The Whole Lesbian Sex Book (4 page)

The good news is that there
is
support for your desires—though finding it will take some creativity (and courage) on your part. (This book lists hundreds of helpful resources, for instance.)

Allow your imagination to run wild. Suspend judgment. Desires are not social contracts. You don’t have to act out your fantasies—unless you want to. Who cares whether your fantasies would rate high marks for cinematography or plausibility? The goal here is to find out what makes your juices run. Forget the political ramifications of your desires.

My legs become swan’s wings, and I see the wings lifting up out of the water.

Make Your Dreams Come True

The paradox, of course, is that to build sexual self-esteem, it helps to act as if you already have it. So, here are some suggestions to start you out:

What Do You Want?

• Listen your cunt. Desire is in your body. What makes your clit throb?

• Look to your fantasy life. What images pop into your mind during those unguarded moments on waking—or just before orgasm? Your own erotic imagination is a ripe resource for discovering your desires.

• Brainstorm. Grab pencil and paper and make three lists: (1) every sexual activity you’ve experienced; (2) every sexual activity you’ve heard about and think you might like to try; (3) every sexual scenario you’ve ever fantasized. Add to your lists as you come up with new ideas. Don’t worry about whether you’ll actually do these things—just write them down. (I tried this exercise with a group of women; it’s amazing how other people’s turn-ons can give you ideas.) See “Erotic Play,” later in this chapter.

• Keep a journal of your own erotic journey. You’ll be glad to have a record of your own sexual evolution. Who knows? You may end up in an erotica anthology someday.

• Read erotica. Collections of erotic short stories, such as the annual
Best Lesbian Erotica
series, are great resources for mining the erotic imaginations of 20 or more creative, articulate authors each year.

• Read sex guides. You’ll find informative, detailed descriptions of things others do or like or desire.

• Watch an explicit DVD or video. You may find porn to be a source of erotic inspiration. See “Lesbian Porn,” below.

Do Yourself a Favor

• Don’t feel as if you’ll ever have the sex life of your dreams? Then grant yourself one erotic pleasure every day—even a small one. Buy a current or back issue of
On Our Backs
. Check out
www.Cyber-dyke.net
and other queer porn sites (that’s
real
lesbian and queer porn—not the fake mainstream variety.) Try out your new pocket rocket vibrator at lunch time. Imagine sex with that new receptionist at the gyne’s office: “First, I’ll get her into the exam room, then I’ll put her in the stirrups….”

• “Forbid yourself nothing” is the rallying cry at Stormy Leather, a San Francisco fetish boutique. The creators of all those scrumptious fashion designs in latex and leather would certainly know. New clothes, a new sex toy, a fresh haircut, that tattoo or piercing you’ve always dreamed of…. Indulge yourself.

• Fantasize about things that delight you, things that frighten you, and things that powerfully turn you on. You can even fantasize about things that you find revolting. It’s fine to fantasize about people other than your lover or to fantasize outside your gender preference. You can fantasize about things you may not want to do. You can have “nonconsensual” sex in your fantasies.

• Declare a day of pleasure without guilt. For one day, imagine the unimaginable.

Find Support

• Find friends who will encourage you in your self-explorations.

• Ask for support. Be specific: “I want to be more vocal about my desires. How did you get over your shyness?”

• Sign on to a sexuality-related Internet discussion group. (See the resources chapter.) Ask the list members how they came to revel in their most compelling desires. (They’ll be glad someone sparked such a fascinating conversation.)

• Ask an expert. Websites like PlanetOut and ClassicDykes host “expert” opinion boards. (ClassicDykes is for lesbians and bisexual women in midlife and beyond, including women questioning their sexual orientation or coming out in later life.) Not only can you post a question, you can see what other women like you are curious about. You can also find lesbian sex advice columns in magazines like
On Our Backs, Curve,
and
Girlfriends
.

• You may be surprised to learn that many well-known sex-positive authors and artists started out just like you. They may have struggled just as painfully for self-acceptance. They may have been isolated, or shy, or criticized for their sexual choices. That’s why they’ve dedicated themselves to making the road easier for you. Check out the bibliography in chapter 19 for work by Tristan Taormino, Annie Sprinkle, Staci Haines, Loren Cameron, Patrick Califia, Kate Bornstein, Carol Queen, Susie Bright, and more.

• Ask your friends to tell you their hottest fantasies. Tell them yours.

Nurture Your Libido

Libido is sexual energy in its purest state—that feeling of
wanting,
regardless of
what
or
who
you want. Libido isn’t about how you look, the size of your toy chest, or who wants (or doesn’t want) to have sex with you. Your libido is your erotic life force, an intrinsic part of who you are. While you may identify many sources of your fantasies,
you
are the source of your desires.

Think of libido as something you practice—like playing the cello, meditating, yoga, or even shooting hoops. Not only do you gain sexual skills with practice, but you find that your capacity for sexual energy (and even sensation) expands. There are many ways to “exercise” your libido: masturbating, fantasizing, sensory awareness practices, giving a lap dance, going to a drag king show, keeping a sex journal, having sex with a partner, watching others having sex, viewing porn, reading erotica, talking about sex, planning for sex, and reading sex guides like this one.

Falling in love, of course, is the universal libido enhancer. Coming out can gear up your sex drive (and you can come out over and over, as you discover new ways to channel your erotic energy). Improved body image, self-esteem, and general health will make room for renewed sexual energy. Anything that expands what you allow yourself sexually will pump up your sexual energy.

Libido evolves over the course of a lifetime, ebbing and flowing in a rhythm that’s natural for you. Many women notice they feel particularly sexual just before or during their menstrual period.

Many female-to-male transsexuals (FTMs) report intensified libido once they begin testosterone injections. Similarly, some male-to-female transsexuals (MTFs) notice a reduction in sex drive with estrogen and anti-androgen therapy.

Pay Porn for Us

Pay porn is ubiquitous in the world of Internet porn. Until recently, “lesbian” pay porn meant girl-girl action on sites marketed to a heterosexual audience.

Pay porn sites operate on a membership basis. Usually, members are offered several membership plans, with options for one-time-only and recurring billing.

CyberDyke (“The Erotic Network for Lesbians Only”) hosts a network of sites featuring explicit photos and videos. DarkPlay is the best known of the bunch; others include: Playbutch, Shaved Dyke, Big Beautiful Heaven, Leaky Girls, Posteriority (“for backdoor girls”). Membership in the network provides access to all.

Heather Corinna, of Scarlet Letters, stars in her own pay site at
www.Femmerotic.com
. Both model and photographer, Corinna posts hundreds of beautiful erotic photographs, many by guest artists and guest models.The quality is a cut above many other pay sites offering erotic photography for lesbians and bisexual women.

Pregnancy is well known to affect libido. For some but certainly not all women, desire diminishes during pregnancy. Rachel Pepper writes, “If you are one of those lucky women who feel more sexual during pregnancy or manage to maintain your normal sexual prowess, more power to you! However, for the vast majority…sexual desire tends to dip.”
⁵
Physiological changes, exhaustion, and worry, that universal defeater of desire, can put the brakes on your sex life:

In my first trimester, I was so afraid of having an orgasm and dislodging the fetus that I would not let my partner sex me up.

After birth, estrogen levels drop, and prolactin levels rise (if the mother is breastfeeding), and sexual desire may take a dive. “The impact of hormonal changes on a biological mother’s libido can’t be underestimated,” sex educators Cathy Winks and Anne Semans write.
⁶

Hormonal changes during perimenopause and menopause affect libido—and not necessarily in the way you might predict:

For me at 44, and eight months after a hysterectomy (kept my ovaries), I’ve never been hornier or felt more erotic. I have always had a good sex drive, but WOW! This is one incredible chapter in my life. I’m still in shock.
⁷

While hormones powerfully affect libido, they’re not solely responsible for
all
the dips and peaks in your sex drive. A study of 40-to-60-year-old women found that mood and energy, rather than hormone levels, were the “best predictors of sexual well-being.”
⁸
After all, many postmenopausal women have hot sex lives, and many premenopausal women notice no connections between their menstrual cycles and their desire for sex. (For more on this, see “Perimenopause and Menopause,” in chapter 3, Anatomy and Sexual Response.)

So to nurture your libido, nurture yourself. Top of the list: reduce stress. Overwork and stress affect libido more than we realize.

I think I have the tendency to overextend myself and am a bit of a workaholic. Over the last year or so, I have lost most of my desire for sexual contact, which is probably due to stress and fatigue.

I lose all desire and get very irritable if my girlfriend even tries to have sex with me. I just really need to relax before I’m able to even consider sex.

On the other hand, you might be able to channel that tension and irritability into an eruption of over-the-top fucking—which, by the way, is a great way to relieve stress.

Other ways to nurture your libido by relieving stress include meditation (even ten minutes a day), aromatherapy (try a relaxing blend of bath oils), exercise, healthy eating, and adequate rest. Most important,
slow down.
Breathe. If your life is so busy you don’t have time to plug in your vibrator (much less use it), you are seriously overbooked.

During sexual arousal, your brain sends neural messages via sympathetic and parasympathetic nerve pathways. Stress can interfere with the functioning of these pathways, which then impedes nerve stimulation (sensation), engorgement, clitoral erection—in short, the signals that let you know you’re turned on. No wonder you’ve lost the urge! (More on sexual arousal in the next chapter; see chapter 4, Orgasm, for information on conscious breathing.)

Erotic Play

Lesbian, bisexual, and queer women enjoy many different erotic activities and turn-ons. Not all of us share all of these turn-ons—in fact, we may not even have heard of some of them. (See the index at the back of this book to find a discussion of terms you may be unfamiliar with.)

anal penetration
blindfolds
blood play
bondage
breast whipping
breath control
caning
caressing
clit pumping
cocksucking (detachable or
not)
consensual humiliation
cracking a whip
cross-dressing
cuddling
cunnilingus
cybersex
dancing
digital cameras
dildos
dominance/submission
double penetration
dressing slutty
dripping hot wax
enemas
exhibitionism
fantasizing
finger-fucking
fisting
flirting
flogging
frottage
fucking
gazing into a lover’s eyes
genderplay
getting a tattoo
golden showers
group sex
hair pulling
holding hands
hugging
ice cubes on her belly
kissing
kneeling
knife play
lacing up her corset
lap dancing
leather, rubber, or latex
licking her feet
making videos
massage with sensual oils
Master/slave role play
masturbating with a vibrator
negotiating sex
nibbling ears and neck
nipple clamps or clothespins
orgasm
outdoor sex
over-the-knee spanking
packing a dildo in your 501s
paying for sex
phone sex
playing with sex toys
polishing boots
putting on a condom
putting on makeup
rape scenes
reading erotica
reapplying your lipstick
rimming
role play
seduction
sensory deprivation
sex in secret
shaving
snapping on a glove
strap-on sex
stripping
sucking her labia
sucking her nipples
talking dirty
tickling with feathers
tribadism
triple penetration
using Saran wrap
voyeurism
watching porn
wearing a butt plug
wrestling
writing in a journal about sex

Sex + Intimacy

“Healthy eroticism does not avoid problems; it works with and transforms them,” writes Jack Morin, in
The Erotic Mind: Unlocking the Inner Sources of Sexual Passion and Fulfillment.
Morin articulates an equation we all can understand:
attraction + obstacles = excitement
.
⁹
The forbidden object of desire—whether a person, a fantasy, or a taboo activity—gets us hot like nothing else.