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My Favorite Sex Toys For Phone Sex

Kate Sloan

It’s funny how you can be a sex writer for 6+ years and still have so much to learn about so many areas of sex. It’s part of what drew me to this career in the first place: the sense of sexuality as a limitless space, stretching outward forever in all directions, ready to be explored.

One such untapped area for me, until recently, was phone sex. I never knew how much I could enjoy it until I started dating an eloquent, golden-voiced boy… who lives 500 miles away from me. Turns out that when the right conditions are in place, wow, I really like phone sex!

Over time, my partner and I have developed our own phone-sex patterns, rhythms, and techniques. It’s like having a palette of paint colors: you tend to lean hard on your favorites, but there are always other options to experiment with.

Today I’m particularly thinking about the ways we incorporate sex toys into our phone sex. Before I started dating this boy, I never gave much thought to how particular toys sounded, or how they made me sound. But after just a few weeks of frequent phone sex with this brilliant nerd, he started requesting (or demanding) certain toys. Sometimes I’d ask him, “Why that one?” and usually his answer would be, “I like how it makes you sound.” Um, let’s just say that this level of specificity really jives well with my “you knowing exactly how to get me off” kink…

Here are some of our fave toys for phone sex, and why they work so well in that context…

The Magic Wand Rechargeable is an unshakeable classic, a constant companion. When my partner teases me for a long time, not letting me touch my clit at all, it’s often the Magic Wand I eventually beg for. Its four speeds just jive with what my body craves at different levels of arousal, and it can always, always get me off.

One thing I treasure about the Magic Wand is that its simplicity and reliability allow me to take my focus off my clit and concentrate on other things: my partner’s voice, the dildo in my cunt, the plug in my ass, whatever. I need clit stimulation to get off but I don’t always want it to be my main focus, particularly if I’m trying to fantasize about, say, getting fucked or sucking cock or taking a spanking. It may seem weird to describe a vibe as big and bulky as the Magic Wand as unobtrusive, but somehow, it is, and that’s why I like it.

Sir says: “The Magic Wand sounds really, really good over the phone. Something about the frequencies of that vibrator make it audible even when it’s far away from the handset. The different speeds are audible too – when you turn it up, it’s obvious to me, and that’s nice. I usually choose it for you because it’s one of your faves so it’s always charged and it’s usually nearby, which is convenient. And it makes you come really hard.”

The Njoy Pure Wand is the most intensely targeted G-spot toy I’ve ever tried. There is simply nothing else like it. So I can only assume the sounds that come out of my mouth when I use it are also not quite like my sounds with any other toy.

See, G-spot sensations aren’t always my favorite. Unlike floaty clitoral pleasure or deep, rhythmic A-spot stimulation, the feeling of my G-spot being touched can be almost uncomfortably intense for me. It can knock the breath out of me, overwhelming me, overriding my control of my own body. But of course, my boyfriend is a dominant-leaning sadist, so sometimes that’s exactly what he wants. And I always take what he gives me, because I’m a very, very good girl.

Sir says: “Sometimes I’m thinking about your body, and I’m thinking about what parts of you I want to stimulate, and sometimes, just based on your voice and which parts of you I’ve stimulated recently and what I know about you, I decide that it’s a G-spotty day, even though you’re an A-spotty girl and typically you want that deep thrusting. Sometimes I want a G-spotty toy for you but I don’t want a big challenge, a big thick guy; I want something that’ll slip into you easily and really G-spot it up. So that’s the Pure Wand. It’s also really pretty, and versatile, and easy to handle, and it makes you make good high moany sounds.”

The VixSkin Mustang is one of the most realistic toys in my collection. When I put it in my mouth, my salivary glands kick into gear like there’s a real dick in their midst. My tongue and lips adore this toy when I’m feelin’ like a beej queen, and when it hits the back of my throat, I get all subspacey just like I do when a partner face-fucks me.

Used in more traditional ways (i.e. in my vag), this is also a highly effective dildo: satisfyingly G-spotty and pleasantly squishy. But it’s not quite as big as I tend to prefer these days, so I’ll often switch to something girthier if I intend to get off that way.

Sir says: “I choose this one when I miss you a lot. The Mustang – or any realistic dildo, really – is for when I miss you so blindingly much that I want my literal cock inside you, in any of your holes, immediately, and I can’t have that, so a realistic dildo is the closest I can get to that. I also like watching you blow it on video; it’s very very good. I can get into a BJ-receiving headspace watching that very easily, which is very fucking good. It’s dual-density and I like the way you sound when you squeeze your cunt muscles on that toy specifically. It’s like a Casper mattress, you know? Just the right sink, just the right bounce. I can hear a little bit of springiness in the squeeze – I know you so well that I know what it sounds like when you contract your muscles and when you release them, and with the Mustang, there’s a little something extra on the release that’s very enjoyable to hear.”

You can’t write about long-distance sexytimes without mentioning the We-Vibe Sync, or another toy that uses We-Vibe’s proprietary We-Connect app. I always feel like I am truly Living In The Future when a partner controls my vibrator from a whole other country. The app even has built-in text and voice chat features, so it can be your one-stop shop for interactive telecommunicative pleasure.

There is nothing quite like tapping a button on your phone screen and hearing your partner moan or yelp in response, hundreds of miles away. Oh, technology, you astonishing minx.

Sir says: “We haven’t used this one recently or very much, but we should, ’cause it’s really fun! I liked hearing you while I was diddling with the app on my phone, and it stayed connected pretty much the whole time; it was reliable. It’s cool that you can control the two different motors individually. I like that a lot; it gives me some control feelings. I don’t know if it’s enough to get you off by itself; I think it’s a better appetizer than it is an entrée. An aperitif, if you will.”

The Aneros Helix Syn isn’t the exact model of Aneros my partner owns, but the differences between models are pretty subtle. I like listening to him getting off any which way, but his sounds undeniably shift into high gear when there’s a prostate toy involved.

It makes me flash back to times I’ve blown him while working a toy back and forth against his prostate, bringing forth these intensely satisfying moans and shouts. *romantic sigh*

Sir says: “This type of toy, depending on my mood and our dynamic, makes me either super subby or super dommy. It pushes me toward one end of the power spectrum, which is weird. I don’t exactly know why. It either makes me feel like you are fucking me and taking control and I just wanna be a subby good boy and take it and be good and come when you tell me to, or it’s like I’m so powerful and sexual that I can be getting fucked and fucking you at the same time and I’ll just take what I want and as much as I want. So I think I can interpret it either of those ways as a switch, I guess.”

What toys do you like using when you have phone sex? What makes them ideal for that purpose?

 

This post was sponsored by the lovely folks at Friction! They’re one of the companies helping me get to the Woodhull Sexual Freedom Summit this year. Check out their excellent selection of high-quality sex toys!

Pigtails and the Patriarchy: Where Sex Meets Style

Kate Sloan

What does it mean to “get dressed up for sex”?

This question hits me right at the intersection of my sex-nerdiness and my femme proclivities. It fascinates me. Because, as with so many things sex-related, the answer is different for everyone. What makes me feel slinky and seductive might make you feel clunky and ugly, and vice versa. You have to wear what makes you feel sexy – and that information can’t be found in any fashion magazine or advice column. It has to come from within yourself.

Sex and presentation are inextricably linked for many people – sometimes in insidious and not-altogether-healthy ways. Where is the line between celebrities being photoshopped to look like realistic sex dolls in magazines because the patriarchy demands it, and a kinkster consensually pursuing that look as part of a “bimbofication” fantasy? Where is the line between shaving your legs because you feel shamed into it, and doing it because having smooth legs turns you on? Where is the line between hobbling around in high heels because it’s “the proper thing to do,” and slipping into those pumps because the way they change your posture makes you feel like a subby minx?

As with most things kinky, the line between right and wrong here is simply consent, agency, and desire. If you’ve got those things, you’re good. Fly free and do you.

Of course, there are those who are quick to point out that our own tastes and desires are influenced by society, and that this makes our choices less “free,” in a sense. True, smooth-shaved armpits and impeccable eyeliner probably wouldn’t make me feel drop-dead gorgeous if not for patriarchal society and its many enforcers. But the patriarchy is so draining, such a source of despair for so many, that I say we might as well take our little joys from it where we can. There is a silver lining to almost everything, no matter how small, and it sucks that the cloud exists, but I’m gonna cling to that silver lining, dammit.

It used to vex me that I craved knowing partners’ aesthetic preferences. Were they more into butts or boobs? Did they like faceplanting in a smooth vulva or a full bush? Did they prefer me in strappy sandals or stompy boots? It bothered me that I cared so much, until I realized it was a kink thing for me. I’ve learned through trial and error that what I really need is a partner who doesn’t require me to adhere to their standards – because of course, “requiring” that type of thing from anyone is, at best, shitty, and at worst, abuse – but who will nonetheless tell me their preferences when asked. I like surprising partners by showing up looking the way they like me best, especially if I’m submissive to them in our dynamic. It’s a form of service, and I feel super smart and accomplished when I get it right.

It’s worth noting, too, that this is often a two-way street in balanced relationships. It delights me when partners take note of which presentation choices make me swoon – rolled-up sleeves, subtle cologne, shirts that bring out the color of their eyes – and show up to our dates having optimized their ensemble to woo me. My current boyfriend knows oral sex feels better for me when his face is smooth, and I’ll never forget the delicious anticipation I felt lounging in a hotel bed once while he shaved his face in the bathroom. I knew good things were coming.

Clothing, makeup, hairstyling, and perfume can all help me access certain headspaces that are useful for kink. Pigtails, pink lipstick, short skirts, and thigh-high socks are often my go-to when I want to feel submissive; they bring out my inner slutty schoolgirl. When I want to feel more dominant, I’ll often wear leather boots and a decisive, dark-colored outfit that lends me some strength. These cues remind my body and mind of what I’m about to do, and help me feel sexier while I’m doing it.

In a world which tells us all – especially women and femmes – that we have to look a certain way in order to be desirable and thus valuable, it’s refreshing to make aesthetic choices consciously, rather than feeling forced into them. Whether I’m rebelling against patriarchal expectations or deliberately playing into them, I feel strong and sexy knowing the choice was mine.

And then there are times when I abandon aesthetic trappings altogether, good sex having rendered me a sweaty, naked, makeupless heap. Those times are lovely, too.

Bonus: if you’re interested in figuring out which aesthetics make you feel sexiest, here are some questions you can ponder and/or journal about!

  1. Which celebrities, fictional characters, and people from your real life have an aesthetic you admire? What do you like about it?
  2. What types of clothing, makeup, hair, etc. show up a lot in your favorite erotic media (porn, erotica, fanfiction, whatever you’re into)? Do you find those choices sexy? Why or why not?
  3. What do you wear and what do you look like in your sexual fantasies? Would you want to dress/look that way in real life?
  4. What aesthetic elements are commonly associated with your sexuality and/or kinks (e.g. leather, pigtails, tight pants, high heels)? Do you identify with those elements, or not? Why?
  5. What clothing and other aesthetic elements make you feel really sexy when you’re by yourself? Why?
  6. What clothing and other aesthetic elements make you feel really sexy when you’re with a partner? Why?
  7. What kinds of things do you typically wear when you go on an exciting date? Why?
  8. In the past, have partners asked or told you to wear certain things or style yourself in certain ways for them? How did you feel about that?
  9. Which parts of your aesthetic are you okay with your partners having some influence over, and which do you want to be your decision alone? (It’s completely okay if you want to make all your own aesthetic decisions, even if you’re submissive!)
  10. If you could encapsulate your ideal “sex aesthetic” in 5 words, what would those words be? (I think mine would be: feminine, playful, retro, glamorous, and comfortable!)

 

Thank you to OVDolls for sponsoring this post! As always, all writing and opinions are my own.

How to Prepare For a Spanking

Kate Sloan

A surprisingly frequent search term people use to find my website is “how to prepare for a spanking.” At first, I found this confusing – what’s to prepare? Just drop trou and you’re good to go! – but the more I thought about it, the more I realized how inaccurate and unhelpful that perspective is. When I’m nervous about an upcoming activity on my docket, sexual or otherwise, often my first line of defense is to google it – and even if I glean no new information from the results, the research itself calms my nerves. Doing my due diligence has never done me wrong.

Here, then, are some tips from me to you on how to prepare for your next spanking, whether it’s your first foray into impact play or your thousandth…

Make sure you actually want to be spanked. Hey: it’s okay if you don’t. Spanking is sometimes discussed as a foregone conclusion in kink spaces, as if every kinkster is into it, but that isn’t the case! You don’t have to get spanked just because you’re playing with someone who likes doling out impact, or you’re going to a play party where spanking is de rigueur, or you liked being spanked by this play partner on a previous occasion so you feel obligated to like it again. Want it, or skip it!

Communicate with your play partner. Here is an abridged list of questions the two of you should ideally discuss before you play. How long do you want the session to last (if you know)? Are there any time constraints your partner should know about (e.g. do you have to pick up your kids later? get to work tomorrow morning?)? What are your reasons for seeking and enjoying pain (e.g. pain as a punishment, as a reward, as a feat of endurance)? What do your face and body tend to do when you’re enjoying yourself? When you’re not enjoying yourself? What are your safewords and/or safe-signals? Do you have other preferred systems for mid-scene check-ins? Is it okay to leave marks? Where do you want to be hit? How much pain can you generally take? Do you like rhythmic pain, or do you prefer it more erratic? What names can your partner call you during the spanking, if any, and which should they avoid? Do you have any medical conditions your partner should know about? Is sexual touching okay? What other sex or kink activities will be involved in the scene? Hammering out all these details can help you relax into the spanking.

Prep your butt. Like all forms of sexual grooming, this will vary a lot based on personal preference. I feel my best during a spanking if I take the time in advance to shave, exfoliate, and moisturize my ass – though, of course, some spankings are too impromptu to allow for this. Taking a fragrant bath can also help you relax, so you’ll sink into a compliant, submissive headspace more easily. Depending on your dynamic with your play partner, they may enjoy rubbing some massage oil into your skin to help relax you even further.

Wear something you feel cute in. Cute underwear is a vital part of my spanking wardrobe, so to speak. Thigh-high stockings are super sexy and make a great frame for your butt. Wear whatever makes you feel hot and provides ample access to the areas you want your partner to hit – whether that’s a fetishistic backless latex spanking skirt, a pair of tight jeans that can be yanked down to your knees, or nothing but your collar. Certain hairstyles or perfumes may also help put you in a good headspace to enjoy the spanking (e.g. I feel super submissive in braided pigtails).

Get your implements ready. There can be a ritualistic joy to laying out your impact tools of choice for the evening: choosing them carefully and arranging them just so. You may want to take it further by, for example, cleaning your leather paddle with saddle soap and treating it with mink oil until it shines, or carefully untangling the falls of your flogger.

Prepare your space. Lay down a blanket where you plan to kneel, for example. Clean your room. Burn some incense. Pull the drapes. Put on some music. Ponder what décor and other trappings would help put you into the headspace you’re hoping to achieve with the spanking, and put as much of it into action as you can.

After all that is done, you should be able to relax into the spanking itself, and enjoy the pain for all it’s worth!

How do you like to prep for an impact play scene?

 

This post was graciously sponsored by the good folks at SheVibe, one of the companies helping me get to this year’s Woodhull Sexual Freedom Summit. Check out their selection of impact toys! As always, all writing and opinions in this post are my own.

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.

What Makes Bad Sex So Bad?

Kate Sloan

I’ve been a sex nerd for a long, long time, y’all. One of the ways this manifested early in my life was subscribing to the Bad_Sex community on LiveJournal.

At the time, I didn’t give much critical thought to why these stories fascinated me so much. But in retrospect, I think they gave me a sense of perspective about sex that I was missing at that time, as a naive virgin whose main understanding of sex came from flowery erotica stories and slick MMORPG cybersex. When the sex media you consume is all smooth ‘n’ hot, it’s easy to overlook how often real-life sex is boring, confusing, unsatisfying, or straight-up bad.

Let me be clear here: I am not talking about sex that’s bad from a consent perspective, i.e. rape, coerced sex, and so on. That is a whole other kettle of fish, obviously hugely problematic in different ways and for different reasons. I am talking about sex where consent is freely and mutually given, that turns out to be bad due to other factors. It happens, and I think we don’t talk about it enough, leaving the young or inexperienced among us with unrealistic expectations of sex as effortlessly perfect and magical.

So I was excited when Lily Wilson reached out to me to tell me about her new book, In the Glow of the Lavalamp: Stories of Bad Sex and Other Misfortunes. It’s a series of short, funny bad-sex tales. Flipping through Lily’s book inspired me to reflect on some of my own memories of bad sex…

The first time I ever had penetrative sex was a mess. Me and a cute lesbian FWB decided our foreplay should be scissoring, since that’s, I guess, the quintessential girl-on-girl act. (Or at least, it was, in the minds of two 16-year-old baby queers who watched too much The L Word.) She’d just purchased some blueberry cheesecake-flavored lube and, having never used lube before, decided one full handful each was the proper amount. We anointed our vulvas with this sticky elixir and then rubbed them together until our muscles ached and the slippery squelching sounds made us giggle so profusely we had to stop.

Next we attempted the centerpiece of our evening: strap-on sex. She suited up in her new harness and slipped a smallish grey silicone dildo through the O-ring. We tried one position, and then another, and another, but no matter what we tried, we couldn’t figure out how to get the dildo into me without hurting me. I’d already used a bigger dildo on myself plenty of times so the hymen hypothesis didn’t check out; it was seemingly an issue of angle and awkwardness.

Finally, we settled on the “cowgirl” position: me on top, astride my pal. I ground down against her for many minutes, looking for an angle that would give me any pleasure whatsoever, but I couldn’t find one. She seemed to be enjoying it, though, so I kept at it… for half an hour. We bucked and writhed in near-silence, just breathing and grunting and sweating. So much sweating. I literally dripped sweat onto her. I felt disgusting. But I couldn’t stop, because she was… into it? Maybe? I couldn’t tell.

When I finally collapsed in exhaustion beside her, I asked, “Did you come?” and she replied, totally mystified, “No. Did you?” Of course, I hadn’t. And the window for any further pleasure had closed, both of us being too overexerted to move, let alone get each other off. We fell into a deep, unsatisfied slumber, in a puddle of sweat, saccharine lube, and bemused disappointment.

The last truly bad sex I had happened last summer, 5 days after a breakup, which should’ve been my first clue it was ill-advised. A beardy Tinder bro talked my ear off at a bar for an hour about his career ambitions, his creative vocations, places he’d been, girls he’d fucked. He mocked the food I ordered, expressed zero sympathy when I mentioned I’d just been through a difficult split, and asked me literally nothing about myself.

And yet, somehow, I decided to go back to his apartment with him. I am not proud.

We smoked weed in his humid attic apartment and launched into messy makeouts, no romance or pretense whatsoever. He awkwardly tried to pin me down because I’d mentioned being submissive, but it felt hollow, perhaps because I’d dated an ardently dominant kinkster so recently and was still sad about it. He went down on me and unleashed a pointy, flicky tongue on my hypersensitive clit, causing me to squirm away and offer breathy suggestions like, “Can you do that slower and softer?” or “Can you focus on the side of my clit instead of right on it?” but he seemed confused by these directives and just kept at it.

After a few more minutes of this, I gave up and tried to transition things into good ol’-fashioned fucking, but neither of us seemed that enthused about his dick being inside me. Finally, he finished himself off on my chest and belly while we kissed. As we laid there in the smoky darkness afterward, he asked, “Did you come?” and I narrowly resisted the urge to exclaim, “LOL, nah, bro.”

Unsurprisingly, what both these bad-sex stories have in common is a lack of assertiveness and communication. There are good reasons for that: the culture we live in encourages us to keep quiet about sex, and also encourages female and feminine folks, in particular, to downplay our needs and focus on making other people happy. I don’t regret these experiences, and my other forays into bad sex, because I’ve learned a lot from every one of those encounters – but I like to think I’d be better at avoiding situations like these nowadays.

Alana Massey once wrote, in an essay about bad first dates, “This life is short and wild and precious, and people are spending way too much time on first dates that they need to skedaddle on out of as soon as they know things are heading south.” I think this sentiment applies to bad sex, too – though leaving any romantic or sexual interaction midway through is, obviously, easier said than done.

Bonus: here’s an interview I did with Lily Wilson, the author of In the Glow of the Lavalamp: Stories of Bad Sex and Other Misfortunes!

Kate Sloan: What made you want to write a book about bad sex?

Lily Wilson: I’d written a story about an incident that was hilariously bad. When I shared it, people began coming out of the woodwork saying, “OH! You won’t believe what happened to me!” They’d tell me their own stories. Many of these were funny. Bad sex happens more frequently than most people imagine; in fact, there’s a universal aspect to it. But we don’t often talk about it. An activity that involves so many complex interactions, so many things that can’t be controlled, is bound to go wrong some of the time. I began to collect the stories and get permission to write them down. They aren’t always funny, but I do love the humor – that’s what makes the disasters bearable.

KS: Assuming we’re talking about sex that is consensual and not coerced, what makes sex “bad”?

LW: Two categories of things can make it bad: 1) stuff that is out of the control of either participant, and 2) choices the participants make. Category One includes things like disasters: the roof falling in on top of you, a giant rat pouncing on the bed… Also in this category would be like illness, accidents, interruptions, that sort of thing. These stories are usually funny, at least in retrospect.

Category Two is more complicated; it covers choices the participants make. Mismatched desires and expectations are behind a lot of bad sex. If both people are not honest about what they want, there’s a strong possibility the sex will be lousy. If person A wants roleplaying, costumes, and trapezes, and person B wants something more basic, and either person fails to communicate, this is not going to go well, probably for either of them. Sometimes people want connection so badly they stifle their needs and desires and attempt to settle for whatever is on offer. Like, OK, I will do y and z, and hope that I can at least have a minute or two of j and k. This approach generally does not produce a happy ending.

Category Two also includes the degree to which each partner cares about the experience of the other. Most of us have been with someone who was completely oblivious to or unconcerned with how the sex was for us… It is very difficult to have a good experience with such a person.

KS: What’s your #1 piece of advice for avoiding bad sex?

LW: Communicate! Make sure your expectations are compatible. Two people don’t have to want exactly the same thing, but it’s important that your expectations don’t nullify theirs, and their expectations don’t make yours impossible to fulfill. Make sure your partner cares about how the experience is for you. That sounds almost too basic to bother stating it, but there are an astounding number of people in the world who seem to be unaware of/uninterested in what their partner experiences. You get to say “No, thank you” to such people.

Thanks so much to Lily for doing this interview and for writing such an interesting book! You can buy it on Kobo or check it out on Amazon here.

Heads up: this post was sponsored, and as always, all opinions and writing (save for Lily’s answers to my questions) are my own.