What sex experts have told me

When my partner and I decided to get married, my partner's male work colleagues took him out for a beer to try to convince him that marriage would mean the end of his sex life.

Naturally no woman has ever given me the same warning. I accepted early on that a woman needs to invest in sex for her man's sake. Even so, I was prepared to believe that there was something wrong with me.

So when I first talked to therapists, I simply wanted to understand how other women were able to reach orgasm during sex. What surprised me was that my questions were met with so much defensiveness.

They insisted that women have an equal sex drive and reach orgasm easily during sex with a partner. Later I realised that my own starting point of orgasm through masturbation was part of the problem.

For example, I was shocked to realise that not every sex expert agrees that a woman needs to stimulate her clitoris (her sex organ) in order to orgasm. A male sex expert told me: "We don't have enough data to say that clit stim is "required" as is fantasy. The fact that some women find that works well for them does not prove it is required. Some women report orgasm by fantasy alone, some by massage of the skin alone, some by BDSM. Kinsey pointed out the huge range of human sexual behavior."

I agree that BDSM (Bondage, Domination, Sadism & Masochism) may cause sexual arousal. But once a person is sexually aroused why wouldn't they want to stimulate their genitals (clitoris/penis) in order to experience orgasm? Men certainly do.

Even today most women limit their sexual experiences to vaginal intercourse so they are not necessarily familiar with orgasm. Kinsey only documented what women told him and women in the 1950's were unlikely to know any better than women today.

Very few women are familiar with orgasm

Many women, even therapists and sex experts, have been unenthusiastic about female masturbation. One marriage guidance counsellor evidently believed that female masturbation was something that only lesbian women did.

It is a given that a man masturbates. Men live with daily erections and they need to release sexual tension through masturbation. Hence the porn magazines. The fact is that relatively few women learn how to masturbate.

Sex experts are never required to acknowledge the limits of their own sexual experiences. So women (and even men) can advise on female orgasm without any direct experience of how a woman reaches orgasm through female masturbation.

The female director a reputable sex clinic in London's Harley Street, commented: "I also believe that you are still over focused on the clitoris and the view that clitoral stimulation is 'the real thing' and that women generally are not satisfied through intercourse; again because of your own experience. I agree with you that in many cases this is the fact, but there are also many women who can have satisfying orgasms through sexual intercourse."

Women have been quick to insist that they do orgasm from intercourse but they never describe HOW they reach orgasm. If women use clitoral stimulation and sexual fantasies during female masturbation, what do they substitute during sex with a partner? It was this defensiveness and the lack of reasonable explanations for orgasm that caused me to doubt.

A British female therapist commented: "You mention nothing of the G-spot or the fact that he clitoris extends deep into the body cavity and therefore can be stimulation through thrusting. It's still true that fewer women enjoy orgasm through penetration..."

So why is the fact that some women cannot enjoy orgasm through penetration not published as part of the whole picture of female sexuality? The fact is that many women never to orgasm by any means. Equally the few women, who are familiar with orgasm from masturbation, often never learn how to share the same experience with a partner (and not through lack of trying!).