Sexpertise - Secrets Of Total Satisfaction | Page 9

part of many sex
therapy programs for more than 20 years. Sensate focus exercises
(sometimes called nondemand pleasuring) are a way for couples in
sexual distress to break free of mutually reinforcing avoidance. But
even people who are not having sex troubles can use these exercises to
great effect.
Basically, nondemand pleasuring works like this: A couple get
naked together in a quiet, romantic place and take turns caressing each
other's body. (Usually, at least to begin, the couple is seated, with the
receiver sitting between the giver's legs.) There's just one rule: The

breasts and genitals are off-limits, and so is intercourse. There is no
pressure to achieve orgasm, no pressure to strive for anything or get
anywhere, no pressure to "return the favor."
There's no place to go except into the sensuality and stillness of
the moment.Sexual Etiquette
Miss Manners can tell you which fork to use at a garden party
or explain the elaborate protocol of weddings. But who's to explain the
etiquette of sex? Pardon the presumption, but here's a
rough sketch of sexual decency guidelines to ensure
that we treat our lovers with kindness, playfulness,
and pleasuring.
Remember the Golden Rule. "Do unto
others as you would have them do unto you works as
well between the sheets as it does anywhere else.
Take the time to make yourself desirable. In longtime
marriages, and even in longish relationships, lovers
tend to let themselves go to seed without really
sensing how unfair that is to their partner. You notice
when your partner comes to bed with legs covered
with stubble, or without having showered, or with unbrushed teeth.
Why shouldn’t your partner notice when you do the same? You may
feel desire, but if you don't take the trouble to make yourself desirable,
is it really fair to ask for sex?
Ask for what you want. It's not fair to present yourself to a
lover and say, in effect, "Here's my body, see if you can figure out
what to do with it." For one thing, if you don't know how to ask for
what you want, you're virtually guaranteed not to get it. For another,
by not helping your partner satisfy you, you’re setting her up for
failure, touching off the tumble toward blame, anger, and
recrimination. If you have the strength and self-respect to ask, it will
help your partner do the same.Make sure that was a "yes." You need to be sure that your
partner has given full consent to sex. Sexual etiquette means nothing if
it doesn't honor this basic sexual right. And consent is not something
that's required only of college kids on a date. It's a question of
propriety that applies to any sexual relationship, even a married one.
Take "no" for an answer. If your partner can't or won I t give
you what you want (oral sex, say), then it's unfair to bully or browbeat
them into giving it anyway. To pressure a lover by withholding love,
threatening them, or making them feel unworthy constitutes a kind of
sexual blackmail. Of course, a "no" may not always last forever. It's
acceptable to ask again later, if you do so in a kind, undemanding way.
Respect your partner's nakedness. "Where else are we as
vulnerable as we are during sex?" asks Jude Cotter, Ph.D.,
psychologist and sex therapist in private practice in Farmington Hills,
Michigan. "We are naked, physically and spiritually, and there's an
obligation to be sensitive to that vulnerability."
During extended foreplay, air taken up into the vagina will
sometimes escape in little farts the French call "love butterflies." A
woman should feel comfortable letting fly a few butterflies in front of
her lover, or saying or doing whatever else she wishes, without fear
that such intimacies will later be violated. To violate the privacies that
are shared during sex should be a crime. (It's not just spies who traffic
in pillow talk.)
Remember to say thank you. If you thank the bagboy at the
grocery store for helping you load the car, shouldn't you also always
thank your lover for more important favors? (There are plenty of ways
to say thank you, of course, and some of the nicest ones don’t require
words.)
Keep some things secret. What people say during orgasm,
more lyrically known as "birdsong at morning," is private and should
be kept secret. The Indians didn’t keep parrots or mynah birds in their
bedrooms because of how readily the birds picked up and repeated
such privacies-so don't you repeat them, either.
There are
plenty of
ways to say
thank you,
of course,
and some of
the nicest
ones don't
require
words.

THREE RULES OF LOVEMAKING
A multitude of sexual problems could be avoided if we all
followed three simple rules for intercourse, says Jude Cotter, Ph.D., a
psychologist and sex therapist in private practice in Farmington Hills,
Michigan.
1. Women first. The woman should be allowed to reach orgasm
before the man. She may get there through whatever arousal
patterns she needs-by stimulating her clitoris with a finger (his,
hers, or both), through oral sex, with a vibrator, or whatever. But
she should always be allowed to get there first. This is not mere
chivalry; it's physiology.
"When the guy is done, he's done-it's all over," Dr. Cotter explains.
After orgasm and ejaculation, men's bodies need a period