How Female Masturbation Can Aid Your Sex Life

How Female Masturbation Can Aid Your Sex Life

Masturbation isn’t only enjoyable by yourself: you can also utilise what you learn in your “alone time” to help you have more fun (and more orgasms) with a partner. Let’s talk about that.

Illustration by Tara Jacoby.

Train your clitoris to be more responsive

The clitoris is supremely sensitive, and can essentially be “trained” to orgasm from different types of stimulation. If you want your partner to be able to make you orgasm when you’re together, you can try exposing your clitoris to a wider range of sensation when you masturbate. The more ways you can teach yourself to reach orgasm, the easier it will be to get there with a partner.

Just like with male masturbation, there are an endless number of ways to masturbate. A trip down the internet rabbit hole turns up suggestions that require everything from moulding clay to turkey basters to Mardi Gras beads, but this Reddit thread has more approachable tips. Here are some of easy things to try:

  • Try new strokes.
  • Change the speed or pressure that you usually use.
  • Use a different number of fingers.
  • Get into new body positions. On your stomach or on your hands and knees are popular with a lot of women.
  • Grind up against soft objects like pillows or blankets, or hard ones like your heel or the edge of a desk.
  • Use a handheld showerhead or the bathtub faucet.

Having a tried-and-true method is great, but it can be a ton of fun to learn new ways of pleasuring yourself.

If you have a hard time making the switch to a new technique, there are a few things to try. First, try alternating between your old stand-by and a new technique of your choosing in one or two minute cycles. Try getting yourself right to the edge of orgasm with your usual method, then changing to the new one at the last possible second. Each time you give this a shot, try to lengthen the time you spend with the new technique. Another way to do it is to go cold-turkey on your typical routine. Knowing that you can’t rely on Old Faithful on can give you more motivation to make it work with the new technique.

Show your partner how to do it

There’s no need to be shy about your masturbation habits! If you want your partner to make you orgasm, one of the best things you can do is show your partner how you masturbate. Women who masturbate on their stomachs or by grinding against objects tend to be a little more embarrassed about masturbating in front of their partners than women who masturbate on their backs, with their hands, but there’s no reason it should be this way. Truly, there is no “right” or “wrong” way of masturbating, and there’s no reason to be ashamed of what you need to give yourself pleasure. Your partner would be crazy not to enjoy the show!

Start off by masturbating on your own for a few minutes while your partner watches. Then have your partner put their hand over yours so they can get a feel for what you’re doing. You can do this whether you’re using your hands or a vibrator. Give them verbal feedback, like “go in a circle” or “just a bit more pressure”. Once they have got a sense of what you’re doing, you can try tag-teaming your clitoris. Touch yourself for a few minutes, then let your partner take over for a few minutes, then repeat. Switching off like this will help your body get used to being stimulated by another person.

Give yourself a hand

There’s also no shame in masturbating to completion when you’re with a partner. This is a great strategy for women who can’t orgasm from penetration (i.e. 70% of us), or who experience a significant mismatch of orgasmic timing with their partners.

Positions like doggystyle or woman on top make it incredibly easy to slip your hand or a vibrator down to your clitoris. You can also get yourself off first before moving on to intercourse (this is a good tip for women who experience sexual pain, since having an orgasm beforehand can help your muscles relax). Another fun thing to do is use your own hand on your clitoris while your partner uses their hand inside of you (more tag-teaming!). Or you can mix it up by having a session where you both masturbate in front of each other, that way everyone gets in on the masturbation fun!

Making it easier to orgasm with a partner is yet another reason why masturbation can be so amazing. Put those fingers to work!


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