lube

Why Everyone Should Own Lube

Kate Sloan

There are very few immutable truths when it comes to sex. Here are a few I think are important: No matter how weird you think your sexual tastes are, there are people out there who are into the same things as you. Informed, ongoing consent is mandatory for any activity. And lube makes everything better.

It seems to me that most queer and trans folks and vagina-having folks are aware of this fact, but a worryingly high percentage of straight cis men are not. That’s largely because the quintessential “straight” sex act – peen-in-vag intercourse – is often depicted in our culture as “not requiring” lube, even though, as with most sex acts, it can be substantially improved by throwing some lube into the mix.

There’s a common cultural narrative that you won’t need lube if you’re aroused “enough,” but of course, that’s bullshit. As sex-positive writers and thinkers like Sarah Jane and JoEllen Notte have pointed out, high arousal doesn’t always lead to high lubrication. It can depend on your body, where you are in your hormonal cycle, medications you’re on, and various other factors. There is no shame in needing or wanting to use lube! In fact, I think just about everyone’s sex life would be improved with the addition of lube if they’re not already using it (and more lube, if they are).

Have I convinced you yet? If so, here are some of my favorite lubes for various fun activities…

For PIV: Good ol’ vaginal intercourse, I find, pairs well with a vag-friendly water-based lube like Blossom Organics. Water-based lubes are ill-suited to predominantly external activities like handjobs, because your body absorbs the water after a few minutes and so you gotta keep reapplying – but since the vagina is self-lubricating for many of us, I find a little water-based lube is often enough to get me started, and then my vag supplies the rest of the moisture I need as I get more and more turned on. I like this one in particular because it’s designed to minimize vaginal irritation (no glycerin or propylene glycol here!) and its taste and smell are inoffensive (a surprisingly difficult quality to find in lubes). Plus it just looks cute on my nightstand.

For butt stuff: I’m ride-or-die for Sliquid Sassy; it’s a known fact. Recently I told my boyfriend I like lots of different lubes and he clarified, “But you’re a Sassy girl at heart,” because he knows me. Sassy is a water-based lube with a thicker consistency than most, so it’s longer-lasting than your average water-based lube and tends to more-or-less stay where you put it instead of dripping all over the place. This makes it a pleasant choice for lubin’ up anything that’s gonna go in your butt, though I use Sassy vaginally a lot too. I appreciate that this lube has only five ingredients and is effectively odorless and tasteless: sometimes you just want a lube that works well without adding any bells or whistles to the experience.

For oral sex: Sliquid Swirl is one of the only actually good-tasting flavored lubes I’ve ever tried – and, crucially, unlike almost every flavored lube on the market, it’s glycerin-free. It comes in lots of different flavors and all the ones I’ve tried have been at least passably tasty, if not outright delicious. Some people find flavored lubes confusing as a concept; I’d invite them to remember that we all get a case of dry mouth from time to time, so sometimes you need a little help with lubrication while going down on your sweetheart. Flavored lube can also just be a silly novelty, for when you want to mix things up – ’cause sex is supposed to be fun!

For handjobs: Whether you’re strokin’ a dick or a vulva, I would heartily recommend The Butters. It’s a smooth, whipped lube made of natural ingredients like aloe vera gel, apple cider vinegar, shea butter, coconut oil, and grapeseed oil. It’s long-lasting and its texture feels divine on the skin. As a bonus, its taste isn’t objectionable at all (to me, anyway), so you can transition from hand stuff to mouth stuff without much trouble. And your skin will feel moisturized as hell afterward!

What are your favorite lubes? Which uses are they best suited for?

 

This post was sponsored by Peepshow Toys, who are generously helping me get to the Woodhull Sexual Freedom Summit this August! Check out their fine selection of lubricants. As always, all writing and opinions in this post are my own.

Review: Piph Lube

Kate Sloan

(Edited to add: this was an April Fool’s Day joke, y’all! Don’t you wish this lube existed, though?!)

If you want a sex product designed right, get a sex toy reviewer to do it. That’s what I’ve always believed, and SheVibe has finally done it, enlisting queen of the sex toy reviewers Epiphora to develop her own lube. It is a thing to behold. I present to you: Piph Lube.

Now, you might be wondering: if I want a reviewer-endorsed water-based lube, why not just grab a bottle of Sliquid Sassy? Well, there’s more to it than that. This lube contains some additives which make it – to quote its tagline – “radically stimulating.” (Sounds like a fingerbanging class taught by a sandy-haired surfer bro, I know, but read on.)

The additives? Cannabis, caffeine, pinot grigio, catnip, and a mysterious force identified only as “queer magic.” These are a few of my favorite things…

Now let’s be clear before we proceed: this isn’t a lube for a quick, get-‘er-done kind of wank, just as a “special” brownie isn’t the ideal snack for when you’re running out the door to go write your SATs. (Well, depends on what kind of brain you have, I guess.) You’ve gotta settle in with this one. Clear your schedule. Light some incense. Take the phone off the hook, you archaic landline-possessing cutie, you.

I was involved in the early testing process of this lube, and skewing the formula created some amusing results. Too much cannabis and my vagina just wanted to squeeze on the dildo inside it, too slowly and too reverently, because it just felt so cooool. Too much caffeine and I’d clutch my Magic Wand in frantic T-rex hands, pressing it against my lube-smeared vulva in a mad dash toward orgasm. Too much pinot grigio and I’d fall asleep midway through my testing session with a dildo lazily sliding out of me and a boozy blush overtaking my cheeks. Too much “queer magic” and I’d get distracted from masturbation by the imminent need to scissor to a Tegan and Sara album. And let’s not even talk about what happened when there was too much catnip…

But the formula is finally exactly right, I’m thrilled to report. When I smear it all over a dildo or a butt plug for a luxurious wank sesh, I know I’m about to have an experience. The first time I tried this final formulation, I had three theatrical orgasms in a candle-rimmed bathtub while intermittently wailing along to Ani DiFranco and giggling like a six-year-old at a birthday party. The next time I tried it, I channelled my inner Rosie the Riveter and got most of my own fist inside me while chanting, “We can do it! We can do it!” The time after that, I squirted so hard I thought I was gonna pass out, and when I looked at the puddle on my bedsheets, I swear to god it was shaped like a unicorn. Hey, don’t ask me, I can’t explain the hows and whys of queer magic.

When I brought Piph Lube to a Tinder hookup’s house and explained what was on offer, he eagerly agreed to give it a shot. Five hours later, we finally collapsed in a heap of glitter and sweat – me scratched up and sated, him wide-eyed and whispering piously about how a communist, matriarchal society would reshape our sexual culture. I gently shushed him, closed his laptop to silence the Crash Pad scene we’d been looping in the background of our romp, and fell into a luxuriant sleep. He told me to tell you this lube “like, absolutely, unironically changes lives, okay?”

The additives are blended together in a base of filtered Portland rainwater, incase you want to “keep your orifices weird,” I guess. I keep wondering what Candace and Toni would think of this lube. They could probably use it to grease the wheels of their rolling book carts, in any case.

Although ingesting too much of any one additive in this lube could fuck you up pretty bad, the lube itself is totally body-safe. And it’s a good thing, too, because I want to use it a lot. Like, all the time. It’s hard not to love a product that makes your vagina feel like it’s flying through the cosmos holding hands with Cher and Prince.

I recommend pairing Piph Lube with a hyper-textured or visually stimulating toy to take full advantage of its sensual effects. Smear some on a heart-shaped butt plug if you just wanna feel more in tune with the love energy of the universe, y’know? Drip some on your BS Is Nice Rainbow dildo if you’re like, “Hey, I’m pretty gay, but I want to feel even gayer today.” Squirt some in your Tenga 3D Spiral if you want your dick to feel like it’s trapped in an Escher painting.

Many thanks to Piph and SheVibe for developing this lube. Now, if you’ll pardon me, I’ll be in my bathtub, crying happy tears, coming too many times, and fucking myself into a sparkly stupor.

Review: The Butters Lubes

Kate Sloan

I’ve never overthought and overanalyzed a lube as much as I did with The Butters. When Peepshow Toys offered to send me jars of The Butters Original and The Butters Raw Honey X Cocoa Butter lubes to try, I said yes, but trepidatiously: I’d never used oil-based lubes like these before. But these got stellar reviews from people I trust, like JoEllen and Lunabelle, so I was curious to give ’em a shot. Here are my thoughts…

Safety and health concerns: It is important to note, right off the bat, that you can’t use oil-based lubes like these with latex condoms, or any other latex barriers (dental dams, gloves, finger cots, and so on). Oils break down latex and compromise the safety of your barriers. However, you can use oil-based lubes with condoms made of lambskin or polyurethane.

I was worried about getting a vaginal infection from these lubes, because I am historically prone to BV and there are mixed opinions about whether oils and honey are vagina-safe. Some people say all oils hang around in the vagina and trap bacteria there; some say only synthetic oils do this, not the plant-based ones used in The Butters. Some say honey inherently contains sugar and is a risk for the forming of botulism spores. I don’t know enough about vaginal health or microbiology to have a damn clue, frankly – so if you know you’re super infection-prone, I would recommend avoiding these lubes.

However, I am infection-prone and haven’t had an issue with them. Vaginas are mysterious. (Or at least, they will be until we have a proper body of scientific research on stuff like this.)

Because these lubes are stored in jars, it’s important to make sure your hands are clean when you dip into them. Otherwise you risk depositing bacteria in the jar which will then breed and multiply. They also don’t contain any preservatives, so they’ll go bad far more quickly than regular lubes, especially if stored in a warm environment (like my poorly ventilated bedroom during a Toronto summer – whoops).

As a lube: The Butters lubes have a glorious texture – whipped and creamy, like buttercream frosting. (Except, you know, safer to put in your vagina.) They’re halfway between liquid and solid, so they stay put better than a typical liquid lube; you don’t have to worry about dripping lube all over yourself while you get a toy nice ‘n’ greasy.

These lubes stay slippery for a looong time; I’ve never had to reapply. As I get more turned on, they intermingle with my vaginal fluids, creating an amplified version of my “girly juice” (!) that tastes, smells, and feels natural. None of those gross lubey chemical flavors here!

These lubes can be a little bit gritty sometimes, in the way that coconut oil is sometimes slightly gritty. For this reason, I wouldn’t necessarily recommend The Butters for anal sex, fisting, or any other activity where an 100% smooth glide is preferred. I don’t mind using these lubes for vaginal penetration and small anal penetration, but once I move onto bigger toys, my butt can detect the ever-so-slight grittiness of The Butters and longs for something slicker and smoother like Sliquid Sassy.

Sometimes I have strange vaginal discharge a few hours after using The Butters – it’s thicker and more opaque than usual, because my natural discharge has mixed with the lube and semi-solidified. This has alarmed me a couple times, as I worried I was getting an infection, but it didn’t smell or taste weird, so I figured I was fine. It’s just something to keep in mind when you use these lubes, so you don’t get freaked out!

As for the difference between the two different types of The Butters I was sent: I don’t notice much of one. The original formula is a little smoother and creamier, while the formula with raw honey feels a little heavier and waxier (perhaps due to the cocoa butter), but not enough to cause a problem. I sliiightly prefer the texture of original, but for the most part, I use them interchangeably.

As a pre-shave treatment: The Butters spreads pretty well – though not as well as my usual pre-shave go-to, regular ol’ coconut oil. I applied a light coating of it to all the body parts I intended to shave (legs, labia, mons, underarms) and then went to town with my Gillette Venus razor. While my skin felt delightfully smooth and moisturized afterward, the razor kept getting clogged with yellowish lube-hair gunk that was hard to clean out.

As a makeup remover: Like many natural oils, The Butters melts away even the most stubborn of waterproof eyeliner and matte lipstick. I would recommend wiping it away afterward, rather than rubbing it in as a face moisturizer, because this lube contains some ingredients that some people find clog pores and/or cause acne.

As a leather conditioner: My go-to leather expert, Peri Plunders, tells me coconut oil (which The Butters contains) is bad for leather. However, the lube’s website specifically advertises its suitability for leather care, and I am a curious reviewer, so I decided to give it a shot. I rubbed a bit of The Butters (original formulation) into a tough spot near the heel of my new-ish Frye engineer boots; it was the only remaining uncomfortable spot on the boots after a couple weeks of break-in time. After applying the lube and rubbing it in, I flexed/bent the area to soften it, and wore the boots with thick socks like I already had been. After a couple more days of wear, the spot softened up, and no longer gives me grief (or blisters). Hooray!

Smell and taste: Some other bloggers have mentioned enjoying the natural, slightly sweet scent of these lubes, but that’s not what I get from them when I whiff ’em; I mostly just smell the sour/tangy apple cider vinegar therein. It’s definitely not as powerful as a straight-up sniff of ACV, but it’s there. Taste-wise, The Butters is milder than it smells – sort of sweet, nutty, and subtle. It certainly tastes better than chemical-y silicone lubes or bitter cheap water-based ones.

Final thoughts: I didn’t think I’d be keen on these lubes, but I find myself reaching for them pretty often, especially when I’m using glass or steel toys. They just feel so silky and luxurious! And I love feeling like I’m being nice to my body by using a natural lubricant rather than one full of chemicals.

At only $10-14 per jar, The Butters are also pretty inexpensive for the high-quality lubes they are. Hooray!

While thick water-based lubes like Sliquid Sassy and Organics Gel will remain my go-to lubes for their greater versatility (especially with regards to latex barriers), I like keeping The Butters around for their luxe feel and hyper-natural appeal. It’s always good to have different options in your lube arsenal!

 

Thanks so much to Peepshow Toys for sending me these lubes in exchange for my honest, unbiased review!

Condoms, Candles & Crystals: My Bedside Table

Kate Sloan

You can tell a lot about a person by looking at their bedside table. It’s where their everyday nighttime necessities are kept. It gives you a glimpse into their private life – or what they want visitors to think about their private life.

Mine right now is pretty indicative of me and my priorities. The table itself isn’t a table at all – it’s a set of drawers in which I store some of my sex toy collection. The top drawer contains my favorite toys, for easy access: the Tango, Double Trouble, S-Curve, Seduction, Mustang, Eroscillator, and a few more.

On top of the drawers, I’ve got my two external hard drives, both primarily full of years’ worth of old photos and videos. I need to have these in an easily-accessible spot, but they’re kind of ugly, so I like hiding them under the other stuff I keep on my nightstand.

Right now I’ve got a copy of Lolita by my bed, because I’m (slowly) re-reading it. I wrote my final high school English paper on it, way back in 2010, and I still love it as much now as I did then. Plus it makes a pretty good – and thematically relevant – impromptu spanking implement!

On top of that, I’ve got my iPad – which, these days, I mostly use for watching porn while masturbating, because I am a modern heathen. And on top of that is a small bottle of BabeLube Natural – a recommendation from Bex when I last visited them in New York and needed to pick up a lube that’d work well for hand stuff and butt stuff with my FWB. I always keep at least one bottle of good-quality water-based lube by my bed. Silicone-based and oil-based lubes are great, too, but water-based can be used with everything, including sex toys and latex barriers, so it’s my evergreen go-to.

Next to that is a Bath and Body Works “Flannel” candle. Admittedly, while I swooned over this scent when I first discovered it in-store, I’m less enamored with it when it’s filling my room. A quick sniff of this candle smells like the deodorant and musk of the handsomest man you’ve ever met; a roomful of it, however, is more like a gaggle of Axe-happy teenage boys in a locker room. I’m looking forward to finishing up this candle and moving on to a gourmand old faithful, like “Twisted Peppermint” or “Salted Vanilla.”

I have another candle on my nightstand, of an entirely different type: it’s a spell candle from Enchantments, the witchy haven in New York’s East Village. Bex bought me this one as a gift the last time I visited them, because they are a gem. I asked the shop’s resident witches to make me a candle that would bring me good luck and greater opportunities in my career, so they whipped this one up for me. It’s very orange and very glittery!

Around the base of the spell candle, I’ve placed a few heart-shaped crystals, because mystical talismans make me happy. There’s rose quartz, carnelian, and tiger’s eye. Rose quartz is the “love crystal,” carnelian is associated with sex and sensuality, and tiger’s eye is said to reduce anxiety – so these are all lovely crystals for me to keep by my bed, as a person who suffers from anxiety and (obviously) loves sex!

Propped up behind all this stuff, I have a framed collage that my friend Cadence made for me. A couple summers ago, we spent a whole day cleaning and organizing my room, and found an old framed photo of me and my ex-boyfriend that he had given me while we were together. I didn’t want to keep the photo but saw no reason to ditch the perfectly-fine frame, so I asked the artistically-minded Cadence to make a collage out of various photos and mementos we’d found around my room. Some of my favorite parts of the collage: a romantic photo of Jeremy and Elsie Larson (they are so #RelationshipGoals; he wrote a whole album of adorable songs about her!), a hand-scrawled note from my friend Eric that says “I LOVE YOU,” and my number tag from the first Crush party I ever went to.

At the moment, I’ve slotted a large print of “The Boss Fight of Nudes” in front of this collage. It makes me laugh every time I look at it. I also have a “Make America Gay Again” postcard from American Apparel displayed there.

Of course, no sexually active person’s bedside table would be complete without safer-sex provisions! I have a cute pink basket covered in roses which I keep well-stocked with condoms. Right now it’s a mix of Kimono Microthins, Crown Skinless Skins, Lifestyles Tuxedos, and One condoms. I love being able to offer partners a wide selection of condoms to choose from – like a good Girl Scout or a sex-positive Martha Stewart!

What’s on your bedside table?

Lube-Savvy Lovers and Slick Sexcapades

Kate Sloan

It’s 2011, I am at a sex shop buying lube for the first time with my first love, and I have no idea what I am even looking at. “Can I help you find anything?” asks the sweetheart of a sales associate. My boyfriend and I both jump at her approach; we’re nervous to even be inside a sex shop, let alone actually buy something. (Yes, kiddos, I am unabashedly sexual today, but in 2011, not so much.)

“Umm, we’re looking for a lube that’ll feel natural and won’t give me an infection,” I manage to squeak, through layers of debilitating shyness.

The shopkeep reaches for a bottle of Blossom Organics and hands it to me, rattling off a shpiel about its natural ingredients and vagina-friendly formulation. Then she leaves me and my boyf to peruse.

We test a little of this mysterious new substance on our hands, and exchange silent, confused glances. At last, my darling murmurs, “I like this one. It feels like your actual vag juices.” I blush, but this time it’s with glee; this soft-hearted moment between us is the most comfortable and least distressed I’ve felt since setting foot in the shop. Because I know that regardless of how much shame I might be feeling, none of it is coming from my boyfriend, and that is what really matters.

We walk up to the cash counter, bottle of lube in hand. “We’ll take this one,” I say, not quite proudly but getting there.

For years, I think of lube as a product for my comfort and pleasure alone, and therefore something I have to specifically request if I want it used. Boyfriends and hookups slide fingers, toys, and cocks into me at my behest, and lube must be applied at my behest too. One partner learns what my “Ouch, I need a little more lube” face looks like, and begins to take it upon himself – but aside from that one perceptive outlier, everyone I bang requires me to be assertive about my own lubrication needs.

I continue thinking of lube this way until, in the winter of 2016, my fave fuckbuddy becomes my fave fuckbuddy, and flips my whole concept of lube on its head with a single comment.

“I want your fingers inside me,” I purr contentedly as he strokes my clit, mid-makeouts, in my big cozy bed.

“You got it,” he replies. “Think you need any lube?”

“Nah, I’m good,” I say. It’s sometimes difficult for me to determine my juiciness level without physically checking, but based on the situation I’m in and the person I’m in it with, it seems likely that I’m soaked.

He kneels between my legs for leverage and pushes two thick fingers into me, finding my A-spot quickly and with ease. I’ve already floated halfway to the heavens when he pauses and says, “Actually, can we use some lube? I want a little more room to move around in here.”

I laugh, having never encountered this request before, and hand him a bottle of Slippery Stuff. The seconds stretch out languidly as I watch him squeeze it onto his fingers and spread it around, coating their full surface. It’s the first time I’ve ever thought of lube as sexy.

He slips his fingers back into me, and I immediately understand what he was talking about. It does feel like he has more room to move around. The slicker environment gives him more freedom for fine movements, fingers building speed in minuscule motions over the exact right spot. He is a manual maestro, a vaginal virtuoso. The sensation reminds me of how much more sensual your own skin feels in a hot bath: the damp granularity of arm hairs, the shiny squeak of wet legs tangling underwater.

I come so hard, I soak his fingers, rendering the lube superfluous. But it was the tool that got us there. The lube he asked for, and the fact that he asked for it.

I regard teaching straight men about lube as a public service I perform. It imbues my sluttiness with noble purpose. Sometimes I daydream that I school all the men of earth on the evils of glycerin and parabens, and in doing so, eradicate a broad percentage of vaginal infections worldwide.

I’ll never forget the crush who, upon getting me naked in his king-size hotel bed, pulled a bottle of lube from his suitcase and said, “It’s no Squillid, but…” Naturally, his mispronunciation of “Sliquid” made me laugh so hard I nearly fell off the bed. The lube he then handed me was chock full of glycerin and propylene glycol, so I passed it back to him and said, “I’m not putting this in my vagina, but I appreciate the gesture.” We spent longer on warm-up before delving into penetration, and it was fine. Perhaps he’s upgraded his lube of choice by now.

I’ll also never forget the night last summer when I told Bex my new boyfriend didn’t own any lube. “WHAT?!” Bex shouted. “We should bring him some! Like, right now!!” They were high, and were therefore perhaps more emphatic about this subject than they would be while sober, but not by much. I brought the boyf a bottle of Sliquid Sassy the next time I saw him, and he put it to good use immediately.

Another day, another night shift at the sex shop. I’m new to the retail scene and trying to soak up as much knowledge from my coworkers as possible. I know a lot about vibrators, dildos, butt plugs, floggers… but about selling these things? Not so much.

Keeping a wide berth so as not to freak out the customer, I listen in on my babely coworker giving a lube pitch. “These lubes are the best ones on the market,” he announces with the utmost confidence, and gestures sweepingly at the Sliquid section. “They’re hypoallergenic, organic, tasteless, and fragrance-free. This one is my favorite.” I watch with scarcely-concealed glee as he picks up the Organics Gel, my all-time fave, my right-hand man, my nightstand essential.

If I could go back in time and tell my 18-year-old self that one day she’d swoon over a dude because of his taste in lube, she’d probably laugh in my face. But it makes perfect sense. Caring about lube is caring about partners’ comfort, health, and pleasure. What could possibly be sexier than that?

 

This post was sponsored by the good folks at Lubezilla, and as always, all writing and opinions are my own!