Women's Sexual Dysfunction

Some sources estimate that 10% of women are 'an-orgasmic', that is, they never experience orgasm under any circumstances. Women who can only orgasm during masturbation are referred to as 'pre-orgasmic'.

"Only about half of all the women who have told me about their sexual experiences say they usually have orgasms during lovemaking. The others either do not have orgasms, or find that they usually have an orgasm only when masturbating." (p80 Woman's Experience of Sex 1983)

The number of men who cannot orgasm during sex throughout the whole of their lives is negligible whereas, for women, the relevant proportion appears to be around 50% (including an-orgasmic and pre-orgasmic women).

Even these statistics for women's sexual performance are likely to be optimistic because women who respond to surveys or talk to others about sex are already in a minority. Bluffers, fakers and sex surveys represent the views of only a tiny minority of women. Many other women justify their sexual relationship in terms of loving their partner or having children rather than as a means of enjoying their own sexual arousal and orgasm.

Surrounded by unrealistic portrayals of female sexuality in the media, women often conclude that they are abnormal when they are, in fact, facing a very normal dilemma with sex and their relationships. Instead of reassuring women, sex information today often implies that women's sexual experiences are dysfunctional. It is also implied that clitoral stimulation solves any problem with orgasm but the truth is that some completely normal women never orgasm with a partner by any means.

Bias in sex surveys

Explanations for women's sexual experiences simply do not add up. We cannot reasonably categorise such a high percentage of women as having a sexual dysfunction and so it would seem that there is nothing abnormal about either an-orgasmic or pre-orgasmic women. Such women do not have a 'problem' at all. They simply need to accept that this is the way things are for many women who hope for orgasm in their sexual relationships.

"Shocking though the statistics are, many women have found it secretly comforting to discover they are not the only ones who experience this enormous discrepancy between masturbation and intercourse. For years I was unable to have an orgasm except by masturbation, and assumed I was a freak. I remember the relief when I discovered Hite..." (p207 Satisfaction Guaranteed 1996)

"Furthermore it's a pretty safe guess that the statistics are worse than that. Because if it's a volunteer sample, the women most likely to come forward and be candid about sex are likely to be those who are also successful with sex. And while many people might be tempted to pretend they do orgasm when they don't, few are likely to pretend that they don't when they do. That's about as probable as a woman claiming she weighs ten stone when she actually weighs nine." (p19 Women's Pleasure 1993)

Women are only judged to be sexually dysfunctional while we insist that their sexuality works the same way as men's. Once we accept that women have a fundamentally different (and lower) response to sexual stimuli than men typically have, we can start to understand and accept female sexuality for what it truly is.

Jane Thomas: Author http://WaysWomenOrgasm.org and http://Nosper.com

Originally, foreplay was suggested as a solution to the inadequate clitoral stimulation provided by intercourse. Unfortunately, not only do women need clitoral stimulation to continue up to the point of orgasm but also, due to the sensitivity of the clitoris, it can be difficult for a man to provide the right kind of stimulation.

So when women ask about lack of orgasm today, experts suggest that they masturbate during sex. In fact, little is known about how successful women are with this approach in practice. To help improve our understanding, WaysWomenOrgasm.org invites women to share how they achieve arousal and orgasm with a partner.