Anorgasmia

Anorgasmia is a form of sexual dysfunction sometimes classified as a psychiatric disorder in which the patient cannot achieve orgasm, even with "adequate" stimulation. It is an inhibition of the orgasmic phase of the sexual response cycle. For some men the disorder presents itself in terms of an inability to reach orgasm only during sex. In such cases it is often possible for orgasm to be reached but only after prolonged and intense non-intercourse stimulation.

Proposed explanations have included lack of sexual education, strong religious upbringing, lack of strength in the woman’s pubococcygeus muscle, past sexual abuse, impotence or early ejaculation in male partner, and high levels of anxiety associated with sex.

Primary anorgasmia is a condition where one has never experienced an orgasm. This is significantly more common in women, although it can occur in men who lack the gladipudendal
reflexes. Women with this condition can sometimes achieve a relatively low level of sexual excitement and may think of intercourse or other sexual activities as pleasant despite their inability to orgasm. They may get most of their reward from touching, holding, kissing, caressing, attention, and approval. However, women who regularly achieve high levels of sexual response
without orgasmic release of tension may find the experience frustrating. Emotional irritability, restlessness, and pelvic pain or a heavy pelvic sensation may occur because of vascular engorgement.

Women with this condition can sometimes achieve a relatively low level of sexual excitement and may think of intercourse or other sexual activities as pleasant despite their inability to orgasm. They may get most of their reward from touching, holding, kissing, caressing, without orgasmic release of tension may find the experience frustrating. Emotional irritability, restlessness, and pelvic pain or a heavy pelvic sensation may occur because of vascular engorgement.

Women who have not yet had an orgasm usually have some combination of the following:
* Sociocultural inhibitions that interfere with normal sexual response.
* Unresolved feelings towards a traumatic sexual experience as in sexual abuse or rape.
* A lack of knowledge about sex and sexuality, which interferes with normal sexual development.
* A lack of opportunity to practice in a safe, secure, socially acceptable, and a private
atmosphere (only two partaking) in a situation that offers approval and support.
* A partner who has primary or secondary difficulty in achieving an erection.
* Dyspareunia, or painful intercourse.
* Genital mutilation ("female circumcision") that removes part or all of the clitoris, scars the genital area, or constricts the opening to the vagina. Often, vaginal intercourse is painful not only because of scarring from this procedure but also because of associated infection.

Secondary anorgasmia

Secondary anorgasmia is the loss of the ability to have orgasms. The cause may be alcoholism, depression, grief, pelvic surgery or injuries, certain medications, illness, estrogen deprivation associated with menopause or an event that has violated the patient's sexual value system.

Situational anorgasmia

Women who are orgasmic in some situations may not be in others. A woman may have an orgasm from one type of stimulation but not from another. Or a woman may achieve orgasm with one partner but not another, or have an orgasm only under certain conditions or only with a sexual expression.

Doctors believe that a woman with situational anorgasmia should be encouraged to explore alone and with her partner those factors that may affect whether or not she is orgasmic, such as fatigue, emotional concerns, feeling pressured to have sex when she is not interested, or her partner's sexual dysfunction.

Random anorgasmia

Some women are orgasmic but not in enough instances to satisfy their sense of what is appropriate or desirable. Often such women have trouble momentarily giving up control and
allowing themselves to respond fully. Therapy can be aimed at helping them give up the need to keep their sexual feelings under control at all times.

Treatment


Effective treatment for anorgasmia depends on the cause. In the case of a women suffering from psychological sexual trauma or inhibition, psychosexual counselling might be advisable and could be obtained through GP referral.

Women suffering from anorgasmia with no obvious psychological cause would need to be examined by their GP to check for absence of disease. Blood tests would also need to be done to check for other conditions such as diabetes, lack of ovulation, low thyroid function or hormone imbalances. They would then need to be referred to a consultant specialising in female sexual dysfunction. Just as with erectile dysfunction in men lack of sexual function in women may be treated with hormones to correct imbalances, clitoral vacuum pump devices or medication to improve blood flow and sexual sensation.

Zoophilia

Bestiality/Zoophilia

Zoophilia, from the Greek (zṓon, "animal") and (philia, "friendship" or "love"), is a paraphilia, defined as an affinity or sexual attraction by a human to an animal. Such individuals are called zoophiles. Zoophilia consists of feeling for the animal, sexual activity is absent, but there is an exaggerated attachment to the animal from the part of the human. Eg: the human may want to run on all fours or to be buried near to his dog.

It is also termed as bestiality, any sexual relations between a human being and an animal. Although the practice is illegal in most countries, occasional zoophilic encounters are fairly common, especially in rural areas, where 17 percent of U.S. males in the Kinsey report of 1948 acknowledged sexual experience with animals at least once. Sexual contacts between women and animals occur less frequently.

Bestiality involves a human-animal sexual interaction, from which sexual excitement is derived. Bestiality has been long chronicled. It has been assumed that when humans lacked sexual gratification, in the pre-historic area, they searched for a substitute which often turned out to be an animal. This happened due to the lack of intellect on the part of the human beings, who did not notice much difference in animals other then shape, size and degree of threat to their lives.

Bestiality occurs in both men and women, and according to Kinsey 8% of men and 3% of women admitted having sexual encounters with animals. (out of the 8% of men, 50% of men who had been reared on farms had such contacts) Bestiality signifies a sexual act between humans and animals. It does not by itself imply any given motive or attitude. It is not always certain whether acts such as kissing, intimate behavior, frottage (rubbing), masturbation, or oral sex are considered 'bestiality' in all cultures or legal systems, or whether the term implies sexual intercourse or other penetrative activity alone. In a non-zoophilic context, words like bestial or bestiality are also used to signify acting or behaving savagely, animal-like, extremely viciously, or lacking in human values. The spelling beastiality is nonstandard, yet some experts suggest that this terminology might be more appropriate.

The activity or desire itself is no longer classified as a pathology under DSM-IV (TR) unless accompanied by distress or interference with normal functioning on the part of the person. Critics point out that that DSM-IV says nothing about acceptability or the well-being of the animal, and many critics outside the field express views that sexual acts with animals are always either abusive or unethical. Defenders of zoosexuality argue that a human/animal relationship can go far beyond sexuality, and that animals are capable of forming a genuinely loving relationship that can last for years and which is not functionally different from any other love/sex relationship.

Amongst zoophiles and some researchers, the term bestialist has acquired a negative connotation implying a lower concern for animal welfare. This usage originated with the desire by some zoophiles to have a way to distinguish zoophilia as a fully relational outlook (sexual or otherwise), from simple "ownership with sex." Others describe themselves as zoophiles and bestialists in accordance with the dictionary definitions of the words.

Finally, zoosadism refers to the torture or pain of animals for sexual pleasure, and also includes willfully abusive zoosexual activity.

Troilism

Troilism Disorders

Ménage à trois

-(French) a relationship or domestic arrangement in which three people, often a married couple and another lover, share a sexual relationship, although the relationship might or might not involve all three persons having sexual relations with each other. The French phrase literally translates as "household of three".

Troilism is obtaining sexual arousal and gratification by sharing a sexual partner (or close relative) while watching or looking on. A troilist becomes aroused and gratified by the "sharing". It is any form of sexual activity where three people are involved simultaneously. Troilism is a deep desire to have sexual relations in the presence of others. This paraphilia is a distinct form of Scopophilia. Troilists gain their sexual gratification by watching oneself or/and others in sexual scenes. This person takes photos of him/herself engaging in sexual acts, uses video cameras to observe sexual scenes or uses ceiling mirrors.

A paraphilia of the mercantile/venal type in which sexuoerotic arousal and facilitation or attainment of orgasm are responsive to, and dependent upon observing one's partner on hire or loan to a third person while engaging in sexual activitie , including intercourse, with that person. Typically, a husband arranges that his wife has another male partner, so that he can fantasy her in the role of a whore, without which he cannot become aroused.

It is the act of two people performing intercourse while a third watches. A common example is a husband watching his wife have intercourse with another man. This scenario is part of the swinger lifestyle, and varies depending on the participants. Two of the parties are related, such as a married couple. The third party comes from outside the relationship, and can even be a stranger to the couple. Although the couple is usually separated, it is possible for the third party to be the observer.

Like many parts of the swinger lifestyle, there are no set rules for performing troilism. Sometimes the observer pleasures himself, other times he waits for delayed gratification; sometimes he watches from a few feet away, other times he watches in another room through a video camera. Illegal troilisms involve hiring a prostitute for the act, prostituting one member of the couple, one member of the sex act not knowing a third party is watching, and rape or forced participation of any combination of the parties. These illegal acts can often be role-playing scenarios.

Swingers gain sexual gratification by exchanging sexual partners, with another person and looking at the two engaging in sexual act. An estimated 8 million couples experienced this kind of behavior. If two couples are having sexual relations at the same time, it is also considered as Troilism.

A study by Jenks in 1985 shows that swingers and troilists;
-Are aroused by the "sharing"
-Are relatively new in the community
-Have moved often over the past five years.
-Are members of the middle class
-Are conservative in their political views
-Identify little with religion.

Transvestism

"Cross-Dressing"

Cross-dressing by heterosexual males is called transvestic fetishism or transvestitism. The male with this fetish usually has a variety of female clothes that he uses to cross-dress. While some males will wear only one special piece of female apparel, others fully dress as a female and use full facial make-up to achieve a total female appearance. Often this disorder begins in childhood. It tends to be chronic in nature.

Transvestism is the practice of cross-dressing, which is wearing the clothing of the opposite sex. Transvestite refers to a person who cross-dresses; however, the word often as additional connotations

Diagnostic criteria for Transvestism

*Over a period of 6 months, heterosexual male patients have recurrent, intense, sexually arousing fantasies, sexual urges, or behaviors involving cross-dressing.

* The fantasies, sexual urges, or behaviors cause clinically significant distress or impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning.

* Typically, patients derive sexual gratification from wearing clothes usually worn by the opposite sex, and patients typically are heterosexual married males (not a DSM-IV criterion).

Different usages and meanings of the term transvestism.

Some of them contradict each other; the only thing they have in common is

* They describe a behavior of people dressing in clothes of a gender that is different from the gender they were assigned (usually at birth) or the gender they are living in. It does imply some inner motive for cross-dressing, but does not specify this motive.

* They (usually) exclude transvestic fetishism and they usually do not include transsexualism, or transgender people who completely change their gender role.

A number of phenomena are conflated under the general term of transvestitism. There became in the late twentieth century perhaps a clearer distinction than in earlier times between the transsexual — who believes him or herself to have been born into a body of the wrong gender, and may seek surgical and hormonal gender reassignment — and the transvestite, who cross-dresses but does not desire to change his or her physical body.

For some men wearing female clothes is a form of fetishism: the clothes are experienced as sexually arousing; this form of cross-dressing is a specifically sexual act, either leading to masturbation, or being a requirement for successful intercourse. The converse is seldom the case in women. Other (male) transvestites lead a double life as normal heterosexual males, with an alternative identity dressing and passing as women. There are also homosexual transvestites who cross-dress, but in such cases there is often an element of deliberate impersonation and even caricature (‘drag queens’): this can be deployed as a critique of existing gender norms but can also be an expression of misogynistic hostility.

Possible explanations

The influence of social and cultural factors is more marked: cross-cultural research indicates that discomfort with biological gender is more common in societies with rigid expectations about appropriately gendered behaviour. Thus the inability of the accepted male role to incorporate qualities perceived as ‘feminine’ may lead to various forms of identifying with the appurtenances of femininity.

Boys who later become transvestites or transsexuals may manifest ‘feminine’ behavioural characteristics from early childhood. In a significant minority of cases, being cross-dressed as a child by a parent or other relative seems to play a part. What is not clear is why in some cases this ‘feminization’ leads to the development in the adult male of a homosexual identity, in other cases to transvestitism with heterosexual orientation, and in others to full transsexualism.

As with many categories of sexual behaviour, ‘transvestitism’ as a classification is a lumping together of diverse phenomena, not only in the different sexes, but among members of the same sex obeying different biological, social, or psychic imperatives resulting in phenomena which are only apparently similar.

Wet and Messy Fetish

A wet and messy fetish (WAM) is a form of sexual fetishism that has a person getting aroused by substances which are deliberately applied on the body like mud, shaving foam, custard pudding, chocolate sauce, squirty cream, jelly and the likes.

Messy and wet substances can include whipped cream, mud, shaving foam, custard, pudding, chocolate sauce, Japanese-style lotion, paint, oil or gunge/slime, etc. Wet substances are mainly water but can also include other liquids such as fruit juice or milk.

It could also involve wet clothes, or any combination of the above. The arousal occurs when the substance is generously applied to the naked skin, or to the clothes the person is wearing. It also could occur when seeing someone else getting wet and/or messy.

Four Categories of WAM

*Messy - the applying of substances not usually used in this fashion. This may include food, shaving cream and mud. A major subdivison of food play involves striking people with cream pies or cakes in films. This category also includes wrestling in mud, oil or gelatin.

*Wet - The major varieties are of images of people in completely soaked clothing, usually involving full clothing ensembles.

*Quicksand - images of people sinking in quicksand. In drawn images, the stage where female characters sink up to their chests and their breasts are pushed up in response is a favourite.

*Underwater - (Aquaphilia). Involves images of people swimming or posing underwater. Some subsets of this category are underwater fashion (models posing underwater, often while fully clothed), scuba, rubber (people in skin-tight rubber wetsuits), simulated drowning, and underwater sex.

Theories of WAM

*One presented theory is that the feeling of wet and messy substances on the skin is a surrogate for the feeling of touching a partners' skin while having sex.

*Another theory is that getting wet and messy amplifies or exaggerates the feelings of lust. Yet another theory is that seeing another person or yourself getting wet and/or messy is arousing, because it reminds of the natural moistures the body excretes when sexually aroused.

Part of the current awareness of wet and messy fetishism is due to the British fetish magazine Splosh!, which until production recently slowed featured pictures of, and stories about, women in wet and messy situations. This has lead to the word 'Sploshing' being used as a kind of shorthand, especially in mainstream media, for the Wet and Messy fetish. Websites were also created that allow forums and exchange of information showcasing WAM.

Fetishism

Sexual fetishism is the sexual attraction for material and terrestrial objects while in reality the essence of the object is inanimate and sexless. Body parts may also be subject to sexual fetishes in which the preferred body part for the fetishist takes a sexual precedent over the owner. Sexual fetishism may be regarded as a disorder of sexual preference, or as an enhancing element to a relationship. It is the compulsive use of some object, or part of the body, as a stimulus in the course of attaining sexual gratification, as a shoe, a lock of hair, or underclothes. Usually the fetish begins in adolescence and tends to be quite chronic into adult life.

Fetishism is a fixation on an inanimate object or body part that is not primarily sexual in nature, and the compulsive need for its use in order to obtain sexual gratification. The object of a fetish is almost invariably used during masturbation and may also be incorporated into sexual activity with a partner in order to produce sexual excitation. The sexual acts of fetishists are characteristically depersonalized and objectified, even when they involve a partner. The focus of attention is exclusively on the fetish, whereas non-fetishists may at various times make a particular body part or an object part of their general sexual arousal and expression with another person, but not be fixated on it.

Inanimate object fetishes can be categorized into two types:

In a form fetish, it is the object and its shape that are important, such as in the case of high-heeled shoes.

In a media fetish, it is the material out of which the object is made that is important, such as silk or leather. Inanimate object fetishists often collect the object of their favor, and may go to great lengths, including theft, to acquire just the "right" addition for their collection.

Festish Objects

Although the list of objects that fetishists can use for sexual gratification is inexhaustible, among the more common inanimate objects are panties, bras, slips, stockings or panty hose, negligees, shoes, boots and gloves. Common media objects include leather, rubber, silk, or fur.

In some cases drawings or photographs of the fetish object may arouse fetishists, but more commonly the fetishist prefers or requires an object that has already been worn. The worn object does not serve as a symbolic reminder of the former owner, however, because it is the object that the fetishist relates to, not the person attached to it. Sometimes it is a body part, such as hair, feet, legs or buttocks that become fetish objects.

In some cases, the fetishist can become sexually aroused and orgasmic only when the fetish is being used. In other instances, a sexual response may occur without the fetish, but usually at a diminished level. When the fetish object is not present, the fetishist often engineers sexual arousal by fantasizing about it.

Symptoms

*The fantasies, sexual urges, or behaviors cause clinically significant distress or impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning.

*Over a period of at least 6 months, patients have recurrent, intense, sexually arousing fantasies, sexual urges, or behaviors involving nonliving objects.

*Patients do not limit the fetish objects to articles of female clothing used in cross-dressing or to devices designated for the purpose of tactile genital stimulation.

*Patients may have a particular pathological displacement of erotic interest and satisfaction for their entire lives (not a DSM-IV criterion).

Causes

The causes of fetishism are not clearly understood. Some learning theorists believe that it develops from early childhood experiences, in which an object was associated with a particularly powerful form of sexual arousal or gratification.

Other learning theorists would not focus on early childhood, but on later childhood and adolescence and the conditioning associated with masturbation activity. Researchers have shown that in general fetishists have poorly developed social skills, are quite isolated in their lives and have a diminished capacity for establishing intimacy.

Sadomasochism

'S&M'

Sadomasochism is a paraphilia that combines both sadistic and masochistic sexual behavioral patterns. The main characteristic of sadomasochism is the eroticizing of pain. What appears to the outsider to be painful, even very painful, is experienced as somewhat painful but mostly pleasurable and very sexually arousing to the sadomasochist.

The sadist in the sadomasochistic pair is the person who inflicts the pain or punishment; the masochist is the person who submits to the pain, humiliation or control of his or her partner. Sadomasochistic sexual encounters usually occur in the context of scripted scenes that simulate interactions between master or mistress and slave, employer and servant-maid, teacher and student, owner and horse or dog, and parent and child.

Sadomasochists may wear black leather or rubber attire. Some gay males and heterosexuals engage in a genre of sadomasochism known as "leathersex", wearing key chains or colored handkerchiefs symbolizing the role being played. Wearing keys on the left side indicates that the individual is a sadist; on the right indicates that he or she prefers the role of masochist.

Sadomasochists tend to alternate between the masochistic and sadistic roles. In milder form, without overt cruelty or bodily punishment, dominance and submissive behaviors may be found in many relationships, or may be an element of fantasy life.

Although sadomasochistic acts in their extreme forms can be physically and psychologically dangerous, the majority of people engaging in these behaviors do so with an understanding of the risks and stay within carefully predetermined limits.

Sadomasochism seems to be in fashion these days. Paperbacks on brutal passions involving pain, physical restraint and servitude are published in large numbers. Sex shops have tons of sex toys and gear for inflicting pain. The web sites destined for the lost and brokenhearted are rife with announcements posted by submissives looking for dominants and vice versa.

Being involved in dominant/submissive relationships on a regular basis is often referred to as being “in the lifestyle.” It would be wrong to imagine a lifestyler as a submissive person handcuffed to a radiator, someone who is continually humiliated by a dominant. In actuality, the above practices fall under the category of roleplaying. The partners who are “in the lifestyle” may resemble a somewhat old-fashioned couple of like-minded individuals.

Terminologies

- B&D is Bondage and Domination involving physical constraint, tying, role plays, servitude, humiliation and punishment;

- D&S is Dominance and Submission involves non-play dominant/submissive behavior that exceeds the limits of “sensation play”. The partners usually agree on a dominant/submissive pattern prior to engaging in such an activity.

- S&M means Sadism and Masochism i.e. practices in which physical pain is inflicted for mutual enjoyment.

- Vanilla, derivative from “vanilla ice cream, is a term used for referring to anything unrelated to BDSM e.g. vanilla man, vanilla relationship, vanilla sex etc.

- The emphasis on informed consent and safety is known as SSC (safe, sane and consensual), though others prefer the term RACK (Risk-Aware Consensual Kink), believing that it places more emphasis on acknowledging the fact that all activities are potentially risky.

- In BDSM, a top is a partner who takes the role of giver in such acts as bondage, flogging, humiliation, or servitude. The top performs acts such as these upon the bottom, who is the person receiving for the duration of a scene. Although it is easy to assume that a top is dominant and a bottom is submissive, it is not necessarily so.

Switching stands for playing both dominant and submissive roles, either during a single scene or taking on different roles at different occasions with different partners. A switch will be the top on some occasions and the bottom on other occasions.

Case

Sadomasochism Bondage Death in Massachusetts Raises Legal Questions

Thursday, October 11, 2007 Fox News

LYNN, Mass. — Adrian Exley was wrapped tightly in heavy plastic, then bound with duct tape. A leather hood was put over his head with a thin plastic straw inserted so that he could breathe, and he was shut up in a closet.

That, apparently, was the way Exley liked it. But the way it ended — with Exley suffocating — was not what he had in mind when he traveled from Britain for a bondage session with a man he had met through a sadomasochism Web site.

Exley's body was discovered in the woods last year, two months after he was bound up in the bondage "playroom" Gary LeBlanc had built in the basement of his suburban Boston home. LeBlanc, a 48-year-old Gulf Oil sales executive, detailed his responsibility in the fatal bondage session in a five-page suicide note, just before he put a gun to his head and killed himself.

Now the question is: Since Exley consented to the sex play, can LeBlanc be held responsible for his death?

Exley's family is suing LeBlanc's estate for unspecified damages, claiming wrongful death. Many bondage enthusiasts are watching the case closely, seeing it as lesson in where to draw the line of responsibility on consensual but dangerous sex.

Exley and LeBlanc met through an online forum for gay men into rubber, leather and bondage. Exley, a 32-year-old stripper, used the screen name "Studpup," while LeBlanc called himself "Rubrman" and built a chamber with rubber mats on the floors and walls, chains, leather restraints, rubber suits and a hospital gurney.

Exley arrived at LeBlanc's house in Lynn in April 2006 after the pair had exchanged e-mails in which they discussed plans for LeBlanc to play the "master" and Exley his "slave," according to the lawsuit.

John Andrews, a lawyer for LeBlanc's estate, said Exley knew the risks going in. "What occurred was an act or actions between two consenting adults, both of whom knew what they were doing, and it had a tragic end," he said.

The lawsuit describes a three-day bondage and discipline session that ended when a third man, Scott Vincent, discovered Exley was not breathing. Exley had been put in a closet while bound in plastic up to his neck and left alone for several hours, according to the lawsuit.

In his suicide note, LeBlanc admitted that Exley at one point had trouble breathing. But he said that after "cooling him down," Exley improved. LeBlanc said that he went to sleep about 3 a.m. but was woken up a few hours later by Vincent, who told him Exley was not breathing and was turning blue and cold.

LeBlanc said he panicked, and he and Vincent drove to Rhode Island, where they buried the body and threw away Exley's clothing and identification.

The Rhode Island medical examiner determined that Exley suffocated. Vincent said in a sworn statement that the straw had fallen out of his mouth in the closet.

"The law says if a person causes the death of another person by an act which is either negligent or reckless, that person is liable," Cook said. "You have a duty to behave reasonably. I think it's the same thing here, albeit a very strange set of facts."

It was Exley's mother, Maggie Horner, who decided to sue LeBlanc's estate.

"We decided that we didn't want Gary's last wishes being granted when Adrian's couldn't be," she said. "Why should Gary be able to kill my son, bury my son, shoot himself and still get his own way?"