Dear Hump Day,

Recently, it has sadly come to my attention that a very large majority of my close girlfriends have never, not once, experienced orgasm. When I found this out, I was in conversation with three girls, all of whom had been in serious and loving relationships for at least one year or more. Reasons for failure to reach climax were not because they were incapable, but because their partners are doing what so many men do in sex and focusing solely on vaginal simulation. (I can’t tell you how many times I have heard these girls say that they actually are happy when sex is over and participate solely to just “get it over with” and make the boys happy.)

At first, I stammered and stuttered in disbelief that they had not experienced the entire reason that sex is so amazing! 

But I think the part that disturbed me the most was that they weren’t even bothered by the fact that they had not yet reached the “big O” with their guys; they justified the situation by listing all the other great qualities of their mates and acted as if it wasn’t a big deal at all.

With society’s outdated gender roles fighting against me, how can I convince these women that their pleasure really does matter? How can I get them to see that “faking it” is not helping anyone? 

How can I tell them that having that open conversation with their boyfriends is not a sign of weakness or failure, but merely healthy communication?

Signed,

Orgasm Help Desperately Essentially Adamantly Required! 

Dear Oh Dear,

All relationships take compromise. A complete lack of any orgasms is NOT what should be compromised on.

Yet, it’s understanding why many of these women have given up on their pleasure. Perhaps they had an inept lover in the past, or didn’t know how to guide their partner to the ways and places that they best liked touched. While we have courses on public speaking and writing, there has never been a course in college on “How to Communicate with Your Lover.” And once you start faking it, it’s a little more difficult to truly moan in pleasure if your partner accidentally touches something you like.

Why do many women fake it? Let’s be honest. It is typically straightforward for the majority of men to cum. That is not the case for the average woman. Even though mainstream porn and chick flicks still hold onto the image of a well-sized dick in a vagina making a woman swoon from ecstasy, that does not hold true for more than the majority of women! 

Yet simply because something takes a little bit more finesse and exploration should not be an excuse for men and women to simply give up on the potential for pleasure.

You should point out to your friends that tolerating dissatisfying sex is not the same as bearing through a game of their boyfriend’s favorite baseball team. It’s definitely important in a relationship to partake in activities that your partner really wants to do and that you may not completely enjoy. Sex is not that activity. Sex is an act that every person can and should enjoy.

Remind your girlfriends of the most unique organ in their bodies, the clitoris. Out of all the organs in the female or male body, it is the only organ solely made for pleasure. Eight thousand nerve endings just begging to be teased, seduced, licked and traced.

Mind you, the part of the clitoris that you see is just the tip of the iceberg. It extends down and around the vulva, in a wishbone shape, which is why many women like to have the area around their vaginal lips played with and massaged. With such an enormous potential for pleasure becoming engorged and sensitized during arousal, there is no excuse to ignore it!

Buy your girlfriends vibrators. You can get the silver bullet for around six bucks. Once they have explored and cum on their own, they will be better able to not only see what they are missing, but also be able to tell their partners what to do.

Now, how do they go from faking it to honesty? It’s a bit difficult to say after a year of being with someone that you have been lying about what they do in bed. There are other ways that can lead to greater pleasure. Encourage them to watch a sex-positive porn with their partner (check out previous columns on porn) and then use some of the moves from the video.

The women can even say, “Hey, I read this awesome column that highly encouraged spending at least 30 minutes touching, licking, stroking and sucking without any penetration. I want to try that!” Make it a game. Have one partner blind folded while the other partner spends that time exploring and teasing every part of the body. Then switch. When it gets to the woman’s turn, encourage her to try communicating a little more when something that feels really good. Either, “Wow, yes right there” or through body language, by bucking the hips or guiding their partner’s head back where they just licked.

Pleasure is not be confused with selfishness, greed, sluttiness or excess. Pleasure is a right. It is what we have been born to do. Pleasure is our body’s communication that something feels right. When we partake in activities where both people feel pleasure and mutually work towards that pleasure, it leads to greater connection, respect and potentially, fantastic orgasms.

This article was written by Nicolette Pawlowski. Nicolette is a trained sexual health educator and a graduate student in Educational Policy Studies. All questions are from real readers. Have a question about sex or relationships? Email: [email protected]