Science Vs - Orgasms: Your Favorite Sex Episode!

Episode Date: August 17, 2023

Here’s the episode you picked as our best sex and sexual health episode: Orgasms! There’s this idea that the female orgasm is a complicated riddle, but for a man with a penis, getting off is easy peasy. Is there really an orgasm gap? And if so — can science explain it? To learn more, we talk to neuroscientist Dr. Nan Wise, neuroscientist Dr. Nicole Prause and psychologist Dr. Candice Hargons.  Find our transcript here: https://bit.ly/SVFavSexEp This episode was produced by Hannah Harris Green, with help from, Wendy Zukerman, Michelle Dang, Rose Rimler and Nick DelRose. We’re edited by Blythe Terrell. Fact checking by Eva Dasher. Mix and sound design by Peter Leonard. Mix and sound design of this episode was by Bobby Lord. Mix and sound design of our original episode was by Peter Leonard. Music written by Peter Leonard, Marcus Bagala, Emma Munger, and Bobby Lord. Data Analysis by Morgan Green. Consulting by Rebecca Kling. Thanks to everyone we got in touch with for this episode including Dr. Adam Safron, Professor Larry Baskin, Professor Caroline Pukall, Dr. Laurence Levine, Dr. Jasmine Abrams, Dr. Justin Garcia, Dr. Laurie Mintz, Dr. Michael Brecht, Dr. Marcalee Alexander and Dr. Erica Marchand. A special thanks to the Zukerman family, Patty Harris, Richard Green and Joseph Lavelle Wilson.  Science Vs is a Spotify Studios Original. Listen for free on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Follow us and tap the bell for episode notifications.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, Wendy here. This month, we're playing our Science Versus Greatest Hits album. Yeah, you all voted for your favorite Science Versus episodes of all time, and we are busting them out. Today, we have the winner of the sex category. Battling it out were our episodes on sex addiction, heartbreak, online dating. The runner-up was The Fertility Cliff, which we heard people made babies because of that episode. So hey, hey, Science vs. Babies out there. But it didn't win.

The clear winner of the sex category, the episode which came out on top was orgasms. So without further ado, here's that episode. This is the show that pits facts against feeling good. On today's show, orgasms. So I guess I'll tell you about the first orgasm I experienced. Do you want to just like dive into this like straight ahead or are we going to circle back or what? Let's circle back for a sec. This is Malaika Grant. She grew up in Ghana and now lives in South Africa. And Malaika runs a blog about the sex lives of women in Africa. It's called Adventures from the Bedrooms of African Women. And one of the reasons that Malaika started this is because growing up,

the women around her weren't talking about how to have orgasms. It was like this big mystery. Because I had so little education around sex and what to expect, I thought an orgasm was supposed to look and feel one way, like, you know, the shuddering on, you know, in the movies and, you know, in the screaming. But for Malaika, throughout her 20s, she never felt like that when she was having sex. The guys who she'd have sex with, they would orgasm, no worries. But for her, it just didn't happen, no matter how hard some of her partners tried.

You know, I had one partner that just did everything in his power. He was like flipping me up this way and turning me back that way and, you know, going harder and going softer. And so finally, I was just like, oh, here I come. And so I start to like vibrate and shudder and go, and he was like, what are you doing? I'm like, I'm coming, but I wasn't. And so it was like, I was really trying to spare his, his feelings. Do you think he was convinced? That's producer Hannah Harris-Grain. I don't think he was convinced. I think he was smart enough to like,

to know, but then I've, I've then I've been with other people that are like, okay, yeah, I was the first to do it. And I'm like, yeah, but your words. But after a lot of disappointment, things were about to change. It happened just before her 30th birthday. Malaika was working in a shoe store at the time. And one night in bed,

that first special, unforgettable moment. I was in a dream and it was just rows and rows and rows of shoes, like shoes as far as the eye could see. And someone, some entity out of the middle of nowhere handed me a credit card and said, you can buy whatever you want and you never have to pay back the balance. And so I'm running through these rows of shoes. Now, mind you, I'm asleep. This is a dream. Running through these rows of shoes and picking up like these phenomenal heels and flats and everything fits and there's no competition for the shoes. It comes so hard. Now, this is my first

orgasm. I came so hard in my sleep that it woke me up and I was like drenched between my legs. I was like, what was that? It was, it made me understand the French term le petit mort because it literally felt like I was dying. I blacked out and I felt like I was on the verge of death and it was fantastic. And then you come back to life. So like the next day, how did you feel? Yeah, so the next day, you know, it was like, well, am I going to have to dream about shoes the next time? You know, I want to experience pleasure during sex.

Like, what is it going to take? What is it going to take to get us all orgasming like that? There are plenty of people who just can't get there and don't always know why. And this is particularly a problem for women. So for example, one survey of about 50,000 people found that 95% of straight men said that they almost always orgasm when they have sex. 95%. But with straight women, it was 65%. And this is so well-known in the science of sex that it has a name, the orgasm gap.

And there is this idea out there that the female orgasm is like a riddle, that it's complicated and hard to reach, while for a man with a penis, it's simple, a straight shot. And it's not like orgasms are the only way to have fun during sex, but they are really nice. So on today's show, we're going to take a closer look at what's going on here. Why aren't women orgasming as much as men? Is there something different about us that makes the female orgasm elusive?

When it comes to orgasm, there can be a lot of, I'm coming, but I wasn't. But then there's science. Science versus orgasm is coming up just after the break. Take back your free time with PC Express Online Grocery Delivery and Pickup. Get in-store promos, PC Optimum points, and more free time. And still get groceries. Shop now at pcexpress.ca Chiara, it means smart in Italian.

Too bad your barista can't spell it right. So you just give a fake name. Your cafe name. Julia. But the more you use it, the more it feels like you're in witness protection. Wait a minute. What kind of espresso drinks does Julia like anyway? Is it too late to change your latte order? But with an espresso machine by KitchenAid, you wouldn't be thinking any of this

because you could have just made your espresso at home. Shop now at KitchenAid.ca. Welcome back. Today, we're exploring the science of orgasms and why it's harder for some to come. So we have this idea that making a woman orgasm is this huge accomplishment, and it it's harder for some to come. So we have this idea that making a woman orgasm is this huge accomplishment, and it's much harder to do than getting a guy there. And when we asked you, our audience, to send us your stories about orgasms, we heard this over and over again.

I love my husband. We have a wonderful relationship. But to this day, I have never had an orgasm. I figured after I tried a couple of times unsuccessfully that maybe it was just not for me. I've tried using vibrators. I've tried looking up different resources to try to learn more about my anatomy. So far, no dice. So what is going on here? And by the way, the research here often leaves out lots of groups, including trans and queer folk. So unless we say otherwise, the science we're discussing is about cis people having straight sex. Okay, our first stop is to

figure out what exactly is going on when we have an orgasm. And for that, we're starting with the biggest, most powerful, throbbing, veiny sex organ. Um, the brain. The brain. This is Nan Wise. She was a clinician helping people with their sex lives for decades. But there was something missing in her understanding of sex. And so?

And went back to grad school to become a neuroscientist when I turned 50. When Nan finished grad school, she set up one of the only studies we have looking at what's going on in the brain during an orgasm. Because she wanted to see what's firing when we're all fired up. First up, Nan got 14 women who said they were up for having an orgasm while in an MRI. But right away, Nan hit this big problem. The number one enemy in brain studies is movement. To get a clean scan in an MRI, your head needs to be perfectly still, which is a bit tough when you're having a wank. So Nan had to invent

something that the women would wear on their heads to keep it still. And after a couple of years of trial and error, she settled on the design. With what we called the Hannibal Hector happy helmet. And it really was a scary looking contraction. Nan used plastic that moulded to the shape of each subject's head and then cut out the eye and nose holes. It kind of looks like having your head wrapped in white construction fencing or like your Kanye on the Yeezus tour. So imagine, you're lying in this MRI, head all cased up, and inside an MRI...

It's loud, loud, loud. It kind of sounds like so they put in earplugs. And now it's orgasm time. The women in the study are lying down with their head in the MRI and the lower half of their body is out of the scanner. In part of Nan's experiment, she had the women's partners touch their genitals until they came. But there were complications here too. With the women stuck in the MRI, with the earplugs in and that loud noise, the couples couldn't talk to each other. So the women in the scanner would have to press a button to say they've started orgasming. And Nan would then relay that to the partners

who were wearing headphones. The partner would hear, your partner is having an orgasm. Then the participant would press a button, orgasm was finished. And the partner would hear, stop stimulating, your partner's orgasm was finished and the partner would hear, stop stimulating. Your partner's orgasm is complete. Oh my gosh. So these partners have your voice in their ear while they are trying to give their partners an orgasm. Right. So I sounded a bit like a deranged, I guess, stewardess. So tell me, do you think that you could orgasm in that

situation? I had to. I was the test pilot for everything. I had more orgasms in that scanner to the point that I should have frequent flyer miles. And I actually had a very funny incident when I was in the scanner using a purple dildo, and it slipped out of my hands and it went flying. So after the scanner went off, I said, Houston, we have a problem. The dildo went into orbit. Orgasms, the final frontier. Despite the Kanye helmet, earplugs, and the fact that these women were basically lab rats, would you believe most of them were able to orgasm in the MRI, either with their partner or on their own? And all the while,

Nan was recording what was going on in their brain as they were climaxing. So what did she find? So the big ticket item is that orgasm is a big brain event. Nan saw areas of the brain involved in emotions, reward, and pleasure lighting up, which all makes sense, right? Pleasure and good feelings. That sounds like an orgasm. One brain region that really went way up and stayed up for quite a while in the orgasm was activity in the hypothalamus. It's like, hello? Wowza. The hypothalamus does a bunch of stuff. When it gets fired up, it can release the so-called cuddle chemical, oxytocin. And the hypothalamus is found in the base of the brain. It's involved in survival. In textbooks, it's sometimes known for playing a big role in the big four Fs. Feeding, fighting, fleeing, and fornicationing.

In one study, rats had an electrode implanted in this part of their brain, in the hypothalamus, and they kept pressing a button to make it go off again and again and again. A few scientists even say that the brain during an orgasm looks kind of similar to the brain having a seizure. It's another time when your brains lighten up in many places all at once. If you were going to commission a band to write a song of the brain in orgasm, who would you get to do it? Led Zeppelin.

Led Zeppelin. Of the little research that we have into what's going on in the brain during the moment of climax, there's actually some debate here. So some research backs up Nan's study, but other work has found that just as people were about to orgasm, their brain actually starts winding down. It's not clear what's up with these differences. Nan and others have said that the techniques that those other studies were using might not have been so good. But just

generally speaking, academics agree that at least in the lead up to an orgasm, a ton of stuff is happening in your brain. But the big question for us is through all this, is there anything that can help us explain why men are having more orgasms than women? Well, Nan has done some similar work in a small group of men. It's not been published yet, but she told us that she saw a lot of the same stuff. A lot more similarities than differences.

It's a whole big brain event for the guys too. Other than Nan's early research, the only study we could find that compared men and women reaching orgasm found that while there were some differences in how the brains responded to genital stimulation, once they hit orgasm, things looked pretty similar. And we also found some research from our furry friends suggesting the same thing.

So, for example, when scientists in Germany stimulated the genitals of male and female rats, they saw the same amount of brain space lighting up, and it didn't matter if the rats had a penis or a clitoris. Yes, rats have clitorises. Just little ones. So, while the research in this space is pretty bare naked, from what we know, it's not like men have some giant orgasm chunk in their brain that women don't have. And bottom line, it just doesn't look like the brain can explain the huge orgasm

gap. But that is just the brain. What about differences in the body? There's the vagina and the clitoris and the penis. Could these physical differences help us explain why some people orgasm more than others? What is currently your favorite tool that you're using to study the sexual experience? My favorite tool? I am somewhat enamored of our anal contraction device right now. This is Nicole Prowsey. She used to work at UCLA and now runs her own sex research lab with fun toys like this anal contraction device. Wait, so tell me more about this. So how do you use it? So we basically fashioned a small as possible butt plug, if you're familiar with the sexual toy. Nicole is playing around with souped up

butt plugs because research has found that a lot of the time when people orgasm, their butt muscles contract in this very, very specific way. We think eight to 12 contractions and the first two are about 0.8 seconds apart and then they get further and further apart until they stop. Something fun to think about next time you're having an orgasm. Okay, so Nicole has poked and prodded dozens of people in her lab to explore how the body reacts to orgasm. And she told us that when we're thinking about the orgasm gap, there's actually a bunch of things in our body

that are pretty similar between people with penises and those with vaginas. So, for example, when we get aroused, blood rushes to the genitals, whether it's the penis or the vulva, which includes the clitoris and the labia. And this is often something, like, pornography hardly ever shows the vulva aroused, I think.

One small study found that the vagina had four to 11 times more blood in it when it was stimulated compared to when it was just sitting around, you know, watching Frasier or whatever. And when men have wet dreams, this is the kind of thing that's happening. Blood is flowing to their genitals while they're asleep.

And guess what? The same thing appears to occur. That is, women have more blood that goes into the vagina during periods of REM sleep. That's work done decades ago. This is probably what happened to Malaika during her erotic shoe dream. And while it's more common for men to have orgasms in their sleep, two studies found that almost 40% of the women they surveyed said that they'd gotten their rocks off in their dreams. But of course, not everything is the same here.

And two things that we want to look at to see if they might explain the orgasm gap are hormones and physical differences between the penis and the clitoris. Let's start with hormones, and specifically testosterone. Now, whether you've got a penis or a vagina, testosterone plays an important role in sex drive. And generally speaking, if you were born with a penis, your body probably makes more testosterone. So maybe that's what's helping dudes get more orgasms. Well, Nicole says this is a lot more complicated. So if you have clinically low levels of testosterone,

there is some evidence that taking more of it can help your sex life. But it really looks like as long as you have enough, so long as you don't have some disease, that level of testosterone that you have doesn't really influence sexual response much. Oh, that's so interesting because so much of what we hear is like testosterone, a high sex drive is what's driving orgasms, but that's just not the case. Yep. It's one of those myths. And research in trans folks also shows that this testosterone thing, it isn't clear-cut. So one study found that for trans men taking testosterone, it did tend to make them more horny. But another study found that it didn't.

Plus, it's not like testosterone is the only game in town here. Meat. Estrogen. Estrogen helps women get wet-ass pussies. Seriously. It helps with vaginal lubrication. And trans women who take estrogen have reported orgasms that are more intense and even multiple orgasms.

Next up, we're looking at the bits. Like, maybe it's just easier to get a penis to spring a leak than a clit. Because there is this kind of idea out there that a penis is like an enlarged clitoris and that the clitoris is like the concentrated, like a concentrated penis. Is that right? Yeah, it's not entirely false. Really?

In the fetus, our bits come from the same star stuff. Whether your genitals burst on the scene as a clitoris or a penis or something in between. In fact, for roughly the first two months of gestation, our genitals look exactly the same. And then once we're born and all grown up, what happens then? Well, when you picture the clitoris,

you might be thinking of a tiny little bump and the penis as a big magic wand. But in fact, that little bump is just the tip of the iceberg. The full clitoris, it wraps around the vaginal canal. Kind of like a wizard in a cloak. Now, we don't know if the penis is more sensitive than the clitoris. No one has done this study. And when scientists analysed tissue from the genitals

of a handful of human cadavers, the nerves looked pretty similar in all the bits. But there is something dangling in the wind here. A big difference. Even though the clitoris is bigger than you might think, a lot of it's hidden away and hard to reach. While with penises... There's more opportunity, you know, more area that's clearly easier to stimulate.

That is, people with a penis may have sensitivity at the tip, maybe more so at the base, maybe more so at the backside. We found a rat study where scientists tickled around 200 spots on the genitals of male and female rats, and they couldn't find as many sensitive bits on the female. Which, funnily enough, is something that Nicole told us happens in her lab too, in people. This isn't from a formal study, but she said that her team just always seems to find sensitive spots on the guys. But with the ladies, sometimes it's not so easy. So I think, you know, if we're

struggling to figure out where the sensitivities are exactly, it makes sense that it might be very difficult for someone who's not hooked up to sensors either to have those experiences as easily as someone who has entirely external visible structures. It's just easier to see the penis. Okay, so maybe some of this physical stuff can help explain the orgasm gap. And maybe with more research, we'll find that the penis is more sensitive than the vulva.

But Nicole and Nan and other researchers we spoke to told us that so much is unknown about the orgasm. It's this giant mystery. And we're still learning things. And in the new frontiers of orgasm research, we're seeing people of all genders with all sorts of bodies getting off in the most remarkable ways. Like this one thing that we heard over and over from you lot, our listeners. So my freshman year of college, I was in a Pilates class

and I was really pushing myself during the abs section. Yeah, when I was doing the sit-ups, I started feeling something. And I remember doing pull-ups and it feeling really good down there. It's like, oh God, do I have to pee? I don't really know. And I just had this building feeling that felt really good. I was like, wow, awesome. I'm working so hard. It would just feel really good. So I keep doing wow, awesome. I'm working so hard. It would just feel really good. So I keep doing pull-ups. And yeah. Bam. I just had my first orgasm in the basement of my college gym

in a room full of 20 other people. And I never actually thought to Google it until now. And I realized it's called a coregasm, like your core. The corgasm. Yeah, there's pretty much no research on the corgasm and we can't say why it happens. But despite all of these orgasm mysteries, there is one big thing that science does have data on when it comes to our orgasms. It's a looming issue that affects every aspect of our lives,

and it could be getting in the way of your orgasm. And it is coming up after the break. Chiara, it means smart in Italian. Too bad your barista can't spell it right. So you just give a fake name. Your cafe name. Julia. But the more you use it, the more it feels like you're in witness protection. Wait a minute. What kind of espresso drinks does Julia like anyway? Is it too late to change your latte order? But with an espresso machine by KitchenAid,

you wouldn't be thinking any of this because you could have just made your espresso at home. Shop now at KitchenAid.ca. Welcome back. Today, we're talking about the battle of the orgasms and why, if you're a man, chances are you're winning. We've talked about the differences in our brains and our bodies, but there's an elephant in this podcast that could be getting in the way of your orgasms. And to tell us all about it is Candice Hargens, a psychologist and assistant professor at the University of Kentucky. Candice told us that she was an early bloomer when it came to sex research. So my grandmother had a set of Encyclopedia Britannica. And as early as like 9, 10,

when puberty began to onset, I was like, what's going to happen to my body? And so I remember exploring this and then being a sex educator to my peers and telling them, okay, this is when we're going to get boobs. And this is when we're going to get our periods. We too had Encyclopedia Britannica. And I'm like, why did I never look up breasts? So Candice grew up, stopped reading Britannica, and started looking into what society tells us about sex. And it might not surprise you, but when it comes to sex,

the thrust of our conversations, they can be a little different for men and women. Candice remembers when she got this message. I did. So I have an older brother. His name is Terrence. He's four years older than I am. So I wanted to be a rapper when I was younger. Don't judge. And the artists who were out that were women at the time were predominantly talking about female sexual empowerment. You know, we're having that big discussion right now about Cardi B and Mac the Stallion and their new song, WAP. But that conversation was going on then. But also, Lauryn Hill was out.

And so I was writing this rap and I wanted to share my lyrics with him. And it was a very sexually oriented song. I was probably like 13 or 14. And he was like, don't be a little Kim when you can be a Lauryn Hill. And so I was like, I'm kind of both though, you know, but at the time I didn't feel like I had that clap back language. So I was like, okay. I have to admit when I just heard you say that, I was like, oh yeah, that sounds classy. And then my second thought was like, wait, why am I not pro Little Kim? Like the sex positive. Right. This tale of Lauryn Hill and Little Kim is as old as time. Academics sometimes call it the Madonna whore dichotomy. And the idea is that good women aren't proud and sexual.

And all this controversy around WAP tells you that that script hasn't gone anywhere. But I always felt like there was something fucked up about the script. And so it didn't align with who I was and how I saw myself. And Kanda says that messages like this can get in your head and really stick. A survey of thousands of teens found that girls felt more shame and guilt around sex compared to boys. And we did a survey too, just informal, of you guys, our listeners. Almost 7,000 of you responded, telling us about your orgasms and what gets in the way of it.

And we found this shame thing was happening too. Men weren't immune from it. In fact, one in ten men said that one of the things that was going on when they couldn't orgasm during sex was shame and negative feelings around sex. But for women, this was worse. One in seven were affected by it. And studies have found that people who feel shame around sex or who they're attracted to,

they tend to feel less satisfied with their sex life. So do we believe that we're worthy of pleasure? I think that gets in the way. Do you have the capacity to be with your body without shame? I think that gets in the way. Research is also finding that women often aren't putting their own orgasms first. They're thinking of climaxing as yourgasm rather than mygasm. Like, a Finnish survey of more than 2,000 women found that they consistently rated their

partner's orgasm as more important than their own. They're a vehicle of somebody else's pleasure and potential to orgasm as more important than their own. They're a vehicle of somebody else's pleasure and potential to orgasm as opposed to someone who has their own inherent worthiness and sexual pleasure worthiness. And then there's this curly reason for the orgasm gap. It's one we hear a lot. That in straight couples, fellas just aren't spending enough time on the clitty. Studies have found that women are less likely to orgasm with just vaginal intercourse. And in our survey, we found that the 500 women who defined sex exclusively as vag to penis, they were less likely to orgasm

than those who included other stuff in their definition, like clitty touching. And men, you can't play dumb here. A large survey of college kids from a few years ago found that men were equally, if not more, clit-savvy than women in the surveys. So it seems that a bunch of men know what to do, and they're just not doing it. So there's a lot of reasons why the orgasm gap might exist without needing physical biological differences to explain it. And Candice reckons that these social forces are a big piece of the puzzle here. And her best evidence for that is this. When men aren't anywhere near the bedroom, guess what?

The orgasm gap closes a lot. So in that big survey of 50,000 people, 65% of straight women said that they usually or always orgasm during sex, 65%. But for lesbians, it was 86%. And we found that pattern in our survey too. It really is evidence that when you remove men from the equation that the gap closes a bit for women. So there's not this patriarchal presence in the bedroom that then sets the tone for whose pleasure is prioritized. Your line, it removes the patriarchal presence in the bedroom, I feel like, should be a poster and t-shirts everywhere. Remove the patriarchal. That's so funny because I don't even know I said that. I just like wrote it in caps like.

I love it. And another time when straight men aren't responsible for the pleasure, when women are masturbating. And here again, we see that women are orgasming for the most part just fine, almost as much as men. So, for example, in our survey, 86% of women said that they always or almost always orgasm when they're paddling their own pink canoe. That was compared to 96% of men. And our survey also looked at orgasms for people who aren't cis. There were almost 200 in our sample.

And we saw hints of the orgasm gap here too. So during sex, trans men and non-binary people orgasmed about as much as cis women, maybe a bit more. But trans women were orgasming the least. Only about a third of them said that they orgasm every time or almost every time they have sex. And as we were poking around in the research, a few other things came up as to why people in general might have a hard time orgasming. Being sexually assaulted, as you might imagine, can make it harder to enjoy sex.

Some antidepressants can also get in the way of orgasms. And as a sex therapist and for her research, Candice has noticed something else going on with some of her Black patients. Racist ideas about Black sexuality are getting in the way here. Like this idea that Black men are super sexual. It really affected an undergrad in one of her studies. He talked about being with a white woman for his first sexual encounter. And he was like,

I didn't know what I was doing, but I felt like I should know what I was doing because I know she had an expectation of me that I was going to be good at sex. And you know, he was like, I felt paralyzed. And Candice says learning about all this bedroom baggage, it can help people. So therapeutically, when I see clients, they feel relief. I think at first and feel validated. They feel like that makes sense. That's why I believe this or that's why I'm struggling in this way. And the thing is, Candice says that even if you know all this, it can still be an orgasm blocker.

As someone who is constantly thinking about racial expectations, gender expectations, does that affect your ability to enjoy sex? You know what? Sometimes it does. Because I can think about all of this stuff cognitively and philosophically and intellectually all day, but I'm still a full human woman and I want to be in my body, although I do very heady work. So it absolutely can get in the way for me too. I'm not exempt from it just because I have insight about

it. And what do you do when it is getting in your head? Do some deep breathing. My partner and I talk about it. So we have very open sexual communication. And I'll just say straight up, I'm in my head right now, even if we're in the act. And he'll say, all right, come out of your head. What do you need from me? What do you need me to do to help you come out of your head? And I'm like, all right, I need to breathe deeply. And then he'll walk me through, like, focus on this, focus on the way I'm touching you right here. And then if that's the case for him, I can do the same. So that's some advice if you've got a partner in the bedroom. But what about those times when you're tackling this on your own and you're still struggling?

We asked Malaika from the start of the show what she's been doing. I don't have to, you know, have dreams about shoes in order to climax. For me, it's just putting myself in a space where I feel like I'm being surrounded by pleasure and could be anything. It's like, you know, surrounding myself with sheets that feel really good against my skin. So it was just getting out of my head as far as what I thought the expectations of what we're supposed to lead to an orgasm were. And then accepting that for me, it's like something else completely, completely different. That's Science Versus. If you want to hear more of Malaika's work,

check out Adventures from the Bedrooms of African Women. The blog is at adventuresfrom.com. So adventuresfrom.com. So adventuresfrom.com. It's this safe space for African women to share their stories and questions about sex anonymously. It's really wonderful. Malaika runs it along with her best friend, Nana Dakwa Setiyama. We'll add a link to it in our show notes. This episode had over 120 citations. To find them, just head over to our show notes and click on the link to the transcript. And in our show notes, you'll also see the credits to this episode. Next week on the show, we reveal the grand winner, what you voted as your favorite episode of Science Versus of all time.

Science Versus is a Spotify Studios original. Listen for free on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. And if you are listening on Spotify, then follow us and tap the bell icon to find out when we're releasing new episodes. I'm Wendy Zuckerman. Back to you next time.