Review: ZIOXX Freedom Plus Extra Large Condoms

Kate Sloan

When Zioxx told me they wanted me to review their condoms, I knew I had to wait until my partner was out of chastity – which, truth be told, hasn’t happened much lately. See, while I am their keyholder and can thus remove them from chastity any time I wish, including for brief and frustrating interludes, post-chastity (or mid-chastity) isn’t a great time to test condoms. A crucial part of reviewing a condom is assessing how well it transfers sensation, and my partner’s sensitivity gets turned up so much from time spent in chastity that they wouldn’t exactly be an objective reviewer.

So I unlocked them, we had sex, I went to sleep, they jerked off the following morning while I dozed (I’m not a morning person, okay?!), and presumably their dick returned to its normal level of sensitivity. That night, a dommy growl crept into their voice as they told me, “I’m going to get you off, and then I’m going to fuck you twice to test out those condoms.”

“Twice?” I asked.

“I’ll last longer the second time, so I’ll get more of a sense of what they actually feel like.” Their hypothesis was sound, and the plan went off without a hitch.

Zioxx had sent me their Freedom Plus Extra Large condoms. My partner’s dick is on the bigger side of the spectrum as far as people I’ve been with (in the neighborhood of 7.5″ long and 1.75″ wide), so I figured the standard size wouldn’t work for them.

As it turns out, even these “extra-large” condoms were a bit too small. This has often been my experience with condoms made in Asia (Zioxx is based in China) – for example, I had a more average-sized partner a few years back who found regular Kimono condoms distractingly tight. These Zioxx XL condoms are 7.09″ long – that’s about half an inch shorter than a standard Trojan, and nearly a full inch shorter than our usual go-to condoms, Trojan Magnums or Magnum XLs. The Zioxx ones have a width of 55mm, which is wider than a standard Trojan but 5mm smaller than a Magnum and 8mm smaller than a Magnum XL. Resultingly, my partner found the Zioxx condoms a little tight during application and removal, and had a slightly more difficult time staying hard due to the tightness.

Other than that, though, they didn’t have many complaints. The lube on these condoms, which is water-based and contains moisturizing hyaluronic acid (yes, the stuff that’s in your skincare), seems high-quality but is perhaps a bit too liberally applied – it dripped a little on both of us as I was guiding their cock into me the second time, but honestly, I’d prefer that over the pitifully small amount of lube many companies put on their condoms. Keep in mind, too, that being water-based, this lube likely won’t be enough on its own for anal, despite how much of it there is on each condom.

These are pretty low-scent and low-taste, always good qualities in a condom, IMO. They’re made of natural latex, so obviously avoid them if you have a latex allergy. The elegant black outer packaging looks nice on a nightstand. The individual packaging of the condoms themselves is a bit too untextured to consistently get a good grip on with lubey hands, but if your hands are dry, you should be able to tear ’em open without issue.

Sensation-wise, aside from the sizing issues, my partner noted that these condoms are smooth and thin, and have excellent heat transfer. The overabundance of lube sometimes made it difficult for them to achieve the amount of friction they wanted, but they were still able to come relatively easily both times we tried these.

There’s no mention on Zioxx’s website of whether or not these condoms are FDA-approved, but they do say that they won a sponsorship from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and that “each condom is 100% electronically tested” with “60 procedures of quality-control.” 🤷🏻‍♀️

Overall, aside from the sizing issues we experienced, these Zioxx Freedom Plus Extra Large condoms are pretty good. At $12.50 for a pack of 18, they’re also plenty more cost-effective than a lot of condoms out there. I guess you could say they were worth unlocking my partner’s chastity cage for.

 

This review was sponsored. As always, all writing and opinions are my own (and, of course, my partner’s).

Are “Makeshift” Sex Toys Safe to Use?

Kate Sloan
A cucumber that may or may not have been inside me at some point

There are a few classic questions that come to mind for me when I think about people who turn to sex educators for advice. “Why can’t my girlfriend come from penetration alone?” is one of them; “Does dick size matter?” is another. But here is the one I want to talk to you about today: “Can I use [xyz household object] as a sex toy?”

My initial knee-jerk response is a resounding “NO,” but if I want to be a bit more nuanced and detailed (like the people who wrote this guide to homemade male sex toys), I have to acknowledge that there are cases in which makeshift “sex toys” can be relatively safe to use. Generally, products actually made and marketed for that usage are safer and healthier (toxic jelly toys and “for novelty use only” monstrosities notwithstanding), but if you fantasize about using particular household objects for pleasure – or you face other barriers to accessing real sex toys, whether financial, privacy-based, or otherwise – you deserve to know how to use those objects as safely as possible. I’m not a doctor or a sex toy engineer and this is not official advice (don’t sue me!), but here’s what I know…

First of all, and most basic, you’re going to want to look for an object that is smooth. It depends on what you plan on using it for, of course, but generally, sharp seams and other pointy bits are to be avoided. You may be able to sand these down with sandpaper if you’re that committed to the cause.

Next, in an ideal world, you’d only use products made of non-porous materials, so they can be sanitized effectively and won’t accumulate bacteria over time. Glass, metal, hard plastic, and 100% silicone are all non-porous, and properly lacquered wood can be effectively non-porous even if the wood itself is not. A couple of the makeshift sex toys I used in my youth fit these criteria – one was a metal tube a friend had given me for my birthday that was designed for storing a single tampon in (?!), and one was the gently curved end of a hard plastic stereo remote control. The non-porosity of these materials meant I could clean them fairly easily with soap and water or a disinfectant wipe.

Many people are curious about using fruits or vegetables as sex toys. I understand the fascination – some of them have really beautiful and pleasurable-looking shapes! I also know this can be a cost-effective way to test out what kinds of toy shapes and sizes you’re into, especially since you can carve these treats however you like. (Were your eyes bigger than your vagina when you bought that giant cucumber? No problem, just whittle it down!) But if you plan on going this route, PLEASE wrap the item in a condom, at the very least. It’ll protect you from what’s on the surface of the toy, whether that be scratchy textures or pesticide remnants, and will lessen the likelihood of you getting an infection from stuffing yourself with produce. I learned the hard way that the plastic wrapping on some fruits and veggies is not a good enough barrier when I accidentally scratched up my insides with some tiny-yet-sharp protruding bits of plastic on a cucumber’s encasement. Just take the plastic off and replace it with a condom. And change the condom every time you reuse your “toy” thereafter, please!

“Put a condom on it” is actually good advice for a wide array of objects you could stick inside yourself. Given that even the actual sex toy industry isn’t regulated so not all products therein are actually body-safe, objects not made for that usage are even riskier. Whether you’re using a shampoo bottle, an electric toothbrush, or anything else, repeat after me: Put a condom on it!

Speaking of electricity… When it comes to putting electronics inside yourself, just say no. Toothbrushes are an odd example because they have to be moisture-resistant due to the nature of what they do, but even they are probably safest to use only externally, not internally. You don’t want to ruin your buzz (or your genitals) by accidentally zapping yourself mid-wank!

In addition, it’s my responsibility as a sex educator to tell you that you should not insert anything in your ass that doesn’t have a flared base. (Google “flared base butt plug” if you need a visual aid.) I also just generally wouldn’t recommend putting anything “makeshift” in your butt, because that area is more sensitive and more easily damaged than, say, a vagina or a penis, and it’s just not worth the risk, IMO.

Finally, please don’t fuck yourself with any items that other people in your household use, unless you have their explicit consent to do so. It doesn’t matter how clean you get it after you use it; it’s still a consent violation, and potentially a health and safety hazard, for other people who might encounter that object in your home later on.

Have you ever used a makeshift/homemade sex toy? How did it go?

 

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

Sextistics 2020: An End-of-Year Sexual Stats Breakdown

Kate Sloan

As odd as it may seem, keeping a sex spreadsheet again this year (going strong since 2015, baybee!) helped me make sense of the chaotic mess that was 2020. I may not have been able to fuck at my favorite hotels and sex clubs, but I could sure keep my data up-to-date and color-coded.

Here, as per tradition, is a post enumerating and analyzing some of the key stats from my 2020 sex spreadsheet. Strap in!

 

Overview

  • In 2020, I had partnered sex 200 times. (Wooo, nice round numbers!)
  • That works out to an average of 16.66 times per month, 3.84 times per week, and 0.55 times per day.
  • I had 181 orgasms from partnered sex (not counting phone sex, which has its own section below).
  • My partner had 178 orgasms during sex with me. (One of their goals, after we started playing with chastity kink, became to give me more orgasms during the year than they had themselves, and they succeeded.)
  • An incomplete list, in alphabetical order, of kinks that were part of my sex life this year: biting, bondage, chastity, choking, cock and ball torture, cuckolding, DD/lg, electrostimulation, face-slapping, financial domination, forced feminization, humiliation, hypnosis, intoxication, kicking, punching, rimming/analingus, roleplay, sadomasochism, scratching, sensory deprivation, sleepy sex, spanking, squirting, temperature play, trampling, wax play.

 

Compared to last year…

  • I had 1.96% less sex, i.e. almost exactly the same amount (204 vs. 200 times).
  • I had an orgasm 90.5% of the time when I had sex, as opposed to 85.3% last year. Improvements, yay!
  • My partner had an orgasm 89% of the times we had sex, as opposed to 103.4% last year, due to our forays into chastity play.
  • I had 2 partners (depending on whether you count a one-off blowjob porn shoot), same as last year when I also had 2.

 

Locations

  • I had sex in a total of 4 locations this year, as opposed to 9 last year. Obviously the pandemic had a lot to do with this!
  • These locations included my place, my spouse’s place, and two hotels: the Conrad, where we stayed on our wedding night, and the Wythe, where we stayed for our little “staycation” honeymoon.

 

Highs & lows

  • My most sexually active month was November (31 times). There were several months this year that we spent entirely together, but many of those were super stressful due to global news; I think by November our pandemic stress had mellowed slightly so we were fucking more often.
  • My least sexually active months were August and September, the only months this year when I didn’t see Matt at all.
  • The day on which I had the most sex was January 26th, at 3 times. It was the Sunday of one of Matt’s weekend visits to me in Toronto, so it made sense that we were trying to “cram it all in,” as it were.
  • I didn’t have any sessions containing multiple orgasms on my part this year, which is the first time that’s happened to me maybe ever? Orgasms are getting trickier for me as I get older!

 

Correlations

  • The sex acts most highly correlated with orgasm for me were being fucked with a dildo while using a vibrator (152 times) and receiving oral sex (18 times).
  • Less common ways I got off were using a vibrator while being fingerfucked (9 times) and being fucked with a dildo while receiving oral sex (2 times).

 

Sex toys

  • My most-used vibrators during partnered sex this year were the Eroscillator Top Deluxe (155 times), the Magic Wand Rechargeable (28), and the Hot Octopuss Amo (2). Notably, many of the times I used the MWR this year, I was using it on my partner and not myself. What can I say, I really love my Eroscillator.
  • My most-used dildos during partnered sex were the Njoy Eleven and Vixen Creations Bandit (tied at 32 times each), the Fucking Sculptures Double Trouble (18 times), and the Njoy Pure Wand, New York Toy Collective Carter, and Uberrime Night King (tied at 15 times each). My dildo usage was less diverse this year than some previous years because I spent large swathes of time in New York this year, where all I have access to is Matt’s collection and whatever I can fit into my suitcase.
  • My most-used kink toys with partners were a good old-fashioned blindfold (16 times), the Neon Wand and its Power Tripper attachment (5 times), and my custom purpleheart Weal & Breech mallet (3). My RodeoH harness also got more use than usual (3 times) because my partner used it to fuck me with a strap-on while locked up in chastity sometimes.
  • The “pervertibles” I used this year included a cucumber, tweezers, and a pair of cowboy boots.

 

Phone sex

  • In 2020, I had phone sex 122 times, versus 246 last year (i.e. about half as much). This is because Matt and I were physically together for 62.8% of the year (we extended visits for weeks/months at a time, both for pandemic reasons and because we were “practicing” cohabitating to make sure it would be a good idea to get married).
  • That works out to an average of 10.2 times per month, 2.3 times per week, or 0.33 times per day.
  • If you calculate the averages based only on when we were physically apart, we had phone sex 26.9 times per month, 6.3 times per week, or 0.9 times per day, which is much more in line with our usual (i.e. non-pandemic year) phone sex numbers.
  • I had 119 orgasms from phone sex, meaning I orgasmed 97.5% of the times we had phone sex. Matt, on the other hand, came only 85 times or 69.7% of the times we had phone sex, again due to periods of chastity.
  • Comparing our phone sex numbers to our IRL sex numbers, phone sex was only 37.9% of my sex life this year, versus 54.7% last year.
  • The total amount of sex sessions I had this year (IRL sex + phone sex) was 322.
  • That works out to an average of 26.83 per month, 6.19 per week, or 0.88 per day. Woof.

 

Did you keep a record of your sex life this year? Notice anything interesting?

 

Additional resources if you’re curious:

Review: Sohimi Clitoral Sucking Vibrator

Kate Sloan

In preparing to write this review, I went and looked up the Sohimi Clitoral Sucking Vibrator on the company’s website, and was shocked – SHOCKED! – to see they’re only charging $36 for it. (Less, if you catch them on a sale day.) Why did this shock me? Well, this toy is rechargeable, made of body-safe silicone, and an innovative multi-tasker, the likes of which a company like Lelo could crank out and charge $180+ for, easy. Damn, Sohimi. I’m impressed.

As with many toys I get sent to review, I didn’t have much choice about which product from the company’s catalogue I would be sent, and I wouldn’t have necessarily picked this one if they’d let me choose. But that’s because I wouldn’t have understood, just from looking at it, what it actually does.

This incompletely-named “clitoral sucking vibrator” does three things, only two of which are mentioned in its moniker. It’s shaped like an uppercase “J,” with a vibrating shaft meant for vaginal penetration on one end and a clit-sucking pressure wave stimulator on the other. But in the middle is something really neat: a G-spot-targeting bump that, when activated, trembles quickly like a partner intensely come-hithering to make you squirt. Sohimi calls this a 3-in-1 toy and they are not fucking around when they say that.

Of the three functions, the vibration is the least interesting to me, both because I already own a zillion vibrators and because these particular vibrations are pretty buzzy. But the other two functions, especially when used in tandem, are tantalizing. The light clitoral suction produced by pressure-wave technology is a very “treble-y” sensation, high-pitched and pinpointed sometimes to the point of being cloying, but here it is tempered by the comparative “bassiness” of that rumbling G-spot stimulator. The thrumming slows down quite a bit when inserted vaginally, as the motor works hard to fight against my restrictive flesh, but I can definitely still register it. When I use both functions in concert, both these crucial buttons get pushed so directly that a “whoa, I’m gonna come!” feeling creeps up faster than expected. I don’t even need to turn the vibrations on, and they’re so buzzy that I usually don’t.

I love that each of the three functions can be controlled independently; it makes me feel like I’m constructing my own customized masterpiece at a salad bar. Each function has multiple speeds/patterns which you can cycle through by pressing its respective button. This is a quality I always miss in dual-stimulation (or triple-stimulation) toys when it’s not present. My clit and G-spot usually want different things at different moments, so it’s nice to have granular control over what setting each component is on at any given time.

I’m not totally on board with the clitoral suction aspect of this toy, because it doles out a sharper, stronger sensation than many similar toys, and my clit is a sensitive baby. Adding lube helps, but nonetheless, I find myself staying on the lowest speeds because the rest get way too intense way too quickly. If you’re not a fan of pressure wave stimulation, this toy isn’t gonna convert you, the way something more nuanced like a high-end Womanizer might.

The design of this toy is such that you basically have to insert the vaginal arm in order to use any part of it; the shaft doesn’t comfortably bend enough to allow you to use the clitoral portion on its own, should you want to. This definitely limits the usefulness of the toy, as does the fact that (characteristically of dual-stim toys) it has to fit your anatomy or it won’t work. I normally have issues lining up dual-stim toys so that both my G-spot and my clit are getting the amount of attention they want, with the correct angle/positioning for each, but this toy happens to fit my body well in that way. The shaft has some give, but not a ton.

I also noticed that I have a tendency to accidentally bump buttons when I try to thrust with this toy, because of where the control panel is placed. But I think it’s not really meant to be thrusted, so maybe this wouldn’t bother most users.

This is one of those toys I’d only grab when I was craving something very specific – in this case, intense clit stim paired with profound G-spot stim – but that’s actually a craving I have fairly often. The Sohimi Clitoral Sucking Vibrator does what it does quite well, with the exception of vibration, and it’s also probably one of the most luxe-looking vibes you could get at its price point. A decent, rechargeable triple-stimulation toy for $36 is nothing to sneeze at, and I’m glad I gave this one a shot!

 

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

12 Days of Girly Juice 2020: 1 Fantastic Company

Kate Sloan

Here it is: my last 12 Days of Girly Juice post of 2020!

Today I’d like to bring your attention to a business I think you need to know about. They’re called ShopEnby.

Normally I highlight toy-makers here – and if I was doing that, I would need to give major shout-outs to some of my faves of the year, New York Toy Collective, Dame, and Glitter Tops – but ShopEnby has been through such a rigamarole recently that I felt it was important to feature them here.

(Content note for what’s to come: this post contains discussions of racism, transphobia, and – briefly – racist and transphobic murders.)

The store is Black- and trans-owned. Its organizational systems and product descriptions are crafted to be inclusive of a broad range of bodies and identities. The owners donate 2% of all proceeds to “a rotating list of small underfunded organizations focused on improving the lives of Queer/Trans People of Color.” Their selection of sex toys, gender affirmation gear, and wellness products is carefully curated and top-notch.

All their boundless awesomeness notwithstanding, ShopEnby faced some troubles recently when Wild Flower Sex – a sex toy company known to be disrespectful to Black femmes (more info here) – threatened them with a lawsuit over the usage of the word “enby,” because Wild Flower makes a vibrator by that name.

You know, “enby,” the colloquial term sometimes used by non-binary people to refer to themselves? Yeah. Wild Flower claimed that that word is theirs. Theirs to use, for profit, and no one else’s.

While it’s certainly their prerogative to use that word for themselves (and indeed, Wild Flower’s cofounders use they/them and he/they pronouns respectively, though I don’t know whether they identify as non-binary or as enbies), no one can own that word. It would be as ridiculous as trying to trademark terms like “lesbian,” “gay,” or “bisexual.” These are labels of identification and ways of finding community, not commodities to be bought or sold.

In response to the threats, ShopEnby set up a legal defense fund on GoFundMe, which you can still donate to. You can also support them by making purchases from their store. I can heartily recommend, for example, the Magic Wand Rechargeable, Dame Arc, and We-Vibe Rave, all of which they sell. If you believe it’s better to support marginalized small business owners than big-box stores of dubious ethics, this is a lovely way to put your money where your mouth is! (It may be too late to get gifts for this holiday season, but Valentine’s Day is coming up fast…)

It was particularly shocking to see the news about the threatened lawsuit in a year where Black people and trans people have been so prominently targeted. Granted, those groups are targeted in various ways all the time, but this was the year when George Floyd and many others were murdered by racist police, when trans people were killed at record levels, when a beloved children’s author showed her whole ass by perpetuating dangerous transphobic rhetoric on a massive scale. Black and trans people have been through more than enough this year, and every year. How dare anyone try to take away a word that causes no harm, helps many people feel more like themselves, and does not – cannot – belong to anyone except the entire community it represents.