Because of the excessive baggage the word masturbation carries with it, it is possible to use the descriptive words genital pleasuring in the context of making love. This is a behavior that can be done to yourself (personal) and to your mate (mutual). We have already established that great sex is built on ejoying your own feelings uninhibitedly, which also arouses your mate. Sometimes in the excitement of making love or the nature of some lovemaking positions, it will be natural and arousing to increase the stimulation of your genitals by stroking youself. This is true of the husband as he grows older and needs more direct stimulation of the penis to gain and maintain an erection.
I think, especially as a wife is working to become more easily orgasmic, personal pleasuring can be a gift to the marriage in self-discovery. Mates can learn about their arousal patterns and what type of stroking feels best on which areas of their bodies. Husbands and wives can also demonstrate to their partner what feels most arousing. If we aren’t careful, we can become legalistic in never touching ourselves. I remember the femal client who started she liked the husband-on-top position of intercourse but that she also enjoyed continued stimulation of the clitoris during his thrusting. I suggested that the most effective way to do that during this position was for her to reach down and stimulate her own clitoris. She exclaimed, “I couldn’t do that! That could be touching myself.”
Lovemaking is a mutual celebration, whether we are stimulating our own body or our mate's body. We are sharing pleasure and arousal. Work beyond the fear of self-stimula- tion or being selfish and learn to play together.
I include three different aspects of genital pleasuring from which I have banned the word masturbation—and thus the idea . “Yuck, I’m touching myself”: (1)pleasuring each other's and our own genitals indiscriminately as a part of making love and enjoying arousal that can create pleasure and lead to a climax; (2) stimulating yourself during sexual interaction to maintain or increase arousal; and (3) arousing yourself apart from your mate as a learning experience to increase personal awareness of pleasuring and how to more easily be aroused, which will be incorporated later into lovemaking.
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