Guest Post by Rebecca Reid @RebeccaCNReid
As a society, we talk a lot about the first time that we have sex. But despite our evergreen interest in how we started having sex with another person, we seem to skip out stories of how we discovered pleasure on our own terms.
Learning to masturbate is just as important an experience as starting to have sex – arguably even more so, given that masturbation provides the building blocks for good sex with other people. In fact, we should talk a lot more about our first orgasms and a lot less about our first experience of penetration.
For many women, the first time they orgasm will coincide with the first time they use a vibrator.
The first time I used a vibrator was with my boyfriend. I was 18 and while I could orgasm alone I couldn’t do so with him.
When he tried to make me come I felt guilty for taking too long, scared he was getting bored and of course those (unfounded) worries made me take longer. When he introduced a vibrator to our sex life everything changed.
I no longer worried about him getting tired or bored because he wasn’t doing all the work. I felt liberated – able to relax enough to orgasm. As soon as I realised I could orgasm with a vibrator, I became able to do so from oral sex as well. It wouldn’t be over stating the matter to say that vibrators changed my life.
Convinced that I couldn’t be the only woman whose whole sex life was revolutionised by vibrations, I sought out other women who also had their lives changed by using a vibrator.
Kate, 22, Brighton
I saw an episode of Sex and the City where they were talking about vibrators as if everyone had one, so I used my card to order one online. I was terrified because I thought my parents might see the package and know it was a sex toy. When it arrived I was really nervous to use it. It was incredibly exciting, even though the toy – a small pink bullet – was quite bad quality.
I had been having sex with my boyfriend for two years when I bought my vibrator and had never had an orgasm. I used it once and came very quickly. It was a big relief when I realised that it was the sex we’d been having which was the problem – not my body. I had assumed I could not orgasm and never would. If it hadn’t been for that toy I might have just accepted that.
Now I still use a bullet (though a more high-tech one) during sex with partners to ensure that I can orgasm.
Rosa, 37, London
I’m ashamed to admit that I was in my mid-thirties when I first bought a vibrator. My friends were talking about theirs at the pub one night and couldn’t believe that I hadn’t ever tried one.
Since having children I’ve had some emotional and mental issues around sexual pleasure following a traumatic birth. I wanted to have sex with my husband but didn’t feel able to.
I started with the Rabbit style because it was the one I’d heard of, but I didn’t get on with it – the shape didn’t suit my body. I thought maybe I just wasn’t the type to be able to use one, but my friends encouraged me to try other styles and eventually I found one that I love.
Before a vibrator changed my life it had been five years since I’d had sex with my husband. It has genuinely altered our marriage for the better.
Gail, 31, London
My vibrator changed my life by helping me to come out as gay. That might sound weird – but it really did.
I had been having totally decent sex with my boyfriend for ten years. He was great, we were good together, everything was fine. Then I was given a vibrator as a birthday present by a friend and started to masturbate.
I had just turned 26 and hadn’t really touched myself much. I found that every single time I masturbated I thought about women, and then I started thinking about women when I wasn’t masturbating. It was like focusing on my sexual pleasure had opened something up inside me.
I told my boyfriend that I was having doubts about my sexuality and he was incredibly supportive. He encouraged me to experiment, and I met a girl who became my girlfriend.
