RETURN TO FAQ CONTENTSDo some women ejaculate when they have an orgasm?
Welcome to the debate: it's been going on for centuries. When a woman becomes excited, the walls of the vagina secrete a fluid--it is the first sign of
coital readiness. Kinsey, confronting the female-ejaculation question,
concluded that "muscular contractions of the vagina following orgasm may
squeeze out some of the genital secretions and in a few cases eject them with some force. This is frequently referred to, particularly in the deliberately
erotic literature, as an ejaculation in the female, but the term cannot be
strictly used in that connection." Havelock Ellis, years earlier, found that
some women become so excited during gynecological examinations that they produced an ejaculation of fluid "sometimes described as being emitted in a jet which is thrown to a distance." (Next thing you know, they'll be able to write their names in the snow.) The German physician E. Grafenberg noted that cases of involuntary expulsion of urine sometimes accompanied orgasm, but in the cases he observed, the fluid was examined and "it had no urinary character." (Many researchers believe that female ejaculate is caused by stimulation of a G spot--"G" being short for Grafenberg--a small, bean-shaped mass of nerve tissue reputedly located about halfway between the back of the pubic bone and the tip of the cervix. However, other medical experts doubt the G spot actually exists, or is present in every woman.) Fifteen years ago, in The Journal of Sex Research, J.L. Sevely and J.W. Bennett reviewed all of the literature on female ejaculation from Aristotle to Masters and Johnson. They concluded that the female possesses glands similar to the male prostate (the male prostrate secretes the fluid that constitutes much of the male ejaculate). The female prostate glands are located near the opening of the urethra and apparently produce a fluid during intercourse. In most cases, this fluid mingles with normal lubricating fluids, but apparently in some women, it is more pronounced. The authors conclude that the subject needs more research. We agree. Dr. Watson, fetch your flashlight and magnifying glass.
There may be another solution. Two researchers in Nebraska studied 281 women who were unable to experience orgasm during intercourse and found that they had poor vaginal muscles--specifically, the pubococcygeus muscle, the one a woman clenches to control urination. The pubococcygeus muscle does not receive a lot of exercise in the normal state of affairs. Isometrics (contracting the muscle for ten seconds at a time, several times a day) may remedy the problem. There's no explanation for the relation between fitness and fun, but if it gets results, who cares?
RETURN TO FAQ CONTENTSHow can I help my girlfriend have an orgasm during intercourse?
Many women have difficulty climaxing during intercourse because of a lack of sufficient clitoral stimulation. (Several studies have reported that only 30 to
45 percent of women regularly climax during coitus.) The recommended cure for lack of orgasm is simple: self-help. Your girlfriend should teach herself to
climax--via vibrators, or shower massage units or her own hand. Then she should take that knowledge to bed with her. Dr. Mary Jane Gray, writing in Medical Aspects of Human Sexuality, reports that "apart from matters of technique, orgasm requires the trust which allows a complete loss of control. It may be that such loss of control is too much for a particular woman and that she pulls back from impending orgasm. She needs to recognize that the genital sensations of pleasure and pain can be very close together and learn to relax into them rather than to analyze them."