Sex With Emily - Performance Tips & Doggy Style Tricks

Episode Date: June 8, 2018

On today’s show, Emily is talking about everything from sex positions to performance in the bedroom to the way our brains work. She reveals how performance issues are not just on old man thing, why you should love yourself and your vulva, how to last longer when using condoms, and debates whether we’re designed to be monogamous. Thank you for supporting our sponsors who help keep the show FREE: Aaptiv, Fleshlight, Apex, We-Vibe Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Thanks for listening to Sex with Emily. On today's show, I'm talking about everything from sex positions to performance in the bedroom to the way our brains work. Topics include performance issues. It's not just an old man thing. Why you should love yourself and your vulva, how to last longer when using condoms, and are we designed to be monogamous? All this and more, thanks for listening. As my man E here, he just got his heart broken, he thinks you're kind of cute. The girls got a hair stand. Oh my! The women know about shrinkage. Isn't it common all the way? What do you mean like laundry? It's shrink?

Can we not talk about sex so much? Are you kidding me? Oh my god, I'm off here. I'm so drunk. Being bad feels pretty good. You know Emily's not the kind of girl you just play with. You're listening to Sex with Emily. We're talking about sex, relationships, and everything in between.

For more information, go to sexwithemily.com, check out our website, and also you still have some time to enter our masturbation month contest. Because I know it's June, that's cool. We extended it to June 18th. And I want to know, how is masturbation benefited your life, your sex life, what is it done for you? Email feedback at sexwithmv.com by June 18th to enter. And of course, we're going to give you

some super sexy prizes. I love the detail. I love your stories. I love it all, but it really helps me keep them short. And as always, follow us on social media. It's all at sex with Emily on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and all those places that you frequent. So sex in the news.

Here's what's going on this week. Researchers found that whether a person identifies as transgender could be tied to how their brains develop in the womb. So the Netherlands analyze brain activity of young transgender people using MRI scans, and they found that the transgender adolescents' brains work the same as cisgender participants of the same gender.

Okay, what does this mean? So cisgender is a term that, for example, means that if you were born with vagina, you identify as a woman. Whereas a transgender person would have been born with a penis, but also identifies as a woman. So basically if you thought that this was a choice, like someone just thought, you know, if a cisgender person, you know, boy, born with a penis, was like, oh, I think it'd be cool to wear a woman and wear dresses. What they're saying here is, no, this is actually their brains work the same way as the gender they later identify with when they're old enough to identify. So it's kind of like, do people choose to be left handed, right?

No, we're born either left or right handed. Sure, you could make them right, right handed, and they could get really good at it, but they'd fundamentally be left handed. So I thought this was common knowledge, because I know a lot of, for example, gay people, they say, well, I always knew that I was gay or lesbian and kind of just like transgender people same thing.

Like they, kind of toys, sound like they were like, oh, all of a sudden it's gonna be fun. It's actually the way their brains are wired. So I think it should become a knowledge. It makes sense that, you know, people who identifies a woman or a girl from a young age would have a brain that works like a woman's brain, but I guess it is not. So I'm glad people are doing these kind of studies to back it up. Speaking of backing up, let's talk about doggy style, because why not? Because I know a lot of you love doggy style position, and I was recently quoted an article that I think you guys will like because listen, we've got limited sex positions, right? I mean, there's base positions, right?

Like, doggie style and missionary. And there's a few others. And then with there's variations on them. So I think people are like, positions get boring. So here's a few tips to make doggie style more intimate. And I know it's also the go-to position for a lot of couples. I think with these tips, I'm gonna give you actually go for any couples and go for two guys, two women, and had our sexual couples.

So let me just say that ahead of time. And I think that, again, Doggy Style is the go-to position for a lot of couples. I think that a lot of men love that it offers a really good view and they're in control of the depth and the speed of the penetration. But how do you make it more intimate? How do you make it to what everyone's really connected during this position? So some tips I have, the sandwich doggy style position. So if you're the receiver, you're lying flat in the bed,

on your stomach with the legs closed, and then your partner gets a top view, and your partner's legs are outside of yours as your partner enters from behind. So this position is less about like thrusting in and out, and it's more about really connecting as your partner enters from behind. So this position is less about like thrusting in and out and it's more about really connecting with your partner. And also for women having your legs closer together if you're on the bottom line and your stomach it offers tighter friction which can make it more enjoyable for women. I know that this is something that I had to

learn later in life but I'm so glad I did that you can easily pump your keggle muscles and your pelvic floor muscles and tighten it and it can feel really, really good. So, I'll first try to friction with your legs together and also your partner's hands are free to jave over your hands or hold your hands and also your partner's face will be close to the back of your neck and you know, they can whisper sweeten the things

in your ear, the neck is a killer, a rogginous zone. So that's a fun variation of it. That's also the rear view. So if you're thinking, oh God, doggy style, it's so, it's just, you know, we're not looking at each other and it just feels so alone. You can actually make eye contact. So here's a little upgrade. When you're in a typical doggy style position, turn your necks, you can connect visually

and look into your partner's eyes as you are, as the thrusting is happening. I think that we're afraid for eye contact a lot during sex because it just makes us vulnerable. I think eye contact in a lot of ways makes us vulnerable. You know those people you meet even, not that you want to sex with, but you meet out in the world and you're like,

why don't they look at me? I think we're all afraid of it, but many of us can't be. But there's a great intensity and closeness that comes when you actually can look into your partner's eyes during sex. So this might be the connection that you need during doggy style to take it to the next level.

Also, you guys, another doggy style tweak is to make sure that everyone's getting having a good time and getting off because a lot of times for women, it doesn't, if you're the receiver, you're not going to have as much clitorial stimulation as you'd like. So this is why it's great when your partner has their hand free. You've got two hands free and you want to make sure that your breasts and clitoris are easily accessible. Either you touch or hopefully your partner will touch,

stroke them, he can use a vibrator, he can hold them at palm of his hands, he can hit all those aridges zones, your clitoris, the vulva, your pubic mound, all those things. So when he's thrusting it out, can bring you both to a really great orgasm. So you don't have to forego your pleasure in doggy style.

So I hope this makes a lot more sense for you and makes it a lot better than before because it's not necessarily common sense in fact a lot of things aren't That's kind of like my theme for today Another not so common although it should be study Performance issues in the bedroom are not just an old man's problem. I Loved this. I love the study. I ate it all up because I think your mind's going to be a little bit blown with this. I'm all really happy. So a study revealed that nearly 40% of men, 40% between the age of 16 and 34 have experienced sexual performance problems in the last year.

I find this so interesting because I think when we think about sexual dysfunction and men, we often link that to the men who are getting prescriptions for a Viagra. And you know, men are over 50, and they have problems with sexual function, but no, this is not the case at all. This is saying that it's actually much more widespread, and the problem is that it's under-reported and under-under-under-under-stud.

That's like a way to say extremely understood. It's not understood that the sexual issues these men are experiencing include lack of interest in sex. So it's not just obvious things like dysfunction where maybe you're getting hard or you're not staying hard as long as you want or coming too quickly. It actually means that these men have lack of interest in sex, lack of adjoining sex, they feel no arousal, they experience pain, and we know difficult getting your maintaining erection or climaxing to early. So I think this is time for really, really honest conversation about these issues.

And it's way, way, way long overdue. Because when it comes to young people's sexuality, I think that we're usually focused on, you guys know this, sex education, we talk a lot about preventing STIs and unplanned pregnancies. We never talk about pleasure and we never talk about what sexual health actually means for men and for women. We talk a lot about women's sexual challenges. Women aren't getting aroused and not having orgasms. You guys know I talk about everything here.

I think this is great because it also points to, and kind of some awareness, it points to the fact that it can also be really embarrassing for men, you know, because they're not confiding in their partners, they're not visiting their doctors, in fact, women go to doctors, they go to their general practitioners, they go to their gynecologist once or twice a year,

way more often than men. And so I feel like guys are kind of like, yeah, maybe I'm not really into sex, but I'm the only guy in the planet who's not into sex well turns out no about 40% of men between like I said to the age 34 Or having the same challenges, so I love this kind of blows it wide open for men to understand that they need to communicate about Whatever's going on with them sexually just like we all do so Sometimes just talking about it with your partner, even in saying like, hey, babe, I've just not been feeling as arousal or I'm worried that

I'm not performing or whatever it is, takes the pressure off because you're not living with it alone because I think a lot of men suffer silently. And you know what happens when you suffer silently. Through any of these sexual challenges, it can really take a toll on your physical and mental health. And so, and then that just kind of perpetuates the problem when you no longer talk about it. And another level of this is that they blame the rise in sexual dysfunction among men, among young men,

an easy access to porn without high quality sex to offer more balanced perspective. So get this, young men, who might not have a lot of experience, actually, they probably don't. The first kind of sex they ever see is important, right? And they have no other sex education. And then they start to have sex,

and then they have some kind of challenge around it, right? A sexual issue. But since we have no sex education, and they're performing themselves to porn stars, this can cause early on anxiety, self-esteem issues, and make intercourse with their actual partners in real life very, very difficult. So some people say that the successive viewing of pornography is actually a side effect

of a sexual issue that's already been present in the men. So perhaps the guys had some sexual dysfunction issues in the past, so he just turned a porn and never went back. So no matter what side you're on, if you lean towards porn because it kind of helped you through something and then you can't have sex with your partner or you learned about sex through porn and you just kind of stayed there, there's a lot of challenges that we're having with porn all around. And I think that the bottom line is no matter what, either it's because men aren't communicating

about their problems around sex because they feel like it makes them less manly or it's too devastating or they're just stuck watching porn for whatever reason. This gets men trapped in this cycle of sexual dysfunction. And it also propagates the myth that sex issues are something that only guys need to worry about. Older guys, right. Okay. So the problem with this, it keeps men trapped in this cycle of sexual dysfunction, and it also propagates the myth that, oh, sex issues are only thing that old dudes have to deal with. It's not for young guys, and so young guys are running on suffering.

Get it? So if you're struggling in the bedroom, you're not alone. And I really hope that this is kind of like light bulbs going on with some guys listening or some women, you know, your friends, your partners, and you can think like, oh God, I wonder how this is having an impact on my wonder. If I understand that lately, he hasn't been getting hard in the bedroom. We hasn't been really into sex lately. Instead of blaming them, I think what women do also, a lot of times, we blame ourselves for like, well, he must not be into me.

He must not be attracted to me. He must be cheating on me. Like a lot of times no he's just a human being with sexual challenges like we all have a different times in our life. So I want to hear from you, what do you guys think? Have you experienced any of these issues at all? Do you want to get past them? Do you think it's porn? Is it more than that? Email me, feedback at sexwithemily.com. Okay let's take a quick break and give a shout out to our sponsors. Thank you for supporting them, and I'll be back in answering your questions. Okay, now we're on to your emails. I love answering your questions.

It's why I exist on the planet is to help you have better sex. So you can text Ask Emily all one word to 7979-7979, fill out the short form or go to my website, sexwithmai.com, click the Ask Emily tab, submit your question, as always include your name, your age where you live, and how you listen to this show. Okay, this is from Chris 29 San Diego. Hey Emily, I've been listening to your podcast for over a year and it's taught me a lot and got me to explore subjects I never really explored before.

I was recently in a relationship with a girl who was polyamorous, slash open, prior to me, and I did a lot of reading on the subject, in particular with the book Sex at Dom by Christopher Ryan. I'm certainly read the book, so I have a question for you. Knowing what I know about human biology and evolution, do you think humans are naturally prone to have more than one sexual partner at a time, and that monogamy is a modern invention? And or that paliamerie was a more dominant pattern in our earlier ancestors, and that modern humans are capable of both. Thanks. This is a great question.

And here's what I got to say to that. You guys, Sex and Dawn is a wonderful book by Christopher Ryan that came out in about 2011, I think. And it really was a groundbreaking book about evolutionary psychology and sex and our ancestors and biology and evolution and all this stuff. So to answer your question, it's true that monogamy is a modern invention. And I do believe that it doesn't work for everybody.

And so monogamy, essentially, the last couple hundred years is the only choice that we have. In many ways, we think, okay, we've got to marry someone, we've got to stay with one partner for the rest of our lives till death do us part. And that works for many couples. Many couples they work through, and that's how they get stronger, right? They're like, I'm just gonna be with my partner,

we're gonna like make it work, and that's great. However, I think that for a lot of people, it doesn't. And I don't know, it could be evolutionarily speaking. It could just be because, you know, we're not wired that way. What I would like to see is people not being so hard to themselves and listening to what they really want. Before they jump into a monogamous relationship,

they're like, I'm just gonna not have sex with anyone else because that's what society says. I think that the time we're living in now is a wonderful time to explore what kind of relationship do I want? Do I want a more modern relationship, a more alternative relationship that's more open and polyamorous?

I think we're capable of whatever we want and all relationships take work. It's just because you're in an open relationship and you're like, wow, I can sleep with anyone. Believe me, it doesn't mean that life is great because you have so many sexual partners. I think a lot of this has to do with the grass as always, greener.

So if you think that one side of the other is going to be the answer to everything, it's not. But I do believe that, yeah, I think that I would just like people to be more open to kind of exploring themselves, not beating themselves up for having desires other than their partner. And not to think that, oh my God, I could never deal with jealousy. Like, I want to have more than one partner, but it'll never work. Because I'm here to tell you that there are really great tools.

People I know in open relationships actually can work. People are married with kids and they just practice like rigorous honesty, fierce communication and they actually, yeah, they get jealous like we all do, but they have language around it and they talk about it right away and for some people it's really healthy. So that's time when I answer your question there. Chris, let me know what you think. Are you trying to try out an open relationship? Let me know. Okay, this is from Giovanna 42 in Florida. I'm a 42 year old single mom and I'm divorced. I've been saving with a 39 year old divorced man. We just hook up and don't have plans for a relationship. He's made it clear that he's not looking for one. The sex is good, but

should I continue to see him knowing it's not going to lead to anything or should I cut all ties and move on? I'm not really sure that I want a relationship either and I don't want to give up on the sex, but I don't want to catch any feelings either. What should I do? Okay, Giovanna, this is a great question because I think what it all comes down to is that you're trying to control things here that aren't necessarily controllable. What you can think about though,

takes some time, you might catch feelings. Is like this whole I don't wanna catch feelings. If you catch feelings for someone, that's actually a good thing, right? I think that can be a good thing if they're matching your feelings and you're talking about it. Most importantly, I have to say, do you wanna, what exactly do you want?

Okay? So here's a thing about dating after divorce. It's a thing. You've been married for a while, coming back, if you've been out of the dating world for five years, 10 years, and you're just entering now, you're like, whoa, dating apps, no one talks on the phone anymore, like that's one hurdle.

And then also just like, wow, what's it like to date a few people, maybe even like a few people, and have sex with more than one person if you're into that thing? But I don't think that you know that yet, Giovanni. So you said he's made it clear he's not looking for the one. You start out saying like, you know, it's not going to lead to anything and should I cut ties.

But then you go on to say, you're not sure that you want a relationship either. So I'm going to say, what do you want? What do you think you're capable of? You might not know this yet, but I want you to reframe the way you're thinking about what you're looking for. Because it might surprise you. But if you're having good sex with this guy, and just because he's telling you, I don't want a relationship, and you know, why don't you

just kind of go into the relationship, being really honest, communicating, being honest with them, what you're thinking right now. You can say, you know what, I'm thinking about this relationship, because if you said you want a relationship, and I'm not sure you don't want a relationship, and I'm not sure what I want right now, that might get you even closer together, but I would be honest with him but most importantly with yourself and challenge yourself because you might be able to still date this guy and other people, even if your brain's going, I could never handle that because it sounds like you're still trying to figure out what you want.

The other option for you is to also say, you know what? I'm just not going to jump right back into dating. If you just got divorced, you might not even be ready you know what? I'm just not gonna jump right back into dating. If you just got divorced, you might not even be ready yet either. So I'm just throwing that out there for you and for anyone else who's listening, who's like, I gotta get back out there and do it. You only have to date when you're ready to date. So go ease in yourself,

really think about what feels good to you, not what the guys want, not what he's telling you but what you want. And that takes some work, but that's how you're gonna be able to find, satisfying relationship that you really want. And that feels good to you. This is from Andrew 35 Australia.

I find I orgasm a lot quicker when wearing condom than when I don't. I can control myself when I don't wear one, but when I do, I can't control myself. And the idea is how to last longer. Okay, well, the first thing I thought when I read this is, well, I love it during condom. I love it.

I love you guys, wear condoms, if you sleep it around, and you've been tested, prevents STDs and pregnancies, okay? You guys, but most importantly, STDs, even if you're on the pill, a woman's on the pill. Okay, so what I was thinking, and there was maybe the condom doesn't fit you right. I think that guys kind of get set on a brand of condoms and like, oh yeah, well, it just

feels weird, but it might be too tight. You might need a bigger size condom, a larger size condom. I always recommend skin condoms. They're great. They make a king size, KYNG and it's skin SKYN. You could also try masturbating with the condom on to test it and practice edging with the condom on where you realize the point where you're about to jack a lit and then you stop to get to the point of no return and then you go back down again.

You could also try doing your keg electric sizes which is great for men and for women doing your kegels, yes men and women can do them in the same way, it can also help you with a jackatory control. But since it's only with a condom, again, I would try different sizes, try masturbating with a condom, and also try doing your kegels and let me know how that goes. This is from Cece. Hello, I had a question in regards to one of your posts. How come I break the stigma of SDDs, especially when shames is used to discourage unsafe behavior? Thanks. Okay, so I think what you're referring to here is that when we talk about

the stigma around SDDs, like, you know, I think what you're talking about is fear. That a lot of times we say like, you know, we use this fear-based tactics, like you better not get an STD or oh my God, you could get an STD and I don't say this, but maybe you're reading into that life could be over and it's a death sentence and all these things. But I think that it's not really so much shame. It's like this, we use these tactics,

maybe your people do, so you don't get an STD, but what happens if you get one? So you're saying like, you know, you're using all this fear and and then you get one, what's how someone's license to go on? And I get that there's nothing great with having an SCD, but it's also not the end of the world. Like, SCDs happen, they do, everything happens, people, and if you get one, you can work with

it. And we've talked about this a lot in the show, like, how to talk to your partner about it, how you can take precautions. For a lot of SCDs, you just can take a pill like an um, and it's gone. Or if you have herpes, you know, you can take a daily, suppressive pill, but you also have to talk to your partner about it. So use precaution when having sex and be safe. But if you have one, there's ways to work around to you guys. That's what I got for you, sweetie.

Okay, this is from Amber 35 in Florida. Hey Emily, this is regarding my feelings of how my vagina looks. It's so bad I never look at it. So I came home from work and looked and it's way worse than I ever remember it to be. It's saggy, wrinkly, and has huge long lips. It looks so beat up and worn out. It's literally the ugliest vagina I've ever seen in my entire life. I've Google Photos of Laby Plasty,

but some look worse after the surgery. I don't know how to get over it. This is almost like a phobia of my vage. It's so friggin ugly, and I buy, and I love how they look. If I ever saw a girl with one like mine, I couldn't even go through with it. I don't know what to do. My husband's as he loves it,

but our marriage is always on the rocks, so one day I might have to be with someone else and I dread it. It's so gross. Okay Amber, whoa, back up. Take a few deep breaths here. I'm gonna take a few deep breaths with you. You're totally fine.

This is normal. To me it sounds like you just look in the mirror and freaked out because your husband loves it. Women, they all look different. I understand, I understand that when you look at porn, they're small and tight and pink and maybe you know, that's the girls who are trying to have a porn or that's the angle, but that is only one kind of vulva. You should check out some of other vulvas to make yourself feel better.

Don't look at labial plastic. You do not need labial plastic. Look up the vulva gallery. Just Google vulva gallery and there's beautiful vulva artwork and they're all different. Everyone is different. And, you know, I feel like you have this concern that all these people, if you ever have to grow out in the world, they're not gonna like you for China

and they're gonna judge you. And then you just said to me, you're vulva, you just said to me that if you came across one, you wouldn't love it. So you are actually the problem here. You're the one who's perpetuating this thing about something, Jynas, to look in some certain way in the vulva and it looks so different.

Every single one is different. Like really if you stood up 100 women in a room and they were all naked, every single one would look very, very different. If you put 100 porn stars in a room, they might look more similar. But if you you put 100 porn stars in a room, they might look more similar. But if you just pulled 100 random women off the street, very different, and each one is beautiful.

So I think that this is where all these challenges have come up from women for loving their volvas, but I think that we gotta do some self-love here, some deep, deep self-love. Because if you're with someone in the future, and they're gonna look at you and they're gonna be like, oh, peace out, peace out, Amber, I don't love your vagina, I think that's not the person you wanna be with.

A, and B, God. Is that really even gonna happen? And if that happens, you're gonna be that person more than anyone else. You know, and B is the same as A, if you find that person, does that to you, you're out. So, as long as it's working, and you're having sex with your part, your husband, although you say you're out. So as long as it's working and you're having sex with your part, your

husband, although you say you're having challenges, I think that we don't, we need to love our vaginas. We need to love our bodies more. The way you're talking about yourself is really, really hateful. I'm going to go on a limb here and suggest that you've got a lot of these negative tapes running through your head about a lot of things about your body, about your life, about your job. If not, you're lucky. Because if it's just about your vagina, I can solve this. I can tell you that you, it's just important to do the work when you're vagina, like standing in the mirror

and all those, it finds some things that you love about it. And your husband loves it. And I would start to take your masturbation, do some mindful masturbation where you're really just, wow, I can't believe how amazing it is I have this body part that can give me so much pleasure and so many orgasms. So I want you to just reframe, re-shift this whole thing about your vulva.

And I want every woman listening to to do the same thing. There is no right vulva. This wasn't even a conversation, you guys. I'm telling you, before porn became so ubiquitous, this barely was even a thing. And now I get all these emails from women are like, I don't look a certain way and it just makes me really sad. So, I just told Jamie in our office, and we've just put pictures of vulvas all over the office.

Like I want him to walk in here and I want like, vulvas, we go, oh, I get it, I get it, right? So anyway, I love you Amber and I want you to love yourself as well. It's a really good thing to work on loving yourself. That's actually the most important work we could do. Cause when you love yourself, everything else follows. Confidence, sexual confidence, being a good person, being a good human.

Jealousy goes away. It's a beautiful thing. Do that. I love you all. Okay, everyone. Thanks so much for listening to the show. I love hearing from you. I love getting your questions.

So please, please email me. All of them. And thanks to my amazing team, Ken, volunteer Sarah, producer Jamie and Michael was good for you. Email me feedback at sexwithamlite.com.