like throwing a ball.  If you’d never thrown a ball before, and I handed you one and asked you to toss it through a hoop on the other side of the room, chances are, you’d miss spectacularly.  The timing, the force, the motion, it’d all be wrong.  But you’d try again and again, and eventually, you’d throw it through the hoop.  Might just be a stroke of luck, but the ball went through the hoop, so yay!  Then, the next ten times in a row, you miss.  But over time, you figure out what it takes, and soon enough, you’re hitting the hoop more often than you miss.  So don’t worry if you don’t get it right away.  The key is to keep trying and don’t give up just because it doesn’t work the first few times.  Don’t be afraid to fail, because failure is how you learn what doesn’t work.  I probably tried unsuccessfully for months before I had an orgasm.  I knew it could be done, I’d heard it was worth it, but I just couldn’t figure out exactly the right motions to perform.  (This was before the days where I could have just done a search for “How do I masturbate?” and gotten an answer in thirty seconds.)

So, start out by just experimenting.  Touch yourself various ways in different places and see what works and what doesn’t.  If you find something that sorta works, build off of that.  Try something close to it: A little faster, a little slower, a little harder, a little lighter, half an inch to the left…  Focus on arousal first.  Don’t even necessarily try for an orgasm at first, just try to find out what gets your motor running.  Even if you have specific and explicit how-to instructions, there’s a very good chance that some part of them won’t work as described, and that you’ll have to go off script.  Approach it with curiosity and follow it where it leads you.

Remember that an orgasm won’t come instantly.  It’ll take a while.  Even if you know exactly what to do, it’ll still take a while.  And if you’re still figuring things out, it might take a long time.  So be patient.  That’s probably why I was unsuccessful for so long.  I would only try for a minute or so during a shower and give up when I didn’t get anywhere.  Eventually, I must’ve hit the right spot and it felt good enough to keep going for a while longer, and that’s when I had my first orgasm.

Try not to think of masturbation as some sort of substitute for partnered sex, because it’s not.  A lot of people do think of it that way, and so a lot of people try to masturbate in a way that simulates intercourse with another person.  You don’t have to do it that way.  In fact, it’s often better if you don’t do it that way.

You may have heard of the G-Spot or the prostate or some other feature or trick that’s supposedly the source of unending ecstasy.  Understandably, you might want to go straight for the big prize and skip all that other diddling about.  No matter how enticing, that would likely prove futile.  That would be like trying to win the Super Bowl even though you’ve never touched a football.  You’re probably just going to end up frustrated and disappointed if you try to do too much, too soon.  Take your time.  Practice.  Gradually work up to attempting that sort of thing, if you even feel the need to try it at all.  If you don’t enjoy basic masturbation, then prostate stimulation or a G-Spot orgasm or whatever other super-duper special technique that’s out there probably isn’t going to change your mind.

And finally, don’t be afraid of a little “help”.  There’s nothing wrong with using toys to help you get there.  Some people try everything under the sun and don’t get anywhere, but as soon as they feel the little bzzzzt of a vibrator downstairs, everything changes.  Sometimes, people need something extra to reach orgasm and can’t get anywhere without one.  Other times, they’ll learn how to masturbate using a toy, and take those learnings and find a way that works using only their hands.

Is there anything I should do to prepare before I masturbate?

First, you’ll want to have some idea of what you’re going to do.  You might be able to figure it out through trial and error, but it’s likely going to be more productive if you have a general idea of where the important bits are and how to use them.  The information in this post series will hopefully put you on the right track.

Next, you’ll probably want to set aside some time to experiment.  It’s probably best if you won’t be interrupted and are free to spend as much time as you need on it.  Many people masturbate just before going to sleep for the night.

Find someplace comfortable.  A comfy chair, a nice couch, your bed, in the bath or the shower.  Someplace where you can spend some time and not be distracted by your environment.  A hard chair in a cold, noisy room would probably not be a good choice if you can avoid it.

Lock your door.  Being interrupted in the middle of playtime has a way of making you lose interest.

Have a towel or some tissues handy.  Depending on what you do, how you do it, and how your body responds, masturbation can get a bit messy.  It’s better to be prepared where you are, than to try to get to the nearest sink when you’re done.

You may want to obtain some sort of lube before you begin.  Since many masturbation methods involve the repeated rubbing of a small area of skin, attempting it without lubrication can often lead to irritation of fairly sensitive body parts.  Lube specifically designed for sexual activity (Usually referred to as “personal lubricant” and found in the drugstore next to the condoms and pregnancy tests) is typically best.  Other lubricants may stain fabric, dry out your skin, or contain ingredients that could potentially cause infections in particularly unwanted places.  Saliva can also work if nothing else is available.  When aroused, both the penis and the vagina may produce lubricating fluids, so your body may produce enough on its own, without any artificial additions.  On the other hand, you may not need lubrication at all.  (Note that water is not a lube.  While it makes floors slippery, it won’t make your genitals slippery.)

How, specifically,  do I do it?

There are detailed guides located here:

An Asexual’s Guide To … Female Masturbation  (For most women, most girls, and anyone else who happens to have a clitoris.)

An Asexual’s Guide To … Male Masturbation  (For most men, most boys, and anyone else who happens to have a penis.)

I’m afraid I don’t have a guide for intersex people or people who have transitioned.  When I was preparing this series, I tried to research those topics, but did not find much information.  If anyone has any good resources, please let me know about them.  Until then, it’s possible that some of the information in the posts above might prove useful.

Can I learn what to do by watching porn?

Watching porn to learn about sexual activities in any way is a bit like watching the WWE to learn how to wrestle.  What you’re seeing are scripted, choreographed performances.  Some people think it’s entertaining, sure, and there’s nothing wrong with that.  On rare occasions, there might actually be something accurate and useful.  But it’s not a documentary.  It’s not a how-to.  Most of what’s done is done because it plays well on camera, not because it’s particularly effective.

Is it a problem if I don’t masturbate?

No, not at all.  In the past fifty years, there have been exactly zero cases of people who were killed by an unresolved build-up of genital energy.  You’re not going to get painfully clogged up downstairs if you don’t test the release valve at least once a month.  You’re not going to get progressively more and more horny every day until you eventually your life is taken over by a crotchmonster begging for attention.  Even the purported health benefits of masturbation or orgasms are miniscule in the big picture.

Masturbation is not required to live a happy, healthy life.

I don’t want/like to masturbate.  Is there something wrong with me?

No, there is nothing wrong with you.  Masturbation is, for the most part, a recreational activity, and like any other recreational activity, it has fans and it has its detractors.  It’s essentially like playing video games or going fishing or building seismometers in your dining room for the fun of it.  Not everyone wants to take part in every recreational activity that’s out there.  No one would ever say “You can’t be human if you don’t build a seismometer in your dining room!”  It’s okay to not want to masturbate, same as it’s okay to not want to go fishing.

Any reason you have for not wanting to masturbate or not liking to masturbate is a valid one, and no one has the right to tell you otherwise.  It’s okay not to masturbate.  You’re not less of a person, you’re not broken, you’re not “missing out”, you’re not any of the things people might say.  If you don’t want to, you don’t want to.  If you don’t like it, you don’t like it.  It’s your decision and yours alone.

After all, masturbation is essentially the act of putting your hand down by where you pee and waggling it about repetitively for a few minutes in an attempt to cause muscle spasms and fluid discharge.  It’s perfectly acceptable to not be interested in taking part.

I don’t like to masturbate, but I feel like I have to.

Why do you feel like you have to?  If it’s because of societal pressure, because “everyone masturbates” or something like that, well, the hell with societal pressure.  If you don’t like it, don’t give a damn what anyone else thinks, and just don’t do it.  You never, ever have to masturbate if you don’t want to.

If you feel like you have to because you’ve got an overactive libido that just won’t shut up until you do, then you can actively try to resist it.  Distract yourself.  Do something that takes a lot of concentration.  Get out of the house, so you won’t have a place to do it.  Avoid things that make you think about masturbating or are erotic in some way.  Remember that physical arousal does not require your attention.  Wear clothes that make access difficult.  Just don’t give in.  While it may feel strong in the moment, your libido will typically die down if you don’t pay attention to it.  You won’t suffer any physical damage if the urges aren’t followed.

If you feel like you have to because you’ll have wet dreams if you don’t, know that masturbation isn’t necessarily going to prevent them.  In some cases, masturbating will cause your body to produce more sperm, thereby making it more likely that you’ll have a wet dream if you don’t take care of yourself within a couple of days.  If you don’t ejaculate regularly, the sperm production may slow down and the wet dreams might dry up.  Also, past the hormone soup of the early teen years, nocturnal emissions typically become less and less frequent.  You may not have them as often as you used to when you started masturbating to prevent them.  And consider if it’s even worth the effort.  Is preventing an occasional wet spot in your undies in the morning worth doing something you hate every couple of days?

Then again, while there’s nothing wrong with not liking to masturbate, you can still try to dive into understanding why you don’t like it, and see if there’s any way to change that.  If you don’t like it because you feel shame or guilt or it makes you feel dirty, then know that there’s nothing wrong with it.  If you don’t like it because you’re repulsed by your genitals, then you might want to consider looking into exposure therapy to try to overcome the aversion.  If you don’t like it because you simply don’t get anything from it, then you can try a different technique and see if the situation improves.  But remember, you don’t have to like it, and you shouldn’t feel like you should do any of those things if you don’t want to do them.

Will I break myself if I masturbate?

Not unless you do it wrong.

You won’t turn into a sex-obsessed freak, you won’t change your sexual orientation, you won’t wear out your genitals, and you won’t use up your precious bodily fluids.

As far as physical damage goes, as long as you’re careful, you’re probably fine.  You may encounter some soreness initially, either on your genitals from rubbing too hard or for too long, or in your hand or wrist from the repetitive motion.  You can generally prevent the genital soreness by using lube, and the hand soreness by using a different hand position or simply by getting used to it.  More serious injuries, like vaginal tears or a sprained penis, are rare and are often the result of something you’d probably think would be a bad idea before you did it.  So, if you think it’s a bad idea, don’t do it!

Can I masturbate too much?

Under typical circumstances, no.  After you have an orgasm, you’ll typically lose interest in having another for a while.  Also, it’s typically more difficult to have another orgasm for some time.  In this way, your body is somewhat self-regulating.

However, if you ever get sore, it might be time to take a rest.  You don’t want to rub yourself raw.  Come back later and try again.

How long does it take?

Typically anywhere from a couple of seconds to a couple of hours.  There’s no set time for how long you should masturbate, and there’s no way to know how long it will take you to reach orgasm.  Every time is different.  Sometimes people will race straight to the finish and be done in a minute or two, while other times people will take their time and enjoy every moment.  Sometimes you may be very aroused and come almost as soon as you start, while other times you may try your best for half an hour and just can’t get yourself there.  In the average case, people tend to take between five and twenty minutes to reach orgasm while masturbating.  However, there’s nothing wrong if you’re faster or slower than that.

I want it to be faster.  What do I do?

In many cases, stronger stimulation will get you to orgasm faster.  Increase the pressure and speed of the stimulation as you masturbate.  Using a toy, such as a vibrator or sleeve may also help.  And finally, in many cases, something like porn or erotic literature may speed things along.

I want it to last longer.  What do I do?

Learn your body’s cues.  If you learn how to tell when you’re approaching the point of no return just before an orgasm, then you’ll be able to slow down or stop for a moment before you get there.  This pause will back you away from the edge of the orgasm.  After the pause, you can continue stimulation for a while before you get back to the edge.  You can repeat this process for as long as you want.  When you’re ready to have an orgasm, just keep stimulating yourself and you’ll get there.

It’s so boring!  What do I do?

Well, if you find it boring and you don’t feel a need to do it or don’t like doing it, then the easiest way to alleviate the boredom is to stop masturbating.  You don’t have to do it, and if you don’t get anything out of it, why bother?

On the other hand, if you do get something out of it or feel that you physically have to do it, there are a couple of things you can try.  Switching up your technique may work.  Maybe masturbation’s boring because you’ve gotten used to what you do, or what you do just isn’t all that exciting.  Try a different position, different hand, or include something you typically don’t include.  You can also try multitasking.  Do something else at the same time that you’re masturbating, like read a book or watch TV or whatever.  Eventually, you’ll reach a point where it’s a quick trip to the orgasm, if that’s where you’re headed.  At that point, concentrate and get it over with, then continue with whatever you were doing.

I live with other people.  What should I do about that?

If you’re living with a romantic and/or sexual partner, or someone similar to that, then in most cases, you can include them.  You can let them watch, invite them to join, ask them to help, or just let them know what you’re planning on doing.  For the most part, they’re not going to mind, and, particularly in the case of a non-asexual sexual partner, there’s a good chance that they’re going to be thrilled at the chance to watch or help out.

If you’re living with roommates or your family, you’re probably not going to go around broadcasting what you’re doing.  If you have your own room, then you can probably lock the door (or just close it, if you trust no one will barge in), and have at it.  If you’re worried about the potential for noise, then playing some music or turning on the TV will typically cover for that.  If you share a room, you might be able to get away with doing it under the covers at night, if you’re careful enough.  You can also wait until everyone else leaves and you’re sure they’ll be gone long enough for you to finish.

In any case, masturbating in the bathroom or shower is always an option.  You’ll usually be able to have unquestioned privacy there, and, unless you spend an hour or two, most of the time no one will comment about how long you were in there.  Plus it’s easier to clean up afterwards.  In the shower, there’s the added benefit of the sound of the water to cover any sounds you might make.

Do I have to have an orgasm when I masturbate?

No, there is no reason you have to reach orgasm when you masturbate.  While that is the goal of many people when they do it, there’s no requirement that you have an orgasm during masturbation.  If you’re fine stopping without one, then go right ahead.  You won’t harm yourself if you don’t have an orgasm.  Any effects of arousal will likely quickly fade away.

There are many reasons to masturbate without reaching orgasm.  You can experience some of the pleasure, but skip most of the mess.  You might find the act of masturbation enjoyable, but dislike the sensation of orgasm.  And in some cases, not having an orgasm for a while may make the one you eventually have somewhat stronger.  And that’s just a few of the possibilities.  There are countless others.

I never have an orgasm when I masturbate.  Is that a problem?

I don’t know.  Is that a problem for you?

There’s no inherent physical problem that will be caused if you masturbate but don’t reach orgasm.  It’s not going to cause any damage.

So, it all depends on what you want.  If you want to have an orgasm when you masturbate, but can’t, then yes, that could be considered a problem.  If you’ve tried all manner of various techniques and methods and still nothing works, then you might want to talk to a doctor, in case there’s a treatable underlying physical or mental cause.

On the other hand, if it doesn’t bother you that you don’t have an orgasm when you masturbate, then no, it’s not a problem.  Don’t worry about how other people expect you should feel, and concentrate on how you actually feel.  If you’re just fine masturbating without orgasms, then it’s not an issue at all.

What if I don’t like fluids?  What should I do?

There are some specific techniques to be found in the how-to posts, but in general, it’s possible to masturbate without coming into contact with any kinds of fluids.  Some basic ways are to do it fully clothed, to use toys, or to do it in the shower where any fluids produced are immediately washed down the drain.

What if I don’t like touching my genitals?  What should I do?

There are some specific techniques to be found in the how-to posts, but in general, it’s possible to masturbate without having to touch your genitals directly.  Two common ways are to leave your clothes on or to use toys.

What if I don’t like being naked?  What should I do?

Nudity is not required in order to masturbate.  The how-to posts have a few techniques for doing it while partially or fully clothed.  Many people, even ones who don’t mind being nude, will sometimes masturbate with some clothing on, whether for comfort or convenience.  Masturbating under the covers in bed is another option, if that would make you feel less exposed.  You can also try masturbating while bathing, since you would probably be naked then anyway.

What should I think about when I masturbate?  Do I have to fantasize or think about sex?

You can think about anything you want.  Sexual fantasies are not required.  Many people will claim that you can’t masturbate unless you fantasize or think sexual thoughts about someone else, but that is flatly inaccurate.  It was years after I’d started masturbating that I realized that other people fantasized while doing it, because I never had.  And after I found out, I gave it a try, but it never worked for me.  I just found it distracting.

Some asexual people do fantasize, but it’s often thoughts of other people having sex, or of a featureless person doing sexual things to them.  It’s not really about attraction, more about the sexual actions that they’re imagining.  Of course, some asexual people don’t really think about anything in particular.  Simply thinking about something while masturbating does not automatically make it sexual.

Do I have to be aroused before I masturbate?

No.  Many people will decide to masturbate even when they’re not aroused, and have to get themselves aroused in order to be able to masturbate.  For some people, they have a routine, where they’ll masturbate before bed or in the shower or whatever, simply because they want to, not in response to any sort of bodily reaction.

Do I have to masturbate if I become aroused?

No, spontaneous arousal, if it happens, is just your body preparing for what it thinks is potential sexual activity, it’s not a demand that you engage in sexual activity.  If you ignore it, it’ll usually die down and go away.

Do I have to wait for my libido to act up before I masturbate?

No.  While your libido might encourage you to masturbate, there’s no reason you can’t masturbate any time you want, even if your libido isn’t active.  You might have to work a bit harder to get your body in gear, but it’s possible.  Many people have a masturbation routine, where they’ll masturbate whether or not their body is asking for it.  And some people who don’t even have a libido to speak of will masturbate.

Do I have to masturbate if my libido acts up?

Not if you don’t want to.  While your libido might be constantly nagging you to do something, it is possible to tell it no and not give in.  You won’t suffer any physical harm if you resist the libido’s call, and in most cases, it’ll give up and go away after a while.

What if I only masturbate when my libido acts up?

That’s perfectly fine.  You should never feel like you have to masturbate more often than you feel like you need to, just because other people do it more often.

Think of it like running.  There are some people who run several times a day, because they think it’s fun.  There are other people who only run when they have to, like when they need to catch a bus.  And some people will never run, no matter what.

What are sex toys?

Masturbation toys, also called sex toys, are a way to enhance or alter your masturbation experience.  You can use them in addition to or in place of another masturbation technique.   There are countless types of toys, designed to stimulate pretty much any part of your body in pretty much anyway imaginable (and quite a few unimaginable ways, too…).  Some common types are vibrators, sleeves, dildos, and rings.

Toys range from featureless to anatomically accurate.  In many cases, the anatomical accuracy is just for looks, and has little to do with the effectiveness of the toy.  If you’re not a fan of interacting with plastic or rubber simulated genitalia, there’s a good bet you can find an equivalent toy that looks less real.

Toys also range in quality from cheaply made pieces of junk to quality instruments that’ll last for years.  Unfortunately, price is not necessarily an indicator of quality.  Sometimes a cheap vibrator will faithfully buzz for years, while one that costs ten times as much will give out on its second go.  Check reviews or recommendations first, or limit your purchase to a price you wouldn’t mind throwing away if it’s no good.

Many sex toy shops are not particularly ace friendly.  Not to mention the general embarrassment and fear that many people, including non-asexual people, have about steping into one.  I’d simply recommend buying online.  Web stores like Drugstore.com and Amazon.com have a fairly decent selection of toys and ship in boxes that don’t draw attention.

I’ll talk about common toys and how they’re used in another post, since their use is pretty specific to the body part they’re used on.

Can asexual people use toys?

Absolutely!  There’s nothing that prohibits an asexual from using a toy to masturbate with, even a toy that’s anatomically shaped.

Am I too young to masturbate?

No, there is no lower age limit.  Some of the bits and pieces might not be in final working order yet, but nothing bad will happen if you start using them before they’re fully baked.

Am I too old to masturbate?

No, there is no upper age limit.  Many people keep going at it well into the senior home.  There’s a weird perception that masturbation is only for teenagers, but that’s simply not true.  It’s also never too late to start.  While many people first masturbate in their early teen years, during puberty, it’s not unheard of for someone to just be starting out in their thirties, forties, even seventies and older!

I feel dirty or shameful or embarrassed when I masturbate.

Feelings like this are often the result of being fed nonsense about how masturbation is for losers who can’t get laid or being told that masturbation is dangerous or being told that masturbation is a pathetic replacement for “real” sex or being told that masturbation is an immature activity.  It’s none of those things.   It’s the result of the same sorts of outdated and misguided thinking that brought us graham crackers, corn flakes, and routine non-religious circumcision as ways to prevent masturbation.  (Seriously.  Look it up.)  From personal experience, I can tell you none of those work.

For asexuals who masturbate, there’s the added confusion of performing a “sexual” act while being asexual.  Sometimes, people will think “I shouldn’t be doing this, because I’m asexual.”  Other times, people will be told that they can’t be asexual because they masturbate.  These sorts of things can lead to shame and doubt.

Shame and doubt and embarrassment and feeling dirty are not healthy.  Masturbation is a perfectly natural thing to do.  There is absolutely nothing wrong with it.  You shouldn’t feel dirty or embarrassed.  You shouldn’t let it make you doubt your asexuality.  It doesn’t matter why you masturbate, whether you’re doing it because it feels good for you or you’re doing it because your libido was nagging you or you’re doing it on a whim to see what it’s like or you’re doing it for whatever other reasons you have, you shouldn’t feel bad about it.

I’m repulsed.  What do I do?

If you’re repulsed and know that you wouldn’t like masturbating, then don’t do it.  You don’t have to try it out, you don’t have to do it because someone says that you should, you don’t have to do it because you feel like everyone else is doing it.  Don’t do it and don’t worry about it.  It’s nobody’s business but your own.

Think of it this way:  I don’t like Thai food.  Being around it, smelling it, even just thinking about it is repulsive to me.  I’ve never actually tried it, but I know that I would hate it and I have no interest in ever experiencing it first hand.  And I’m fine with that.  No amount of people saying “But it’s awesome!  It’s the best thing ever!” is going to change my mind. I don’t have a problem if you like it, just keep it away from me.  Your relationship with masturbation can be like my relationship with Thai food.  There’s nothing wrong with that.

It is possible that you may want to masturbate or feel that you have to even though you’re repulsed.  There are a number of techniques (detailed in other posts) for masturbating without direct genital contact.  You may find that these work and minimize the repulsion that you feel.  You can also try to work toward overcoming repulsion.  Often, repulsion stems from feeling that the genitals are icky and dirty. Tackling that feeling is a good place to start.  True, there’s a lot of stuff that can be dirty down below, but basic hygiene will generally take care of it.  In most cases, after you’ve bathed, there’s nothing particularly “dirty” about that region.  Even so, the sense that they’re icky may remain.  One way to try to overcome this sense of ickiness is to prove to yourself that nothing bad will happen to you if you touch down there, and that it’s very easy to clean your hands afterward.  I’d recommend doing this while you bathe, so that if you’re overcome by the ick factor, you can easily stop and clean off your hand:  Without a sponge or washcloth or a handful of soap lather or anything else, reach down and touch that area.  Hold your hand there for a while, but don’t do anything else.  Repeat this exercise every time you bathe for a while.  Hopefully you will become less and less nervous or repulsed by doing so, because you know that it’s safe.  This is called exposure therapy, and is how people are treated for anything from fear of spiders to fear of heights to compulsive hand washing.  As you become more and more comfortable, try doing more and more. Start trying to stimulate yourself, maybe start performing the exercise when you’re not in the shower.  Go slowly in this process, take your time.  There’s no time limit and you can take as long as you need to take to get there.  Eventually, you may be able to fully masturbate without overpowering repulsion.  (Then again, it may not work at all.  Remember, I’m not a psychologist or doctor or anything like that, I’m just someone with a website, so there’s a good chance that I have no idea what I’m talking about.)

I’m asexual, but I have a non-asexual partner.  I don’t like sex, but I do masturbate.  Is this okay?

Of course it’s okay.  No one, not even your partner, should ever coerce you into having sex you don’t want.  And it’s fine to masturbate and not have sex with your partner.  Although they typically involve the same body parts, they’re very different activities, and there’s no requirement that you do one if you do the other.  You do not owe your partner an orgasm, even if you have them on your own.

What are Kegels?  What’s the PC muscle?

Kegels are an exercise of the PC muscle which can potentially lead to stronger orgasms.  The PC muscle is the muscle used to control urination, so if you want to figure out what muscles they are, the next time you pee, stop yourself in the middle.  The muscles you squeezed are your PC muscles.  (PC is an abbreviation of something that’s too long, too difficult to spell, and too irrelevant to mention here.  Pretty much everyone just calls them the PC muscles.)

To perform a Kegel exercise, tense and relax the PC muscle repeatedly, sometimes keeping it tensed it for a few seconds.  You can do this at any time you want and as often as you want.  Like any exercise, to gain any benefit from it, you can’t just do it once every month or so.  If you plan to perform Kegel exercises, try to do them for several minutes at least a couple of times a week.  (Note that other than the initial test to find the right muscles, you don’t have to and probably don’t want to perform these exercises while you’re urinating.)  Kegels work by strengthening the PC muscle, which is one of the primary muscles involved in orgasm.  You can also contract these muscles during masturbation for added sensation.

Although typically mentioned as a vaginal strengthening technique, Kegel exercises can also be performed if you have a penis, where they may lead to stronger erections and may help prevent premature ejaculation.

For some people, regular Kegel exercise can turn an orgasm from a ho-hum somewhat dull experience into something that’s intensely pleasurable on many levels.  For other people, they have very little effect at all.  If you don’t get much out of masturbation, you might want to try performing them and see if they help, but don’t fret if they don’t do much for you.

I’ve heard that everyone masturbates.  Is that true?

I’m assuming you’re referring to that silly “99% of people masturbate and 1% of people are liars” thing?  Well, it’s just plain wrong.  Not everyone masturbates.  Some people never have, and others used to, but don’t anymore.  You don’t have to masturbate, and there’s nothing wrong with you if you don’t.  Don’t let anyone use a phony statistic like this to push you into doing anything you don’t want to do.

I don’t feel like I’m as good at it as other people are.

Are you getting out of it what you want to get out of it?  That’s all you should be concerned about.  Don’t worry about what other people are doing or how they’re doing it.  No one’s keeping score, it’s not a competition.  Masturbation is about you and what you want and what’s right for you, it’s not about expectations, it’s not about an endless quest to be better, it’s not about how well you perform.  If what you’re doing is right for you, that’s all that matters.  (Even if what’s right for you is not doing it at all.)

Masturbation is a unique, personal experience.  There are no universals.  Nothing is guaranteed to work for everyone.  Something that works for 90% of people might not work for you, but you might find something else that only works for 3% of people that’s really effective for you.  You shouldn’t worry if you don’t find vaginal penetration or prostate stimulation appealing.  You shouldn’t worry about frequency or how long it takes.  There are huge variations from person to person.  Even if you took exactly what works for someone else and transferred it to you, there’s a good chance it won’t work on you as well.

There doesn’t have to be a goal or a time limit. You don’t have to have a mind-blowing, earth-shattering orgasm every time out.  Often, the orgasm you have is good enough.  And if you’re fine without an orgasm, that’s fine, too. A two-minute race to the finish is just as valid as spending an hour and a half idly rubbing yourself in a half-aroused state.  You shouldn’t feel like you have to live up to someone else’s expectations or try some wild trick that people say is amazing, just because they claim “everyone’s doing it”.

Is sex better than masturbation?

Not necessarily.  Any kind of sexual activity, whether partnered or alone, can be good or bad, depending on the circumstances.  You can’t really say that one is “better” than another.  Some people will say that their strongest orgasms come by their own hand, while others will say that orgasms are more powerful with the touch of another.  Some people prefer the closeness of a partner, while others prefer the pleasure feedback loop of masturbation.  Some people consider both equally unpleasant.  Some people like both, in different ways.  It all boils down to personal preference.

Masturbating isn’t inherently “worse” than having partnered sex.  Masturbation’s not second-class sex or a substitute for the “real thing”.  They’re very different experiences, even though they share the same body parts.

It’s sort of like comparing Yellowstone and Yosemite.  Some people like the geysers of Yellowstone, some people like the granite cliffs of Yosemite, some people think they’re both majestic and awesome, and some people don’t care for either one and would rather go to Vegas.  You can’t definitively say that one is better than the other, you can only say that they’re different.

Do sex and masturbation feel any different?

Of course they feel different, but again, that doesn’t necessarily mean that one is better than the other.

Physically, there’s contact with another body.  That leads to sensations of pressure and warmth in places that usually don’t feel pressure or warmth during masturbation.  Your partner will often be more unpredictable than you are with yourself.  They may touch areas or do things that you typically wouldn’t do, or may not even be physically capable of doing yourself.

Emotionally, there’s the presence of another person.  You’re involved in some fairly private interactions with them when you’re having sex.  You’re letting them touch areas of your body that you don’t let most people even see, let alone have contact with.  On the flipside, they’re allowing you to do the same with them.  You’re exposed to their reactions all throughout the process.  All of these are things that aren’t present during solo masturbation.

As far as orgasm, both masturbation and partnered sex are capable of producing mind-blowing stunners or disappointing misses.  There’s no guarantee that an orgasm with someone else is going to be better than one you have on your own.

[Up to Main]

An Asexual’s Guide To … Female Masturbation

[Up to Masturbation | Main]

The techniques and details described in this post are not the only way to masturbate.  They’re not the “correct” way or the “best” way.  They may not even work for you.  They’re provided as a base upon which you can experiment and learn what works for you.

Okay, so, I’ve got a clitoris and I want to try masturbating.  How do I go about doing that?

First, note that the question said “clitoris” and not “vagina”.  This is because your clitoris is generally where the action is at.  It’s typically very difficult, if not impossible, to reach orgasm through vaginal stimulation alone.  The vagina just isn’t that sensitive.  So, if you’ve been unsuccessfully attempting to masturbate by penetrating or stimulating your vagina, and haven’t involved your clitoris at all, then stop.  Take your fingers out.  Move them to your clitoris.  Now try rubbing there for a bit.  If you give that a shot, you may find that you don’t even need to read the rest of this post.  (That’s not to say that your vagina is completely useless while you masturbate, many people do find vaginal penetration to be a useful addition while masturbating, but it almost always takes a back seat to clitoral stimulation.)

Second, if you’ve ever seen masturbation in porn, forget pretty much everything you’ve seen.  It’s probably all lying to you.  Most of the time, “female masturbation” in porn is the fictional representation of what the stereotypical horny straight dude wants to believe is masturbation.  It’s typically a carefully scripted and staged penetration-based fantasy that bears very little resemblance to how people actually masturbate.  It might be good for a show, but it’s not generally good if you’re actually looking to have an orgasm.  (Speaking of which, if the “masturbation” porn video even bothers to show an orgasm, which they rarely do, it’s almost certainly fake, too.)

In any case, the real first step is to get ready.  Find a comfortable and safe position, where you’ll have enough time to experiment and try things out without being disturbed.  This can be a bed, a chair, a bathtub, a shower, or wherever else.  Lock your door if that would make you feel more comfortable.  You may want to have a towel nearby so you can easily clean up afterward.  You might even want to sit or lie on the towel so that it’ll soak up any wetness there might be. (If you’re in the shower or tub, then it’ll all just wash down the drain, so you don’t have to worry about that.)  Finally, you may want some sort of lube to help things along.  Your vagina may end up producing enough to use on its own.  Saliva would also work  However, if you want a little artificial help, then a lube specifically designed for sexual activity (typically called “personal lubricant”) is your best bet.  Stuff like hand lotion, Vaseline, or baby oil typically have substances that could potentially lead to vaginal infections (not to mention that they’ll destroy latex condoms), so you should probably avoid them, and soap or shampoo may seem slippery, but they’ll dry you out and may irritate your sensitive bits.

Oh, and make sure your fingernails are nice and trimmed.  You don’t want to accidentally cut anything down there.

All the prerequisites are taken care of, it’s time to get down to business.  The most common and most straightforward way to masturbate is to use several fingers to rub circles on your clitoris repeatedly until orgasm.  That’s the technique I’m going to explain here.

For this to work, you’re going to need access to your clitoris.  I’d suggest taking off your pants and underwear, so it’s all out there and freely reachable.  Or if you want, you can simply reach into your underwear and do it entirely inside your pants.  Of course, it’s also possible to rub your clitoris through your clothes.  Some people prefer this way, since they find more direct clitoral stimulation to be too intense, and this method has the added benefit of keeping all the fluids away from your hands.

It’s probably going to work a lot better if you’re aroused before you start going at it full speed.  Arousal is where your clitoris fills with blood and peeks out of hiding and your vagina starts lubricating itself.  At this point, most other resources will direct you to “Think of that hot guy in accounting” in order to get aroused, but since you’re here, I’m assuming you’re ace, so that’s probably not going to work so well for you.  That means you’ll need to get one some other way.  Of course, you might already be ready from reading this far and anticipating what’s next.  Awesome, you’re ready to go!  Then again, you may already know how to get turned on, in which case, proceed.  Or, you can always wait until you become aroused naturally for some reason.

However, in many cases, you might have to help the kitten start purring when you want to use it.  Here’s a few things you might try to get you up and running.  Feel free to mix and match these techniques.  If one doesn’t work on its own, it might work with the help of another.

  • Touch or rub your vulva.  This may seem rather obvious, but it’s often effective.  Don’t just poke at it, though.  Cup your hand over the area, press against it, and start rubbing around in circular motions or side to side or front to back.
  • Caress your stomach or inner thighs.  Try focusing on other areas around your vulva.  Those regions are often fairly sensitive and may send a wake-up signal to your equipment.
  • Apply pressure to your vulva or your clitoris.  Press against it with your hand.  Tuck your leg up so that you sit in a way that your heel presses against your clitoris.  Or sit or kneel over a pillow or bunched up blanket that is pressing against you.
  • Tense or clench your genital muscles.  Try tensing the muscles that you use to hold back pee.  Clench and hold, or repeatedly tense and release.
  • Touch, rub, or pinch your nipples.  Your nipples may be a sensitive zone.  Touching them or pressing on them may trigger arousal.  Rubbing them or pinching them may also work.
  • Think about sex, look at porn, or read something erotic.  Yeah, you’re asexual, but this still may work anyway.  Don’t ask me why, I haven’t figured it out myself.
  • Use a vibrator.  If you run a vibrator near, but not necessarily directly on your clitoris, you might start to become aroused.

Okay, now that you’re ready to go, it’s time to get going.

At this point, pretty much anything that rubs around your clitoris over and over may eventually lead to an orgasm.  Some techniques are very effective, while others are a quick trip to carpal tunnel.  I’m going to describe one of the most common techniques.  Note that this is not the only way to masturbate.  There are many variations that you can do, so I’d encourage you to experiment and improvise in order to find out what works best for you.

Reach down and place a couple of fingers or the palm of your hand on your clitoris.  Press on it.  It should be enough that you can feel the pressure, but not so much that it feels like you’re going to crush your clitoris.  Start making small circles around your clitoris with your fingers and hands.  It should be a smooth, continuous motion, like a wheel going around.  Keep spinning these circles repeatedly.

You may find that your clitoris is too sensitive to be stimulated directly.  If this is the case, try rubbing the clitoral hood, instead.  The hood should slide over the head of the clitoris and provide a bit of a cushion.  If that’s still too sensitive, try applying the pressure to a wider area, or try placing a towel or blanket over your clitoris as you rub or try masturbating through your clothing.  It’s often the case that as you continue and get more into the experience, that more direct contact with your clitoris becomes tolerable, possibly even preferable.

If there’s too much friction or you want to try sliding around a bit more, try applying some lube.  Start with just a little bit, like a drop or two, because it’s always easy to add more, but harder to get rid of too much.  As I mentioned earlier, your vagina itself might be a good source for lube, otherwise saliva or an artificial personal lubricant would work.

As you continue to spin little circles, it should start to feel somewhat different downstairs.  It probably will start to feel good.  Varying the pressure you apply, the speed of the rubbing, the size of the circles, even how many fingers you’re using may all have an effect on how much pleasure you experience.  Everyone is different.  Some people like fast movement while others take it slow, but too fast may cause irritation and too slow may not be enough stimulation to keep yourself aroused.  Some prefer a lighter touch and others prefer more pressure, but too light and you won’t feel anything and too hard and it might hurt.  There’s no “perfect” speed or pressure, so you’ll have to experiment with what works best for you.

Okay, so, you’re circling round and round, and hopefully it’s starting to feel like you’re getting somewhere.  There’s a misconception that you won’t feel much of anything until all of a sudden, BOOM! Orgasm.  That’s typically not how it works.  It’ll probably start to feel good well before the orgasm, with a small surge of pleasure with every rotation.  You’ll start to get a feeling for which areas feel best, and you’ll start to focus on them.  You’ll probably start to adjust your speed and pressure to maximize the sensation.  Just keep at it like this.

Don’t worry about whether or not you have an orgasm.  You probably won’t have one the first time you masturbate.  Or first five times.  Or maybe even your first hundred.  Don’t try to force it and don’t feel discouraged if you don’t have one.  It doesn’t mean you’re broken, it doesn’t mean you’re frigid, it doesn’t mean you’re unable to have one.  More than likely, it just means you’re inexperienced.  So, just relax and keep doing what feels good and trying different things when something doesn’t feel good, and eventually, you’ll probably get there.  If it doesn’t feel like you’re getting anywhere this time, then stop for now, don’t sweat it, and try again later.

However, if it feels like you’re getting somewhere, keep going.  As you proceed, the pleasure will probably increase.  You may notice that your pulse and breathing have changed.  Muscles all over your body may start to tense up or shake involuntarily.  You may start to focus on the sensations and begin to tune the rest of the world out.  Eventually, you may feel like you’re climbing a hill or pushing against a wall, that’s there’s a sense that something is about to happen, if you can just get there.  You may even start to feel like you have to pee.  At this point, a lot of people become nervous and think that something’s wrong or that they’ve hit a dead end, so they stop masturbating.  Keep going, keep trying to get to the other side.  You may want to change the speed and pressure of your rubbing at this point.  A lot of people will go faster and press harder in an effort to get over that hill.  You’re not far off from the orgasm, so keep going.

In some cases, your vagina might pulse or twitch when you’re at this stage.  That’s not a sign that something’s wrong, it’s just your body preparing for what’s next.  This doesn’t always happen, though, so don’t worry if it doesn’t happen to you.

Eventually, all that repetitive circling you’ve been doing will pay off.  You’ll have a sensation that you’ve made it to the top of the hill and you’ll start coasting down the other side.  This is the orgasm.  Usually, there will be an intense surge of pleasure that lasts for several seconds.  Often, there will be a series of rhythmic muscular pulses in your vagina, kinda like a very strong heartbeat.  These pulses are often accompanied by a surge of pleasure.  They’re roughly a second apart at the start, but they slow down and become weaker with each passing pulse.  You can have from one to over ten of these pulses, but generally you’ll probably have somewhere between 3 and 7 of them.  In some cases, a small amount of fluid will also be expelled from the vagina.

Your first few times, an orgasm may feel more weird than good.  You’ve got muscles moving on their own in ways you’re not used to, you’ve got sensory input you’ve never had before, and maybe you even have strange liquids being expelled from your body.  You may even feel slightly nauseous.  It’s almost a guarantee that it won’t be a mind-blowing, world-shaking experience and it probably won’t be the best feeling ever.  More than likely, you’ll get used to the sensations of orgasm over time and it’ll start to feel better as you go along.

After you orgasm, you’ll probably feel deeply relaxed.  All the tension that had built up while you were climbing that hill has been released.  At the same time, it’s possible that your clitoris has become very very sensitive.  Trying to continue stimulating it can be unbearably intense.   Even a light touch might be uncomfortable.  You can let go of yourself at this point, but you may also enjoy the feeling of simply resting your hand on your vulva (without moving anything) for a while afterward.  During this time, you’ll gradually lose your arousal and clitoral erection and your heart rate and breathing will return to normal.

Most people will stop at this point.  In many cases, everything downstairs will want to take a bit of time to recharge.  In some cases, however, you may feel like continuing onto a second (and maybe even third and fourth…) orgasm.

In any case, that’s just one of many ways that you can masturbate.  As I’ve been saying all along, don’t be afraid to experiment and try other things.  You’re the only person who can know what works best for you.

tl; dr:  Spin little circles on your clit until you come.

What about the vagina?

It’s a misconception that the vagina is the primary source of sexual pleasure.  This misconception leads many people to think that they’re physically incapable of sexual pleasure and orgasm, because they don’t get much out of vaginal penetration.  When I ran a series of questionnaires to gather information for these posts, several of the responses said something similar to this:  “When I was young, I tried masturbating.  I dipped a few fingers in, didn’t feel anything, got bored and gave up.  I feel like I’m broken down there.”

It’s disheartening to see things like that.  It’s disheartening to know that things like that are not an isolated incident.  Many people feel that way.  And it’s not just some kind of sheltered asexual belief, many people who aren’t even remotely asexual think their parts don’t work because they don’t get much out of vaginal stimulation.  It’s a failure in how we talk about sexuality and bodies and how everything is arranged that leads to this.

Sure, it seems like your vagina should be the center of good feelings, given that it’s a fairly notable feature downstairs and since it plays an important role in sexual intercourse.  And so much porn is dedicated to vaginal penetration, I mean, it’s gotta be what important, right?  But in reality, it’s not all that sensitive.  The main source of pleasure is tucked away in your clitoris, that often overlooked nub at the edge of the vulva.  That’s not to say the vagina is completely numb.  Vaginal penetration can feel good, but it’s often not enough to reach orgasm.

However, it certainly can enhance the sensations while you masturbate, and there’s nothing wrong with vaginal penetration, if that’s what you want.  In some cases, while you masturbate, you might even feel an urge to have something inside you.

If you decide to explore penetration, there are a few things to keep in mind.  First, if you’re using your fingers, clip your nails!  Sharp nails and folds of skin can lead to cuts, and cuts can lead to infections, and infections never lead anywhere good.  Second, don’t put anything in there that shouldn’t go in there.  Things you might find around the house that might seem like they’d fit are probably not a good idea.  They might have hidden sharp edges or be home to all sorts of bacteria looking for a new home.  (And they might belong to someone else, which would just be rude…)  Use your fingers or something like a dildo or vibrator.  Start small, and work your way up.  It can be uncomfortable or even painful to put something in your vagina.  You don’t even need something all that big to get some added sensation, often just a couple of fingers will do.  And finally, don’t rush in!  If you try to go in before your vagina is ready, it’ll probably be an unpleasant experience.  Wait until you’re warmed up a bit and your vaginal walls have started to lubricate themselves.  If there’s not enough lubrication, some saliva or personal lubricant should help with that.

What you do once you’re in there is up to you.  You might enjoy moving your fingers (or whatever) in and out repeatedly.    How deep you go or how shallow you stay and how fast or how slow you go is entirely up to your preference.  You might just simply leave your fingers motionless and enjoy the feeling of fullness.  You might want to explore and try to find your G-spot.  (More about that later.)  Or, you might decide that penetration really isn’t your thing after all and take your fingers out and never look back.  Many people don’t get much out of vaginal penetration and don’t include it when they masturbate.

What if I don’t want to touch myself?

If you’re not a fan of direct contact with your genitals, you can try wearing a glove while you masturbate.  You can also try masturbating with clothing or something else between your hand and your vulva.  In either case, you can still use pretty much any technique as you otherwise would, including the circles method outlined above.

If that’s not your cup of tea, you can try using toys.  Many dildos and vibrators are long enough that you can stimulate your clitoris with them, but keep your hands well out of the way.

Running water is often an effective hands-free masturbation technique.  Turn on the bath faucet, adjust the temperature, then scoot up and let the water fall onto your vulva.  If you have a hand held shower head, you can use that to direct a spray of water directly at your clitoris.  And I’ve heard good things about Jacuzzi jets.

And if you don’t want to use hands at all, you can try grinding against something.  Grinding is when you press your vulva against something so that there’s pressure on your clitoris, then rock your hips back and forth to stimulate yourself.  This rocking motion should change the pressure point.  You can grind against something like a pillow or bunched up towel or blanket, or against a piece of furniture or something similar.

Sitting on a running washing machine may work.  The strong vibrations have been known to get the job done.  (The same is true of driving on a bumpy road.)

You can try simply squeezing your thighs together repeatedly, as well.  This action can stimulate your clitoris, and doesn’t require using anything else in the process.

What if I don’t like fluids?

Many of the techniques described above about masturbating without directly touching yourself can help here, as well.  They all keep your hands away from the fluids.  In particular, the techniques involving running water will do a pretty good job of washing away anything that might happen.

It’s possible to do it while wearing a pad.  The pad should catch all of the fluids since, you know, that’s kinda what they’re supposed to do.

Are the fluids harmful?

No, your vaginal lubrication is not harmful to you in any way.  It’s perfectly safe to touch it.

What about toys or other implements?

Masturbation toys, also called sex toys, are a way to enhance or alter your masturbation experience.  You can use them in addition to or in place of another masturbation technique.  Some toys won’t get you to orgasm on their own, but they can potentially increase the pleasure.  There are far too many types to talk about all of them, so I’m just going to cover a few of the common ones.

  • Vibrator:  A vibrator is wide term that encompasses any toy that vibrates.  You typically press the vibrator against your clitoris.  Some vibrators are designed for vaginal or anal penetration.  Most vibrators have adjustable speed or strength.  Many people say that they rely on the assistance of a vibrator to reach orgasm, and many people report that they did not think they could have an orgasm until they tried using a vibrator.  There are multiple types of vibrators.  Bullet vibes, where the vibrating motor is encased in a small egg are fairly popular.  Dildo vibes are the combination of a dildo and a vibrator.  The Rabbit is a type of dildo vibrator which has an arm that will stimulate your clitoris as it penetrates your vagina.  Then there’s the personal massager vibrators, which are typically larger, stronger, and are usually marketed as back massagers.  The Hitachi Magic Wand is a popular personal massager.  Some common household items with a vibrate feature can be used as a vibrator, too, such as electric toothbrushes, cell phones, and video game controllers.  Just remember that’s not their primary use and also consider that it’s probably a bit rude and icky to use one of those if anyone else might want to use it for its intended purpose.
  • Dildos:  A dildo is a generally somewhat cylindrical toy that is designed for penetration.  Sometimes a dildo may have a vibrator inside it, and sometimes a dildo might be designed to resemble a penis.  (I think technically a dildo is a featureless non-vibrating penetrative toy, a dong is a non-vibrating penetrative toy that resembles a penis, and a vibrator is any kind of toy that vibrates.  But those distinctions typically don’t matter.)  You use it by inserting it in your vagina (you may need lube), or by applying generous lube and carefully inserting it in your anus.  You may choose to move it in and out, or you may wish to simply leave it there.  Vaginal or anal stimulation rarely leads to orgasm on its own, but it often will enhance the pleasure of masturbation.  Some dildos are designed for G-spot stimulation and will have a curve or a knob that makes it easier to stimulate that area.  Some dildos have an arm or an extension that is designed to stimulate your clitoris as you use it, like the Rabbit.  In some cases, you may use a dildo strictly for clitoral stimulation by rubbing it externally, without any vaginal penetration.  (If trying one in the back door, be sure to only use toys specifically designed for anal penetration, which typically have a ridge to prevent the whole thing from going inside.  Also, take note of the size.  Many dildos are designed for vaginal penetration, so they can be fairly large and using them in your anus can be very uncomfortable and unpleasant.  Anal penetration can also be a bit messy, so be prepared to clean both the toy and yourself when you’re finished.  And, this is important, don’t use a toy vaginally after you’ve used it anally, until it’s been well cleaned, or there’s a risk you’ll transfer bacteria you don’t want living in your vagina.)
  • Handheld Shower Head:  If you have one of those detachable handheld shower heads on the end of a small hose, you can direct the spray toward your clitoris, vulva, or perineum.  Adjust the spray pattern and water temperature to find what works best.  In some cases, you may find that a direct spray at a specific spot works, while other times it may be more effective to sweep the spray across your genitals.  The handheld showerhead has the added benefit of not being seen as a sex toy, so if you’re looking for something totally discreet, this is probably your best bet.  (Sure, some toys are marketed as back massagers, but anyone who recognizes it will know you’re probably not using it for lumbar pain…)

What’s the deal with the G-Spot?

The G-Spot is a somewhat hard, ridged area along the forward vaginal wall.  In some cases, stimulating this region in the right way can lead to an intense orgasm.  Many people report that an orgasm with the involvement of the G-Spot can lead to female ejaculation.

G-Spot stimulation should be considered an “advanced technique”.  If you’re just starting out, it’s best to get a little bit more experience masturbating before trying to include the G-Spot in your play time.  Otherwise it’ll just unnecessarily complicate things.  Even if you’re a veteran, you may not find G-Spot stimulation to be worth the trouble.

To find it, insert a finger into your vagina and feel along the forward wall (the side that’s closest to your front) for an area that feels different.  It’s probably a few inches inside.  Much of the vagina is soft and smooth, but the G-spot is harder and feels bumpy or ridged.  If you’re not a fan of using a finger for vaginal penetration, there are a number of toys that are designed for G-Spot stimulation.  These toys usually have a curved shape that will press against the G-Spot when inserted, although you’ll have to rely on sensation to know you’ve found it, rather than touch.

G-Spot stimulation generally consists of rubbing while pressing against it.  G-Spot stimulation alone might not be enough for an orgasm, so you may want to use your clitoris at the same time.  As with the clitoris, the amount of pressure and the speed of rubbing will likely affect how it feels.

Not everyone responds to G-Spot stimulation in the same way.  Some people don’t see what the big deal is.  Some people find it uncomfortable to touch.  Some people may not even have a G-Spot.  (In fact, some people don’t believe it really exists at all…)  So, if you’re having trouble finding it, or you’ve found it and you’re not really impressed by what it does, don’t worry about it.

What’s the deal with female ejaculation?

First, it’s important to note that if you’ve ever seen this in a pornographic video, it’s less likely to have been an actual instance of female ejaculation and more likely to have been an instance of peeing on cue.

Ejaculation should be considered an “advanced technique”.  If you’re just starting out, it’s best to get a little bit more experience masturbating before trying to ejaculation in your play time.  Otherwise it’ll just unnecessarily complicate things.  Even if you’re a veteran, you may not find ejaculation to be worth the trouble.

Female ejaculation is where a small amount of fluid is pumped out of the urethra during orgasm.  It’s different than lubricating fluid being pushed out of the vagina by the orgasmic contractions and it’s not urine.  The ejaculation fluid is typically whitish and somewhat thick.  The most common way to cause ejaculation is to stimulate the G-spot to orgasm.

Some people say that an ejaculating orgasm is more intense or pleasurable than an orgasm without ejaculation.  Some people don’t see much difference.  Some people intentionally try to ejaculate, while for other people it just happens unintentionally during orgasms occasionally.

Ejaculating is not an easy thing to do.  There’s no 100% guaranteed trick to make it happen.  Many people try repeatedly with no luck.  It may not even be possible for some people to do.  Even people who can do it aren’t able to do it all the time.  If you try and don’t get anywhere, don’t worry about it.  It shouldn’t be something you feel like you have to be able to do.

Can I have multiple orgasms?

Possibly.  In some cases, after an orgasm, you might be able to continue stimulating yourself and have another orgasm (or two or three or …).  If your clitoris becomes hyper-sensitive following orgasm, you might have to wait a short while for the sensitivity to die down.   Strengthening your PC muscles by doing Kegel exercises might make it easier to have multiple orgasms.

Not everyone can have multiple orgasms, not everyone wants multiple orgasms, and not everyone who can have them wants to have them every time.  There’s no scorekeeping in masturbation.  If you’re fine with one orgasm, that’s great.  If you want to shoot for double digits, that’s great, too.  And if you don’t even want one, let alone more than one, even that’s great. The important thing is that you do what you want to do and not what you feel like you’re supposed to be doing or what you think other people are doing.

A lot of people wonder, “If you can have multiple orgasms, how do you know when to stop?”  The answer is that you know it’s time to stop when you don’t want to keep going.

What other things can I try?

The vulva isn’t the only body part that you can use while masturbating.  Try touching or pinching your nipples and caressing your breasts, or try rubbing your thighs, stomach, or chest.  All of those places, and more, can enhance the experience.

Some people enjoy anal stimulation.  You can try rubbing the opening, or gently push a well lubed (and well-manicured) finger inside.

What if it doesn’t feel good?

If you’re first getting started, it might not actually feel all that good.  You’ll probably have to try a couple of times before you start figure out what works for you.

If you’ve been at it for a while, but still nothing, shake up your technique a bit.  Switch hands, try using lube, try a different position, try using a toy, go faster or slower, press harder or lighter.  And remember, there’s no cookie-cutter way to masturbate.  What works for someone else might not work for you.

If you’ve tried it all and it still doesn’t feel good, then maybe it just won’t.  .  If it bothers you, you might want to consult with a doctor.  There may be a treatable medical reason for why it doesn’t feel good.  (Notably, it’s a side effect of many medications.)  However, if you’re cool with it, don’t worry about it.  You don’t have to masturbate or have orgasms to survive, so don’t worry about it.  It’s not your thing, but it doesn’t have to be your thing.

Are there any dangers or warnings I should know about?

  • This post has been written specifically about solo masturbation.  There are numerous health and safety concerns that would potentially need to be addressed if you’re doing anything I’ve mentioned here with someone else.  Most notably, there are countless disease prevention (and in some cases, pregnancy prevention) steps you would probably want to take that I have not mentioned here.
  • Make sure your vagina is adequately prepared before inserting anything.  Often, your natural wetness will be enough, but if it’s not, use an artificial lube.  If you attempt penetration without proper lubrication, you could irritate your skin and it may be uncomfortable or painful.
  • Don’t stick anything in your vagina that wasn’t meant for it and clean whatever you put in there before and after you use it.  The skin is soft and sensitive and any sharp or rough edges could cause painful and awkward cuts.  (In particular, cut your fingernails!)  And if you’re using something that’s not quite clean, then you run the risk of infection, because bacteria love the warm, moist environment.  This is why it’s a very bad idea to use anything (toy, fingers, etc.) in your vagina immediately after using it in your butt.
  • Watch what you use for lube.  Shampoo and soap might seem nice and slick, but it can severely dry out the skin or cause a rash.  They also may get into the urethra, where they’ll burn.  Hand creams and Vaseline and baby oil can all disrupt the natural cleansing action of the vagina and lead to infections.  Additionally, some creams contain a “medicated” tingling or warming feature.  It might feel good on a sore back, but the sensation could be excruciating on your genitals.  (Then again, that one’s up to individual preference…  Some people like how it feels…)  It’s best to use a personal lubricant specifically designed for genital use.
  • Inserting an object in your anus carries the risk of it getting stuck.  Save yourself an embarrassing visit to an emergency room and only use items that can’t get pulled completely inside and “lost”.  Many anal toys will have a ridge or tab to prevent them from going all the way in, or they’ll have a string attached to easy retrieval.
  • Make sure anything entering your anus is smooth and well lubed, and don’t force it in.  In particular, cut your fingernails!  A long fingernail might cut the inner lining, which can be unpleasant and runs the risk of infection.  Inadequate lubrication might cause irritation or tearing.
  • NEVER do ANYTHING that forcibly cuts off your airway while masturbating.  People have actually died from doing that.  You can hold your breath, but leave it at that.  Besides, taking long deep breaths can actually increase the sensations more than holding your breath will.
  • If it hurts, stop!  You’re probably doing something wrong.

[Up to Masturbation | Main]

An Asexual’s Guide To … Female Anatomy

[Up to Anatomy | Main]

(For most women, most girls, and anyone else who happens to have a clitoris and/or vagina.)

Between your legs, right where they meet your body, you’ll encounter a kinda squishy area that’s full of folds of skin and flaps of various sizes.  That area is your vulva, and that’s where we’ll start our tour.  Contained within are a number of points of interest.  Sometimes the whole area is mistakenly called the vagina, but that is actually just one of many things in the area.

First, you’ll encounter the flaps of skin known as the labia.  These act as a sort of covering for everything else that’s down there.  The thicker outer lips are called the labia majora, while the thinner inner lips are the labia minora.  They vary in shape and size from person to person.  Yours may be small and tuck themselves away between the outer folds of skin or yours may be large flaps of skin that stick out or yours may be somewhere in between.  In many cases, one side might be larger than the other, and the thickness of the ridge may not be the same for the entire length.  The labia are often a different color than the rest of the skin in the area.

If you venture between the labia, you’ll find a tunnel leading inward.  This is the vagina, also sometimes called the “pussy”.  It probably feels somewhat smooth and slimy, and is a bit stretchy.  Should you ever find yourself pregnant, the vagina was likely involved in that process somehow, and will likely be involved when the baby decides it’s time to get out and face the world.  At the far end of your vagina is your uterus, also known as “Aunt Flo’s Apartment”, where she lives and prepares for her monthly visits.

Along the forward wall of the vagina, several inches in, you may encounter an area that’s slightly harder and ridged.  This is known as the G-spot.  Although you may be touching it right this very second, many scientists (most of whom do not have a vagina) continue to debate its existence.

As you turn around and exit the vagina, you may come across an elastic ring of skin surrounding the outer opening.  Or you may not.  Either way, this is called the hymen and has absolutely no bearing on who you are or how you’ve lived your life, despite what other misguided people may claim.  The hymen has no practical use, and, if it’s even noticed at all, it’s largely known for being a painful nuisance if you choose to put anything inside your vagina.  In rare cases, the hymen covers the opening of the vagina, a condition that typically requires medical attention.

Okay, now that you’re back on the surface, head toward the front of your body, but stay between the labia.  Where the two sides of the labia come together, you’ll find a nubby thing hiding up there.  That’s your clitoris.  It’s probably not as prominent as some of the other bits and pieces around.  In some cases, people may not even know it’s down there until someone points it out.  However, it’s actually one of the most important bits down there and is usually well worth making friends with.

The size of the clitoris can vary greatly from person to person.  Yours may be the size of a grain of rice or may be two inches long.  The size of your clitoris has very little effect on what can be done with it.  Sometimes, the clitoris may change size and get harder.  This is called an erection.

Surrounding it is a loose bit of skin known as the clitoral hood.  In many cases, your clitoris is a bit shy and will often hide underneath the hood, only occasionally peeking out now and then.  The bit of the clit that sticks out on the surface is called the glans.  Under the surface, your clitoris has two legs which extend back and reach alongside the vagina.

In between the vagina and the clitoris, you may have come across a small lump with a hole in it, somewhere in the smooth skin that’s down there.  That hole is your urethra, and it’s where pee comes out.  Pee does not come from the vagina, unlike what some people believe.  Furthermore, some people (people who have not taken this tour or have not consulted a road map of the area) may confuse the urethra with the clitoris.  Let me tell you, that’s just a recipe for disappointment.

Let’s head outside and take a look back at the vulva as a whole.  You may have noticed a forest of short, curly hairs surrounding the area.  These are pubic hairs, also known as the “bush”.  The area that they cover and their density varies greatly from person to person.  For some people, the hair is limited to a small area immediately outside the labia.  In others, the hair will live around the vulva as well as in a tuft on the mound that sits in front of the vulva.   In still others, the hair is thickest around the vulva and the mound, but may spread upward and start a colony around the navel.  Sometimes the color of pubic hair may not match the color of the hair elsewhere on your body.  In some cases, people shave some or all of this hair away for various reasons.   According to scientists, the only known purpose of pubic hair is to be particularly repulsive when found in a hotel room.

If you travel back from the vulva, you’ll encounter another hole.  This one is known as the anus, and it’s where poop comes out.  There isn’t much else here, so let’s keep moving.

We’re now leaving the lower reaches and heading up to your chest.  On your chest, you’ll probably find a pair of small nubs of skin, known as nipples.  The nipples may be surrounded by round bits of darker skin, which may or may not have hairs protruding from it.  Occasionally, the nipples will tighten up and get harder and stick out.

In many cases, the nipples live on squishy bags of fat called breasts, also known as “boobs” or “tits”.  Your breasts may range in size from completely flat to protruding a foot from the surface of your chest. While they occasionally provide food for babies, most of the time, the breasts have no practical use and may just be in the way.  Despite their general lack of utility, they are inexplicably one of the most obsessed about body parts.

It is, however, not obsessive to learn how to give yourself a breast self exam.  A breast self exam will check for lumps that may be related to breast cancer.  (Just do an Internet search for instructions.  The phrase “breast self exam” generally leads to a fairly safe, medically oriented set of results.)

This concludes the tour.

(You will notice that the tour did not stop at the magic orgasm button.  That’s because there’s no such place.  If you want an orgasm, you’re going to have to work for it.  More on that later.)

[Up to Anatomy | Main]

An Asexual’s Guide To … Male Masturbation

[Up to Masturbation | Main]

The techniques and details described in this post are not the only way to masturbate.  They’re not the “correct” way or the “best” way.  They may not even work for you.  They’re provided as a base upon which you can experiment and learn what works for you.

Okay, so, I’ve got a penis and I want to try masturbating.  How do I go about doing that?

The first step is to get ready.  Find a comfortable and safe position, where you’ll have enough time to experiment and try things out without being disturbed.  Lock your door if that would make you feel more comfortable.  You may want some sort of lube to help things along.  Pretty much anything slippery will do, but try to avoid soap or shampoo, because those have a tendency to dry out your skin or cause a burning sensation if they get in your urethra, neither of which is very fun.  Lube specifically designed for sexual activity (typically called “personal lubricant”) is your best bet, but something like hand lotion, baby oil, or Vaseline will also work.  (However, oil and latex don’t mix, so if there’s any chance that a condom and another person will be involved in your session, stick to water-based personal lubricants that are specifically made for use with condoms.  To repeat:  Do not use hand lotion, baby oil, Vaseline, or anything else like that if there’s going to be a condom involved.)  And finally, you’ll want to have a towel or some tissues nearby.  If you end up having an orgasm, you’ll probably ejaculate, and you’ll probably want to clean that up.  (Or just masturbate in the shower or bath and wash it all down the drain.)

All the prerequisites are taken care of, it’s time to get down to business.  The most common and most straightforward way to masturbate is to wrap your hand around your penis and stroke up and down repeatedly until you orgasm or decide to stop.  That’s the technique I’m going to explain here.

For this to work, you’re going to need access to your penis.  I’d suggest taking off your pants and underwear, so it’s all out there and freely reachable, and so you don’t have to worry about accidental stains on your pants when you’re done.  Of course, it’s also possible to pull your penis out through your fly, although that can sometimes lead to painful zipper bites.  Or if you want, you can simply reach into your underwear and do it entirely inside your pants, but that typically leads to restricted motion, which may make things uncomfortable and more difficult.

Now you’ll need an erection, also known as a hard-on.  This is where your penis fills with blood, becomes somewhat stiff, and tends to stand up.  At this point, most other resources will direct you to “Think of that hot girl in accounting” in order to get an erection, but since you’re here, I’m assuming you’re ace, so that’s probably not going to work so well for you.  That means you’ll need to get one some other way.  Of course, you might already have one from reading this far and anticipating what’s next.  Awesome, you’re ready to go!  Then again, you may know how to achieve erection, in which case, proceed.  Or, you can always wait until you have one naturally for some reason.  Morning wood can be used for masturbation, just like any other erection.

However, in many cases, you might have to help your little soldier stand at attention when you want to use it.  Here’s a few things you might try to get you up and running.  Feel free to mix and match these techniques.  If one doesn’t work on its own, it might work with the help of another.

  • Touch or rub your penis.  This may seem obvious, but it’s often rather effective.  Don’t just poke it with a finger or hold it like you would when you pee, but run your fingers or hand around it.  Near the head on the underside (the side that faces your balls when you’re soft) is an area that’s often more sensitive than the rest of skin.  Rubbing there in a circular motion may get you aroused.
  • Grab and pull your penis.  Don’t yank or jerk, but gently pull it outward and move it around.  Start stroking or pushing along it.
  • Move the loose skin back and forth.  Pull the skin back, then pull the skin up over the head over and over.  If you have a foreskin, pull it back all the way.  Try gently pinching, rolling, or stretching the skin.
  • Caress your stomach, inner thighs, and balls.  Try focusing on other areas around your penis.  Those regions are often fairly sensitive and may send a wake-up signal to your equipment.
  • Constrict the base of your penis for a short time.  Make a loop with your thumb and forefinger around your penis, down near where it attaches to your body.  Make the finger loop tighter. This will allow blood to enter, but make it more difficult to leave, which may result in an erection.  Toys called “cock rings” do this same thing.  Don’t stay like this for too long or hold it too tightly, or you’ll cut off circulation, which could be bad.
  • Apply pressure to your penis.  Press it against your body with your hand.  Lean against something, so that your penis is between your body and something else.  Or try laying face down, with your penis between your body and your mattress.  Make a gentle rocking motion with your hips to vary the pressure on your shaft.  You might also try crossing your legs with your penis between them.
  • Tense or clench your genital muscles.  Try tensing the muscles that you use to hold back pee.  Clench and hold, or repeatedly tense and release.  After a while, you might start to get an erection.
  • Think about sex, look at porn, or read something erotic.  Yeah, you’re asexual, but this still may work anyway.  Don’t ask me why, I haven’t figured it out myself.
  • Use a vibrator.  The little buzzing machines aren’t just for a clitoris.  A penis can be woken up by one, too.  That zone on the underside is a good place to try placing it.

By the way, you don’t actually have to have a full erection to begin masturbating.  An erection isn’t an on-off binary, where you’re either completely soft or rock hard.  There’s a huge area in between, and you can usually work with your penis even if it’s in a semi-erect state.  So, if you’re able to get yourself partially hard, but not completely there, then you’re probably far enough along to continue.  The later stimulation will likely complete the erection.  And if you start to lose the erection after you’ve started, come back to these tricks and you might be able to regain it.

Okay, so now you have an erection (Or at least enough of one) and are ready to go.

At this point, pretty much anything that slides up and down your penis over and over may eventually lead to an orgasm.  Some techniques are very effective, while others are a quick trip to rug burn.  I’m going to describe one of the most common techniques.  Note that this is not the only way to masturbate.  There are many variations that you can do, so I’d encourage you to experiment and improvise in order to find out what works best for you.

Reach down and wrap your hand (doesn’t matter which) around your erection.  Your grip should sort of be like you’re holding a cup or a refrigerator door handle.  Your thumb and forefinger should be able to completely close a loop around your penis near the head, your palm will fully contact the shaft, while the rest of the fingers will curl around as far as they can reach.  You want to hold tight enough that you can feel some pressure, but not so tight that you’re really squeezing it.  You’re not trying to pull off your penis, so you don’t need a death grip.

Start sliding your hand up and down the shaft of your penis.  It should be a smooth, continuous motion.  If you’ve ever seen the piston on an oil well or on a steam locomotive, think of the continuous back-and-forth movement of one of those.  You don’t want to “jerk” it or “yank” it, despite what the common euphemisms for masturbation imply.  Keep stroking up and down your penis repeatedly.  If you have no idea how fast to be going, try about one or two full up and down strokes per second, but don’t worry about precise timing.  Faster or slower is okay, and you’ll find the speed that works for you.

There should be some play in the skin of your shaft.  Your grip should be tight enough so that the skin moves slightly back and forth with your hand, but loose enough that it’ll slip back into position as you move.  You don’t want a grip so tight that it feels like you’re going to pull the skin off or so loose that you don’t feel the skin move at all.  If you have a foreskin, you might be able to slide that back and forth.

You do not have to move your hand along the entire length of your penis with every stroke.  The base of the shaft is less sensitive than the head, so you may not get much from stroking the base.  Then again, the head may be too sensitive to stroke, so you may want to avoid it at certain times.  You’ll probably keep your hand in contact with your penis most of the time as you stroke, instead of pulling it completely off the end with every movement.  Sometimes you might make several short strokes close to the head between strokes along the full length.

If your hand’s not sliding smoothly across the skin of your penis as you stroke, you may want to use some of that lubricant that I mentioned above.  Start with a small amount, like a drop or two.  It’s easy to add more, but harder to take it away.  You want to add enough so that you reduce friction, but not so much that you’ve completely eliminated it.  Too little and it’ll probably feel sticky, but too much and your hand will slip right off.  Make sure that the lube is spread around to all of your fingers and your palm.  If it starts to dry out, adding a little bit more or a few drops of water will usually bring it back.

As you continue to stroke, it should start to feel different downstairs.  It probably will begin to feel good.  Varying the pressure of your grip (even mid-stroke), the speed of the stroke, the angle you’re holding it, even how many fingers you’re using may all have an effect on how much pleasure you experience.  Everyone is different.  Some people like fast strokes while others take it slow, but too fast may cause irritation and too slow may not be enough stimulation to keep the erection up.  Some prefer looser grips and others prefer more pressure, but too loose and you won’t feel anything and too tight and it might hurt.  There’s no “perfect” speed or pressure, so you’ll have to experiment with what works best for you.

There are various areas of your penis that will react to stimulation differently.  The shaft is probably the least sensitive area.  On the underside of the penis, near the head, there may be a zone that is very pleasurable to stimulate.  A band of skin called the frenulum connects the shaft to the head in that area, and the frenulum can be quite sensitive, although it’s unfortunately sometimes removed during circumcision.  The head is often the most sensitive area.  Sometimes, particularly for someone who is uncircumcised, the head may even be too sensitive to stimulate directly until you reach a high enough level of arousal and your body is prepared for it.  The corona, the ridge around the base of the head can also be a highly sensitive region.

Now, you may be thinking, “If the head is so sensitive, why don’t I just spend all my time focused on that?”  Well, the answer is that it’s generally too intense to do that.  The stimulation will sort of overload your senses and it may become too much to take.  If it starts to feel too intense, back off a bit.  Slow down, loosen your grip, maybe retreat to the shaft for a while and stroke the head a bit less.

Okay, so, you’re stroking over and over, and hopefully it’s starting to feel like you’re getting somewhere.  There’s a misconception that you won’t feel much of anything until all of a sudden, BOOM! Orgasm.  That’s typically not how it works.  It’ll probably start to feel good well before the orgasm, with a small surge of pleasure with every stroke up or down.  You’ll start to get a feeling for which areas feel best, and you’ll start to focus on them.  You’ll probably start to adjust your speed and pressure to maximize the sensation.  Just keep at it like this.

Don’t worry about whether or not you have an orgasm.  You probably won’t have one the first time you masturbate.  Or first five times.  Or maybe even your first hundred.  Don’t try to force it and don’t feel discouraged if you don’t have one.  It doesn’t mean you’re broken, it doesn’t mean you’re impotent, it doesn’t mean you’re unable to have one.  More than likely, it just means you’re inexperienced.  So, just relax and keep doing what feels good and trying different things when something doesn’t feel good, and eventually, you’ll probably get there.  If it doesn’t feel like you’re getting anywhere this time, then stop for now, don’t sweat it, and try again later.

However, if it feels like you’re getting somewhere, keep going.  As you proceed, the pleasure will probably increase.  You may notice that your pulse and breathing have changed.  Muscles all over your body may start to tense up or shake involuntarily.  You may start to focus on the sensations and begin to tune the rest of the world out.  Eventually, you may feel like you’re climbing a hill or pushing against a wall, that’s there’s a sense that something is about to happen, if you can just get there.  At this point, a lot of people become nervous and think that something’s wrong or that they’ve hit a dead end, so they stop masturbating.  Keep going, keep trying to get to the other side.  You may want to change the speed and pressure of your strokes at this point.  A lot of people will go faster and grip tighter in an effort to get over that hill.  You’re not far off from the orgasm, so keep going.

In some cases, your penis might pulse or twitch when you’re at this stage.  That’s not a sign that something’s wrong, it’s just your body preparing for what’s next.  This doesn’t always happen, though, so don’t worry if it doesn’t happen to you.

Eventually, all that repetitive stroking you’ve been doing will pay off.  You’ll have a sensation that you’ve made it to the top of the hill and you’ll start coasting down the other side.  This is the orgasm.  Usually, there will be an intense surge of pleasure that lasts for several seconds.  Often, there will be a series of rhythmic muscular pulses in your penis, kinda like a very strong heartbeat.  These pulses are often accompanied by a surge of pleasure.  They’re roughly a second apart at the start, but they slow down and become weaker with each passing pulse.  You can have from one to over ten of these pulses, but generally you’ll probably have somewhere between 3 and 7 of them.

Most of the time, you’ll also ejaculate when you orgasm.  Ejaculation is when the muscular pulses pump semen through your penis, causing it to come out of the end.  Semen is a whitish (or maybe yellowish) liquid that generally contains sperm.  Sometimes, it’ll just dribble out the end, while other times it’ll squirt out with such force that it can fly several feet.  Sometimes it’s thick, while other times it’s runny.  The volume of semen, as well as the strength of the ejaculation is different for every person, every time they have one.  In many cases, if you haven’t ejaculated in a while, it’ll tend toward thicker and more volume, while if you’ve ejaculated more recently, it’ll become thinner and there will be less.  I should probably point out that although your testicles produce the sperm, they’re not really all that involved when ejaculation happens.  They don’t pump anything, and if you touch them during ejaculation, you won’t feel them moving at all.

Your first few times, an orgasm may feel more weird than good.  You’ve got muscles moving on their own in ways you’re not used to, you’ve got sensory input you’ve never had before, and you’ve probably got strange liquids being expelled from your body.  You may even feel slightly nauseous.  It’s almost a guarantee that it won’t be a mind-blowing, world-shaking experience and it probably won’t be the best feeling ever.  More than likely, you’ll get used to the sensations of orgasm over time and it’ll start to feel better as you go along.

After you orgasm, you’ll probably feel deeply relaxed.  All the tension that had built up while you were climbing that hill has been released.  At the same time, your penis has probably become very very sensitive.  Trying to continue stroking it is probably unbearably intense.   Even a light motion might be uncomfortable.  You can let go of yourself at this point, but you may also enjoy the feeling of simply holding your penis (without moving anything) for a while afterward.  During this time, you’ll gradually lose your erection and your heart rate and breathing will return to normal.

Most people will stop at this point.  Most of the time, everything downstairs will need a bit of time to recharge.  You’ll probably lose your erection and find it difficult to get another one for a period of a few minutes or up to several hours.  This is called the refractory period.

In any case, that’s just one of many ways that you can masturbate.  As I’ve been saying all along, don’t be afraid to experiment and try other things.  You’re the only person who can know what works best for you.

tl; dr:  Put your hand around your cock and stroke until you come.

What if I don’t want to touch myself?

If you’re not a fan of direct contact with your penis, then you can try wearing a rubber glove on your hand or a condom on your penis while you masturbate.  You will almost certainly need to use lube in this case, and if you go the condom route, be sure to put some both inside and outside.  This method has the benefit of being pretty much identical to the hand stroking technique outlined above.

If that’s still not your cup of tea, you can try using toys.  Many masturbation sleeves cover your penis completely, so with the exception of possibly helping your penis into the sleeve, you won’t have to touch it while you masturbate.  I’ll talk about some of them in a bit.  However, you’d have to purchase a toy, so that may not be the best solution.

Another option is to remain fully clothed and grind against something.  Grinding or humping is when you press your penis against something, then rock your hips back and forth in order to stimulate yourself.  The hip rocking motion should either move the penis or it should change the pressure point, in either case, the part of the penis that’s being stimulated will change as you rock.   Lying face down on a mattress is a common way to do this, as is grinding against a couch or other piece of furniture.  There are downsides to grinding, though.  First, since you’re probably grinding against rough clothing, you may end up irritating your penis.  Second, if you orgasm, you’re probably going to ejaculate in your underwear, which would probably get a bit messy.

What if I don’t like fluids?

Probably the best way to avoid fluids is to wear a condom while you masturbate.  They’re specifically designed to catch and contain your semen when you ejaculate, after all.  You can put one on when you first get started, wear it the whole time you’re masturbating, then take it off and throw it away when you’re done. The downside is that condoms can get expensive if you’re buying them all the time.

You can try keeping a tissue or a towel handy.  When you sense that you’re about to come, place the tissue around the head of your penis and cover your urethra and try to catch the ejaculate.

Masturbating in the shower is another good way to deal with fluids.  When you ejaculate, it goes straight down the drain, and you can immediately wash your hands.  A similar technique would be to ejaculate directly into a toilet.

Many masturbation toys will contain your semen after you ejaculate.  You simply ejaculate into the toy, then wash it out later.  These toys also contain the lubricant, leaving your hands clean and dry.  I’ll talk about them shortly.

Another option is to stop before you reach orgasm and ejaculation.  It can still be quite pleasurable.  If you learn the signals of your body, you’ll be able to tell when you’re about to reach orgasm, so you can slow down or stop for a bit then resume a while later.  This allows you to continue masturbating almost indefinitely without having an orgasm.

Are the fluids harmful?

Your own precum and your own semen are not harmful to you in any way.  It’s perfectly safe to touch them, it’s even safe to ingest them if you think you’d be into that.  Semen might start to smell bad after a while, but you’re probably going to clean up long before that happens.

What about toys or other implements?

Masturbation toys, also called sex toys, are a way to enhance or alter your masturbation experience.  You can use them in addition to or in place of another masturbation technique.  Some toys won’t get you to orgasm on their own, but they can potentially increase the pleasure.  There are far too many types to talk about all of them, so I’m just going to cover a few of the common ones.

  • Penis Sleeve:  A sleeve is a toy that encloses your penis.  You typically apply lube to the sleeve, insert your penis, grab the sleeve and stroke with it.  The sleeve usually has soft ridges or bumps or some other texture on the inside to vary and increase the stimulation.  Sometimes, sleeves are little more than a thin tube that’s open on both ends, while other times, the sleeve is made of a thicker material, or closed off on one end.  Sleeves that are large enough or that are closed on one end are often a good way to contain the ejaculation for easy cleanup. Occasionally, sleeves have an opening that resembles a body part, but the opening rarely has any practical effect on the stimulation.  Common sleeves include the Tenga brand and the Fleshlight.
  • Vibrator:  A vibrator is wide term that encompasses any toy that vibrates.  You typically press the vibrator against a sensitive spot on your penis, run it around your testicles, or, in some cases, insert it in your anus.  Most vibrators have adjustable speed or strength.  Vibrators by themselves may not get you all the way to orgasm easily, but they can be used to help with arousal or enhance the sensation of orgasm.  There are multiple types of vibrators.  Bullet vibes, where the vibrating motor is encased in a small egg are fairly popular.  Dildo vibes are the combination of a dildo and a vibrator.  Cock ring vibes are the combination of a cock ring and a bullet vibe and allow hands free stimulation of your penis.  Ring vibes that are sometimes sold with condoms are typically single use and have weak motors powered by watch batteries.  It’s possible to get stronger ring vibes which have larger vibrators attached, and which are powered by AA batteries.  Then there’s the personal massager vibrators, which are typically larger, stronger, and are usually marketed as back massagers.  The Hitachi Magic Wand is a popular personal massager.
  • Cock Rings:  A cock ring is a ring that fits around your penis (sometimes your penis and testicles), and is designed to restrict blood flow.  Restricting blood flow tends to create a stronger erection, because the blood can get in, but has a harder time getting back out.  Most of the time, cock rings are passive, you just put it on and leave it on until you’re done.  Sometimes, however, they’ll have vibrators attached, which can provide additional stimulation.  Cock rings should not be used for an extensive period of time and you should take it off immediately if it starts to hurt.  Also, remember that your penis probably will grow when you get erect, so a size that fits when you’re soft might become uncomfortably tight when you’re hard.  Don’t use a ring that you can’t cut off in an emergency, or you might be facing an embarrassing visit to the ER…
  • Dildos:  A dildo is a generally somewhat cylindrical toy that is designed for penetration.  Sometimes a dildo may have a vibrator inside it, and sometimes a dildo might be designed to resemble a penis.  You use it by applying generous lube and carefully inserting it in your anus.  You may choose to move it in and out, or you may with to simply leave it there.  Anal stimulation rarely leads to orgasm on its own, but it often will enhance the pleasure of masturbation.  Anal dildos are an effective way to stimulate your prostate.  Be sure to only use toys specifically designed for anal penetration, which typically have a ridge to prevent the whole thing from going inside and getting stuck.  Also, take note of the size.  Many dildos are designed for vaginal penetration, so they can be fairly large and using them in your anus can be very uncomfortable and unpleasant.  Anal penetration can also be a bit messy, so be prepared to clean both the toy and yourself when you’re finished.  The Aneros is a dildo that’s specifically designed for prostate stimulation.
  • Handheld Shower Head:  If you have one of those detachable handheld shower heads on the end of a small hose, you can direct the spray toward your penis, testicles, or perineum.  Adjust the spray pattern and water temperature to find what works best.  In some cases, you may find that a direct spray at a specific spot works, while other times it may be more effective to sweep the spray across your genitals.  It can be difficult to reach orgasm with only the spray from a shower head.  You may wish to direct the water at your balls while you stroke your penis.

Ejaculating seems messy.  What do I do about that?

First, it’s important to understand that there typically isn’t much fluid produced when you ejaculate, often no more than a few milliliters.  That means there isn’t too much to clean up, and it also means that it’s fairly easy to contain, if that’s what you want to do.  As I mentioned in an earlier response, you can contain it when you ejaculate by using condoms, certain toys, or by finishing into a tissue or towel, or you can simply masturbate in the shower and wash it all away.

You can also deal with it by controlling where you ejaculate.  Some people will shoot into toilet or sink when they masturbate, while others might try to aim it so that all of the semen lands on their stomach, where it’s a quick wipe to get rid of.  It’s also possible to ejaculate into your cupped hand, then wash it off from there.  Also, instead of ejaculating directly into a tissue or towel, you can place it on your stomach and chest or wherever and just ejaculate onto it.

Some of these techniques are more disruptive than the others.  If you’re lying in bed masturbating, it can be quite a shift to jump up and run to the bathroom to ejaculate when you feel orgasm coming on.  Try different methods, and you’ll find one that works well and doesn’t distract from the experience.

There are several techniques to prevent ejaculation during orgasm.  One is to apply pressure, either by squeezing very tightly around the base of the penis or by pressing hard against the perineum.  Both of these techniques will close off the urethra and not allow semen to exit through the penis, but both can also cause discomfort.  Another method is to clench and hold the muscles around the penis as tight as you can for as long as you can during orgasm  This will disrupt the ejaculatory pumping, and you may experience and orgasm without ejaculation.  (These are also some of the techniques that could lead to multiple orgasm.)  Both of these techniques are not 100% effective and take a lot of practice to get right.

If you ejaculate on something, you’ll probably want to clean it up fairly soon after you’re done.  Semen will turn dry and crusty after a while, and will probably leave a yellowish stain behind.  (So, don’t use your favorite shirt to soak it up…)

Will I always ejaculate when I masturbate?

Not necessarily.  While orgasm and ejaculation usually happen at the same time, they’re not actually the same thing.  It’s possible to have an orgasm without ejaculating.  Sometimes it just happens, where you get some sense of an orgasm happening, but nothing comes out.  Other times, you may have ejaculated so many times within a short period of time that there’s not really anything left.  And, as mentioned above, you may also be able to train yourself to have an orgasm without ejaculating.

Of course, there’s no guarantee that you’ll get anywhere close to the orgasm/ejaculation zone when you masturbate.  And even if you do, if you’re able to sense when you’re getting close, you can easily stop before you get there.

On the other hand, if you do experience orgasm when you masturbate, but you rarely or never ejaculate, you may be experiencing what’s called retrograde ejaculation, where the semen enters the bladder instead of exiting through the penis.  If that’s what’s happening, you might want to consult with a doctor about it, especially as it may point to a condition that’s more serious than simply not ejaculating when you orgasm.

If I don’t masturbate, will I explode from an unreleased buildup of semen?

No, not at all.  Semen doesn’t endlessly build up in some internal balloon until you eventually ejaculate.  If you fail to ejaculate regularly, exactly nothing happens.  Most of the time, the sperm produced will simply be reabsorbed into the body.  Occasionally, you may have a wet dream and ejaculate while you sleep.  But you’re not going to explode because there’s too much sperm in you.

Think about people who’ve had vasectomies.  A vasectomy doesn’t do anything to turn off the testicles.  They’re still there and running, constantly producing new sperm.  A vasectomy just cuts off the tubes that connected the testicles to the penis, so that the sperm has no way to get out.  People who’ve had vasectomies don’t have to go in for a sperm draining every couple of weeks.  The sperm just gets absorbed back into the body, and that’s the end of it.

People who say that they’re going to explode are just exaggerating.  They might have a high libido, they might really enjoy orgasm, but nothing physically is going to happen to them if they don’t ejaculate.

What’s the deal with the prostate?

The prostate is an organ that produces some of the ejaculatory fluids.  It’s located just behind the forward wall of your rectum.  And for some reason, despite its location, it can feel good if you stimulate it in some way.

Prostate stimulation should be considered an “advanced technique”.  If you’re just starting out, it’s best to get a little bit more experience masturbating before trying to include the prostate in your play time.  Otherwise it’ll just unnecessarily complicate things.  Even if you’re a veteran, you may not find prostate stimulation to be worth the trouble.

The prostate is not in a terribly accessible location, so stimulating it isn’t the easiest thing to do.  It can be reached by sticking a well-lubed finger in your anus.  (Be sure to clip your fingernails first!)  Go in a couple of inches, then press against the wall toward your front.  You should eventually come across a walnut-sized lump on the other side of the wall.  That lump is your prostate.  If you’re not too keen on sticking a finger up your butt, there are many toys that are specifically designed for prostate stimulation.  They typically have a curved shape that will press against the prostate when inserted.  And if you’re not a fan of anything at all going in that opening, then it’s sort of possible to stimulate the prostate from outside.  There’s a soft patch in your perineum, directly in front of your anus.  If you press there, you should be able to feel your prostate.

Prostate stimulation generally consists of rubbing it or pressing against it.  Some people claim that prostate stimulation alone can cause orgasms, orgasms without ejaculation, or ejaculation without an orgasm, but in most cases, it just tends to increase the intensity of the sensation.  It also may make it so that a much larger than usual amount of pre-ejaculatory lubricant will flow from your penis, even if you’re not doing anything to stimulate your penis.

Can I have multiple orgasms?

Maybe.  There’s a common belief that once there’s been an orgasm, the penis goes into sleep mode and can’t be used again for a while.  While that’s typically the case, it can be possible, with practice, to be able to have an orgasm, but then keep going afterward.

Multiple orgasms should be considered an “advanced technique”.  If you’re just starting out, it’s best to get a bit more experience masturbating before going for extra innings.  Otherwise it’ll just unnecessarily complicate things.  Even if you’re a veteran, you may not find going for multiple orgasms to be worth the trouble.

One technique is to prevent ejaculation when you orgasm.  This can be done by tightly squeezing the base of the penis or pushing hard against the perineum just as the orgasm starts, in order to close off the urethra.  This way may, however, be uncomfortable.  Another method is to tighten and hold the muscles you use when you pee.  As soon as the orgasm starts, stop stimulating yourself and clench those muscles and hold them as tight as you can for as long as you can.  You’ll probably need to have strong PC muscles to pull this off, so practice those Kegels!

Another technique is to completely relax and stop stimulating your penis as soon as the orgasm starts.  Completely relax and hands off.  Your penis will probably twitch and pump and you’ll likely ejaculate a little bit.

In either case, once you feel the orgasm is ending, resume stimulation.  If you’re successful, you won’t feel too sensitive or not sensitive enough.  It’ll be just right, and the stimulation will feel pretty much like it did before the orgasm.  You should be able to build it back up for another orgasm (and possibly another and another…).  You probably won’t be able to keep going forever, though.  Each successive orgasm tends to become harder to obtain.

The orgasms in a sequence of multiple orgasms are often less pleasurable than the typical single orgasm.  This is because you’re disrupting the process and making it less intense.  Unfortunately, this means that if you ever fail to ride through the orgasm and aren’t able keep going on to another one, you’ll probably only have had a relatively weak and unsatisfying orgasm, and be facing a limp penis that’s not interested in continuing.  Because of this, you’ll probably want to try to finish with an orgasm that you don’t intentionally disrupt.

If you decide to pursue multiple orgasms, be aware that it takes a lot of practice and a willingness to experience disappointment while you try to get the hang of it.  Even if you get it figured out, you may decide that it’s not worth the effort.

What other things can I try?

The penis isn’t the only body part that you can use while masturbating.  Try caressing your testicles or your perineum, try touching or pinching your nipples, try rubbing your thighs, stomach, or chest.  All of those places, and more, can enhance the experience.  In particular, don’t be afraid of your testicles.  They’re not as fragile as you might expect.  Don’t be afraid to rub, tug, or even squeeze them.  Just start gently and work up from there.

Some people enjoy anal stimulation.  You can try rubbing the opening, or gently push a well lubed (and well-manicured) finger inside.  The prostate, mentioned before, lives in that area.

You can try sitting on a rubber ball, rolled up sock, or bunched up blanket or towel in such a way that it presses gently against your perineum.  The penis extends back into the body, just above the perineum, so pressure there can work to stimulate that extension of your penis.

Try a different grip on your penis.  The “door handle” grip is just one.  You can turn that grip upside-down, so that your thumb and forefinger are on the positioned closer to the base.  You can place your fingers down the side of your penis and have the head cupped by the palm of your hand as you stroke.  You can use only fingertips.  Any way you can hold your penis is a valid way to try masturbating.

Go at it two handed.  You can stack your hands on top of one another and have an extra long stroke.  You can perform an “endless” stroke by stroking one direction with one hand, then when you reach the end, place the other hand and stroke with it, in a continuous motion.  You can stroke with one hand, and rub circles with the other.  You can place the palm of one hand over the opening in the other hand, so that a downstroke will have the head of the penis rub against the palm of the hand.  You can rub your penis between two palms.  Or you can have one hand pay attention to the shaft, while the other hand works the head.  Any way you can think of to use two hands it probably something worth experimenting with.

You can try a completely different method of masturbation, one that does not involve manual stroking.  One fairly common method is to thrust into something smooth and slippery.  The smooth and slippery object can be any number of things:  Your lubed up hand, a penis sleeve or similar toy, a condom, or even something improvised, like a plastic sandwich bag with a little bit of lube placed inside.  You can try sandwiching the object between a couple of pillows on your bed.  You might want to place a towel between the object and the pillows, in case any lube or anything else spills out.  Once you’re set up, you lie face down on top of the pillows and place your penis inside.  After you’ve adjusted everything and found a comfortable position, you can start moving your hips back and forth in order to thrust your penis in and out of the object.  This method often feels very different than masturbating by hand.  (And always, experiment with technique, speed, and pressure to discover what works best for you.)

What if it doesn’t feel good?

If you’re first getting started, it might not actually feel all that good.  You’ll probably have to try a couple of times before you start figure out what works for you.

If you’ve been at it for a while, but still nothing, shake up your technique a bit.  Switch hands, try using lube, try a different position, try using a toy, go faster or slower, relax or strengthen your grip.  In particular, try squeezing a bit when you stroke over the head of your penis, adjust your grip so that you press harder on the underside of your penis, or try tightening the loop made by your thumb and forefinger as you pass over the corona.  And remember, there’s no cookie-cutter way to masturbate.  What works for someone else might not work for you.

If you’ve tried it all and it still doesn’t feel good, then maybe it just won’t.  If it bothers you, you might want to consult with a doctor.  There may be a treatable medical reason for why it doesn’t feel good.  (Notably, it’s a side effect of many medications.)  However, if you’re cool with it, don’t worry about it.  You don’t have to masturbate or have orgasms to survive, so don’t worry about it.  It’s not your thing, but it doesn’t have to be your thing.

Are there any dangers or warnings I should know about?

  • This post has been written specifically about solo masturbation.  There are numerous health and safety concerns that would potentially need to be addressed if you’re doing anything I’ve mentioned here with someone else.  Most notably, there are countless disease prevention (and in some cases, pregnancy prevention) steps you would probably want to take that I have not mentioned here.
  • Don’t stick your penis into anything that wasn’t meant for it.  Always remember that a soft penis grows into a hard one, so something that’s easy to get into may be considerably harder to get out of.  Also, if the object is hard or rough, you could potentially cut, scrape, or otherwise injure yourself.
  • If you’re masturbating by thrusting into something, be careful not to accidentally jam your penis into something with the full force of a forward thrust.  Although there are no bones to break in your penis, it can still be severely injured by something like this.  If you slip out of whatever you’re thrusting into, carefully guide your penis back in before resuming full speed.
  • Watch what you use for lube.  Shampoo and soap might seem nice and slick, but it can severely dry out the skin or cause a rash.  They also may get into the urethra, where they’ll burn.  Some creams contain a “medicated” tingling or warming feature.  It might feel good on a sore back, but the sensation could be excruciating on your penis and testicles.  (Then again, that one’s up to individual preference…  Some people like how it feels…)
  • Inserting an object in your anus carries the risk of it getting stuck.  Save yourself an embarrassing visit to an emergency room and only use items that can’t get pulled completely inside and “lost”.  Many anal toys will have a ridge or tab to prevent them from going all the way in, or they’ll have a string attached to easy retrieval.
  • Make sure anything entering your anus is smooth and well lubed, and don’t force it in.  In particular, cut your fingernails!  A long fingernail might cut the inner lining, which can be unpleasant and runs the risk of infection.  Inadequate lubrication might cause irritation or tearing.
  • NEVER do ANYTHING that forcibly cuts off your airway while masturbating.  People have actually died from doing that.  You can hold your breath, but leave it at that.  Besides, taking long deep breaths can actually increase the sensations more than holding your breath will.
  • If it hurts, stop!  You’re probably doing something wrong.

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An Asexual’s Guide To … Male Anatomy

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(For most men, most boys, and anyone else who happens to have a penis.)

The most prominent part of the male anatomy is the penis.  Know that floppy, dangly, tube-shaped thing at the top of your legs?  The thing you pee out of.  That’s your penis.  It’s also known as “cock”, “dick”, “member”, “johnson”, and about 247,000 other slang terms of varying vulgarity, popularity, and descriptive inaccuracy.  Sometimes the penis will stop being floppy and dangly and will instead get stiff and stand up, which is called an erection, or “hard-on” or “boner”.  The penis has a number of components and points of interest that I want to mention, but let’s continue the tour and come back to them later.

Behind the penis is a lumpy bag.  This bag is called the scrotum and the lumps inside it are the testicles.  This part is also known as the “balls”, “nuts”, or “that thing that really really hurt and was sore for days when I accidentally got hit there that one time in PE”.  There are typically two testicles in the scrotum.  Sometimes the testicles dangle and sometimes they hug the body.  When they dangle, it’s common for one to hang lower than the other.  If you feel the scrotum, you should be able to feel both testicles, as well as a series of tubes connected to them.  In many cases, the word “testicles” is used to refer to both the testicles and the scrotum.

Many testicle owners are afraid of handling them, since they have a reputation for being very sensitive and causing a lot of pain when injured.  The truth is that you can often handle them quite safely.  Just be gentle and work up from there until you find your limit.  And handle them you should!  If you’re a testicle owner, you should periodically conduct a testicular self exam for lumps that may be related to testicular cancer.  (Just do an Internet search for instructions.  The phrase “testicular self exam” generally leads to a fairly safe, medically oriented set of results.)

While you’re down in this area, you may have noticed a forest of short, curly hairs.  These are pubic hairs, also known as the “bush”.  The area that they cover and their density varies greatly from person to person.  For some people, the patch of hair starts at the shoulders and stretches uninterrupted all the way down to the feet.  For others, the hair is limited to the area immediately around the base of the penis and testicles.  In still others, the hair is thickest around the penis and testicles, but may spread upward and start a colony around the navel.  The testicles are usually covered in hair, while the penis is typically hair free beyond a certain elevation.  Sometimes the color of pubic hair may not match the color of the hair elsewhere on your body.  In some cases, people shave some or all of this hair away for various reasons.  According to scientists, the only known purpose of pubic hair is to be particularly repulsive when found in a shower.

As you travel further back, between the legs and behind the testicles, you arrive at a  long, fairly featureless stretch, called the perineum, sometimes also called the “taint”.  On the surface, the most prominent landmark is the fold of skin in the middle, that looks like a sealed up seam, known as the raphe.  If you trace this seam forward, you’ll find that it continues along the bottom of your scrotum and keeps going up to the tip of your penis.  If you trace it backwards, you’ll find that it ends at your anus (which is our next stop).

The perineum is most notable for what lies beneath the surface.  The structure of the penis continues into the body underneath the perineum.  When you have an erection, the part of the penis located under the perineum also becomes hard, and you can feel it through the skin.  Also, if you press inward, into the soft area just in front of your anus, you may be able to feel your prostate (Although more on that later).

The anus is as far back as we’re going to go on this trip.  It’s the hole in your butt where poop comes out.  Strangely, this area is also home to a notable point of interest, called the prostate.  It takes a bit of spelunking to get to, though, so not everyone may wish to take this part of the trip.  (If you plan venturing inside to find your prostate, be sure to clip your nails first, wear a rubber glove if you’ve got one, and use some form of lube, or else your trip will likely be short and even more unpleasant than it already is.)  To find the prostate, venture a few inches inside and start pressing against the forward wall, as if you’re curving your finger to point at your belly button.  You should find a hard, kinda roundish lump on the other side of the wall.

Okay, now, enough of that.  Go wash your hands.  Thoroughly.

Our tour now leaves the lower reaches and travels up, onto your chest.  There you will likely find two nipples, one on each side.  The nipples are largely pointless little nubs of skin that typically are surrounded by darker discs of skin which may of may not have hair growing out of them.  Sometimes the nipples will get slightly hard and stick out.  Most people regard nipples on the male body to be some sort of cosmic joke, although they do have some limited utility that I’ll get into in a later post.

Okay, let’s get back to the penis.  Remember where it was?  Good.

The part that’s sorta long and tube shaped and fairly smooth is called the shaft.  The mushroom shaped squishy bit at the end is called the head or the glans.  The ridge where the shaft connects to the glans is called the corona.  The hole that pee comes out of, probably near the tip of your penis, is called the urethra.  (Other stuff comes out of there, too, but more on that later.)  The rest of the urethra is a tube that runs along the lower side of your penis, and may become more pronounced when you have an erection.  Also on the lower side, there may be a band of skin that connects the shaft and the glans, called the frenulum.

You may have a turtleneck sweater-like bit of skin at the end of your penis, which probably covers all or most of the head when you’re soft.  This is called the foreskin.  The foreskin is usually pretty loose and can slide back and forth along your penis.  It can be pulled back to expose the head (which often happens naturally when you have one of those erection things I mentioned earlier), or it can be pushed forward, past the tip of the head.  (I’ll cover what’s likely to happen if you repeat that pull and push motion over and over in a later post…)  If you don’t have that turtleneck sweater bit, don’t worry, that’s fairly common, too.  It was probably just cut off and thrown away when you were a baby, in a process called circumcision.  If you’re circumcised, there may be a ring scar that circles your penis.  The skin on one side of the scar might be smooth and thin, while the skin on the other side might be rougher and thicker and a different color.  There are many styles of circumcision, so it’s possible that you may not have a visible scar and that the smooth skin continues all the way to the head.  Some circumcisions even eliminate the frenulum.

Penises come in many different shapes and sizes.  The size of your penis has very little effect on what can be done with it.  Often, a two-inch penis is just as useful as one that’s nine inches. The one you have probably even changes shape and size every once in a while.  If you’re naked and cold, it’ll probably shrink and hide all close to your body.  If it’s warm, it’ll probably hang lower.  Sometimes, it’ll get wider, longer, and harder, and may stand up on its own.  This is called an erection, and occurs when the spongy inner bits of your penis fill with blood. The size of an erect penis does not necessarily indicate how small you’ll be when you’re soft.

When you’re soft, your penis is floppy and can easily move and twist in any direction.  When you’re hard with an erection, the movement of your penis is greatly restricted.  (This has probably been known to cause a great many frustrating mornings, when you wake up with both a full bladder and a hard-on…)

Don’t worry if your penis isn’t a perfectly straight, perfectly symmetrical cylinder.  Your erect penis may have a curve to it.  It may lean one direction or the other, it might stick up, it might stick out, or it might stick down.  There may be a slight twist to it.  Veins may crisscross the shaft at all angles.  And the whole thing may be lopsided in places.  That’s all normal, every penis is unique.  (In some extreme cases, the foreskin might not retract right or the circumcision might be too tight or the frenulum might be too short or something else could be wrong that causes a very sharp bend.  In those cases, surgical intervention is often a possibility.)

This concludes the tour.

(You will notice that the tour did not stop at the magic orgasm button.  That’s because there’s no such place.  If you want an orgasm, you’re going to have to work for it.  More on that later.)

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