Expert Advice: What To Do When You Have Difficulty Orgasming During Sex.
It’s one of the number one reasons people seek out sex therapists.
Despite difficulties orgasming being a common problem — not being able to climax leaves a lot of us feeling abnormal. After all, Hollywood movies and pornography make it seem as if all you need is 30 seconds of penetration to have an orgasm. And it’s not as if it’s a subject we bring up by the water cooler, which means for all we know, we’re the only ones who can’t come.
Let me tell you — you’re not alone — regardless of your gender.
Listed below are the 4 steps you need to take in order to be able to have an orgasm.
1. Understand the root cause
There are a lot of different reasons as to why we experience difficulty orgasming during sex. There are physical reasons such as taking SSRI medication for depression or anxiety, having weak pelvic floor muscles or not being turned on physically, i.e. not having an erection or not lubricating.
Even psychological reasons often affect our orgasm abilities. Not feeling turned on mentally is a big one. So even if our body is raring to go, we might not be interested in having sex on a psychological level. This is due to the sexual desire vs. sexual arousal complex, which I explain further in this blog post.
For those who find it incredibly easy to orgasm, sexual desire isn’t always needed to climax. But for most of us, we need to feel in the mood for an orgasm to happen.
The same goes for being present during sex. If our mind is more preoccupied with thinking about the dishes or an upcoming presentation at work, than focusing on the sex we’re having at the moment, it will negatively impact our chances of coming.
Most times, difficulty achieving orgasm is about a combination of several different factors, often psychological and physiological. By using the steps listed in this article you can increase your chances of having an orgasm, regardless of your gender.
2. Make sure you’re turned on and enjoy the sex you’re having
This may seem obvious, but as a sex therapist who regularly sees clients who can’t come, I can tell you it’s pretty common.
If you’re not enjoying sex with a partner, chances are you won’t be having an orgasm either. In order to experience an explosive climax it’s important you actually like the sexual encounter.
This means being fully present during the whole thing — appreciating the touch of your partner and/or yourself, and not wondering or worrying about whether an orgasm will happen.
Being turned on is about both the mental and physical aspects of sexual desire. This means that you want both your brain and your body to feel excited about what it’s doing. It’s not uncommon to have only one of the two be on board, and sometimes that’s okay. The most important one to focus on here, at least in the beginning of the act, is the mental desire — your libido.
When you’re having sex you need to feel that urge to revel in the passion with your partner(s). If you’re caught up in thoughts such as “why am I not coming?” or “it’s taking too long for me to have an orgasm” or “she’ll think there’s something wrong if I don’t come soon”, your libido will likely disappear quickly — and with it goes your orgasm too.
3. Use the right technique
Difficulty orgasming during sex is often partly caused by not using the right technique.
If you can orgasm during masturbation but not during sex with a partner, chances are you’re not orgasming because you’re simply not using the same techniques during partner sex as during solo sex.
For women and people with vulvas/vaginas, stimulating the clitoris is usually needed for an orgasm to take place. In heterosexual relationships we’re used to viewing vaginal penetration as the “real sex”, and everything else, such as oral sex or petting, as foreplay.
This means we’re often not engaging in sex that actually produces orgasms. If this sounds familiar you’ll want to try incorporating external clitoris stimulation during vaginal penetration, or focusing on having the kinds of sex that more easily produce an orgasm.
If you’d rather your partner was the one touching you, you’ll need to instruct him or her on how to actually do this accurately. The same goes for men and people with penises — if you’re used to using the same technique over and over again during masturbation, and your partner isn’t stimulating you the same way, you’ll want to make sure the technique is adapted to better fit your needs. Tips on communication and relationships can be found in this blog post.
If you can’t orgasm during masturbation or sex with a partner, you might want to try out other techniques than the ones you’ve used before. For women and people with vulvas/vaginas it can be as simple as adjusting pressure or perhaps circulating around the clitoris as opposed to directly on the clitoris.
For men and people with penises it’s important to also try playing around with different techniques. Some might be helped by using a sex toy, for example, a masturbation egg.
4. Tone your pelvic floor muscles
Sometimes it can seem as if you’ve tried a hundred different things and yet your orgasm just won’t give you the time of day! This is the time to bring in some good old exercises known as kegels.
We tend to think of kegel exercises as something only women and people with vulvas/vaginas need to do after pregnancy and child birth. But kegels are actually important for everyone!
Kegel exercises tone your pelvic floor muscles. These are the muscles that contract when you have an orgasm and in order for them to be able to contract quickly enough, they need to be somewhat toned. This not only helps those who have difficulty orgasming during sex, but it also improves erectile function in all sexes.
Difficulty orgasming during sex can take a toll on both ourselves and our partner(s). But even if it’s been years since you’ve had an orgasm or you’ve never had one at all, there are ways to remedy this — and they don’t have to be so complicated! It’s all about being turned on, using the right techniques and doing your kegels.
Leigh Norén is a sex therapist and writer. Her writing on low libido, communication and intimacy has been featured in YourTango, Babe, The Tab, Glamour, and more. Learn more about Leigh on her website.
Originally published at https://www.therapybyleigh.com on December 24, 2019.
