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Demystified Approved: Come as You Are: The Surprising New Science That Will Transform Your Sex Life

Note: Demystified Approved posts are not sponsored content. They are products and services we actually use, love and believe more women should know about! If you have a suggestion for a Demystified Approved post let us know in the comments below, or email us. I only came across Emily Nagoski’s Come As You Are this year, and, as promised, it has totally changed my life. We and our writers have discussed in past posts how female sexuality

Demystified Approved: Flex Menstrual Discs

Note: Demystified Approved posts are not sponsored content. They are products and services we actually use, love and believe more women should know about! If you have a suggestion for a Demystified Approved post let us know in the comments below, or email us. Like so many women, my period has always been a THING. Preceded by anywhere from 5 – 10 days of emotional PMS symptoms that my doctor once referred to as my

Finding “Good Sex” in the Age of Aziz

Last week I found myself perplexed and disturbed as the Aziz Ansari story broke. Not only were Atlantic and New York Times op-ed writers minimizing the victim’s experience by calling it a “disappointing hookup,” “a lousy romantic encounter,” and overall bad sex—many of my feminist friends were echoing this sentiment, too. Sensationalized tone aside, I believe that the Babe.net piece is one of the most important stories to come out of #metoo. This time, it wasn’t a

Demystifying Sexual Dysfunction

I expected losing my virginity to hurt, but I did not expect being penetrated to feel like having a knife enter me and rip me in half. It took long enough for the boy to actually be able to insert his penis into my vagina, which seemed to just not want to let anyone in, although I was more than ready and willing to have sex. Once his penis finally entered me, I clenched my

Demystified Approved: OMGYes

A few months ago, I came across some shattering statistics about female sexuality in my Human Behavior class. Apparently, between 20 and 30% of women in the US and Europe experience female orgasmic disorder (basically, not being able to or having a hard time coming, with the added dimension of feeling distressed about it)*. Also, 30% of women AROUND THE WORLD experience female sexual interest/arousal disorder, featuring a reduction of interest in sex, and, again,

Demystifying Sexual Fluidity

Years ago, a friend told me she’d kissed a girl. My first reaction? “Jealous!!!” Wait, where did that come from? A little personal reflection later, I concluded that having an experience with a woman like she had was something I was quite curious about. I had occasionally fantasized about it since my late teens, but never thought much of it. I had always accepted those thoughts as totally OK, but never contemplated action. Over the

Demystifying Overdue Orgasms

I did not have an orgasm until I was twenty-three years old. Looking back, do I regret the orgasm-less decade I experienced until that time? YES. YES I FUCKING DO. So, this used to be my deepest and most shameful secret, one that only my closest and oldest friends knew. But you know what?? Like a lot of shameful female secrets, it’s not even that unusual!! There are studies and medical institutes that indicate that

Demystifying Feminist Sex Work

I knew that starting graduate school would change my lifestyle, but I never predicted I’d be spending a Sunday evening standing with my legs open over a man’s face, aiming my urine into his mouth. But here I was, a queer women’s studies major and sex-critical feminist who wrote countless undergrad papers critiquing the commodification of women’s bodies, doing sex work. How the hell did that happen? Before last year, I usually viewed sex workers

Demystifying Incontinence

The fear started to set in after a couple of moments. There I was, a 34-year-old woman doing jumping jacks in front of a class of 7-year-olds, pleading my pelvic floor to hold on so that I wouldn’t pee all over the school yard. This was about a month ago now…and the last time I tried doing any sort of open-legged jumping I needed to change my pants. I am one of the many people,

Demystifying Healing Sex Toys

I first heard of Chakrubs and founder Vanessa Cuccia on an episode of Down for Whatever. The origins story of her crystal sex toy company is both simple and serendipitous. Vanessa was working at a sex toy shop in LA when she got to know some new spiritual friends. One night she met a woman with a vast collection of crystals. Cue the a-ha moment, taken from the eloquent recap on her website: I hadn’t