this is a week of lowered expectations (and fuck tumblr lifehack gifs)

Expectation of the Week: I will get through the day without sending a group of mobile developers an email stating my fucking cat could do a better job at integrating web services. It's not true; my cat would fuck it up deliberately, rather than by sheer incompetence, because he's a goddamn cat.

Also, would it kill them in some unspecified way to have error messages that have meaning? All of them have the same text because they're still working on creating pop-up error messages that say what's actually wrong, and do it three times in a row sometimes. I'd take a goddamn random-ass number-letter code.

Playlist of the Week: May Kicks Ass, created from the songs used on several Women of Marvel vids on youtube. Setting May kicking Ward's ass forever to empowering music does things for me.

Note: All the TMI. I'm posting this at one thirty in the morning after three days of work related wtfery and pretty much nothing is a bad idea at this point.



...who saw that coming for a cut line? It's got a certain rhythm, don't you think?

Reading on tumblr a lifehacks reblog that mentions yoga, sage oil, farting and diva cups as ways to deal with cramps, the lack of 'get yourself off' surprised me. And the thing is, I rarely see that one anywhere, and this is in fandom and tumblr, where I've had long, intense discussions on how to deliver pizza to an alpha knotting an omega during heat (really).

Years ago--and I'm talking x > decade--Te told me in chat during a particularly nasty case of uterus hate to try getting myself off and I sat there, almost shocked (context: I was writing at the time Lex rimming Clark and googling prostate massaging, as one does) because--I don't actually know why I was shocked at the idea of getting myself off to get rid of cramps.

(Spoiler: years later, I will have a theory on this one.)

It was months before I actually tried it, it was awkward and weird the way that masturbation hadn't been for me since I got the basics down, and the thing is, it worked--it wasn't particularly magical (and of a very specialized aesthetic value indeed, one that is most definitely not mine), but it did work--but I restricted myself to the worst cramp times (aka desperation) for several years until one day, curled fetal-like and bitter in bed and debating if this was bad enough to justify getting myself off for pain relief--

--it occurred to me I had no clue what that even meant: like, it was tainting my sacred getting-off-to-mcstories-m/m-body-modification to use my skillsets for pain relief, making forced magical male feminization with optional remote controlled catheter orgasms less special and meaningful?

(Just reading that sentence makes me wonder about my life and my choices. Like, I make pretty good ones sometimes. Go me.)

There a line in a novel I read in my teens about a woman: she reduced sex to something as casual as taking a trip to the refrigerator for a snack.

That stuck in my head for years and I didn't even question it or the explicit disapproval of such shenanigans because reasons; when I started having sex, when I stopped, when I learned to masturbate, when I got good at it, when I bought my first vibrator (and second and third, because once you go Hitachi you never go back), when I wrote fic with a porn per capita to plot of 1000 to 1, when I leveled up from mcstories and nifty straight to asstr, when I stopped entering vaguely generic keywords and hoping to hit something kinky by accident, when I started entering the keywords I stopped pretending I didn't want, when I stopped pretending I wasn't curious if I'd like to read about that, when I stopped pretending that I wasn't ashamed of liking it, and when I realized I wasn't ashamed of a goddamn thing.

Except my orgasms as a late night snack: I didn't roll like that.

And then--looking at my keyword search of asstr including one thing I had to look up to spell--I wondered why exactly masturbation for snack value was a line I couldn't quite cross and for that matter, what the fuck does that mean and why was I afraid that was me?

Operation: Masturbation Like Doritos was a-go.

For indeed, I wanted to find out what it was like to get off like it was Pringles and I couldn't have just one, tortilla chips and salsa at two in the morning, peanut butter straight from the jar with a steak knife and a lively lack of self-preservation due to hunger because the bread was like, two entire fucking feet away and that was bullshit, the jar's right here. Let's see what better living through orgasms can do for life's problems; would it get less special, more boring, would I be unable to get off at all eventually because I was ruining my four-course orgasm dinner with empty orgasm snacks?

(Reference: this is the moment I realized what a terrible metaphor I'm using here.)

Here are (a very few of the) things the internet seems not to know about that the Dorito Method taught me (your mileage will vary):
1.) Sleepy? Better than coffee.
2.) Cramps? Better than ibuprofen.
3.) Bored? Excellent time to expand your solo skillsets and kill some time.
4.) Not in the mood? That's what I call a challenge to my own ingenuity.
5.) Need to relax? It works.
6.) De-stress? It works here, too.
7.) Unfocused and distracted? Yep.
8.) It's a pretty decent analgesic for a toothache, too.

...and when one achieves getting off because you're four hundred miles away from your dentist and your tooth hurts or because you've got two hours to kill and just can't be fucked to do anything that requires you get anything not within reach of your arm, you have achieved Dorito level status. I'm so proud.

The only difference I can discover between "masturbation not Doritos" and "masturbation like all the Doritos and peanut butter at three AM with a steak knife" is that I got much, much better at it, quality improved substantially, and I learned that sometimes, I want an epic orgasm filled with feelings and sometimes, I just want to manipulate my own biology when my body is fucking with me and I don't have time for this because I got shit to do.

It's not something that occurred to me before, how the female orgasm is approached, and I get the reason it's like this, but honestly, it might help if we stopped approaching it as a transcendental experience you should be having or you're not doing it right, and more like a sneeze and you then can level the fuck up. Books, movies, and personal tmi posts talk about long periods of failure before the magic switch gets hit: the bursts of pleasure and the awesome and how they felt when they got it right, it was magic and breathless and all the romance novels in the world. All you need is a switch, a binary zero of failure or one that screams success.

They don't say that it could be some of us were getting it right early on, and there was another reason it took time to go from 'eh' to 'holy shit'. This may be biology, but my body had to learn to use a toilet not a diaper, how to form words with my mouth and tongue, my hand to hold a pencil, how to move to form a single letter and build them into painstaking words. My kindergarten efforts with the written word weren't calligraphy quality; that doesn't mean I wasn't doing it right and no one thought I was doing it wrong or telling me about the copperplate switch that would make a six year old write like a monk with too much time on his hands and a lot of ink. My hand was new at this shit and needed to learn.

Practice helped. A lot of it.

It took me years to get past 'nice' in my orgasm related activities not because I was doing it wrong, but because much like my handwriting, my body was new to this shit and needed to learn. And it still is: I'm teaching it more every day (sometimes literally).

All those Doritos helped.

This has been a life lesson (mine, in case you're curious) in which I really should have rethought my metaphor but by the time I realized that I was too committed to care. I liked the tree-serf post a lot better.


In closing: yeah, I shouldn't have stopped when I was writing this post (around playlists, to be specific) and checked my dash. That never ends well, though to be fair, it's not like anyone sane saw this coming.

Comments

[niqaeli]

If getting off worked for me like this, I would be doing it so fucking much more. Mostly, it doesn't. I mean, it's nice occasionally but it also usually pisses my hip off to a greater extent than it produces pain-killing endorphins. It barely even touches my menstrual cramps.

It also doesn't knock me out, like, at ALL. Which i hear it does for a lot of people. I AM BITTER.

I mean, maybe I'm just fucking doing something wrong, but. It's not like I don't get any happy fun feelings. They just don't come with any of the fringe benefits.

I'm, like, grey-A and probably would be even if orgasm had half the lovely effects I hear tell other people get -- but I'd be grey-A AND GETTING OFF/HAVING SEX EVERY GODDAMN DAY. I find the people who act like this is attitude terrible and sex should be always be transcendent or meaningful or what the fuck ever... okay, whelp, y'all ain't ever had fucking bad insomnia, have you. You go be over there and have your nice adorable opinions. I'll be over here, bitter that shit doesn't work for me.

Because seriously when my insomnia is bad enough, I'd deep-throat a fucking hedgehog if it was guaranteed to work.

[seperis]

For me, it wakes me up like whoa, and if I were an evolutionary psychologist, this would be proof that the true nature of humanity is polyandry because he's asleep and dude, I'm ready to go again, husband two, you're up.

I mean, maybe I'm just fucking doing something wrong, but. It's not like I don't get any happy fun feelings. They just don't come with any of the fringe benefits.

I don't speak as an expert, but as someone for whom this was (totally worth it) a lot of effort to learn so for me, I narrowed it down to the (rather obvious) realization I didn't not feel it, but I simply didn't recognize it.

It took me three years before it was more than pleasant way to pass some time while reading erotic fanfic and three times that long to really understand what I was missing, that being "this is a learned skill for me."

TMI--in my case, approaching it like observing my orgasms in the wild helped to identify conflicting impulses, where they came from, and narrow down the useful ones that would sometimes spark for a moment--those were what I wanted. That actually was difficult, and it doesn't help that I was super self-conscious about it and feeling like an orgasm failure (that probably was the main reason it took me so goddamn long).

The biological contractions are hardwired, but the interpretation of the release of tension isn't or how to build it to get more than 'eh'; basically, for me, I had to learn to recognize it and make the connection to what I was doing, which isn't easy when I can't even see what I'm doing and I'm working from 'there...no there...wait, what's that, fuck, where'd it go?"

I think of it as a spring that over time I learned to wind tighter and tighter before the contractions started; I was competing with my body and I do like to win.

Nice benefit: now, I can kind of...decide exactly how much that spring needs winding for my purposes and measure intensity (when I have cramps, not much: I'm in this for the contractions and the quick endorphin hit). Experimental Note: when practicing this, don't confirm your results four times, holy shit I was sore.

I find the people who act like this is attitude terrible and sex should be always be transcendent or meaningful or what the fuck ever... okay, whelp, y'all ain't ever had fucking bad insomnia, have you.

Jesus, when you can finally fall asleep after a bad insomnia streak, it's pretty much analogous to an orgasm.

[monanotlisa]

Whatever gets the job done, girl. <3

[seperis]

I have a work ethic!

[cathexys]

The first two are definitely on my Doritos list. I discovered that a long time ago, because my menstrual cramps used to be brutal and I get hornier during my period. Voila! A new temporary solution was born. As for sleep...definitely.

Love this post!!! :)

[seperis]

because my menstrual cramps used to be brutal and I get hornier during my period

Ha! Mine is three days before my period where combination PMS plus horniness made a terribly funny feedback cycle. It's also when--I don't want to say have to, but especially when I hit my mid-thirties, it's recommended I take care of business thoroughly on demand while at home or there are consequences.

Consequence: I abruptly went zero to plateau at work reading some soft core romantic Supernatural fic that wasn't even explicit. And lets just say that's several extremely uncomfortable hours of wtf distraction with nothing--and I do mean nothing--to be done but wait.

Happy ending: me and Hitachi broke a record at thirty seconds.

[pocketmouse]

I didn't notice it wasn't listed on that tumblr post, because I was too busy skipping past how dumb all of it was. Plus I was on a bus full of strangers. But yeah, I'm surprised it wasn't listed, because I've been getting off to get rid of cramps for years. In part because 90% of the time that's the only time an orgasm will actually do anything for me -- hormones, I think. The rest of the time I would really just rather have the Doritos.

[seperis]

Hormones and oxy in your bloodstream, maybe? When I hit a certain pain threshold I get a very hard euphoric hit from vicadin (like, out of proportion to the dosage) and now that you mention it, if I'm not utterly miserable and my body does minimal cooperation, I do get a mini hit of that when the cramps are really bad and then they stop.

Interesting.

[out_there]

I find this kind of hilarious and weirdly reassuring. I mean, for all that fandom in general talks about kinks and sex and ridiculous details, the masturbation thing is still highly TMI and not something that gets brought up.

During cramps time, yes, it does help. Not always and depends on the mood, but it's something I frequently do.

And yet the masturbation as a snack thing totally applies to me. Well, maybe not a snack at any time of day. Ice-cream, really. Like having a late night sweet treat before bed. Not every night but definitely more nights than not, and nothing big and fancy, just me and a hand and my imagination.

It's probably one of the reasons I'm generally happy enough being single. If I wasn't getting myself off like, 4-5 times a week, if it wasn't something that basically required 10-20 minutes of alone time and a qiet room, I might have more impetus to make an effort to meet people and date.

And yet, nobody talks about it. Or if they do, it's a big occasion or a rare treat or something... odd. I mean, if there are jokes about how easily guys do it, if I'm in the middle of a community that has no trouble acknolwedging sexual desire and the value of writing something just to turn ourselves and each other on, why is it still such a weird non-discussed thing?

if we stopped approaching it as a transcendental experience you should be having or you're not doing it right, and more like a sneeze and you then can level the fuck up.

Hilariously, I vaguely remember Mum talking to me about sex in those terms. That an orgasm was like an all-over tingle, a lot like a sneeze. (Wow, Mum. Healthy sex attitudes for the win. Even if at 13 y.o. I was too embarassed to appreciate it at the time.)

[seperis]

I find this kind of hilarious and weirdly reassuring. I mean, for all that fandom in general talks about kinks and sex and ridiculous details, the masturbation thing is still highly TMI and not something that gets brought up.

SO MUCH THIS. All of what you said, actually.

Hilariously, I vaguely remember Mum talking to me about sex in those terms. That an orgasm was like an all-over tingle, a lot like a sneeze.

See, someone on FFA said that--literaly the sneeze comparison--and suddenly everything made sense.

Something else I learned--getting there is three quarters of the point and sometimes the best part. That took a lot of the stress off of the so-called main event when I caught on.

It's the journey, not the destination: truer words never spoken.

[out_there]

It's the journey, not the destination: truer words never spoken.

That's a very good point. If you focus on it as less of a win/lose pass/fail type equation and actually enjoy it -- without making it the be-all and end-all -- it makes everything a lot easier and a lot more fun.

[(Anonymous)]

IAWTP. Everyone should read this post! --Ces

[seperis]

Are you the real Ces or fake Ces who doesn't login because she wants to pretend she doesn't know me?

My feels, Ces. They are hurt.

[devon]

Thanks - this post and your list made me laugh.

I learned to masturbate really well early on (before I had sex with anyone else). I've found that it helps me in all the things you listed *except* the cramps. For me, it makes cramps worse. I think my uterus gets too excited about the orgasm and tries to join in by dancing around, and that's just not good for easing cramps.

[seperis]

For me, it makes cramps worse. I think my uterus gets too excited about the orgasm and tries to join in by dancing around, and that's just not good for easing cramps.

Okay, that made me start laughing, because now dancing uterus making gimme hands for orgasms.

*CACKLING SO HARD STOMACH HURTS*

[laurajv]

Heh.

Back when I actually had a decent amount of child-free time (I have 2 little kids now, I got stuff to do), I had a very well-developed routine. Like. Basically if I wanted an orgasm I was like "ok let's just plug in the proper devices and wait 5 minutes". I didn't even have to interact with anything; like you say, it was just manipulating my biology to make it do the thing and then I could go on with my life.

Then I broke the vibe I used for that and none of the replacements have ever worked the same way, dammit!

For me, I've never found unpartnered orgasms particularly interesting, but I did find them useful for stress relief, so it was nice to have a very simple routine for them. I miss it.

[seperis]

Then I broke the vibe I used for that and none of the replacements have ever worked the same way, dammit!

...I am trying to imagine losing my hitachi forever and just cannot deal with it. I"m so sorry.

[laurajv]

It was still available at Blowfish's site, so I ordered a replacement, and it was OUT OF STOCK (which wasn't labeled) and after SIX MONTHS I canceled the order (it was still listed as in stock on their site but they were like nah we don't have it) and I, seriously, cannot find it anywhere else.

Maybe I'll get a hitachi for the fall when I'll be in grad school and definitely in need of more stress relief.

[laurajv]

Oh! One thing I didn't mention but meant to: for me, at least, frequent unpartnered orgasms make sex with a partner better, because my body's like "oh yeah I know how to turn all the machinery on". Convenient! Another reason to resent loss of that particular vibe omg.

[metaphortunate]

My vibrator broke once and Mr. E FIXED IT. He is such a keeper. I would have been heartbroken if it had gone for good!

[seperis]

My vibrator broke once and Mr. E FIXED IT. He is such a keeper. I would have been heartbroken if it had gone for good!

He does the work of gods and men. May he be honored through all of time.

I actually bought my backup, still boxed up in my closet, just in case it breaks on a Friday and Amazon two day shipping means potentially five entire days without one or worse, out of stock.

[metaphortunate]

There was a while there in my early twenties when I got my female friends vibrators for their birthdays. It was borderline inappropriate, I knew. I didn't care. An older friend had taken me to get mine in my first year of college, and I never would have gone without her (okay....I would. But it would have been many more sad, vibrator-less years.) And I needed to pay it forward.

I would include batteries in the box because I knew that they would not go out and buy batteries for the thing.

I remember one friend who got it and was all, "Uh, thanks...but I have a boyfriend, y'know, I don't need anything like this." "That's fine," I said.
"Presents should be frivolouse things you don't need. It's just for you to have. You don't have to use it!" A couple years later we were talking and she mentioned that, like you, she had bought a backup just in case.

FLAWLESS VICTORY \o/

[rosefox]

Here via a friend's locked Twitter account--would you mind if I tweeted a link to this? It's stellar.

[seperis]

I'm honored. Of course, and thank you.

[rosefox]

Thank YOU. I started taking a very similar approach a few years ago and it was tremendously rewarding. Really glad to see it being talked about and advocated.

[julian]

Here from... I don't remember. Rose, probably.

Anyway, I have had more than one person tell me solemnly that if you masturbate (with a vibrator) too much, you will lose sensitivity. (This is what is technically called "complete bullshit.")

This is part and parcel of the entire thing you're talking about here, where orgasm has to be this transcendental burst of hooha, reserved only for Very Special Occasions, Most Preferably With A Partner. America's got a weird relationship with sexuality, but we all know that.

[seperis]

Anyway, I have had more than one person tell me solemnly that if you masturbate (with a vibrator) too much, you will lose sensitivity. (This is what is technically called "complete bullshit.")

I heard that, too, and actually early on kind of worried about that (I think the idea of calluses forming, which in retrospect is hilarious). Doritos killed that myth dead and logic returned; if use decreases sensitivity, human skin would be really useless after say, age five, and that's not even adding in the thing how that's not how bodies work like, at all. (And also makes zero sense when compare/contrast with the penis; if this was a general use problem with sexual organs, you'd think you'd hear a lot more about guys getting special surgery for numb penis heads.)

This is part and parcel of the entire thing you're talking about here, where orgasm has to be this transcendental burst of hooha, reserved only for Very Special Occasions, Most Preferably With A Partner. America's got a weird relationship with sexuality, but we all know that.

Very much, and in this case, not even specific to women (though more focused on women, yes); it's just done in different ways. And with women, it's easier to believe because historically, body knowledge wasn't something that was encouraged for women, and two, we have a lot less in the way of visual help in getting the work done.

(Which--if I were making baseless speculation without evidence and I am, and because it's kind of hilarious--is one reason that partnered sex with penis was considered the best if not the only way to get off; your partner didn't need a mirror and some contortions to work out what was down there, just you to give feedback, and generally, penises would eventually be part of the proceedings. Yes, no evidence for that but it's fun to consider the possibilities, especially before the invention of the proto-mirror.)

[mishaday]

So, I never had anyone tell me I'd lose sensitivity with a vibrator. But I did notice that after I'd been using one for months, I was having a hard time getting myself off without one. I wasn't having any of that bullshit: I didn't want to wait until I had the vibe in hand to orgasm, so I trained myself off the vibrator and now really only use it every once in a while.

[seperis]

Yeah it's not a sensitivity thing but more a 'get used to' thing. There was a hilarious article in Dan Savage about a guy who used this amazing towel to get off and now couldn't get off nailing his girlfriend and was terrified this meant something and Dan is like "No, just cut yourself off the towel for a while, you're just spoiled and in a rut" which yeah, of course. That's what humanity calls 'habit'.

[mishaday]

Ha, pretty much all of your list save #8, for me: though I have gritted my teeth through a migraine just to get to the other side of a migraine because it'd relax me enough to get to sleep instead of staying up and adding insomnia to the headache.

Not so much in my current job, but in my last one I was pretty frequently bored, and I'd read fic up to the point I needed manual stimulation to orgasm, then excuse myself to the bathroom for a few minutes. I mentioned this to friends, and they attempted to tease me about it, (to the point where everything is now a masturbation joke, when it's not a poop joke - the discussion was initially about bathroom stalls) but the boys in the group quieted down quite a bit when I pointed out that at our ages, their libidos were drooping, and mine was still ramping up.

On reflection, that last bit may be a more about how we women are finally getting used to our bodies and how they orgasm, rather than actual desire - as a teen and early twenties, I just didn't know how to efficiently get off.

And I'm hysterically amused by the Dorito analogy because my current celeb crush is Chris Evans, human dorito.

[seperis]

Ha, pretty much all of your list save #8, for me: though I have gritted my teeth through a migraine just to get to the other side of a migraine because it'd relax me enough to get to sleep instead of staying up and adding insomnia to the headache.

*winces* Ouch.

Not so much in my current job, but in my last one I was pretty frequently bored, and I'd read fic up to the point I needed manual stimulation to orgasm, then excuse myself to the bathroom for a few minutes.

On one very high-libido day (three days before my period is like 'holy shit body that's just a breeze') I did end up having to because I was so distracted and I knew it would be three minutes tops and I was desperate. That's never worked since, so there have been some seriously uncomfortable days.

I mentioned this to friends, and they attempted to tease me about it, (to the point where everything is now a masturbation joke, when it's not a poop joke - the discussion was initially about bathroom stalls) but the boys in the group quieted down quite a bit when I pointed out that at our ages, their libidos were drooping, and mine was still ramping up.

*BITES LIP* Yes, this. Science was right about that so much.

Argh, cut off.

On reflection, that last bit may be a more about how we women are finally getting used to our bodies and how they orgasm, rather than actual desire - as a teen and early twenties, I just didn't know how to efficiently get off.

Now that's an interesting idea. It didn't occur to me until now this might be a feature, not a bug as far as the sheer breadth of human diversity goes; some women's bodies simply may--by design--be on a different timetable of development. Like, maybe all the wiring just isn't up to code for some women a little longer (to put it in a very weird way) by design and not as an abnormality.

And I'm hysterically amused by the Dorito analogy because my current celeb crush is Chris Evans, human dorito.

*Dies laughing*

[majoline]

I'm late coming into this post again (thanks AT&T for making *both* DW and LJ basically impossible to connect to most days) but yeah, I got masturbation down to a science, basically, well before I labelled what I was doing masturbation.

Which took a surprisingly long time? but I just honestly never thought about it.

I am lucky enough that all of your list is true for me! And I have one more, 9) It'll declog my sinuses. True I don't usually resort to masturbation to declog me unless I'm already in bed and don't want to get up *or* it's the last resort because everything else has failed, but yeah. It works pretty well.

The only thing it doesn't help is cluster headaches, but nothing helps with those, so yeah.