How I Track & Manage My Chronic Illness Symptoms in a Bullet Journal

Kate Sloan

I’ve long admired bullet journaling as a practice – like the art journaling and planner collage I did as a teen, it’s a way of making the everyday into something visually appealing and memorable. Life itself feels more beautiful, I find, when you document it in a beautiful way.

I was recently hit by a deep and recurring urge to return to this style of creative documentation. But, in particular, I’d been wanting to find a more concrete way of tracking my chronic illness symptoms. In seeking a diagnosis (which I’d been doing for over six years with no luck thus far), it can be helpful to have cold hard numbers to show to a doctor, so they can get a sense of how serious and ongoing the problem is. I’d experimented with symptom-tracking apps, spreadsheets, and digital notes, but had found it difficult to use these consistently enough to gather any real data. It was time for a physical solution.

While I no longer do much writing with an actual pen on actual paper, I’ve known for a long time that it can help unlock things in the mind that would’ve remained unexplored if you’d stayed in a digital medium. There are numerous scientists who have opinions on why this is; there are also cultural commentators, like Tom Hanks and John Mayer in the documentary California Typewriter, with their own views on why physically scrawling or hammering out a piece of writing can feel better and produce better results than digital alternatives. I doubt this is true for everyone, but it’s certainly true for me. All attempts I’ve made to journal on a computer, for example, left me feeling unable to dive as deep emotionally as I tend to when I let my thoughts meander through a notebook on my lap.

So I figured a similar principle might apply for tracking my various symptoms, remedies, ups and downs. I bought a bright yellow Leuchtturm1917 dotted journal (widely considered the best choice for bullet journaling aficionados) and some colored pens and highlighters, and got to work building my setup.

I should say upfront, what I’m doing is a very loose interpretation of what “bullet journaling” actually means. I’ve also pulled a number of ideas from various sources I found through Pinterest. Let’s talk about 3 of the main tools I use in my journal to help track and assuage my chronic illness symptoms:

Habit tracker on weekly spread

Lots of people do a “weekly spread” in their bullet journals, where they lay out the days of the week like a traditional planner, and write their commitments and appointments on the corresponding days. I got inspired by some of the journalers I saw online who were doing habit trackers as part of their weekly spread, so I decided to start doing my own.

Basically this is just a table with a list of habits I want to instill on the Y axis and the days of the week on the X axis. When I successfully do one of the things on my habit list, I fill in the square for that habit on that day. Pretty simple.

However, I continue to find it astonishing how motivating this practice is for me. The satisfaction of coloring in a part of the table and seeing the page get gradually more colorful… The ability to see, at a glance, whether I was good or less good at self-care during a particular week… The ability to triumphantly text my partner a photo of the days when I complete all of my habits… It’s all lovely.

I love that I can change up which habits I’m prioritizing from week to week; for example, if I’m having an active psoriasis flare-up, I’ll add “apply psoriasis lotion” to my habits list. The habits on my current page are: sunshine (get outside/feel the sun on my face), exercise, supplements, reading (at least 20+ minutes; must be a book, not an article or blog post), brush & floss, and intentional joy. That last one is the vaguest, but basically I’d define it as taking some time out of my day to deliberately experience something that makes me happy, whether that’s laughing my ass off at a Netflix comedy special, having a decadent jerk-off session in the afternoon, or cuddling my roommate’s cats while telling them how pretty they are.

I’ve genuinely gotten much better about sticking to these habits since I started tracking them in a journal. Would recommend!

Monthly health notes page

At the start of every month, I divide one page into 3 columns – pain, brain, and miscellaneous – and number the days of the month on the left side of the page. Then I make notes throughout the month about which symptoms I noticed and when.

This is fantastically useful for so many reasons. It gives me a record that a doctor might find useful. It gives me a clearer picture of how my menstrual cycle affects my symptoms. I can cross-reference this page with my habit tracker to see how various habits affect the way I feel.

In fact, I recently did exactly that, when I started having scary heart palpitations a couple days a week or so. I looked at my health notes and my habit tracker and discovered that the days my heart went haywire were all days that I had ingested both caffeine and a red panax ginseng supplement I’d recently started on. I did some research and found out that ginseng is known to increase heart rate for some folks – and of course, so is caffeine. I also found out through research that the antidepressant I’m on, Wellbutrin, increases some users’ sensitivity to caffeine. With all of this information available to me, I was able to make the decision to stop taking the ginseng supplement and limit my caffeine intake going forward. My heart palpitations haven’t returned since I did that.

I also like that the health tracker page gives me a place to brain-dump any random symptoms I might be experiencing that my hypochondriac brain thinks might be perilous. Looking back on this page helps me see that most of the stuff I was worried about turned out to be nothing (or, sometimes, turned out to be anxiety-related).

Self-care bingo

I read about this in a bullet journaling blog post and loved the idea immediately. Self-care is definitely an area where I need as much help as I can get, being a depressed and anxious workaholic prone to destructively high expectations for myself. I liked the thought of “gamifying” my self-care to make me more motivated to actually do it.

At the start of each month, I draw out a 6×6 bingo board and fill in each square with something specific that I want to do to reduce my stress level and increase my joy quotient. Some of the things repeat from month to month because they work consistently for me – like “take a bath” or “no social media for 3 hours” – while some get changed up.

This spread gives me permission to be nice to myself; self-care feels “productive” because I know I get to fill in a little square on my bingo board after I do it. As a person who has often beat herself up for reading or playing video games because those activities “weren’t productive,” I know that I struggle to do things just for the pleasure of doing them; there’s almost always some guilt and/or shame attached to that for me. I’m working on it in therapy (among other things), but until I figure out a better way to deal with that problem, this self-care bingo thing seems like a great stopgap.

 

Have you ever used a bullet journal to track or mitigate your chronic illness symptoms?

5 Reasons No One Should Spank Their Kids

Kate Sloan

Content note: This piece touches on nonconsensual spanking, other forms of physical abuse, sexual assault, trauma, suicidality, addiction, and human rights violations.

 

1. It doesn’t work. According to one expert, Elizabeth Gershoff, who reviewed 61 long-term studies and 8 international investigations, “Zero studies found that physical punishment predicted better child behavior over time.” Some studies found physical punishment increases children’s aggression and other behavioral problems. (I mean, yeah, when the person you’re supposed to be able to love and trust implicitly starts beating you on a sexual body part, you’re gonna have some feelings about that, and those feelings might manifest as aggression.) Gershoff’s final word on the matter: “Physical punishment is harmful to children’s development and well-being. There is no evidence that it has any positive outcomes whatsoever.” Hear hear.

2. It’s traumatic. Studies have found that, in terms of inciting behavioral problems in children the likes of which are usually due to trauma, spanking has “statistically indistinguishable effects” from other forms of childhood trauma, like emotional abuse, neglect, and the death of one’s parent. People who were spanked as children are likelier to die at a younger age from cancer, heart disease, and respiratory problems. They are also likelier to develop aggressive and antisocial behaviors, anxiety, depression, and autoimmune disorders – all problems known to arise from trauma more generally. Spanking is also linked with an increase in heavy drinking, street drug usage, and suicidality.

3. It’s sexual. As spanking fetishist and journalist Jillian Keenan argues in her brilliant Slate piece on the matter, the butt is an inherently sexual zone. The area shares an artery with the genital region, so when you spank someone, bloodflow to their genitals increases. This is part of why spanking arouses so many kinksters – and why it’s a vastly inappropriate thing to do to one’s child. A scientist who’s studied spanking’s neurological effects on children says it produces “the same reactions in the brain” as sexual abuse. Just because a body part doesn’t seem sexual to you doesn’t mean it’s not sexual, culturally and biologically.

4. It teaches a terrible lesson. I don’t know about you, but if I ever have kids, I hope to impart good lessons to them about conflict resolution and emotional self-regulation. It’s horrendous to teach your children – even just indirectly, through behavior you’re modelling for them – that hitting someone is an acceptable way to deal with feeling angry or overwhelmed. You’re actively making the world worse if you do this.

5. It’s a human rights violation. Children should have just as much of a right to bodily autonomy and protection from harm as anyone else in society, but as things stand, they don’t. It’s still perfectly legal to spank your kid in many places, even though – as described above – there are mountains of evidence showing that spanking is ineffective and harmful. This one form of physical abuse has been privileged as an “acceptable” form, and it’s not. It’s abuse. It’s a violation. It’s not okay. Stop doing it. If you find yourself wanting to hit your child for any reason, seek professional help immediately and stay away from your child(ren) until you’re able to calm down.

In Defense of Fantasizing During Sex

Kate Sloan

I remember the first time anyone said those magic words to me during sex. “Think about whatever you want.”

He was a vanilla boy with a nonetheless toppy sensibility. His craving to evoke moans and expletives out of me was a recurrent theme in our fucks. He was happy to get into any position that made me yell into a pillow, happy to spank me if I explained how and why, happy to use my favorite dildos and vibrators and butt plugs with me whenever I asked. So it makes perfect sense that he wanted to use another crucial “sex toy” of mine that we had at our disposal: my mind.

See, fantasies are powerful when you’re trying to feel good and get off. If you’ve ever fantasized while masturbating, it’s likely you know that they can spike arousal, alter headspace, and make already-pleasurable sensations feel somehow even more pleasurable. Why wouldn’t that be true during sex with a partner as well?

The common argument against fantasizing during sex goes as follows: You should focus on the person in front of you (or, uh, behind you) while you’re having sex. You should be mentally present, and anything less is unfair to your partner. You especially shouldn’t fantasize about sex with someone other than the person you’re currently having sex with. How rude!

There’s a lot about this argument that I actually agree with. I agree that being mentally present during sex can create deeper intimacy and connection, and that not being mentally present during sex can be a sign that something is going awry with the sex or the relationship. I also agree that for some of us, it can be hurtful to hear that your partner was fantasizing about someone else while you were fucking them.

However, I don’t think any of that is sufficient grounds to completely dismiss the idea of fantasizing during sex as a categorically bad and rude thing to do.

In the years since that toppy friend-with-benefits first encouraged me to let my mind wander while he fingerbanged me, I’ve fantasized during sex countless times. I’ve fantasized about the partner I’m currently fucking: the face and sounds they make when I go down on them, how good it feels when they do a sex act other than the one we’re currently doing, different situations I’d like to fuck them in. I’ve pictured alternate-universe versions of the person banging me – like a dommier version of my vanilla fuckbuddy, or my spouse if they were a withholding English professor. I’ve placed myself in wild situations with faceless strangers – like in a brightly-lit film studio with a porn cam trained on me, or being gangbanged by the cast of a musical after the final curtain call. And yes, sometimes I have thought about actual, real people other than the one in my bed at the time.

This is a very complex subject, morally speaking. (That time I almost got a philosophy minor is definitely gonna inform what I’m about to write.) Some people would say you should always tell your partner if you think about someone else during sex, and that doing anything else would be dishonesty tantamount to cheating. I disagree; I think Orwellian “thought police”-type notions are terrifying, and I don’t think any thought can be inherently immoral if it’s never acted on in the real world. I feel strongly that you’re allowed to sexually fantasize about whatever the hell you want – these thoughts only become problematic when and if they start to influence your IRL behavior. Which, to be clear, can happen. I would imagine, for example, that watching a ton of racist porn would tend to deepen any existing racist biases a person had. There’s also lots of debate over whether watching child pornography makes pedophiles less or more likely to assault a child, but I would guess the answer is sometimes “more.” (These are extreme examples with too much complexity to really get into here, unfortunately, but you get the idea.)

My position is that you don’t have to tell your partner if/when you fantasize about other people, but you might want to, for a few reasons. First of all, a secret becomes less of a threat when it’s not a secret anymore. My partner knows I have a thing for butch women in leather jackets, and pretty much always have, so if I fantasize about one, it doesn’t mean I’m gonna leave them for one – but if I had that fantasy and kept it a secret, that would seem immediately more suspect and hurtful. Secondly, communicating your fantasies about third parties can actually, ironically enough, promote the very intimacy and connection that their critics say they threaten. If my partner is fucking me and knows I’m thinking about the barista around the block, then they know where I am mentally and can join me there if they want, by talking dirty about the fantasy and even including themselves in it. Thirdly, the more you let your partner into your inner erotic world, the better they can understand it. If I was in a hyper-vanilla relationship but kept fantasizing about dominant folks, telling my partner could prompt a conversation about kinky stuff we could explore together. How can they know about your fantasy if you don’t tell them?

All of this presupposes that you have a partner who is not so far gone into Toxic Monogamy Land as to think that fantasizing can be cheating. If your partner does think that way, well… that’s a tough spot. When two people want to be monogamous to each other but their definitions of monogamy differ, either they have to compromise or they have to break up. It’s a difficult choice, and I wish you strength in making it. My view is that pretty much everyone fantasizes about people other than their partner from time to time, and sometimes that means they’d rather be with that person than their partner, but most of the time it doesn’t. It’s just a normal human thing that happens. Personally, I would rather use those fantasies as a catalyst for greater pleasure and intimacy than see them as an obstacle to those goals.

My spouse is a dirty-talk master, brilliant at weaving filthy narratives that keep me present and focused. But they also know when to use my own brain the way they’d use a vibrator. “Let your mind go wherever it wants to,” they’ll say as they work their way down my body for a luxuriant oral sex session – and I lie back and breathe a sigh of sweet relief, knowing the thoughts in my head can be all pleasure, no guilt.

 

This post was sponsored. As always, all writing and opinions are my own.

Review: Wowyes OYE-030 A7 Sucking Vibrator

Kate Sloan

I was skeptical about this vibrator. And then it made me come in under 5 minutes, and I was sold.

The Wowyes OYE-030 A7 Sucking Vibrator has, without question, one of the worst names I’ve ever seen in this industry, but despite that, it’s got a lot going for it. It’s a We-Vibe-esque toy that can vibrate against your G-spot while simultaneously applying pressure-wave stimulation (à la Womanizer and Satisfyer) to your clit. It’s covered in silky-smooth silicone and has a little pink flower on its one button – cute.

Despite the similarities between this toy and the We-Vibe Sync, it lacks one of the Sync’s much-discussed features: a bendable “hinge” between the two sections of the toy so you can adjust it to find your preferred spacing and pressure. Ultimately, this is probably for the best – a hinge likely would’ve increased the toy’s price point as it did for the Sync, and when I worked at sex shops, customers accidentally broke our Sync floor models at the hinge so many times that we had to stop leaving floor models out. However, that lack of adjustability means that this Wowyes toy will only work for people who have a clit that’s about 2 inches (or less) from their vaginal opening. Any more than that, and you run the risk of over-bending the toy and/or finding that its nozzle can’t reach your clit.

When testing this toy, I scribbled a frustrated note about the lack of a hinge, but when the toy gave me an orgasm 5 minutes later (I’ll get to that in a second), I started to understand how this was actually a good design choice. Although I love the bendable Sync, it tends to slip out of position periodically as its hinge widens from the pressure of masturbation/sex; the Wowyes toy, on the other hand, stays tightly pressed against my G-spot and clit throughout the session and doesn’t tend to slip out (in part due to the stimulating ridges on the G-spot end). This ultimately results in more satisfying orgasms because the toy maintains pressure on my spots even while my pelvic muscles are rhythmically clenching.

So, how does this toy actually feel? The pressure waves feel like they’re blended with some buzzyish vibration that makes them intense but also slightly numbing after more than a few minutes. The internal vibrations are, similarly, on the buzzier side of the spectrum, but they have a bunch of excellent patterns that somehow negate that for me. The first pattern – rhythmic pulsing at a medium speed – is the one I stay on 90% of the time, because it pairs brilliantly with steady clit stimulation, lending a sense of motion and rhythm to the overall sensation.

The “mouth” is one of the smallest ones I’ve seen, so unfortunately it’s probably not a good pick for people with medium-to-large-sized clits. Normally I don’t like super pinpointed pressure waves, but this toy has a protruding silicone “lip” that runs the perimeter of its mouth and stimulates the area around my clit, as well – the clitoral hood and some of the labia, depending on how my legs are positioned – so it still feels pleasurable to me even though it’s laser-focused on the tip of my clit. Squeezing my thighs together takes the intensity of the buzziness down somewhat, making the pressure waves feel rumblier and like they’re penetrating deeper into my internal clit.

Both functions of this toy have multiple settings and patterns, but to be real with you, in my testing I have rarely ventured past the first or second pressure-wave speed and that first pulsing vibration pattern. They just work too well in tandem for me to want to explore much else beyond what’s necessary to write this review.

Used alongside a fabulous blowjob porn clip, this toy gave me a fast, intense orgasm with its steady clit-sucking portion and those rhythmic vibrations pulsing away against my G-spot. I’ve often found that pressure-wave toys tend to make me come quickly and unsatisfyingly, but something about this toy makes orgasms unexpectedly intense for me. I think it’s the firm pressure against my G-spot (owing to that lack of bendiness in the neck of the toy) and the “lips” surrounding my clit while I come. It’s definitely not as profound and world-altering a sensation as can be provided by something much rumblier, like the Eroscillator or the Tango X, but it’s pretty damn good for a $50 toy. I will say, however, that (uncharacteristically for me) I tend to crave another orgasm just a few minutes after having one with this toy, as if the first one hadn’t quite satisfied me.

The toy’s one button is gratifyingly clicky to push, and its smooth, domed shape is easy to locate by touch in the heat of the moment. After you’ve turned the toy on by holding and pressing the button briefly, hitting it again activates the vibration portion, and double-clicking it activates the pressure-wave portion. You can cycle through each motor’s different modes separately by either single-pressing (vibration) or double-pressing (pressure waves). It seems to me that it would be easy to make mistakes while controlling the toy this way – after all, “double-clicking your mouse” can distract you from any other double-clicking you might be doing – but I actually haven’t screwed up even once while scrolling through this toy’s settings, because the button is so well-designed that each push feels distinctly discernible. Cool.

In any case, it doesn’t matter that much because the toy comes with a little heart-shaped remote (watch battery included). Unlike almost any other toy I’ve tried of this type, the remote arrives pre-paired with the toy, so you don’t have to mess around with Bluetooth settings before playing. The signal even travels through my pants, underwear, and closed thighs. Neat! I wish the remote was a little more substantial-feeling – it’s light and feels cheap, reminding me of some kind of knockoff Sailor Moon children’s toy – but for a product that only costs $49.50, I find it impressive that they included a functioning remote at all. Remote-controllability also tends to make toys more accessible for disabled folks – always a plus.

The remote would be especially great for the toy’s main intended purpose: enhancing partnered intercourse. Much like the We-Vibe, it’s designed to be worn vaginally while a partner penetrates you with their penis or strap-on. I did not try it this way because my partner is 500 miles away right now (boooo), but I imagine it would be passable-but-not-amazing for that purpose. Whereas something like the We-Vibe benefits from the friction and motion of a partner, rubbing its vibrations all over your clitoral area with every thrust, pressure-wave toys comparatively tend to need to stay in one spot in order to maintain their suction on your clit and keep feeling good. That’s especially true when a toy has a nozzle as small as this one has. I think PIV would jostle it off its target too often for it to really feel good, but hey, feel free to prove me wrong.

This toy definitely doesn’t work as well for me in the absence of porn to watch. Granted, that’s true for a lot of toys, but I think this one in particular really benefits from mental stimulation; on its own, it’s a little too buzzy to really feel impactful, but when porn is arousing my brain, the toy’s sensations feel amped up and make me come easily.

Sadly, this toy is pretty loud, especially the clitoral portion. It quiets down when it’s actually sucking my clit, or when it’s pressed tight between my closed legs, but it gets noisy if I try to reposition it. Not a huge deal for me, but certainly not ideal for people who need to keep their toy usage on the down-low.

Overall, I’m really impressed with the Wowyes OYE-030 A7 Sucking Vibrator, and will probably keep it in my regular rotation for those days when I just want to get off fast. Its remote works better than any I’ve tried, it stimulates both my G-spot and clit surprisingly well, and it’s cute as fuck. Assuming it fits your anatomy and you can deal with the loudness and lack of flexibility – and that you like mild clitoral suction and rhythmic G-spot vibration – I think it’s a perfectly viable toy to spend $49.50 on. Its name is the worst thing about it, and if you know the sex toy industry, you know that that’s a backhanded compliment but a compliment nonetheless.

 

Thanks to the folks at Honeysx for sending me this toy to try! This post was sponsored, which means I was paid to write a fair and honest review of this product.

Guest Review: Tantaly Monroe Realistic Sex Doll

Kate Sloan

Note from Kate: I asked a cis male friend of mine to review this sex doll for me, because my partner already has one and doesn’t have enough room in their New York apartment for another one 😂 Here’s what my friend thought about his new doll, in his own words…

I’ve always wondered what it might be like to own a realistic sex doll. But I never bought one because the high-end ones I looked at were pretty expensive, and I was afraid that if I owned one, someone might find it in my home and make fun of me. I wouldn’t want someone to know I spent so much money on that kind of thing!

So imagine my surprise and delight when my friend Kate asked me if I’d be interested in testing and reviewing the Tantaly “Monroe” sex doll… for free! And when I say “doll,” what I really mean is a headless, armless torso with thighs that cut off above the knee. “Monroe” is ostensibly named after Marilyn Monroe due to her elegant hip-to-waist ratio, though I don’t remember Marilyn having G-cup breasts. This thing costs over $900, so I figured it had to be pretty legit.

After following Canada Post’s tracking for over a week, I got a knock on the front door and found a box big enough to hold a dining chair. I don’t know why sex toy reviewers always feel the need to describe their initial unboxing when they’re going to immediately throw the box away, but what the heck, let’s do it anyway: They promised “non-descript packaging,” and wow they weren’t kidding. It was a cardboard box containing a compact styrofoam coffin, inside of which was a nude torso wrapped in plastic. Nothing in the way of presentation or pizzaz, not even so much as a ribbon tied in a bow; only a teeny instruction pamphlet and tampon-like “drying stick” used to dehumidify Monroe’s orifices when not in use.

Once I cut Monroe out of her powder-coated placenta, it was time to pick her up and carry her to the bedroom like some sort of extremely fucked-up “carrying my new bride over the threshold” situation. And, while I know it’s rude to say so, she is HEAVY! 68 pounds of totally dead weight, to be exact (though when she sat on my face it felt more like 69, har har). If you have less-than-average upper body strength, you should really take this into account when considering the purchase of a Monroe. I had to struggle laboriously up the stairs with her draped over my shoulder like a firefighter trying to rescue half of someone. My cat didn’t know WHAT the fuck was going on.

After tossing her onto the bed and catching my breath, I immediately had the urge to eat her ass. In real life, spontaneous ass-eating can be a risky proposition to say the least, but it’s been over a year since I’ve had the opportunity to eat any ass at all, so I dove in and it was a lovely experience. Then I flipped her over, spread her thighs apart ­ ­–which took more than a little bit of effort – and went down on her, fingering her in the process. While doing so, I suddenly thought about how wild it is that I finally have a lover who needs no foreplay and here I am warming her up just for the fuck of it!

Anyway, she was now on her back with her fabulously gravity-defying breasts pointed to the heavens. I gave them a few ham-handed squeezes the way I might have in a teenage wet dream. They felt nice to the touch (and I even licked a nipple which was kind of fun). With that being said, I’ve had a few dozen sexual partners and I feel confident in saying the texture of these boobs doesn’t mimic the feel of any that actually exist, unless there’s some cosmetic surgeon out there stuffing wads of “cyberskin” into patients’ mammary glands.

Now the time had come: I lubed up her vagina and, since it was a bit cold in there, I held my fingers inside for about 30 seconds to transfer some of my body heat. After getting hard, I got into position, slipped in there, and WOW

WHOA

I came extremely fast. To be fair, I was particularly aroused by the anticipation of this experiment, and it probably ratcheted my horniness up even more when I revisited my long-lost pastime of ass-eating, but Monroe’s vagina was far and away the most pleasantly stimulating fake pussy I’d ever been inside. In my lifetime, I’ve owned around 10 various masturbators that purported to mimic a real fuckable orifice and this one takes the cake. And by the cake, I mean the cum. The first time I slid my penis into it, I immediately felt that anxious “oh shit I need to slow down” feeling I often felt in my early sexual experiences. My penis is pretty thick, and I’ve occasionally run into sex toys that are so tailored to a small-to-average penis size that they’re either uncomfortable for me or they begin to wear prematurely, as I’ve found with my otherwise delightful ArcWave Ion. But this hole was neither too tight nor too loose… To mix metaphors, I felt like Goldilocks finding the perfect bowl of porridge to stick my dick into.

As a side note, I enjoy the fact that I can seriously rail this thing like an industrial piston. I’ve never been allowed to ram into a partner’s hole with all my strength. Here, I could do that and it felt amazing both in terms of sensation and raw caveman humpery. So there I was, probably less than a minute after penetration, breathing hard atop a buxom semen-filled effigy.

And that’s when I learned that cleanup is a bit of a process. It’s tempting to skip it directly after coming because you’d rather bliss out and not do an immediate chore. But from what I understand, failing to clean this product, especially after ejaculating inside it, is a quick way to get a nasty situation on your hands. Sadly, this vagina is not self-cleaning and its pH is not self-regulating. But a few squirts with a bulb douche and sort of “scooping” out the cum and lube inside – not unlike some intense G-spot stimulation – gets it reasonably clean. You just have to figure out where the water will go when it inevitably comes back out of there (or else your bed may end up looking like someone’s just experienced an absolutely legendary squirting orgasm!) Once you get as much water and jizz out as you can, you insert the included “drying stick.” By the way, Tantaly sells additional drying sticks as well as other maintenance accessories and even a USB-powered “heating rod” to warm the orifices before use. You’ll want to buy a second drying stick unless you strictly fuck one hole per session. Speaking of maintenance, one inconvenient thing about Monroe is that she must be stored lying down, meaning she’ll take up around 8 square feet of space in your home. In my condo, she lives in a trashbag on the floor of my closet like something you’d see on some nauseating true crime docuseries.

So anyway, that was round one. A few hours later, I remembered “Oh yeah, I have a naked torso on my bed!” and decided to go for round two. This time, it would be doggy style. I once again picked her up and flipped her over, and I have to say, it was not very fun to do so. Tantaly sells similar sex doll torsos that weigh much less, and I found myself wondering if I’d rather try one of them (though it’s possible that their relative lightness could make them feel less realistic). I had a difficult time getting Monroe into a position that felt right for doggy style. While she is highly poseable, her skeletal frame takes a lot of effort to adjust. This is for the best, since she would collapse too easily if her frame were flimsier, but when trying to get her into position, you feel like you’re fighting with rusty levers in some abandoned mad scientist’s lab. It often feels like you’re forcing someone to move against their will, which is slightly distressing if you dwell on it for more than a second. Moving her around on a bed adds the element of mattress bounciness which can make the process even more unwieldy. To successfully pose her in a “doggy style position” requires you to make sure her thighs are both positioned at the exact same angle (otherwise she’ll lean too far to one side)… It’s like trying to get a tripod perfectly level if the tripod’s legs were human legs with rigor mortis! Also, she has no knees, so in any “kneeling” position, her butt is lower to the ground than it would actually be if her legs were complete and intact.

To her credit, when you finally get Monroe into a doggy-style position it’s a truly beautiful thing; her ass is a sight to behold and unlike a real-life situation, it feels okay to stare and truly appreciate what you’re looking at. Unfortunately, after trying rear-entry PIV in a few varying positions, I realized that both the angle and position of her vagina are so optimized for the missionary position that they make full penetration from behind nearly impossible for an average-sized penis. I’m a little longer than 6 inches and I could barely get halfway in from behind. So I decided to grab the lube bottle again and head on down to brown town. Her anal orifice (or “tunnel” as it is called on Tantaly’s website) is anatomically realistic in its shortness, but just like the vagina, it is textured in a way that’s more stimulating than any ass I’ve ever fucked. I enjoyed squeezing her asscheeks as I went in and out – WHOOPS, I came again. This time I lasted a bit longer, but once again, I could see an orgasm on the horizon the moment I started. Mind you, I’m no two-pump chump. The few times in my adult life that I’ve finished really quickly were with particularly petite women whose anatomy made for a lot more friction and grip than usual. But even then, I lasted longer than what felt like 60-90 seconds in this case! As I neared orgasm, I thought “Pull out! Pull out! It’ll make cleanup easier!” but my usual failsafe (fear of an unwanted pregnancy) was absent, so… hey, I got another chance to rehearse the ol’ “douche n’ scoop!” This time I put a towel underneath her to catch the jizzwater.

The next time I fucked her from behind, I experimented with ways to make her position feel more anatomically accurate. At one point, I set her clavicles onto a small piece of luggage and put a small briefcase under her thighs to create the true position her body would be in if she were a real person in that position. In this way, I could squeeze her boobs while fucking her ass from behind. I enjoyed it, but setting it up was quite a production for what was – yet again – a very short ride. I’m honestly considering fucking her with a condom just to last long enough to fully enjoy the experience!

It seems to me that one of the biggest selling points for a toy like this is the realism of something anatomically proportional with a realistic amount of heft. But despite her realistic weight and size, Tantaly hasn’t so much achieved realism as an enhanced fantasy version of realism. The breasts don’t feel like breasts, but it would be hot if breasts felt like that. I don’t think there are any vaginas or rectums with internal “pleasure nubs” but it would feel amazing if there were. Most partners won’t want you to slam into their holes with the full force of your body, but it would be fun if they did. These factors all add up to the heightened “fantasy-realism” of Monroe.

Two more details before I wrap up: It’s worth mentioning that after 7 uses over the course of 10 days, I noticed one small part of her skin (on the outside of her right thigh) looked very slightly damaged, as if its very surface were slightly peeling off. This might portend an unexpectedly quick deterioration of her materials, but it’s possible that something I did unduly caused the damage. Also (get this) if you decide to get rid of Monroe, you cannot ethically throw her in the trash; she’s made of high-quality TPE, so she must be recycled AND she may also be labeled as “bio-waste” due to “personal use.” So enjoy telling your local recycling center how the neighborhood kids must have pulled a prank by leaving her in your blue bin.

But here’s the big question: Is Monroe worth nearly $1,000? That’s hard to say. For the sake of comparison, I happen to have gotten plenty of enjoyment out of a smaller masturbator from Extreme Restraints that looks like a disembodied cross section of buttocks and vulva in a doggy-style position. It doesn’t feel as good as Monroe, and it’s nearly impossible to get into a truly realistic position, but it also retails for only $140, it’s easy to store, and I’ve never felt arm pain the day after using it. On the other hand, let’s consider who would be the perfect candidate for this kind of product: I imagine a lonely, bored, and/or sexually inexperienced guy who also has deep pockets. Maybe he wants a chance to practice with a life-size simulated partner before he starts having real sex. Maybe he’s afraid he’ll finish too quickly and wants to build up stamina. He either has a fair amount of storage space in his home, or he has a place where she can stay permanently. This guy also would ideally have decent upper-body strength. If all of these traits describe you, dear reader, then I think Monroe would be a great purchase.

But for the rest of you, let’s look at the pros and cons:

PROS:

  • Amazingly-textured orifices
  • Exciting proportions for those who love curves
  • Weight & heft add to the realism
  • Seriously, WOW these orifices, just WOW
  • Realistic size can allow realistic sexual positions
  • Useful for stamina training

CONS:

  • Heavy and unwieldy
  • Somewhat difficult to pose
  • Vagina placement prevents deep penetration from behind
  • Inconvenient to store/must be stored flat
  • Requires disciplined maintenance
  • Skin may begin to (slightly) deteriorate after few uses

Keep in mind that Tantaly sells a line of torso dolls with a variety of weights and sizes, so if you’re intrigued by the pros but turned off by some of the cons, you might consider one of their other models. As for the Monroe doll, she’s a partner with a few qualities that are more amazing than I’ve ever experienced, but they come at a steep price and aren’t without some annoying quirks… Hey wait, maybe she IS realistic after all!

Note from Kate: If you want to buy your own Monroe, you can use the code “GJMonroe10” to get 10% off! This post was sponsored, which means we were paid to write a fair and honest review of the product that was sent to my friend.