Musings

10 Activities That Are More Fun With a Butt Plug In

Kate Sloan

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I am always looking for “life hacks” that will make my day-to-day feel more joyful, more decadent, and more rewarding. I think this stems partly from my struggle with depression: if there’s any way I can convince myself to get out of bed on a bad day, I’ll try it, even if it’s something small and silly like putting on red lipstick, cranking some uplifting tunes, or – yes – inserting a butt plug.

If you like anal play, wearing a plug can bring a little extra magic into just about any endeavor. Slather your plug with anal lube, slide it in, and try any of these activities – if nothing else, they’ll be more interesting!

Penetrative sex. You may have tried this already. It can be a grand old time. If you have a prostate, the plug will rub against it with every thrust – and if you have a vagina, wearing a plug will make you extra tight, which your partner might enjoy. I’ll never forget the time I got fucked while a large-ish plug was in my butt, and my partner exclaimed, “Jesus Christ, you’re so tight! Who turned the sleep number up to 100 in your vagina?!”

Receiving oral sex. Gettin’ head can feel fantastic, but sometimes it just isn’t quite enough to get me off. A partner’s fingers inside me can add a little extra stimulation if need be, but that requires a lot of co-ordination on the part of the giver. Using a butt plug while receiving oral can circumvent this problem. The plug will shift and undulate slightly with the turned-on pulses of your pelvic muscles, creating a mild sensation of getting fucked that might help push you over the edge.

Giving oral sex. Going down on your sweetie can be a massive turn-on; even moreso if you have something to squeeze around while you do it. The giver’s enjoyment and enthusiasm are a make-or-break factor in good oral sex, so you’re doing a favor for both yourself and your partner if you find a way to crank up your pleasure even higher.

Getting spanked. Sex educator Tina Horn has said that one of her favorite things about spanking is just getting to handle a butt, because butts are great. In my experience, this isn’t uncommon: oftentimes, when someone is into doing stuff to butts more generally, they’re into spanking, and vice versa. So if your partner likes smackin’ your ass, they might enjoy the added excitement and extra squirming that results when you wear a plug while they do it.

Running errands. Look, no one said grocery shopping or going to the bank was going to be a rip-roaring good time. But you can make these things slightly more thrilling by doing ’em while plugged. It’s a fun secret you can carry around with you. (Bring extra lube so you can pop into a public bathroom for a quick reapplication if needed!)

Housework. I loathe cleaning my room, putting away my laundry, and organizing my desk. If I have to do these things (which I do, because I’m an adult and I don’t have on-staff maids), I might as well have a happy butt while I’m adulting. Bonus points if you put on some Taylor Swift or Carly Rae and dance around while you clean your space.

Working. I wouldn’t recommend wearing a plug at an actual workplace, although I know people who have. But if you work from home (or from cafés comme moi), wearing a plug can stiffen your spine and wake up your brain. This is especially true if you’ve got a dom-y partner who’s told you, for example, that the plug should serve as a reminder that they are expecting you to get your work done or you’ll get a punishment…!

Facing a fear. Speaking of dom-y partners: often it is easier to do something that scares you if someone you adore has commanded you to do so. A plug can be a tangible reminder of this, as you take on whatever’s terrifying you, from public speaking to air travel to returning the clothes your ex left behind at your house. Even without a partner bossing you into bravery, a plug can still give you something to focus on while you tackle your fears, like how meditators are instructed to focus on their breathing. It sounds silly, but the sensation of something in your butt can ground you and keep you present when your anxiety-brain is pulling you out of your body.

Posing for pictures. Tyra Banks famously advocates “smizing”: the modeling trick of smiling with your eyes, not your mouth. It creates an approachable warmth that looks lovely in photos. I think wearing a butt plug could do the same thing! You’ll have a glimmer in your eyes that says, “I have a secret.” The goofiness of this situation might even help relax you, so your natural charm and beauty come through in whatever boudoir shots or glamorous headshots you’re posing for.

Getting ready for a date. If your beau is into butt stuff, you can prepare your ass by wearing a plug before and/or during your date – how thoughtful of you! But even if not, sporting a plug during your pre-date prep could help get you in a sexy, flirty headspace. As your butt muscles relax around the plug, so too will you relax, loosen up, and lighten up!

What are your favorite activities to pair with a butt plug?

This post was sponsored by lubezone.org, and as always, all writing and opinions are my own!

Meditation, Mindfulness, & My Slutty Mouth

Kate Sloan

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Two major things happened to me in February: I had one of the worst depressive and anxious spells of my life, and I became obsessed with giving blowjobs.

I don’t think it was a coincidence that these things happened at the same time. We’re drawn to what we most need at any given moment: when your body’s deficient in magnesium, for example, you might crave chocolate. And likewise, I see now that when I most needed to clear my mind and focus up, I craved the sexual act that gave me that experience most readily.

This connection didn’t really hit me until the owner of my favorite BJ dick skipped town and I found myself in a fellatio drought for a while. As my anxious and depressive episode worsened, I craved blowjobs the way I’ve craved other life-affirming touchstones: nutritious food, quality friend-time, creative expression, cat cuddles. It ran deeper than my typical carnal hankerings. It felt more like a core psychological need.

When you struggle with anxiety and depression, people constantly offer unsolicited advice. So I’ve heard it all. “Get more sunshine!” “Try yoga!” “Eat more greens!” One suggestion I’ve heard many times is mindfulness. This seems counterintuitive at first blush – if my issue is feeling sad and scared, won’t focusing on those feelings just make me sadder and scared-er? – but I actually find it works the opposite way. Acknowledging my negative self-talk, greeting it like an old friend instead of slamming the door in its face, diffuses some of its power. And then I refocus on my breath and my body instead of my buzzing brain, and those quotidian sensations are calming in their simplicity. It’s not a magic pill, but it’s something.

That’s what blowjobs can be for me: a venue for mindfulness. They force me into my body and don’t allow me to fall back into my anxiety-brain until the deed is done.

When I first started giving BJs at age 19, I didn’t find it hot at all. “My mouth just isn’t an erotic zone for me,” I remember telling a friend. I felt all those mouth sensations very vividly – the weight of a cock on my tongue, the texture of the skin sliding over my lips, the smells and tastes – and they captured my attention so completely that I couldn’t focus on other things, like my own arousal or pleasure. I hadn’t yet developed a concept of sexual enjoyment that didn’t centre on my own genitals, so I interpreted my BJ dalliances as, “My mouth just isn’t eroticized.” Wow, how wrong I was.

That sensory overwhelm is the main reason I enjoy BJs so much now. They are unique among sexual acts for me in this way. When someone’s fucking me, fingering me, or even going down on me, I can tune it out to some extent if I want to. My mind can wander into anxiety-land, and sometimes I need to remind myself, “Oh, right, I’m having sex right now!” I never, ever experience that with a blowjob. I can’t. My mouth is so front-and-center in my perception that I can’t think about much else when I’m slobbin’ on the knob. It’s just me and the dick, and nothing else matters.

Leo Babauta calls this concept “the universe of a single task” (albeit in a rather different context!). He writes that you should “make each task its own universe, its own specialness.” This is an approach I try (and often fail) to bring to my relationships, my creative work, my very existence as a human. But for some reason, when it comes to blowjobs, I succeed. A beej can be my entire world for its whole duration and I don’t feel deprived or distracted. It is my everything.

This is highly affirming at times when I feel like a fuck-up in every other arena. Maybe I’ve missed a work deadline, or I’m fighting with someone I love, or my financial situation is unsteady. It doesn’t matter. Faced with a dick to suck, all that other shit fades away. A blowjob is a task with crystal-clear parameters and expectations, unlike many other challenges we face. I know exactly what I am supposed to do and how to do it, especially if the person I’m blowing is someone whose body and preferences I’m familiar with. I’m not an Olympic-level cocksucker, but I feel fairly confident in my skillz. Giving a good beej makes me feel empowered and successful even when I don’t feel that way about my life as a whole.

Of course, I’m a kinkster, so my brain is forever swimming in kink, and that probably informs the psychologically restorative way I experience BJs. Being a good girl – in this case, by giving good head – is a way for me to feel valuable when I otherwise don’t. My boss, editor, dad, and best friend could all be fuming at me, but if I’m pleasing a dom partner, that’s all I’m thinking about at that moment – and I’ll feel great about it. Maybe that’s fucked up, but there’ve been times when the satisfaction I glean from pleasing a partner was the boost I needed after depression dug me into a hole in every area of life.

Giving head is also an activity that gives you moment-to-moment feedback on how you’re doing. That is precious and rare in this world of anxiety-provoking uncertainty. I can try out a new trick during a BJ and know in under five seconds whether it’s a flop or a worthy addition to my repertoire. Nifty!

This all makes it sound like I approach fellatio as a zen monk would approach his meditation cushion, and that’s not quite right. True, sometimes kneeling at a partner’s feet to take his dick into my mouth feels akin to prostrating myself before a statue of a revered deity. But there is, of course, a sexy element too. Beyond just having a straight-up BJ kink – which I absolutely do – I also think the psychological calm I get from sucking cock takes the pressure off my sexual brakes. The less anxiety and overwhelm I’m feeling, the easier it is for sexual arousal to flow into my body and mind. Abraham-Hicks says your mood is like a cork held underwater, and it rises fast as soon as you let go of it; I find it’s the same with my arousal. The less I cling to my anxiety, the quicker I turn into a hot puddle of arousal in the presence of things that turn me on. Hence, a meditative blowjob – or other anxiety-quashers like marijuana, booze, and sleepiness – makes me hornier by sheer virtue of eliminating my stressors.

Naturally, this process relies on having a partner I trust – someone who I feel safe relaxing around. But I’ve found this penile peace with more casual partners, too. It’s a nice moment for both of us – him luxuriating in pleasure, and me zoning out on his dick. It’s why, for example, my Tinder hookup in Minneapolis asked me mid-beej if I wanted to “do anything else with that cock,” and I looked up at him with confusion in my eyes and said, “…No.” It had been a couple months since I’d had a hard dick in my mouth, and dammit, I needed my fix.

 

Do you find certain sexual acts meditative or calming? Got any stories or suggestions?

23 Things I Learned About Sex & Relationships At Age 23

Kate Sloan

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Today’s my 24th birthday! It’s a good day to reflect on the past year, because I think 23 was my most transformative and educational year yet. I banged and dated a bunch of different people, and it was essentially a crash course in emotional maturity and sexual confidence. Here are 23 of the most valuable lessons I learned about sex and relationships over the past year!

  1. I have a DD/lg kink. I first noticed these feelings back in late 2014 when a hot lawyer inspired some surprising fantasies in my bad little brain. In November I started seeing a dude who was muuuch kinkier and more kink-experienced than me, and when I disclosed to him that I had burgeoning DD/lg fantasies, he knew exactly what to do with that information. I still vividly remember the time I sassily asked him why I should follow his instruction to jerk off for him and he said, “Because you’re a good little girl.” It was the first time anyone had ever said anything like that to me before, and my vagina did cartwheels.
  2. Terrible mental health days are terrible kink days. At least, for me. If I’m already feeling extremely shaky, anxious, or depressed, kink tends to just worsen my mood. I learned my lesson from the time in January when an intense spanking on an already-anxious day made me burst into tears and sob deeply for several minutes while my confused partner tried to comfort me.
  3. …but, kink can help with mental health. Paradoxical, yes – but for me, there’s a fine and important line between “too distraught to submit” and “just distraught enough that submitting will actually help.” Pain, punishment and praise can help shake me out of a poor mental health day, used judiciously with a trusted partner.
  4. I can have casual sex… with people I don’t really like. Sex tends to open up my emotional floodgates, intensifying any burgeoning crush-y feels that already exist there. I was able to have some casual, feels-free fuckbuddies this year, but only because we didn’t click romantically. This is useful info for me to know going forward, though it does mean I’m incapable of being “chill” with anyone I even remotely like.
  5. I like pain (in some places). I’ve dabbled in spanking over the years, but it wasn’t until age 23 that I really grasped how much pleasure I can get from pain. Getting my tits and/or ass slapped has become one of my favorite foreplay activities. I even like getting my hair pulled, a proclivity that used to mystify me.
  6. I love giving blowjobs. HOO BOY, this was a big theme of my year. My previous blowjob experience encompassed only one partner, and while he was lovely, his dick and my mouth just didn’t have chemistry. In broadening my BJ horizons, I’ve discovered how much I can crave having a cock in my mouth when the right one comes along. (I’ve gotten pretty damn good at it, too.)
  7. I’m more of a size queen than I thought. Remember when I first started this blog and dildos over 1.5″ in diameter were a stretch for me? That is certainly not the case anymore… Just ask my Eleven, Double Trouble, and Seaside Steamroller!
  8. I need to trust my intuition more. My anxiety is excellent at talking me out of what I know, deep down, to be true. When I let myself listen to my hunches, I can usually tell when someone is flirting with me, likes me, or wants to get in my pants – and it happens more often than my anxiety wants me to realize.
  9. Aftercare is important. Coming from a pretty vanilla history, I never thought much about the importance of aftercare until I really needed it. Fortunately, all my kinky partners this past year (and even the vanilla ones) gave me the post-sex cuddles and reassurances I needed.
  10. Most men like thigh-high socks. They just do.
  11. Sex is grown-up playtime. My favorite sex is the goofy, unstructured kind. I love trying stuff, experimenting, playing around. I’m happiest in sexual partnerships with people who are similarly fun-oriented, rather than goal-oriented.
  12. I like being pinned down. Have you ever had a moment where, suddenly and all at once, you noticed a kink of yours that you never knew you had? That was me last summer when a partner put a firm hand on my upper chest and held me down while finger-fucking me. I went from “huh, that feels pretty good” to “holy shit, I am coming right now!” in about three seconds flat. I’ve been pinned down during sex a bunch of times since then, with similar outcomes. Now that I know I like this, I want to get better at asking for it!
  13. Threesomes are fun, but not really my jam. I’ve gained a reputation among my friends for constantly having threesomes. I’ve only had two, but I guess that’s still more than the average person? In any case, while I enjoyed myself both times, I still prefer the intense, focused connection of a standard one-on-one encounter. (Talk to me in a month, though… I have a rather epic threesome coming up on my calendar that might get me more on board with group sex.)
  14. When you’re sad, sometimes you just gotta feel your feelings. A couple of painful rejections left me in emotional shambles at times this year. I spent a lot of time crying on friends’ shoulders and saying things like, “I’m just so sad! I don’t know what to do!” My friends are fantastic and a lot of the advice they gave me boiled down to this: it’s okay to be sad when sad shit happens. Don’t try to run away from those feelings or distract yourself from them; just live in them for a while. It’s so much easier to move on when you’ve processed your feelings properly.
  15. You can like someone very, very much and they can still be wrong for you. You are not obligated to try to “make things work” with someone who’s a deeply bad match for you. Even if they’re a good person. Even if you adore them in many ways. Even if they don’t understand your reasoning.
  16. Platonic kink is a thing. I learned so much about kink this year, including that it can exist independently of sex. I have friends who fuel me by calling me a “good girl” when I finish my work; I have friends who phone me and speak to me in commanding, daddy-dom tones to calm me down when I’m anxious; I have friends whose kinks I know intimately and (consensually) use to guide them into healthier and happier behaviors. Kink is more than a sexual interest; it can be a psychological tool, a powerful motivator, a framework in which to understand yourself and your place in the world.
  17. Twitter is a great place to meet sexual partners. Half of the new people I banged at age 23 are folks I met on Twitter. Obviously it’s a problematic space and women receive a lot of harassment and abuse through tweets and DMs, but I’ve also built an audience there of clever, compassionate sex nerds, some of whom are pretty great sex partners.
  18. When you like someone, it’s okay to act like you like them. My anxiety makes this tricky, because even the smallest braveries feel like ballsy overtures to me. But I’m working on it. More people should know that they’re cute, and I should tell ’em.
  19. Don’t stake your mood on other people’s behavior. Most of my miserable-est days this year were the result of me believing, “If [person] would just [action], I could be happy right now.” I learned that I need to either change my expectations, or try to make things happen myself; waiting for someone else to read your mind and do what you want them to do is a fool’s errand.
  20. Anxiety-friends are invaluable flirting sherpas. This is no joke: I owe most of my romantic and sexual success this past year to Bex. Any time I didn’t know how to interpret a romantic interest’s flirty behavior, or couldn’t parse a cryptic text, or needed a push in a flirty direction, I went to them for advice. I have other “anxiety-friends,” too, who are willing and able to answer texts like, “[Person] said [thing], are they into me?!” and “What do I wear to a date-that-might-not-be-a-date?!”
  21. I like anal sex. I wasn’t sure how I’d feel about it, because my past adventures with butt plugs and anal beads had been inconsistently pleasurable. But, holy fuck, I was into it and I want to do it more.
  22. I don’t need (or want) monogamy, but I do need to feel special. I don’t mind having partners who have other partners. (Yay, #PolyLyfe and compersion!) But I do need my partners to make me feel valued, seen, and focused on when we spend time together. I received a few propositions this year from folks who date/bang a lot of people, and I learned that that only ever feels okay to me if they clearly like me for me – not because they like dating/banging whoever. I’m definitely not anti-promiscuity and there’s nothing wrong with being slutty! I just need a side order of emotional connection with my sluttiness.
  23. Life is too short for bad sex. I believe there are two main ways to be bad at sex: you can be bad at technical skills (“He kisses like a snake!” “Her fingering rhythm is inconsistent!”), and you can have a bad attitude about sex (“He refused to use toys on me!” “She got all sulky when she couldn’t get me off!”). I’d rather be with an enthusiastic newbie than a mopey pro any day. If you’re fun to bone, I’ll probably gladly teach you how I like to be fucked so you’ll know for next time – but if you’re a sad and draining lay, there probably won’t be a “next time.” I’ve raised my standards enough to say no to bad sex – because, frankly, I’d rather just masturbate.

 

Here’s to another sexy, educational year!

My Clit is a Diva and I’m Sorry-Not-Sorry

Kate Sloan

“Higher.”

He moves his fingers a centimeter higher on my clit, and keeps rubbing.

“No, higher,” I say again.

He looks at me quizzically. I grab his hand and move it where I want it. Ah, yes. That’s better.

A couple minutes later, his hand slides down to my opening and he pushes two thick fingers inside me, finding my G-spot and then my A-spot with ease. And that’s nice. Fuck, he’s good at that.

When he comes back up to my clit, though, he forgets everything he’s learned. Goes straight for the exposed bud in the middle of my folds. I wince.

“Higher.”

Without even looking at his face, I can feel his confusion in the slow way he drags his fingers upward an inch or two. Maybe this is the time when he’ll remember, when he’ll get it. I love that moment.

Later, after drinks and dinner and sly sex chats in a noisy pub, we walk back to his place together. Boots crunching in the snow, arms bumping against each other casually as we walk. “I think I’m starting to figure you out,” he says. “It seems like you like the shaft of your clit to be stimulated, not the clit itself.”

I brighten. “Yeah! Exactly.” And I want to hold his hand, but both of our hands are stuffed in our coat pockets to hide from the cold.

“In my experience, you’re definitely an outlier,” he tells me, “but it’s nothing I can’t work with.”

Later that night, he gets it just right, and I don’t even have to move his hand.

This is a process I’m used to. Because my clit, like me, is a finicky princess. It likes to be stimulated downward through the clitoral hood, or sideways through the inner lips. When I use vibrators, I usually hold them over my clit hood, or on one of my outer labia. My pussy can handle a lot, but one thing it cannot handle – one thing it actually hates – is direct clitoral stimulation.

I was inspired to write about this after reading JoEllen’s post about the Womanizer, a clitoral stimulator I tried and admittedly liked. In her review, she writes about her hatred for direct clitoral stimulation, and her distaste for the common sexual discourse which says, “Touch a woman’s clit and she’ll definitely come!” It got me thinking about how sexual outliers are often shamed, even within the sex-positive communities which claim to unjudgmentally accept all preferences and tastes.

As a sex toy reviewer and a routine user of vibrators, I’m often accused of having “desensitized” myself. When I explain to laypeople or even “sexperts” that I have trouble coming from the touch of a partner’s tongue, fingers, or dick, sometimes I’m told I should lay off the vibes for a bit and see if my sensitivity returns.

Granted, I am more sensitive when I take a vibrator sabbatical. And I make a habit of avoiding vibration and orgasms for 2-3 days before a scheduled encounter, so I’ll feel everything my partner does to me and reach orgasm more easily. But it’s not vibrators that made me this way. I think my body’s just naturally a tougher nut to crack.

You know how I know that? It’s because my orgasm difficulties aren’t related to a lack of sensitivity, they’re often caused by an excess of sensitivity. When a partner’s tongue grazes my exposed clit, it hurts and I get wrenched out of the moment. When a vibrator slides too low on my clit hood and makes direct contact with that bundle of nerves, I feel overloaded and have to crank down the power. When someone’s fingering me and goes straight for my clit, instead of spending time turning me on by touching the rest of my vulva first, I get overstimulated and that makes me feel numb. It’s like my clit panics and hides under a blanket, if by “hides under a blanket” I mean “gets desensitized by the onslaught of sensation.”

It’s been nearly two years since I’ve had an orgasm from oral sex. This is big news, considering how obsessed with cunnilingus I used to be. But, yes: the last person to get me off orally was my ex, with whom I ended things in late 2014. I’ve slept with several more people since then but none of them have made me come with their mouth.

I think that’s partly owing to how my body has changed: I tend to need more intense stimulation now than I used to, for a longer period of time, to reach orgasm – and tongues get tired sometimes. I also rarely come without some form of penetration these days, which – let’s be real – is a difficult thing to incorporate into cunnilingus and often isn’t done very well when people try, at least in my experience.

But the other reason, and maybe the main reason, I haven’t come from oral in ages is that I haven’t had a partner stick around long enough to learn how I like it. Most of my sexual flings in the past two years have been short-term or one-offs, always with people who had other partners at the time and therefore couldn’t be expected to keep my Very Specific preferences programmed into their muscle memory. My ex had time to learn my rhythms, signals, noises, and most importantly, how to lick my clit without causing me actual pain.

My clit needs to be romanced, seduced, won over. It needs you to play hard-to-get, while knowing the whole time that you’ll eventually give it what it wants. I want you to ignore my clit for a long, long time, while you kiss my mouth and neck, suck and lick my nipples, smack my ass and thighs, bite my mons and fleshy hips. I want you to shower my labia and vaginal opening with attention, because most people don’t. I want to be at the point of begging you and punching the bed and moaning in despair for at least five whole minutes before you even hint at going near my clit.

The reason for this rigamarole, you see, is that it amps up my sensitivity while also increasing what I can handle. If I’m halfway to coming by the time you make clit contact, I will almost certainly come at some point. What guarantees me not coming is if you jump straight to my clit and short-circuit the whole system. Be careful. Approach with caution. Don’t cannonball into the pool; just trail a few fingers in the shallow end and see what happens.

My ex understood this. He also understood how to use his lips and tongue around the periphery of my clit instead of stroking it directly. He knew when to wander away from my clit for a while, to lick my opening or nibble my labia, so the main attraction could take a breather and gain back that original fervor to be touched. And when the time came to buckle down and do identical tongue-circles for a couple minutes to actually get me off, he knew how to do that too.

Once, he asked me, “Is there ever a situation in which you want me to lick your clit directly?” My first instinct was to shout “NO! NEVER!” but when I thought about it some more, I reconsidered. “You can try it, as long as you’re very gentle,” I told him. After that, he would occasionally – as sparse punctuation in a widely varied cunnilingus session – pull my clit hood back and press the lightest, softest, slowest of licks to my exposed clit. It felt almost like an act of kink: I was giving him the power to do something potentially painful, and he was doing it without hurting me. I trusted him, handed over a particular power I rarely trust partners with, and he used that power for good. It was kind of magical.

Going down on someone with a picky clit is a complicated business, man. It requires showmanship paired with tenacity. Decorum married to determination. A sense of flair, and some elbow grease. But yeesh, those orgasms were worth it.

In fact, since my ex, I haven’t had any orgasms with partners that didn’t involve me assisting in some way: holding a vibe to my clit, or rubbing it with my fingers. Because, as I said, none of them were in my life long enough to learn what I like, remember it, and get good at it.

But I live in hope that I will have another partner who’ll put in the time, effort, and brainpower to figure me out. Who’ll get to know my clit’s weird ways, the same way he gets to know mine. Who’ll learn me like a video game, patiently, and never get annoyed that there’s no cheat codes.

Because, dammit, my clit’s an outlier, but it still deserves pleasure.

A Dick Worth Sucking

Kate Sloan

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A friend once told me that in her ideal life, she would give a blowjob every day. Her partner would get home from work in the evening, he’d drop his pants, she’d suck him off, and then they’d go about the rest of their night. She considers giving head as important to her emotional well-being as the other self-care routines in her life, like skincare, yoga, and long leisurely baths.

I think about this often, and my opinion on it seems to change from week to week. There are times when the thought of a daily blowjob is so unappealing, I want to keep my mouth closed for the rest of my goddamn life. And then there are times – like now, for instance – when even just the mental image of a cock resting on my tongue is enough to get me going. And I think: a blowjob a day? Every day? For the foreseeable future? Yes please.

But why does my attitude about BJs flip-flop so drastically? I think it comes down to the dicks that I have at my disposal at any given time. Because if there’s not a dick worth sucking in my life, I barely think about blowjobs. But as soon as I find a cock that makes my mouth happy, it’s all I can think about. I’ve got BJs on the brain. Like, nonstop.

My idea of the Perfect Blowjob Recipient is multi-faceted. Partly, it’s about technical specs. Is the dick shaped and sized in such a way that it won’t make my jaw ache after thirty seconds or curve up into my uvula? Is it clean, well-groomed, and pleasant to the touch? Does it harden in my mouth satisfyingly when I’m doing a good job?

But what makes or breaks any kind of sex for me, what takes a cock from “aesthetically pleasing” to “incredibly fun to suck,” is really the personality of my partner. More than the physical sensations of sex, what makes an encounter memorable for me is how much fun it was, how excited I felt, how my emotions and psychology got looped into the experience. And with that in mind, I have some tips for folks who want to be a good blowjob recipient. Or at least, my ideal blowjob recipient.

Firstly and most importantly: make me feel comfortable. Set me at ease. Prioritize my safety and emotional well-being above your pleasure at all times. Maybe that sounds like a lot of work, but it’s really just a chain reaction you can set up once and it’ll domino the rest of the way with only occasional nudges from you. Say things like: “You look gorgeous doing that.” “Is this okay?” “Your mouth feels so good.” “Let me know if you get tired and want to stop; that’s totally fine.”

My anxieties and insecurities are what kept me from loving blowjobs for a damn long time. I was so distracted by thoughts of my own inadequacy that I missed out on the actual sensual pleasure of having a cock in my mouth. If you front-load enough of these assurances into our first few BJs together, you’ll imbue me with the confidence and calm to keep giving you stellar head without getting nervous about it. It doesn’t take a lot of effort and the payoff is enormous.

Secondly: fucking appreciate what I am doing. And I don’t just mean privately feel grateful for my blowjobs inside your own head. I mean express your appreciation. Tell me when something feels good. Bring it up not only during, but after the fact: “That blowjob last night was amazing.” “That thing you did with your tongue made me come so hard.” “I loved the way you touched my balls.”

Make some noise. In talking to other women about sex with men, one of our main complaints – and that’s not an exaggeration – is that men don’t make enough noise. Performing oral sex on a silent partner is unsatisfying in the same way that it’s unsatisfying to flip a light switch when the bulb has burned out. In past relationships, when my blowjob enthusiasm has dwindled, it’s been because I got tired of pouring my heart and soul into a dick that might as well have been a banana for all the response I was getting. It can take some time to train yourself into making noise in bed if it doesn’t come naturally to you, but it’s worth doing: your sounds guide me, fuel me and reward me. And that means you get more BJs.

Thirdly: cultivate the skill of giving direction that doesn’t feel like a rejection. I love the process of teaching someone how to get me off, and I love being on the receiving end of those lessons as well. But this requires a careful balance of correction and compassion, and it’s easy to fuck that up.

Never tell me that I’m doing something wrong; show me how to do it right, instead. Never imply that the way you like your dick sucked is the only way, the best way, or the way I should have learned long ago; acknowledge that it’s just the way you like it, so it might take me a while to learn. Encourage me when I do what you want, with pleasure noises, words of affirmation, and physical touch. God, if I could learn everything in my life by having a hot person stroke my hair and call me “good girl” when I got it right, I’d be way better at volleyball and piano and CSS than I am.

Our culture teaches men that their sexual pleasure is a foregone conclusion, that they should be reserved and stoic in bed, and that all women should love giving blowjobs for their own sake. Not all of these beliefs are necessarily evil, but they do add up to a whole lot of men who don’t adequately appreciate, thank and reward the people who blow them. And I know my experience isn’t universal by any means, but when I feel unappreciated and unacknowledged, I feel unsexy. It’s your enthusiasm that will get you laid, and laid well.

This month brought the first time in my life when I actively craved giving a BJ the same way I crave having sexual things done to me. My lips and tongue and throat ached for it, the way my clit can ache for pressure or my cunt can ache for fullness. And it was because the particular person I was fantasizing about is indeed my Ideal Blowjob Recipient. His dick is on-point, sure, but it’s his behavior, his attitude, his whole approach to receiving head that makes me want to drop to my knees in front of him literally whenever he asks.

My mouth-lust for him got so bad that I did something I could have never predicted I’d do. “Hey, I’m sorry if this comes across as totally crass or un-‘chill,'” I wrote to him, “but I can’t stop thinking about going down on you and I’d really like to do it again soon.”

And, what do you know? He took me up on my offer. See? I told you enthusiasm will get you laid.