She Comes First: The Thinking Man's Guide to Pleasuring a Woman (Kerner)

by Ian Kerner

Shere Hite, author of the Hite Report on Sexuality, went so far as to suggest, “Intercourse was never meant to stimulate women to orgasm.” One of the reasons for this is that the clitoris is about 2 to 3 cm closer to the front of the woman’s body than the vaginal opening. During intercourse, the penis often misses the clitoris altogether.

The women reported that during intercourse they reached orgasm about 25 percent of the time. But they reached orgasm 81 percent of the time during oral sex.

Men also acknowledged that they relied more heavily on pornography and firsthand experience when seeking information regarding female sexuality and felt substantially less comfortable seeking “touchy-feely” advice from parents and friends.

I was sure that on my gravestone, my epitaph would read, “He came. He saw. And then he came again.”

I learned from my study of the pioneering sex researcher Alfred Kinsey that the typical male sustains penetrative thrusting, on average, for about two and a half minutes.

Masters and Johnson dubbed it “ejaculatory inevitability” and the late Dr. AlfredC. Kinsey, famous for interviewing thousands about their sex lives, declared that 75 percent of men ejaculate within two minutes.

Studies, like those by Kinsey and Masters and Johnson, have concluded that among women whose partners spent twenty-one minutes or longer on foreplay, only 7.7 percent failed to reach orgasm consistently.

According to Greek mythology, when Zeus and Hera went to the hermaphrodite Tiresias in order to determine who experiences more pleasure from sex, men or women, Tiresias responded, “If the sum of love’s pleasure adds up to ten—nine parts go to women, only one to men.”

The clitoral orgasm is often criticized as being quick and lighthearted, while the others are somehow deemed more serious and substantial. But a quick study of anatomy reveals that all orgasms are clitoral.

Making love with one’s penis is like trying to write calligraphy with a thick Magic Marker. The tongue, on the other hand, is under our direct control, has no time constraints, and can be manipulated with expert precision. Unlike the penis, it’s effective when hard or soft, and never gets overheated. When using his tongue, a man doesn’t have to worry about growing fatigued, nor does he need fret over premature ejaculation or impotence. He can relax and enjoy the act of giving.

Freud demoted the clitoris and promoted the vagina, characterizing clitoral orgasms as “infantile.” According to Freud, adult women needed to get past their need for clitoral orgasms and develop a desire for penetration; after all, isn’t that what penises do? Penetrate? Female masturbation was criticized as creating clitoral dependency; oral sex was verboten.

we are told that during the Tang Dynasty, the Empress Wu Hu ruled China. She knew that sex and power were inexorably linked, and she decreed that government officials and visiting dignitaries must pay homage to her imperial highness by performing cunnilingus upon her.

Etymologically, “vagina” originates from a Latin word meaning “a sheath or scabbard for a sword,” reinforcing its relationship to the penis and dependency upon penetration or insertion for broader meaning

As Napoleon noted in a love letter to Josephine: “A thousand kisses to your neck, your breasts, and lower down, much lower down, that little black forest I love so well.”

Interestingly, the inner lips are also archaically known as “nymphae,” named after the nymphs of ancient Greece who were famous for their irrepressible libidos and are the source of the term “nymphomania.”

Some anthropologists speculate that a woman’s use of lipstick stems from her desire to have the visible upper lips resemble the inner hidden lips below—a signal to the opposite sex that she is sexually ready.

During the process of arousal, the inner lips change color, from light pink to darker hues, and swell and puff in size as they engorge with blood.

There’s quite a bit of contention over the etymology of the word “clitoris.” Some believe it stems from the Greek, kleitoris, meaning “little hill or slope”; others say it comes from the Greek verb kleitoriazein, meaning “to touch or titillate lasciviously, to be inclined to pleasure”; and still others claim that the Greek word kleitoris originally meant “divine and goddesslike.” In some sense, all these meanings are true.

Additionally, the clitoris has layers of muscle, usually referred to as vaginal muscles or pelvic floor muscles. There is the oval-shaped bulbocavernous muscle that rests between the inner lips and the bulbs of the clitoris. This muscle is interwoven with muscle that encircles the anus, and is part of the reason that anal stimulation is often a turn-on and hence part of the clitoral network.

Does a woman actually ejaculate? The answer is yes, but not in the same sense as the explosive male orgasm and not nearly as often as the “ejaculation evangelists” would have us believe. In general, female ejaculation appears to be the exception rather than the rule.

In short, female ejaculate of this sort is not urine.

In a nonaroused state, the vagina is a compressed tube, about three to four inches long, composed of muscle, and lined with mucous membranes not dissimilar to the lining of the mouth. During arousal, a woman’s vagina widens and opens in order to accommodate the penis—a few inches in both depth and width—creating what Masters and Johnson referred to as the “ballooning” effect.

Masters and Johnson broke down the process of sexual response into four stages: Excitement, Plateau, Orgasm, and Resolution. With the application of steady, rhythmic stimulation, each phase builds upon the last in the creation and release of sexual tension.

The number of orgasmic contractions varies, anywhere from three to fifteen on average, although Masters and Johnson observed a woman who experienced a forty-three-second orgasm consisting of more than twenty-five successive contractions. Additionally, it’s been observed that pregnant women sometimes experience prolonged orgasms because of the persistent engorgement of their genitals.

While there’s no rule of thumb for the number of orgasmic contractions, women tend to experience six to ten contractions, whereas men generally have four to six. Once again, we are reminded of Masters and Johnson’s declaration that a woman has “an infinitely greater capacity for sexual response than a man ever dreamed of.”

Well, part of what it feels like is this, that you’re just a drop of oil on a white tablecloth, just a tiny, still drop of oil, and then in a flash you’re expanding outward in every direction, evenly, turning into a stain, a little drop expanding into a bright stain that covers the universe, the process of that, the expanding…that’s part of it.

With women, it takes longer for the genitals to return to their normal state, at least five to ten minutes. Women tend not to get sleepy, their genitals don’t become hypersensitive (except the clitoral head), and they don’t experience a refractory period—with a little stimulation they’re ready to begin the process all over again.

It’s been said that a woman’s genitals are as clean as a fresh carton of yogurt, and this comparison is often made because the kind of bacteria found in yogurt, lactobacilli, are also found in a woman’s vaginal secretions.

So in some sense, smell may be indicative of promiscuity, and is probably why the Kamasutra describes licentious women as smelling like fish.

Based on the numbers, it appears that women are more likely to have had at least one STD at some point in their lives. They were twice as likely as men to have had genital warts, and more than twice as likely to be infected with genital herpes.

If a man has two to four sexual partners in his lifetime, his chances of contracting an STD are about 3 percent. As the number of partners increases, so does the risk. With more than twenty partners, his risk is about 28 percent.

During foreplay avoid direct contact with her genitals for a minimum of ten to fifteen minutes. Stimulate other parts of her body; let the oxytocin wash over her and pervade her bloodstream. Save the genital kiss for last, as the first kiss upon the vulva is the threshold between foreplay and coreplay.

numerous studies reveal that breast contact stimulates men way more than it does women. In a Kinsey study of female sexual response, only 11 percent of the eight thousand women surveyed said that they stroked their breasts during masturbation (compared to 84 percent who stroked their clitoris or labia minora).

Most men think of vaginal wetness as the most reliable indicator of a woman’s level of arousal; and while there is indeed a strong correlation between lubrication and sexual response, she may or may not be wet for reasons that have nothing to do with her level of sexual excitement. Breathing, on the other hand, is an oft-neglected indicator. As she gets more aroused, look for the commensurate changes in her breathing, and tightening of the abdominal muscles.

Press your thumb against her clitoral head and gently flick it from side to side as you penetrate her with short shallow thrusts. Or press the shaft of your penis against her clitoris and then gently thrust between the folds of her labia without ever entering her. Or she can perform Kegels (the squeezing of her pelvic muscles) while you, ever so slowly, penetrate her. Really take the time to feel her pelvic muscles contract against your penis as you slowly withdraw.