The complexity of the
female orgasm

Dear Sasha

—Seeking the Elusive O

Dear Seeking,

Explaining “the types” of female orgasm as succinctly as you wish would require gathering information from virtually every woman alive and at different points in her life. Like so many people, perhaps you believe that it’s easy to delineate female orgasm because of the Must Have culture splashed about in women’s magazines. As Paul

Joannides writes in the fifth edition to The Guide to Getting It On, “Oh the comfort in reading simple answers to complex questions.”

Here’s another priceless piece of wisdom from the book: “In the late 1950s, a scientist named Kermit Krantz dissected the genital regions of eight dead women. He explored how women’s genitals are wired.” Krantz apparently found “a great deal of variation in the way nerve endings are distributed throughout the different women’s genitals.” How does this kind of fact-based information get lost in the tumult?

There are many reasons why women believe they are not coming to their potential or that the orgasms they are having are second rate when they are not vaginally based. Though totally false, Freud’s theory about women only reaching sexual maturity once they give up clitoral orgasms for vaginal ones insidiously prevails, the vision of women in pornography having extravagant orgasms without clitoral stimulation (who knew spanking your mons was so thrilling), fakers and yes indeed, women (roughly 30 per cent depending what you read) who do come during intercourse. Comments from boyfriends who seem to think “that all women can” also don’t help matters. Asking some women to come by not touching their clit is like asking some men (but not pressuring them, just telling them you’ve heard all men can!) to come by not touching the head of their penis.

The term “clitoral” orgasm is a bit of a misnomer too, because what we are referring to when we use that term is stimulation of the tip of the clitoris. If you look at its full anatomy—which you can in The Guide to Getting It On and The Clitoral Truth by Rebecca Chalker—you’ll notice even women who have what we call vaginal orgasms involve the clitoris to some extent, they simply access it at a different border. The clitoris has a glans and shaft that separates off into crura, two legs that rest atop what are called the clitoral bulbs. You know when you get excited and the area around your inner labia swells? Those are the bulbs, and the crura are above that. If you press or massage that area, you might find it feels lovely. And just as an interesting note, when it’s all stretched out, the clitoris from crus (the singular of crura) to crus measures about eight inches.

If you’re interested in exploring how vaginal penetration might be more pleasing for you without the subtle coercion of a partner, I suggest getting yourself a dildo (in this case, fairly long and curved so you can really probe around) and lube, some porn or erotic literature, and going to town on your own dime. Masturbating with a dildo is a great way to investigate because it’s not moored to anything. You might always find you’ll like some stimulation around the tip of your clit, but you may also find some pretty keen spots inside you. One thing I also like about playing with a dildo is being able to feel, when you pull it out, how much of a seal your vagina creates around something when it’s been aroused.

Got any questions for Sasha? E-MAIL: POULEDELUXE@YAHOO.COM